Stripped City Adra: Each Showing Their Hand

That night,

Heine packed up his equipment, took a deep breath, and looked at himself in the mirror. A strange light flickered in his eyes.

After breakfast, almost every mage chose to eat in their rooms. They handled dinner there as well, all while remaining vigilant for intruders entering the protective barriers set around their rooms.

Naturally, Heine was no exception. It would be more accurate to say that this was the essence of a mage: the people one needed to guard against most were other mages.

"Brother..."

Rosalind opened her sleepy eyes and looked at her fully armed brother, speaking softly without thinking.

"I'm here, Rosalind. Did I wake you?"

When Heine saw his younger sister, his expression softened. He reached out and stroked her head. Feeling that warmth, the light in his eyes became even more resolute.

"No. Brother, are you going out?"

"Yes. I won't be long."

After all, I was a mage known as a knight. That title did not merely describe my knightly virtues; more importantly, I possessed the formidable strength of a knight as well.

Though this might mean losing his identity as a mage, he had still chosen to do it without hesitation for the sake of the inheritance. Of course, his experiences in the Holy Church had also taught him that there was nothing wrong with doing so.

That was why he had come here, hoping to obtain Ashborn's inheritance and remove the mutated Mage Crest.

After leaving the room, Heine's expression turned stern. He suppressed that tenderness within his heart and returned to the demeanor of a mage.

"Don't worry about me, Rosalind. Your brother is very strong."

However, the Mage Crest seemed to have undergone some unknown mutation. Rosalind's life force had almost been completely drained away. Even Heine, who