As Aron and the group were making their way through the desert like valleys of the Veldra Community, the loud boom of the Astroda exploding caught their attention and caused everyone to grow alert.
"What was that?" Henry who wasn't far behind Aron came to halt and asked this aloud while looking in the direction the sound had come from.
Soon the entire group followed his gaze and all they could see was a large cloud of smoke in the far distance which caused them to worry.
"It's likely from a battle, if so it won't be long before Aethelian forces know that there's been a breach in the area." Esmeralda narrowed her eyes and made the most obvious guess as to what the origin of the blast could have been.
Many thought along the same lines as her so no one bothered to bring up another theory, including Aron and Rose who let everyone speculate. In a situation such as this it was best they not involve themselves too much.
"If that truly is the case then it won't be long till we are caught. They'll be moving via airships whilst we are on foot, not to mention much of the terrain here is open and dry land so we can't even expect to find good cover." Juliet also added a worrisome point that they couldn't neglect.
Despite Ariel and the other elves leaving, the group was still quite large and thus easy to spot. If they continued to move like they were in this largely open region then it wouldn't be long before they got caught or encountered trouble.
"You, Elves. Don't you know of any passages or routes we could exploit?" An irritated Brutas looked in the direction of Sharla and Mirai before asking this with great impatience.
Although he was being rude, nobody corrected him and instead they all turned to the two elves as well, hopeful that they may present a solution. But alas that wasn't to be the case. "Sorry but we don't know much about the Veldra Community, we can only be of help once you cross the boarder into Aethel." Sharla replied hurriedly with clear irritation in her voice, she didn't like Brutas's tone one bit but chose not to speak up as they were outnumbered should a confrontation arise.
"Then we can only divide into smaller groups and each use different routes to enter Aethel." Aron finally spoke up and brought up a reasonable suggestion given the current circumstances.
Henry didn't even to ponder long on it before agreeing to the suggestion by giving Aron a nod. "You're right, let's split up into groups of five then, the more experienced among us can act as group leaders."
After Henry's words everyone began glancing at one another curious as to how the groups would be organized. Many thought it would obvious who Aron would take but much to their surprise he made quite an odd selection.
"Then I'll be going with Evanora, Mirai, Sharla and Lucas." This selection caused the others to look at him strangely, Lucas included. The majority had expected him to group up with people he was familiar with.
"Why them?" Juliet asked out of genuine curiosity and Aron quickly responded. "Evanora only cooperates with me, Mirai and Sharla would be discriminated against if grouped with anyone else and lastly Lucas would want to be with them, simple as that."
No one could refute Aron's words as he indeed had made a could point. Not only did the teams need some strong individuals but they also needed at least some sort of chemistry with one another to prevent internal conflict.
After seeing Aron's selection the others proceeded to quickly make their own. Brutas, Henry, Lady Rose and Esmeralda all lead single groups whilst Esmeralda had Emilia in her team, Juliet had Anastasia in hers, Claudia had Scarlett and Xavier in hers, Sebastian had chosen to join Henry.
For the most part the groups had balanced out. The extra individuals left even after groups were split had joined up with Lady Rose or Henry.
Once this was done, each group leader selected the route they'd be taking before finally parting ways. As Aron and Lady Rose were doing so, the two glanced at each other in the corner of their eyes before giving subtle nods.
….
Evening soon turned to night and the groups had now made some distance between one another. Aron's group would be taking a route in the south eastern direction which on the surface didn't look to be a problem as many thought he just randomly picked it.
What they didn't know is that his route was basically a linear way of heading towards Aethel's capital, although this meant he would also likely encounter more obstacles.
As for Lady Rose, he hadn't shown her the map either or directions and left her to navigate on her own. This wouldn't be difficult for her thanks to her scouters which she could use to track Aron at any given time so she had picked a random route that didn't align with Aron's.
….
"Won't we be taking a break? It's getting late." Lucas soon suggested as the group hadn't stopped moving since parting ways with the others. Sharla had also looked towards Mirai and felt a break would be necessary.
Elves had rather weak physics when compared to other races and so it wasn't all that surprising that their endurance was low. However Aron wasn't about to make exceptions. "We can only best move at night, given how open this region is it would be easy to spot us during the day. Our biggest task now is finding shelter before sunrise." Aron didn't stop walking as he spoke while glancing around, trying to be sure they wasn't anyone or anything within a kilometer radius at the very least.
Sharla wanted to argue but his words were right. "Sharla don't worry about me I'm fine, this much I can handle." Mirai spoke gently as she knew Sharla only made this suggestion because of her.
As Aron was walking he glanced at the three in the corner of his eye and narrowed his eyes on Sharla. 'For an elf she's got quite the endurance, even surpassing Lucas. Strange.' Aron thought before feeling a tug on his right, coming from none other than Evanora who barely had any presence during the entire trip.
When he glanced at her she pointed towards a mountain range and spoke. "There, Evanora thinks there's food there." She muttered sheepishly causing Aron to focus on that very mountain range before understanding what she meant.
[ Aspect; Earthen Vision]
He then crouched down and placed his palm before using the aspect of the Horned Basilisk to map out the land. The results he got caused him to nod in Evanora's direction before standing back up.
"There's a settlement within that mountain range or at the very least a gathering of Veldrea. We can find shelter there so let's hurry." Aron didn't bother explaining how he discovered they were Veldrea there and just left the others curious.
What using the aspect had showed was the geographical aspect of the earth within a one and half kilometer radius in all directions including underground and above sea level. He didn't expand this radius as it would use up more of the Basilisk's mana that he held unnecessarily.
The results showed him some artificial looking tunnels within the mountain range and large open areas underground that he could only assumed belonged to Veldrea.
Given how barren the land was on the surface it was no surprise that they dwelled in mountain ranges and underground.
"I doubt they'll be friendly to us so how do you plan on getting shelter?" Lucas raised a good point as only Mirai and Sharla were elves but Aron didn't answer and continued to walk.
…
The journey was short and the group arrived at the base of the mountain range before turning to Aron. "We'll go in under the guis of being enforcers." He suddenly muttered without turning to behind to the others.
Since Mirai and Sharla lacked knowledge concerning the Veldra community it couldn't be helped that he had to take the lead. Things may have been easier if Ariel had been the one who chose to remain but alas that wasn't the case.
The very fact he didn't truly know what an enforcer was meant he had to be clever about maintaining the cover. He didn't think too much on this because if he got found then he got simply destroy the place.
[ Aspect: Death Stalker; Shapeshift ]
In the next moment Aron's ears had grown more elongated and his hair had become a heavy blonde color whilst his eyes became a piercing blue. Although only these three feature were changed he looked nothing like his usual self apart from the stature.
"Evanora commands her hair, ears and eyes to look like Aron." Evanora followed and commanded this before she underwent the same changes. This caused Aron to glance at her a bit oddly.
'She must have some limits or parameters.' Aron thought with slightly narrowed eyes at the enigma that was Evanora.
For image casters, their limit was their imagination. How vividly one could picture something would determine how the spell would be cast, the secondary factor was one which affected them most being mana capacity and control.
If an image caster had low mana capacity and control then they couldn't bring forth strong spells ( arts and techniques ) without causing self harm or even death to themselves.
However Evanora possessed a mana demon that covered for her short comings making her a terrifying existence despite her simple mindedness.
With Aron and Evanora now looking like elven siblings the only person left was Lucas. "Evanora commands the same for the weak boy." She muttered and despite the vague words Lucas had the same features appear, all that muttered was the image she had projected in her mind.
Just this more demonstration made her value towards Aron rise even more. An image caster was extremely rare and so were mana demons so for the two to exist in one being with such perfect synergy left him quite interested although on the surface he maintained a regular expression.
"Wow, they feel so real and so sensitive." Lucas muttered as he began touching his ears weirdly.
N0 v el Next. CoM
"Right well just leave the talking to me once we make contact. The entry point should only be a bit further ahead." With those words from Aron the group started to move again and entered the mountain range.
The passageway leading into it was rocky and narrow with a large mountain on either side extending all the way up. Soon they encountered some roughly craved steps that allowed them to climb up a bit higher before arriving at a large door like structure made right into the mountain.
It was about two meters high and wide with the material being earth itself which gave it a sort of natural look despite being in the mountain.
In front of this strange door were some Veldrea that looked to standing guard and patrolling. The fact they couldn't sense Aron or the others until they were in their line of site was testament to how dull their senses were.
When they did finally notice and the others approaching they grew alert. "Who goes there!?" but only for a moment until they saw the elven features the group held, replacing their alertness with worry and fear.
"We are enforcers, I'm here to speak to your leader." Aron replied in a very domineering tone while ascending the ruggedly made steps.
