Wolfe double-checked his motorcycle as the witches and the Noxus Elders got settled into the APC and rearranged the gear which he had loaded in there for them.
"We're ready to go when you are." The driver called out as the doors closed.
Wolfe swung a leg over the bike and gave her a thumbs up. "I will cast the necessary spells on the vehicle if you get stuck, so just keep at it, and we will make good time to the border."
The driver didn't waste any more time and floored the accelerator, sending the vehicle bouncing across the rough terrain at a pace that Wolfe was certain the occupants wouldn't be happy about.
The ride smoothed out a few seconds later as someone in the vehicle, presumably the Headmistress, cast an Air Magic spell to help suspend the vehicle's weight and make the ride easier for the suspension to handle.
Follow on NovᴇlEnglish.nᴇtThat let them move quite quickly over the rough grasslands, leaving no doubt that they would at least be at the former front lines well before dark or even back onto the developed roads that led to the Academy.
Most of the region had good roads leading to the villages and cities once you got a bit further from the border, so once they got there, Wolfe could be reasonably sure that they would be safe to get back to the Academy.
He was strongly considering going all the way to the Academy with them though, just to make sure that they made it safely and got Peach back to her home base, where she wouldn't have to worry about ambushes and treachery.
Well, not as much treachery. The Coven Council was sure to still have some people embedded in the facility who would immediately report back to them, but they wouldn't be as great of a concern as the bandit groups who might have planted traps along the road to catch travellers off guard.
They had just passed a small stand of trees when Wolfe caught sight of a group of monsters, and for some reason, the vehicle turned toward them. The rushing wind made it impossible to talk to the driver, but Wolfe pulled up to the window to see if she would get his confusion through gestures.
The driver made an eating gesture to him when he caught her attention, and Wolfe realized what they were doing. The group was oversized Water Buffalo, with Water Magic as prodigious as their size, but they were delicious and a favourite of the locals now that they had the enchanted ammunition to safely hunt them.
Even one would be enough to feed a village for weeks, as they weighed nearly two tonnes when alive, so Wolfe changed course to get one for the Witches.
The herd began to move away as Wolfe approached, sensing the danger that the Magi posed, but there was one nearly lame member left behind. It had clearly been attacked by other monsters, and one leg was broken, so Wolfe targeted it first.
A full power cast of [Wind Blades] lopped the head off the injured beast, ending its suffering before it even noticed it was under attack and letting the body fall softly to the grass.
The herd was better off when they lost the weakest members since they wouldn't have to sacrifice more of their own to protect the weak, and as soon as the lame Water Buffalo was down, the slow-moving herd picked up speed and moved to the far side of the pond.
It was still well within Wolfe's range, but it was far enough that the herd felt safe that he would stop targeting them. They weren't wrong. As soon as Wolfe got to the fallen monster, he began to dress it and remove the innards so that it could be transported on top of the APC.
The vehicle rolled up to a stop beside him, and the Noxus Elders hopped out to give him a hand with the body.
"No need, gentlemen. I have Gravity Magic, so I can move it directly to the roof. Then you will only need to strap it down, and we will be ready to go again." Wolfe reminded them.
"Well, that makes life easier. Alright, we will tie it to the roof, and we can get going again. The witches were way too excited about the prospect of fresh monster meat when they saw the pack, so we had to detour." The Elder laughed.
Follow on Novᴇl-Onlinᴇ.cᴏmThe driver was off just as fast as before once the animal was strapped to the roof, and Wolfe could only shake his head at the strange sense of excitement that the Witches seemed to have gotten once they reached the Fae Forest.
It might be because he had fixed their mana pathways, but they seemed more like kids on their first field trip. They needed to see everything for themselves and do all the things.
But then, most of these had been drafted out of the Academy, and the others were far too old to be excitable, so it made sense that it felt like students on a field trip with the teachers.
Wolfe scouted ahead, but in this part of the Frozen Wastes, he didn't expect to see much of anything but the occasional monster. With the sense of power that he gave off, all the small creatures would hide as he rode past, and the majority of the monsters had moved either toward the coast for better hunting or up into the mountains to avoid the warmer weather.
In all, it only took them an hour and a half to reach the border of the Frozen Wastes at the breakneck speed which the APC was maintaining. That had to be hard on Peach's mana, but she would warn them before she ran out, Wolfe was certain.
That meant they would soon be on real roads again. Dirt roads, but proper roads, where they could hold much higher speeds toward the Academy.
The first one started right behind the first camp that they came across, so the driver took a wide detour. The area around the camps was still highly toxic and saturated with the poison from the mundane army's attack. That was why nobody had gone in to recover anything.
Even if they took it back out, it was all poison, and it would strip the powers of anyone who was in contact with it. The Witches were just hoping that Wolfe could do something about that before he brought what he found back to them.