Buildings fell away to either side as Krion followed Rolfun dowreet to what looked to be an open square. Alesin was still close by his side, and while he remained irritated at her for how she had criticized him, he also knew she had only said the things she had said because she was ed about him. Though he would still have made the same decision to fight against the Storm Wolves, given what Rolfun had said as well, he would make sure to be smarter about things iure. Perhaps putting some extra stat points into intelligend wisdom would help with that. He’d have to think a bit about how he wao distribute his free stat points. While it had been weeks, that was still strao think about.

  “We are here.”

  In the middle of the square loomed a rge, fortified stone building. The structure was intimidating. Round in shape with thick walls, the two-story structure had narrow windows and was surrounded by hastily structed barricades. Wagons had beeurned and shed together, piles of crates and barrels filling the gaps. There were even ks of wood and rubble stacked in pces. Nervous members of the City Watch crouched under cover, warily watg the surrounding approaches to the square. A number of them were staring in their dire. A arted to whisper to each other, and one even pointed out his appearand bloody clothing.

  Alesin tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention.

  “Here,” she handed him a letter that she had pulled from her ste ring. “Once you are inside, show this to the oint Attendant. They will send you to the capital city of this world. Once you arrive, ask to be taken to the Waygate for the Imperial Academy. Show the letter if you o, but make sure to keep it in your hand when you cross through. You will to gain admission. Do not do anything else, o anywhere else, until you arrive at the Imperial Academy. Any questions?”

  Holding the letter tightly in his fist, Krion responded, “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Then this is where we part ways,” Rolfun said, a hint of sadness in his voice, though Krion couldn’t see it on his face. “Just remember what we said. Keep your head down; train hard; make allies; and beyond everything else, please don’t be foolish with your safety.”

  “I’ll do my best,” he said, feeling sad himself.

  In the grand scheme of things, the past two weeks really hadn’t been that long, but the time he had spent with Alesin and Rolfun had been incredibly important to him. Not only had they given him his first taste of experieh the ence he was heading into, but they had been incredibly kind and, he suspected, went beyond their duties to help better prepare him for what was i.

  “Thank you. For everything,” Krion said. Without a word, Rolfun stepped in close to pull him into a full-body hug. The air ressed from his body as the rge half-ogre briefly fot his own strength. Before he could say a word, another pair of arms ed around them both. If anything, they squeezed a bit harder. After a long few moments, both released him to stand back. “Hopefully I’ll see you both again soon.”

  “We’ll see. Now, get going,” Alesin said, nodding to a Watch Sergeant who had stepped from cover, waiting for Krion to approach.

  While he felt a bit unfortable leaving his escorts behind, he did not gnce back as he approached the Watch Sergeant. Without a word, Krioehe letter Alesin had given him.

  The Watch Sergeant took it without a word, opening it in a smooth motion. But as his eyes sed the paper, the man’s expression ged. His face lost color, and his stance shifted subtly, a sign of cautious respect tempered by underlying dread. This wasn’t the first person to react this way, so just what in the hell was written iter?

  With a single nod, he motioned Krion festuring for the two guards stationed oher side of the heavy, iron-bound door to the imposing building to let him through.

  Krion looked back dowreet to where Alesin and Rolfun stood watg him. He gave them a wave goodbye, already knowing he was going to miss them no matter what came . His escorts, no his friends, both responded with salutes of their own. Without another backward look, Kiron turned back to the building and pushed open the heavy door to go inside.

  The room he entered opened up into an expansive hall brightly lit with what looked to be some kind of glowing rocks embedded in the walls. Across the floor were four raised ptforms, each holding a softly glowing circle on top. Even with his limited experience, Krion could tell these were the oints. Above each of the walls loomed a raised ptform, on which stood guards wearing different armor thach. Each wore dark pte decorated with an emblem of a green tree circled by a thorned . Each of the roughly dozen who could see stood still, but the hree shifted to watch him as he entered. Almost like they were determining if he was a threat or not.

  “If you are here to use one of the oints, you will actually have to e in, you know.”

  A man in blue robes stepped forward into his line of sight. His movements were calm but deliberate, carrying an air of quiet authority. His hood ulled down, preventing Krion from seeing his face. Despite that, it still felt like the man was impatient for some reason.

  “So? Where are you bound?”

  “The capital.”

  The blue-robed figure visibly stiffened. “By order of the lord of Thorn’s Rest, no one is permitted to use the oint to the capital so long as the Storm Wolf threat tinues. You will have to wait until then.”

  Krion’s heart rate picked up as he began to experience a mix of panid anger. Alesin had been clear he o gh the oint now, not ter.

  “But I have to get to the capital,” he insisted, urgen his voice, “and I was told I o leave for it. Now.”

  The blue-robed man shook his head, his tone remaining firm. “This is not a matter open to discussion. The capital’s safety demands strict trol over these oints. The lord ordered the one linking Thorn’s Rest to be shut down until the crisis ends. You wait here or return from where you came, but you will not be able to gh the oint.”

  Recalling Alesin’s earlier instrus, Krion pulled out the letter she had given him and prese to the blue-robed figure. “I think you should read this. It expins why I o leave now, even amid this crisis.”

  The blue-robed man looked at the letter skeptically before accepting it. He opehe dot with a practiced hand and leaned closer to the letter to read it. Partway through, he stiffened in clear surprise. Taking a small step back, he jerked his hooded head in a nod. “My apologies, S Bcksword. I was unaware of your status. ”

  The plete ge in how the man was treating him was a bit jarring, but Krion was gradually growing used to the impacts of the letter. While he hadn’t read it, he had his suspis that its tents were backed up by the might of House Bcksword. That would expin why everyone ged their treatment of him after they read it. He couldn’t wait to learn a bit more about his family.

  “Please, this way,” he said, his tone now deferential. “The tral oint is the ohat will be able to take you to the capital.”

  Krion followed him toward a raised ptform at the room’s ter. Stepping onto it, he could more clearly see the circle inscribed with symbols of some sort which had been giving off that soft glow when he had first ehe building. Motion to the side brought his attention back to the man in blue robes.

  Making several rapid motions with his hands, the man caused the inscriptions at Krion’s feet to fre into life. As they did so, the man raised his head and Krion was finally able to see uhe hood. Eyes glowing a soft blue met his own.

  “Safe travels, S Bcksword.”

  The humming sound nearly drowned out the words. The brightness of the inscriptions at his feet increased once more in a burst of light. A jerking motion nearly took him off of his feet right as he was blinded. Moments ter, his feet smmed against the ground, and a massive room filled with movement came into focus around him. His stomach had twisted in protest, but he was able to keep everything down. It seemed being teleported became easier on the body the more you did it.

  The sprawling chamber that he had appeared in came into sharp focus. Circur in shape, much like the chamber he had just e from, this one was almost impossibly rge. Vaulted ceilings carved from polished stone gleam under ented lights. Beh sat at least a dozen oints. Intricate marble tiles stretched across the floor around him. Krio very self-scious at the dark stains of blood on the floor around him. Apparently, his arrival had caused some of the Storm Wolf blood, and his own, to be scattered across the tiles him. Si couldn’t be helped, he turned his attention to all those moving around him.

  Dozens of people, likely more, moved all around with purpose. Though the activity was jarring, what truly shocked him was the sheer diversity of the people. Meeting Alesin and Rolfun had been his first true experieh there being more than just humans. Thorn’s Reach had built on that, firming to him that all the cssical races of humanoids from Earth’s mythologies likely existed somewhere out here in the multiverse.

  But apparently, the capital of a frontier world on the edge of the Empire he now found himself a part of was a different thing altogether.

  A group of elves, with hair as pale as snow and exposed skin little darker, moved with lithe grace off a neighb ptform to his right. They moved without stopping in the dire of a number of what, in his previous life would have been TSA checkpoints.

  His attention ulled to the left as two groups of dwarves verged on each other with a cacophony of cshes and gs. Much like those he had so briefly seen in Thorn’s Reach, the stout figures garbed in heavy leather carried with them stacks of crates and boxes of tools. Apparently, the ones in the front of each group had not been watg where they had been going, leading to the collision unfolding now. Beards of brown and bck bristled as they barked orders at one another. Seemingly this happened often enough that no one else nearby, let alone security, was seeking to intervene. Indeed, it seemed like a number of nearby figures wearing uniforms simir to those ba the Thorn’s Reach Waystation were focused on a group uing gnomes pointing at some kind of meical device that sat on the floor smoking.

  Then there were the stranger races. Ones he couldn’t even begin to name.

  A t creature with the body of a man but the horns of a stag carried a massive pack with apparent ease, its hooves clig against the marble of the tiles. A trio of beings loomed just behind it, each with glistening, translut skin, almost like living crystals, glided silently past. Each of their bodies refracted light into rainbows across the floor as they moved. Off to the side, a tiilian figure darted between the legs of a tall human trader, its scaled tail flig in irritation as it hissed something inprehensible over its shoulder.

  The scale of the Waystation he found himself in only amplified his sense of awe. These weren’t just travelers moving through - they were builders, merts, soldiers, and more, each with their own reasons for being here. For perhaps the first time Krion got the barest bit of insight into the enormity, and plexity, of the Empire.

  He swallowed hard, the weight of his own insignifice pressing down on him, despite the letter that supposedly said otherwise still tight in his fist. For all the training Alesin and Rolfun had worked to give him until they reached Thorn’s Reach, he still felt so incredibly small. Perhaps he should have asked more questions about what it was like to live in the Empire, and not just about ons and history.

  Before a panic could set its hooks into his chest, Krioed a great mental effort to ge his perspective. Yes, he arently so very, very far out of his depth. Yes, he barely knew anything about the Empire. But. Yes, but that was something that he would quickly be able to rectify at the csses in the Imperial Academy once he arrived. Yes, curiosity and a desire for knowledge and learning were what he o focus on, not how much he was treading in the deep waters.

  Having grounded himself, Krion looked in the dire of the checkpoints he had seen earlier. At intervals along the walls stood tall desks staffed by harried-looking officials. They seemed to be orchestrating the chaos, their hands darting over papers and glowing crystals as they barked orders and instrus at the lines of people f before them.

  “Look at this dirty mongrel, dripping filth and blood all over that oint!”

  Following the dire the voice was ing frht Krion’s attention to a group of finely dressed human merts standing off to one side, their attention fixed squarely on him. Their silk and tailored jackets gleamed uhe lights of the Waystation, jeweled pins and s catg every glint. One of them, a tall man with slicked-back hair and a sneering face arently the one who had spoken, as the athered around him were ughing.

  “I practically smell him from here,” a portly man with multiple rings on every finger said iween snorts of ughter. A renewed gale of ughter greeted his words.

  Krion stiffened, heat rising to his face as their mog words reached his ears. He could feel their eyes still staring at his bloodstained clothing.

  “Holy,” came a third voice, this one belonging to a sharp-faced woman whose voice dripped with disdain, “do they let just ahrough the frontier oints now? I thought the riffraff would know to stay where they belong.”

  The tall man smirked. “Must be some backwater bumpkin. Probably doesn’t even know where to go. Hey, boy!” he called, his voice also ced with mockery. “Lost, are we? Maybe you should ask for dires before you bleed all over civilized society.”

  The group ughed again, their jeers slig through Krion’s growing embarrassment. He ched his fists, his knuckles going white. His first instinct was to snap back, but he bit his tohere was no point wasting energy on their pettiness. Instead, he igheir ughter and forced his attention back to the lines of people. His jaw tightened as he fought to stay calm. Let them ugh. He had far more important things to worry about than a pack of overdressed jackals. The sooner he could get to his destination, the better.

  Krion carefully stepped off the oint ptform, his boots slick with blood and greatsword shifting on his back. He nearly lost his footing, catg himself in time, but the stumble was enough to send the human merts into another round of raucous ughter.

  “Careful there!” another called out. “Wouldn’t want you to fall - though it might improve your appearance!”

  Krion’s jaw tightened further, but he refused to look back at them. Let them ugh. Let them mock. He focused oask at hand: getting into line so he could figure out where he o go. Unfortunately, it was soon apparent that the shortest line leading to the exit of the Waystation was directly adjat to the group of jeering merts. The other liretched out into the throng of travelers, and Krion wasn’t about to waste any time here if he could help it. Steeling himself, he moved to the checkpoint.

  The human merts noticed his approach immediately, their attention sharpening like predators spotting wounded prey.

  “Oh, look at this,” the portly mert said with a grin, nudging the tall woman. “He’s ing cluess he does want our help after all.”

  “Careful, darling,” the woman said, wrinkling her nose as Krion passed he group. “He might get his filth on you.”

  Krion said nothing, keeping his gaze fixed forward as he moved to take his p the back of the short lihe smell of Storm Wolf blood apparently still lingered around him, as a number of other travelers edged away. The li shorter, though, which was a relief.

  “Silent now, is he?” the tall one spoke again, his voice dripping with mock pity. “Maybe he is smarter than he looks.”

  Krion tio ighe taunts, standing stiffly in line as the merts tio chuckle at jokes that were progressively more insulting. His heart pounded with suppressed frustration, but he refused to give them the satisfa of a rea. They were nothing more than a minor invenience, an obstacle to be endured a behind.

  He focused on his breathing, oeady rhythm of his heart, and oter ched tightly in his fist.

  Finally, it was his turn.

  Krion stepped forward as the official manning the checkpoint that seemed almost aed office desk waved him forward. His boots tio leave faint, bloody smudges on the marble floor. The official, a thin man with sharp features and an expression that spoke of boredom and irritation, wrinkled his nose as Krion approached.

  “What is this, then?” the official snapped, his eyes raking over Krion’s disheveled and bloody appearance. “By the Seven, you’re trag blood all over the floor. What is your business here in the capital, vagrant?”

  Krion’s grip tightened oter in his fist but kept his voice steady. “I am here to be directed to where I o go to get to the Imperial Academy.”

  The official barked incredulous ughter, leaning back slightly as if Krion’s very presence offended him. “The Imperial Academy? You?” He sneered. “They don’t take beggars. Enough with the poor jokes. What is your name and why have you really e to the capital?”

  Rather than answer, Krioehe letter to the official without another word. The official hesitated, then snatched the letter with an annoyed huff. Without b to look at the seal, he pulled opeter. His eyes darted across the words, only to freeze within seds.

  The transformation was almost instantaneous after that.

  The official’s face went pale, the color draining away from his cheeks. His eyes darted back to Krion, then to the letter, and back again. His mouth opened and closed as though searg for words, but none came. Finally, he managed a hoarse, “You are…?”

  “Krion von Sturmwacht,” he responded, his voice attempting to carry a weight of authority he still didn’t feel. “S of House Bcksword.”

  “You—” the official stammered, his voice catg again. He cleared his throat and straightened abruptly to find so formality. “How might I assist you, Krion von Sturmwacht, S of the Imperial Archducal House Bcksword?”

  The official’s voice rang loudly, catg the attention of those nearby, including the merts who had been harassing Krion. Out of the er of his eye, he saw the merts gid. Their ughter died mid-chuckle, repced by horrified silehe woman’s face paled, and the portly man fumbled nervously with the edge of his gaudy cloak, bravado evaporating like a puddle in a desert.

  “He’s a s of House Bcksword?!” one of them whispered harshly, but still loud enough for Krion to see the words cause a ripple through others hem. He grew unfortable as he felt more eyes shift in his dire. Just what was the reputation of House Bcksword?

  Again refusing to aowledge those around him, he spoke directly to the official. “I need dires on how to get to the Imperial Academy,” he repeated evenly.

  “Of course, my lord! Right away!” The official gestured frantically to a nearby attendant, who scurried over to take the official’s seat as he stepped down. The official theurhe letter to Krion. “Please, follow me. I’ll ensure you reach the proper oint without further dey!”

  As the official came out from behind the elevated desk, Krion was surprised to see how short the man was. Easily a foot shorter than his ow. When he moved past, Krion followed along behind. He felt the stares of the merts b into his back, but thankfully, the mog had ceased altogether. Luckily for them, he wasn’t the vengeful type when it came to simple mockery.

  The official led Krion across the chamber at a good pace, but as they got closer to the other side, the crowd grew thicker, and their progress slowed. He could clearly see that the official was starting to grow pa the people getting in their way, so Krion spoke up.

  “It’s alright, I uand the Waystation is busy,” he said to the official, causing the man to hesitate and turn to him. “Just lead me where I o go as best you , I be patient.”

  “Of course, lord,” the official respohough he did appear a bit reassured. “The oint to the Imperial Academy is in the upper tier of this chamber. Even with your patie should only take us a few more mio get you there.” So saying, the official retur to make progress through the crowd.

  Krion followed him across the bustling chamber, his boots eg on the marble as people gradually ceased moving to watch the curious situation unfolding in their midst. Merts, guards, and even what Krion expected to be legionnaires all paused to observe the official’s unusual behavior. versations began to die off as those observers realized that the official was ag sely because he was esc Krion.

  The soft roar in the Waystation was starting to die down as Krion and the official arrived before an ornate doorway set into the far wall from where they had started. Two massive guards, nearly the size of Rolfun, wearing blood-red full pte armor, stood oher side of the doorway. As the official led Krion to them, a pale elven woman in bck leather seemed almost to appear from behind the one on the left. As they came to a stop before the trio, the elven oke.

  “Waykeeper Oswal, what brings you to the entrao the sed tier?”

  “I e bringing S Krion von Sturmwacht of the Imperial Archducal House Bcksword into your care. The lord seeks to make use of the capital’s oint to the Imperial Academy.”

  At those words, somehow, the whole chamber seemed to sink into a preternatural silence. Krion tio try to do the best he could to ighe shocked stares of all those around him, but he promised himself one of the first things he would do at the Imperial Academy was try to find out just what the hell was going on with House Bcksword that would cause these reas.

  Oswal turned away from the stunned guards to face Krion and bow. “My lord, I leave you in the capable hands of the Wayguard Captain.”

  “Thank you for your help, Oswal.”

  Oswal froze, then bowed even deeper. “Your lordship is too kind, I was only doing my duty.”

  The elven woman cleared her throat. “If you would follow me, S?”

  Nodding, Krion followed behind the elven woman as she made her way through the ornate doorway. Stepping to the right, she led him to a stairwell that spiraled upwards. It was thankfully not an unfortable climb for Krion. The steps were of a det size, and the spiral was rge enough that his greatsword did not scrap against the wall as they went.

  Finally, the Wayguard Captain stepped out onto the sed floor, then moved to the side to gesture Krion through. Stepping past her, he saw a single raised ptform in the surprisingly small room. He gnced around, taking in the pin surroundings. The chamber was a stark trast to the bustling chaos below. No uards were present.

  “I thought there would be other oints up here?”

  “There are,” the Wayguard Captain responded politely. “Just not in this area. Direct travel to the Imperial Academy is strictly reguted, and this oint is reserved for only those who have gained permission to travel there. Now, if you would step on the oint, I send you on to the Imperial Academy.”

  Krion stepped onto the oint ptform. It hummed faintly beh him, the inscriptions carved into its surface beginning to take on the brightened glow of the one he had taken from Thorn’s Reach. Soon, the hum was vibrating up his legs and the light bathed the entire room. He reparing himself for the teleportatiohe Wayguard Captain broke the silence.

  “Good luck at the Imperial Academy.”

  “Ah,” he was caught ftfooted, not sure how to respond. “Thank you.”

  The Wayguard Captain offered a faint smile, then pressed her palm against the wall near where she stood. The ptform underh Krion’s feet erupted into a burst of light. The world around him again disappeared, but rather than simple brightness, this time everything seemed to dissolve into a kaleidoscope of shifting colors aions. Then, with a jarring lurch, the world reassembled itself as his vision was gradually restored. Blinking rapidly, he struggled t the world around him into focus.

  He had finally arrived at the Imperial Academy.

  Sorry for the dey, I had some surprises at work I o take care of. I hope you ehe chapter!

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