"Err, what?"

"To think you could still stand and fight after all that beating, indeed, for a mage you are sturdy."

"You know, I am getting confused here, aren't you here to kill me?"

"Indeed so."

"And you had all the chance to do just exactly that, why didn't you then?"

"Why didn't I? Simple," Titan reached his hand out, "I was testing you, and judging you fit to be my apprentice,"

"Wha-"

Titan remained quiet and kept his hand out. Isaiah felt Nicole hold his hand as if she was worried. This put him in a rather tough spot,

"You... You're joking right?"

Titan once more remained silent,

"And if I don't?"

Titan withdrew his hand and pointed his massive axe at Isaiah,

"You... You don't have to join him..." Nicole splurted out, her voice breaking under panic, "I-I can pay you, yes, my father-my father is the Duke of Swadia, he can give you appropriate rewards if you deliver me back to him... He is rich, really rich, like uber-rich! My father has a fountain made of marble and gold even..."

'The duke of-...' Isaiah brushed up his history lessons and remembered that dukes are at the top of the noble pyramid being only outranked by royalty. 'If her father is a duke, then wouldn't her kidnapper be in real trouble if she escaped? There is nothing more dangerous than a desperate man with everything to lose.'

"What good is money to the dead?" Titan said as if he read his mind,

"We can escape... We can still escape, no need to fight..."

"Can you really escape? Even if you did escape will Lord Caleb allow you to do so?"

"I... I helped you out, Herr Mage, please... Don't leave me alone,"

"You don't even know his name..."

"Shut up..." Isaiah opened his mouth and turned to Titan, "Just shut up, okay... Do you work for them? Work for the Kilo guy right?"

"Indeed so?"

Isaiah pointed at his chest, "I've been branded, why would I work for someone whose master gave me that mark?"

"Have you ever heard of my name before boy?" His voice sounded much deeper when he saw those words, "I can easily remove that mark off your body, just as I can easily remove your life. No one will touch you so long as you are under me, not Caleb, not the king, not even god!"

"No... And I don't care."

"I see..." Titan brushed the necklace hanging near his throat, it was a rather large necklace made purely out of gold embedded with twelve brilliantly shining diamonds. "That should tell you."

Isaiah looked at his plate, but couldn't make heads or tails about what such a thing entailed and neither the two of them gave him some insights as to what it meant. That said, considering how everyone was reacting it must have meant that he was in a whole class of strength. The silence was beginning to mount on his psyche. Being the attention of two rather peculiar individuals made Isaiah shy as his introverted side was beginning to take hold of his emotions. He was panicking, trying to find a way out of this situation when Nicole suddenly whispered to him,

"I can move now..."

"I see... I'll distract him, then we run,"

"Yes..."

"Run? Run where?" Titan asked, overhearing their conversation,

"Tsk, whatever!" Isaiah stretched both his arms and at once all the silverware in the room began to fly around like a wall of flies,

"No matter what you throw at me..." Titan held his hand out and began to move forward, the silverware's noise and thick wall covered his vision momentarily and when he finally got out of the tornado of forks, he found both Isaiah and Nicole having run off,

There were three exits from the ballroom. Though it may be difficult to figure out exactly where the two had run off, Titan knew that all three would converge in the exit. And thus he went through the middle path.

Both Isaiah and Nicole ran as fast as they could, having taken the left door and both unaware of the layout of the mansion. That said, they had begun to unconsciously relax and slow down a bit after realizing that Titan was nowhere to be seen or heard. As they turned a corner, Nicole froze up in shock as she saw Titan standing not too far from her, she turned her back and bumped into Isaiah,

"Wha... What's going..."

"Titan..." She looked around and found an open room from the side, "Quick!" She pointed over to the room and the two made their way inside as quickly as they could, they didn't notice the wet floor on the ground and the two fell into each other, buckets of water spilling all over them as mops and brooms and all manner of cleaning paraphernalia fell around their bodies. The smell of dirty water, strong soaps, and chemicals permeated in their bodies.

The whole place was a mess, it also didn't help that the room was pitch black with the door closed. Thus, to not create more noise, Nicole simply stayed still in a very compromising position on top of Isaiah. It also didn't help that the pitch darkness of the room made both very conscious of each other. Both were healthy, young individuals after all.

He was already enamored by Nicole's beauty, but now he got to feel her whole body up close. Her soft but warm breaths were brushing the side of his neck constantly, making him blush redder, while his whole body burned hot from the lust now beginning to boil deep inside him. Though he did his best to suppress himself, her warm breaths and the brushing of their bodies didn't help at all. Even with his best efforts, as this was his first time having such close contact with a lady, his lust began to explode, the lewd thoughts on his mind simply wouldn't disappear with every passing second.

'Little one, calm down... Don't rise, don't rise... Don't destroy my image now...' Isaiah lamented his lack of underwear as he began to think of plain and simple things like houses and buildings, roads and bridges, beaches, and the women in bikinis, hills, and mountains that looked like human body parts. 'Calm down, calm down...'

Nicole herself became very aware of Isaiah, she was able to pick up his emotions rather clearly due to the loss of sight and their proximity. Despite her efforts, the weight of the mops from behind weighed down on her making it rather difficult to separate herself from him for fear that they might make a sound. And then, there was also one thing that she had a hard time trying to ignore no matter how hard she tried.

'Settle down,' She whispered, her voice partly shaken after she felt the poking thing between her legs, 'Not now...'

However, to the grand master of loneliness, those words spoken by a beauty had the opposite effects, especially the words 'Not now' which implied something else entirely. This broke Isaiah's reasoning, his lust ballooned up which instantly consumed his sanity and his body now began demanding to feel her even more. Isaiah tried to stop himself, he knew it was wrong but his hands began to move by themselves, they first touched her back.

He felt her shaking body suddenly go still when he moved his hand on her back. He felt guilty and told himself not to continue but when she gripped his shoulder tightly, it was giving him mixed signals. Just as he was about to continue with his adventure, the sudden loud thud of Titan's footsteps made him go limper than a man with erectile dysfunction.

Gone were all notions of perversion in his thoughts as he waited and listened to the sounds of his steps. Even Nicole who took rapid breaths had grown very quiet, both had stifled their breaths. Soon, the footsteps grew quieter and quieter, before eventually growing silent. Nicole was the first to break the silence, she asked in the lowest voice possible,

"Is he gone?"

"I... I think so." Isaiah took a deep breath and began to move out of Nicole, "Sorry, for that..."

"It... It's alright, it wasn't your fault..."

"It... Still, I am sorry."

The room was still dark, and the two, though no longer touching each other were still aware of each other's presence. Silence befell them as they tried to figure out how exactly they could move out of this embarrassing situation when they felt the air suddenly drop. Isaiah grabbed Nicole and shielded her when the door exploded into a thousand pieces, followed by Titan pulling away the entire front wall, the stone crumbling from his back... Light entered the room instantly, and their wet figures emerged. Nicole froze still as she stared at Titan's eyes while Isaiah looked back,

All of a sudden, Titan grabbed Isaiah by the neck and lifted him.

"Gaah!"

Isaiah flailed about choking, he vainly smacked his fist onto Titan's massive arms as his head turned blue,

Nicole broke out of her fear and began to throw at the items that littered their area in an effort to free Isaiah,

"Stop!" She loudly demanded as she struck him with a broom, only for the handle to break, "Put him down! Why are you doing this?"

Titan turned his eyes to Nicole and quietly glared at her. Being subjected to such an intense hate-filled gaze made her breathing grow heavier and her legs began to shake before giving in entirely. With her now silent, Titan turned back to Isaiah only to find him holding his helmet, as his palms erupted into an intense storm. The electricity began to surround his helmet and enter his body,

"Gah!"

The large knight recoiled in pain as he let go of him. Isaiah took a deep breath to keep himself steady and without wasting even more movements, turned back and crushed the wall behind them. Taking Nicole by the hand, they then both leaped down and crashed into the ground below, a bush of some kind cushioning their fall. Their fall wasn't too deep and thus both managed to get away with only minor injuries.

"Are you alright?" Isaiah asked Nicole who still looked scared,

"Y... Yes, yes... How about you?"

"Good, now, let's go..."

"Right."

The two then proceeded away from the mansion as quickly as they could, thankfully the guards were all busy dealing with the slave revolt inside thus they met minimal resistance. What little did intercept them were swiftly dealt by Isaiah with a swipe of his hand.

Upon reaching the wall, Isaiah's adrenalin rush ended suddenly sapping all his energy away he fell to the ground, gnashing his chin to the hard dirt below causing it to bleed, nonetheless, he stood up and with what little energy he had left he used to create little holes in the wall for the two of them to climb to the top. Once above he paused and surveyed the mansion, sweat drenched his whole body from head to toe while his heart beat so loudly he felt like going deaf. He chuckled, this was the most exercise he had done in his whole life.

'I should exercise more, lose up the fats, and increase those muscles.' He wiped his forehead as he began his descent. Though he wished to rest the day was not yet over, there was some distance to be made first.