"Fine. Begin the spell"
Taking a deep breath, everyone moves to the side as Valentine begins.
Slowly she stretched her palm into the air, and it rippled. Wasting no time, she tore it open with her two hands.
Raising her palm, she stopped the suction force that would otherwise swallow everyone around and then widened the portal size slowly until it stabilized.
Upon stabilizing, she heard a voice behind her.
"I'll be assisting. Hold on"
"What?"
A palm landed squarely on her back, and before she could question it, large amounts of mana penetrated her skin.
That of the same quality as a mana stone.
Valentine was temporarily breathless. Coming back to reality, she tried to control the mana.
"Don't try to control it, just let it all out" Ezra instructed, and she obeyed.
Channelling the gushing mana into the portal, she was able to navigate beyond her normal limits and feel her mother's mark faster than before.
"I've found it" she said. Immediately linking the portal point to open as close to the mark as possible, and it happened.
The dark green portal began swirling at a much slower speed.
Only then did Valentine release her hand.
Falling on her back, Valentine let out tired breaths as she swiped her hair off her sweaty face.
A shadow loomed over.
"Good job" Ezra intoned. "But it's too early to be exhausted"
He looked at the crowd at the side. "What are you waiting for?" he asked, tossing the unconscious head warden and then the assassin through the portal.
Quickly, the squad leaders and the guards picked up the pace, running and jumping into the portal, followed by the Vassals and then the poison man.
Valentine got to her feet, ready to jump in when she looked at Ezra, who stood unfazed.
"Well?"
"Go ahead. I have one last thing to take care of. Also, begin opening the next portal the moment you go through"
She stared… "Suit yourself", before jumping through anticlimactically.
Ezra chuckled.
Not willing to waste any time, he lit with lightning and took to the air, levitating to the top floor.
From this height, he could survey the entire place and could see the carnage he wrought with clarity.
All the cells had been destroyed, either by the inmate or by him. The floors were filled with what remained of the inmates.
Corpses.
Corpses in a worse state than slaughtered beasts.
A pool of blood had formed.
In face of such horror, Ezra didn't even blink.
He saw what transpired after they got released during his life as Kevin, and he wasn't about to let it happen again.
'Now to bring this place down'
Moreover, with all the inmates dead, what good would it be to leave the place standing?
Yes, Ezra intends to destroy the facility, relegating Arcadia to the annals of history.
A sphere of fire formed from the air above his open palm.
Rapidly it grew, when it became thrice his size, the corpses were already sizzling.
Of course, it could be destroyed with much less effort.
But since he'd be destroying it anyway, why not use this to pull away attention from himself while he fled.
When it became four times his size, Ezra stopped expanding and started compressing it until it came down to the size of his half his fist.
When that happened, Ezra simply let it fall.
It began dropping, but at Ezra's speed, it was as fast as a falling feather.
He picked the sphere of fire once more, brought it very close to the top and then sped off into the portal.
Arriving at the gathering, he finds himself in a forest, with the rest waiting.
With the second portal stabilized. Valentine was waiting for Ezra, since with him the process was faster.
"Close this portal" Ezra spoke.
No doubt that with no one holding it up, the sphere of fire was already falling.
Closing a portal was easier than opening one so Valentine did that easily.
Done, they proceeded to link the new portal to the next location.
A mark was simply a version of saying a set portal.
Meaning the portal opened was set in place by Elisa, and already had a predetermined destination.
At the same time, it meant the mana provided was far smaller.
Within a minute, the portal was opened, Ezra went through first with the head warden and assassin chained along.
At the same time…
The sphere of fire dropped with leisurely pace, providing the only light to Arcadia's now silent environment.
The moment it touched ground it imploded, engulfing everything in sight.
Seconds later…BOOM!
The mountain top broke apart, producing a sound too loud to be ignored.
So loud that even the escaping guards heard it.
All of Vonnamor came alive as grandmasters rushed to the scene, successfully pulling their attention away from a fleeing grandmaster whose aura could be felt if carefully searched.
A day later, they were in Niton.
Hellison and Lexon were neighbouring continents.
Elisa could've made the trip to Arcadia in half a day but had no reason to expend herself.
Valentine, the one who made it possible, was bleeding from nose just to say far past her limit she'd gone.
It was worth noting that she'd been able to take them this far because they travelled through set portals.
Now in Niton, the party was free to disband. Before that though, everyone apart from Ezra sat down to recover.
Portal travel was exhausting.
If non-space mages travelled too frequently with portals, not only did all their bodily organs begin to hurt, but their sense of time would begin to warp.
Such as what the members were currently experiencing.
Ezra flung the head warden away with the lightning chains binding him like a fly.
He brought him along in chance of making him an ally, but he'd given up, the man was a lunatic.
The head warden woke up by the time Valentine opened the third portal and started a ruckus.
Ezra had to thoroughly beat him to make calm.
With everyone resting, Ezra decided it was the best time to make his announcement.
"We're in Niton, so each of you can go your separate ways " he said. "Before you go, I extend an offer-I would like to recruit whoever is willing to join me on my journey"
They began murmuring.
Most never thought they'd have this problem until they grew too old for their job at Arcadia.
Moreover, those scouted for such positions were not normal individuals. None of them lived normal lives.
For that, most didn't have any place they knew to turn to.
There was also no guarantee that they wouldn't be killed pending they met a powerful enemy.
An offer like this-was exactly what they needed.
Having seen him bash the head warden effortlessly, they could vouch for his strength.
Moreover, he was a prince.
"But your highness" once spoke. "I don't mind. But with the palace regarding you as a demon-will we not be killed if we follow you?"
Murmurs increased once more as they all remembered why Ezra was in Arcadia in the first place.
"No worries, if that turns out to be the case, I will keep our relationship a secret. I will have you join one of the many guilds working under me. With that, no matter what happens to me, you remain unaffected"
The man held his chin, nodded, and then lowered his head. "I pledge my loyalty"
Others followed suit, leaving a few.
"Good" he nodded, handing his new subordinates mana recovery potions.
It couldn't substitute the effect of food and water, but it alleviated their exhaustion.
"Those with me follow as we find cover for the night"
He placed Valentine on his shoulder like a bean pack, and with her being too exhausted to fuss about it, they walked off, leaving the rest to find their way.
They found a place and successfully lodged in for the night.
Ezra paid for a three day stay for every person and their essentials as they also needed food and rest.
When the food arrived, Ezra realized he was the hungriest one, eating so much, even he was shocked.
Three days, because Valentine needed that much time to rest and recover her strength.
Ezra was able to truly relax for the first time in a long while, and contemplate past events.
While doing so, he let Severus out of the space ring.
'Master!' Severus cried. His voice rang in Ezra's head. 'You almost killed me!'
Ezra stared. "Eh…when?"
'While you were meditating, a lot of demonic energy poured out of your body, and it almost killed me!'
Ezra blinked. "Oh, that must be while I was in Ziltris' memory"
He exhaled heavily, thinking about how he almost lost his sanity a few days prior.
Even now, what happened with him was still unclear, he woke up to find himself a Grandmaster, and that his goals were of utmost clarity.
'That's not the point!'
Severus' voice took threw out of his reverie.
Ezra placed Severus on lap and rubbed its head and under.
"I don't know what happened. But I'm sorry"
'Hmm, saying that after almost killing me'
It seems Severus held grudges.
'Meditating for three months, I wonder what you were thinking for so long-
"What?"
'?'
"What do you just say?"
'I wonder what you were thinking for so long?'
"No, before that"
'Meditating for three months?'
"Yes that. What do you mean?"
'Huh, what do you mean what do I mean?'
"Gah! I don't understand"
'Huh?' the snake blinked. 'You don't know?'
"Severus" Ezra cracked his knuckles. "Don't make me angry"
'You were in deep meditation for three months' it said. 'I thought you knew'
Ezra stared into space.
No wonder he ate so much, he hadn't eaten in three months!
