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The group was traveling on the bird's back, and Lena used this opportunity to enjoy the ride. The bird flew at a much faster pace than she ever experienced, and it was even faster than the airships they took to the empire.

She understood the airship had much more space and could move much more luggage and people, as well as travel much longer distances, but there was something freeing about flying on a beast's back. Well, at least for the humans on its back.

They moved at a high speed above a huge forest, cities, mountains, and valleys. They would stop every 12 hours to let the bird rest and continue their journey right after. In 3 days, they already reached the border of their empire to the neutral zone where the ruins were located.

"We will land in 30 minutes in the ruins' area. We will walk on foot for 20 minutes before we arrive at the entrance, and only when all groups will assemble, you will be able to enter the ruins."

"How many groups are there?"

"There are 5. One from each empire, one from the Assassin Order, and one from the Church of Light."

Everyone knew about the Church since they were popular among the common people. But most of them didn't know what the Assassin Order was.

"What is the Assassin Order?"

"They're an organization that works in the shadows and accept hit orders. All their descendants have an affinity with Darkness. Those who don't either get killed or tossed out of the family."

"But isn't it rare to have Darkness and Light affinities? Even if one parent has the Darkness affinity, the kid will have less than 5% to inherit it."

One of the students who knew the statistics asked about the Order's traditions.

"You're right, but just like the priests of the Church of Light, they're a group of inbreds. In order to keep the chances as high as they can, they marry with their siblings and within their clans to have high genetic resemblance."

Elijah explained and his tone was full of disgust. Evidently, he wasn't a fan of those two groups.

"Where does the Order work? Wouldn't the empires attack them if they undermined the empire's authority?"

"Both forces work in all three empires. Since the Church of Light had swept the hearts of many commoners, the empires let it be. Their main activities are healing people and making them support their causes. We don't know the Church's long-term goals, but the empire doesn't want to kill so many light users if they don't call for revolution."

"But what about the Assassin Order? If they kill people, doesn't it affect the empire's ability to enforce its laws?"

"You're right. The problem is that they're extremely hidden. All three empires tried to unroot them from their territories, yet never found their bases. Both those forces have at least two Grand Magi in their ranks in every empire and a few other True Magi. However, they aren't counted in the empire's Magi List."

From Lena's perspective, the Church didn't matter at all. They only had the commoners behind them, and those could be easily oppressed since they were weak. She guessed that's why the empire let them be until they grew too strong and influential in the empire.

Now if the empire tried to suppress them, the commoners could stop providing all the food and taxes, and it would be bothersome to deal with it. Additionally, they'd have to fight with 2 Grand Magi who were already inside their borders. Even if they won, the fight would cause massive damage to the lands and could destroy whole cities.

'But the Order is quite dangerous. If someone orders a hit on my head, I'd probably have to fight for survival.'

"Don't worry too much about those two forces. The Empires made some agreements with them like letting them explore ruins like these, and in exchange, they would limit their activities. For example, the Assassin Order accepts hits against dukes and the imperial family only if it came from someone from the same empire."

Lena shook her head. As expected, most of those restrictions only kept the imperial family safe.

The group landed and soon reached the ruins' entrance. Lena could see 3 groups waiting and deduced that one group was still missing.

*BOOM*

A huge fireball appeared right above them out of nowhere and was blocked by Elijah's stone wall spell. Instead of a normal stone wall, it was a wall made of a powerful mithril, a powerful metal with silver color.

The wall turned into lances that were launched at the attacker, a skinny redhead man who led a group of 6 young mages. The man waved his hand and the lances melted, falling down without causing any harm to his group.

"Elijah, you still haven't lost your touch."

"Kurama, you shouldn't embarrass yourself in front of your students by fighting someone you can't beat."

Elijah led his group to free space, and they sat and waited for the last empire to arrive.

"The group with the black clothes and red-colored masks are the from the Assassin Order. Those with white robes are priests from the Church of Light. The group whose guardian attacked us earlier is from the Chijakor Empire. Now, we only wait for the Incan Empire."

The group of the other empire looked quite different in Lena's eyes. Their eyes were slant and monolid. Overall, they seemed also slightly shorter than the average in the Amistrys Empire, and their skin was slightly darker with different undertones.

"If you meet someone from another group, kill them if you can and run away if you can't. If you aren't sure whether you can kill them, just probe them from a safe distance. They'll likely do the same. Since everyone sends their light users, the assassins are at disadvantage in those ruins despite being usually the most dangerous group."

Just when he finished talking, a huge green flying serpent with feathers on top of its long body could be seen in the distance. A few moments later, the last group from the Incan Empire arrived and everyone assembled.

"Remember the rules. Whatever you get there is yours, you can kill each other if you want, but no more attacks once you're outside. You can't tell your guardian what items the other groups got before leaving the neutral zone."

Those were the rules the empires agreed on many years ago, so everyone just nodded and got ready to enter. The 5 magi then channeled their energy into a large gate that seemed to have nothing beyond it, and slowly a strong light appeared in the gate and hid everything behind it.

"What you see once you go in will be completely different from what you saw behind the gate earlier. We don't know how it's exactly done, but we believe it's a special magic circle made by light Great Magi that cast illusions on those who enter it. You will be separated when you go in, so try to find each other."

Elijah explained to his group who nodded and ran into the gate.

"Ready for another round, Elijah?"

"I'm not that bored, you can fight it out with the priest."

-------

As soon as she entered, Lena cast on herself a simple yet effective light spell. This spell would prevent any Darkness mana user to sneak up on her through the shadows. Although it gave her location away from a longer distance, she didn't want to get ambushed.

She sensed the mana around her and searched for areas with higher mana density. With her higher elite human senses, she was much more efficient than normal mages. She wandered around aimlessly when she suddenly noticed the density would get slightly thicker as she walked south.

She started jogging in that direction and soon she could see in the distance a man with the same light spell as her around him, and one man with green clothes standing next to him. They were sending weaker spells to probe one another.

'Priest robes, he must be from the Church of Light. As for the other, I think the group from the Incan Empire wore those uniforms.'

They could see her as well when she got closer, so they stopped fighting.

"We noticed the item here first, go search for something else."

The Incanian frowned at Lena and tried to send her away. He didn't want to start a three-way battle since everyone was True Mages, and he didn't have any clear advantage.

"What item is it?"

"None of your business. Priest, wanna gang up on the Amistrysian girl first before continuing our fight? We don't have room for new competitors."

"Sure- AAHHHH!"

But before the priest could continue, Lena already launched her attacks. She wouldn't wait for her enemies to come to an agreement before starting the battle, so she sent her favorite fire snakes against the priest who was about to answer.

The priest had one light spell active to prevent ambushes, and one wasn't enough to stop Lena's spell. He couldn't even use his best affinity to defend himself since light doesn't have good defensive attributes.

He tried to pour as much mana as he could into a large circle of fire, but the snakes broke through it quickly, bit his body, and exploded. It was a gory scene and needless to say, he didn't make it out alive.

"Now it's 1v1, still want to come at me?"

Lena smiled at the man who offered to gang up on her and charged forward.