Life or death

I had run for almost three hours, but I couldn't find anything else but forest, no roads, no lakes or rivers just trees, bushes and rocks. There were still about five people behind me, and I didn't know their amount of cores so I didn't want to fight them. Anything else however seemed impossible.

I again charged my feet with lightning and tried to run as far as I could, after my speed was slowing down, I stopped and let Olivia down. She seemed scared was a little bit anxious. he

-Don't try to run far away, go hide somewhere close enough and don't let anyone know where you are.

She nodded and tried to convince me that she was going to be fine, but her face didn't say the same. She was sweating a little and her lips were trembling and even she was shaking. I couldn't do anything about that and only watches as she ran away.

I ran to the opposite direction to meet the bandits. Soon five people appeared and stopped infront of me. Even if they were that close, I could still not tell how strong they really were. Only with inspection magic could you see how many rings a person has. Many strong magicians however can sometimes sense how strong your magic is and make a guess. Even that doesn't work 100% because if your rings are like mine that you have a smaller one, it may show like I'm almost getting my fourth ring.

I didn't even enough experience to guess their strength, I had only fought people in the 1 vs 1 tournament and didn't even then know the amount of rings that they had, but mostly 1 or 2 I would think.

I took out my sword and started to gather mana.

-4, go look for the girl.

A bandit from the front tried to jump over me, but I couldn't concentrate to the fight fully, if Olivia's life was in danger. I shot a lightning upwards and perfectly hit the bandit, one was already down. After the guy dropped on ground, I appeared next to him and put my sword though his neck.

-Sorry, but I can't fail my first mission.

I took my first parts stance and had enough mana to start fighting. The other four didn't panic but I could sense some stress from them. They all got ready to fight, we were now all staring at each other waiting for the other one to make a move.

The stress was too much for one guy and he started running towards me. I of course had to defend myself, so I slashed my sword across his chest with great speed killing him instantly. The guy didn't even get a chance to defend against it, he was too slow. I wonder how he kept up with me?

Now it was only a 1 vs 3 situation. Maybe I overestimated them because they were able to keep up with my speed while chasing me. However, I was wrong, I didn't underestimate them. Because instantly after killing the second guy, third one was behind me and tried to stab me from behind. I jumped to other direction and tried to get relax but there was another guy already waiting for me. I had also dodge him, but it was difficult, after all the last guy was shooting fire ball at me.

I slashed the closest one with my sword, dodged a sword and responded with a kick. It got blocked and I was thrown against a tree, it did however give me time to recover and gather more mana. I think that it's now great time to test out my sword styles 2nd part.

OLIVIA POV:

I was hiding under a trunk, I could see the fight because of my magical eyes but they couldn't see me. I thought that Ayden would win easily after killing the two guys but then the flow of the battle changed. The rest of the bandits worked well together, and Ayden could only dodge, he was then thrown against a tree.

It didn't seem to be going to well, should I help? Should I run? I almost stood up but then something changed, I again tried to look what was going on with the fight, but I was shocked. Ayden was gripping the sword in a weird way, the sword was like last time but now he had another sword, but it was made out of lightning. It was facing the opposite version of the black sword and was sparkling.

Was he a both handed sword user? After the sword had appeared Ayden opened his eyes and a huge amount of killing intent escaped from him. All the enemies took a step backwards and I too fell down on my butt.

I broke some branches by falling and the bandits heard it, one was coming towards me, but Ayden ran faster and killed him by slashing from his hip and neck.

Ayden was not standing on top of a corpse between me and two bandits. The two didn't want to fight Ayden now. He was a lot better with two swords or he wouldn't have saved it as a trump card. When the two were backing away and preparing to run away, Ayden charged towards them and stabbing the magician. Third one tried to run but Ayden had thrown his sword and it hit the bandit's head. We were safe now, I guess.

AYDEN POV:

After killing the last bandit pursuing us, I disbanded my lightning sword. I walked to where Olivia was, I could see her now that she was standing up and waiting for me.

-Are you alright.

She seemed concerned about me.

-Don't worry, everything is alright. Now let's try to get out of here.

She nodded in response and we started to walk forward. We didn't see anything for full 4 hours but then we finally noticed something again. A field, it was fully grown and looked like wheat. We ran to the field and looked for any signs of where we might be. And there was one, a tall tower.

-Look, it's the capital!

Olivia yelled and pointed at the tower.

-If we go there, do you know where you need to go?

-Yes

-alright.

I again picked Olivia up like before, she didn't resist but blushed a little and looked in another direction. I charged my feet and ran towards the tower.

The run there only took 10 minutes, and we were in front of big gates, it had a big line of carriages trying to get outside or leaving and guards guarding them all. I let Olivia down and we walked to the guards.

-Hey, kids you need to wait in line

One guard was yelling at us. Then Olivia showed her noble badge and the guard gulped.

-What about you brat.

I too showed my identification, that was my adventurer's badge. The guard got to his knees apologizing and let us inside. When we finally could see the city, Olivia grabbed my hand and we walked for a long time. Until we arrived a big mansion and she knocked on its door.

-Excuse me, we are now a little bit busy, so could you wait a littl...

The butler that opened the door was shocked when he saw who was standing there and quickly let us inside. I should prepare a good explanation for the count.