"Damn it!"
A cursing swear sounded as a man fell from the tree. The man stood up and and dusted his clothes, checked his items and began walking. As the man walked, wind blew as his black, tattered cloak was fluttered and swayed to the motion of the wind. The swaying of the cloak revealed the clothes of the man. A dark green long sleeved shirt which looks old and tattered and a black, worn out pants. On his foot was a tattered, worn out boots and on his back was a rucksack containing what was left of the man's belongings.
'I may have been in a different world' The man thought as he continued walking to where the wind will take him.
A few days ago, he is just your ordinary combat mage, hailing from the Sleitrip Empire. A combat mage are mages who joined the military and is treated better than the common soldier. His team explored an abandoned ruins found at the border of their country and found riches like gold and jewelries. Of course for a mage, knowledge is wealth and power. While his fellow soldiers are looting the place, he on the other hand is searching for magical things and items inside the ruins.
A couple of old books, some tattered and some in good condition awaited him as a couple of magical items greeted him upon which he examined on his heart's content. He knew his limits, though. He himself is just your ordinary mage whose with limited talent. His affinity with the elements is slightly higher than normal which enabled him to stand out a little. But everything has its limits.
Mages of old once used techniques which brought modern mages to shame. They don't need much talent nor affinity to an element as their secret arts can raise them. They reached heights unreachable by mages of the modern world and they conquered star after star, planets after planets, until they fought amongst themselves due to reasons unknown.
The mages of old became the mages of lore, as traces of their once powerful selves littered the world. Every now and then someone will unearth ruins created by mages of old and gain unimaginable powers along with a meteoric rise to fame and glory. But that is for those lucky enough who chanced upon the ruins of old mages.
He once thought that those bastards who discovered knowledge of mages of old are some lucky bastards who knows not of hardships. Then, came to the situation when he himself joined the ranks of those lucky bastards.
At once he examined the magical items first, as the books can wait. Among his loot was two items, one a rucksack and the other a pendant, which can store items inside it. Storage items the term modern mages gave these items and spatial pouch are what the mages of old calls them. These are items which has their own pocket dimensions inside it so that one may store items inside it. Only those rich enough can afford one as each storage items costs a fortune. He immediately stored the books inside the rucksack and the magical items in the pendant.
Noises came from the outside as sounds of metal and screams echoed from the outside. He immediately went outside and the scene that greeted him was the scene where his fellow soldiers were being killed one by one by their enemies.
The Kingdom of Estoa was the Sleitrip Empire's enemy and every now and then, a skirmish will happen between the two countries. At the joy of founding a ruins filled with treasure, they have forgotten there purpose here. They are to patrol the borders and report every enemy activity that they have sighted. Well, it looks like his comrades will be done for every moment now so he immediately went inside deeper in the ruins. Cold hearted? Well, at moments llike this, it is every man for himself. The enemies outnumber them by two to one and from their gear and insignia, there seems to be at least three enemy mage. The best course of action is to run if he wants to live, after all, the books he got from the ruins may well be the start of rise to prominence.
The walls of the ruins are filled with drawings and designs which the mages of old are very fond of. After a while when he estimated that he must have been running along the corridors of the ruins for a while, a large open area greeted him as a circle with various patterns and symbols are found on the ground.
Teleportation Circles
These are magical structures mages of old liked to use. Well due to the lack of materials in modern times and also, lack of knowledge, modern mages used something known as Spatial Gate. The difference between the two is that Spatial Gates can send an object thousands of kilometers away while Teleportation Circles can send the same load from planet to planet.
At once, he was dazed and stunned by the marvel in front of him as he snapped back to reality after a while. He scanned the place around him as he noticed a few tattered and weathered books along with the items. Then with a quick move, he shoved all of them inside his storage items as he took out a spatial crystal he looted before and pondered upon his life.
This Teleportation Circle is most likely connected to a world somewhere. From the looks of it, this ruin may have been used by mages of old for travelling from planet to planet and with the limited knowledge he have, the planet connected to this circle may be a backwater planet or a dangerous place.
Sounds interrupted his thoughts as he heard sounds approaching this place. Without further ado, he run in the middle of the circle, placed the crystal at the dent and poured his mana as the circle lighted up. The lights vanished as soon as it came as the sounds drew near enough to reveal a whole bunch of armed soldiers who gazed at an empty blank space.