Luca bounded through the forest canopy, his whole body a dark shadow as the surroundings were mostly a collage of darkness and the occasional ray of light.
His loud footfalls as he leapt onto the next branch were completely dampened by the dark feathered cloak as well.
Still, he didn't let it get to his head. He wasn't out of the clear. Not even close. He wouldn't consider himself safe until he finally got the feathers and was far away from the forest entirely.
More importantly, he was being careful because of the guards patrolling below.
They wore different colours of armour, but the primary shade was bronze, and from their aura he could mark them as Bronze Armour Knights.
He kept moving, jumping lightly from branch to branch, and looking down from time to time. According to Erina, the Sky Tyrant was the most costly creature being kept in the Menagerie, and also the strongest, which was why it had to be constantly sedated.
This made it the most closely guarded and monitored. If there was a situation that made the creature awaken, they would spring into action immediately. Erina had insisted it wouldn't wake up even if he plucked a few feathers.
Luca decided to take her word for it, considering he could do nothing but try his best to escape if it wasn't true.
Despite his vigilance, he couldn't help but admire the type of beasts chained down below. He had never seen most of them and was only able to match their descriptions to what he'd read in books.
There was a massive wolf with blue fur instead of the usual black or orange. It stood at half the height of a tree, chained into the ground by a medium-length chain made of a special alloy that shimmered purple in the sunlight.
The wolf circled around and tried to lunge at the guard stationed nearby, but the chain's length stopped it short every time.
He paused for a moment to observe it. He had never seen a wolf that large, or with that colour. But even that wasn't the oddest part.
What stood out most was that he sensed faint traces of stellar energy inside its body.
He remembered one of the methods early mages used to discover glyphs in a safe manner. Aside from exploring the Veil, some dissected special animals that had glyphs embedded in their bodies, granting them unique properties.
Luca suspected these were the very types of beasts used for those experiments.
The glyphs they found back then were often weak, good for little more than killing the weakest of creatures of that era.
History lessons often spoke of the great ages, like the Era of Darkness, in which incredibly powerful beasts roamed the land and human civilization was nothing more than a fragile speck.
As mages grew stronger, they eventually reclaimed the land and established nations. The records claimed this was tens of thousands of years ago.
The Church's lore, however, told a different story. In their canon, the Era of Darkness was said to be a time when the world was submerged in perpetual night.
Humanity was on the brink of destruction until Sol appeared and gave one of his hearts, which became the sun, illuminating the world for the first time. At the same time, he bestowed knowledge and power to a chosen few, his priests.
Like much of the Church's stories, Luca didn't believe a word of it.
'Hmm. Come to think of it… that's twice now that the world was submerged in something, and Sol came to the rescue.'
Luca had never received any proper education, certainly none that covered mages, but he pieced things together from stories told by his parents, a few books he'd read, and Crowley's legacy.
Weaker beasts like the blue wolf likely carried weaker glyphs, while stronger creatures, like the Sky Tyrant, surely carried glyphs far more powerful.
What those glyphs were, however, he had no idea.
He returned his attention to the task at hand. The wolf was perhaps the least interesting creature in the Menagerie.
There were beings he had never seen anywhere near Carinthia or its surrounding forests.
A dog-sized, rat-like creature covered in thousands of spikes along its back. It was reddish-brown, and surprisingly radiated more energy than the wolf.
A fox with ears as long as a bat's. A large golden-scaled creature that walked on four legs with a long snout. Birds more colourful than any eagle he had ever seen. Horned deer.
There were all sorts of strange beasts, and Luca realized it must cost Duke Venton a fortune to feed and maintain even a single one.
'Holy shit, he must be wealthy! No wonder Erina can hand out a Crown like it's nothing.'
The creatures were fascinating, and some radiated strength, but he wasn't interested in them at the moment. He noted their appearance and pressed forward toward the centre, where the real prize lay.
He leapt again, landing on the next branch, only this time he broke through the canopy, bursting out into open air.
It was a clearing.
Below, a guard snapped his head up at the sound of rustling leaves.
THUMP!
Luca landed hard on the ground and found himself staring directly at the man.
That wasn't right.
He frowned, quickly taking stock of the situation.
First, the massive bird lying in the middle of the clearing, completely sedated.
It was even larger than the Sun Eagle Haider had ridden, towering over buildings he'd seen in the city.
The Sky Tyrant resembled a gigantic falcon.
Snow-white feathers covered most of its body, broken by a vivid blue line running down its back and parts of its sides. Four wings were folded neatly along its body, while a long white-and-blue feathered tail curled around it.
The beast was magnificent in every sense, and even with the chains suppressing it, Luca felt the raw power inside as it slumbered.
But that wasn't all.
The clearing was littered with bodies. Dozens of them.
And standing among them was the knight.
His skin had taken on a deathly purple tint, the whites of his eyes gone dark. Dark, purplish smoke leaked from the joints of his armour.
The knight turned, locked eyes with Luca...then lunged right at him.