Departure morning was a study in contrasts.
Lyanna arrived at the city gates at dawn, fully armored, checking and double-checking supplies with military precision. She looked like the cover of 'Knight Monthly.'
Celeste floated in ten minutes late, hovering six inches off the ground on a disk of mana, reading a thick book while a magical unseen servant carried her pristine luggage.
Ravi walked up eating an apple, the terrifying Widowmaker glaive slung over one shoulder and a backpack the size of a refrigerator on the other.
"You're carrying the tent?" Lyanna frowned at the massive pack. "And the cooking supplies? And... is that an anvil?"
"Portable repair kit," Ravi corrected, shifting the weight. It weighed about four hundred pounds. To him, it felt like he was wearing a windbreaker. "Thought it might be useful given my track record with equipment."
"Physiologically inadvisable," Celeste noted without looking up from her book. "Spinal compression from that load should reduce your height by two inches over a three-day march. Unless your vertebrae are reinforced with carbon nanotubes."
"They drink a lot of milk where I'm from," Ravi said.
"Milk," Celeste scoffed. She floated closer, slapping another one of her sticky crystal sensors onto Ravi's neck. "The calcium density required would be… absurd. Keep the monitor on. I want to see your vitals when you collapse."
"You're full of sunshine, aren't you?" Ravi muttered.
"I am full of facts. Facts don't care about your feelings, weakling."
Lyanna sighed, rubbing her temples. "This is going to be a long trip. Alright, listen up. We're heading to the edge of the Gloomwood. It's three days travel. We stick to the King's Road until the pass, then we hike."
She looked at Ravi seriously. "Grimshaw set us up. Cultists in the Gloomwood? That's not a random patrol. If things get bad, you run. Celeste and I will cover the retreat. Understood?"
"Loud and clear," Ravi lied.
"I don't do retreats," Celeste added haughtily. "I do tactical repositioning."
They set off.
The journey was... educational.
Ravi learned a lot about the world's power system, mostly because Celeste wouldn't shut up about how much he didn't fit into it.
"It's quite simple," Celeste lectured on day two, floating beside him while he walked. "Mana cores accumulate ambient energy. Warriors channel it into their muscles—Augmentation. Mages channel it outward—Projection. You possess a core, theoretically, because you are alive. But it is inert. dormant. F-Rank. And yet..."
She stared at his legs as he trudged up a steep hill without breaking a sweat.
"...your kinetic output suggests high-level Augmentation without the mana expenditure. It defies thermodynamic law."
"Maybe I run on determination," Ravi suggested.
"Determination isn't a fuel source!" Celeste snapped, nearly dropping her book. "Stop answering with platitudes! I will find the source of your power, Ravi. And when I do, I will write the most scathing paper the Academy has ever seen."
"Looking forward to the rough draft."
Lyanna, walking point, glanced back. A small smile played on her lips. "Don't antagonize the walking artillery, Ravi."
"He's impossible," Celeste grumbled, floating ahead.
Ravi sped up slightly to walk beside Lyanna. "So, this Gloomwood. How bad is it?"
Lyanna's expression darkened. "Bad. The trees block out the sun. The mana density is warped. Shadows move on their own. And if there are cultists... they'll be using Void magic."
"Grimshaw mentioned that. What does it do?"
"It erases," Lyanna said quietly. "Elemental magic burns or freezes. Void magic... removes. If it hits you, there's nothing to heal. The flesh is just gone."
Ravi nodded. Removes matter. That sounded problematic. Even dense bones couldn't stop existence deletion. He'd have to actually dodge.
"Don't worry," Lyanna said, mistaking his silence for fear. Her hand brushed his arm—a brief, grounding touch. "I won't let them get close enough to cast on you. That's my job."
The protectiveness was still there. But it was different now. It felt less like she was guarding a child and more like she was guarding a treasure.
By the afternoon of the third day, the vibrant green fields of Aethelgard gave way to gray, dying scrubland. Ahead, a wall of trees rose up like a black tsunami. The trunks were twisted, black bark oozing a tar-like sap. The canopy was so thick it swallowed the light.
The Gloomwood.
"No floating," Lyanna ordered. "We need to be quiet."
Celeste sighed theatrically and lowered herself to the ground. "Fine. But if I get mud on these robes, the guild is paying for the cleaning."
They entered the treeline. The temperature dropped instantly. The air smelled of rot and old copper.
"Movement," Ravi said softly.
Lyanna froze. "Where?"
"Left flank. Three hundred yards. Something heavy."
He couldn't sense mana, but he could hear the snap of a twig a mile away. His ears were just better.
Lyanna didn't question him. She drew her greatsword. "Formation. Celeste, center. Ravi, watch the rear. I'll take point."
They moved deeper, weapons drawn. The silence of the forest was oppressive.
Then, the shadows detached themselves from the trees.
They looked like wolves, but wrong. Made of shifting, smoky darkness, with burning white eyes and teeth that seemed too solid for their wispy bodies. Void Stalkers.
"Ambush!" Lyanna shouted.
She lunged, her blade glowing with a soft blue light—mana reinforcement. She cleaved through the first stalker. It didn't bleed; it dissipated with a hiss like steam.
"Void constructs," Celeste analyzed instantly, raising her staff. "Primitive but numerous. Ignis Burst!"
A wave of fire erupted from her staff, incinerating two more wolves.
"Don't let them flank!" Celeste yelled.
Ravi turned. Three of the shadowy beasts were circling behind them, silent as smoke. They lunged for Celeste's exposed back.
She was casting, focused forward. She didn't see them.
Ravi didn't shout. He moved.
He didn't use a technique. He didn't use a skill. He just stepped in.
The Widowmaker was a blur. He spun the heavy polearm like a baton. The butt of the weapon caught the first wolf in mid-air.
CRACK.
The sound was startlingly loud in the damp forest. The creature didn't just dissipate; it exploded. Ravi's strike hit it so hard the physical force disrupted the magic holding it together instantly.
The second wolf snapped its jaws at his leg. He ignored it, feeling the teeth scrape uselessly against his pants (he'd reinforced them with leather patches, thankfully). He brought the black blade down.
It sliced through the wolf and six inches into the stone-hard root beneath it.
The third wolf hesitated. Animals, even magical ones, have instincts. It looked at Ravi. It looked at the bisected corpse of its packmate.
It decided it had pressing business elsewhere and vanished into the gloom.
"Clear!" Lyanna called out, breathing hard. She wiped sweat from her brow and looked back. "Celeste, are you okay?"
"I... yes," the elf stammered. She was staring at Ravi. Or rather, at the crater the butt of his glaive had left in the dirt.
"That wolf," Celeste pointed a trembling finger. "You hit it with the blunt end. And it vaporized."
"Soft targets," Ravi shrugged, pulling his blade out of the root with a casual yank. "Structurally unstable."
"It's a magical construct! It doesn't have structure!" Celeste practically shrieked. "You disrupted the mana lattice with brute force! Do you have any idea how much force that takes? You essentially punched magic in the face until it stopped working!"
"It worked, didn't it?" Lyanna interrupted, stepping between them. She gave Ravi a nod of approval. A warrior's nod. "Good reflexes."
"Let's keep moving," Ravi suggested, noting that the forest seemed to be holding its breath. "Grimshaw's cultists are likely close. And I don't think these wolves were wild."
They pushed on until twilight made navigation impossible. They found a defensible clearing near a rocky outcrop to set up camp.
Ravi handled the heavy lifting, setting up the large canvas tent and digging a fire pit in minutes. He broke three tent pegs by pushing them into the rocky ground with his thumb, but luckily no one was watching.
Night fell heavy and suffocating.
They sat around a small, smokeless fire Celeste had conjured. The tension of the battle had faded, replaced by the awkward reality of three people sharing a small space.
"You slept in a cave like this?" Celeste asked, watching Ravi effortlessly snap a thick log in half to feed the fire.
"A really damp one," Ravi nodded. "With worse company."
"Grimshaw sent us to die," Lyanna said suddenly, staring into the flames. "Three wolves? That was a scouting party. This isn't an investigation. It's an extermination. And we're the bait."
"We survived," Ravi said softly.
"Because you're..." Lyanna stopped. She glanced at Celeste. "Because we got lucky."
Celeste snorted. " Luck is a statistical probability. This is... something else." She stood up, brushing off her robes. "I'm taking first watch. I need to recalibrate my sensors anyway. Your combat data is nonsensical."
She walked to the edge of the clearing, her staff glowing faintly.
That left Ravi and Lyanna.
She scooted closer on the log. Her armor was unbuckled, revealing the linen tunic underneath. She looked tired.
"You really punched magic in the face?" she whispered, a smirk tugging at her lips.
"Ideally, I wanted to stab it," Ravi whispered back. "But I got the grip wrong."
She laughed, a soft sound that warmed the chill air. She leaned her head on his shoulder. Just for a second.
"Grimshaw doesn't know what he unleashed," she murmured, closing her eyes. "But I'm starting to think I do."
Ravi sat still, letting her rest. His body was hard as stone, unyielding, but he tried to stay as soft as he could.
In the distance, deep in the Gloomwood, a chant began. Low, rhythmic, and utterly wrong.
The peace lasted exactly ten seconds.
"Problem," Celeste hissed from the perimeter. "Big problem."
Ravi sighed. "Can't we have one quiet night?"
"Apparently not," Lyanna said, sitting up and reaching for her sword. Her eyes were hard again. The Princess was back. "Welcome to the job, Ravi."
Ravi stood, gripping the Widowmaker. The darkness between the trees was moving again. And this time, it wasn't wolves.
It was people. Lots of them.
And they were glowing with the sickly violet light of the Void.