Chapter 33

Zolotoros really wasn’t an idiot. The moment Flint’s friend shouted, “Run, you idiots!” the mage hesitated for only a few seconds.

And then he ran.

Just not quite in the same direction as everyone else. Zolotoros ran toward the southern gates. The very same ones their group had used to sneak into Triverd. Finding the way was not difficult—other mages were running alongside him, those who had recognized Viktor Irre Faraday in Yan immediately, and whose fear had overcome their desire to “throw some lightning around.”

The saving moonlight was already visible ahead. The Academy itself was shaking to its foundations. Somewhere on the opposite side came the sound of buildings crumbling apart.

“Well, well. There you are.”

Zolotoros did not even have time to squeak before a thin, pale hand with bandaged fingers grabbed him by the scruff, threw him to the ground, and bound him.

“Oh no…” Zolotoros whispered, looking up into the face of a necromancer named Lacilius. The mage tried to use magic, but whatever they had bound his hands with—that “something” would not let him cast properly. “The Shackles of Felianora…” Zolotoros hissed through clenched teeth. “You won’t get away with this, dark mages!” He glared furiously at Lacilius and Velet. “You have no idea what you’re getting yourselves into! Or what kind of power you desire!”

“Us?” Lacilius raised his left eyebrow in surprise while Velet hauled Zolotoros to his feet, and together they dragged the fugitive mage outside. “Oh, oh, our dear Zolotoros.” The necromancer shook his head. “We have no need for your power. But the Spectre Empire…”

“You won’t get away with this!”

“Shut your mouth and move!” Velet cursed, punching the mage in the teeth hard enough to send a couple of them flying.

They made it outside, shoving the fugitive mage out ahead of them. Lacilius followed. Panic reigned all around.

“Damn it, no horses!” Velet exclaimed furiously.

“Not a problem.” Lacilius waved his staff, and three dark horses woven from shadow and bone rose straight out of the ground before them.

Zolotoros was thrown onto one of them. Then they raced away and, like shadows, dissolved into the night, as though neither the necromancer Lacilius nor the dark mage Velet had ever been there at all. No one had even noticed them. No one had paid them any attention. No one could even have imagined who they were.

Or perhaps… that wasn’t quite true?

The innkeeper Semyu, who had been running after Zolotoros the entire time but had been unable to catch up because of his large build, saw the mage being seized and carried away into the night.

And having witnessed with his own eyes the result of Yan Di Wonderwalk’s monstrous, uncontrollable power, Semyu knew perfectly well that the mage’s kidnapping could lead to consequences just as terrible—only this time, across all of Tsagat.

Or perhaps even worse.

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“So, he killed him,” Chadun stated.

“Yes,” Julius replied.

“Just completely destroyed him!”

“Exactly,” Khad confirmed.

The group was hiding behind a column of the nearest ruined building. The Academy’s central square had turned into a genuine battlefield.

“He literally turned him into a piece of gray shit!” the mage continued.

“We know!” everyone else answered in unison.

“So what now?” Sovt asked.

“Now it’s our turn. Well, relatively soon,” Julius explained, watching another mage get his skull smashed in.

“And what are we supposed to do?! Is there really no way to stop him, Amressa brothers? Some weakness or something?!” Sovt exclaimed angrily.

“Well-l, actually, there is,” Khad replied as yet another wing of the Academy collapsed somewhere off to the side. “Though I’m afraid it won’t help us much. If Yan Di Wonderwalk goes off the rails and stops being an ordinary human being… there are a few people and things that can calm him down.”

“BOOM!” came from somewhere above their heads.

“The first ones who could help us are Yan’s old team, the Hostages of Free Will,” Khad continued. “They’re strong enough to beat some sense into him. The second weakness…”

Somewhere nearby came the agonized screams of a dozen sorcerers at once.

“The second weakness,” Julius picked up, “is someone from the hereditary House of the Bright Stars, the Godslayers of Fenegel. Their power is the direct opposite of Yan’s.”

“But that House died out about three hundred years ago, slap-dash!” Chadun blurted out in panic.

“BAM!” The ground around them began to shake.

“And that’s it?!” Sovt blurted out, dumbfounded. “So we’re one hundred percent dead?!”

And the answer to his question surprised more than just the knight.

“Well, heh-heh, actually, Yan Di Wonderwalk has one more weakness. A third one,” an unfamiliar voice suddenly said.

The friends looked around and unexpectedly saw two mages beside them. A representative of Encantaria and one of the Magical Vault.

They had been hiding in the exact same place all this time. But they had kept quieter than mice. And no wonder—who in their right mind would make so much as a sound in a situation like this?

“Huh? And who the hell are you?” Khad asked in surprise.

“Old acquaintances of the guy currently rampaging through the square,” Eric replied. “And you, I take it, are his new acquaintances?”

“Our relationship is complicated,” Sovt remarked.

“BOOM! CRASH-BANG-BOOM!”

“I see,” Eric said, swallowing hard.

“Hey! You said Yan had another weakness! A third one!” Sovt reminded them.

“Yan Di Wonderwalk’s third weakness…” Flint replied, trembling like an aspen leaf.

“Women,” Eric finished.

And with that, the noise in the square suddenly stopped.

To say that everyone present was shocked by what they had just heard would be an understatement.

But there was no time left for panic or surprise.

Because Yan was already standing on the column above them, his eyes burning with red fire.

“Dwarven mugs. And here comes death,” Eric summed up.