32nd of April, 412th of NDE. Thorngde Fort, Central Reykjanes Heimrad, Naireanth.

  The pleasant wind of te spring blew onto Veronirth’s bare chest the moment she opened the window of her residence in Thorngde Fort sitting along the main trade route leading from the southern megacity of Framnes to the equally humongous border-city of Gurung to the north.

  She took a deep breath while the wind rustled her purple-blue spiky hair cut in a boyish short style which fitted her brutishly cute face adorned with vague draconic features still lingering after five years of consuming the Bck Rose Blend.

  Her vibrant silver eyes in an elongated, graceful frame scoured the surroundings as her – and her friends, the noble-born Mil – looked straight out to the golden meadows surrounding the gloomy fort sitting atop an elevated pteau. To the north-west a forest of golden auburn foliage formed a crescent while a small river twisted and turned towards the cold peaks of the Eptirrion Mountain’s western range.

  “Dress up or you get a cold Vero!” Mil, her snow-blonde roommate and fellow cssmate said in her usual kind, but disciplining tone while she finished buttoning up her aetherna satin blouse with dark triangur colrs, straps, cuffs and hemline.

  “Just a second.” Veronirth breathed a handful once more before heading for her cabinet and opening it up, she stared at her uniform. Silently she offered a thanks to Myelia and to Lythienne for not making them wear skirts during the Neonate Program.

  For the most part she wore the same arcane faux leather and arcane satin combination of a uniform as Mil, except her blouse had deep crimson colrs, hemline, cuffs and straps on the shoulders. The single-breasted coat was the same elven styled bzer of dragonid leather as Mil’s, designed with a veiling pcket, double cuffed sleeves, a scalloped hem instead of the usual asymmetrical, snow-silver satin lining, framing, utility belt, a singur enormous piece which they counted as a pel folding over the chest and finally the cheek high neck with a folded down, pyramid shaped colr.

  Though for them they also received a short cloak of mixed dragonid leather and aetherna satin hanging loosely from the baseline of the neck. And unlike Mil who properly wore her uniform, zipping and buttoning up everything which she could, Veronirth preferred to wear her uniform a bit more loosely, with the necktie of theirs just practically dropped over the neck.

  Before Mil could try to fix her uniform, a knock sounded on their door and Veronirth like some shade glided across the room beside her and greeted their fellow Neonate, Nabee an exotic beauty of the southern colony of the Alliance with a bright ultramarine hair of moderate length with two ponytails while most of it was still cascading down into the confines of her coat’s open neck.

  “Good morning!” Veronirth’s deep voice echoed through the hallway, waking up the few still in the phase of five more minutes as she wrapped around her slender, muscle ripped arm Nabee’s colr and pulled her along while Mil followed after them while sighing and stroking her forehead beneath the thick jungle of a curving bangs.

  “Well, Venerable-Sister Sumevarina shall reprimand her once more.” Mil murmured as she carefully closed the door then followed after the two far ahead at the stairs leading down to the cantina of the apartment-tower of the eastern wall of old and dark, stacked stones still perfectly smooth and gleaming.

  **

  “You know, you can eat with a slow pace right Vero?” Mil said as she looked with a tired expression at Veronirth who already packed half her cheeks with the famed waffles of Reykjanes heimrad dosed in a copious amounts of chocote sauce mixed with imported maple syrup from Northern Eoran and a bit of whipped cream that formed into a faux moustache above her softly gleaming lips.

  Nabee just watched as if she looked at her own pet hound munching on his food. “I think it’s fine, she needs all the energies for today.” She said in her soft, husky voice as she smeared the processed troll rd over the toast then levitated the purple onion into the air which then sliced itself into many hundreds of part with a few nding on the greasy ptform of the toast.

  Veronirth nodded in agreement as she grasped the fourth yer of waffles – once a proud tower of ten yers – and tore it into four parts with her golden cws garnishing her fair fingers. “At least you could use a knife and a fork.” Mil said defeatedly as this was the fifteenth morning since they began their month-long internship in the fort. And it was five years since she befriended the two at the Academy in the northern range of the Eptirrion Mountain.

  The Neonate Program itself served as a way for the students to find out which path they truly wished to tread on after their graduation. Which was why the program itself started from halfway through their studies, offering them plenty of time to choose. Though these three already knew what path they wanted to follow.

  Veronirth herself wished to become a Drengriar then rise there to the top or at least the second step below. Mil herself was a bit different, partly because of the expectations of her family, partly because she wanted to be like her idol, Lythienne and become a volvaeth then reach to the top no matter what.

  Nabee while initially a bit unsure, chose the path to become a protector, a vordriar hoping to get back to her homend after graduation and crack down on the criminal elements of her home city and make sure her little sisters can grew up in a peaceful environment.

  “Have you guys heard of the recent bank heist?” Nabee wanting to change topics asked as she peeked at the back page of the newspaper Mil picked up while sipping her ogre hand sized mug of coffee with a spiraling tower of a whip cream on it.

  Which she then immediately whipped around and read it in a second while Veronirth swallowed the waffles grinded between her fangs. “The one with them grinding down the guards weapons, the staffs belonging and using the transmuting machine to print a colossal amount of money?” She asked while using her leathery sleeves to wipe off the cream from the edge of her lips.

  Nabee nodded. “Those guys were quite creative I must say. Why didn’t no one thought of doing that yet?”

  “Because it is foolish. Those bank notes will ooze with magical residue and no doubt they shall be found in a few weeks.” The two looked at her with questioning looks and after her quite bountiful breast of hers expanded she expined in her covertly haughty style. “You see usually when banks print their money, before they put them into circution, they put them into a pressing machine which sips out any residual mana. Reason being that some of these notes in the early days were used to assassinate important figures like nobles or states-folk.”

  “That sounds cool.” Veronirth said as she toyed with the idea of joining the Raven Eyes. “And terrifying more importantly.” She then added when Mil looked at her menacingly. Even one of her ancestors from a few centuries ago was a victim of such technique, as when he received a payment for selling weapons to a now nameless group, his whole body melted away while he counted the notes infused with a curse.

  “More importantly, it seems like the head of the Stromberg guild passed away years ago while he was on his own deep sea vessel, killed by pirates.” Mil said as her eyes moved to the adjacent segment with a rge photo of the elderly head former head of the company.

  “He should have hired us.” Veronirth said unaware that he did hire the Bck Roses but Mil decided to remain silent instead, letting this shame pass her friend.

  “I hope it won’t affect the trade with the colony.” Nabee murmured as she finished the st bite of her toast then drank the special mint tea which dispersed the bad breath usually following in the trail of such county cuisine.

  “Don’t think so. It is a big revenue to the guild, and as far as I am aware he had little to do with that business.” She was quite close to the truth, though as she was a sorceress in the making, she had little idea that Stromberg armed both sides – theirs and the rebels fighting for sovereignty.

  “That was good. Let’s go.” Ignoring that Veronirth burped and rose from her chair feeling refreshed. “Don’t forget your beret.” Mil yelled after her as the trio left the cantina and headed to report to Venerable-Sister Sumevarina.

  **

  Her vibrant silver eyes with slit pupils followed the Drekavac, small and hunched devilish goblinoids with rotten brass epidermis, primitive heads with sloped foreheads merging into their bald head while their pointy ears of infernal contours took an interesting turn upwards. Their eyes small and filled with savage insidiousness while their mouths are wide with their fork tongue fpping beyond its dried, fleshy borders.

  The flow of her mana gave a slightly tickling sensation that helped her focus while her sight sharpened and zoomed in on the furthest of the savage group. Like a twisting river, parts of her mana changed their trajectory into her hands, and then right into the stave rifle which wooden stock pressed into her shoulder.

  Suddenly a small fiery sphere ejected from the round, metallic barrel engraved with rose thorn patterns and hit the target in the head. The devilish creature had no time to let out a deathly shriek as its head exploded in fmes which swiftly swallowed the chunks of flesh and bone.

  “Good shot!” The eahrith drengriar with long and luxuriant naturally flowing vermillion red hair – better known as Venerated-Sister Sumevarina – complimented her while she too aimed and shot at three different drekavacs at the same time. Each of their heads exploded as a mana bullet of solid earth passed through their soft skin and meat, spraying their dark blood and fetid flesh onto the thick bark of the trees covered in emerald vines slithering above.

  “Nice one too Venerated-Sister!” Nabee complimented too in her soft voice, and Sumevarina turned at her smiling kindly while holding back the urge to pat the girl.

  As a high ranking drengriar, Sumevarina’s uniform possessed a few additional decorative elements. Like the cloak having snow silver liquid paldium roots spreading on its metallic silken surface, her imposing, triangur colrs bearing simirly liquid metallic draconic cw marks numbering at three on each side close to the tips, with each heading towards the back curve shortening.

  “You did well too Mil. Now let’s clean up their corpses.” Sumevarina coughed then spoke in her imperatively deep voice as she swung the stave rifle over her left shoulder, Veronirth doing the same while watching, imprinting each movement into her mind while nodding.

  While the two were the more combat oriented part of the group, Mil’s task was to keep the group under a bubble of magical inscription erasing their presence, their smell, their form outside its border. Nabee on the other hand simply had the task to supply Mil with mana as the spell consumed it quite voraciously.

  “Creepy.” Nabee said as the group moved back to the road and she noticed the bckened skeletal remains pieced together in an eborate formation. A cold aura emanated from them, chilling her spine as she took a short peek at it.

  “Keep your eyes from them. While they are savage, their “shamans” are quite well-versed in mental spells and enchantments.” Sumevarina said as they slowly approached the four drekavac’s corpses. Then she looked at Veronirth and the two held their arms out, their hands at the elevation of their foreheads with fingers intertwined for a short moment as they circled back with their knees poking their abdomens.

  At the same time, numerous small holes opened in the earth and swallowed the grizzly remains before closing back in. “Can you still hold out Mil?” Without saying a word, Mil nodded and at her command, the group headed back to the fort, just as a group of merchants arrived with their mechanized carts.