Something that Casimir’s gone through a lot of effort to learn was how to use the tremorsense divination without also giving away his exact position, on top of giving all of that valuable topographical information to whoever was paying attention with mana sense. This was primarily accomplished by getting better at sensing mana, and then just using less of it to divine the underground terrain. Anyone worse at sensing stone mana than you will get less information from your weaker spell.

Whatever mage they have attempting to detect hazards or pursuers did not learn how to do this. Like clockwork, a pulse was sent out every five hundred feet, and walking on tiny force barriers a few inches above the ground pretty much made it impossible for them to detect him following them. Unless they were exceptionally sensitive to force mana, of course, but that’s not a large concern.

These kinds of tunnels… there’s usually a substantial monster risk. He didn’t sense any enchantments that warded away monster formation… which didn’t mean they weren’t there, but that just meant that whatever enchanter laid them was a master at subtlety. No wonder the Warden didn’t know about the operation under his nose. Or he’s just good at playing dumb, but as long as Casimir retrieves his students with no major injuries, he’s willing to let bygones be bygones. Well, he’ll still dismantle as much of their operation as he can find and loot them into poverty, but he won’t go on a long crusade hunting down every scrap. He’s got places to be.

As he walked, he realized that he had stopped paying attention to the weather. It started to rain, washing the environment with water mana and making it more difficult for him to sense his students. Of course, that cut both ways. He increased his sensitivity by putting his feet back on the steadily soaking ground, and that same rain created enough metaphorical noise that the mage they had scouting couldn’t tell any but the heaviest impacts on the ground.

After about an hour of the kids getting moved slowly through the tunnel, presumably on a wagon, they made it to the trade road. There was an inn that was presumably connected to the tunnel network, so he just entered the place and slumped dramatically at the bar.

The inn was called ‘The Trader’s Rest’, and the bartender was a young and pretty elf. “Rough week?” She asked.

“My students vanished on me, and now it’s raining so I can’t go look for them.” He grumbled. “What do you have that’s strong? Today’s a day to make mistakes.”

The girl smiled widely. “Well, we do have some select stock in the basement that’ll knock out just about anyone.” She said slyly. She was good, she was cool as a cucumber despite the payday he was dangling in front of her. Whether she suspected a trap, on the other hand…

The mysterious enchanter’s work was better here, the presence of Casimir’s students was muffled to his senses. If not for him artificially increasing his sensitivity to their distinct mana profiles, he probably wouldn’t be able to sense them at all. “Give me the whole bottle.” Casimir demanded, pulling out a gold coin and slamming it on the bar. The sound was loud, demonstrating his strength without making it obvious that he was doing so.

Greed sparkled in her eyes at last. Smoothly, she added. “The whole bottle will cost you…” She picked up the coin and assessed it. Or rather, assessing him. “Five of these.” She finished. “It’s a very exclusive vintage.”

Casimir counted out four more, deliberately pulling out twenty of the quarter-ounce pure gold coins the locals used to do so, replacing the coins into a bulging money pouch. Grinning, the elf slipped the coins into her cleavage and rang a little bell at the back of the bar. After a moment, a panel in the wall opened up, and she whispered into it: “Umbra vintage for the customer.”

Casimir focused his senses on the ground beneath him as he pretended to be depressed. As expected, the good/drugged wine was kept in the secretive areas that his students were kept in, and he was able to get a flash of clarity on where the entrance was when the cellar door opened up, weakening the privacy enchantments for a few seconds. Similarly, his sense of his students increased at the same time, confirming that they were inside that door.

Noting his exact path, a scruffy man that looked like an experienced warrior entered the bar area, holding a wine that was black as pnuma flower, but without the points of light. “Here you are, sir.” He said, unable to sound dignified and instead managing the epitome of sleazy. “A few glasses of this and you’ll be lucky to know where you are in the morning.”

“All right!” Casimir said, faking enthusiasm. He easily opened it with his bare hands and gave the substance a good whiff. Immediately, his head swam with the gaseous narcotic within the bottle. What the hell did they just give him? “This is powerful stuff!” Casimir complimented shakily. He used a flash of life mana to purge the noxious substance from his body.

“Only the best for our customers.” The man said, not bothering to hide his evil grin.

Casimir was going to fake drinking this, using magic to purge the poison as he drank it, but with something this potent… Change of plans. Casimir put the cap back on the bottle. “Where’s your toilet?” He asked instead. “I should piss before I stop being able to walk places.”

“Chickening out, eh?” The slaver taunted. “A real man’s drink too much for you?”

Casimir was pretty sure you could knock out a dragon with a barrel of this, and they were usually pretty resistant to poisons. “Fuck off.” Casimir said, faking irritation. “I’ll find it then.” He walked towards the place the slaver popped out of, trying the doorknob. Hrm, auto-locking, huh? Fancy.

“Hey, that’s employees only.” Called out the elf.

Casimir spent a chunk of mana to rip the locked door off its hinges. “That sounds like a ‘you’ problem.” He shot back as he opened the bottle again, drawing out and aerating the drug within. The slaver took out a knife and charged, but when the cloud of drugs was shoved into his face by Casimir’s spell, he dropped to the ground, out like a light.

The elf rang the bell frantically, sounding the alarm to her confederates. Casimir put the bottle away after drawing out enough drugged air to deal with a few more of them, drawing his sword as he did so.

A few slavers attempted to ambush him as he repeated the steps the first one used to deliver the drug, but he directed his improvised knockout magic into their hiding spots, appearing unopposed as he walked through the hallways.

Even with the rain being blocked by the roof, the water mana that inundated the environment during such a storm tended to creep into structures anyway. Casimir added that mana to the cloud of drugs he was directing, increasing the size and speed at the cost of making it a vaguely visible mist.

“This is good practice.” Casimir murmured to himself as he manipulated the water mana into the nostrils and lungs of a few more slavers that were lying in wait. “Ambushes only work if you can actually hide, dumbasses.” He muttered as he made it to the hidden trap door. He considered the quantity of drugs left in his mist, then dispersed it. He could save the rest of those drugs for later. Instead, he drew in more water mana from outside and converted his internal mana and released it, building up a proper domain that he could carry into the underground. It would slow him down, but it was important to manage the slaver’s fear.

Currently, he hadn’t killed anyone yet, and was fighting them with domain magic in the rain. Scary, but not ‘panic and do something stupid’ scary. It allowed them to think they had a chance to win.

When he felt he had a decent amount of mana at his fingertips, he stomped on the trap door, injecting a spike of metal mana to tear the locking mechanism apart before lifting it. Taking cues from the book he had been studying during the break, he condensed the domain further, sending a thick cloud of mist into the trap door. Dropping in after it, Casimir deadened the sound of his landing, which did not appear to impede the volley of arrows that launched immediately on landing.

With the instant feedback provided by the mist that was linked so strongly to his mana sense, Casimir was able to avoid all but two arrows, to which he angled his body to make them deflect off his armor instead of scoring deep cuts. From the sound of the impacts, they were enchanted with additional impact force, but his armor’s enchantments held up.

A few motes of cold mana were fed by the domain, causing ice to grow over the bow-wielding slaver’s bodies in a second. Four more of them charged with swords, against which Casimir focused the domain’s mana at the ground they walked, creating a slick patch of wetness that was not quite ice, but their boots could find no purchase on the surface of it anyway.

Casimir leapt away, allowing the melee slavers to crash into each other before churning the mist in exactly the right way. Just a tiny seed of lightning mana was placed near their pile, and a large chunk of the domain, more than he wanted to, instantly flash-converted into more lightning mana, cooking the four men in their skins with the sound of a thunderclap. They… probably could survive it. If they get potions within the next hour.

“Need to work on control.” Casimir muttered to himself as he finished knocking out the archers that didn’t decide to quit the fight after getting flash-frozen. “One underpowered spell, and one overpowered. Are we going to go zero for three?” There was enough mana left in the domain that he could probably pull off one more big spell; it was a pretty small one. Really, it wasn’t even more mana than he could personally throw around if he was so inclined. This way just let him get in more practice with domain magic.

Of course, you didn’t get to be a successful criminal enterprise in this world without having a few ways to deal with random veteran ranks showing up to dismantle your operation. Which is what he was pretending to be.

What did these guys have? It seemed to mostly be trap enchantments. Which he literally washed away by flowing a cloud of mist to erode away the mana in the enchantments. It was a little tricky to pull off properly, as while you could twist water mana into a corrosive force, it was more in line with his skills to just use it as a medium to cast negative magic through and disarm them normally.

Eventually, he found his way into the cell block. Twenty discrete cells were there, about half of them filled. His students were in one, still unconscious from the sleep magic they used to incapacitate them. Well, it was possible that Illivere was just pretending to be asleep, but he wasn’t sure. She was really good at that.

Still, a disadvantage of using domain magic was that his mana senses were muffled, so when combined with the suppressive enchantments in places that he hasn’t worn away yet, it left him feeling a little twitchy. The wagon that his students were transported in was in the room, the crate filled with their equipment inside.

Carefully, he directed the remainder of the domain he dragged in here to strip the enchantments on the occupied cells, the smothering water mana absorbing the violent discharge of lightning mana that they were armed with, converting it all into a massive blast of thunder that Casimir directed deeper into the complex, collapsing the tunnel towards the prison. The tiny amount of noise that escaped his control (relatively) also coincidentally shattered the sleep spells on all of the prisoners, causing them to all awaken screaming.

“Get up!” Casimir shouted over the ringing that was no doubt in their ears. He used a few motes of mind mana to make them understand him anyway. “We’re going to get out of here before their real enforcers show up.” He assumed they’d be showing up, anyway. Despite the enchantments, he thought the defenses he’s been barreling through were kind of light. It seemed to just be whatever thugs were on hand at the time.

“Teach, they were going to sell Illivere to a dragon!” Peter exclaimed. Oh?

“We’ll go over that after we’re out of here.” Casimir promised.

Over the next few minutes, Casimir busied himself disarming the enchanted collars that kept the prisoners from doing anything to affect their escape. Like all of the enchantment work here, it was very well done. “...wait.” Casimir said after he disarmed the last one. “I recognize this style.” The suicide enchantments… “These guys are connected to Luci and Magnus.” He whispered to himself.

Casimir’s eyes hardened. “Start binding mana.” He instructed his students. “I expect trouble.” Each one said an affirmation and started doing the Evoker’s dance.

Casimir examined the other slaves, but they seemed to be captured mostly for domestic or labor purposes; not particularly dangerous when armed. “You all… just stay out of the way.”

Faron shouted an affirmation: “We’ll keep you safe!” He vowed.

Casimir started sorting his student’s equipment, which was surprisingly the only thing in the wagon. He knew they rushed them out of the prison in a hurry, but seriously? Did they expect the Warden to tie him up for long enough for them to escape?

After his students were properly equipped and in possession of some small amount of mana, Casimir figured it was a good time to get out. “The slavers have been evacuating the bodies of their fellows for a while.” Casimir warns. “Follow me.”

Walking back up to the Inn was unopposed, but when he was about to leave, a set of five men landed, as if they leapt a great distance to get there.

“Who are these guys?” Peter asked.

Illivere answered first: “The slaver’s enforcers.”

“Powerful warriors.” Hanna added.

“Mages?” Asked Faron.

“No.” Casimir said. Despite the rain, the men were stripped to the waist, their muscles on full display as they held their weapons like dedicated warriors. But the power emanating from their stances… It was significant. “Cultivators.”