The battle ended early as scheduled.
A battalion of human knights rode horses in triangle formation, scooting the surrounding area for someone or something suspicious as the orders were. They had to find a threat they didn't know about and get rid of it. They mostly rode in the main road and came to a halt near a spring of water that was blessed by the temple.
To access Valtrar, humans had to take the normal stoned path that was blessed by the three temples. The fog was kept away from it and it was easy to travel on it. Obviously, to travel or even walk on it, you had to be part of the knights, be a priest or a noble. Commoners didn't have the chance to come out to the outside and they didn't have any desire to do so. For them, going outside was a suicide mission without a blessing.
The knights took shelter in one of the blessed areas humans with light attribute made. They built their tents and sat down drinking their rums. They were a total of seven, the youngster was the newest recruit. To become one of them, humans had to go through an extensive training and a special test. They also had to be accepted by the temple and be blessed by them continuously. The blessing kept the Ustriestan controlled and pushed it outside the walls. No Undead could be blessed; the blessing just dissipated when it met with their rotten flesh.
A man had a smug grin on his face while looking down at their newest recruit. His shoulders were wide and he had armour over his body. He looked big and overwhelming. Even the new recruit couldn't hold his gaze and just left after taking the humiliation of loss. The latter moved elsewhere to train; he knew the mission was important but he had to keep training and become stronger. The missions would grow harder. Even if the forest around Valtrar wasn't crowded with the undead, he had to train. Who would have thought that in his quest for training he would meet a strange individual sleeping in the foggy area?
"Don't stray much, youngster! Staying too much in the mist will make your blessing ran out. Come back as soon as you can after perfecting your stance."
"Leave the boy alone! Just go and have fun, Mike. There is no need to keep your guard up all the time. This forest isn't that dangerous at day. Just have fun exploration but Don't stay too much in the mist."
"Be careful out there and Don't hold grudge against Jack! The Commander is a good man. He just wants you to be stronger and be experienced in the face of death. Especially against those visitors of the night, imagine if you are outside at night. You will be in constant threat! He just wants you to be better. We all walked that path, you will get used to it."
The boy looked back and nodded politely. He didn't have any right to voice his anger. They were older than him and the continuous challenging duels they had with him were for his benefit. It was true Jack had battled him more often and let out curses and insults each time the boy did a blunder or had a fake death causing the duel to stop, but it was for his own good. Mike didn't like one thing in all the duels: the fact that everyone laughed at him when he fell or failed to stop a simple strike.
Death treated everyone fairly. You needed to be strong to toss it aside and keep living. The ones who lived long enough in the Outside Walls Corporation and returned after every mission knew that simple truth. Being outside the walls was dangerous but surveying the areas around was a must. Who knows who would have the idea of trapping them?
After all, humans had one last kingdom. If they lost it too to a war, they would be slaves to the other races.
Mike walked with his sword ready in hand and stepped inside the forest, deviating from the path. The fog pricked his skin slightly but the sensation faded as soon as the blessing did its work. The Ustriestan fog dissipated around him and his eyes were better. He stopped to what seemed a clearing and started swinging his sword until something stopped his training. There was something glowing not far from him. The shape of a barrier appeared in his field of vision.
He walked, his guard up ready to strike, but he let down a sigh of relief as soon as he saw the body of a teenager, someone that appeared around his age, lying down against a tree and sleeping soundly. The barrier didn't look like a blessing but it kept the mist away perfectly.
Mike stood there waiting for a suspicious movement from the boy and pondered about the fact that maybe it was a trap by someone. However, nothing seemed to change and the boy still had his hand over his stomach, sleeping. Mike narrowed his eyes seeing him drool in his sleep and snore.
He found it a must to warn the boy about the dangers of the place then he thought about the threat they had to take care of and stopped a feet away from the barrier. The boy had poor mages clothes and a broken sceptre next to him; he must have fought with something and was exhausted but he won.
Mike crouched next to him and shook him by the shoulders. The boy opened his eyes slowly and saw the shape of an armed warrior in front of him. Taken by alert, he grabbed his broken sceptre and pointed it at the young Knight's neck. "Who are you?" he glared.
"I am a knight, a human knight," Mike raised his hands in surrender, guessing the boy was an idiot. A broken sceptre would never be able to cast magic. "You certainly know that you can't do anything with your sceptre, right?"
The boy looked at the sceptre but still kept it at Mike's throat. "I can hurt you with the broken part. It's always interesting to try piercing a neck. It might hurt horribly but it will do the trick."