by M J Conlon
“Get a guard to get us six sets of pen and paper. One pen, one ink well, and seven sheets of paper each.” Derick said, turning his back to the line of five females as he began his next step. It was Penelope that broke the line and ran to get the guards to get the required materials. Derick waited for Penelope to get back in line with the others, before he began his lesson.
“When our ink and papers get here, I am going to draw 21 runes. I am going to tell you what they are and what they do. I will then draw a destination that requires seven of the runes. You will then draw those seven runes in order, say the destination, and tell me where they go. The ones who can do this, will be my apprentices even if there is more than one of you. Deal?”
Each of the women looked at each other, then back at Derick.
“Are you sure?” The princess asked.
“If you can follow these instructions I will gladly train you as a pupil.” Derick said.
“What if none of us are able to complete this task that you have set before us?” The Princess asked. Derick simply smiled at the Princess before stating.
“Surely with five such intelligent and independent women as yourselves, one of you will have the will to accomplish this task. If for no other reason then you will be able to leave your mother’s rule if only for a little while.” Derick replied, before continuing with his instructions on attention to detail.
Shortly after the time that it took Derick to describe what he was going to teach, three guards came into the room offering one set of the required materials to each of the princesses and one to Derick. Derick then proceeded to use his psychic-telekinesis to pick up the piece of paper, draw a symbol on it and place it on the ground once each student saw it and began to copy it on their own. Once that was over, he picked up his sheet, had the women look at their drawings, make any alterations then he named the rune, what it did and what it represented mathematically. He then went on to do the same with 20 other runes, he then let the students share his sheets to make sure theirs were perfect. Additionally, he unlike the princesses did not leave the words behind to describe the sound of the rune, nor a description of what it represented. Finally after a few hours of the introduction to the gnomish runic alphabet, Derick drew seven destination runes in a particular order. He held it out, letting each pupil see it, then memorize it, before hiding it in his pocket and letting the girls begin.
“You can use your notes, my notes, each other. You can use everything but me and what I have on me. Now begin.” Derick said, before going over to a corner and started testing the three spheres of power he had just received from Queen Mab, while also watching the students work from the corner of his eye. He took out the sphere of fire, then the sphere of light healing, then the sphere of spiritual attack. Each glowed in their own particular color, red for fire, white for healing, and a weird blue indigo color for spirit attack. Derick set about trying to figure out how to get the spheres to teach him knowledge. He held two in his hands, while letting psychic-telekinesis hold the sphere of spiritual attack to his head.
“No don’t” was yelled out by the aetherial mage, but her words were quickly drowned out as Derick felt a jolt of lightning open up and tear its way free of the orb and go straight into his mind. Derick fought for consciousness, then fought for control over the stream. It was similar to his battling the dragon minds for dominance, though far less powerful. He followed this one to the sources of its power and touched the blueish indigo stone at the center and absorbed every ounce of energy back into himself. In the end he was able to absorb the energy within the sphere until the blue indigo color turned pale and empty.
A gasp was let out by the girls, but Derick didn’t focus on their shrieks, as he remembered his lesson from the dragon eggs. The quicker you absorb power, the less power can be taken away. With that Derick grit his teeth and forced the light healing sphere to his temple and braced for the torrent of energy that was soon to follow. Soon the light healing sphere turned pale and clattered to the floor with the sound of a giant glass marble. Derick feeling liquid pouring from his nose did not stop, not even to wipe off his face. Instead he just continued on.
The fire orb was absorbed a lot more easily than the other two, but Derick was not certain exactly as to why. Perhaps it was due to his high elemental resistances, though they were in truth no higher than the other two. Perhaps it was due to his having absorbed two just seconds prior and the nerves that had been fighting him were now raw and worn. Or perhaps it was due to his intrinsically being aware of the chemical reaction of fire and how his mind was far more readily able to accept burning everything to the ground, rather than building it up as healing would, nor understanding the deeper human psyche and trying to attack from an intellectual level. Whatever it was, Derick had succeeded. He focused on slowing the spinning of the world around him. Until finally he looked at his health bar, that while it had gone up quite a bit since his altercation with Queen Mab and the being of unspeakable power, it had dropped to an almost critical level.
Seeing this as a perfect time to use his newly acquired talents, Derick looked in his mental periphery to find the powers that he had unlocked. To his surprise he now had a total of five glowing blue boxes.
Derick clicked open all five boxes, letting the bonuses for each flood his character.
You have unlocked the mage ability spiritual assault. Synergy sync applied. New ability obtained psychic assault: destroy the mind of a sentient target by applying your will against theirs. If successful, you will be able to break down an opponents mind at a rate of ((Ability Power Level time 10 + Caster Willpower) - Opponent Willpower until 100 points of mental damage are reached each point of mental energy applied to attack drops the opponent’s mental damage capacity by a rate of 1 per mental energy applied to a maximum of minus 99 enemy mental damage). If damage taken is higher than opponent’s wisdom they are considered stunned for one second per point of damage taken over their wisdom trait.
You have unlocked mage ability light heal. Synergy sync applied. New ability psychic-healing: (ability channeled) player can heal himself at a rate of (Power Level X 10) + (Willpower/10) per second for a total of 10 mental energy per second. Psychic healing other: player can heal others at a rate of (Power Level X 5) + (Willpower/10) per second at a cost of 10 mental energy per second.
You have unlocked mage ability fire mastery. Synergy sync applied. New ability pyrokenesis: (Ability Channeled) Player can create a source of heat energy that causes ((Power Level X 10) + Willpower fire damage to a single spot at a rate of 5 mana per second channeled.
Then Derick saw a box that seemed somewhat odd.
Temporary character ban lifted. Player able to receive earlier confiscated power. Ability gained empathy. Synergy sync applied. New effect empathic viewing applied to psychic-viewing power. Derick wondered when and where this power fully became available. Thinking back, it seemed that this had been applied shortly after his encounter with the entity of unfathomable power. Perhaps that is why I was able to ascertain Luscinda’s relationship to her mother so easily? If this power was automatically being added to my psychic-viewing then it would help explain why some of my reaches in logic seemed so accurate at the time.
Derick not taking time to read the fifth box, healed himself first, before moving on to read the fifth blue pop-up box. New title acquired: negotiator. Through tireless and exhausting displays of willpower, you are able to come out on top of many business dealings making others feel like they received a bargain. Effect player receives a +10% bonus from all experience gained, money earned, and ability and spell power points increased from quests, when player negotiates with quest giving NPCs. Additionally prices at shops are 15% cheaper to purchase, and yield 15% more on items sold by the player.
“Once you are complete sit behind your work and wait for the others to be finished.” Derick said, seeing that the aetherial mage appeared to be restless and looking around anxiously at her other sisters. Double checking her work, versus the runes
she wrote down, she nodded to herself then sat back and she too began to meditate. The green mage and fire mage were next to follow, followed by the princess. Penelope looked lost, until she looked around the room got up, looked at my sheets that Derick had out. Seeing that I didn’t make any comment she then proceeded to go to the aetherial mage’s sheets and copy what she had. The aetherial mage let out a gasp of anger, but it was the green mage who spoke out.
“You can’t do that!” The Green Mage said.
“I can and have.” Penelope said, then she quoted almost verbatim the instructions Derick had given the class. “He said we could use our notes, his notes, or each other. There was nothing in there about working willingly with each other.” Penelope said, before adding the words and pronunciations that she saw on the sheets from the aetherial mage. Derick could see this all, even from the far corner of the room using his celestial vision skill, but said nothing. Derick waited until Penelope looked at the script before her, then double checked the rune sketches that I had provided, before going back to her seat and sitting down behind her work.
Derick could see that the other women all wanted to move, seeing their muscles twitch under the skin, then release as each of the other students wanted to apparently succeed or fail on their own merit, a trait Derick could appreciate, so long as they were right. Finally after an extra few minutes were given with all of the potential students staring at Derick, Derick rose up to his feet and began walking down the line. Pretending to observe the sheets, though he already knew who had the correct runes. Finally after making his way through the list of candidates, Derick got to his teaching spot and asked.
“Does anyone wish to look at either my notes, share notes with each other, or make any corrections?” Derick paused for a second, as no one immediately made any movement to check their work he said “very well, let’s see who will become a portalist. Take your final sheet, write your name on the back, then turn it right side up. I will collect your papers, put them in a display on the floor and we will all see who has the correct coordinates listed.” Derick said. Instantly all of the girls dropped to their knees, quickly turning over their works, signing their names waiting for the ink to dry. Turned the sheet back over, then held it up for Derick to take as he walked by. Derick took all five sheets of paper, shuffled them up gently. Then placed them on the floor in a line. From there Derick took out the neatly folded sheet from his own pocket and held it up for the students to see.
“Gather closer, and show me who will be allowed to continue onward as my apprentice.”
Derick saw the women gather close, then saw the look of resignation fall across the face of the princess and the green mage as they both realized their depictions were inaccurate. The green mage had her final two runes reversed, while the princess had substituted Ro for Ru. Derick handed those two their respective sheets and gestured for them to wait off to the side. That left only Penelope, the aetherial mage, and the fire mage.
“So, any volunteers to see who remembers how to accurately state the destination?” When Derick saw that none of the three women was particularly willing to risk their apprenticeship, Derick decided to sweeten the pot. “I will give the student who goes first the ability to mispronounce one rune and still be accepted.”
The fire mage almost immediately took a step forward declaring she was ready.
“Ful Mach Tish Ro Isen Arl Yargah” The last word caught in her mouth and rolled incorrectly creating a discordant resonance. Instantly a viewing portal that showed a large reptilian eye appeared in the middle of the room, as if summoned by the piece of paper that the fire mage held in her hands. The eye quickly scanned the room, somehow able to view both the front and back of the viewing portal, before settling in on Derick.
Derick could feel something trying to penetrate his mind, but was held off by an unseen force. Then Derick saw a blue trail of energy snake out from the viewing portal. It reminded Derick of a large blue serpent trying to reach out and devour a mouse.
“Get back!” Derick screamed at the girls who were all cowering in fear. Derick thought about the end point, then tried to close the portal, but the viewing portal was being strengthened on the other end. Derick thought desperately as the blue cord slithered around until it found the green mage, the one that had not backed away far enough from the moving eye in the portal. In a second the green mage started chanting in an old language. It took Derick’s mind a second to realize what she was saying, she is saying the completion words necessary to create a permanent portal.
Derick knew that the traditional time needed to create such a portal would last a minute or so, but Derick had a quicker plan.
“Penelope, aether mage, and you fire mage get over here.” Derick said, gesturing the two girls to come to him quickly. All three came hesitantly. “Congratulations, you all are accepted if you do this one task. I am going to create a portal, I need you all to go back, wait two seconds for the portal to drop, then when a new portal appears jump through as quickly as possible. Can you all do this?” Derick asked, mentally trying to figure out the location where the fire mage originally opened the viewing portal, then finding an area nearby, check, now to create a two way portal. Instantly a portal appeared before the three girls. “Go now. Wait till it closes then quickly come through the other, got it?” Derick said as he began pushing the three taller females through the portal. No sooner had the last girl gone through then Derick stopped the two way portal. Derick shook his hands, then mentally prepared for what was to happen next. “Okay, you can do this.”
“Yes, do it.” The princess spoke from her position near the far door.
“Shut up Princess.” Derick said as he then created a one way portal from where he sent the girls to their current location in Triton. Derick could feel a slight tremor over taking the castle as the fire mage made her way through first, then the aether mage. By this point the one way rift in space was causing the whole palace to shake as the portal looked for components to take up the same mass and weight as the two princesses that had gone through. Finally, after what only took a millisecond, but felt like a lifetime Penelope came through and Derick slammed the one way portal closed. In a heartbeat the viewing portal that had been showing an eye that was fixated upon the green mage shook violently and then seemed to explode.
Within a few seconds the palace finally stopped rumbling and shaking. Derick fell to the ground, once again feeling the all too familiar sensation of liquid pouring down his face, though this time he could feel it pouring from his eyes and liquid pouring from his ears as well. His ears rang, his body felt like it was holding down a jack hammer and there were now at least fifteen princesses all swirling in groups of three.
Derick forced his mind to cast psychic healing on himself, then went around to the other princesses who also had trails of blood pouring down their faces. Derick began healing each of the five princesses who were around him. Finally by the time Derick had quickly healed the green mage, he could feel no less than 20 guards running up the back hallways towards the hidden chamber. The princesses all gathered around, each other, checking each to make sure they were all okay. While they all seemed to give the green mage a little bit of extra distance.
“What in the Creator’s Name is happening here?” The royal guard captain who looked like Tannerick’s grand father demanded. Derick still feeling woozy, grabbed his can and started to stand up.
“We had a portal training session go a little off the tracks, when the fire mage. . .” Derick gestured with his right hand toward the one he had been referring to as the fire mage all along. “spoke the words to an apparent trap, one that allowed an unknown entity to send tendrils of power through a viewing portal, where it took control of her.” Derick said, pointing to the green mage. “From there the three candidates to whom I will teach the profession of portalists, so long as they still want to learn. All followed my commands without question, where they went to the location with the being that was trying to create a permanent rif
t in our reality, using a two way tunnel. Then I gave them a practical example of why a one way portal is dangerous and ultimately goes against the cosmic laws of correspondence.
Once all three made it safely through the one way portal and no mass was able to take the place of the three students, the energy built up began to seep into the objects nearby causing an infusion of power. Then as we all know infusions of power are terrible if not directed. In this case they weren’t as the being was still too pre-occupied by trying to create a rift into our world via the green mage.” Derick once again pointed at the green mage, or the one he considered the green mage in his mind.
“The energy caused an explosion.” Derick said, now pointing to the viewing portal that showed a now empty void filled with burning debris particles. “So there you have it, Correspondence at its best and never leave a place in a one way portal, unless you really want to leave there forever. Any questions?” Derick said, the entire explanation must have taken but a few seconds, but the look of confusion coming over the royal guard captain’s face took at least twice as long to clear up as the explanation. Derick looked at the still open viewing portal, then snapped his fingers and instantly the viewing portal closed. While the gesture was unnecessary, it did show the others that he was the reason why it was closing.
“Why didn’t you do that earlier, like when the evil eye was controlling my sister?” The Princess demanded.