Chapter 39.

The old man trailed off and Adrian turned his full attention towards the wolf type demi-human, who stood straight in response, the rest of the town silent and attentive as the two men spoke.

"We have already come to an agreement," reminded Mr Adrian, "training for Raphtalia, information and a chance to rest here should we decide to return in the future you need not worry about any other cost."

His voice was firm but not cold and she could see the people around her calm down, "I'll leave some herbicide that can remove the plants and a few seeds that will grow rapidly, you won't be able to shape the trees as I have but you can at least place a stopgap if one or two of these trees are destroyed." he continued.

Mr Oldrin bowed deeply again, "Thank you." he said and Mr Adrian nodded.

"We'll be going hunting today Oldrin," he said, "I'd like all the information you can give me on the terrain and the monsters, both new and old, as soon as possible."

"Of course," said the town leader, "Please allow me to summon our hunters, they can tell you all you need to know." then he turned to his people and continued, "Everyone, please begin to harvest some of the fruit…"

While Mr Oldrin gave his orders Adrian walked up to her and asked, "Was there something you needed?"

Raphtalia nodded, "I just wanted to know whenwe'll be leaving so that I can get ready."

Mr Adrian frowned, "An hour or two," he said, "I want to make sure that the plants behave within my expectations and then set out some food for the people here to have a decent amount in their storage. We can leave after that. Make sure to get Rifana ready, I'll deal with Isis and Trystan."

Raphtalia nodded immediately and then hesitated before she said, "About Rifana…"

"I want to level her up," he said calmly, "It'll be safer for her and help her healing if she's at a high level. I promise that we'll keep her safe, the monsters around here are much weaker than in Dragon Territory."

Raphtalia swallowed her doubts and held onto that promise, "All right," she said.

He smiled and said, "We'll keep her safe." he reiterated and she nodded, surprised that she believed him.

Raphtalia found it eerie how different the world around her looked when she was expected to fight the monsters that populated it. She hadn't realized it until now but she had simply taken it for granted that Adrian, Isis and Trystan would defeat any of the monsters that would be encountered by their group. She didn't think it was an incorrect belief. Adrian had taken care to ensure that no monster that could pose a threat would be alive in her presence, but it was a reminder of how much she had come to depend on Mr Adrian even before she had realized that he was a nice person.

It was a little late at night and it had been around three or four hours since they had taken their leave from the town. After Mr Adrian had confirmed that the trees he had used to create a wall around town were fine and had Isis test them out to see how much damage they could endure, a lot as it turned out, they had arranged for lunch, left several weeks worth of food and then said their goodbyes for the moment.

She had felt a little bad about leaving them behind without making absolutely sure that they were safe but Mr Adrian had reassured her that once he got to level 50 and unlocked a teleportation skill they could return here at their leisure and ensure that the people of Ayrith were safe and sound.

At the moment Mr Adrian and Isis were preparing to test out a Combination Skill and both of them had their eyes closed as they concentrated on their magic. Rifana was sitting down in the floating Disc that had once carried her and the Filolials when they had been young and Trystan was standing next to her in his Filolial form watching the two members of their party who were preparing to attack attentively.

"We are the source of all power and so we command the world. Obey. One Hundred Lightning Strikes," both of them intoned in perfect synchronization as if they had practised it a hundred times. Raphtalia waited for something to happen, and for an instant, she wondered if something had gone wrong before Mr Adrian held his sword up, the tip pointing towards the clear sky, and exhaled loudly.

At first, a single sword, wreathed in lightning, emerged and quickly moved upwards until all she could follow was the bright light that the lightning emitted but as it went higher and higher the brightness intensified as one Sword became two, two turned into four and they kept on dividinguntil the sky was lit up with a hundred swords covered in lightning.

Mr Adrian swung downwards and the swords moved. Raphtalia could only see bright streaks of light moving across the sky and soon enough they were out of her line of sight, but she could hear the results. Screams and screeches of pain rang out and were silenced mere instants after they were first born. Bright bursts of light would flash out from distant locations, she couldn't see what was happening but she could guess.

Raphtalia felt a small surge of pity for the helpless monsters that had just been slaughtered. That pity died a quick death after she remembered that these were the same monsters spawned from the Wave.

"That worked quite well." noted Mr Adrian, "we'll have to try that out with a Thousand Swords and possibly Ten Thousand Swords should the cost be reasonable. It'll make a good move at the beginning of a Wave. How bad is the MP cost?"

Isis frowned, closing her eyes, "I can do that around fifteen-no twenty, around twenty more times Father. Anything more and I'll be exhausted."

Mr Adrian nodded slowly, "We'll have to see how much your reserves improve with your Class Up and the Levels you'll gain afterwards. Still, it seems that this is a pretty good Anti-Army move. We'll practice it again if we find an area with a lot of monsters...actually, this will be very good at dealing with underwater monsters. We'll have to try it out when we get to the coast."

Isis smiled up at Mr Adrian, "Yes Father," she said, happy to have been praised.

Raphtalia felt a little bittersweet. The lightning reminded her a lot of Sadeena. She had always been really, really good at lightning magic. Raphtalia remembered when Sadeena had created a huge lightning bolt and slammed it into the ocean so that she could get the fish more easily. Papa had been really mad that Sadeena had been lazy instead of fishing properly.

They continued to move after that but it was nearly half an hour later that they got anywhere near their next monster. Mr Adrian called for a stop once they were a few hundred meters from it.

"Raphtalia," he said, turning towards her, "these ones are yours to fight if you wish it. Trystan shall be your back-up but you'll be the one on point. It's a small troop of Skeletal Knights."

She nodded, feeling a slight thrill of anticipation, she knew that she was stronger than these monsters but that knowledge didn't help her feel confident. Instead, she tried to remember her lessons with Nicol, made sure that the grip she had on her sword and shield was fine, took a deep breath and then moved forward towards her target, Trystan a few steps behind her.

They didn't sneak up on the monsters, but they still had the advantage of surprise as the monsters were facing away from them, and she moved towards the Skeletal Knight on the back of their little formation and slashed through its' torso with ease.

The resistance of the bones and leather armour proved to be no match for her sword. She backed off after the first elimination, letting Trystan slam into the Knights, scattering them and ruining their formation. She took advantage of this and took down another Knight, one that had been separated from the group.

By the time she was done Trystan had taken care of the other three survivors.

Raphtalia stopped and realized abruptly that she was actually breathing really quickly, it was odd how the sound of her heartbeat had been negligible until she actually stopped. She took a quick look around, making sure that the Skeletons weren't moving before relaxing a little.

Mr Adrian, Isis and Rifana entered the clearing soon after and she winced as she saw the relieved look on Rifana's face. Her friend must have been scared. It was interesting to see the contrasting expressions on the other two, Mr Adrian simply nodded at her and began to absorb the skeletons while Isis just ignored everything in favour of watching the surroundings.

She had wanted Mr Adrian to compliment her. Raphtalia quickly shook off the thought, it had been stupid to expect the defeat of a couple of monsters to be impressive when Mr Adrian regularly slaughtered hundredsin seconds.

They continued their hunt, Trystan and Isis didn't get any experience as they were at level 40 and Raphtalia reached that level soon as well but Mr Adrian and Rifana kept leveling up. It turned out that because the three of them were at level 40 any experience they earned went to Mr Adrian and Rifana. By the end of the day, Rifana was at level 32 and had already started to eat a lot.

They sat down and had a proper dinner a few hours after sunset, Mr Adrian told them that they'd have to start early tomorrow as they'd have to move to another location, apparently, they'd pretty much depopulated the entire area around Ayrith of monsters. She could tell that he wasn't happy about that. He was still at level 47. He really wanted to get to level 50.

Trystan just sat down in his Filolial King form while Isis climbed on his back and slept there with a quilt. Mr Adrian would be up for the first watch so Raphtalia moved her sleeping bag next to Rifana who had barely spoken a word during Dinner. Even Trystan's best attempts had rarely drawn out a word.

Raphtalia tried not to feel angry at that man. Anger at him always reminded her of what she had done to him and she didn't want to think about him but she couldn't help it. Rifana's silence spoke louder than anything else. It was a brutal reminder that even with him dead nothing had been fixed.

No. Rifana had been saved. That was not something she could let herself forget.

"Goodnight Rifana," she said, lying down after making sure that she was covered up.

Her friend turned towards her and smiled, it was a hesitant smile, not at all like her old smiles but Raphtalia loved it anyway, "Goodnight," she said and closed her eyes, her voice still quiet, but she felt a deep sense of relief. She was talking.

Raphtalia fell asleep holding onto her friend.

She had no nightmares that night. Rifana was not that fortunate.

The next day was spent in battle.

She fought with Isis and Trystan for the most part with Mr Adrian spending most of the time hunting solo trying to reach level fifty. She made a lot of progress, got better at not doing stupid or necessary actions and did her best to apply the lessons that Nicol had taught her.

When they sat down for dinner an hour after sunset she knew that he had not reached level fifty. His frustration was telling. Still, he quickly pulled out some really tasty food, served it to them and started eating quickly. Raphtalia shook her head at his impatience but she understood. Teleportation was something he really wanted.

She turned her attention to Rifana who was eating her food ravenously.

"Is it good?" she asked, keeping her voice light.

Rifana nodded, barely taking her eyes off the food while eating.

Raphtalia smiled, "Good." she said, glad to see that she was at least eating properly even if it wasdue to extreme hunger. Rifana had spent most of her day riding on Trystan or Isis while nibbling on something or the other but she knew how easy it was to get hungry again when leveling up rapidly.

"Father!" she heard Isis say urgently, "someone really strong is coming closer!"

Mr Adrian stood up immediately, absorbing his food and releasing the Disc in a single smooth motion. Raphtalia picked up Rifana, the sudden movement dislodging her grip on the plate she was holding which made her cry out a little before she stifled the protest, and jumped onto the Disc.

Mr Adrian, Trystan and Isis joined her and they were above the forest floor in seconds.

"Direction?" asked Mr Adrian.

"There!" said Isis pointing East, "they're really far away but I can still feelthem. Their mana is a lot stronger than your father."

Adrian quickly prepared a dozen floating swords and closed his eyes before opening them and focusing on the direction that Isis had pointed out.

"They're close," said Isis. Making Raphtalia tense up. Her grip tightened on her sword.

And then they all heard Mr Adrian laugh, it was not a happy laugh, more like he had been shocked by something. They all blinked when the disc started to descend.

"Father?" asked Isis urgently, "What is it?"

"There is a very, very powerful Filolial Queen coming to meet us," he said, his expression very serious, "running is unnecessary and pointless. Let's all be polite okay?"

All of them nodded hesitantly, his voice had been very firm and very scared as he said his last sentence. As they returned to camp Raphtalia began to wonder just how powerful and dangerous this person must be to scare Mr Adrian.