Thaumaturge Derrek Zephyr wondered how many of the people he was ostensibly working with right now realized that he had actually been to the southern lands before.

  He suspected it wasn’t many, although Lady Galatea certainly knew. Perhaps the drones just hadn’t seen fit to bring it up. And to be fair, it had been decades ago and he knew little that would be relevant right now. Certainly nothing in the way of general information that Galatea would not have told them anyhow. He wished the ignorance had been enough to spare him from having to go, but that would hardly matter.

  Traveling here, he had been forced to leave his mount behind, which left him more worried than he’d like to admit. He didn’t want to lose this one too. He had steadfastly refused to name it to avoid attachment, but he couldn’t help that his thoughts wanted to say ‘Lisa’ instead of ‘the wyvern’ and it took conscious effort not to. Of course, she was only part of the reason why he wasn’t all too happy about this mission.

  There was nothing for it, however. At least Queen Kiara was largely more reasonable than her late cousin. He’d spent more than enough time as royal mage and effectively a glorified errand boy and punching bag. Sometimes, it had felt like he was single-handedly propping up King Nicholas’ rule and he hardly received any thanks for it. The new queen at least respected his abilities and didn’t waste him on tasks a knight would be better suited to.

  He wasn’t too thrilled about working for the Hive Queen Empress, on the other hand. Not after everything. Or, at least, he hadn’t been. He did have to admit it was a much more intellectually stimulating environment she provided. He had great professional respect for Lady Galatea, and although he had little personally to do with the Empress, it was enough to recognize her as a gifted if still somewhat unpolished mage. While there were — somewhat understandable — trust issues, she seemed to coming around to respecting his skills, as well. Perhaps he should consider this mission a good sign in that regard.

  For said mission, he was currently traveling again, although it didn’t strain his magic as much. He was thankful to have gotten at least a little rest in Iliucin. It had meant leaving Tim, the young newly-named prince, largely on his own when dealing with the city’s nobles, at least at first, but that couldn’t be helped. He’d been awake for most of the planning, at least, and Tim seemed to take their Hive Queen sending him here as a sufficient sign of trust. Unfortunately, since he didn’t have his usual ride, this short trip was a lot more complicated. It would have been easy enough, considering its short distance, but he was also trying to avoid any notice. Leading more of their enemies straight to the base the first expedition had found would not help their goal here.

  So, he had used a modified Haste Spell and then switched it to an invisibility Spell later. Keeping both up would have been uncertain and too risky. At least he had managed to get good descriptions and maps of the area, so he knew where to go. He wished he could have chosen a mount, even a horse would do, but he couldn’t be bogged down by worrying about where to keep it. That meant he had to traipse through the wilderness alone, following uneasy and winding trails. It reminded him uncomfortably of his childhood, before he’d been able to practice magic and leave outdoor work for the luxury of well-lit rooms and books. He tried not to dwell on the memories and instead focus on the issue at hand.

  Fortunately or unfortunately, the sounds of battle soon served to anchor him in the present moment. He slowed down a little and made sure to keep his movements silent. It wouldn’t do to attract attention. Unfortunately, he couldn’t discern much from the sounds yet; just the occasional clash of metal or battle cry — it didn’t seem particularly heated, but then there weren’t so many men involved here, were they? He’d known the plan called for an attack, and it seemed he’d came too late to see them decide on the particulars.

  He stepped forward quietly, sticking to the sparse tree cover as best he could. He had no weapons except for a knife in an inside pocket, but he didn’t need any. Indeed, as he crossed behind a surprisingly thick tree trunk, he finally made out what was happening.

  It was a skirmish — probably not the first or the only one. Four Imperials were fighting, or rather three Imperials, specifically a drone and two humans, and one dark elf, against half a dozen southerners in unmarked mail armor. Both sides were using Class Skills, as was evidenced by flashes of light and heat and sudden rapid movements. He only took a moment to assess the situation.

  The next moment, a small barrage of Magic Missiles arced over their heads and dropped on top of the hostiles. Not every one of them died to it, but those who survived were quickly bested by the Imperial fighters.

  He stepped forward, noting with approval that his allies didn’t drop their guards and instead only waited tensely, still arrayed defensively. He walked closer, noting the shifts in their body language, before he finally dropped his illusion.

  “Thaumaturge!” one of the men said, visibly relaxing. He didn’t recognize him, but they very well might have seen each other at some point in the past. “Your arrival was well-timed.”

  “You fought well,” he praised. “Is there more fighting going on?”

  “Yes, Sir Zephyr,” the dark elf ranger answered. “We’ve been skirmishing with them throughout these fields for the last hour or so, after we managed to draw them out. I should guide you to the command group. If you please?”

  “Please do,” he said, nodding at the others. The dark elf, Oliren, sheathed his weapon and turned without delay.

  He hadn’t been here before, but it wasn’t hard to orient himself. Oliren was as stealthy as expected, and he kept pace easily. He had decent physical Stats, since he wasn’t given the ease of simply staying in a mage tower all the time. At the moment, it was a good thing, and he had only started to breath hard by the time they finally reached their destination. Castaway and the others had clearly done well and spread the fighting over an significant area. He assumed they were apportioning their forces to ease the numerical disparity and instead gain the numbers advantage in individual skirmishes.

  The Delver officer in question was standing with a few others in a grove that looked quickly grown together, not too far from where he put the entrance to the underground base. One of them was the elves’ Three-Century Commander Eltarianal; he knew who must have come up with most of the details for this plan. They all looked up as he arrived.

  “Zephyr,” Sir Owin said, reaching out a hand. “The Empress really called in the big guns, didn’t she?”

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  “I suppose so,” he replied, shaking his hand, then greeting the others.

  “I’m surprised Tim sent you. That must mean this is really the most important place to be right now. We could use your help in wrapping this up, as long as you can do it without showing off too much.”

  He hoped Owin hadn’t meant that the way it sounded. “I can. What’s the situation? Have you managed some progress on our goals?”

  “We attacked just before dawn,” Anuis Eltarianal said. “We’ve been skirmishing for the hour since, and managed to draw out most of their forces. One prisoner who we presume to be a lower-ranking officer is under guard back at our camp. We’ve tried to hide our identities, but by now they will have a good idea. No fatalities on our side yet. Unfortunately, they’ve kept their golems relatively close to their base.”

  “I see, that might be a problem,” he mused.

  “We were just coordinating — If you can provide a distraction, I can lead a party to cut off and capture one of them.”

  Owin glanced at him and nodded in agreement, so he straightened with a slight smile. “I’ll give you plenty of time.”

  “We might also send a few people into the base in search of information or physical evidence,” another officer, a major he hadn’t met before, said.

  They quickly hammered out a few details of the plan, while he evaluated the group. It seemed they’d done decently well so far. Hopefully, they wouldn’t mess it up now.

  It didn’t take long for them to walk until they could see the entrance of the base, which answered a few questions he’d had and raised a few more. Clearly, the enemy commander was nothing special, or he wouldn’t have allowed himself to be drawn into skirmishes. But the tunnel was broad, the entrance much larger than a typical door, and it would not be entirely easy to fortify it. Since the Imperial side had higher levels and more specialized Class Skills — that felt like a safe assumption — he could see the logic in not just sitting tight and allowing themselves to be attacked without responding. Or perhaps there was more to it, he’d had some experience, but he was hardly a military strategist.

  Instead of wasting time, he started his attack right away. Something effective and showy but not too flashy was required, so he relied on a mix of Firebolts, wind magic, and the occasional bit of earth magic. Growing spikes of stone from behind an enemy fighter’s head and seeing their surprise was almost satisfying.

  The fight quickly gained momentum and grew rather more serious than the ‘fake’ skirmish the plan had originally called for. That didn’t trouble him, they could adapt. He walked forward slowly, one hand raised and still firing off a barrage of spells. In the pauses, he layered shields on his allies. It would be embarrassing to lose one of his compatriots in a fight like this, if nothing else.

  Predictably, they soon faced stiffer resistance. He didn’t let it trouble him and kept walking forward. ‘It’s all about the image,’ he remembered his old mentor telling him. ‘Battles are won and lost when men believe they are won or lost.’ He’d found that to be good advice for the occasions he did have to participate in a larger fight. So, keeping a careful eye on his mana pool, he advanced, throwing out attack and shield spells, careful to avoid his truly powerful magic that would be bound to attract more attention.

  More and more of the enemy soldiers turned on him, and he had to truly work at it not to slow down. But it was worth it, because he noticed the sounds of fighting from a little further away, as Eltarianal’s party had started their own strike. It was a good moment for a distraction, so he unleashed another barrage of Firebolts, letting these ones be a little flashier, and then reached into the ground and poured his mana in. He didn’t have a structured System Spell for this, but it was too useful to not have experimented with it. As his mana pool fled like ice in summer, the ground started to shake. At first, it was barely noticeable, and he staggered under a surprise Fireball from an enemy mage, his Shell almost visibly denting. Then the quake was strong enough to stagger men, disrupting their formation; and entirely keeping their attention on his side of the battle.

  It didn’t come without a price, of course. His mana pool was draining at an alarming rate, and if the enemy had any competent officers they would guess as much. He had to stop, instinctively setting into a more defensive stance as he focused on defensive magic. At the same time, more enemy soldiers joined the ranks against him.

  He hesitated for a moment. If he pressed now, he could perhaps scatter them and capture the entrance to the base, and from there root them out of it. But no, that was foolish. He couldn’t fight all of them himself, and his own allies were too scattered from their strategy to offer sufficient support right now. Instead, he grudgingly focused on the defensive, gesturing at the other soldiers to support him.

  Luckily, they didn’t need to keep it up for long. He glanced at Dustin, who was currently leading the unit supporting him, and jerked his chin backwards, holding up a hand behind his back and closing the fingers one by one. When his fist snapped close, he retreated, using the strength reinforcing his frame with his modified Mage Shell to get back quickly. The others melted into the terrain behind him.

  Several of the enemy soldiers tried to pursue them, but whistles and cries from their officers quickly called them back. He noted the length of time it took them to assemble — not bad, but not as good as the Imperial military would now manage, he’d wager — before they were out of sight.

  “Well done,” he nodded at Dustin. Without waiting for a reply, he started jogging south.

  Not being a complete amateur, they didn’t meet up with the other group immediately. Instead, he covered their retreat with another strong gale, which thankfully took less mana and also helped hide some less obvious tracks, before he backtracked to their preset meeting point. It took ten minutes until he was finally able to confirm that their mission had been a success.

  All of Eltarianal’s party were carrying the golem they’d managed to snatch, what he supposed was a specimen of moderate size. He greeted them and managed to contain his curiosity until they’d safely returned to their current camp site and rangers sent out to make sure they were unobserved.

  Then he paced up and down the captured golem, ignoring the curious looks of the gathered leaders. This was why he’d been sent here, when Prince Tim could have just as easily used him in Iliucin. His magic would be a tremendous asset for a proper assault, but the others could have managed the ‘fake’ one just as easily.

  The golem was bound in what looked like black vines and clearly deactivated, given it didn’t attempt to struggle. The only visible damage was to its head, but it had barely scratched the outer plating.

  “It stopped moving once we got about five minutes away from the base,” Commander Eltarianal said, anticipating his question.

  He nodded, then crouched down to look at it more closely. The material was unfamiliar but, as expected, the same as the samples he’d already seen. He searched for a hinge before finally finding a slight gap in the plating close to the armpit. Grabbing a blade, he managed to leverage it open, then carefully pried out the outer plates of the torso. As he’d half-expected, there were designs on the backside, as well as in the inner parts.

  “Can you tell us anything about this?” Owin finally asked.

  He straightened up, dusting off his hands. “It will require further study,” he answered. “However, I am already confident this is not in any way a Hivekind creation, or a remnant of the Progenitors. The materials, perhaps, but not the construction. Too modern — for a given value of the word. I still need to evaluate the power source, but it would surprise me if there was any change.”

  The others nodded. “So, whatever they’re looking to find here, they didn’t put it into the golems, beyond the materials,” Eltarianal said slowly.

  “As far as you can tell,” Owin added.

  He shrugged, not offended at the implication. “I will still be able to tell you more about the creator and where they studied once I analyze it further. Finding evidence to link it to Iliucin is not going to be a challenge. Also, we’ll be able to use it ourselves with a bit of work,” he added.

  Owin visibly relaxed a bit at that. The elven commander had more composure, but she did smile slightly. He nodded at them both before returning to his analysis.

  Ancient or not, he didn’t often get to study objects as novel as this, after all.