The attacker's body, as far as I could see considering it was covered in a black cape, was made from some sort of black wood with inlaid gemstones, the design sleek. It moved with unnatural grace as it swung its head between me and Rebecca. No sound came from it as it did so.

  Before I could react in any meaningful way, Rebecca had grabbed a chair and smashed it over the attackers head, wood splinters exploding everywhere. In return the attacker slowly turned to face her, clearly unbothered by the attack itself, more bothered by being interrupted at all. It lowered its hands.

  “Intended Perpetrator found. Acquiring combat characteristics.”

  Its body changed, its head and hands enlarging, flexing and shifting like ooze before settling in a new shape. Its hands now shaped like claws and its face now containing large canine teeth, it jumped for me. I managed to fall out of my chair in a manner that dodged the attack, landing hard on the floor, the air driven from my lungs as it stood over me.

  The attacker raised its hand, striking towards me faster than I could react. I clenched my eyes shut and expected the strike.

  But the hit never came. Rebecca swiped at the attackers midsection, ripping it off its feet bare handedly with that single swing, tossing it into a bookshelf, sending probably valuable books flying everywhere. “Got you.”, she said, satisfied. She grabbed it as it was about to get up before slammed it towards the ground. “So what do we have here?”, she asked.

  As the attacker attempted to rise to its feet again, Rebecca took deep breaths. “Sturdy piece of-”

  The attacker charged me again. This time I managed to jump out of the way. It looked between me and Rebecca again. “What is it-” “DONT SPEAK.”, Rebecca yelled.

  The attacker turned to her and yelled. “HELP, SOMEONE, THIS BITCH IS TRYING TO KILL ME!”, icicles stung into my back. It yelled in Henry's, no, it yelled in my voice. Rebecca didn't hesitate and grabbed its throat before slamming it into the ground. “Shut up.”, she growled at it. “Shes threatening me!”, it yelled its voice completely unimpeded.

  As it struggled to free itself, its claws carving gashes into Rebecca's arm, I noticed a bright green gem on its torso. I scampered towards it, cursing as I grabbed it. “What are yo-”

  As soon as she noticed what I had seen, she grabbed the gem and ripped it out, not hesitating another second before spiking it into the ground, smashing it into a million pieces with a high pitched ping. The attacker's body went limp under her hand and Rebecca sat onto the ground, gasping for air.

  “Did you notice it?” Rebecca asked breathlessly.

  “Noticed what?”

  “The glass shards.”

  I looked around but the ground was clear of them. Shards of the green gem yes, but no glass shards.. “There are no-” I turned towards the window. The balcony was covered in glass as if someone inside had jumped outside.

  “It ripped the glass outwards, that way it would look like I fled after killing you.”

  “Killing me?”, I asked, looking between her and the window

  "Yeah. That's why it copied my claws and jaw.”

  Claw- I looked down onto her hands and, sure thing, Rebecca had clawed hands. Yet, as she continued to breathe deep breaths, the claw′s slowly but surely regressed back into fingernails. I looked between her hands and the Golems and sure enough, the shape was almost identical.

  “Why go through all that?”, I asked, pointing at the Golem fighting the shaking of my hands..

  “Cause Mariticide is one of the four Unjudgeable Crimes.”

  “Right. I should-” I took a deep breath. “I should have thought of that.” I had no clue of course but it sounded like something a noble should know about so I couldn't ask.

  She looked quizzically at me for a few seconds. “So. We are going to leave earlier than I planned originally. This time they sent an old Instigator Golem, there is a high chance that this was just a warning.” Her tone allowed for no response.

  I looked down at the shrivelled up creature. The gemstones on its body resembled the stones Leopold had sent Henry alongside the spellbook.

  “So that's a golem.” I thought quietly to myself, bending down to look at the stones. Each of them was broken perfectly in the middle which, according to the book meant that they had been overcharged and as such were no longer useful for the kind of magic found in the spellbook. Which was a shame considering those needed for those spells were apparently pretty expensive even at low grades. A small one could allegedly be exchanged for enough gold to pay for a full year worth of grain for a small family.

  It was at this point that the door opened up, Leopold, holding a spear, looked around the room, shivering head to toe. “Is everything ok?”, he asked. "Master?" His gaze fell onto Rebecca, bleeding and towards me, not bleeding and he relaxed. “Y-yes?”, I answered, my voice shaking more than I'd care to admit. “What happened? I heard you scream.” Rebecca looked up and turned to him before I could say anything.

  “Newlywed stuff. You wouldn't get it.”

  Leopold looked at me and I decided to simply nod instead of commenting on it.

  “Is…. is there anything I can bring you Sir? To… assist?”, he seemed as out of his depth as I felt.

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  I looked at Rebecca's arms and the deep gashes on them. Clearly she was wounded, why didn't Leopold say anything about that? The man had come to help despite quite visibly fearing for his life. But this is where he drew the line?

  “Bring me medical supplies.“, I told him and he nodded, “Of course Master, I'll be right back.”

  Rebecca looked up from her own wounds, her gaze scanning me. “What do you need those for? You′re not hurt.”

  I blinked at her. “No, but you are.”

  “Oh. You meant-” She looked at her arms. “For my-”

  “Yeah, you got hurt defending me.”

  Rebecca opened her mouth but seemingly decided against whatever she was going to say. “I appreciate it.”, she said instead.

  Leopold soon returned with the medical supplies before leaving once more, not before wishing us a good night and talking about warning the maid what the source of the sound had been in case she was to check in herself later. The total lack of worry was concerning.

  ”Have you done this before?”, she asked. I took her hand to get a better look at her arm. Her fingers were strong and steady, her skin warm. The cuts bled heavily but didn't look deep.

  “Not for real, no.”, I responded. When she tensed up, I almost told her that I had learned this for my driving license. But I didn't know how to answer the follow up questions so I held my tongue.

  "You're trying to patch me up from what you read in some book?”

  I gently applied the alcohol from the bottle in Leopold's Medical Kit. To Rebecca′s credit, she barely flinched when it made contact with her wounds.

  “Not really, it's complicated.”

  I wanted to ask a million things but I couldn't calm down enough to think about what Henry might have known and what excuses I could have made for lacking certain information.

  “When are we leaving?”, I asked instead.

  “Ideally tonight.”, she let out a sound that might have been a whimper as I tightened the bandage a bit more.

  “In the dark, when who knows how many of these things might be waiting?”

  “Good Point. Tomorrow afternoon then.”

  _________________________________________________________________________

  Simple Transportation Magic

  I know that you, as a nobleman won't have much practical use for this, but it is such a common spell to teach beginners that I'd be amiss to not show it to you.

  As you are not awakened to magic I will include the list of components required to perform this spell.

  Requirement:

  One Piece of square Cloth, large enough to lay out everything you wish to transport on it. Note that the bag will be exactly as tough as the material you′re using so I suggest using something strong like steel fibre or a material with other qualities like flame retardant asbestos.

  At least two hands breath worth of string or thin rope

  A charged Moonstone, Moonphase irrelevant.

  Begin by laying out the square on a flat surface. It does not need to be perfectly laid out or perfectly flat but it makes the process easier. Ideally use a tough fabric as the objects inside the bag do not vanish as they would with higher levels of this spell.

  Grasp the Moonstone in your hand and wrap the string or rope around your wrist of the same hand. Extend your arm to shoulder height, holding the stone above the middle point of the fabric.

  Speak a command phrase. Some guides will here go into detail on what to say or warn of using something a stranger could find out about for safety but that is stupid. If someone grabs the bag they can simply cut the rope and retrieve all items that way. And half the chants you see in books like this are merely so the user will take it more seriously.

  Apparently it's not “magic” if you use the word “Apple”. The only important thing is that you will need to say the word backwards in order to break the spell without cutting the rope or the bag, which you don't want to do because everything will spill everywhere. Though some prefer it that way.

  The bag, no matter what it contains, will now fit comfortably into your palm and weigh around a pound. But beware, the items inside the bag still exist so it might pierce it from within or damage what's inside so don't fill it up too much, and use stuffing when possible.

  _________________________________________________________________________

  “Racecar.”, I whispered. The cloth's corners rose up, tying together using the string around my wrist. The Moonstone's glow vanished, rendering it nearly see through. The bag rose up to my hand, weighing no more than a few apples. Rebecca poked the bag.

  “Useful.”, she said. “Do you get the charge on the stone back when you undo the spell?”

  “Doesnt say so in the text, so I don't know.” I showed her the page.

  Rebecca took the book and flipped through the pages. “Are there any combat spells in there?”

  “No, I checked. The closest would be a spell for lighting campfires.”

  “Shame.”, she said as she shouldered a backpack.

  “Maybe I can find some combat magic later?”, I suggested as I placed the book into my own backpack.

  “Would be nice but neither of us is awakened to magic so we′d run out of Moonstones quickly.”

  “Maybe we can find more?”

  “Even the best adventurers I′ve met have less than a hundred. I′ve heard about two dozen, maybe a couple more Mages. Four of them Moonstone Mages, all the other ones normally awakened. So I wouldn't hope for a career as a Mage.”

  “Master, are you sure you are leaving today?”Louise asked and Leopold nodded. “There is no reason to leave early." he added. I didn't know what to say to them. Rebecca noticed my hesitation.

  “I decided to leave early.”, she simply said. “You got your orders so just do your jobs.” Leopold opened his mouth but I shook my head. “Im sorry but you can't convince me otherwise. We need to leave.” Neither of them were convinced. What could I say to…. An idea came to me. I gestured to Leopold to come closer.

  I leaned in and whispered: “While I'm gone, you two go ahead and give yourselves a raise for the extra work. I'll leave the height up to you but I expect work as good as the raise is high.” Leopold′s eyes lit up. He stepped back and relayed the message to Lousie whose eyes gained the same shimmer.

  “Of course Sir.” they said as one.

  “I knew I could rely on you two.”

  “Enough.”, Rebecca said, grabbing me by the chainmail and lifting me onto a horse. “We′re leaving now.”, she said. “We got a lot of way to clear and not as much daylight left as I would like.”

  With a last bow by both Leopold and Louise we set out on our way.

  “So where are we going now?”, I asked.

  Rebecca looked at me, at her size, even her horse was gigantic and as such she loomed even higher over me than usual. “We′re gonna sign up as Adventurers.” she said. “And then…. Then we'll see further. Gonna be around three days till we arrive.”