After the evolution and consolidation of the new companion bond, the group spent the rest of that day resting. Susan did help heal up the two crispy girls, at least once she and Rhyana had adjusted to their new state of being.

But the morning soon came, and the set off into the wilds once more.

The next few days were surprisingly peaceful for the party. Few wandering beasts seemed eager to attack a group that consisted of two beast lords, understandably, still that did hinder the goal of strengthening Susan and Rhyana.

So to counter this, Violet and Luna spent a considerable amount of time learning how to properly control their passive presences.

They did have a general understanding of how they could control it, yet it took some mental energy to actively reign in their presence. It was possible, but trying to maintain that for any length of time quickly drained the two. Additionally, with their presences restrained, they lost the greatest benefit of having a presence in the first place. They could no longer feel what was within their domain.

It was not a major loss, but both girls felt like they should be able to better manage this new ability and so dedicated themselves to refining their control of it.

The first breakthrough was from Violet, she managed to keep the domain part active, but restrained her presence. This allowed her to keep a passive awareness of her surroundings, but made it much harder for other creatures to be able to sense her.

With that breakthrough both girls focused on refining that ability. It was hard work, and they both ended each day with a splitting headache. But, the results spoke for themselves.

After almost a week both Violet and Luna were able to maintain that state for a couple of hours at a time. This allowed them to finally begin to encounter some more beasts that the new companions could face by themselves. The freshly evolved duo opted to limit their involvement in battles with pre level 80 beasts, to only intervene if the other two would be in danger of serious injury or death. Thankfully, they had not needed to intervene just yet.

Both Violet and Luna also chose to hold off on using their skill upgrade token. Violet because she wanted to upgrade her multi cast skill, Luna because she wanted to upgrade her healing presence. Both skills were very close to being able to be upgraded too, so hopefully they wouldn't have to wait too long.

On the 8th day since evolving, Violet and her group crested a hill and were met with a new sight. It was not the usual sight of a lake or forest, but instead what greeted them was something that neither Violet or Luna had any idea about what it was. It was Susan that first recognised what they were looking at.

"It's a ruin!" She exclaimed. That brought curious looks from both Violet and Luna, they had no concept of what a city was. Luna had only know small villages, Violet just had no idea.

What lay in the valley was the abandoned remains of a once great city. Collapsed building spread for miles, overgrown with greenery as the forest worked to reclaim what was once its domain. Still the fractured stone of the various buildings valiantly held on to what semblance of structure they could, a broken wall ringed the city. Signs of a great struggle marring the charred sections of the walls that still stood.

In the few places that the wall managed to stay standing it towered over everything else in sight. It climbed up to the sky, eclipsing even the towering trees that surrounded the city, easily reaching 300 meters in height. It was an awe inspiring construction, yet it also prided a question, what could possibally be able to topple such mighty fortifications, and how long ago did this event happen.

Based on the state of the overgrown vegetation this city must have fallen a long time ago. Several hundred years at least, yet even still violet could almost taste the remnants of magic siffusing the very air itself, radiating from the fallen city.

At its center the shattered remains of a once mighty castle stood, however, it seemed to have suffered the most damage of any point of the city bar the once mighty walls. The castle had been thourghly broken, through brute force and magical might that building had been utterly devastated, only the grand mound of rubble remaining hinted at its once grand visage.

"What is this place? Iv never seen anything like this before!" Violet exclaimed in wonder and awe.

"This is… was a city, it looks to have been destroyed. I don't know what could have destroyed such a place, but it must have been a mighty battle to fell such a city." Explained Susan.

"But what is a city?" Inquired the confused dragon, clearly not quite understanding much of the explanation past the fact that a battle once took place here long ago.

"A city is a location where people live." Then after noting Violet's still confused look she expanded further. "Enlightened folk, like me, sometimes choose to gather in great numbers. When enough gather they will sometimes build a city, the stone structures were the buildings that they lived in. The tall walls were built to keep out any dangerous beasts and monsters to help keep the population safe from outside dangers. Evidently these walls failed to stop a calamity from befalling this place."

A hushed silence enveloped the group as they all contemplated Susan's explanation, yet Violet still wanted more information. "But how would they grow stronger if they hid behind the tall walls, wouldn't something that can fly or dig under the wall be able to kill them all?"

Susan shook her head at that before explaining further. "Their would likely have been an army, or some group of individuals that would regularly venture out into the wilderness to hunt beasts and monsters down to grow stronger. They would then protect the weaker people, in turn those that did not fight would work in other areas to help support the city as a whole."

"Ohh okay." Violet said, clearly still not quite understanding the purpose of a 'city' but unwilling to state so. Still she understood the basic principle, even if she disagreed with the idea that some people would not want, or need to grow stronger to survive.

For a beast like her, staying weak meant death. If she had not fought from the moment she was born then she would have died any number of ways. Either from starvation or simply by being killed by a stronger beast.

Regardless of Violet's understanding, she was still quite eager to explore this ruin. She could feel the powerfull magics still radiating from the city. What truly caught Violet's attention was that the magics present felt faintly familiar, and was quite interested to find out exactly what it is that is causing that outflow of power.

Plus she could sense the presence of several beast lords within the crumbling walls. Non of them seemed overly powerful, so in other words, the perfect kind of beast for her group to hunt down in order to grow stronger.

Rhyana and Susan were both currently level 78. So it should only take a couple of good fights for them to reach their next evolution/ advancement. Both girls had been eager to advance but had been hampered by the local beast tending to flee from Violet and Luna now that they had evolved.

"So we are going to explore that place right? I wanna find out what is causing that outflow of magic."

Getting a round of confirmations from the rest of her party, Violet smiled wide, and without further delay began to descend down the small hill that they stood atop. Heading towards the nearest section of collapsed wall.

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