Arthur tested the levitate spell on a few conjured balls of earth before he tried it on himself. The feeling of several updrafts keeping him afloat was a very concerning and uncomfortable feeling, hopefully he would learn how to actually fly instead of just levitate on his stomach, he had to lay on his stomach because there wasn’t enough updraft to keep a standing person levitated.
With the uncomfortable testing out of the way Arthur was able to put the rest of his time towards his alchemy and stocking up on all his little products that he had gotten into the habit of making.
The only other thing of note that Arthur did was read over most of the manual for the mage staff. Most of it was magical jargon he did understand regarding how to repair the enchantments should the staff become too damaged to be used, but he did find the name of the person who made it, a Mr. Hamulim Leadjaw. ‘That is a dwarven name, I probably should have expected that given the craftsmanship of the staff itself. I wonder how Claudius managed to convince him to make this for me.’
A short while later Arthur drifted off to sleep thinking about all the different things he would need to do instead of the studying he wanted to do. ‘Mmph, things were simpler when I was an apprentice for Calvus.’
**********
A good while later while the outside was still dark Arthur woke up, he slowly and silently sat up in his bed and looked around the room for the source of what awoke him. He could hear a small little sound that reminded him of two pieces of metal clicking together, but from where he was it was muffled and he could only hear it because of his enhanced hearing.
Slowly and carefully Arthur reached for his mage staff next to him and quickly casted the muffle spell on himself before he got out of bed. Taking the staff with him he slowly walked through his bedroom door while keeping low to the ground, even though nothing had happened yet he had a feeling that it was best if whatever or whoever was making the clicking sound didn’t know he was awake.
As he passed into the kitchen/living room the sound was at its loudest, the sound was coming from the back door. Someone was trying to do something to his door, most likely whoever it is wants to gain entry. The only question was, what are they actually doing? Despite the little amount of noise they were making they clearly aren't all that good at it, otherwise they would already be inside without all the noise.
Arthur elected to crouch behind the nearby table and the nearest chair to conceal himself, odds were that whoever was making the noise was either going to give up or eventually succeed. And when the door lock made an audible click signaling it was now unlocked Arthur knew he made the right decision and watched.
Arthur watched as someone slowly opened the door and slipped in through as little room as possible before closing it. The overall body shape gave them away as either an elf or a human, but the clothes they wore kept him from reaching any definitive conclusions.
The intruder took a quick look around without noticing Arthur and slowly made their way towards the other two rooms, and the overall direction indicated that they were far more interested in the spare room where Arthur kept his alchemy supplies.
‘Interesting, whoever this is knows what I keep that is of considerable value. They must have done their research beforehand, but unfortunately for them they suck at opening locked doors, and they are quite loud as they do it.’
Arthur smiled as he slowly approached the would-be thief slowly and quietly as they crept towards the spare room. He even waited for them to start going through all his stuff and grab several potions before he announced himself near the doorway.
“I don’t think those belong to you.” The thief froze for a moment at those words before they spun around and saw Arthur standing near the door casually.
The thief tried to subtly reach for something towards their back, most likely a knife or another short bladed weapon Arthur thought to himself. Suddenly the thief rushed towards Arthur with a knife drawn and plunging towards his face. He quickly controlled his mana through the staff and triggered the force armor spell built into the mage staff. The armor shimmered into existence and the knife was deflected harmlessly with a loud ting as the thief ran by.
The thief clearly heard the ting and was in no mood to stick around and made a break for the back door with their collection of potions and other alchemical products they stole. Arthur readied his staff and used his mana to cast the force barrier spell and block the door.
The barrier of force blocked the open door and then some causing the thief to run face first into what is essentially an invisible wall, as the thief collided Arthur heard a loud snapping sound, and when the thief dropped to their knees and turned around he saw that their nose was bent at an awkward angle. The nose must have been in quite a bit of pain as the thief was crying softly as they clutched their broken nose.
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Not wishing to waste a moment Arthur conjured a set of earth shackles around the thief's hands and conjured a small flame igniting the logs sitting in the nearby woodstove and illuminating part of the room. The light revealed the thief to be an elf, specifically a wood elf with skin resembling an oak tree's bark. When Arthur removed the mask it showed the elf to be a man, a very feminine man, but still a man.
‘I figured he would be a woman with his clothes and what little I heard of his voice, he is also quite thin for an elven man despite how much smaller elves are than humans.’
Arthur pulled up a chair from the nearby table and sat down as the feminine elven man sat just before him clutching his broken nose. “So, what should I do with you?” Arthur leaned over the elf with his right hand still holding his staff, the idea was to try and intimidate the elf into going along with him and perhaps even sell out any allies he might have along with all their stashed valuables, it was a partial success.
“I -I don’t know.” The elf spoke, his voice muffled somewhat up from the broken nose. “What are you going to do? Are you going to call the city guards to arrest me?” The elf started to fidget with his left hand as he spoke, the worry evident despite the distorted voice from the broken nose.
“That depends, what did you intend to do after you stole my stuff?” Arthur reached over and took one of the potions from the elf, the potion was a basic healing one, useful for light cuts, bruises and stopping or slowing bleeding in more serious wounds. “I highly doubt you actually need these for any medical reason, unless you know someone who is sick.”
The elf avoiding his gaze told him that there was no sick family member or friend, he was stealing because he either needed money or something to sell. But he looked quite ashamed by it, like he didn’t like stealing and felt bad about it.
“So why try and rob me? You do know that mages are very dangerous once angered, right?” The elf gave a nod while still avoiding eye contact, Arthur gave a sigh at his meek attitude.
‘Is this guy even a real thief? It's almost like this is the first time he has broken into a house before.’ Arthur froze the moment that train of thought occurred and thought back to when he tried to gain entry with all that clicking. ‘This must be the first time, whatever he did to the lock must have been his first time and why he made so much noise in the process.’ Arthur looked at the meek elf again on the floor with a different view. ‘He must have needed money and lots of it. What better place for someone with a conscience than someone who can easily afford to have some of their stuff taken.’
Now with the revelation that the young elf before him was just desperate Arthur had to put away the idea of just killing him, but that also left the possibilities of having him arrested or beating him up a bit as distasteful. But then suddenly Arthur had an idea, a simple yet efficient idea that would not just get the elf to stop stealing but also free up some of his own time for other things.
“What is your name?” Arthur asked the elf and he leaned back into his chair.
“Gaelin.”
“Well Gaelin, I assume you don’t like stealing. So what about doing something else for a living.”
“I tried that, no one wants to hire me. Every position is already filled before I get there, or they don’t think I can handle the work.”
“Well how about this, I need to acquire various amounts and types of plants from the forest every few days to brew my potions. If I offered you some money to do that for me every day would you be willing to do that?” Gaelin looked up to Arthur with a small touch of hope in his eyes. Despite the attempted robbery just a minute prior he was offering him a job, that was something most people didn’t do. But Gaelin was no fool and immediately accepted. “O -of course. What types of plants do you need?”
“I have a book here that has all the different plants that can be used in alchemy, if you find anything in that book take it with you. It is quite valuable and I will probably be able to find a use for it.” Arthur reached into his bag and pulled out a book titled Ryul’s guide to alchemical plant life and handed it to Gaelin.
“While it is helpful to know how to read it isn’t a requirement, you can just look at the images alongside the descriptions and other important characteristics.”
“Don’t worry, I can read. How much do you want me to bring you?”
“I have a small wooden box you can use. Just fill it up as much as you can and I’ll pay you depending on how much that is and what is actually useful.” Arthur quickly walked into his spare room and returned with one of the empty boxes that he normally kept some of his ingredients in.
Originally it was one of the boxes that the glass bottles were delivered in leaving it with two little holes on each side for hands, Arthur had repurposed it into a temporary storage for his excess ingredients.
“Oh and before you go drink this.” Arthur handed Gaelin a light red potion in a small bottle. The potion had no smell and when Gaelin drank it his nose slowly fixed itself and stopped bleeding. Gaelin then excused himself before returning all the potions he stole and left saying “I’ll see you tomorrow sir.”
*********
The next morning at almost nine thirty Arthur eventually woke up while feeling slightly groggy from missing some sleep. ‘Oh, if I knew I was going to miss so much sleep because of that elf I would have blocked the doors and windows with magic of some sort.’ Arthur eventually reluctantly got out of bed and put on a clean set of his alchemist attire, including the overcoat.
Arthur then walked over to the kitchen and made himself a nice breakfast burrito which he then ate. Once his stomach was full Arthur went through his current stock of potions and found that he was starting to run low. If he wanted to sell the usual amount to the alchemy club then he would probably need to spend a significant portion of the day just brewing more potions and products.
Thankfully he still had a decent stock of ingredients to brew everything, but he would still need more if he wanted to keep up with his schedule. ‘I just hope that Gaelin finds a decent amount of plants, then I could at least skip out a day or two of collecting ingredients on my own.