Descending Into A Novel-Chapter 62:First Mission (9)

In the end, while he and Ellen were brainstorming on ways to separate the two, an opportunity ended up falling right into their lap.

"Cador, hold these for me while I go to the bathroom."

How incredibly lucky for them, was this the fabled luck of a major side character? Ellen disliked it whenever he likened their lives to novels and he could understand why but they really were just too suitable to be protagonists.

Coincidentally stumbling into the inheritance of one of the most legendary heroes, being born into one of the most powerful families and having an intense family civil war, being forced by your own race to do horrible things, seducing princes of entire kingdoms, getting revenge on the sect that threw you out and becoming the strongest hero that there ever was.

Every single one of them could just as easily have been the protagonists of their own novels.

Each of them alone were characters with achievements that made them legendary figures to be remembered for years, but combined together. How were their predecessors supposed to even try and match them?

He and Ellen looked at each other, immediately moving into action the moment Lucy disappeared into the bathroom.

Casting an invisibility spell on himself and Ellen. He stared at Cador, estimating his coordinates and distance from him with a quick thumb test.

Locking in the coordinates, he made a hand incantation using his right gloved hand. His index tracing a circle in the air, as if he was drawing an invisible border around Cador, before abruptly clenching his fingers into a fist. His dimension-attuned mana flowing out of his core and into the glove.

"Forced Relocation."

Without so much as a sound, Cador disappeared from where he was standing. The bags he was holding falling onto the ground with a slight thud. No one around to even witness him disappearing.

Quickly turning to Ellen, he grabbed her hand. Before casting another teleport spell on the two of them.

Opening his eyes, he found himself standing outside of a large abandoned warehouse.

The town of Dravenport, was naturally a town located on the east coast of the Euni continent. With a pretty large fishing industry given its small size. Since it mostly relied on fishing and imports for food, the town naturally tried to fish more to reduce costs.

The port was therefore unnaturally larger then it should have been for such a small town. Making it quite a perfect place to conduct a hidden interrogation/ kidnapping.

Yesterday, Raymond had scouted out the area and found the perfect isolated abandoned warehouse.

Setting up several engravings inside of it, he was fairly confident that neither Cador or Lucy could escape.

Sound cancelling, reduce presence, durable walls, weaken strength, slower thinking. Spells to disrupt any tracking, he put everything that he could think of which might serve to be useful.

All sorts of engravings which would weaken them and make it hard for them to try and signal the outside world for help.

Ellen briefly activated her innate power, letting her see through one of the overhead skylights. Revealing Cador frantically trying to use his ash Arts to break through the door. Too bad for him, it was probably the most magically protected part.

Quietly drawing her bow, she notched a special arrow she had prepared long before the mission. At the tip of it, was a small needle and a hollow cylinder—filled with a special sedative.

Activating her innate power again, she observed the blue pathing that was formed. Her mind instinctually calculating the best way for her to fire off an arrow to follow said pathing.

Her innate powers let her see weaknesses and the red which she still was unsure of what it was exactly. After being given an elixir by Zachary in the previous timeline, it had been permanently enhanced to improve her eyesight and improve the earlier two abilities. Making it so that rather then just seeing weaknesses she could also see the best path to follow to hit said weaknesses.

The elixir, was somehow still effective. Making her innate power stronger then what it was before.

But even if she could see the pathing to follow, actually following it was rather difficult as well. Depending on the enemy, they could have only a few or dozens. Each one had a very specific path they had to follow, making it hard for Ellen to even hit them sometimes.

In the previous timeline, when she still used a sword. She had simply used it to try and attack these weak points, making her sword fighting weak and easy to counter for any skilled opponent. Using a bow was a much better use of her innate power. She had even considered using mana guns rather then a bow, but Killian’s inheritance was purely based off archery so she used that to fully utilize his inheritance.

Quietly taking a deep breath, she drew the string back. Her eyes locked onto Cador and the blue pathing she wanted the arrow to follow.

With a quiet twang, she loosed the arrow. A quiet whistling sound as the arrow flew through the small notch in the roof. Burying itself an inch into Cador’s lower back, injecting his body with the sedative.

Cador, reacted exceptionally quickly. His hand gripped around the arrow and dug it out, his body and head turning to the skylight where the arrow originated from.

But it was already too late, even while turning his movements turned slow, his eyelids drooping slightly and his angry expression slowly turning serene and calm.

With a loud thud, he collapsed nearly face first into the ground. Snoring as he lay there.

With that, it was Raymond’s turn. While he was knocked out, he would search their memories and try to find out any secret information.

Rolling up his sleeve slightly, he crouched down next to the collapsed Cador. Putting his right hand onto his cranium.

Memory reading like what Raymond was about to use was considered as under the mind magic discipline.

Truth be told, Raymond himself struggled with spells in this discipline. He only learned this particular memory reading spell due to...circumstances in his past. Even then, he disliked this particular magic discipline.

He could even go so far as to say it was arguably worse then then black magic which encompassed magic like necromancy and dark magic. Heck, it was even worse then life force magic.

At least he knew a few decent people who were necromancers or dark magic users. But none of the people he knew that used memory reading were good people.

He winced slightly as he activated his magic. Cador’s mind was unusually tough for someone so young. It was hard to describe it exactly.

His mind felt raw, unlike the usual delicateness that most humans were like. His mental state seemed more instinctual and wild rather then controlled.

It was almost like he wasn’t human.

Searching through his first memory, he quickly entered said memory. Releasing a small grunt as he did, right now their most crucial thing to do was finding out whether or not Lucy was a demon contracter.

In the past life, Lucy wasn’t one but she almost did become one. The chances weren’t zero.

In the memory, since it was from Cador’s point of view. He found himself and Lucy in a cave together, the outside was snowing hard. The occasional gust bringing in cold air from the outside. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

Lucy was shivering, her arms wrapped around her legs as she desperately tried to keep herself warm. Her clothes were ripped at some places, revealing festering wounds which still hadn’t healed. Blood, wet and dry covered her. While her hair was messy and disheveled.

Raymond could recognize this memory easily, how could he not?

Around a year before entering the academy, Lucy had been ambushed by a few enemies of the Floriza family, aiming to kill her and enrage her father—who had once been a villain. In hopes of even slightly dragging down the Floriza family.

The attempt had failed. Lucy never revealed much details about how and why but she did mention she spent several weeks holed up in a cave while she waited for the weather to calm down.

The memory was unusually vivid, most people only had faint recollections of their memories. Unless they had very good memory or it was something that was unforgettable, it was usually always blurry.

In fact, the whole memory was too vivid. The smell of blood was intense, and despite being quite far away from Lucy, he could hear her whimpering all too well. Every small sensation, he could feel it. He barely even felt cold despite how harsh the weather was outside.

His eyes widened, looking down at his own body.

Raymond hadn’t noticed it just now since he was looking purely at Lucy, but now that he saw himself—through Cador’s memory. He could see his own body.

Revealing a large muscular furry body, with four legs and claws on each of them. His whole body in shades of grey.

He couldn’t see his own face but he didn’t doubt that he had a wolf head either.

Despite nearly all living creatures blinking, or being able to see parts of their own face. Such things were always removed from memories. Making it quite odd to experience someone else’s memory.

He cancelled his memory reading spell, gasping as he was released from Cador’s memory

"Raymond?! What’s wrong?"

Taking several deep breaths as he panted, he stared at Cador’s still sleeping body for a while before he answered her.

"Cador Ashfield...he’s not a new person or anything like that. He is Ashfield, the wolf that Lucy bonded with. No wonder he was so odd...he probably can’t speak or walk properly."

Raymond cursed himself for not noticing it sooner. Looking back on it, the signs were all there!

How he never talked or showed any emotions, how his movements always seemed stiff and robotic. But most egregious was his ash Arts!

It wasn’t Arts, it was literally just his ability as an Ashborn Wolf! Like how humans had Arts or innate powers, most monsters would have their own innate abilities, and Ashfield’s ability was to control ash.

Lucy already learnt her Art which let her fuse with her pets, she was just hiding it and Ashfield for some reason!

Laughing to himself a little, he clenched his fists as he sat on the ground. He felt so damn stupid for not realizing.

He quickly stopped laughing however, turning to Ellen with a serious look on his face.

"By the way. Lucy should have tracked us down and is probably rushing to our location as we speak."