They ended up settling on trying a restaurant they’d never been to before – which was most of them. After wandering around Blackmist’s sprawling campus for almost half an hour, they chose a nice, two story restaurant named the Toasted Bun.

A waiter seated them promptly, depositing a pair of menus in their hands before sweeping away to go stand at the podium near the entrance in preparation for the next pair of customers.

One quick glance around the room revealed that only around half the tables were occupied, but the low level of chatter in the room and warm light coming from a large fireplace in the center of the building gave it a comforting ambiance. A thin stream of smoke rose up through a hole in the roof right above the fire, curling away and disappearing into the sky.

“I bet getting all the smoke to go straight up was a pain,” Sylph said. “I doubt they’d have very many happy customers if everyone got smoked out.”

“Maybe a bunch of wind generating runes around the edge of the fire,” Damien said, rubbing his chin. “They’d have to be pretty weak to avoid making a bunch of noise, but that’s what I would do.”

“Very astute,” a waiter said, inclining his head as he set a glass of water down before each of them. The light reflected off his slightly shiny, slicked back hair. “Have you ever visited the Toasted Bun before?”

“First time,” Sylph said. “Any recommendations?”

“Everything on the menu is certain to meet your expectations,” the waiter replied with a smile. He tapped one of the entrees. “But the Fried and Battered Sourfin is one of our specialties. Nobody has complained about it yet, so it can’t be too bad.”

“Do people typically complain about your other dishes?” Damien asked, laughing.

“Oh, people will complain about anything,” the waiter said with a conspiratory wink. “Would you like some more time to look at the menu?”

“I’ll go with your suggestion,” Damien replied. “Sylph, do you need more time?”

“I’ll get this,” Sylph said, pointing to a desert at the bottom of the menu.

“Brilliant choices,” the waiter said. He collected their menus and swept away, disappearing through a rotating door at the back of the room. The scent of warm cinnamon, honey, and freshly baked bread wafted out from behind it.

“I like this place,” Damien said. “It feels comfortable.”

“You haven’t tried the food yet.” Sylph grinned. “But I agree. It’s relaxing. Somehow, I don’t think we’re going to find much of this in Forsad.”

Damien shuddered. “Let’s not think about that for now. Considering the company we’ll be keeping, Forsad is the last thing I want on my mind. Well, actually, scratch that. When we’re there, you need to be careful.”

“Careful? Of what? Do you think Second is going to cause problems?” Sylph asked, lowering her voice.

“I don’t know about that, although it wouldn’t surprise me,” Damien said, leaning closer. “It’s not him that I’m worried about. It’s Derrod.”

Sylph’s lips thinned. “I’m always wary of him. Is there something else that I should pay even more attention to about him?”

“I feel like he’s trying to do something, but I don’t know what,” Damien said. “He hasn’t bothered with me once in the past few years, and all of a sudden he’s showing up all the time.”

“You’ve met him a total of two times now in the past month. That isn’t exactly all the time.”

“Three, actually,” Damien corrected. “And you’d be right if it were anyone else. He doesn’t do anything without a reason, but I don’t know what his reason is. I don’t trust him, and I’m worried he might try to do something to you.”

Sylph’s features softened. “I can take care of myself, Damien. Derrod was right about one thing – I’m trained. I can deal with someone gunning for me – even Derrod. I can’t take him in a fight, but I’m also a lot more resilient than anyone else we know, and he isn’t aware of that ability as far as I’m aware. I do appreciate your concern, though. Are you sure that the one in danger isn’t you?”

“No,” Damien admitted. “I’m not. I know one thing – he only cares about the kingdom. He wouldn’t do anything against its best interests, and I have no reason to ever go against them.”

Sylph raised an eyebrow ever so slightly. “I know. You just can’t discount anything. If he’s as dedicated as you think, he might just be really making sure you’re on the kingdom’s side to make sure you won’t turn into a threat. He’s one of the most egotistical men I’ve ever met. He probably assumes you, as his son, have to be strong and doesn’t want to risk anything.”

“The sad thing is that you might be right,” Damien said with a laugh. “Good point. I didn’t even think about that.”

They let the conversation trail off and just sat there, soaking in the atmosphere of the restaurant while they waited for their food. The waiter emerged from the kitchen a few times, each time passing right by their table but delivering the food to someone else.

Finally, after around fifteen minutes, the man finally brought them their dishes and laid them out on the table. After confirming they didn’t need anything else, he swept off and the two dug in.

***

Derrod Vale leaned against his sword, enjoying the evening wind as it rustled his hair and chilled the blood cooling on his knuckles. He drew in a deep breath, savoring the smell before letting it out slowly and opening his eyes.

A lanky, humanoid monster loomed in the distance. Its limbs were thin and gangly, and its face featureless. Green liquid and strips of rotted fur covered its body, barely covering the rocky skin beneath it.

The monster approached him, covering enormous swathes of ground with every single awkward step. A keening screech ripped out from it, although from where Derrod could not tell. It reached out for him with a hand the size of a large horse.

Derrod lashed out with several dozen mental spikes. They punched into the monster’s arm, turning it into a pincushion in his mind’s eye. His eyes flared with blue energy and he flickered forward, the huge sword at his side tracing a path through the air and severing several of the creature’s fingers.

He drove several more spikes of energy into the monster’s body around the wound. Energy rushed into the creature from the surrounding Ether, trying to repair its wound, but it faltered and failed to pass through Derrod’s mental energy.

Derrod chuckled. He blurred once more, his sword falling once more and taking several fingers off the other hand. More spikes followed the wound, stopping it from healing.

“You are a waste of time,” Derrod informed the beast from behind it. It spun, trying to strike him with the back of an enormous hand. A bolt of lightning leapt from Derrod’s hand, striking the monster’s hand and sending it flying in the opposite direction with a brilliant bang.

Green acid dripped from the monster, sealing the smoking wound. Derrod didn’t stop it. He ripped his mental energy free of the monster and acid started to flow freely once more. Within seconds, its fingers had regrown.

The monster lunged at him, crashing into the ground and tearing dirt and grass away in a huge cloud. Derrod flickered back, then leapt into the air and hurled his sword down. The blade punched into one of the Corrupted monster’s arms, severing the hand cleanly at its wrist.

Derrod wrapped both pieces of the limb with mental energy, then sent a thick bolt of lightning into the tall creature’s head, slamming it back into the dirt before it could stand.

“Where is the one that sent you?” Derrod demanded. “You are boring me, and my time is needed elsewhere.”

If the monster could respond, it didn’t. It simply let out another screech. Its arm bent back at an impossible angle, swinging to strike Derrod. He raised a hand and a powerful gale whipped around him. He caught the blow with his hand, then sent the power coursing back through the monster’s body.

It bulged in a dozen places, skin splitting in miniature explosion as lightning forced its way out of the monster’s body and back into he ground. Derrod sent dozens of miniature spikes into the wounds, forcing them to remain open.

“It is unfortunate that you caught me on a night where I can do nothing but wait,” Derrod whispered, his eyes as cold as the moon that was starting to rise in the sky behind them. “You can clearly feel pain, so you’re going to help me discover if your kind can speak the common tongue.”

The monster struggled against him, but Derrod’s sword leapt back into his hand. He stepped onto it, sending blue energy scoring through the beast’s body as he walked, and drove the weapon into its chest, twisting it. He didn’t stop it from healing and allowed the acid to sizzle as it tried to push the crackling blade out fruitlessly. Another furious screech filled the night.

“It’ll be a long time before you use up all the Ether in the area,” Derrod said, drumming his fingers on the pommel of the weapon. “And this is less boring than sitting around and doing nothing. Do you speak?”

A blur shot at Derrod from the tall grass in the distance. Small and lithe, it moved with incredible speed as it flung itself through the air, green acid dripping from jagged fangs as it went to rip the distracted mage’s throat out.

Its incredible speed was such that most other mages wouldn’t have even been able to spot the creature before it reached them. With Derrod’s blade stuck in the other monster’s back, he had no weapon to deflect its attack.

The beast’s eyes widened as Derrod’s head turned to look straight at it. There wasn’t a single ounce of fear or surprise in his gaze. There was only hunger. Derrod twisted, driving his hand up and grabbing the blur by the throat.

He shifted his weight, swinging the monster over his shoulder and slamming it over the hilt of his sword with such force that the blunt end drove through its chest. Acid and fragments of stone sprayed everywhere.

Blue crackling energy surged around Derrod, disintegrating it before even a drop could touch him. The new monster struggled on his sword, but he drove his mental energy into it, forcing the wound to remain open. It was vaguely canine shaped, but its limbs were far too long and jutted out in all the wrong spots. Two nubs on its back looked like they had been meant to be other limbs, but had been chopped or fell off somehow.

“What about you?” Derrod asked, raising an eyebrow. “Do you speak?”

“T-the Corruption will consume you,” the dog monster snarled, sputtering and coughing as acid dripped into its throat and filled its lungs. “Your world will suffer for what it has done.”

“Why do you attack the Kingdom?”

“We care not f-for the kingdom,” the monster snarled. Its taller companion tried to rise once more. Derrod sent a thick blast of lightning into it, blowing the creature’s head off in a single strike. It started to repair itself and he did nothing to stop it.

“Ah. We’re just in the way, then?”

“All man will be p-purged so that we may live.”

“Go on,” Derrod said.

“I will say no more. Death comes for you all.”

“Ah. Pity,” Derrod said. His lips quirked up in a small smile. “I’ve never liked dogs, you know.”

Several thick beams of lightning leapt from his fingers, surging into the sword pinning both monsters to the ground. The night sky lit up and an enormous bang shook the grassy plains. A huge tree formed of lightning erupted from the monster’s bodies, disintegrating them. Derrod ripped every last shred of their connection to the Ether apart with his mental energy, ensuring not a single fragment of them remained when he was done.

A purple portal carved itself into the air beside Derrod and Dean Whisp stepped out from within it, her gauntlets soaked with blood. She glanced around, then raised an eyebrow at Derrod.

“I was told you were sent to fight a strong Corrupted monster. Where’d it go?”

“Dead,” Derrod replied. “It wasn’t much of a challenge.”

“Figures. Learn anything?” Whisp asked, reaching for her side and grabbing a flask to take a large swig out of.

“Nothing of interest,” Derrod replied. “But my boredom was assuaged slightly. Any service for the Kingdom is one that I am honored to do.”

Whisp snorted. “Sure. Want a drink?”

“What is it?”

“Red wine.”

“I’ll pass,” Derrod replied. “I don’t drink spirits when I’m hunting.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you drink,” Whisp said with a laugh. She took another long drink from the flask, then turned it over and shook it. It was empty. She harrumphed and tossed it onto the ground.

“Not in the past ten years,” Derrod replied with a tight smile. “But, there are more important things to address. Who knows when we’ll get a few moments alone again. I have some questions to ask.”

Whisp cocked an eyebrow. “You bout to proposition to me?”

“Don’t delude yourself,” Derrod replied. “Tell me about my son.”

“He’s your kid,” Whisp snorted. “What can I tell you about him? How he’s doing in class? I don’t even know that myself, but he must be passing.”

“I don’t care about that,” Derrod said. “What about his schools of magic?”

“Geez. You don’t even know that? What kind of father are you?”

“Those don’t sound like schools of magic to me.”

“Gah. No wonder everyone hates working with you,” Whisp said. She hiccupped, then wiped her mouth with the back of her sleeve. “He’s got Dark, Light, and Space.”

“Interesting combination,” Derrod said, rubbing his chin. “That’s it?”

“Space is a very powerful school, and most people don’t even have two, much less three,” Whisp said. “Your kid isn’t half bad, Derrod. He’s done some good work, even if he is a bit of a smartass now.”

“Dark, Light, and Space,” Derrod repeated. “From what Plane?”

“Darkness. Some new demon, supposedly. As expected as a child of Stormsword,” Whisp replied. “Why?”

“Just curious,” Derrod replied. He turned, starting toward the portal. Just before he stepped through, he paused and glanced back at her. “Has anyone ever seen his companion?”