There was no ti to waste, the group marched forward after the claims of Anna, who seems adamant that she can sense the direction of where the owner of this seal was. Summoning a spectral dog that floated and danced around her body, Anna presented the seal of the spectral beast, which seed to sll sothing on it, before jumping around in the air, leaving fluttering lights then turning towards the very hole they ca across before.
But the mont they climbed out of the hole, they found themselves back in the sewers.
"We are back here?" So of the mages asked in confusion, while Vance and the Knights started to hit the walls with the hilt of their swords, before confirming they this was actually the sewers.
As for Anna, who was the titular leader of this group, she also stopped for a while, before turning to Kassandra. "Is this your doing?" She asked, holding so suspicions. But Kassandra just shook her hand and waved her hand in an attempt to unravel whatever spell or curse was causing the issue.
"There is nothing." Her voice was kind and soft, holding no ill intent or any emotion whatsoever. Which was odd considering her domain. A personality that Anna got used to, considering that Kassandra was the only other woman on her level.
"Is this how you lead?" Vance asked, before calming down and asking. "Hurry, whatever it is at play here, obviously didn’t wish us to go out from here," Vance called out and he was on point as well.
But the mages on the other hand, who ca with Anna and Kassandra took his suggestion the wrong way.
Making noise of "How dare you" and "Why couldn’t you do it." Words that even annoyed Anna for a mont, but she didn’t intend to cause any strife among us or lose their trust in a bid to appease n who would one day be her enemies.
So she just asked them to shut up and then said. "Dolly has imprinted the mana in its body, once it gets close to the seal owner, he will bark." She said, before sending her small spirit familiar toward Vance, who readily accepted it. "So your plan is for us to split apart?" He asked, seeing such action.
And Anna nodded, before summoning another bigger spirit, who slled the seal in the sa way. "Yes, whatever or whoever is doing this, they can’t use the sa technique on two sides that are far apart. "
"As for chances of this being a trap or an illusion formation, it’s low, considering the path of destruction we saw on the way."
"People fought here not too long ago, and in such a little ti, the chance of a formation creating the loop we just experienced is low."
"aning an individual is doing this. Soone who is either capable of playing with the environnt..." At those words, Anna gave a slight look to Kassandra, which was noticed by Carrion, before continuing. "... or they are capable of playing with the mind."
It was at this point in the mind Vance, the words of his old master that was exiled for his cris after mindlessly hunting a single wraith throughout his life.
"He is weaker than an insect, changing his vessel ever so often. Even a child can destroy him. And this was my arrogance when I originally t him on that fateful day. He rose from the corpses of the dead where I was sent to exorcize the corrupted souls."
A long story that he had heard countless tis during his training. A story that always ends up with a single line. "Never look down on him Kid, he might be weak. But he knows how to play with the mind in all sorts of ways."
"The victims I t, their entire personalities changed in a single sleep. Their mories, their personality, and the very essence of their being. Changed so easily that it scared ."
"It’s what caused this..." The old GrandKnight spoke while pointing toward his head. "So beware, if you ever co across him. Keep your mind clear and don’t fall for its tricks."
With those words in his mind, Vance concluded his own. Ignoring the words of Carrion that seed to want to say sothing and nodding towards Anna and choosing directions to move.
"We go south." The two parties went in opposite directions this ti and Anna ca across a hole in the ceiling again where the streets were visible. The group of Knights also ca across a hole.
A hole in which they can see the figures of Anna and the rest of her group as well.
"..."
Which caused creases to form on Vance’s forehead. He recalled the past again, the place where his master was pointing at his skull.
He recalls the tallic fillings in his master’s head, multiple of them caused by his Master’s habit to dig into his own skull with his finger in a bid to break away from the power of the enemy.
And this thought appeared in the head of Vance for a while as well.
"They can’t seem to see us."
A few of the Knights pointed out, while Mages were doing their own thing and trying to climb out once again.
"But this position is different from before, why did this happen?" Haseem asked. But Vance didn’t have any luxury to waste ti on such traps.
One thing was for sure, the enemy’s power was not absolute, otherwise, there wouldn’t have been a need to play such a ga. aning, there was a chance to break this cage.
"Ignore them, we break the ceiling above."
With those words, the group moved away from the hole and ignored their sounds as they eventually climbed back up. The farther the better, as Anna spoke previously. ’Unexpected movents would probably break the flow of this maze-like illusion.’ Vance thought, before charging his sword and slashing at the air, causing flas to eject out of the sword. Breaking the ceiling and when the dust settled down, one can see a new scene above, unlike the previous ti.
"Knight Vance, it would seem you ca to the sa conclusion as us." Anna, who was walking from the back, comnted with a smile.
"Didn’t you say that moving away would make it harder? Then why co in our direction?" Vance said, pointing his blazing sword toward Anna. Causing the small phantom puppy next to him to growl at him in anger, seeing how this human dared to aim his weapon at its master.
"Well, you see... Kassandra, can you please explain what we found to him?" Anna asked, finding how it was hard to explain.
"What did we find?.. Did we find anything?" Kassandra was confused by Anna’s words for a while. But considering the seriousness of the situation. She spoke out in clarity.
Of course, this just made the suspicions of Anna’s weird actions worse.
But before anything can go on any further. A shot was heard and the body of Kassandra was thrown off to the distance.
A large chunk of her head fell into the body of multiple mages that stood behind her.
"Wa?"
"Who..., Lady Kassandra!!"
Two mages ran toward Kassandra, holding her now dead body, and then looking toward the owner of the rifle that had just fired.
And it was none other than Carrion, who had an annoyed look on his face, while Vance and the rest of the Knight also took out their arms and then aid at Carrion. Wondering if their companion’s mind was taken over.
"Carrion, explain your actions," Vance said. While the mages cursed from the side, conjuring their beasts and arms, ready to fight off the Knights that dared to kill the tower master.
But Anna, who should have been the most hurt, instead of feeling angry over the Knight’s action, started to laugh instead.
"Ha, I knew it. Put down your magic. This is not the real Kassandra."
"And you, old Knight. I thank you for your understanding."
Anna was suspicious of Kassandra since the mont they fell into this maze-like illusion. For one, it was already weird that an Archmage-level figure among illusion and phantasm can’t crack this illusion.
Not to actively participate in cracking it, she just did simple actions and stopped.
Though most of it was based on assumptions, she can’t act on her own or harm another Tower Master only on suspicion. Which is why she gave multiple suggestions to Vance about what was going on before.
But due to Vance’s mind being flooded with mories of his master, he didn’t catch on. While Carrion, the old man was quick to pick up on Anna’s suspicion. So he shot her after confirming he had been greenlit by Anna, after her last-ditch effort to et up with the Knights.
And they were right. This was not Kassandra, because if she was. The attack would have easily deflected from the mage shield an archmage-level figure was capable of.
"Lady Anna, how dare you speak of our Tower Master like this. Those n killed her right in front of your eyes..."
"Hush!" Anna ordered, causing a Knight to walk out of the portal that opened next to her, a knight with a rotten visage and a rusted sword. "She the creator of this Mage, don’t tell you who studied under her didn’t detect the peculiarities."
Anna spoke as more beasts and monsters started to fill the small path, while her own students and companions started to create so distance between themselves and students from the tower of Phantasm.
"Hmm, I guess. She can deal with them herself." Vance spoke, after understanding the gist of the whole situation. Before turning to old Carrion and saying. "I thank you for making up for my shortcomings."
There was no need for any further sweet talks among the n, Vance turned to the rest of his n and ordered. "We now know the enemy, a target we have to hunt. She is the kind to play illusions. So rember to keep this in mind."
"If anything seems out of place from this point on, it doesn’t exist."
Vance started to convey his order on dealing with the annoying illusion specialist.
A specialist had entered my room and was looking over .
"Oh, dear Jester. What has beco of you."
"Hah! Kassandra, you really chose to pick up their commission. I am very disappointed." None of our lips moved. We both can be considered ntalists, so it was way easier for us to understand each other through brain waves instead of our mouths.
And let tell you, Kassandra might be a woman of few words. But her truth was sothing else.
"I an, this whole stint as the Tower master was getting old. So choosing to work with so maniacs who were intent on reviving a god seed interesting."
"And who knew, you were also lurking in this place... I tried searching for you. But you always ran away. Feeling a bit guilty, are we?"
"Truth be told, you were a bit clingy. A bit stalkerish."
"Of course, I would have to be that way. It’s the only way I can have my revenge."
"..."
"Did you really think I wouldn’t figure it out?"
"Well... it’s not that."
"How to say this."
I struggled with how to explain this to a woman who ca here to take revenge.
"Well, you see... Don’t be angry, but I don’t rember what I did at all. You can bla my lifestyle on it."
"..."
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