Icarus walked a few steps behind master Valerius, a nervous expression on his face.
He could not read his master intentions, it was not normal for him to walk with his master, in fact it would be forbidden normally.
Valerius leasurely strolled through the market, peering at different market stands, a while late he glanced back at Icarus, as if to check if he was still there.
Icarus snapped to attention, this was clearly not a look signifying something simple, Valerius seemed to be pointing with his eyes, Icarus followed his gaze and saw two people haggling in an alleyway.
It was a brief glance and Valerius seemed to signal him to follow, the two of them took a staircase that lead up to a secluded corner that was not in earshot of any houses and had good visibility in case someone wanted to listen in.
Icarus had ascertained all this, over the years his intuition became very impressive, it was necessary for his survival so that certainly helped him.
Valerius spoke in a calm measured tone. "I trust you have some idea what I was trying to show you?"
Icarus nodded and Valerius continued "Those people were haggling, but not at a market stall or in the open, they tried to blend in but in the eyes of someone like myself or you, they basically outed themselves as some kind of criminal."
Icarus was impressed by this, Valerius was a lot sharper then he gave him credit for.
He raised a hand, the way a slave could ask if he could talk.
Valerius nodded "Go ahead."
"Aren't some of the market stalls also owned by illegal corporations? What could be so important that they are doing there business in such a secretive but flawed manner?"
Valerius shook his head, "they are likely playing a bigger game, maybe trying to take territory from other groups. But they are going to move soon regardless."
One question filled Icarus' mind "so will we move again? Even though we just got here?"
Valerius chuckled slightly. "No. The slave trade is the largest criminal operation in the world. We will not run from some back alley thugs."
Icarus nodded, "in that case will I have more contracts soon?"
Valerius turned and waved him to follow "more then likely, it will probably take a couple days for us to find out necessary information though."
They walked back through the markets, the people from before were nowhere to be seen, the pair passed by a weapon stand and Valerius turned with an enthusiastic gasp.
Icarus looked and saw him hovering over a particular book, he looked up at the merchant and demanded. "Is this a Grimoire from the citadel? How have you got your hands on something of such quality?"
Icarus was interested as well, the Grimoire would be useful to him as he could begin following the Grimoire pathway which synergizes quite well with the visualization pathway.
The merchant raised it and simply stated "5 gold."
Valerius reached into his pocket, not for gold but for his pendant which revealed the organization he was a part of. As he pulled it out, the merchants eyes widened.
Icarus heard the sound of wood bursting behind him. He turned, as if in slow motion a giant of a man, easily 7 feet tall, and red skinned burst out of the wooden wall behind him.
Icarus did not have time to move, but the man rushed past him and slammed into Valerius, knocking him over.
Immediately the slave brand on Icarus' neck erupted with searing pain. He drew his dagger and thrust it into the man's spine, he made a sickening noise and started to turn, but Icarus twisted the blade violently and the man's spine was severed, leaving him paralyzed and bleeding on the ground.
Icarus panicked as he saw master Valrius, who lay in a pool of blood seemingly in grave pain. He ripped the dagger free of the man's twitching body. If Valerius was injured he would also die. A moment Valerius stood up with a grunt of discomfort. The mans blood had soaked him and he shuddered in disgust.
He turned to Icarus and gave him a nod. "Let's go, enough attention has been attracted."
The pair left and moments later they were back at the storehouse.
Icarus sat at the table, Valerius observed himself in a nearby mirror as he stood, "will you go downstairs, I need to change now. Come up in around 30minutes."
Icarus nodded, stepping out of the room, Icarus found his way to the door.
He opened it and stepped inside, it was dark and smelled of earth and rock.
He smiled slightly, "just like home."
He took a step forward, he could not see in the darkness but he was careful and reached his foot out for a step.
No step was found, he figured that the layout was just more complicated than he initially thought.
However minutes later, there was no change in his vision, this was strange as his eyes were particularly good for a human in this world and usually he adapted very quickly to darkness.
He reached back for the door handle, he might as well just go back ou-
He shuddered, behind him was a cold, rock wall. This did not seem to be the inside of a house.
He lit his candlelight, but it did not penetrate the darkness that surronded him at all, the candle was blown out a moment later by a gust of wind that passed by him.
He panicked and scrambled, the walls around him resembled a corridor, behind him was nothing but Rock.
He calmed his breathing slightly a minute later. There had to be some way to explain this after all.
He fumbled in the darkness, he tried to go forward, two minutes later he crashed his head into another solid wall and fell to the ground.
"DAMN IT! what is this!"
He tried to think as best he could, minutes passed but if felt like hours, this place of impenetrable darkness.
He got up, feeling around him he found that the wall he crashed into was no longer in front of him, he nearly got mad all over again but took a deep breath.
His thoughts ran for a few more moments, his senses, touch, smell, taste, hearing, sight!
He closed his eyes, sight was worthless to him now, he purely focused on his other senses, even attempting a very basic type of magic to enhance these senses.
He felt his way along the wall, listening for new sounds and smelling for new scents.
He slowly felt the corridor widen, a new scent filled his nose like a a must rather than dark earth.
He felt something strange happen, an unexplainable sensation, it took him a moment to remember what he had thrown away in that dark tunnel.
His eyes opened, light filled them and he shielded them for a moment before they adjusted.
He moved his hand, he saw the walls around him, an ornate stone room with 12 pillars surrounding him.
A large pillar floated in the center his eyes followed it up, above the pillar there was... Something.
Icarus' eyes widened, his heart dropped, a feeling of utter dispair filled him.
He collapsed to the ground but could not take his eyes off that object.
Behind him the passageway was gone, he had not looked back but somehow he knew, he knew everything in that moment.
The room began to shrink, he neared the object, or maybe it neared him.
They rotated around eachother, the gap between them shrank until it was no more, the object became one with him, filling his being.
Something else retaliated, Magenta colored magic laced with blue and crimson surged outwards from him, the object retaliated mindlessly, but sigils of the mana shot forth and countered every single move.
Icarus was not entirely conscious, he did not feel or understand what was happening, his brain was overloaded with too much information.
The object began to take form in his mind, its final mindless attempt to keep itself in the boys body, the sigils formed into ridiculously complicated chains of mana, these took hold of the thought, removing all memory of it from Icarus' mind.
As this was happening, something strange invaded Icarus' Perception, a burning sensation on his neck grew every second.
He could barely think as the pain grew, it was unbearable but he was not conscious enough to bear it.
Slowly, his consciousness faded, and he blacked out.
.
.
.
Icarus stood at the top of the stairs, he was wide eyed, suddenly he gasped and clutched his throat.
He remembered the tunnel but he had returned where he had been.
Looking around he saw the door behind him, he could not shake off that he was forgetting something, how could he have gone from the tunnel, straight to here?
He shook of the feeling, the tunnel was likely a day dream. He was completely exhausted and had likely drifted off, hopefully he was not late to speak to master Valerius.
He opened the door, in the center of the room stood master Valerius, he wore a white undersuit, the upper part of it lay in a heap
beside him.
Icarus looked from the suit, back to him and his eyes widened.
A crimson stain was spreading on the front of the white suit.