Forced into the basement

Eldrian's counter, calling the general a fool, got to the general. His smile disappeared and turned into a glare. "I assume you won't be coming willingly."

"I've no interest in being a guinea pig," Eldrian replied, wishing that mana on Earth was just a little more abundant. That was when he got an idea. 

Kicking the old nearly decayed wood below his feet, Eldrian caught it and quickly drew the rune of hardening while feeding it a bit of his personal mana. He didn't have much, and it took a lot of time to recover. He had to think carefully when he would use how much. 

His only other option was using spirit magic, but that had dangers he didn't want to risk. He also wasn't really in the right mood to cast spirit magic spells that would be effective. A little caveat of spirit magic that was easy to forget.