"…Heh. Watch your back."
William and Sarah heard only those words come out of the Wildflower Mage's mouth by the time they approached. But, even from afar, they could see the battle and its final result.
General Stormwalker Specter's back was soaked with some sort of greenish-purplish liquid that slowly tarnished and blackened his veins, causing pain all around his body, all while he was frozen still in place.
"…To think that powerful clash was all so that he could gain the upper hand with this," William said, "Those punches, they were loaded with a strength that could probably destroy buildings!"
Sarah agreed. In their eyes, the battle was intense and frightening. Each blow was infused with maximum power and a visible, potent aura and their fists were summoned by air pressure that could turn bones to dust in an instant.
Their technique, accuracy and devastatingly strong punching power, despite them being a mage and the other not using his ability to its maximum, could probably allow them to take on one hundred gorillas at once.
But, neither of them was even slightly scarred by that battle at all. This was not even close to a display of their true might, for either of them. And, to think that the lands were so much bigger and vast than before that there could be tens, or rather, hundreds of thousands of people stronger than these two.
"Hey, you two."
A voice snapped them out of their daydream. The completely still Specter was beckoning them to come and help him move freely again.
"I'll… hm… I tell you what, you two, I'll put in a good word for you two when I meet back up with the Chief General again!" He said, to no reply.
"No bite? Hmph, you two do know I can't stay like this forever, right?"
William and Sarah glanced at each other but still refused to reply.
"…This is your last chance. Or else, not only will I personally come for the head of that foolish mage, but for yours, too."
William finally responded by shaking his head in contempt.
"How do we know that you won't kill us the second we free you? And besides, I'm sure the mage wouldn't let us do it in front of his eyes anyway."
The Wildflower Mage, who listened in from a few steps away, flashed a small smile.
"Yep, I certainly wouldn't. But, thanks to your response I now know that you two aren't stupid." The Wildflower Mage said.
"This guy's just desperate not to fail his mission, as a high-ranking General of the Knights of Conquest."
Specter's eye twitched and he proceeded to glare bullets at the mage's head.
"Hah. But, you don't need to pay any attention to him anymore, since we're leaving."
Sarah glanced behind her and noticed the gradual sound of a horde of conqueror knights approaching fast, with sharpened spears and swords.
"Yeah, we need to go, now. But the question is, how will we leave?"
The mage gestured to the ground as if he was expecting such a question, and snapped his fingers. In an instant, a spurt of sewage water burst forth from the underground.
"The cellar dungeon isn't the only thing underneath the city floor. No matter how ruined the city above is, the underground will always be a safe passage, as it is almost as vast as the ocean."
William approached the sprinkling spurt of water and reeled from the dreary, nasty water in disgust at its smell.
"…It's sewage water…"
"Duh. Now quickly, head on in!" The Wildflower Mage said, pushing them into the gap in the ground, from which the stream of water spurted constantly.
William and Sarah found themselves falling several feet downwards through the leaking pipes and into the city's soiled waters. It was dark and glum and looked almost nothing like what they were expecting the sewers to look like. But, the one thing they did think right was that there were swarms of rats, almost everywhere.
The Wildflower Mage hopped into the opening soon after and he used another concoction in a vial, which he pulled from his pocket out of nowhere and doused on a random twig, just before setting it ablaze.
William stared at him oddly, and the Wildflower Mage turned to face him.
"What do you think? My concoctions are helpful, right?"
"…Sure."
The mage chuckled, before leading the two of them through the swampy sewage water and clutters of dung and waste. He was quiet for a few minutes, allowing William and Sarah to collect their thoughts together about him.
From what they gathered, this mage, which they still didn't know the name of, didn't seem too bad. However, both of them were still leaning more toward the cautious side due to the massive disparity in strength between them and him. But, what they didn't know was the fact that the Wildflower Mage already knew that they were cautious, slightly anxious, even, around him.
So, in an attempt to soothe their nerves in this dreary place, he decided to open up and talk about his experiences before the occurrence of Twilight's Dawn.
"Hey. Do you two want to hear a story?" He asked.
Hesitant by the sudden, unexpected question, the two gestured a faint yes.
"…Good. Since maybe my personal experiences will be able to mould what you'll experience out in this new world."
"And, I can tell you right now that your apprehensiveness towards me is the right attitude. This world will not be the one you're used to, after all. Everything will undoubtedly become grimdark and gloomy after everyone has settled in, with only one rule: survival of the fittest."
His tone changed suddenly, from a relaxed one to a more serious manner, and delved into a story that took up the remaining portion of the slow trudge to the destination he had in mind.
He solemnly spoke of where he came from, which was a particular place in the Desolate Lands.
Far north of the big cities and the Holy Capital of an eternal empire. According to the wishes of the emperor at that time, all had to worship the pantheon of deities that ruled the skies, the seas and the earth.
Even he didn't know if these Gods were in any way, shape or form similar to the earthly Gods, or if they were perhaps the beings who merged the worlds in the first place. But, in the northern Hermit Mountains where he once lived, it seemed a "God of Darkness" descended upon him and his fellow villagers every night.
They sacrificed their animals, they sacrificed their crops, and they even sacrificed those who had eternal karmic debt as criminals to the divine. And, in return, they gained a special gift, which they called, "divine power."
Using that gift, they all grew stronger and healthier than ever before, surpassing their limits. And yet, despite that, they weren't able to escape their fatal end, caused by mortality.
First, it was his elderly uncle that died. Then, soon after, his grandma and grandpa followed. And then, his sister, and his parents too. It wasn't until he was the only one left that he discovered a demonic statue at the base of the mountains, and a bowl of some strange, purplish concoction in front of it.
This statue resembled a horrific monster, a calamity that could only be described as an evil entity, like the daemons he often heard in stories. Despite him being original, the Wildflower Mage admitted he did not know much about the history of the Desolate Lands, and it seemed as though it were hidden on purpose.
At this time, rain poured heavily and lightning struck, and although he wanted to go back up due to a bad feeling he had, he caught a glimpse of the black lightning that struck the statue, emitting a mist of the very same divine power that they cherished.
He discovered then and there that it was a falsity.
Everything that had happened was the result of a foreign, evil power, a tangible, weaponized spiritual energy called "Karmic Debt", which was secretly imbued with some kind of strange mystical veil that hid its effects of corrosion. It ate away at the soul, and made sure there was nothing left by the time it had finished its job.
"…Everyone died. Merely because this trickery, caused Karmic Debt to seep into their bodies through the statue. And, I realised that upon absorbing it through my lungs and feeling a familiar effect to that of the special gift we received.
"…I realised that everything was set up to kill us all, and that… that the lands had no lack of evil."
William's eyes' landed on the unreadable expression on the mage's face. Neither of them could comfort him, because they knew instinctively in their hearts from the sound of his voice that he had grieved and mourned them for decades, no, even centuries.
"Hah… and do you know what was worse about it? The ones behind this atrocity were the same people behind many others. "The Bewitched". A group of humans that serve the daemons, the wicked, and the catastrophes that will destroy everything. At that time, two thousand years ago, they had once even managed to succeed in an open plot of killing a past emperor."
"This was their first open act of hostility to all living beings, and it also displayed their faction's true might for the first time. But, even though they were powerful, beyond even my comprehension, I hunted down any leads I could find, and slayed everybody who I thought was connected to that organization."
"I was so full of vengeance that I hunted and hunted until I met her, that sly vixen."
"…Who?" Sarah asked, intrigued by who he could have possibly described in such a rude way.
The Wildflower Mage stopped in his tracks and suddenly extinguished the torch in his hand. William remained calm, although he was surprised, and Sarah also tried her best to imitate the mage's unfazed behaviour.
"I've come to visit you, but you don't even look at me. How harsh of you, Lady Celine."
A harsher silence remained briefly before a pair of slithery, green eyes turned to face him.
Following the strange gaze, another flame was suddenly ignited in her palm, and the graceful figure of a beautiful and sleek black-haired woman graced all three of their eyes, lying on a bunch of crates put together to look like a miniature throne.
"Ha, so you just knew I would head here, in this dump of all places? Is that what you think of a respectable woman like me?" She asked, exhaling a puff of smoke from her thin smoke pipe.
He didn't answer, and so she smirked and took the opportunity to provoke him.
"What's the matter, Brewer? Cat's got your tongue?"