TBE Chapter 77

TBE Chapter 77

Ezekiel found a nice campground where they would stay for the night before the sunset and after he summoned the Galder’s Towers that they had been using during their travel, Robert and Luke went inside the bedroom house, probably to the washroom to play with their toy ship on the tub there.

He busied himself with Prince Charming and once he was done, since it was early, he planned to practice his woodworking. He planned to create three large stackable boxes again but this time, Ezekiel would take his time to make sure that the boxes would be clean and pristine and since he was in the process of mastering his craft, he couldn’t afford to use spells to create them. To master the craft, he would need to use his hands for that.

He thought of that since Ezekiel felt that even though he had been crafting several wooden items, he felt like his mastery of woodworking was not increasing. He did use the Mage Hands spell though and thought that if that was inhibiting him from becoming proficient, he should stop using it and check out if the spell was truly inhibiting his growth.

Ezekiel thought that using a spell to lift things shouldn’t be a problem though, just actually using them to directly craft things. The problem was, that the Mage Hand spell and even the Tiny Servant spell were not very strong when it came to lifting things. That was also the main reason why he was sticking to crafting small things. He was still too weak to attempt to craft actual large things like beds, dining tables, and dining chairs.

After a couple of hours of work, he was looking at the box that he completed and Ezekiel thought that it was fine. The lines were clean and smooth and there were no obvious flaws that one could see. Of course, Ezekiel knew that it wasn’t valuable since the wood just came from the wood from the forest and they weren’t even from the same tree since he mainly collected fallen branches. It was also not finished yet since he needed to sand it and put a varnish on it.

That was one of the knowledge gaps that Ezekiel needed to fill to truly become a master wood crafter. Knowing specific trees and woods and which furniture was better for which wood. That meant that he might not truly become a master wood crafter because he couldn’t afford to apprentice himself to an actual master. He had his system which was his way to power and wealth so he decided that wood crafting would just probably remain as a hobby.

Ezekiel went to the bedroom tower and saw that his brothers had bathed already and were playing on the bedroom floor so he went to the washroom and took a shower. After that, they ate dinner then he taught his brothers how to read and write for an hour.

After the lessons, he joined his brothers in playing with their toy ship then when he saw that Robert and Luke were getting tired, told them that it was time to sleep. He read to them the continuation of the manga that he had been reading to them but after a few minutes, his brothers were asleep.

Ezekiel cast all the defensive spells that he usually cast before sleeping, checked with Yuki Onna briefly the situation outside then after that joined his brothers sleeping the night away.

The next day arrived and Ezekiel and his two brothers continued with their journey. While on the road, after making sure that there was no one near them, Ezekiel resumed his magic practice so Robert and Lukes laughter from playing was interspersed with the loud sounds from Ezekiel’s spell casting. He did try his best to not cause any forest fire since Ezekiel didn’t want his spell-casting to cause unnecessary deaths. They stopped briefly by the side of the road to eat lunch then they went back to traveling sedately on the road.

During the afternoon though Yuki Onna sent him a message that there was a disturbance inside the forest. A man was being chased by three other men and was captured. Then the man who was on the run was brought into a camp deep inside the forest.

Ezekiel stopped the cart and used his Familiar’s eyes to see what Yuki Onna had reported. Based on what he saw, the three men were part of a fairly large bandit group. They captured a carriage and from what he saw, the carriage’s passengers who were now tied up and in the middle of the bandit group consisted of a man, a woman, and possibly their children since two of them looked young. The young girl, who looked like a teenager, was around 15 or 16 years old and the boy was around 9 or 10.

The captured family looked well-off since they were wearing nice clothes. There were dead men nearby and Ezekiel had an inkling that the dead men were the family’s guards.

The man who ran away and was captured probably wasn’t one of the family’s guards since the man wasn’t wearing the uniform that the dead men were wearing and Ezekiel thought that he might not be a relative since the runaway’s clothes looked the same as what the bandits were wearing.

The runaway man kept on talking with the bandits but he suddenly received a blow to the head from one of them causing his head to bleed. Ezekiel thought that the man might have died on that blow alone.

Then Ezekiel saw something very gruesome next. The bandits killed who looked like the father of the family that was captured and they mercilessly killed the boy. Then they suddenly started stripping the girl and the other woman with the intent of violating them.

Ezekiel knew that even if he rushed toward them flying, he wouldn’t be in time to save the man and the boy from their deaths, and even now, if he flew towards the bandit group, they were far enough away that the group would have violated the girl and his mother several times before he arrived.

Ezekiel knew that this world wasn’t peaceful especially since this world was like it was in the medieval era but he never expected that he would see this sort of brutality so soon. He didn’t want his brothers to encounter the same thing so he decided that he would destroy the bandit group. He knew that the woman and her daughter would be traumatized if they survived the bandits’ assault on them but the only thing that he could do was to kill the bandits and help them go to where they wanted to go.

He guided their cart inside the forest.

“Are we going to camp so soon?” Robert asked when he noticed that Ezekiel moved Prince Charming and the cart.

“There’s a bandit group up ahead and they’re particularly vicious. I would like for the two of you to stay here inside the house that I would create with my magic so you’ll both be safe while I destroy them.”

“Can we join you?” Robert asked.

“I will be flying high above the trees with Yuki Onna to be safe so it will not be convenient for me to bring the both of you.”

The boys pouted when they heard what Ezekiel had said but were obedient. After Ezekiel cast the Galdur’s Tower spell that allowed him to create a shelter for the boys and Prince Charming, he made sure to cast more spells to protect the houses like the spells Arcane Lock and Glyph of Warding paired with the Minor Illusion spell that would cause those who were affected to see fearsome illusions. That would probably cause them to run away. He also refreshed the Mage Armor spell on all of them including Prince Charming.

Ezekiel then cast the spell Fly and flew towards the bandit group. He commanded the 10 butcher knives awakened by the Tiny Servant spell to follow him. He made sure to fly silently so the bandits would not notice him and after several minutes, he joined Yuki Onna on the branch where it was perched which was near enough to observe the bandits but high enough that the bandits shouldn’t notice them. He then waited for the butcher knives to arrive.

When he checked out the situation with the bandits, Ezekiel was sad to see that the woman and her daughter were now dead as well. It was unexpected to Ezekiel since he thought that the bandits would keep the women alive so they could enjoy them more but from what he could see, the two women probably tried to kill themselves either by biting their tongues or they probably tried to defend themselves by biting the men who were assaulting them since the two of them had a lot of blood on their faces.

Ezekiel then spent 20 silver coins to purchase the 3rd level spell Summon Shadowspawn since he didn’t want to show himself to the attacker. He then commanded the ten butcher knives to attack the bandits and then he cast the Summon Shadowspawn spell.

A shadowy spirit appeared on the place where Ezekiel pointed and then he commanded it to attack the bandits. He also prepared his Magic Missile spells since he didn’t want any of the bandits to escape.