Karl waved to the cleric as he got the team moving. "False alarm. It is probably the students. We had an encounter with a Holy Relic, remember? They've grown much more than expected in the last few days."
"They're from our school. Those two are professors, not High Priests, but strong with Holy Magic. I don't know the guards, but the other students are familiar faces. I didn't know that they were out here as well. The High Priest only told us we were leaving, not anything else." The cleric boy with them explained.
"Well, at least we can confirm that they're really clerics. Let's get there and get settled in for some storytelling. They are not going to let us just silently board the train without giving them all the details. I hope that you are ready to relive the dangerous parts." Karl whispered back.
"I think so. It's not my favourite memory, but I doubt that I'm going to panic if I happen to remember it." The boy replied.
The guards moved to encircle them once they got close to the group. They were all facing out, alert for some sort of danger, and definitely not threatened by the students. But Karl still had that creepy feeling, like something was wrong.
Only now that he was close, he could tell that it wasn't coming from this group of people, just from this area in general.
So, he didn't relax, and he prepared to bring the Refreshing Lightning barrier up as soon as he sensed a threat. Calling the beasts out would be a last resort, as he would have to explain to all the soldiers beforehand, but keeping the barrier up shouldn't be too much of an issue.
Everyone expected the Elites to have some sort of supernatural powers.
The two clerics came over to the group and began examining the students they had rescued, while the other four students looked on in envy. Even they could sense the power from the two newly arrived students, and it was obvious that they had been gifted with magic by the trial.
"This does pose a bit of a dilemma. It is holy magic, but so much of it might make the Government believe that they are Serum Awakened, and not just common clergy." The older of the two sighed.
"Is there a distinction within the church?" Karl asked, hoping it wasn't rude.
"There is. The ones who awaken cleric marks with the divine injection are sent to us, while the ones raised by us that awaken other marks are sent to the Academy. There weren't any last year, only one got a mark, and it was a cleric, but our group does not have many students to begin with." The priest explained.
The other four boys nodded in unison.
"There are only eight of us in our year for the whole region." One of them offered.
That made sense, the Seminary Academy was normally raising selected orphans as priests and nuns to help keep the church running, not to become elite magic users. The main orphanages were in the big cities, where there was the most need. The fact that some of their intended helpers did gain exceptional levels of holy magic either from the Serum or from their faith was just an added benefit.
"If I didn't know better, I would say that you were awakened by the Serum. Have either of you gotten a mark on your body after the trial?" The cleric asked.
Both of them carefully took off their gloves, revealing the mark of a bishop's sceptre with a dragon wrapped around it.
That wasn't the mark that the cleric in front of them had, Karl noticed. His was a simple ankh, a cross with a looped top on the back of his right hand, but these two were much more ornate and detailed. They were also larger. Much like Karl's claw marks, they took up an entire forearm.
But the cleric knew what they were right away.
"You, Team Leader, do you have an emergency phone?" He asked.
"Of course. Do you need to make a call?" Karl replied.
"Dial 777, and when they pick up, put us on speakerphone." The cleric instructed.
Karl did as he requested, and the phone only rang once before being picked up.
"Speak." The person on the other end replied.
"Cleric Class Professor 8675309." The priest replied as soon as Karl hit the speaker button.
"Verified. What is your emergency?" The bored voice asked, sounding nothing like it was an emergency.
"Two Dragon Priests found. Awakened at a Holy Relic before the Serum injection." The priest replied.
"Eight minutes." The voice informed them, then hung up.
Karl looked at the group, who mostly seemed as confused as he was.
"They're not really talkative, are they?" Karl asked.
"It's better if they're not. Remember that number in the future, it is the direct line to the Holy Inquisition. They're the church's version of special forces, and a number of especially devout Elites work with them to prevent damage to sacred sites or attacks on travelling clergy." The priest informed him.
"Well, it looks like we will be separated very soon, so let me be the first to congratulate you both on your awakening. From the response, I would say that your class is a good and well-known one, so your futures should be secure." Karl congratulated the two students, who had kept their awakening to themselves this whole time, though everyone had known that their magic was growing more powerful even before their eyes first glowed with golden light.
"Do you know what dragon?" The priest asked the students, who shook their heads.
Dana raised her hand. "I think that we do. Their eyes glow golden in the dark."
The guards looked reverent at those words, and shifted their defensive postures, as if they were ready to guard the two students even against the other clergy.
"Then thank the gods we called the Inquisition. I was not looking forward to facing the Academy Matron, or worse, the Grand Priestess to report that by myself." The second priest muttered.
Karl and a few of the guards couldn't help but laugh. Some things were truly universal, and one of them was the aversion to being called out by your superiors. Even if you hadn't done anything in particular wrong.
They were beginning to relax and count down the minutes until the reinforcements arrived, when the creepy feeling that Karl had been getting intensified, and now even the clerics and mages were feeling it.
"There really is something else out here. Everyone on guard, I feel a disturbance in the mana flow." The leader of the guard troop announced.
"In position, circular formation." Karl ordered, and the students moved to surround the clerics, with the mages inside the ring of warriors, behind the front lines of the guards.
"Are you not moving inside the formation?" The older priest asked Karl, who had moved to stand with the guards in the outer ring of the defensive line.
"Guards, I have three tamed beasts with me, as part of my class skills. A Lightning Cerro, a Windspeed Hawk, and a Bloodbath Spider. If I have to call them out, I need you not to attack them. They are not a spell, they are living creatures." Karl called out, and got a sharp response from the guards.
"Understood, Sir." They called in unison, and Karl settled into his place among the guards, next to their team leader.
If there was an attack, it would be easier if the two of them could coordinate their orders.