16 - Chapter 16

The dinner was going to begin after sunset, and guests could enter the palace at teatime. Burris’s identity now is ‘Kreve’, a young but highly valued apprentice of the mage. He had to change into clothes that were more in line with his identity and of a younger style, instead of dressing like old Burris.

After taking off the big cloak, Burris felt insecure as a shell less snail. He chose a light silver-gray formal attire with an indigo robe on the outside. This was a common match for a mage’s attire, which could only be used in celebrations. The clothing texture was too thick and hard to be comfortable, and it was not suitable for going out; it was really not easy to wear.

In the eyes of other guests, Roth’s identity was a mystery, just as his sense of beauty.

His black hair was tied up with a bright purple ribbon, and he was wearing a blue velvet formal attire and a rose gold coat. The golden pins on his shoulders were inlaid with small red pyroxenes, and the stones formed a small dragon head. This was nothing. What was more terrifying is that he was wearing an elven style dark green silver-rimmed belt with a pair of golden pants. There were two rows of tassels on the left and right sides of the pants, which danced gracefully with his steps…The most low-key thing about him were his boots. From a distance, they were just pure black leather boots, but If you looked closer, you would find out that the two sides of the boots were covered with pointed small crystals. Under strong light, each facet of the crystal would sparkle with a different color.

This outfit didn’t look like the one of a mage apprentice, so Roth didn’t need to pretend to be one. His invitation was written as ‘The Emissary of mage Burris’, and the nobles and court attendants thought that he was a nouveau riche landlord from the border merchants, and the mage of the Tower of Truth believed that he was a warlock holding Burris’ thighs.

However, compared to the colorful Roth, the ‘Apprentice Kreve’ was more eye-catching. Many people had guessed that he was the young apprentice from the rumor, the child who was related to the old necromancer. These eyes were within Burris’s expectations, so he didn’t mind it too much. He knew that soon someone would contact him alone.

After wandering in the palace gardens and corridors for a while, someone stopped him. The other person was a mage from the Tower of Truth in the capital. She was in her thirties, pale and tall, and was responsible for the daily affairs management of the grand library. Burris had contacted her, her name seemed to be Haida.

By talking about book lending, Haida took Burris along the garden path and slowly moved away from the other guests. Originally, Burris was worried that Roth would not be able to keep up with him. Looking around, he saw that Roth was secretly following them from other paths like a lynx stalking prey, and he was carrying a cup of flower and fruit tea.

They followed Haida from the guard barracks to the servants’ room, and then through the closed berry garden to the garden that was not open during repairs and detoured a lot before reaching the back door of the palace. After entering, Haida said that she would stay on the first floor to rest and asked the two mages guests to go upstairs by themselves.

Estel was waiting for them in the hall on the second floor. There was only her and a maid standing at a distance. The maid was a confidant of the princess, who had already known her mage status. Today, Estel was not wearing a riding suit or a mage robe, but a rose-colored court lady dress. She was a little surprised when she saw Burris. Maybe it was because Burris had changed his clothes and didn’t look like an old mage reborn, but a real 20-years-old young man.

“Mentor.” The princess lowered her voice. “I have to call you ‘Mr. Kreve’ when I’m outside today, and you have to call me Your Highness.”

“Of course, I know, Your Highness.” Burris glanced toward the door of the corridor deep in the hall. “What about your cousin…?”

“Sure enough you also heard…”

Roth came over: “Did she really was killed by a durian?”

The princess showed an unbelievable expression: “Even the durian thing was leaked? No, she was not killed by a durian…but there really was a durian in the incident. It’s strange to say, I…”

She looked around. The maid in the distance looked at the corridor for her and made a gesture of no problem. Then she went on: “I checked, and she was cursed with suspended animation. At the time of the incident, there were no suspicious people on the scene. The spell should had been casted by a preset trigger. I tried to help her dispel it but failed.”

Burris nodded: “I’ll take a look later. What’s the matter with the durian?”

Estel led them into the corridor and came to a guest room. The guest rooms here were originally not used to entertain the prince’s daughter, and now this arrangement was just for confidentiality. Miss Tarina was in a special situation, and neither His Majesty Passia nor the Prince wanted to cause disturbances.

The 13-year-old girl lay flat on the bed with her eyes closed. She was pale, her eye sockets were slightly sunken, her lips were dark, and her chest had no undulations. She looked like she had died. In front of her bed sat a young man in splendid clothes. According to the introduction, this was Estel’s cousin, Tarina’s second brother, the trainee knight Charles of the Knights of Silver Falcon.

Hearing that the visitor was the messenger of the ‘Mage Burris’, Charles’s sad expression faded slightly. He stood up suddenly, and Burris almost felt the lights in the room dim…Charles was tall and strong, two heads taller and more than half a man wider than Burris. He had a mighty appearance, but a childish face. Perhaps he was even younger than the ‘present’ Burris.

The last time he saw such a strong young man, he was an orc, Burris thought silently.

After greeting the guests, Charles drew back to the bed and held his sister’s hand, and said bitterly: “Mages, look at her. She was killed like this by an evil mad warlock…”

“Tell me about this mad warlock.” Burris said, casting a spell beside Tarina to check on her. Estel’s judgment was completely correct, and the girl had indeed been cursed with the suspended animation spell.

Charles was sitting upright, showing his serious energy to report military information to the commander: “Well, my father’s Silver Falcon is near the Moonset Mountains, and they were once occupied by barbarians and orcs. They come from the other side of the mountain, always attacking our line of defense again and again. Many years ago, my father led an army to conquer the bandits. It took him several years to drive those evil creatures back into the mountains, so that they would never invade human cities again. There were not only soldiers involved in the battle, but also some local civilian armed forces and a few spellcasters…”

Burris was familiar with the Battle of the Moonset Mountains. His arsenal had produced a large number of enchanted long-range weapons for this purpose, such as composite bows and one-handed crossbows that add magic damage, mountain chariots that can fire heavy crossbows, and magical fire bombs that only kill creatures but do not burn trees…In the face of orcs and barbarians, human infantry had little advantage in close combat, and mountain battlefield was not suitable for cavalry, so magic and archers with enchanted weapons played an extraordinary role in that campaign.

Charles continued: “Back then, my father had a warlock ally. Everyone called him the Red Vulture, because he was red-haired and had very little hair remaining on his head. The man used to live in a village near the mountains and the villagers worshipped him like a priest. My father always looked down on him because he often used his spellcasting talent to fool others. After the war, he was unexpectedly reliable, so my father changed his opinion greatly and promised to invite him to the castle after winning the war…”

When the young knight said this, Roth again committed his old problem of interrupting: “Let me guess! As a result, your father repented after winning the war, causing the Red Vulture to madly take revenge against your family…”

“It’s not like that!” Charles said blushing. “The Red Vulture did take revenge on us, he returned kindness with ingratitude! After the war was over, my father didn’t go back on his word. He really invited the Red Vulture to the castle. The Red Vulture was insane, but for some reason he became more and more crazy, and could hardly do any work…There were also one or two mages who participated in the war that year. Those mages also found the Red Vulture strange. They said that his progress from weak to strong was too fast and abnormal, and it was also strange for him to suddenly become weak later. It’s a pity that I couldn’t understand the conversation of the mages. I could only understand it to this extent…”

Burris gently urged him to get to the point: “So, did this crazy mage hurt your sister Tarina?”

Charles said: “He must have done it. It started soon after my sister was born…When Tarina was about to reach her first month of life, my parents held a celebration in the castle and invited all the local squires and their friends who had participated in the war…”

Roth interrupted again: “I heard that people usually celebrate like this when they give birth to their first child. Your sister is the third… Did your parents celebrate after your brother and you were born?”

Charles answered honestly: “They did. We hold carnivals throughout the city and celebrate all day and night.”

“Why? Local customs? ”

“No, because we have money.”

“…all right, go on.”

The young knight continued: “My father did not invite the Red Vulture to this celebration. To be more precise, the Red Vulture was no longer able to participate in such activities…He was mentally abnormal, he often talked nonsense, and he couldn’t go out without someone who looks after him. My father had a shift guard outside the door of his house, and soldiers were watching him to prevent him from running. At the ceremony, the soldiers on duty were a little lax, so the Red Vulture ran out and broke into the banquet hall, making a scene in front of all the guests…He accused my father of not keeping his promise, and he said that he would overturn the castle with eight hundred big fireballs…At this time, Tarina, who was still a baby, was frightened by his strange screams and cried. He noticed Tarina and yelled a curse at her…”

Burris wanted to laugh, so he had to resist desperately, maintaining a solemn expression: “Uh…The Red Vulture cursed your sister to be stabbed to death by a spindle in the future?”

“Of course it was not a spindle!” Roth replied for the boy. “The warlock must have said that she would be stabbed to death by a durian.”

Charles nodded: “Yes. He said durian. The table in front of him had durians shipped from Quintilia. He wanted to grab the durian and throw it at my father, but he was hurt by it… So, he dropped the durian, pointed at my sister and said: ‘I curse this child with elemental power. When she grows up, she will be stabbed in the finger by a durian and die!’”

His elemental power, right? Tarina was clearly affected by a necromantic spell. Burris tried to control the disdain on his face.

At this time, Roth’s curiosity reminded everyone: “Here, this thing shouldn’t be over yet? There should be other spellcasters at the banquet. At this time, someone should stand up and claim to be able to break the curse of the mad warlock…”

“Yes! There was such a person!” Charles said. “My father was very angry and called the soldiers to drag the Red Vulture down. At this time, a mage stood up. It was an elf mage, a guest of my father. He also participated in the battle to expel the orcs…”

Burris was taken aback. As far as he knows, there is only one mage who participated in the Battle of the Moonset Mountains…

“Is it a male elf and his name is Heisong?”

“Yes, it’s him.”

Hearing Charles’ answer, Burris felt heartbroken, feeling very sorry for the innocent victim Tarina. “That mage…what did he do?” Burris asked weakly.

Charles said: “He told my parents not to worry, he would stop Tarina’s death. He left a spell on her, so that when she was stabbed by the durian, she would not die, but fall into a magic state of suspended animation. He also said that during her suspended animation, someone would be able to rescue her completely…Later, for safety reasons, our castle no longer imported durians. Tarina had never seen durians. Until yesterday, she saw the goods sent by the Fruits and Vegetable Trading Company while wandering around in the palace…”

Very good, very good. Heisong, you have done well. Burris buried his face in the palms of his hands and did not speak for a long time.

The mad warlock probably didn’t understand curses. His growing craziness and power fluctuations were indeed strange. If necessary, in the future, Burris would like to take the time to investigate… Just for the ‘curse of durian’, this warlock didn’t have the ability to take the lives of others with a word. The curse was just madness, and Heisong took it seriously without a prior investigation, so he put a real trigger curse on the girl –when she was stabbed by the durian, her suspended animation curse would take effect.

He asked nervously: “Mr. mage, do you have any way to save her?”

Of course Burris could save her. He knew how to do it, but he was doomed to fail now…because that damn soul is out of tone. The good news is that the Skeleton King can use magic to lift this curse –just as he did when saving the dying Heisong.

The mage looked at Roth beside him, who guessed what he meant and licked his lips deliberately.

“I can save her.” Burris sighed with his shoulders slumped. “However, your Royal Highness and Sir Charles…you need to get out.”

Thanks for reading! 🙂