“The granaries are full, my lord.” Richard began. “We should be able to feed our people until the winter.”

Vedas soured in annoyance. “Yeah, in stale bread and vegetable soup.” For the mighty Archmage, used to sample the luxurious exotic food of Madras, his new diet seemed very unpleasant.

Richard completely ignored his comments. “The Madras’ men didn’t find every hidden cache, so we may have a little bit spending money, it’s not nearly enough, but it’ll allow us to buy the bare necessities, and pay the wages of our workers, military or otherwise.”

It was when he was at his new study, speaking with Richard about the new state of their lands when Erling barged in along with two men.

They seemed to be working men, both in decent shape, but judging by their garments they were clearly affected by the situation.

“What is it, Erl?” Vedas asked.

“This just came to my attention, my Lord. But these two were envoys sent by some of the surrounding settlements in order to petition your Chrismund for help, he refused their requests, but I thought you’d may want to hear them.”

Agis took out his glasses and put them on the desk, lying back on his chair. “Alright, I’m ready.”

Erling mentioned for the man at the right to speak.

“Milord, I come from the port town. We’ve been besieged by nagas for the last fortnight! They were chasing an imperial navy contingent who washed out on our shores, and we have been barely able to hold them off with their help. Our town needs your support!”

Vedas recognized the town, it was the only sizable settlement in their lands that had a port in their lands, and they had a sizable fishing community.

He massaged the bridge of his nose, the problems just seemed to come one after the other.

“And you?” He pointed to the other man.

“We’re miners, milord. Kog’zul tribe’s been raiding our lands for people for the last few days…” He explained.

“They came all the way to this side of the Makragh? What has Duke Gunther doing?” Exclaimed Theodore, who has been standing at Vedas’ back the whole time.

The Iron Duke Gunther is a household name here in Irearith, he was/is the only Transcendant rank Aura user in the region, even before the war. And his house was responsible for guarding the northern border of the kingdom against the Kog’zul for generations.

The Iron Wall was a structure built by their founders in order to keep them out, as they were preferable to chasing them in the Makragh Mountains, with their treacherous terrain and horrendous weather.

“He was doing too good of a job, it seems.” Answered Erling. “Kog’zul tribes have been scattering away from their lands for a good while yet, as the Duke would slowly and systematically lead a campaign against the barbarians.”

‘Ah… That makes sense.’ Thought Vedas.

The war must have been the last resort for them, a chance to make some time for Kazko to conquer the mainland, forcing Duke Gunther to face two opponents from differing sides.

The Iron Wall is a series of impenetrable fortresses, but only from the north, a southern enemy should be able to harass their troops much more easily.

‘Plus, Kazko was also a transcendent.’ He mused.

“Thank you for your honesty, brave men. I assure you that both your settlements will receive the aid they need, we aren’t the Madras, after all.” The men bowed and profusely thanked him in response, they must have been scared silly for their people.

After being led outside by one of Erling’s men, Vedas began to discuss the situation.

“We got the nagas in the north and the Kog’zul at the east, at this point I’d wonder if something is happening at the Starblight forest…” He spoke.

“Should we send troops to the two settlements, my lord?” Asked Erling.

“Of course, not only do we have a duty to protect our people, but we also severely need the money.” Vedas scratched his chin in thought. “Someone needs to stay here to keep things in order, so I guess that’d be me.” He looked at his knight’s commander.

“Both you and Theodore are going to have to leave, do you have a competent choice that can replace you for the moment?”

Erling instantly nodded. “Yes, Xavier, he was already a Journeyman when we recruited him, and he’s young and competent, I was planning to groom him to fill Theo’s post anyway.” He answered.

“Good, put him in charge. In the meanwhile, You’re going to lead a hundred knights to the mining villages, take no footmen since the Kog’zul are known for using guerilla warfare, and deal with the problem. Meanwhile Theo is going to lead two hundred knights and five hundred of our new recruits; we have to start blooding them. That’d leave me with five hundred knights and a thousand infantrymen. That should be enough for any inconveniences that may prop up.”

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“My Lord, who is to be your bodyguard while I’m absent?” Theodore interjects.

“No one, I never needed one anyway.” He answered. “You people somehow forget that I’m the safest one here, go pick out your people and prepare to leave, and Erling, send for Xavier, I have to establish some command structure here.”

“”Yes, my Lord.”” They echoed.

Vedas turned to his Chamberlain. “We need to figure out a payment plan, we have a considerable amount of gold to gather, and we need some way to make some income that isn’t taxes…”

“What do you propose, my lord?”

“I have some ideas, but we’re going to wait for Erling and Theodore to come back first…”

“My lord, if I were to interject, shouldn’t miss Ovia be consulted too?”

Vedas's face soured, the most unpleasant part of being an Archwizard is seeing much older men and women harass him about his knowledge. If he had a penny for every time greedy magic users approached him for tutelage only to attempt some sort of “betrayal” for his imaginary collection of sacred tomes, he won’t ’t be rich, but he’d definitely get a heavy purse.

Mediocre magic users (by his standard), mages and wizards especially, tend to obsess about knowledge, and every time they see someone like him they assume it isn’t because of talent and effort that he reached his level, but with the help of some cache of mystical knowledge.

He did have a cache of priceless books, but he wrote most of them, dammit!

Arrogant fools can’t think that they’re just not as smart and competent as they thought.

He didn’t know Ovia, so he had no idea about her temperament, but it was an instinctual reaction to keep a considerable distance between them.

“Alright, I’ll go see the damn woman.”

----------------------------------------

Ovia was at the library, it was a decent sized room all things considered. Most Nobles reserved space for libraries, mostly for the sake of pleasing their Court Mages, and the Agis’ were no exception.

It was Vedas’ first time visiting the place since his return, and he felt a great deal of nostalgia at the familiar sight.

He spent a good amount of time here in his childhood, in here he discovered for the first time the mysteries of magic, and Iveus, the Court Mage at the time, had educated him (and later discussed) on its wonders in this same room.

Ovia had obviously kept it largely intact, and was sitting there reading a small book. Vedas read his title, ‘The Origin of Fire’ It read.

“I wrote that, you know.” Ovia’s reading was interrupted by his comment as she stared at him in slight surprise.

“Really? It didn’t mention an author and was fairly new so I thought it Iveus that wrote it.”

Vedas chuckled. “No, god no. Iveus was a Life Mage, the whole reason he chose to settle here was to study the properties of the forest, and to maybe learn some spells from the Starborn elves. He hated fire magic with a passion, but I liked it a great deal since I always fantasized about slinging fireballs at my enemies in my childhood.”

“Really? But this is pretty advanced; I thought it was written by a master.”

“I wrote this at thirteen.” Vedas smiled. “I thought it’d be a nice tidbit to leave people who visited the library. At the time I had finally convinced my father to send me to the capital for my Master examination, and I knew already that I was going to leave to explore the world.” His smile soured. “I thought I'd never settle here, but life plays cruel jokes on men.” He said.

Ovia’s eyes turned sympathetic. “I apologize.” She said. “I realize that I might have been able to forward in my inquiries toward you, that was uncouth behavior, and it won’t happen again.”

Vedas let out a sigh, his Halo lighting up as if to match his emotions. “That is to be expected, I guess.”

Ovia eyes shifted from time to time to the focus, and she seemed to barely stop herself from asking about it.

“I guess, for someone like you who’s already achieved their goals our efforts might seem meaningless, but for people like me have to fight for every scrap of knowledge. Experimentation can only do so much.” She spoke, albeit a bit too confrontationally.

“Hah!” Vedas laughed. “What do you think I did? I worked hard for every single one of my achievements.” He mentioned to the library with his hand. “Look at this room, that’s what I grew up in. You spent six years here; did you find any hidden knowledge here? Forbidden methods that’ll blow your mind?”

He exasperatedly lifted his hands. “I’m a wizard for god’s sake! I don’t have a high affinity to use as a crutch! I may have had some tutelage when I was young, but don’t you dare imply that everything I achieved was not of my own hard work.”

“The academy offers knowledge to all their students equal-“

“The academy costs a godsdamned fortune! Who do you think paid for my tuition? The yearly fee is almost twice what my family made in a year. I had to compete with scions of Wizard lords, princes of wealthy kingdoms, and people who had everything handed to them from the moment they were born, the greatest resources, libraries the size of this castle, tutors from the time they could read and write!”

“I killed monsters and sold their hides, explored treacherous ruins, all the while studying, improving. While you spend your days here, in your comfortable chair, reading a book I wrote, implying that I had everything handed to me?”

The woman looked chastised; she was a master mage in her thirties and was considered very talented for her endeavor. The late Marquis had paid a relative fortune in order to get her, and if it wasn’t recommended by the Guild then she would have refused.

When she learned that Vedas was the famed Archwizard of Stars, she was overjoyed, she expected to get tutelage from one of the foremost experts in magic, and was looking forward to a smooth road in her journey as a mage.

But on the contrary, Vedas almost shunned her and was uncomfortable with her inquiries, she realized later that she may have seemed a bit too forward, but expected that with time, he’d open up to her.

And as more time went by, her eagerness got twisted into a bit of resentment, he was a vaunted Archwizard, and he couldn’t take the time to teach her even the slightest of his knowledge? And worse, she was treated worse than she was used to, he didn’t need her magical expertise and so she no longer had the lord’s ears.

But now she realized, that to him the knowledge that he was asking for was way more precious than she thought, he had scraped for every bit of expertise, while she, a mere Court Mage, wished it to be just handed to her?

“I suggest, Ovia. That you start thinking about how you could be useful; there are many, many more people, each at least as competent as you, who would be willing to pay for anything to stand in your place.” He said. “I had people offer me things you wouldn’t believe, riches that would be outside the bounds of your imagination, for something that you seem to demand.”

“That’s the knowledge I’m imparting to you.” He spoke as he walked to the door.

She mindlessly stared at his exiting back, thinking back on her actions.