CHAPTER 30: MANA STORM

Ezekiel marveled at the large castle looming gloriously before him, its resplendent and ancient but strong walls having withstood many years with no true harm having been done to its surface, its beauty and majesty undaunted by time.

If he didn’t know better, the mechanic would have assumed he was standing before a King’s castle. He didn’t care much about the majesty of the walls and castle though. His thoughts merely wandered towards a single question. ’Fuck, how much starls would I gain if I raided this place?! Even the walls seem so damn expensive!’

Watson, who stood to the side, watched as the trio displayed their shocked expression while they approached the castle gates with a smile, his expression displaying a pride which he didn’t bother to hide. One could only imagine how expression would appear if he learned of Ezekiel’s greedy thoughts.

As they had only been admiring the beauty of the castle before them, Vahn and Yuri recovered quickly. They both paused, easily noticing the greedy light flashing in Ezekiel’s eyes as he glanced about the castle walls as they flew past it, safe within Watson’s air bubble.

Vahn sighed helplessly, using his elbow to hit the mechanic softly, awakening him from his nefarious thoughts. The latter jerked slightly then sneakily glanced at Watson to make sure he hadn’t been able to guess his thoughts.

Seeing that he hadn’t, he heaved a relieved breath before coughing awkwardly and silently thanking his friend. He straightened his getup—having already placed his Battlesuit into his Dimensional and wore one of his formal clothes—before staring straight at the approaching castle, his expression calm and nary of any anxiety.

He was then surprised to see that they passed by the main entrance of the castle, moving past it to approach one of the main paths leading outside the Earl’s city. Upon spotting the two large noble carriages, a look of understanding appeared on his face.

The noble family didn’t seem to have time to even see or escort them, or rather, Watson himself didn’t deem it fit to bother them. He had the appropriate authority either way, he was more than capable of arranging the carriage for their journey.

This made sense to Ezekiel though. After all, he had seen how busy his parents had been while they were mere Barons, not to talk of Earls which controlled a vast array of lands. He didn’t think people of such status would bother to pay much attention to a manaless teenager and his E rank friends.

Plus such a concept was a common thing back on Earth. As a grass level employee, one couldn’t just hope to meet with the very CEO of the company just because of any minor issues. Such would be handled by their immediate superior.

The siblings didn’t seem to be happy with such a decision though. But seeing Ezekiel’s calm and apathetic expression as if the situation was as he had liked, they chose to tacitly keep shut, controlling their expressions.

Anna, on the other hand, shifted with embarrassment and guilt. But even she was helpless in such a situation, although she was the daughter of the Doyce family, she was just one of the many children the noble family had sired, though she was of the main line.

But even then she had many direct siblings, all who had been able to get into the Institute. Her admission was barely seen as a surprise by her parents so they did not deem it fit to delay whatever matter held them up just to see her off.

Around the carriages was a team of knights containing 10 individuals with a D rank Mage as the captain. They all bowed watching Watson descend from the sky with the four teenagers by his side. He nodded his head and gestured towards the four. "Younglings, this is Vera and her team of knights, they will be responsible for your safety during your journey to Valor City." He then nudged Anna forward, pointing her to one of the carriages. "Young miss, your transport."

The latter nodded before getting onto the carriage while Ezekiel and his friends got onto the other. At their sides, the knights their horses, ready to move.

With a flick of the whip, the horses moved forward, dragging the carriages behind them while the knights followed on their horses. Watson took the skies from behind them, his words finding its way to their ears. "I wish you a safe journey, younglings."

***

Ezekiel tried wiping the sweat off his forehead with a sleeve, only to remember that he was currently wearing his repair gloves but not after feeling its slightly warm and metallic surface painfully brush against his forehead.

He placed his portable workstation into his Dimensional ring, feeling lucky that the carriage was large enough to accommodate the main components of the workshop, allowing him to fix his and his friends’ Battlesuits. ’Nobles really know how to spend their money.’

The mechanic glanced about before returning the various items that had belonged to the carriage which he had kept so as to free up space. He stepped outside the carriage, almost groaning in pleasure as he felt the cool breeze brush against his skin while the earthy smell of the forest wafted towards him.

Vera and the other 9 knights tasked with their safety ignored the teenager, having gotten used to his unique method of forging after having traveled with him for 3 days. By now, they had already gotten over the mindboggling fact that a forger possessed the capability to forge without having a single strand of mana within his body or the fact that he was able to carry a portable forge with him wherever he went.

Vahn and Yuri, masquerading as Ezekiel’s guards, had also firmly rooted themselves as powerful and talented teens at the E rank who could handle the attacks of up to 5 knights at the same time—their magic was synergetic after all. Just remembering the scenes where five knights had teamed up on both the teenagers as a practice and had still gotten their asses handed to them, left a shameful and awkward smile on all those involved in the matter.

Anna had also been able to breach a bit of the distance between her and the three, after all, she hadn’t been the one to blame for her family’s indifference, not to mention that the mechanic didn’t even care about it in the first place.

Ezekiel yawned, his fatigue leaking out temporarily as he watched the siblings help with setting up camp for the knights while Anna stood by the side, internally struggling between deciding whether to join in to help or retain her noble demeanor.

Vera watched on with an amused expression on her face. Walking up to the knight, he smirked and spoke with a weirdly close level of familiarity. "Reveling in your young miss’ struggles I see."

The mage glanced at the teenager by her side and shrugged, unbothered by his words. "It’s not every time you stumble upon such a sight. In fact..."

She suddenly paused and glanced to the south, her expression turning somber as she infused mana into her throat while she yelled. "Gear up and pack up those tents already set up. A mana storm is approaching!"

"Huh?!" The mechanic jolted with a start, slapping on his visors while staring south along with her. He didn’t possess mana sense like all awakened after all, he had to rely on his inventions to pick up on any signs of concentrated mana around him.

And what he saw wasn’t good.

A mana storm was as named, a storm made up of highly concentrated mana. Normally, such a phenomenon would be seen as a blessing from the heavens because the path of an awakened was trying to absorb and condense as much mana as they could.

Such a concentrated mana would be able to allow them to progress at a crazily fast speed, capable of allowing them jump from the F rank all the way to the C rank all in the span of one day.

But it wasn’t a blessing. Not when such an influx of mana could stress the mana veins in an awakened body, overloading them to the point of them straight up blowing up from the inside out.

Even if that weren’t enough to kill them, the storm itself posed quite the significant amount of danger. Such a gathering of concentrated mana meant that the mana had become so powerfully condensed that it could leave its gaseous state to assume a physical nature. The size would range from a pea to a stone the size of a man’s head.

And all these physical states of mana would gather within a mana storm, flying about chaotically at an insane amount of speed. A speed which, while not able to immediately cut an individual into minced meat, was still able to pulverize them if they dared to stay within the periphery of the mana storm for more than a minute.

And such a storm was heading towards Ezekiel and his consort.