Salt was happy he was not going to the main plane, because even a mundane kingdom on the main plane had enough wealth to hire a wizard full time. The downside was a sub plane truly did not have enough mana floating around to let him throw spells like he usually did. The other thing was the upgrade from a kingdom to an empire, it was not always the case, but an empire usually had a more warlike posture or a deeper tradition both leading to a harder time if one wanted to steal their secrets. This would take careful planning but first, shopping!

Trudging his way from the Nersinian portal down toward the docks of a massive city called Urguth Salt was lucky to find a solicitor sign on the third tavern he passed. Entering the hovel and seeing the rune of silver over a man in silk ha continued forward, notice me not cantrips were a godsend in such a place, but Salt could not wait till he could cast the 6-cicle mortals begone. A spell that temporarily stasis's an entire place so you can have a conversation in pace and leave without getting blood and ash all over yourself. Getting up to the silver Salt cleared his throat and said, “I am looking for a solicitor, have I come to the right place?” Hastily turning his head in recognition, the Silver spoke “Ha, ha a Nersinian mage. Don’t fley my skin of, ha, ha.” Salt repeated “have I come to the right place?” Shifting his eyes about the Silver looked scared for a moment then trying to steel himself and said. “Yes, yes right place. What can I do for you? Fish we have fish, do you want fish?” He chattered nervously and Salt almost went elsewhere, but time flew ever forward, and he had other places to be. “I need paper. The Walt-lodger paper company has been driven out of business by their competitors Strix-co, this was done by temporarily selling paper at a loss a policy they still have but which lapses today at midnight. I need you to get your friends and anyone else to purchase as many reems of paper in bulk as possible from Strix-co. Give me your hand.” The Silver sat perplexed before a “what, wah, what!” broke the silence. “Would you like a taste of wealth little Silver?” said Salt. The sceptical Silver nodding automatically at the word wealth. “Then give me your hand.” Shyly and hesitantly the man brought his hand over.

Salt took the hand and showed a vial into his arm, the Silver screamed and fought but Salt did not budge, nor did anyone seemed to take notice. Releasing the Silver Salt said “so, what just happened was 1. I poisoned you. Now, maybe you know someone who can cure you that leads us to 2. I have your blood now,” salt held up the vial showing him the blood. Salt then reached into his shawl and pulled out a spatial amulet then said “this is an amulet of holding, there are gold within it. You are to go purchase paper at the discounted prize, say you need to inspect it and put the paper into the amulet. Are we clear so far?” The Silver looked scared but nodded. “Good bring your friends and some guards when you make your purchases, I need the volume of the amulet filled. The amulet can hold as much as a small warehouse. Now, there is enough gold to pay for two warehouses of discounted paper, whatever is left after the amulet is filled is yours to keep. I should caution you to hire some professional guards, I should also caution you that I am a Nerisian Wizard not a mage. The difference being that a mage will kill you, but with this blood here I will kill you raise you as a spectre and force you to kill everyone you love. After that I would probably set you to clean outhouses or something. So, when your done at 0100 today you are to meet up with me at the big glowing rune above the docks ok?”

Setting this the eight silver to get a small warehouse of paper for him, Salt tried to figure out how much more was needed. Though the price of the intelligence was high he had gotten the enormous backlog of paper from the bankrupt Walt-lodger paper company as long as he made Strix-co suffer. It's interesting Salt thought how powerful spite is. The minute he had told his plan to the Walt-lodger paper company they were in on the scheme. It also seemed Nersinian wizards had a reputation for horrible vengeance and keeping their word oddly enough. With the 22 people from the Walt-lodger paper company and the 8 silvers Salt had sat in motion hopefully he would have the paper market around here cornered. And hopefully have enough paper for the scribe tome to copy all the mundane stuff down with.

That being said he did have some stuff to do, walking back to the portals Salt tough it was time to get some hired guns in case someone tried to murder him while he was busy and also to stop having to fucking walk everywhere thought Salt as he kicked the useless manaless dirt. Porting from a low mana realm to a high mana realm was not easy but there was a trick to it if you burned half of your mana node before leaving the manaless place you can sort of even it out by swiftly taking in the manarich flavours from the other. Now this was of course something that first and second circle mages spent weeks doing and if they did it wrong or their concentration slipped, their brains were literally no longer in their head.

Stepping lightly Salt preferred that this not take too long so he knew he had to hire a team as a whole, and the only team he had that could on such short notice...... Well, they were light aligned and preachy, quite preachy. Opening the door to an inn he knew he would find his quarry in, he balked at the name: The zephyr's Sepulchre. Might as well call it holy, holy, a well waiving down the barman he asked for his `friends` getting a weird look but the directions Salt went over and knocked on the required shield. Feeling the teleport ripping his skin a bit, Salt found himself in a familiar room.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Truth be told it was not always easy if you told people outside that you went to Nersinia, to many MASTERS and students have ripped too many kingdoms and gods apart for his school ever to have a fair reputation. Very few groups will take up a cause with someone from or associated with Nersinia, at least on the second and third circle rung of adventuring. He had met The Paragons with a party of second years from Nersinia, thankfully him being in the Soil chassis at the time. He made them believe he was a struggling plant mage and that Nersinian wizards held his soul captive and that he did not wish hardship on any soul. Bribing and then verbally tricking Arcalios angel of the mourning justiciar of the court of true justice he swore to their purpose his help and they had been adventuring on and of ever since. I tell you who does not love a crochety old plant mage who has years to think and research your questions so that next time you see him the solutions are perfect and the wisdom glimmering.

It could be hard to get them to trust Salt instead of Soil, but he just had to see what he was working with. Teleporting to their job recruitment placement a holosoul met him with “Welcome to The Paragons have you worked with us before or have a referral?” Nodding Salt said “Yes, I was referred here by my grandpa Soil a plant mag who have fought with them before.” The half automata spent some minutes piecing things together before saying “yes, one of The Paragons will see you now.” And then Salt was teleported again, falling down on one knee Salt played along with the roles his acquaintance always played with people. “And who do we have here?” Boomed a voice in a big hall, Salt getting up and trying to look like he was trying to look brave answered “hello sir I am Salt grandson of Soil I was told to come here if a was ever to need good folk to hire for a task.”

“So, you're saying you are supposed to uncover the dark deeds of an empire Cartisia who supposedly use their urchin as child soldiers. And the fact that you’re a bookmancer makes it so that it will go fast and easy, and you will only need us for 3 to 4 days and we get to do good.” Salt was thankful that the brothers Telleen was here, expert specialists in spatial magic and the one reason he was still in contact with The Paragons and even did adventures with them to increase the likability factor. Unfortunately, one of the brethren's wives was here to and it was the shrill one. “We cannot just take his word for the fact that this is a mission for good, Soil is a member of dread Nersinia for God's sake. We need ask for divine guidance in this or at least let us pray on this for a couple of days.”

Arguing, praying and generally light interrogation followed for about two hours until the man Salt had been waiting for started in on him “So you are the grandson Soil mentioned twice in two years, and how is your uncle Silt?” Trying for not trying to be earnest Salt said “well sir he is probably good but just a bit dead.... sir.” The bizarre man with the biggest Mustache he had ever seen said “yes that’s true is it not.” blanking while staring into the air Salt finally could not take it anymore and decided to just pay. “Um, sir if you are Manfred the paladin could you not just summon Arcalios angel of the mourning justiciar of the court of true justice to see if I am who I say I am.”

“So, your Salt, Soils grandson......” Salt jumped up and said “yes, I am pretty lady and my grandpa wanted to give you this; holding up the martyr's blood on cloth. The angel took it reverently, then said “this is a princely gift I see you have another thing that is also holy would you like me to enhance it?” holding up the wooden gong striker Salt said, “oh but your holy ship this is just to lay unruly souls to peace, to still their vengeance.” The angel replied, “that is a good purpose for a good thing please let me bless it.” Salt tried to draw this clear at least to him, transaction out trying desperately to make it feel natural to the onlookers. Angels where the best liars he knew but only to themselves. “Oh, blessed child I must go now, go and do good in the Cartisian empire.” And with a loud and beautiful fanfare the Angel was gone, and Salt looked at his audience quite worried that they would see through the charade in front of them. At least Salt was until Manfred strode forwards and declared, “all evil will be stricken from the Cartisian empire so say i suffer no evil.” And the rest of the guild intoned, “suffer no evil.”

This was aggravating, his little scalpel of justice had been hijacked by fanatics into a hammer of purging flame. Seriously Salt did not have any proof that the Cartisian empire was doing anything evil, but all empires do some heinous shit. Mind control, splicing man and monster, child soldiers, using dissidents for experimentation, selling a few million sentients to evil schools to open a portal nearby and hypercharge trade through your territory. You know, basic empire management 101. If he had done the scalpel solution, he would have found proof of something, and The Paragons would have been happy and self-righteous in their bubble. So now he needed them to go along with the scalpel first while the dumber members of the guild prepared war supplies and other light morality stuff like shields and medical supplies for refugees. Salt also had a different problem, by invading the empire the Mundane arts of the worlds wanted the information on. Well, he was sort of breaking the spirit of the agreement, he would just have to gather more secret mundane knowledge for them and hope that was enough.