When A Mage Revolts

On the northern side of the capital, on a deserted plain that was far off the main road, a carriage moved swiftly.

In the carriage sat Michelle and Benjamin.

Before this, after leaving the capital the two had headed towards the direction of Perseus Lake. But after walking for a while, Michelle noticed something. Her expression changed slightly. She knelt down and placed her ear on the floor to listen.

Seeing this, Benjamin panicked a little.

"What’s wrong?"

Michelle did not say anything, but made a gesture for him to keep quiet, signaling him not to make any noise. After that, she stuck closely to the floor and frowned, as if she was concentrating to try to hear something that came from far away.

What the hell?

Benjamin knew what Michelle was doing. Thus, he did not bother Michelle, and instead stood aside, silently waiting for her results.

After five minutes.

"The holy knights are on to us, they are huge in numbers, I can hear their galloping." Michelle stood up to dust off the dirt, and said," But, their movements were scattered, I can’t really tell which direction they are headed…...plus, many of them are headed towards the capital instead."

Upon hearing this, Benjamin frowned.

The skill of listening from the surface of the ground- he has read it somewhere before. Right now, Michelle could hear the galloping of the holy knights’ horses. This meant that their distance from the Church’s men was not far.

How troublesome...

The place they were at now was rather secluded, but the north side of the capital was not that big. If their opponents rode on horses – in addition to the size of their numbers- they would eventually search the whole area.

If the holy knights are doing a widespread search, how far would they escape on two legs?

They had to escape the area before the holy knights found them. If not, the Church would eventually catch up. The problem now was time.

Benjamin suddenly had an idea and said it out loud, "Why not…...steal a few horses?"

Michelle looked at Benjamin and raised an eyebrow. After some consideration, she nodded in agreement.

This led to the scene of them sitting on a horse drawn carriage.

What they intended to do was to steal two fast horses. If riding them, they could go far, far away. But, two fast horses were hard to find - they could not just go steal the horses from the holy knights.

At the same time, to prevent being spotted by the holy knights, they could not return to the main road, they could only patrol the surrounding area. If Michelle heard the horseshoes, they would turn around and go in another direction.

With this method, and much effort, they eventually managed to bump into a horse drawn carriage.

The carriage was simple, and was rather derelict. But at the same time, the carriage was empty, parked by the roadside, and not carrying a single person. The horses that were bound to the carriage were already bored to the point that they were blowing out air from their noses.

At the time, Michelle carefully walked toward the carriage. After making sure that there was nothing wrong with it, she looked around to double check her surroundings, knelt, stuck her ear to the ground and listened to the sound of the holy knights’ movements.

After a while, she stepped up, frowned and said:" All the sounds have vanished. Those holy knights seemed to have all returned to the capital. But, not only the new group of holy knights - those that left the capital along with us, the sound of their horses is gone as well."

Hearing this, Benjamin sensed that something was awfully wrong.

For no reason at all, there was an empty horse carriage by the roadside, the holy knights had returned to the city, the travelers were nowhere to be seen…. if he had not already made sure the nature of this world, he would have thought himself in a supernatural scenario.

Where did the people go? Could it be that there was gold raining in the capital, making them change their minds?

Thinking of this, he looked down at ground around the carriage.

The floor was messy and there were hoof prints everywhere. It was obvious that the horses that were here were not the only ones that were bound to this carriage. Not only that, the important part was that on some of the prints, he could see a small cross.

Making patterns on horseshoes was such an unnecessary act, only the Church would do such a thing.

But the horseshoe prints that had crosses on them all stopped around here. Looking at the direction, the people probably turned around here and returned via their original route.

"From the looks of it, the owner of this carriage was brought back by the holy knights." After some thought, Benjamin came up with this conclusion.

Michelle nodded.

But even after realizing of the origins of the carriage, it did not help them to guess what the Church’s motive was. The Church came to capture all these people? Why? If they did not want anyone to leave, why would they open the gates to let them out?

So strange...

Plus, he was the one the Church wanted. The holy knights capturing innocent people, and making no efforts to conduct a search, what could this mean?

Benjamin was still confused, but Michelle did not care much anymore. She walked a few steps ahead, grabbed the reins, and boarded the carriage.

"No matter what the Church plans to do, the horse carriage is already here, there is no point rejecting it." She looked inside and turned around" Come aboard, this horse carriage is safe. We have to get away from the capital as quickly as possible."

Thus, Benjamin boarded the horse carriage as well.

On the carriage, the two did not head directly to Perseus Lake. Instead, they took the long route to prevent being spotted by the Church.

Their path inclined towards the west.

About ten kilometers west of the Capital, plains slowly led to a mountainous area. The mountains there were not tall, most of them were just small hills, but there were two taller ones. Between them, the better known one was Mount North, it was once the base of operations of the most infamous gang in the land: The Bandits of Mount North.

The bandits were long gone, and their boss that earlier had managed to escape was already killed by Benjamin - with a single shot. Mount North should now just be an empty and abandoned mountain.

Of course, they did not plan to hide there. If they went there, they had to stray further off course, and that could lead to more unpleasant possibilities. They just wanted to borrow the geographical advantage it provided to escape from the Church. After that they could slowly make their way to Pearl Valley.

Using the underground pass, reaching the Valley of Broken Armies, then escaping the Kingdom of Helius was their real motive.

Time passed slowly, and the capital was left further and further behind. On the way, everything was peaceful. They did not have any encounters and eventually sense of impending danger slowly faded. Benjamin even entered his dimension of consciousness to continue working on repairs of the rift.

Slowly, time passed into the afternoon, the light in the sky slowly dimmed, and the surrounding trees had their shadows lengthened.

After spending some time doing the repairs, Benjamin felt mentally exhausted and left his dimension of consciousness, ready to rest.

On the carriage, he looked at the surroundings which was totally foreign to him. Suddenly, he turned around and looked at Michelle.

Luckily, sitting in the carriage, there was nothing for them to do. It was time for the questions in his heart to be answered.

"Initially, you acted mysteriously, like you had an ulterior motive. But now, why do I feel like you honestly want to help me?" He frowned and asked.