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While we were sitting tight and waiting for backup to come, my life in the fort has become a lot more dull. Besides checking on my patients in the infirmary to follow up on the more severe cases, like reattaching or resetting cut/broken/shattered limbs. The worst cases were those who had their bones smashed into many fragments, and those were a nightmare to heal.
But one of the main reasons for my boredom was the vibes I had been getting from the rank-and-file troops. Ever since word got around that I was the fort commander's son, those same troops who had been telling me lude jokes, slapping me on the back, and treating me like I was one of the lads were now a lot more formal when interacting with me, and to my disgust, a few of them even acting like boot lickers.
This killed my mood, especially because some of Dad's knights, who I grew up around and acted as my uncles, were killed in this battle.
But now that things had calmed down, I quickly busied myself by joining the mages on their never-ending quest to see what made those glowing swords we captured tick, but try as we might, no matter what form of spells we used to try and identify what allowed those swords imbue their former wielders with great strength, aura, and super regeneration the likes none of us had seen before.
As we studied the swords, we kept coming to the conclusion that it was just a well-made steel sword with no enchantments. This time spent discussing and departing theory with the mages, most of them being my fellow alumni from the Royal Academy, reminded me of my time spent in Professor Sageira's personal lab, running different experiments and training.
This gave me an idea, so I waited for the other mages to take a break while I told them I was staying back to try one last thing. Once I was alone, I pulled out the dragon scale Professor Sageira had given me to contact her.
[Professor, are you available? Can you hear me?] I mentally whispered.
After a few seconds, just when I thought I might be out of range from her, Professor Sageira replied, [Sorry about that, I was in the middle of a conversation. Are you back from that war thing you humans like so much?]
[Kind of, we're now waiting for reinforcements to relieve us. But that's not why I'm calling. What I am calling about is a weapon we captured, but we just can't figure it out.] I said.
I then described what I had observed from the previously glowing swords and their wielders. When I was done reporting, there was a moment of silence from the scale. Eventually, her mental voice came over, [Put the scale on the sword.]
Once her scale was on one of the swords we were examining, the scale started glowing a white light for a few seconds before cycling through different colors every few seconds. After a few minutes of the scale doing its thing, the glow died down, and I picked up the scale. [So, what did you get?] I asked, only for her to hush and curtly ask me to shut up so as not to disturb her.
After waiting for a minute or so while twiddling my thumbs, she eventually replied, [I cannot be sure due to the faint trace, but I suspect this has something to do with Soul magic. That is all I can tell when I am scanning it through my scale. Bring me one of those swords so I can get a better look.]
Soul magic… why does that sound familiar… wait a minute, I learned this in magic theory. [Errr… isn't Soul magic, like, super illegal? And no, I can't just pass you one of those swords. Each one is accounted for, and if it goes missing while in our charge, my father is going to get in a lot of trouble.]
[Yes, it's illegal by most human laws and thrown in the same basket as necromancy and blood magic. And I am not surprised that the Zagraf Theocracy is dabbling in this. As for the sword, just tell me when the swords are handed over to someone else, and I will take care of the rest.] she said.
[Wait, what? What do you mean you are not surprised by the Zagraf Theocracy's involvement in the usage of soul magic? Are they the ones going around hunting all these forbidden magic users?] I asked.
She somehow mentally snorted and said [And what do you think happens to all the research left behind after they kill the forbidden magic users? I wouldn't be surprised if they have the largest collection of forbidden magic on the continent. As you have recently observed, they are not above supplying weapons to different nations. All organizations of their size have some sort of dark side to keep them in power, politically or otherwise.]
All I could say back was [Oh.] as all the dots started connecting in my head.
***
Days passed, and eventually, we got word of a battalion on its way to relieve us in a few days. In the meantime, I was not stuck helping Dad with the mountain report he had to write. Not wanting to suffer alone, Dad asked me to write up my own report to account for what happened and to think up a way to explain the golems we deployed.
After thinking up different ways to explain the wood golems, I called Professor Sageira to see if she could come up with a plausible reason, but she just told me to put her down as the one who gifted the golems to me. Anyone in the know of her identity would know better than to ask questions, and if those not in the know started asking questions, they would be asked by those in the know to drop it if they knew what was good for them.
When the relief forces finally arrived, we spent an entire day going through the handover process, followed by a brief handover ceremony. Once that was finished, we left and headed back home to my cozy bed.
Honestly, I think I bit off more than I could chew this time. If not for the golem, I would have been dead. I think it will do me some good to focus on more domestic affairs for the foreseeable future.