Chapter 208: Ulrich Against The Valmorian Knights

Ulrich looked at the sisters.

Then he turned back toward the eight Valmorian knights.

His sword rose.

Crimson mana gathered over the blade once more.

He rushed forward.

The eight Valmorian knights had barely recovered from Airam’s witchcraft when he reached them. Crimson mana clung to his sword in tightly bound layers, the reinforcement spell rebuilt once more despite the strain in his hand.

The nearest knight raised his anti-magic blade.

Ulrich did not meet it directly.

He stepped to the side, caught the attack near the lower edge of his sword, and guided it past his body. The black blade tore through the crimson reinforcement, scattering red sparks across the grass. Ulrich had already moved beyond the strike.

His sword came toward the knight’s neck.

The helmet turned in time.

Ulrich’s blade scraped along the black metal and cut across the gap beneath the ear guard. Blood appeared, though the wound was not deep enough.

A second knight attacked from behind.

Dark red runes flashed across the ground beneath the soldier’s boots.

Airam had raised her hand again.

The runes did not try to crush the knight or bind him completely. That would have required more force, more control, and more time than she could spare. Instead, they pulled at the ground beneath his feet. Mud gathered around his boots. Stones shifted beneath the grass. The knight’s next step landed poorly.

His sword missed Ulrich’s back.

Ulrich turned.

He drove the pommel of his weapon into the side of the soldier’s helmet, then cut toward the inside of the man’s elbow. The blade found the armor joint.

The Valmorian knight’s arm dropped.

Ulrich thrust toward the opening beneath the helmet.

A third soldier intercepted him.

Black steel struck crimson mana.

Ulrich’s spell shattered.

The impact forced his arm down, pain shooting through his wrist. He stepped backward, trying to create distance, but the Valmorian knights moved with him.

Their black armor really made them difficult to wound, and the serum allowed them to endure injuries that would have stopped most men. One had blood running from beneath his helmet; another held an injured arm close to his side. Neither retreated.

They closed around Ulrich again.

Hermione lifted her hands.

Small Formula Rings appeared around her wrists.

She did not aim the spells at the armor. She sent bursts of wind, force, and light toward the soldiers’ surroundings. A flash of pale light struck the narrow eye slit of one helmet. A sudden gust swept smoke and ash across another’s face. A force pulse struck a fallen sword near a third knight’s boots, sending the weapon skidding beneath his step.

None of the attacks could defeat them.

But each one made them look away.

Each one made them hesitate.

That was enough for Ulrich.

A knight turned his head to avoid Hermione’s light.

Ulrich stepped through the opening and cut beneath the man’s helmet. The blade entered the gap at the throat. The Valmorian soldier choked and staggered backward, clutching at the wound.

Ulrich pulled his sword free.

The knight fell.

Seven remained.

As much as the serum made them stronger, it wasn’t perfect, it seemed. It was like it was dumbing them a bit.

Airam’s runes flashed again.

A loose wind rune caught the shoulder of another enemy, turning him just enough that his sword struck the ground instead of Ulrich’s ribs. A binding rune wrapped briefly around the soldier’s ankle. The anti-magic weapon in his hand broke the effect at once, but Ulrich had already used the pause.

He jumped over the lowered blade.

His boot struck the knight’s shoulder plate as he passed. Ulrich twisted in the air and brought his sword down into the narrow seam between helmet and breastplate.

The sword entered.

The knight collapsed into the grass.

Six remained.

Ulrich landed heavily.

His side burned.

Blood had soaked through his coat now. His movements were still fast, but they had lost some of their earlier sharpness. Every time he turned too quickly, pain pulled through his ribs. Every time his sword met black steel, numbness climbed farther into his arm.

The Valmorian knights saw it.

They pressed forward harder.

One swung high.

Ulrich ducked beneath it.

Another attacked low.

Ulrich jumped back.

A third knight came from the side and drove a shoulder into Ulrich’s chest. The impact knocked the breath from him. He stumbled across the wet grass, barely keeping his sword raised before another blade came down toward his head.

Airam’s runes exploded against the ground between them.

The knight jumped back.

Ulrich used the space.

He formed a small air spell beneath his boots and shot sideways through the smoke. The sudden movement carried him out of the encirclement, but two Valmorian soldiers turned immediately and followed him.

Hermione watched him closely.

"He is slowing down," she said.

Airam’s hand remained raised.

Her fingers had begun to shake.

"I know."

"We need to do more."

Airam’s eyes remained on Ulrich.

The dark lines beneath the skin of her forearm had climbed higher. Her witchcraft still answered her, but she was keeping it restrained. Every rune she sent had a limited purpose. Every effect ended quickly. She did not allow the red symbols to remain in the air long enough to become unstable.

Hermione saw the effort it cost her.

"Hold them for a little longer," Hermione said. "I will prepare another Rank 3 spell."

Airam looked at her sharply.

"You cannot control another one."

"I can if you help me."

"Hermione."

"Ulrich will die if we do nothing."

The words came out harder than Hermione intended.

Airam’s expression tightened.

Across the clearing, Ulrich had been forced back toward the stream. Six Valmorian knights surrounded him in a shifting formation. He avoided one sword, parried another, and used a brief burst of wind to keep a third from reaching his blind side.

But every movement cost him.

Every strike brought the soldiers closer.

Airam looked back at Hermione.

"I am barely controlling this," she said.

Her voice was low.

The red runes around her hand trembled.

"I have them at the perfect limit. They are responding, but they have not entered my veins. If I force more power through them, I might lose control."

Hermione looked at the runes.

Airam was right.

The witchcraft was held at a precise point between obedience and disaster. The runes had not turned black again. They had not begun moving on their own. They remained under Airam’s command because she gave them only enough mana to disturb the Valmorian knights without allowing the power to grow wild.

"Then keep them there," Hermione said. "I will make the spell stable myself."

"You said that last time."

"And it worked."

"It threw our own knights across the clearing."

"They are alive."

"Barely."

Hermione bit her lip.

It was frustrating.

They had so much mana, but they couldn’t even use it properly.

"It’s because of Ulrich. If he had brought us a Witch two years ago to help us, we wouldn’t be struggling here," Airam said, annoyed.

"Do not start complaining about Ulrich now."

Airam looked away for half a second.

Hermione’s lips pressed together.

"We would have better control by now if we had a witch to teach us," Airam said.

"I know..." Hermione nodded, reluctantly. "Grandmaster Strelley is an excellent teacher. He knows a lot about magic but he does not understand the Witch Tree."

Hermione’s hands lowered slightly.

The Witch Tree.

The name sounded harmless to someone who knew nothing about witches. In truth, it referred to the strange network growing within a witch’s body: the invisible channels that carried power beyond the mana core. A mage used the core to form Formula Rings, draw mana, and release structured spells.

A witch possessed that core too.

But beneath it lay something else.

A second source.

A tangled inner structure that responded to fear, rage, instinct, and pain. It allowed witches to seize runes directly, bypassing the careful geometry of magecraft. It granted speed and versatility no ordinary mage could match.

It also made control difficult.

When the Witch Tree surged, it could interfere with the mana core. When the mana core overflowed, it could awaken the Witch Tree. The two sources did not always obey the same rules, and Airam and Hermione had spent two years learning how to restrain them from tearing into each other.

Grandmaster Brian Strelley had taught them how to build Formula Rings properly.

He had taught them the order of runes, the geometry of spells, and the discipline required to prevent a formation from collapsing. He knew how to make Hermione stronger as a mage.

But he was not a witch.

He could not teach Airam how to hold loose runes at the edge of control. He could not explain why Hermione’s mana sometimes surged too strongly when the Witch Tree reacted to her fear. He could not help them separate one source from the other when both began to answer at once.

They needed a witch.

Someone who understood the dangerous part of them.

Someone who could teach them how and when to use the mana core, how and when to use the Witch Tree, and how to keep both powers from destroying the people around them.

"Ulrich should have found someone," Airam said. "Two years. He had two years to find a witch who could teach us."

Hermione’s eyes flashed.

"Stop blaming Ulrich."

"He knew what we were."

"He also saved us."

"He kept us safe, yes. But he refused to let witches near us."

"Because he was trying to protect us. All these witches want to keep us for their own goals, to use us."

"I know that," Airam replied.

But in the end, Ulrich’s stubbornness and hatred for Witches had clearly slowed their growth; that was a fact.

Hermione stared at her.

For a moment, anger rose in her chest.

Then a Valmorian sword struck Ulrich’s blade.

Crimson mana broke apart.

Ulrich staggered.

The argument ended.

Hermione raised one finger toward Airam.

"After this, you can complain to him as much as you want."

Airam’s mouth tightened.

"I might actually hit him."

Ulrich was moving too fast, like the knights he was fighting. It could easily end wrong.

"I might as well..."

Hermione said and turned back toward the fight.

"Hold the runes," she said.

Airam nodded.

Hermione began building her spell.

A Formula Ring opened above the ground before her.

Then another ring appeared around it.

Then another.

The formation grew slowly.

Unlike her previous Rank 3 spell, Hermione did not force the runes into place all at once. She built the circle carefully, one sequence at a time. Airam stood close beside her, using small witchcraft runes to stabilize the outer edge whenever Hermione’s mana threatened to spill beyond its path.

The spell would not attack the Valmorian soldiers directly.

Their armor would resist too much of the force.

Instead, Hermione began drawing the water from the stream.

The current rose in thin lines at first. Then the water gathered into a spinning mass above the ground. Wind wrapped around it. The pressure within the spell increased, tightening the water into several narrow streams sharp enough to cut through gaps in armor if released at close range.

Airam watched the Formula Ring.

"You are making blades."

"Not blades," Hermione said. "Needles."

"Against armor?"

"Against the spaces inside it."

Airam looked toward the Valmorian soldiers.

Hermione meant to force the water through the gaps beneath helmets, around joints, and into the small spaces where armor could not protect the body.

It was a dangerous spell.

It required precision.

If the water streams spread or shifted at the wrong moment, they could strike Ulrich.

"Do not release it until he moves clear," Airam said.

"I know."

Ulrich fought on.

The six remaining Valmorian knights attacked together.

A sword came for his neck.

He ducked.

A spearpoint aimed for his wounded side.

He shifted, but the point still scraped against his armor and opened another shallow line across his ribs.

Ulrich stepped backward.

His heel struck a stone.

One knight moved toward him with his sword raised.

Airam’s runes appeared beneath the soldier’s boots.

The ground buckled.

The knight lost his balance for a fraction of a second.

Ulrich used it, his movements ruthlessly cold and efficient.

He drove his crimson blade upward beneath the man’s helmet. The sword entered through the gap in the neck guard. The Valmorian soldier fell.

Five remained.

Ulrich pulled the blade free.

His chest rose and fell heavily.

A Formula Ring appeared beside his left hand. He reached into the inner pocket of his coat and took out a small vial. The soldiers rushed toward him, but Airam sent a wave of loose runes into the ground before them.

Stone rose.

Mud clung to their boots.

Wind struck their helmets from different sides.

The interruptions lasted only moments, but they gave Ulrich enough time.

He tore the stopper from the vial with his teeth and swallowed the contents.

A sharp medicinal taste filled his mouth.

Warmth spread through his body.

The potion did not heal his wounds completely. It could not restore the blood already lost or erase the damage done to his muscles. But it dulled the pain, strengthened his breathing, and pushed a small amount of energy back into his exhausted limbs.

Ulrich threw the empty vial aside.

He rushed forward again.

His sword met a Valmorian blade.

Crimson mana shattered.

Ulrich turned the impact away and drove his shoulder into the knight’s chest. The black armor held. The soldier barely moved.

But a small wind spell hit the back of the knight’s knee at the same moment.

The soldier’s leg bent.

Ulrich’s sword entered beneath his arm.

The blade went deep.

The Valmorian knight dropped to one knee.

Ulrich pulled free and stepped away before another enemy could strike him from behind.

Four remained.

"Hermione," Airam said.

The Formula Ring above Hermione’s hands had completed.

The water gathered from the stream spun faster within its outer circle. Thin lines of pale blue pressure formed around it, sharp and tightly controlled.

"I have it," Hermione said.

Ulrich was still too close.

The Valmorian knights circled him, their positions changing with every exchange. Hermione could not release the spell yet. One wrong angle would send the water needles through Ulrich as easily as the enemy.

Airam kept her runes moving.

Her face had become almost colorless. Blood ran from her nose again. The crimson light around her hand flickered dangerously.

"Ulrich!" Hermione shouted.

He heard her.

His eyes moved toward her for only an instant.

Then he understood.

Ulrich drove his sword into the ground and released a force spell beneath his feet. The blast pushed him backward through the air, carrying him out of the closing circle of Valmorian soldiers.

Hermione lifted both hands.

The Rank 3 spell released.

The water needles burst forward.

They crossed the clearing in pale blue lines, fast enough to cut through the smoke. They were aimed at the gaps in the Valmorian armor: beneath helmets, inside elbows, behind knees, at the seams between chest plates and shoulder guards.

The spell had reached them.

Then a black figure appeared before it.

Valdris.

He moved between the water needles and his soldiers with impossible speed. His dark sword came up, and mana gathered around the blade.

He swung once.

The anti-magic weapon cut through Hermione’s spell.

The compressed water formations burst apart in the air. Mana scattered into pale blue fragments. The stream-water fell harmlessly across the grass and armor of the Valmorian knights.

Hermione stared.

Her Formula Ring collapsed.

Valdris stood before the remaining soldiers, black sword lowered at his side.

His eyes moved from Ulrich to the sisters.

His face was cold.

"Enough," he said.

He raised the blade slightly.

"I offered you a peaceful return. If you refuse to come willingly, I will take you by force."