Their road stretched to the horizon a far, through hills and prairies they walked with a great alertness. Eventually day turned to twilight, as the setting sun cast a scarlet hue over the land, and the lizardmen still yet to be found within their sight, some part of them started to hope that the creature was indeed gave up.

Pushed through the night they went, with the moon and the supernova above, the sky never gone passed civil twilight, the land in front their eyes was well lit and clear to the naked eyes were countless undulating hills spread all the way to the dark forest a far where trees danced with every stroke of the cold wind of the night. Emma shivered on the saddle, pulled up the coat to cover her neck as the group waited on the side of the road for a group of wagons to passed by, the wagon’s drivers bade their gratitude before went below the hill, headed back to civilisation. They stuck to the main road which lead north, the winding road though prolong their travel time but perhaps kept close to a well-travelled road would deterred the lizardmen from making any moved if they were had yet to give up.

With every howl of the cold night wind, their body shivered, the further north they went the freezing fang of the element bit deeper onto the travellers. Even the wool coats they had prepared still could barely guarded them from the wind. A miserable look mixed with tiredness fixed on Emma’s face since the moment the sun dropped off the horizon, as she tried her best to kept herself awake through the journey and kept watch from her position on the velelis, just to slowly slipped in slumber and then got rudely woke up when the cold wind picked up again. Samuel watched her with a smiled, admired and felt sorry for the poor princess tried to toughen herself up to pushed through the hardship she never went through in her entire life. Out of courtesy, Samuel handled his coat for her.

“please don’t worry, I can handle myself,” Emma declined.

“You look like you about to freeze to dead already, just take it I had been through worst” –Samuel insisted, after some hesitation Emma finally accepted his offer.

“You alright up there?” Samuel asked.

“Thank you again, well… sort of, I had already been through this situation before” –Emma’s teeth chattered as the wind picked up again and she quickly draped Samuel’s coat on her- “Got to get used to it somehow, and... who would’ve thought just a few dozen kelias up north and the wind could get this cold.”

“How do you pushed through all this alone before we found you anyway?” Samuel curious.

“Well… I was not alone after I got separated from my convoy, there were a few loyal men were with me who had help me get away from the lizardmen’s onslaught” –Emma gave off a sad smile- “Before they got picked off one by one by the pursuing lizardmen, may Quelas’Airuth and the Fives save their soul,” Emma sighed.

When the road winded its way into a heavily bushy area and the wind somewhat died down together with some shielding from the tall bushes, they gave a sigh of relief as finally mother nature had given them a break. But sadly how wrong they were, at the moment the bushes somewhat blocked their view of their surrounding and small object, seemed to be a cloth ball about fist size, suddenly flew through the shrubs, and landed in front of the group and kept spewing smoke to the air. Quickly follow that ball was many more, chugged toward them. Samuel’s short sword quickly unsheathed, the veleles somewhat agitated from all the smoke in the air, as the group braced for an ambush, but suddenly the wind picked up again and dispersed most of the smoke. Samuel smirked as seemed mother nature was on their size and helped foiled the lizardmen’s ambush.

“SAMUEL! GET ON THAT VELELIS AND STAY CLOSE TO ME!” –The Elvas shook his head intensively and yelled at his companion. Covered his mouth and nose with the coat edge, he rowelled his velelis ahead in a hurry to get away from all the smoke bombs.

Samuel jumped on the velelis with Emma and quickly caught up to Elesil, the Elvas’s face filled with anxiety and Samuel could even saw sweat poured out like a shower and flew off his face. Something had greatly stressed Elesil, indeed, but it was not the fact that they just got ambushed by the lizardmen a moment ago, even if the lizardmen tried their luck after they threw those smoke bombs, Elesil still could blew them to smithereens with a close range lightning bolt, no, what scared him was the smell of those smoke bombs. Powerful mages in this world they might, but invincible they were not. There were ways for even the most mundane of person to get a levelled playing field with a mage, to neutralized a mage’s magical power, and the smell in those smoke bombs was one of those. The smell that could only be noticed by a mage, the smell of a kind of inhaler drugs designed to interrupt a mage’s magical energy flow.

With every passing second the drug in those smoke bombs seeped further into Elesil system. He could felt the circulation of magical energy, or as the Elvas called it “Quasum”, inside his body falling apart, dizziness gripped hold at Elesil’s head like a predator’s claw clutching its prey, heart drummed and his hands trembled like an alcoholic craving for a drink, his mind a haze, coherence thought and speak took much effort to form. And fear, fear for his own life and his companion’s safety surged like an unrelenting tidal wave.

Ran, ran and ran, they whip their velelis in desperation, but unfortunately, Samuel’s velelis started to falling behind Elesil’s velelis due to the great load it had to carry. And soon, from the corner of his eyes, Samuel noticed figures flashed through the bushes on the side of the road and tailing them, tall shadows with lengthy arms and long neck, their yellow seemed glowing under the heaven’s light, and they were many, at least four lizardmen were chasing them that Samuel could saw. It was amazing how those creatures still be able to kept quite a close distance to their veleles, despite being on foot. But that was not the most of his concern, as light suddenly flashed ahead of them and a wall of fire rose up blocked the entire road, the veleles screeched in panic, everybody on their back held on for dear life as the animals made a sharp turn to the right to avoid the wall of fire. Of which was deliberated arched in a certain angle to force the trio’s veleles to turn toward a specific direction, deviate from the main road.

Quickly, they found wild bushes whipping their legs, and branches tried to grabbing onto their clothes, as their velelis cut through a semi-wooded area, a lizardmen poked out from a large bush on a small nearby hill, arms stretched and fingers loose, he released an arrow.

“GET DOWN!!!” –Samuel yelled, fell his body on Emma to put her down on the saddle and shielded her from the arrow.

The arrow’s shard whizzed by Samuel’s nape, its fletching rubbed against his skin and not for long, Samuel felt a wetness sensation on his nape. By some kind of luck, the arrow was barely miss its target, but its broad head still able to made contact with Samuel skin and leave behind a small cut.

“ELESIL! WHAT HAPPENED TO THE MAGIC BARRIER?” Samuel shouted.

“Th… THOSE SH… MOKE BOMBS, TH… TEY HAD AN ANTI MAGIC DRUG” –Elesil yelled the answer with a slight slur in his speech- “MEE… POWER IS FAILLING!”

Another pair of lizardmen jumped out as they passed by another bushes, and spears were thrusted at them, Samuel have no idea how, but as the veleles made another turn to avoid their assailants those pointed objects had missed their target by some luck of the draw. Sadly, after five? Or perhaps ten minutes of the chase? Eventually, the distain between Elesil’s velelis and Samuel’s velelis slowly drawn farer, the animal’s stamina started to wane by the heavy load on its back.