‘Do we fight or ignore them?’ Micky asked as the quartet of Blues loomed ahead.

Even from hundreds of metres away, the enemy mages’ faces appeared solemn – the poor bastards clearly understood the level of danger they were in, but their superiors had probably left them no choice but to try and get in Percy’s way. Of course, Micky was more than fast enough to circle around them and skip the fight entirely if necessary, but Percy was still trying to decide whether that was the best course of action.

‘I don’t want to kill more people than we have to, and I would rather not waste time on them. Still…’

The problem was that the groups Percy left standing might not give up. There was a good chance they’d chase after him and Micky, following them all the way to the Fungal Spire and drawing even more attention in the process. That would lead to everyone figuring out Percy’s goal even sooner. If that wasn’t bad enough, they would also constitute a hidden danger – should Percy and Micky face trouble at their destination, they’d have to worry about the additional Blues catching up from behind and placing them in an even tougher spot.

Sighing, he stood on his familiar’s back, knowing that dealing with the Blues here was the safest option. Four were a lot. It was on par with the previous group – the most he and Micky had ever faced at once. Thankfully, they would probably be much weaker without the dangerous assassin in their ranks. The sheer number of hostile domains would certainly be an issue, but both Percy and Micky had grown stronger over the past few days.

Summoning a pair of scythes from his spatial seal, he rolled his shoulders, taking a deep breath after another to push the Carnival to its limits. Grey flares of phantom mana danced erratically around him, painting a stark contrast against the pale backdrop of snow spinning around the crow.

‘Three minutes. That’s all the time we can afford to spend here. Any more and we’d be better off just escaping,’ Percy said, getting a round of mental nods back from his companions.

Peering ahead, he scanned his opponents carefully, trying to spot any clues that might help, though he came up empty-handed. The group appeared to contain mages from two different Houses – allied ones, most likely – but Percy failed to identify them. Hopefully, they wouldn’t have any troublesome bloodlines.

Two women were dressed in cyan robes, the badge pinned to the left side of their chests depicting either a stag or a tree, though it was hard to tell what exactly it was from that distance, the screen of icy mist partially obscuring Percy’s vision not making things any easier. The other two – a lanky man and a woman dressed in yellow clothes – had insignias depicting the sun. Sadly, contacting Nesha wasn’t an option at the moment, so Percy would have to go in blind.

There was no way to tell whether these people had been part of the previous manhunt from a few months ago, or if they’d recently been asked to join due to him and Micky roaming close to their families’ lands. Either way, this was Percy’s first time seeing any of them.

It was also clearly their first time seeing him – the famous criminal they had likely heard so much about. Despite their apparent advantage in numbers and information, the lanky man floating in the centre-left of the group swallowed visibly after meeting Percy’s scrutinizing gaze. Evidently, he had hoped that the encounter wouldn’t have devolved into a fight to the death. Sadly for him, that hope was quickly dashed as Percy chose to call their bluff.

Regardless, the enemy Blues didn’t wait passively for Percy and Micky to attack. Instead, they seized the initiative when they were still about a hundred metres away. Two attacked from either side, violent torrents of water shooting at the crow and his rider. The others didn’t sit idly either, launching a colossal boulder and a massive fireball that rolled together into a red-hot meteor, flying straight toward Percy’s face, leaving a long, smoking trail in its passing.

Micky dove to avoid the powerful spells – something that the stacked domains made extremely difficult. The thick willpower felt like an ocean of honey, making even the slightest movement a monumental struggle.

‘The sooner we bring one of them down, the sooner we’ll have some breathing room,’ Percy noted.

The crow spun, using the rotating sheet of ice mana imbued with his own willpower as a knife to shave off part of the hostile domains, Percy grabbing against his familiar’s plumage firmly to remain glued to his back. Micky barely managed to fly beneath the oversized blasts in time, but Percy didn’t care about that. He grinned, seeing an opportunity in the chaos.

Stolen story; please report.

The enemy group fired a second round of attacks, but Percy and Micky had an easier time dodging this one, knowing what affinities to expect at least.

Scattering broken shafts in his surroundings, Percy gathered as much soul-freezing ice mana as the clone had already provided him into his hand. Pointing his palm at a weakness he spotted in the walls of mana and willpower visible in his mutated eyes, he aimed at one of the silver silhouettes hiding behind the obstructions.

Then, he fired.

The Soul-crushing Needle phased through the aquamarine river shooting from his right side, drilling soundlessly through the inky-black lines permeating the magical liquid. The woman he was targeting appeared to realize the danger she was in at the very last second, her silhouette flaring with horror as she tried to dodge.

Percy never saw the attack land, having been forced by the apocalyptic explosion just over his head to duck on Micky’s back. Still, it must’ve found its mark, judging by the woman’s lifeless body plummeting toward the ground a moment later, her eyes glazed over. Just like that, the first of their four opponents had been dealt with, a quarter of the suffocating pressure vanishing right with her!

Percy didn’t allow himself to relax, however, knowing that this was the best time to follow-up with a second blow to his opponents’ morale. Leaping off Micky’s back, he jumped from one pair of crossed shafts to the next, heading toward the lanky Blue – the fire affinity user.

The enemy mages looked shocked by their companions’ sudden death, but that barely lasted an instant. Regaining his composure, the earth user tried to assist her male teammate in stopping Percy, while the surviving water mage was forced to attack Micky instead.

Percy found it difficult to build up momentum inside so many domains, though he managed to dodge most of the attacks flying toward him by slipping through narrow gaps in the willpower. Splitting their domains between two moving targets clearly wasn’t easy for the Blues. Hovering a few dozen metres away from his target, Percy put as much pressure on him as possible to give Micky a chance to take another one down.

The crow spun faster and faster, the howling blizzard hugging his frame intensifying with each revolution. The pale winds connected with his oversized beak, increasing its penetrating power and range greatly as they propelled him forward.

Another river of compressed water shot toward the bird, but Micky didn’t bother to dodge this one, meeting it head on. A grinding screech permeated the aerial battlefield, the magical liquid freezing and shattering into a cloud of fine powder that sparkled under the dim sunlight. The spell barely slowed the oversized bird, Micky’s beak snapping shut around the woman’s core a second later, ripping her body apart in the process.

[Congratulations! Your familiar’s spells have merged: Dance of the Savage Gods – Masterful + Wild Art: Consumption – Masterful + Wild Art: Winter’s Fang – Masterful - Wild Art: Symbel of the Savage Gods – Masterful!]

Under different circumstances, Percy might have cracked a smile. His friend had finally completed his boosting art after decades of relentless efforts, merging all of his spells into a top-tier Masterful spell on par with the Carnival.

Unfortunately, he was somewhat busy with his own side of the fight at the moment – though he was about to get markedly less so. Tiptoeing around and through a barrage of stone javelins as thick as tree trunks, he rapidly approached his prey. The disappearance of another domain finally allowed him to pick up speed, rendering his opponents powerless to keep him at bay.

The lanky man tried to dodge, of course, but he was no match for Percy’s speed. Clearly realizing that he was done for, he unleashed what was left of his reserves as Percy’s scythes sank into his torso, probably trying to take his killer down with him. A tsunami of flames burst out of every pore in the Blue’s body, incinerating his clothes in an instant before slamming onto Percy.

Percy didn’t panic, however, believing in his own means to protect him. He pulled his hood down to shield his face, pouring mana into his Cloak’s runes. The reinforced silk and the structural integrity enchantments negated most of the force. At the same time, he fed what little ice mana he’d been able to recover into the heating runes, relying on them and his freshly tempered body to resist the scorching flames.

The blast still sent him flying back of course. He took a moment or two to regain his balance, feeling like he’d been struck by a charging ram. Thankfully, his injuries were rather light, and his familiar had already attacked the fourth Blue to defend him.

The rest of the battle didn’t hold much suspense.

The water mage appeared to realize that she didn’t stand a chance, though she still fought to her last breath to delay Percy and Micky – if only by a few more seconds. Whether she was acting out of stubbornness, hatred over her relative’s demise, a misguided sense of duty, or something else entirely, Percy didn’t know nor care.

He and Micky cleaned up the battlefield as soon as she was dead, storing any elixirs they could find into his spatial seal while feeding the cores to the crow. Climbing onto his familiar’s back, Percy instructed the bird to resume his flight, leaving Remior poorer by four more Blues.

It hadn’t even been a full three minutes.