Spot was very affectionate and somewhat obedient, getting a push from Ariwyn with orders that he didn't quite understand. Then Taramo began to get hungry.

  Spot split himself into four little pieces with the rest of him returning into the wand. Taramo would need scouts in front and behind him and who knows how many twists and turns the sewer system could have.

  Taramo remembered the land being almost entirely empty besides a few vineyards a few days travel on foot. That hardly mattered in a time where the Tower Network could get someone teleported anywhere in the world in less than three days, as long as they were fine with anyone who wanted to know where they had gone.

  Things had obviously changed in the tens of thousands of years, but even Ariwyn was not certain if the city was inhabited at the time.

  "The city has been abandoned a few times" She'd said before he'd disassembled the speech weave, "Some of the wisps had been used for Necromancy and having dead things walk on their own was not conducive to a helpful society. Except when the leaders wanted that." Some small parts of the city would be occupied almost certainly but beyond that there wouldn't be a good way to tell.

  They passed upstream of the sewer hoping that some access point would easily get them to the surface. Pieces of Spot were left at each sewer conjunction in case that someone would pass through. This went on for some time until one of the forward scouts let out an alarm.

  A massive spider had caught the wisp in a net of thread and was trying to web it up even more. The piece of the wisp had, due to it being insubstantial in body and ameboid in magic, fought valiantly to escape. But magic, being energy, was part of the food chain.

  Taramo pointed his wand at the spider.

  "(Rend, horizontal where pointing, ignore rock)" Then he flicked the wand horizontally to get the magic going.

  A slice of dim light flew out from the wand and sliced through the thread holding the wisp, one of the spider's chelicerae that had almost bitten the wisp and the forelegs of the animal. The piece of spot was able to fly clear of the web without the spider's attempts to keep it still and the spider itself leapt at Taramo.

  Taramo pulled a web of his own that he set in front of himself and the creature landed perfectly on it. It was unable to slip past and finish Taramo off given that he'd set the whole web alight, charring all the legs off.

  The heavily wounded beast fell to the ground, looking to any layman as if it were dead. Taramo made a needle of mana and finished it off.

  The spider's body was about as long as his torso and the surface of it was charred of any recognizable markings. That didn't stop Taramo from picking one of the legs and bending one of the leg joint's backwards until it popped. The meat was a little overcooked but that was probably better than undercooked. Taramo finished off three of the legs and let spot gorge himself on the body.

  Past the spider there were some webs that crossed the sewer. From what Taramo could see the thread was able to gather mana from the air and other sources, strengthening itself. He could break through it though that would result in anyone knowing for certain that someone passed through there. Given the size of the spider people probably didn't go through that way normally so Taramo decided to retrace his steps and try a different passage.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  The other passage was much more useful. There were no animals besides a few rats, one of which Taramo allowed Spot to eat. An iron banded door was ahead on the other side of the waters. It was one step, if a big one, and Taramo was able to jump across even though Ariwyn chastised him for taking too many risks. There could have been something inside the water or he could have fallen in and gotten ill.

  Leaving Ariwyn's remarks uncontested Taramo checked the lock on the doorway. It was a smart design that incorporated a mana alarm in case it was broken open. Suppressing the alarm (Taramo had a lot of experience with that in his youth) he found the door opened without any mechanical picking necessary. The key was only to avoid setting off the alarm. Somehow the key was needed to open it from the other side, so he'd left a bit more of Spot there to open the door when he got back.

  There was a ladder in the room leading up as well as a selection of shovels with a few polearms with large hooks and a blade on the other side. The ladder was iron and a little slippery and the room above was mostly empty with a bench and some sconces for candles and a barrel that had some water that smelled fresh. The door here had a lot of light peeking through so it probably went outside.

  Taramo listened at the door and heard some birdsong, but no carts of people speaking. That didn't mean that no one was there so he made a little eye on the end of his wand. Closing his right eye he projected it through his eye and poked it under the door.

  Outside was an alleyway either in the late morning or afternoon. The three story black brick buildings had closed shutters and one of the four doors leading into the alley was broken off its hinges. Some green vines were present among the massive web of brown ones with a few small buds. On one entrance of the alleyway there was a street with the opposing alley being filled with trash. On the other side was a dead end currently hosting either a mugging, abduction, or attempted murder.

  Six hooded figures were laying their fists on a downed person and Spot decided to intervene, leaping from the end of the wand. Taramo disconnected the magic eye and set some hasty wards as sounds of confusion quickly turned to screams.

  He threw open the door to see two people running past, heedless of the fact that their third had run straight into the door. Taramo's wards flared against the possible injury of having the door slammed against him so the runner thumped over.

  Spot apparently decapitated one of the aggressors and was fighting on even terms with the other two, one of whom had drawn and swung around a mace that blazed with mana and the other who threw darts of fire. Taramo ordered some of the dead vines to bind the unfortunate man's hands to his feet and calmly walked towards the fight.

  It was very likely that a fight would be inevitable but it was concerning that Spot was so aggressive. Taramo would probably have to train it out of him. Spot should wait for the order.

  "Send this blight back into the deeps from whence it came. Smite!" The mace wielding man didn't seem the talkative type but after he spoke his mace lit up like a thousand suns with mana. Spot had been hit with it but the leftovers that reached Taramo set off his wards.

  Mage's armor is supposed to protect the user from attacks, and the most mana efficient ones do only that. Useful in industrial contexts or when having a bit of a scuffle with someone where you aren't trying to kill them. That's not all it can do. Much more mana intensive types are able to categorize friend from foe and only attack enemies, meet up with other allies' shields and make a wall, permit two fighting mages to speak with each other, lots of things.

  Taramo had two things that his wards attempt. If attacked by magic, hit the attacker with a strike and try to undo the wards around them. The latter pulled on a thread connected to the mace wielder resulting in his mace suddenly winking out of mana like a blown out candle. The former ... does what a sucker punch from an unknown enemy would be expected to do, smack him in the head and he went down.

  Spot was reeling in front of and protecting the person on the ground. The other attacker was staring dumbfoundedly at Taramo. Then he fell on his knees and started begging in a language that Taramo was surprised to find out he was completely unfamiliar with.