I returned to the stables and went about finding the others who were poisoning the animals. I knew there had to be more than one after all. I was right to. I did my Minituarization spell, named the culprits 'disease cultist', For those who actively spread disease and misery. Then a collection spell. Only 20 persons in the palace, including one of the maids who keeps trying to poison me. I don't know why Jason was leaving her in play, till I note 3 high ranking guards and one palace official in my cage.
I use one of Jason's shadow spy's to let him know that he had worms working in his palace but I boxed them up for him. I really was not expecting Jason to come himself. Normally when I do something like this, he does not. But then normally I don't find any of his shadows to do a report either. I am beginning to see why a lot of the unpleasantness has been happening around here. Key places have bad people in them. These 4 were in such possitions and were triing to throw their miniscule weight around at me now. I calmly point out I can make them smaller, but large has not been done before, well not with out it exploding the person. They shut up.
Jason arrived as I was gently giving Richard a rub down. He was seriously enjoying it to. Jason looked over the tiny people, looking very disappointed. He had placed a couple of them in those important possitions and they had used it to undermine his authority and spread sickness and misery to his people. His own guards carefully took them away and I for one don't know, or really care, what he did with them.
"You keep adding to your levels of accolades. I know you only did it cause it was hurting people. But still you went Hero on us again. Also good work finding those spies."
"Disease Cultist. That is what I aimed the spell at. Persons who diliberately spread disease and misery. Those 20 all fell in to those possitions. I also noted the one who assigns where the maids and such go was in there, as well as 2 of the maids who kept trying to poison me. I had wondered why those two were still free."
He nods, "I told him to have them arrested, but it turns out he is one of the problem persons around here. Shame he was up for a promotion to. Oh how did you get them to be so quiet ?"
"I told them that returning people to their proper size has the problem of the person exploding. They took it rather badly for some reason." no smile, no facial expression at all.
He nods, knowing what I meant as he got a full report on how far along I am in my studies. The 'explosion' was caused by the rapid expanse in size and was mostly anything in their stomachs as they lost their food - explosive vomit really. So we learned Not to feed them for a couple hours before restoring their size. That took all of 3 days to figure out. Though he was not there for those experiments, several of the palace mages were. They are all very suprised that I found the spells in the 'forbidden archive'. I don't know why it's forbidden. Nothing in their is inheritently evil. Except the memoriors of the first emperor. The man Hated mages with a passion and claimed all of them were in league with the demons. I recognized his hate filled speech, it's the same one used by bigots and racist the world over on any person or profession they disagree with. Given the present Emperor is a mage and a powerful one, I suspect his grandfather died before he learned of his grandsons magical abilities. I have not mentioned finding those books in there either. They don't paint the same kind of wonderful picture most of these people have of their founding Emperor and I can see why they were locked away. I actually shrank them and hid them better. (Makes microfilm look big)
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Jason watches as I work on making Richard more comfortable, so his recovery will be easier on him. He does not get to see this side of me often. I do it a little bit with his younger children. While ignoring his older, more demanding brats. I annoy them as I won't bend over backwards to do much of anything they want. The mothers are not pleased with that, but Jason understands they need to learn that much of the world does not care what They want and I am an important leason for them. He has also heard of my threat to turn some of the more obnoxious ones back in to infants, so they can grow up again and maybe learn not to annoy their elders. Especially the elders who can change your life in dramatic ways. I pointed that one at the wives to. He did not say one word against me on it either. He is pretty sure unless they do something very stupid, that I will not follow through on that threat.
His youngest children though adore me as I will play with them or tell them stories and such.
He squats next to Richard and gently rubs his head, "You have a great deal of compassion and yet my spirits are all quite terrified of you."
I shrug, "I have training as an Exorcist and they know it. But they are contract sworn to you, so I leave them alone. I am not foolish or neive enough to know that you or your country are perfect. Nothing mortal ever is. But what I have seen, over all, your a good leader and try your best to do your best for your people. I have seen good, bad and horrible leaders before. Your a good one, mostly." he chuckles at that and nods, "I found some of your grandfathers journals. He came from a very dark place. A society that hated magic, most everything in those journals spoke of how he tried to outlaw magic in the early years and nearly lost everything when he did it. So instead he hid away certain things, trying to lose magic and make it so no one would ever use it again. But the Gods saw through what he was doing and changed the rules of magic, adding to it or making certain things easier or harder based on a rebalancing of it all. Enter me, someone with just enough knowledge to understand the new rules and is just crazy enough to make use of them with out fearing the consequences. Trust me, I made a few good sized mistakes in my magics before I got here. I told you about one of them. Some did nothing visible. Some, well there are a few less tree's in part of Thessnia really. So not good to get spooked and know how to create a high energy blast. One less Imp in the world though."
He nods. He knew I had 'left out' parts of my story or stated 'I practiced' but not all that went in to that. I glossed over things, some of which he believes I left out cause I scared myself. He understands that.
He nods about his grandfather, "I knew he hated magic. So I had to study in secret. He did not know I had the gift for it. Father told him that I studied the magics so I would be better able to defend the family from it. Grandfather liked that idea. Father had to do it that way as Grandfather killed any child that showed an appitude for magic. Like all my older siblings. We all have it, but I was the only one wise enough to pretend I could not use it. Mostly as they returned to me, as spirits and warned me what Grandfather would do if he found out. The day he died was a relief to the surviving family really. The end of an era of terror for the people to. Not a month after my Grandfathers death did my own father establish a school for mages in the capital. That is also when he set up the rule that any non evil church could have representives living in the Palace of Serinity. That is also about the time of massive construction and all the maze like passages came about. Grandmother, the one who survived Grandfather was a little paranoid he would some how come back, so she wanted the place to be so confusing that he could never find her in the palace. But there are no blind passages, lots of secret doors though. I really think she was the only one who knows the full lay out of the place."
I look at him, "In some ways your grandfather sounded like a Demon King instead of a Hero."
"In many ways he was. The Demon King he conquored was a minor threat really. One of the weakest ever but Grandfather did not stop there, he carved out this massive empire, all for power. Only stopped when he got so large he was having trouble governing it all. Well that and the other nations all made alliences against him. We have been at peace with them for almost a century now. I like peace and its really the reason I have not just wiped out Thessnia despite having a huge standing army. Which turned on us and tried to take over fairly recently."
"I think I can work a grand spell that will remove all mind control and conditionings done by enemies of this state, which includes slavers and St Boneheads people. But I won't do it with out your permission as this is your country and thus your ultimate responcibility." I tell him while I gently comb Richard.
Richard sighs "you got my vote to turn all the evil in to toothless mice."
I snort and Jason gives me a strange look, so I tell him what Richard said. Jason grins to.
"You really need better internal security. Spies inside your borders as well as with out. Would have much fewer surprises that way."
Jason sighs, "Father won't let me do that, well anymore than I have. He says spying on our own people is evil."
"Nessisary evil if you don't want a revolution like you almost had. Idealist idea's that everyone is happy in their own nation is so much crap. There are always people who want to tear down what has been built, either to take it over or just for the anarchy of it all. Knowing who is doing what greatly reduces the likely hood of you waking up to find your head laying next to your own body."
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Jason nods and sighs, "I understand, I really do. But truthfully I don't know how to build such a network with out necromancy being involved. Lots and Lots of bound spirits."
I look at him, "There are trustworthy people who can do it to you know. don't have to have an all spirit network. Better if you don't really. Just takes someone with my kind of training to undo the Spirit networks and there are lots of us out there. More than you know because till I Showed up here 'Mystic' was not in your detection sytems catagories."
He gets the thousand yard stare and nods, "Many say we need to change how we catagorize people and their occupations, but no one has a good plan for that."
I grunt, "Keen Sight does. He has copies of the Old books with all the old occupations listed in them. That is one of his hobbies. Though I am getting the feeling he would be quite happy as a centaur over being a humaniod." I am watching Keen trying to flirt with the fillies again. I shift up my awareness and then sit up, "OH"
Jason looks around, "What ?"
"All those horses over there." I nod to the paddocks.
He nods, "The ones slated to be made in to meat for the servants tables." he tells me.
"Jason, those are transformed People. Every single horse in that paddocks are Humans turned in to horses. I really got to teach you to increase your awareness so you can see aura's." I sigh. He is looking shocked.
"Turning people in to animals is how Some are getting around the anti-slavery laws." I tell him.
He is stunned.
"Which is another thing you would have known had you an internal security force keeping an eye on the criminal elements at the least." he just sits there, staring at these people.
I get up and sigh. I am going to be one tired little superhuman shortly.
I say a prayer to the Balance and well Richard is healed, and younger, as is Jason really. (only by 5 years so it's not to noticable).
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I headed in to the special room I found. Its hidden deep inside the palace and looking it over I think it was made back when Jason's magic hating Grandfather was in power. It's very well shielded from outside detections.
I go about setting up the last parts of the grand spell I need to cast to free all who are not enemies of the State (active types, not just disgruntled persons) from their animal and slave state forms, while turning all those who do this to others, knowingly breaking the laws in to special kinds of monkeys (no tongues - so they can't reverse the spells). Mind you, I am not doing this alone. With me are a few mages and priest who are all aware of what I have found and agree with my methods to fix the problems this country is going through. Most caused by 'Father' and his very libral views that have hamstrung the nation for sometime. Really had he not been born in to it, he never would have been in place to 'not' run things. Jason everyone agree's is a much more competent leader but he has only been running things for 15 years I have learned. Which really explains allot.
I inform all my volenteers what I just learned, both the disease plot and how all the horses being used for meat here are actually transformed people. Several look green as they have been eating that meat.
Takes us a couple hours to get it all set up and cast the Master Spell - This is a 9th level group spell, mix of Old and New magics. It's not a cure all by any means, but at least in this region we can fix some things and put a hurt on the evil that has been plagueing this part of the world.
Jason Argon tried to limit knowledge and lock away truth, not understanding or wanting to understand the nature of this world. His son and only survivor of his insanity, Alexander tried to hide from the world and ignore it's problems.
Jason is now trying to clean up and fix all the problems his forebares left him, with out actually knowing the full extent of those problems.
Then in comes me, the ape with a monkey wrench and wierd luck. I have in the 3 months I have been here, found or partially fixed several problems. I made contacts with the secret society of Mages and Priest of Magic that hold court in all the secret and hidden places with in the Palace of Serinity. They accepted me, after a few test and my turning some of the old guard in to actual mice, then turning them back just to shut up some of their stupidity. Worked nicely. They were retired by the younger and less close minded members of this hidden Guild. A Guild started by Jasons 'insane' Grandmother Hilda VonFritze. Her portrait is on the Grand Halls meeting room wall. Nice Mural really.
She had naturally green hair I am told. They believe she was part fay or something. She was a Lost one and mostly Psionic. As her 'innate gifts' were not magic in nature she survived her insane husband. The real reason for the way the palace is built, well its really a very large set of magical protection runes. No outside evil can work magic on those within. They have since learned the Evil just has to be inside the walls for them to work magic. So good plan as far as it went, but not perfect. Also not very useful versus ME as I am a Neutral and thus the protection spell ignores me. There was many face palms when these magical people learned That bit of mischief.
Now as for the Horse Problem.
Well end of spell, 3 guilds of horse traders are suddenly all small monkey's who can't speak and all the transformed horses with in 500 miles of us are suddenly Human again (or centuar or elf or what ever).
Turns out all centuars had vanished off the face of the world about 100 years ago. No one knew what happened to them.
What happened was some mages decided all the demihuman races that were half human, half animal should all become Only their animal side.
Once we figure that out (takes a few days) we build a new Master spell, in which they let me Boost it like I wanted to originally, and Poof, I break all the transformation spells (and all the mental conditioning and mind control spells used by 'evil' to control people and 'animals' - The guild did not realize that I stuck that in to the matrix of the new master spell.) Suddenly all these thousands of persons all over this contenant are Free of these things. A few turn on their 'masters' but over all, lots of crying and being very aware of Who enslaved them and why. The Church of St Bonehead, for example, dropped to a few hundred and their core group of 50 'spiritual leaders' who did not live long as the several hundred thousand of now freed persons turned on them.
The other thing that happened. With their minds freed, the Grand Wish We cast restored these people to their true forms as they were no longer bound to the Dark God - which caused him a huge loss in power. Dropped him back down to a mid level demon or so I was told later. The Gods he had been harrasing found him and well, I don't need to worry about him anymore - I did tell Tymor his true name though, she happily used it to make sure he would never bother this world (or any other) ever again.
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Of my two friends. Richard thought being a knight had been a dream, but now he knows he was really the knight who really had not liked horses. Now he has a great deal of respect for the animals.
Keen Sight had been hoping he would be a centuar, but no, he is human, well half elf, with a slight fetish for women with very wide hips. His first actions upon getting his human form back was to summon his clothing, gear, favorite books and his giant white wolf familiar 'Trixie'.
I like Trixie, he has a wonderful attitude about pretty much everything. Likes to sit On his master to, so he can't wander off again.
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Repercussions of my spells - Jason wanted to know on whose authority I cast those spells. I outed the Grand Master of the hidden guild.
Jason took one look at the large number of Arch Mages and dropped it. He had no idea all these powerful people even lived in the Palace. He about had kittens when they showed him the truth about his palace. I really think he said 'mew' in a little tiny voice when he learned his grandmother had founded a secret guild and designed the Palace as a giant protection ward.
Then he laughed his ass off when they figured out I had rewritten the second Master Spell. Not one of them thought me devious enough to have done something like that. Jason though not only knew I was, but expected me to do something like that.
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Month 4 I met Alexander - he wanted my head cause his prize horses turned in to 6 healthy men, who all left him and his carrage in the middle of nowhere.
I laughed in his face and pointed out HE had never run the country. All these officials, secret societies and hidden agencies had been running his Country since his fathers time. HE was just a figure head. Jason on the other hand, he was respected by a lot of these people and ran more of the Empire than his failure of a self entitled father ever had.
He made threats, I offered to turn him in to something useful. Jason told me to leave his father alone. He had protected his family after all.
I sigh and drop it. Family drama's I try to stay out of. But, I don't know. I never meant to stay this long, except I have learned so much. Really that is the only reason I stayed, access to the magic books. Over all doing what Tymor told me to, learning about the world and the 'normal' magics and teaching the new magics to the mages and priest here.
Jason has some grand cerimony coming up to. Another reason his father is there. I suspect he has plans for me during that cerimony to.
He is going to be so disappointed as I am not going to be there.