Aldric hadn’t had to do this much unseen movement since his military days. He felt a certain smug satisfaction that he could still pull it off. Not that it was hard to sneak around these kids. Some of them wouldn’t see danger until it had already taken a bite out of their ass. Maybe they would work on that later. This was his field trip, after all. It could be about whatever he wanted.

The kids still thought this was a weird assignment, but if Aldric was going to go into hiding against his wishes, then he was going to make it fun for himself. It felt good to be out in the wilderness, and there was a certain satisfaction in teaching things he was great at that his students had probably never experienced. Besides, it was good for them to rough it for a few days. It certainly had been good for him when he was their age.

He was repositioning himself to give his poor posterior a break when he saw movement in the tree line. Going stock still, Aldric watched as a wild deerkin stepped into view. The animal resembled its namesake, with four legs and large antlers, but instead of antlers, there was only a wickedly sharp horn right in the middle of its forehead. Deerkin weren’t too much to deal with for a mage, even students, but they could be nasty when cornered, and were not to be underestimated. They were also incredibly fast, with sensitive hearing to boot.

The deerkin tiptoed closer to the base of Aldric’s lookout tree, scanning its surroundings as it sniffed the breeze for predators. It cautiously made its way over to a berry bush nearby, one that contained a deerkin’s favorite fruit. Once it had decided nothing untoward was going to happen, the deerkin stepped into a muddy puddle to settle in for a midday meal.

Before the poor thing could get even one bite, the muddy puddle sprouted tentacles of water that wrapped tightly around the deerkin’s legs. The beast immediately tried to run, but found itself unable to move. It thrashed wildly, kicking up muddy water everywhere in its attempts to free itself.

From the nearby tree line, a whip made entirely of pure fire snapped out at the deerkin, wrapping around the base of the creature’s horn. The fire whip suddenly flared even hotter before cutting clean through the hardened bone like a hot wire through wax. The horn fell to the ground, leaving the deerkin without its best means of defense.