The hours dragged on, and Sable developed a bare understanding of how to cast spells.

As it turned out, in a similar manner to swinging a sword around, earning basic capabilities wasn’t hard. In a sword’s case, all you had to do was stick the pointy end into the enemy. For spell casting, copy a template to the best of your ability, then apply liberal amounts of mana. Inelegant, but it did work.

Though, that description was simplifying, slightly. Spellcasting was harder than a sword, even at the lowest levels, but a day’s diligent training meant Sable could, in the most bare-bones meaning of the word, call herself a [Mage]. Or, a [Frostfire Sorceress], as her official class title went.

Under Roman’s guidance, Sable cultivated shaky competence in three simple spells. Sable and Roman worked together on the design. Though Sable wasn’t a woman experienced with combat, she did, in her opinion, have a fair ability to think things through. When it came to general adventuring purposes, the three spells a person would want in their arsenal were: a high damage single target, an area-of-effect, and, aligning to frostfire specifically, perhaps a debilitating effect, used to lock down a troublesome enemy—perhaps a root, freeze, or stun of some kind.

She wasn’t a gaming aficionado, but she had some experience with various popular ones, and so, she had resources to pull from. Though, maybe assuming strategies with magic in video games carried over to real life wasn’t smart. Might not be the wisest way to model her abilities. But it made sense to her in the moment. Single target, AOE, and CC. Using those terms—video-game ones—felt silly, but when in Rome, right? She was in a world that operated on RPG principals, so she might as well embrace it.

So. Three skills. Respective to how she’d laid them out, she named them—for mental organization—[Frostfire Spear], [Frostfire Burst], and [Frostfire Grasp]. Of course, they weren’t skills in the traditional sense. Rather, applications of a freeform [Arcana Specialty]. But thinking about them with proper names made it easier.

Thusly prepared—though intending to pursue more lessons in the future—Sable set off. Her time with Roman had been enlightening, and her decision to not spend overmuch time bashing her head against a wall trying to figure out the secrets of magic had proved a wise one. She never would have progressed without help. Or, maybe she could have, because the first mages in history had, but reinventing the wheel was, generally, a poor strategic maneuver.

She had a new arsenal of spells, and a desire to test them in combat. Beyond that, she wanted to provide the city of Skatikk some measure of assurance that Sable’s reign—while oppressive and sudden—wasn’t wholly a bad thing. Reducing the likelihood of rebellion seemed smart.

Especially because Sable was leaning entirely on her fearsome reputation, or rather, that of her predecessors. If Skatikk brought its highest level warriors to bear, especially in a surprise attack, Sable wasn’t sure how well she’d do. Especially if they outsourced help. Clearly, dragons were killable, much less juveniles like Sable. Her only reassurance was that goblins were, from her admittedly shaky knowledge, both remote and weak on a global scale. Poorly suited to handling a threat of Sable’s magnitude.

Either way, reducing the chances of rebellion was smart. She had new spells and desire to test them, and wanted to help out the city of Skatikk. Not be a total drain on them. A benevolent ruler, if needing to masquerade as a vicious, selfish one.

Touching down into Skatikk’s town square—and only causing half as much panic, this time—Sable arranged a meeting with a collection of Skatikk’s leaders in a few short minutes. A quarter-hour, thereabouts.

Timeliness. She appreciated it.

An audience arranged, Sable addressed the withered old goblin Chieftain.

[I’m seeking hunting grounds,] she informed the man. [I presume the city of Skatikk has agitators of some sort?] Realizing they might apply the request to people, an enemy tribe or such, she clarified, [Monsters. Ones causing you trouble. Easy to find, preferably.]

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

The scattering of important figures shared a look, seeming baffled at Sable’s offer. She’d expected it. Dragons weren’t ones to provide benevolent support to their subjects.

[An unfettered Skatikk means a prospering Skatikk,] Sable said coolly. [Seeing how you belong to me, aiding you is aiding myself.]

Understanding crossed their faces. The world made sense again. Sable wasn’t kind; she was worried over Skatikk’s well-being for her own selfish motivations.

“There’s the Danner Quarry,” one of the gathered men offered—though Sable didn’t know his name. It seemed directed more at the Chieftain than Sable.

The Chieftain of Skatikk looked at him, considering.

“The Danner Quarry,” he said after a moment. “That there is …”

***

The Danner Quarry was, as the name suggested, one of Skatikk’s nearby mining operations. Flying overhead, Sable observed the abandoned carts—piled with old loads of stone and dirt—and the various structures both inside the enormous scar on the earth and on the outside, either stables for beasts of burden, housing, or administrative buildings to oversee the operation. A valuable setup, sprawling, a venture that had taken no small effort to arrange. One that had needed to be abandoned suddenly and entirely, thanks to an infestation of [Orecrunchers].

The name gave it away. Orecrunchers were, at least for this portion of the Red Plains, a troublesome threat to quarries and other mining setups. The infestation at the Danner Quarry was especially bad. A threat even Skatikk had decided to cut their losses on. It was, apparently, not an uncommon thing to be chased away from valuable resources in these hostile lands.

Sable intuited they could reclaim the operation should they invest their full effort in doing so, but, while profitable, the Danner Quarry wasn’t so crucial as to require drawing every powerful classed that they had access to. They’d washed their hands of it, willing to wait for the monsters to move on naturally rather than investing the resources in clearing them out themselves.

But Sable? Who was seeking monsters to snack on? The leadership of Skatikk had pointed her their way happily.

That was the plan, at least. She had no idea how difficult this task would be, for all she had sniffed and pretended to be unintimidated. It would serve as a good benchmark.

Maybe, even, Sable shouldn’t have offered to help Skatikk so early into her career. This task would quantify her strength to them. The orecruncher infestation was something Skatikk hadn’t thought feasible to deal with—at least for the cost of reclaiming—and so, the joined might of the orecrunchers posed a real threat to them.

If Sable couldn’t clear it out, then it signaled to Skatikk’s leaders that Sable wasn’t as powerful as they believed.

Then again, Sable could always present herself as a grave threat to the city through less direct means. Dropping burning trees and igniting the city, for example, as she’d done with Gadenrock. Sable—dragons in general—would be rather annoying to deal with, regardless of direct power.

Which would only mean they’d spring a surprise trap. If they discovered that Sable was weak, they’d arrange whatever powerful classed they had access to, then spring an ambush of some sorts. It wouldn’t be easy, even then, and the timing of arranging something like that would be difficult with Sable not announcing her arrivals, but it was still a threat. Sable needed to stay mindful of those.

But that would become a problem only if she failed to clear this quarry out. If she succeeded, it would earn her a reputation, and they’d be more hesitant to fight back.

She was getting ahead of herself. First, the task.

She circled slowly down. Finding the culprits wasn’t difficult, unlike the golems back at the Ruins of Nefar. They were rock elementals, but that was where the similarities ended.

Not humanoid in the slightest, the lumbering, bulky monsters resembled bears mixed with beetles. They had two powerful arms ending in shovel-like apparatuses, clearly intended to scoop out stone and ore. The exact details behind their biology, Sable was ignorant to, but she knew these creatures feasted on exposed ore and stone. Hence their invasion. They’d been attracted by Skatikk’s convenient exposure of such a large tract of land. Less work for them. Easy pickings.

[Greater Orecruncher - Lv. 12]

She didn’t despair at the level difference. Clearly, level wasn’t everything. As a level three herself, if level was absolute, then she’d have been defeated by even the weakest of Skatikk’s heroes. Level was a relative scale. It implied a person’s—entity’s?—power compared to others of similar race. A level one dragon wasn’t remotely on the same level as a level one goblin, human, or orc. Or orecruncher.

Though, nine levels higher. And visibly powerful. Making out exact dimensions was hard from high up in the air, but she suspected the creatures were ten feet long at a minimum, and five or six tall. Hulking beasts. Reinforced with stone skin. A threat sufficient enough to force Skatikk to withdraw in a hurry, as the abandoned carts and buildings suggested.

So. A challenge.

Good.

At a guess, it’d be one of the smaller ones she faced in the coming months.