Envis who was near the tent of asleep Lucis and Olivia looked towards the direction of the village.
"Why is there so much smoke? Is it a fire or an attack?" he wondered aloud.
Breaking a branch from a nearby tree, he used it as a mount and flew towards the village. By the time Envis arrived, the village was already under attack. Bandits were killing every man in sight, throwing children into cages, and violating the women. Most of the houses were on fire.
"Shit! A bandit attack!" Envis muttered, pulling out a device to send an SOS signal to the nearby magic knights' camp. The number of bandits was too great for him to handle alone. His body turned invisible as he ran towards a nearby bandit, punching him to the ground. The bandit, accustomed to living in the wild, had sharp instincts and managed to somewhat balance himself after falling, but Envis stomped his foot on the bandit's face.
The rest of the bandits, seeing their comrade fall, became alert and started shooting spells in Envis's direction.
Envis's magic allowed him to create a cloak of invisibility around himself, but the cloak would be dispelled if he was hit by an attack. Though he could be sensed by anyone with good magic sense, only a few of the bandits had such abilities, giving him an advantage. He picked up the fallen bandit and used him as a shield to tank the attacks. Sensing an attack from behind, Envis sidestepped to dodge a sword strike, but a ground-based attack from below disrupted his cloak.
"IT'S A MAGIC KNIGHT! KILL HIM!" the bandits roared.
'It's going to be hard. I hope reinforcements come soon,' Envis thought, his body turning invisible again. As he disappeared, the bandits showered the area with wide-range spells to break his invisibility. Envis jumped onto the roof of a nearby house and shot an orb of mana towards a bandit while simultaneously throwing a sword he had picked up along the way at another. He then leaped in the opposite direction, confusing the bandits about his position. Taking advantage of their confusion, he hit two or three more bandits on the ground.
"Lucis, wake up!" Olivia shook the sleeping Lucis, but he refused to wake up.
"Mother… let me sleep five more minutes," he mumbled in his sleep.
Olivia cleared her throat and released a shrill sound near his ears.
Lucis woke up instantly, clutching his ears. "Can't you wake me up more gently? Someday I'll have hearing problems because of your methods," he grumbled, rubbing his eyes.
"I could have, but now's not the time for that. Something is wrong in the village. I see a lot of smoke rising from that direction."
After confirming her words, Lucis washed his face and told her to pack their things. He retracted all the magic traps he had set up and created a mount of light for them to travel.
They reached the village in a few minutes and saw the horrifying scene. Lucis immediately reacted and ordered Olivia, "Use attack and durability buff."
Olivia took out her grimoire and started singing in a melodious voice. In response, Lucis's body glowed with a soft blue light. He created several arrows of light and pointed them at the bandits who were throwing children into cages. Although the light arrows were fast, Lucis had not yet tapped into the true potential of his light magic, so their speed was not as fast as it should have been. The bandits managed to cut the arrows with their weapons, but the arrows' goal was not to hit them. The broken arrows shone and formed a large net that wrapped around the bandits.
"Olivia, now!" he ordered, creating more nets.
Olivia nodded and released a shrill noise from her mouth towards the fallen bandits. The noise made the bandits bleed from their ears, impairing their ability to think properly for a while. Lucis jumped towards them and began punching the bandits in the head with large fists of light.
Lucis created a sword of light and slashed at a bandit who had shot an arrow at him. He then spotted a bandit shooting arrows from the top of a house. A platform of light formed under Lucis's feet, lifting him towards the bandit as he deflected incoming arrows with his light sword.
"Hehe, got you," said another bandit standing below the one on the roof, preparing to shoot a bolt of lightning at Lucis. But a string of light emerged from the ground, binding the bandit's movements. Lucis hadn't known there was another bandit but had cast a binding spell for safety. Lucis had few attack spells but many to incapacitate or disorient people. His body shone brightly, making the bandit on the roof cover his eyes. Taking advantage of this, Lucis decapitated the bandit and stabbed him with several light swords. He did the same with the bandit on the ground.
He then noticed another bandit dragging a woman and shot towards him.
On the other side of the village, Envis was clutching his bleeding hand, facing a bandit with a lightning-clad sword. This bandit was the strongest among the attackers.
Envis dodged another attack but cried out in pain as two arrows struck his back.
"Seems like it's your end, Mr. Magic Knight," said the bandit, increasing his speed and bringing down his sword to decapitate Envis. But before he could strike, his hand was cut off at the shoulder by a black slash.
"Captain Yami!" Envis exclaimed in happiness.
"Yo, looks like you need help," said Yami, lighting a cigarette. A few minutes earlier, Yami had been resting at the nearby magic knights' camp when he received the SOS signal. Half the magic knights present, along with Yami, had rushed to the village.
"The civilians need help," said Envis with a worried tone.
"Don't worry about them. Help is here," said Yami, slashing his sword towards the bandit. The bandit tried to defend with his remaining hand, but it was futile. The hand was cut off, and a large wound appeared on his chest.
"I can't save everyone," Lucis thought, moving a person from a broken house. A bandit attacked him from behind but fell clutching his bleeding ear. Olivia had come forward and kicked the bandit's family jewels with a mana-reinforced kick. They had already seen a magic knight fighting the leader, so they focused on rescuing civilians and fighting off the rest of the bandits.
"If you're wondering about the fire, don't worry. It will be resolved soon," said Olivia, pointing upwards. Following her finger, Lucis looked up and saw two people flying in the sky wearing the vests of the Crimson Lions. Lucis recognized one of them as Randall, the vice-captain of the Crimson Lions.
Randall looked towards his partner and ordered him to cast his spell. A large amount of water was released from the second magic knight's hands but remained floating under the effect of Randall's air magic. He controlled the air to make the water fall over the village, extinguishing the fire. Other Crimson Lion members were capturing the fallen bandits or fighting the ones still resisting.
Midnight:
"Looks like you all are done," said Yami, looking at Lucis and the others sitting under a broken house. He turned towards the restrained bandits who were cursing the magic knights. Annoyed, Yami released a wave of mana pressure, knocking them out.
The rest of the magic knights were busy either healing the wounded or rescuing people from the broken houses. Around thirty people had been killed before Yami and the squad arrived.
Yami already knew Lucis's identity from the Wizard King, and he was pleased to see someone of Lucis's status taking missions so far from the capital. As he was about to say something, another SOS signal was sent to his communicator from deeper within the forsaken area.
"Sigh! They won't even let me rest for a moment," Yami grumbled.