We didn't stop along the way. The horses were tired but after being fed with life magic from time to time, they were more energetic than ever.
I don't care about hiding the tracks. If Evan knows, he knows.. After getting out of the Capital, he can't stop me in any way. To hide like a turtle from him, he wasn't my enemy..
I only needed to hide the three children's faces that look like Evan and the twins..
Except for Adam, Natalie and Bryan, we often pulled down the hoods after we were out of the Capital. The twins are still in the small world.
We saw the refugee groups on the way to the Cursed forest.
"There are too many sick and injured people. Should we do something? But it will delay us.."
Noah asked me. He was a healer. So he wanted to do something in his abilities. I could even see the injured people infected by dark magic.
"Okay, only Noah and I will heal them. The rest can maintain the order around us. Just use healing spells. We can't use light spells here. We are still in human territory. We will be suspected if we use light magic as only the Royal family of the Bright Sun Empire have the light magic."
But it doesn't matter if we arrived at the Cursed forest. We can visit the battlefield and collect some merits by purifying the injuries caused by dark magic.
The priests were giving priority to the infected people. So the ordinary sick and injured people were somehow neglected. The priests couldn't be blamed. It was just that the priests were also having a hard time.
The main group was in the battlefield while they maintained the refugees with a small number of priests.
"Call me Young Miss in front of them."
"Yes, Mother.."
Anyway, we can help while we can. I jumped down from the horse and headed towards the priests.
"Hello, Mr.Priest.."
I pulled down the hood covering my head.
"Hello, Young lady. What can I help you with? Can you please say it fast? As you can see, we are very short of time.."
The priest replied while purifying the patient.
"I wanted to ask if you need help, Mr.Priest. We have two healers in our team."
The priest was very happy and stood up with visible joy on his face.
"Really? Welcome, Young lady. Which levels are they?"
"Level 5 and 6"
I chose to hide my level and said I was level 5. Noah won't need to hide as he looked mature than me and he could fight very well.
"Good good. Tyler!! Tyler!! Put two tables beside me and lead the sick patients over.."
After yelling at the busy junior priest, he turned towards us and said awkwardly…
"I'm sorry. We can't talk too long. Is there anything you need, young lady?"
"You can get busy with your own patients, Mr.Priest. We can keep the order ourselves.."
"Okay then.."
He sat back down and continued the process of purifying. Noah and I occupied each of the tables and started healing.
I haven't healed others many times. Now, as I casted the healing spells, I became proficient. I kept my speed of the spells consistent with Noah to avoid letting others see that my level was higher.
We started healing in the afternoon. Soon it turned dark..
The merits kept appearing in the form of notifications but I let Veronica turn off the notifications.
"Young lady.."
"Mr.Priest.."
The priest came to us with a tired face.
"I'm here to invite the Young lady for dinner. Although we don't have much, it was the gratitudes of the patients. The knights of the Young lady will also get tired of maintaining orders. Please come.."
I looked back at my children. I can't see the three children's faces behind the masks but the smile of Noah was brilliant and Liam's stern face was softened.
"I think we should go, Young Miss."
I won't be surprised if this was said by Noah but it was Liam who said that. He continued when he saw I was surprised..
"After all, it is the fruit of Young Miss and Noah's hard work."
"Okay.. let's go"
The dinner was not rich but acceptable. Bread, thick soup and some veggies we hadn't seen. We were poured more soup by the host even though we couldn't finish.
After dinner, we returned to the place where our horses were tied.
"Come on, we should get going."
We hopped on the back of the horses and disappeared in the night.
The eyes staring at them from the dark also followed the group.
After riding slowly for about a quarter of an hour, I stopped the horse.
[Can you detect how many people are following and what are their strengths?]
[About twenty something. One 7th ring Advanced Mage and others are 6th and 5th..]
[They are elites if you place them in the knights or mages.]
We couldn't detect the level of the mages but Veronica could.
I got down from Pegasus. We decided to wait for this group to catch up. Or else, with the speed of our horses, they couldn't even see the tails of our horses in just a few minutes.
Liam : "Don't underestimate others, use all your strength."
Noah : "He was right. They drugged us but we are fine. That's because they didn't understand our traits as elves. We are new to them. So, they also didn't have the understanding of our fighting power. Crush them all.."
Natalie : "They are the first real opponents of us. We sparred with each other before but couldn't use the full power. Now we can use the full power. I am excited."
"Hmm. Use whatever you have. Our road ahead is full of fights. We should get familiar with many fighting styles. They don't have killing intentions and are humans. There aren't many dangers if we fight head on. Be careful. Don't get hurt. This is our first battle."
Should I take out the twins?
[ Veronica, how about I take out the twins for experience? Can they fight? ]
[ I have been teaching them spells and close combat in the small world. Master, they are more ruthless than all your children outside. I will send them out. ]
Yes, they are more talented than the rest of the children. The S and SS body alone can crush the enemies with the strength of 6th ring Advanced Mage.
"Mother, I heard we are fighting.."
Alice was very excited.
"Yes, we are fighting. Do your best. Be quick and ruthless to the enemies."
"But Mother, if I do my best. They will be poisoned and dead in no time. Are we allowed to kill?"
Alex said, blinking his big eyes. He was so cute that I gave him a lot of kisses..
"Allowed. Why not? If we are not strong, I don't know what kind of fate we will suffer. We can't put our trust blindly in human's nature."
I could feel the malicious gazes from the crowd when I was healing. At dinner, the soup was drugged. It was not the lethal kind but that could make the victims weakened.
We knew there were malicious people in the group that invited us to dinner. But we still went only to lure the enemies out.
We knew it just from the smell that the soup was drugged. Knowing this, we drank it as any drugs or poisons made from the herbs couldn't harm us, elves. We are darlings of nature.
Now, we were out in the open, they would come believing we were weakened by the drug. They are confident because we are healers however the drug they used was something like sleeping agents, something the healing spells can't remove.
"They are here."
"Act like we fall for it."
"Children!!! It is your first battlefield. Be careful.. If possible, leave the leader alive for interrogation. If you can't control your hands, someone alive will do.."
I decided to sit back and let the children control the battlefield. Liam was the eldest and he was the one that could control all the children. Without my intervention, he became the leader.They are acting sluggish and weakened to lower the vigilance of the group who followed us.
"Why are two more children in the group? Where did they pop out?"
"It doesn't matter. It will be a bit troublesome if the adults are added. But if it was a child, we would get a fortune. Look how cute they are…"
"They are already weakened. Be careful not to hurt them. The scars can lower the price.."
Their voices are not loud but our long ears with heightened senses can capture the voice accurately. Sure enough, they fell for the act..
They relaxed and became reckless.. We are surrounded by them openly.
"Do it.."
The children didn't have weapons on their body. However, they have small spaces on them that can assemble or disassemble their fixed gears.
With a command from Liam, their fixed gears are assembled instantly. Noah made the staff longer and thumped it on the ground. He took place beside me, ready for the fight.
Adam and Alice were surrounded by Natalie, Bryan and Alex. Liam jumped on the nearby tree, holding the bow in his hand.
"Why bother fighting? Just surrender, won't you? I don't want to hurt our precious goods.."
The leader said with a chuckle. Just like we thought, they wanted to sell us. They saw we were not affected by the drug but still relaxed as they had more people on their side.