The Dark Secrets of the Mage's Estate
Fireburp held the magical book in her hands. The tome was bound in thick, dark‑blue leather, its edges decorated with silver patterns that pulsed faintly with the magic sealed inside. Where a lock should have been, a translucent, water‑colored sigil shimmered—like liquid crystal frozen mid‑flow. The dragon girl scratched her head, clearly unsure what to do with it.
Anita glanced over her shoulder at the book.
"Is that magic book sealed?" she asked, stepping closer. "It practically screams that it's hiding something. Can you break the seal?"
"I can try melting it off," Fireburp offered, already raising her hand to summon flames.
"Give me that book," Anita snapped, snatching it away. "You'll set the whole place on fire. If this belongs to Water‑Mage Marek, then it's probably sealed with water element magic. Which means it won't explode in my hands if I slice it a little with my wind element."
The female Wolf Knight drew her knife. The blade was slender and elegant, wrapped in a faint, whitish glow—like the air itself was caressing it. With one decisive motion, Anita slashed through the magical seal.
A burst of translucent blue light enveloped the book, illuminating the entire room for a heartbeat. The seal cracked with a soft snap, and the book suddenly sprang open in Anita's hands, as if it had a will of its own.
"Whoa…" Anita recoiled. "Didn't expect that. For a moment I thought it was going to explode."
"What's inside?" Fireburp asked excitedly, practically bouncing in place.
"How should I know?" Anita grumbled. "It just opened. Let's see…" She ran her finger along the densely written pages. "It says… yes, this is definitely Water‑Mage Marek's magic book. Water spells, experiments, complaints…"
"You're not planning to read the whole thing now, are you?" Lazuro cut in. "Skip to the end. Maybe we'll learn something about the mage's last activities."
"To the end, huh…?" Anita flipped forward. "What the hell is this? The idiot was experimenting on demons! More precisely—imps. The mage has a secret laboratory in the basement."
Lazuro raised an eyebrow.
"And where's the entrance to this secret room?"
"Checking…" Anita leaned closer to the book. "Apparently there's another passage in the basement, covered by an old rug."
"Ah, so that's why we missed it," Lazuro muttered. "We already looked there once. Shall we check it out?"
"Of course!" Anita snapped the book shut. "And that means the villagers were right. Maybe it wasn't a demon roaring, but imps. According to this, he kept five of them. Gray ones—earth‑element types, not those red bastards that attacked us in Greenwood."
"What's the difference between the two species?" Lazuro asked.
Fireburp burst out laughing.
"Haha! You don't know that? It's simple! Red imps are fire‑element, so some of them can throw fireballs. Gray imps are earth‑element. They're way more dangerous in close combat because they harden their bodies with earth magic. Their skin is like trying to cut through solid rock."
"Relax," Anita waved a hand. "It's not a big deal. You just have to hit them more times. And harder."
"And it's easy to tell when their defense is active," Fireburp continued. "If they're on the ground and charging you, they're as heavy as a stone statue, so they can't fly. But if they are flying, they're easy targets, because that means they're not using their earth defense."
"Thanks for the detailed imp lecture," Lazuro said. "Makes sense. I'm earth‑element myself, after all."
Anita smirked.
"I see you're taking your mage lessons seriously, Fireburp."
"Dragons are wise creatures!" the dragon girl declared proudly, puffing out her chest. "Hahaha!"
The team returned to the house's basement, where the stale, musty air of the cellar greeted them like an old, unpleasant memory. Cobwebs hung thick along the stone walls, and decades of dust clung stubbornly between the cracks. In the center of the room lay the same worn, shabby rug they had noticed earlier—suspicious then, and now they finally knew why.
Anita pulled the rug aside, stirring up a cloud of dust. Beneath it, a thick, rusted iron hatch waited. Lazuro grabbed it with both hands. The metal groaned loudly, a long, miserable screech that echoed through the cellar… and woke something below.
From the darkness, a gray imp shot upward. The creature was small, but its muscles were taut, its eyes glowed red, and its frantic wingbeats kicked up dust. The attack was so sudden that all three of them froze for a heartbeat. The imp, however, slammed straight into the ceiling with a dull thud, then tumbled back down, dizzy.
Fireburp reacted instantly. She fired a quick, precise fireball that struck the imp squarely, sending it smoking to the floor.
"Nice one, Fireburp!" Anita praised.
"Yeah, they're easy as long as they're flying," the dragon girl shrugged, as if she'd just swatted a fly.
Lazuro leaned over the open hatch, peering into the darkness.
"If the imps are loose… you think they killed the mage and escaped?"
"Probably," Anita replied. "I doubt the mage could've tamed these things. Especially if he was experimenting on them."
"So… we're going down?" Lazuro asked.
"Fireburp, light a torch and drop it down the ladder," Anita ordered.
The dragon girl unhooked a torch from the wall, lit it, and leaned over the opening. A cold draft rose from below, like the earth itself exhaled. Fireburp hesitated for a moment, then let the torch fall. It clattered down the ladder and landed with a soft thump.
The light didn't reach far, but it showed enough: the ladder didn't descend very deep, and nothing seemed to be moving down there.
"All right, Fireburp," Anita said. "Go check if the coast is clear."
"Why me?!" the dragon girl protested.
"Because you can fly," Anita explained patiently. "As long as you're in the air and the gray imps are on the ground, they can't hurt you. And if they do take off, they're easy targets. This job was made for you. Besides, you're a brave dragon."
"Fine, but don't complain if I end up defeating all the imps myself," Fireburp grumbled.
"Imps don't give points," Anita waved her off. "My Dark Sword can't use their blood."
"Relax," Lazuro added. "We'll come right after you once you say it's clear."
"You two are so brave," Fireburp muttered. "Sending a little girl ahead."
"We're sending a dragon," Anita corrected. "Now go."
Fireburp descended the ladder and picked up the fallen torch. The flickering light revealed not a room, but a short, narrow corridor ending in a half‑open oak door. The wood was cracked, the iron fittings rusted—untouched for years.
Once Fireburp signaled that it was safe, Anita and Lazuro climbed down after her.
"All right," Anita said. "That leaves four more imps… and possibly a mage."
"I'll take the lead," Lazuro declared. "With my earth element, I've got the strongest defense."
"Good," Fireburp sighed. "I thought you were going to make me go first again."
The group moved cautiously down the narrow corridor, lighting each torch fixed to the walls as they went. The flames cast warm, orange light that sent dancing shadows across the damp stone, making it seem as if the darkness itself shifted around them. The air smelled of mold and the metallic tang of long‑forgotten magic.
Beyond the oak door stretched another long hallway, and at its end the path split in two.
"So, which way now?" Lazuro asked, studying both directions. "Straight or right?"
"No idea," Anita shrugged. "I'm not a mage. Let's just go straight and hope for the best."
They followed the straight path—only to end up in a dead end. The corridor opened into a small storage room cluttered with the mage's old junk: broken flasks, dusty scrolls, rusted tools, and a few unidentifiable remains of things that may once have been alive.
But the real problem clung to the wall.
Three gray imps were plastered against the stone like grotesque statues. The moment the group stepped inside, the creatures dropped to the floor simultaneously. They didn't fly—their earth‑element defense was active, making their bodies heavy and rock‑hard.
Three against three.
Anita reacted instantly. Her short sword flared with wind element, a pale, swirling aura forming around the blade. With three swift, precise strikes, she cut down the first imp, which collapsed with a dull thud.
Lazuro engaged the second. The power of the earth element wrapped around him, making his movements slower but deliberate. It was a battle of patience, but he eventually overpowered the creature with a well‑timed blow to the chest, sending it sprawling across the floor.
Fireburp took on the third. She shot into the air and hurled two fireballs at the imp, but its earth‑hardened skin only smoldered—no serious damage. The imp stubbornly stayed grounded; it knew instinctively that if it took flight and dropped its defense, a single fireball would end it.
So focused was the creature on the dragon girl circling above that it never noticed Anita slipping behind it. The female Wolf Knight drove her blade into its back with one decisive thrust, and the imp collapsed.
Three more gray imps down. Only one remained somewhere… and the mage himself.
"You guessed wrong," Lazuro remarked. "We should've taken the other path."
"This works too," Anita replied. "At least we cleared out the imps."
"There's still one left," Fireburp said, eyeing the bodies.
"Probably down the other way," Lazuro nodded.
The group returned to the fork and took the right path this time. After another long corridor, they arrived at the mage's laboratory.
The room was spacious but chaotic. Tools and equipment lay scattered everywhere—flasks, tubes, cauldrons, all half‑filled with strange liquids. Books and research notes were piled on the shelves, their pages yellowed with age. Dust and debris covered the floor, as if no servant had set foot here in decades.
In the center stood a large, heavy wooden table. On it lay the fifth and final gray imp—gutted and dissected, its body opened with meticulous precision, as though the mage had been studying every detail of its anatomy.
"Okay," Anita said. "That's the last imp. Now all that's missing is the mage… Water‑Mage Marek."
"Let's look around," Lazuro suggested. "Maybe he left something behind. Something that tells us where he went… or if he's even alive."
The group didn't get the chance to search the laboratory. From the neighboring room, a sudden demonic roar erupted—so powerful that the stone walls trembled. The sound was deep, distorted, unnatural, as if it had burst from several throats at once. The echo tore through the corridors and slammed back into them with such force that even the torch flames flickered violently.
Had they not been seasoned fighters, at least one of them would have collapsed in terror.
As it was, Fireburp merely let out a tiny, girlish pop of fright.
Her face turned bright red.
She was probably still digesting that monster‑meat stew she'd eaten for lunch. It was around two in the morning—the exact hour when the village youths had heard the same roar days earlier.
"What the hell was that?" Lazuro asked, instinctively gripping the hilt of his sword.
"That definitely wasn't an imp," Anita growled. "Those things don't have lungs big enough for a roar like that."
"Even Fire Demons didn't sound that terrifying," Fireburp added, still blushing. "This is… something else."
Heavy, thunderous footsteps followed the roar. Something big, heavy, and furious was approaching. Judging by the clattering and crashing, the creature knocked over everything in its path.
A moment later, a grotesque monster appeared in the doorway.
Even Anita froze at the sight. The creature's body was a mass of twisted muscle, its skin a sickly gray‑black, as if molded from ash and rotting flesh. Its head was disproportionately large, its jaw too wide, and its teeth jutted out like rusted daggers.
The demon was far too large for the doorway, but it didn't have the sense to crouch or turn sideways. Instead, it rammed itself against the frame in a mindless rage, tearing, pulling, and smashing until half the wall gave way. Stones crumbled in a cloud of dust as the creature forced a much larger entrance for itself.
"I've never seen anything this hideous," Anita muttered. "What is this supposed to be, some kind of mutant beast? Wait… my Demonhunter Sword is reacting."
The blade pulsed with a dark purple glow.
"So it is a demon."
"Well, that's unexpected," Lazuro said. "I'd rather have met the mage."
The demon finally noticed them. Its gaze was wild, hungry, and utterly devoid of reason. Drool dripped from its mouth like Ironclaw at a pig‑slaughter feast. It clearly didn't see intruders—it saw a late‑night snack.
Anita stepped forward and shouted to her companions before the demon could lunge.
"I'll handle this abomination! You two get out of here!"
"You sure you don't need help?" Lazuro asked. "Can you take it alone?"
"You'll just get in the way! Move!"
Lazuro didn't need to be told twice. This monster was far beyond his weight class. Wherever this demon had come from, its power rivaled that of a Fire Demon Clan Leader—and that was an entirely different league.
Fireburp hurled one last massive fireball into the demon's face. It scorched the creature's skin but didn't stop it. The dragon girl and Lazuro retreated down the corridor.
Meanwhile, Anita drew her Dark Sword. A cold, icy aura flared around the blade as the female Wolf Knight shifted into her ice‑demon form. Her pupils narrowed, her skin took on a frosty sheen, and the air around her dropped several degrees.
She launched herself at the demon.
Their clash thundered through the underground chamber like a lightning strike hitting stone.