By the time Wolfe had returned to the road, the witches had already filled in the trap with Earth Magic, and the APC was well on its way again.
Sitting next to a trap while one of your members went to look for the perpetrator didn't seem like a great idea for them, and Wolfe was known to be able to take care of himself. So, they cast the spell and started on their way as soon as he had located the potential ambushers.
The driver slowed as Wolfe came into sight behind them just before the sun fell below the horizon.
"Did you take care of it?" She called out the window as he pulled up alongside.
"In a manner of speaking. They were just a group of deserters who didn't know anything after the suicide mission they were sent on. I told them to come to the Academy and tell the teachers their story since they want to go home if possible." Wolfe explained.
"You're too nice. But if they didn't attack, they're likely not bad people. A truth spell will let us know what their real intentions are much more easily than you could interrogate them anyhow." Peach informed him, sticking her head out one of the armoured side windows, which swung outward so that the occupants could shoot out of the vehicle.
The APC picked up speed as the twilight faded toward darkness, and Wolfe turned on the bike's light while he scouted the road for the much larger vehicle. The small motorcycle could dodge traps much more easily, and with his Armour active, not much he came across out here would be able to hurt him, even if it wanted to.
The roads started to look familiar only a few hours after sunset, and Wolfe realized that they were already back at the portion of the road which the Coven Security forces had taken him down the day of the draft. They were nearly back at the Academy already, well ahead of schedule thanks to the constant use of magic, and they would be in the area patrolled by the guards soon.
That prediction was spot on, and ten minutes after Wolfe recognized the road, he came across the roadblock set up by the patrol guards which Headmistress Peach had hired to protect the Academy.
"Halt. Who are you, and what is your business here?" The Witch asked, holding a wand in her hand.
"My name is Wolfe Noxus, and I am escorting the Headmistress back from a mission for the Coven Council into the Frozen Wastes. She is in the vehicle behind me." Wolfe replied evenly.
The APC pulled to a stop behind him, and the witch looked noticeably nervous, which put Wolfe on guard against betrayal, but the checkpoint guard began to relax as soon as their lights spotted the logo on the vehicle.
"It's a Coven vehicle with the new logo." She called back to the rest of her group, who were hiding in the shadows.
The barricade across the road was pulled to the side, and the guard waved the APC forward. Headmistress Peach moved to the front to wave at them out the windshield, and the witch's eyes opened so wide that Wolfe thought her eyes were going to pop out of her head.
"She's a Rank Two Witch." The guard stammered.
"Indeed she is. And she requests that you not say anything about that just yet. It's a bit of a secret until she finishes with what she's doing with the Coven Leader." Wolfe explained.
"I thought that only that strange Demon, the one who helped the Coven Leader advance, could make a Rank Two Witch." Someone in the dark commented.
With [Detect Hidden] on, Wolfe could tell it was a rather average-sized witch and what she looked like, but in the dark, the spell didn't detail anything in colour, just grayscale, so he couldn't really tell much more about her or the others in the checkpoint team.
Wolfe smiled at them. "Oh, you mean that Cursed Demon kid from the Fortress City, the one with two Witches as Familiars, who had the Coven Leader and Miss Mary, the one with the big white dog as a Familiar, under a Servant bond?"
"Yeah, that guy. What was his name again? Wolfe or something?" A guard in the back agreed.
"Yeah, Wolfe Noxus." Wolfe agreed.
The witch closest to him began pointing at him with her mouth wide open, but Wolfe just accelerated through the open checkpoint, following the APC toward the Academy and, hopefully, a nice warm bed for the night.
The Academy gates looked exactly the same as when he left, but something was drastically different about the atmosphere of the compound, and Wolfe couldn't put his finger on it.
It felt wrong like there was something here that hadn't been here when he left, and it didn't belong.
The APC pulled to a stop off to one side of the main entrance, and the escort team piled out, surrounding the vehicle in case there was some threat in the area waiting for them.
"Did you hire a bunch of new staff?" Wolfe asked curiously when the Headmistress climbed out and stretched after her long ride.
"No, they're mostly the same as when you left. It's only been one winter. Why do you ask?"
Wolfe frowned. "Something feels wrong here. It doesn't belong, and it wasn't here when I left."
The Headmistress sighed. "I think I know what you're talking about. When the rebellion started, the Academy was attacked by rebels who wanted to wipe out all of the mixed-blood students. There is still a lot of lingering curse energy in the area, though we broke all the spells.
Now that I've reached the Second Rank, I can feel it in my bones just standing here. Do you have a bit of mana you can spare? You always could channel a lot, even when you were first put on punishment detail."
Wolfe smiled at the memory. Five Hundred Units every day for a month. It was such a huge amount when he still equated mana capacity to money. Now he could fill that multiple times a minute without any real trouble.
"I've got plenty of stored mana if you want to cast a cleansing on the area. Do you need reagents, or do you want to do it now?" He asked.
"Let's get it done before we go in. It will be a great present for the students after their break. None of them could leave the compound. It's still too dangerous out there. But first, let's find a spot to lie down. I need to have maximum contact with the earth for this to work properly." She added with a tired sigh.
The driver and two of the other guards pointed toward a spot at the side of the building at the same time.
ραΠdαsΝοvεl.cοm "If you're going to be spread out on the grass somewhere, we know the perfect spot. The hill between the founder's statue and the training fields. It's where everyone goes to suntan during the summer semester." The driver laughed.
There wouldn't be any suntanning at midnight, but if it was a good spot, it was a good spot.
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