It was noon time when Karl finally took a break from his investigations to take a closer look at data he has gathered. He sat at an empty table in the Adventurer’s canteen. First off he learned that there were ranks for adventurers, Novice being the lowest and Paragon being the highest. Sadly there were no Paragon ranked Adventurers in Larien, heck even Vanguard ranked adventurers( second highest rank) were a no show here in the village. Most of the Adventurers here were Adept ranked adventurers which was only higher than the Novice. The bigger problem was that according to the Sorcerers he hired, Paragon level Sorcerers simply didn’t exist because those who are incredibly gifted in magic spend their days inside the magic institutes perfecting their craft. The magic using adventurers either didn’t really care much for magic or simply didn’t have the talent to enter any magic institute. This disappointed Karl quite a bit since he wanted to see first-hand what high level magic looked like. Nevertheless he was still able to gather valuable data from the adventurers.

In order to use magic one must have two things; mana and a casting spell. mana was described as some unseen energy/force that sorcerers spend in order to use spells. There were two sources of mana; mana from within the body and natural mana found in the world. Casting spells are chants that acts commads used to convert that mana into a specific action, one interesting thing to note is that stronger spell have longer casting chants.

It seemed that Magic also followed the law of conservation of energy, since more mana is consumed for more powerful spells. He observed that low level spells like the fireball were casted quickly while a stronger spell like greater fireball required the user to gather natural mana and then convert it using the spell, though it should be noted that the mana threshold differ from person to person with some having more mana within them than others. Gathering Natural mana however was a whole new matter. Highly talented sorcerers use their body as conduits to gather mana while the lesser ones use tools like staffs or wands to gather mana for them. He captured this phenomenon with his camera, and in the footage a small white light gathered infront of the Sorcerer’s staff before it exploded into a great inferno.

Still he had more questions than answers. For one he couldn’t figure out a reason chants convert the mana into an action or phenomenon. Second where did this mana come from? Is it a fifth universal force in this world? He had so many questions yet so little data, and this excited him a lot. It was an opportunity to learn new things and as a man of science there is nothing more he could ask for.

As he was pondering about possible explanations, a familiar man suddenly sat in front of him. It was Steven and he had the widest grin known to man and frankly, it creeped Karl out a lot. Karl knew that that there was no escape from this situation and begrudgingly accepted his fate.

“The creatures in this world are AMAZING!” Steven exclaimed, glee leaking from his voice.

“Yeah? Tell me about it?” Karl replied, trying his best to hide his sarcasm.

Truth be told Karl didn’t really think much of biology, he thought it was very boring and uninteresting. Even the fantastical beasts found Nelithea didn’t interest him at all compared the prospect offered by magic. Still he didn’t want to be rude to Steven, a fellow scientist, so he put up as much “””””Enthusiasm””””””” as he can.

“The wealth of fauna and flora in this world is truly fantastical! Their stories about encounters with 3 headed beasts, heck even KILLER PLANTS. KILLER PLANTS KARL!” Steven shouted as he moved himself across the table. His face now inches away from Karl. Of course Karl found this very uncomfortable so he pushed him away slightly.

“T-that’s great, I wonder what wonders await us in this world” Karl doing his best and failing at his attempt at being enthusiastic, thankfully Steven was sinking deeper into his own little world to notice.

Captain Christopher then appeared and set with the gentlemen, a presence Karl greatly appreciated. It appeared that Carl was there to pick them up for lunch at the base they set up in Larien village. Steven wanted to object since he wanted to sample some local cuisine when suddenly a bright flash appeared in the canteen.

The light disappeared and in its place came four people who looked like adventurers. It seemed like a teleporting spell was used by these adventurers to get to Larien quickly. The small girl who looked like a sorceress nearly collapsed but was caught by a woman that looked like an archer. The swordsman that was with them began shouting as soon as he realized he was back at the hub.

“ARE THERE ANY VANGUARD RANKED ADVENTURERS HERE? THIS VILLAGE IS IN DANGER.” The swordsman screamed in panic.

“Calm down sir, what happened?” A front desk clerk approached the man. But this just agitated him further.

“I have no time to calm down.” He declared. “Manticores! Three Manticores are headed towards this village. We spotted them when we were hunting Mystic wolves at the edge of the mystic forest!”

Upon hearing these words the entire canteen was swallowed by chaos. People panicked left and right, even though they were adventurers they still didn’t want to lose their lives. Some were in a hurry to flee as fast they can while others decided it was their time for glory and decided to stay and fight.

Christopher reacted fast and immediately contacted Fort spearhead the moment he heard this news.

“This captain Clarks to HQ, requesting support, three bogeys inbound strength unknown, will prepare men on site to intercep the threat over. “ the soldier calmly talked over his communications device.

The headquarters then gave an unexpected reply “This is HQ captain Clarks. We advise your men to stand down and wait further instrcutions over”.

“You have got to be kidding me, people are at risk here? Why are you telling me to stand down?!” The captain replied, anger can be heard in his voice.

“We have detected the threat ealier and have already sent flyers to intercept them, but the general said this was a good opportunity to demonstrate our military might, so it was decided that the flyers would only intercept when the bogeys are within visual range of the village over”

“Are you people insa-” The captain wasn’t even able to finish his sentence when all of a sudden loud roars could be heard outside the hub. The adventurers immediately hurried outside and in the chaos the captain lost track of the two scientists. Captain Clarks was having a really bad day.

Once outside the adventures saw the village in complete chaos as the villagers were fleeing in panic at what they are seeing. Three Manticores were now circling the sky around the village preparing to strike. The adventurers, knowing that escape is no longer an option decided to stay and fight, knowing that even if they tried to run away they would still be caught by the monsters.

As they braced for battle metal spears driven by fire suddenly appeared and hit one of the Manticores. It was then engulfed in a violent explosion that tore the legendary beast apart. The adventurers were stunned by the events unfolding before them that they just stood there and watched, even the villagers who were once running frantically stopped in their tracks. Then suddenly a metal bird came flying past the remaining Manticores at great speeds, creating a loud noise as it passed by. The adventurers realized one thing, this was a weapon of the outsiders.