And immediately after he leaves the crack between the rocks, a spear of ice comes hurtling his way. 

What the-!?

The ice spear can be met by a bunch other ice spears coming from the ground at an angle. While, Zephyrinus makes a quick assessment of his surroundings while moving.

He appears to have wandered onto a battlefield! A variety of elemental attacks are being thrown back and forth, along with terrain-altering defensive ones, by several dozen people across the wide, rocky field before him. There looks to be two sides, based on the way the fighters are dressed. Many are also wielding weapons, and they seem to be aiming to kill. There are bodies littered over the field, either injured or worse. 

His display of defensive ice spears has attracted some attention. The nearest combatants break off from their fight to turn to him warily. Both are from the same faction, wearing light loose clothes which are wrapped from elbow and knee down, thick body armour, and armoured bracers. One carries a plain sword, the other an ornate rod. The rod-bearer hovers behind the other, keeping an eye on their surroundings while he gives the unknown element his full attention.  

-This guy is winged and blue, why is he blue, is he some kind of humanoid monster, there shouldn't be any within miles of a battlefield this loud but you can never be sure-

He holds his sword defensively but doesn't make to attack. If this newcomer isn't with the Empire then he doesn't want to drive him to side against them of his own accord. 

Okay. He will run for cover and try to make sense of the situation. Not flying yet. Sounds like a way to make himself an even more obvious target.

He doesn't recognize the place. Maybe there was a portal in that rock formation? Mind magic? He will have to investigate once there is less of a war happening around him. ...Everyone is in the same shape, which is very odd. Even the people dead or hurt. Even if they are all slaves... how would two sides coordinate to have so many slave soldiers locked into a single shape?

He stares at the two on his path and tries to circle around them without looking away from them.

He turns with him, letting him circle around them but keeping him in his line of sight. The lieutenant behind him - he thinks his name is Kion - turns to fend off someone thinking to take advantage of his distraction. Ilek twitches but leaves it to him. 

His eyes turn to look past the strange being as he catches sight of a fireball coming their way. He tenses, preparing to dive out of the way. 

Well, that's sure something destructive coming their way. The blue stranger doesn't want anyone from either side to die. And the easiest solution to this problem is a dome of ice around them all.

He is extremely alarmed by this! That much manipulation - it's not particularly wet here either he must have made that entirely from mana - does he have an artefact - that has to be high second tier! 

Kion catches his breath from the prolonged casting he'd been doing and turns around to focus on the new threat. Ilek waves him down when he looks ready to start casting, "Let me try talking," he mutters, grimacing. 

"Are you with the Empire?" He calls over. 

Oh, lord. Translation problems. And Hibera forms are not particularly good at this sort of thing. He says something that's clearly in a foreign language.

Well shit. He doesn't have a translation runestone, or know a spell for it.

Jaim does, but they're kind of in the middle of a battle here...

Still, if he doesn't speak Imperial, he's probably not with the Empire. They're pretty serious about stamping out other langauges.

He lowers his weapon a bit and glances at Kion. The man shrugs, "I don't recognise it, Highness," he says regretfully, "And I specialise in combat magic," he adds. 

He looks over at the blue winged being and runs a hand through his hair in stress. He looks at the dome, points at it, and then makes a flat-palmed downward gesture, "Could you lower that? We were in the middle of something," he requests, hoping the gesture will get across if not the words. 

He's no use in diplomacy, but there's a fight going on, which is something he's good at.

He raises a hand. He considers changing shapes, but that could be construed as hostile. And leave him right open.

Instead, he switches powers, his veins pop-up like he is under a lot of pain (which he is), and then... okay, this version of ice manipulation has awesome range and good precision. With that, he doesn't take the dome down, but creates a hatch and invites them to step out.

Elsewhere, on the battlefield... Ice is not the most healing or soothing of the elements, but it's better than bleeding to death. People might notice that a lot of the soldiers find their open wounds frozen.

He squints in confusion at the vein-popping, but is quickly distracted by the hatch. 

He nods, "Thanks," he says, uselessly, and carefully proceeds out of the dome, wary of any attack. 

As the hole opens, Jaim pauses in his rampage towards it. Catching sight of his brother cautiously coming through it, he turns his attention on clearing the area for him, pelting nearby Imperials with exploding fire arrows. 

The ice will probably be very helpful for anyone wounded by those.

His reckless abandonment of mana conservation does send the ones still standing into retreat, however. Hopefully he won't have cause to regret being low on reserves. 

The arrows are not ineffective, but are less effective, at least by themselves. The targets find themselves bound by ice bonds and then flying away. This sounds like a sufficiently good strategy that Zephyr starts applying around the field.

He, however, does not apply it to just one side. Even if the three immediately around him are not affected.

Most of the fighting has stopped by the time this happens, but it fully stops after a couple of people from each side are iced over and flung across the field. 

The Imperials commit to a retreat at this point, all who are still mobile following after Jaim's targets. 

Some of the people still standing start checking over downed soldiers, of both types. They're confused by the ice but do their best to heal what they can despite it. The enemy soldiers are lightly patched up, to ensure they survive to be taken prisoner. 

Jaim himself pauses in his attacks as well. With the fighting winding down he lowers his Bow and jogs over to Ilek.

"Who's this?" 

Ilek shakes his head, "Don't know. He doesn't speak Imperial," he offers, "Or any other language we recognise," he adds, nodding towards Kion, who is focusing on a nearby downed enemy. 

Jaim nods, reaching into a pouch on his belt for his translation runestone. 

They don't really know how these things work. They're just copied whole cloth from the ones in Sanctuary. He directs a bit of Illusion magic into it and then turns to the newcomer, "Can you understand me?" 

"I can now." He still suspicious and on guard. "Can you understand me?"

"Yes." He pauses, not entirely sure how to continue. It would probably be rude to ask if he's a monster if he is, in fact, not. Better to avoid the question for now. 

"What are you doing here? I would expect unaffiliated people to avoid the warfront, let alone an actual battlefield." 

"I am unaware of how I got here, which was just moments ago. I don't know by which method. There weren't any warfronts near where I was."

He frowns, "That's... odd. I don't know of any magic that can transport a person without them noticing." He has no reason to believe or disbelieve this person, except that they claim something so odd when a much simpler explanation would be more readily believed - like that this happened to be his territory, or he was just flying by. 

Humming in thought, he glances over the field, noting that his people seem to have the injured and dead well in hand. Someone has gone to examine and retrieve the people who had been flung away encased in ice, and everyone who can't walk is being carefully floated with space or air magic. 

"Come back with us to camp? We can speak more safely behind our fortifications. I'm afraid we're not exactly prepared to set up on this specific field. It's on the outer range of our patrolled territory, though we might have to set up a watch on it in case more lost people appear." 

"And I would be coming as a guest?" He does not propose the alternative of coming as a prisoner.

"Of course. You don't appear to be Imperial, or hostile - ice aside. None of my people have been harmed. I wouldn't want to leave anyone out here to be attacked by anyone too spell-happy - though I suppose with those wings you could avoid us all entirely."  

Zephyr response to this is a simple nod.

So he leads him, and the column of soldiers, wounded, and prisoners, back to the camp.

They've set up inside magically constructed walls on a hilltop, the walls carved with runes for anti-magic and stability. The ward dome surrounding it shimmers lightly as they pass through the gates, currently set on passive and therefore not preventing entry. 

The camp is bustling, people rushing to and fro on their duties, a large contingent coming to help the returning soldiers move the wounded to the infirmary and the prisoners to the cells. Unburdened, many of the soldiers make their way to the large building to the right which houses the kitchens. Many more can be seen eating at the tables outside. He still shouldn't be able to understand any of them - the runestone only allows Jaim to understand him and vice-versa. 

Approaching the command center, a stone building in the center of the camp, he pauses to look at the stranger's wings. 

"I'm not sure you'll be able to get through the door," he says apologetically. It's wide enough for two people to go through at a time, but only a head taller than most men.