[h3][u][b][color=fff200]Aerarius[/color][/b][/u][/h3]
Aerarius turned to Esfander. "Of course, Great Sage.  Take all the time you need, can be difficult adjusting to a new body."  Truth be told, Aerarius was eager to get out of there as soon as possible.  There was so much that he wanted to find out- what the world looked like now, what magical advancements have been made, and just how many years they had been flung ahead.  And if the Volstanian Empire still existed, it was their duty to cut out its black heart.

[i]I'm almost starting to sound like Sylphie.  Maybe I did absorb some of her mana in the coffin after all[/i], he jested to himself, glancing at the goddess who was now rambling about fighting bandits.  While he didn't worship her, instead being a devotee of the deity of knowledge, Aerarius felt that Sylphie's bloodthirst and moral compass would both be a boon in the coming days.

He looked over the rest of his companions.  He knew little of the Great Sage's past other than that she was formerly an elderly man with a reputation for being a disaster magnet, yet wise and charitable.  Unable to cast spells in a conventional sense, but able to manipulate mana to an incredible degree.  Aerarius wasn't sure of the exact mechanism by which a centuries-old man had gained the body of a little girl, but might be worth looking into, if only for curiosity's sake.

The mage named Izel was an enigma to him.  She was well known as the "Grand Magus of Unira" before the war, centuries old and the founder of a once great academy and library, one one of Unira's greatest patrons of the advancement and collection of magical knowledge.  Until, of course, the Volstanians destroyed it, just like they destroyed the Royal Institute of Magical Technology of Aerarius' own homeland.  She might be a kindred spirit, but perhaps she was simply too alien to Aerarius to be considered such.  Not just due to her age, but because something was off about her.  She looked outwardly human, but when viewed through the automaton's mana sensors, it became clear that not only was she not human, she was unlike anything living, artificial, or supernatural that he had ever seen.  Were her thoughts equally incomprehensible to human understanding?  Or was she simply a human who, like Aerarius, had given up her humanity for power?

The beastman was the youngest of the group, but even in his youth he was an experienced veteran of the war.  He was a shapeshifter, capable of taking the form of a massive cat, and like Aerarius, he had lost his home to the Volstanians' aggression.  The last companion, Malachi, was mostly unknown to the automaton.  He knew that the half-elf was a foreigner haling from somewhere outside of the Alliance, but knew little else, other than that he had proven himself fighting against the Volstanians.

For now, Aerarius' concerns would be focused on more immediate matters.  The automaton strode up to the exit, behind the demigoddess, half-elf, and beastman, and looked into the dark cavern before them.  "I don't suppose any of you have a light?" he asked.  "I doubt there could be anything in here that could threaten us, but I would rather not stumble around in the darkness."

[@VitaVitaAR][@Raineh Daze][@PKMNB0Y][@Lugubrious]