Initially Inari thought that Yera’s nervous chuckle was because of the bad ‘joke’ he’d made, but after a few more instances of nervousness from Yera, he concluded that she was nervous because of him. He had no clue as to why, but he could tell from the glances she kept sending his way when she was sure he wasn’t looking her way, Inari had always had exceptional peripheral vision, and ability to pick out details, it was like he said everything clearer than others did, that very rarely saved him from all the shit he got into though.
“Ohm’s plane, what is this? It wasn’t this big from the outside was it?” Marke exclaimed what all of the group was thinking as the four of them walked into a gargantuan hall, extending hundreds of paces in every direction from the entrance they all huddled in. Inari didn’t reply as he was too busy staring at the plethora of enchantments and runes that seemed to vibrate with energy as they clung to the walls and ceiling far above them, ‘this must be enough mana to charge the entirety of Thëlos for months, what is this place?’ Inari thought idly as he scanned the area slowly, barely paying attention to the floor he was walking on.
After about five minutes standing in the entrance to this grandhall, the four of them all unanimously decided it was time to plunder this crypt of treasure, the fact that all of the enchantments and energy was still present was a good sign that this crypt had never been explored or looted yet, they tended to only react to the first entrance of sapient races, after those initial entrances they’d begin slowly bleeding mana until all of the enchantments that maintain the structures became inert and the place crumbled. ‘But an expanded space like the one here, this wouldn’t crumble, this would implode, the damage caused by the final implosion of a place like this would be on a scale nobody from Thëlos had ever witnessed, save perhaps a few archmages, we do not wanna be here longer than necessary, this place is now a ticking bomb’ Inari thought as he wandered forwards and looked around for corridors to explore.
As Inari wandered around and eventually found a corridor to disappear down without a sound, he became so absorbed in the markings on the walls and the runes which vibrated with contained energy that he lost the others. ‘Mm, that’s a problem, but it shouldn’t be too big of an issue, I’ll grab what I can and head to grandhall again as soon as possible’ Inari shrugged to himself before continuing on his expedition into the darkness alone. Over time he studied the runes and recognised a few of the spatial distortion runes that had been briefly referenced in some tomes he’d bought years ago when he was aspiring to become a mage, before everything else happened. The runes had only been theorised as no mage currently alive that was willing to help, could actually form them, no mages that were in record for the sapient races actually had a spatial disposition or bloodline ability, not even the fae, it was a major loss for the sapient races. ‘If we could put these systems into the cities and smaller settlements like Thëlos we’d be safer and more mobile as a whole, we might even be able to establish larger static cities, I wish I could note these down, they’d probably go for a lot’ Inari lamented his lack of recording supplies deeply.
Further down the dimly lit corridor, framed by glowing runes of power, Inari stood completely still, frozen in disbelief as he stared at what could only be described at a small library, slightly further down the corridor. ‘Shit, oh this is good, oh I’m gonna be rich, surely this will have what I need somewhere here’ Inari thought while grinning excitedly. He couldn’t stop himself and soon was walking rapidly towards the shelves holding scripts and tomes with hundreds of variations and topics, this could be what he needed to progress and get a magic type that actually suited him, he’d been struggling for years but ‘Finally!’ Inari would have a means to progress as soon as his bloodline awakened.
Inari’s finger traced the spine of each book he gazed at as he searched the shelves trying to find something that called to him, he briefly saw an introduction into spatial magic but he knew that was far beyond his capabilities, he was barely a novice mage after all, he couldn’t even reliably cast anything apart from a tracking spell that only worked on arcane creatures and nothing else. It was even called ‘Mark’ by the mage association, which made him excited to learn it, only to find out the truth shortly after. ‘Nothing is calling to me and time is ticking by, do I just grab one?’ Inari sighed while looking at the hundreds of books and scrolls on the shelves and finding no inspiration among them. Eventually Inari reached a moderately intriguing section, the section labeled on the shelf was ‘curses’, these were outlawed by sapient races all over the continent apparently, only barbarian tribes of lessers practiced this stuff… and yet when Inari looked to the spine of one of these tomes, it called to him.
He stood there, confused and excited simultaneously, what did this mean? Had he found something he could use? Should he even use it? ‘It must be outlawed for a reason’ Inari thought, turning around and looking at other books, but from that point onwards he couldn’t shake the compulsion he had to browse the book his gaze had lingered on. ‘This isn’t natural, they always said when I found a tome that fit my magical aptitude I’d know but… this feels so forced and it’s starting to be scary even’ Inari thought with ever so slowly building dread, he knew he couldn’t escape the compulsion now.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Inari sat on a small stool, probably used to reach the higher shelves usually. He sat there with a book of curses in his hands, it was closed, allowing Inari to stare at the cover with that unfamiliar mixture of fear, excitement and confusion. The title of the book read ‘A Guide To The Mystic, Curses and The Arcane’, it seemed like such a broad title and Inari was confused why this book had been his aptitude, it felt surreal to him. After sliding a hand along the spine of the book and contemplating for one short moment more, the book flipped open to the first page, it was a note by whichever mage wrote it, it simply stated:
‘If this book has found the hands of one with aptitude for a subject so broad and nuanced, I only wish them luck with deciphering the intricacies of higher level magic in this field, as those still elude me to this day, I hope you are more successful that I ever was, or will be. This is a culmination of my lifetime efforts as the archmage of curses, I’m unsure if my name will make it into the history books of the future, but for the satiation of my ego, I’ll create one book to continue my name, nothing more’
- Kyphen R. Hex
Sitting there trying to absorb the information that was slowly entering his stunned brain, Inari was barely aware of the building compulsion that was almost forcing his hand to turn the page. After a while Inari snapped out of it and was already presented with the first spell, it was apparently an obscenely easy spell to accomplish, according to the archmage that had written the book, and yet Inari sat there entirely lost as he stared at what looked like random lines and markings on the page in front of him. ‘...What?’ was all that he could think as he felt utterly lost, “WHAT!?” Inari repeated, audibly this time. ‘I went through all this bullshit, all this random shit for a book I cannot even understand!?’ Inari seethed, but not purely out of rage, a large part of his mind was occupied by pure frustration at the helplessness of his situation, he’d been working towards finding his aptitude for years and it had been snatched from his grasp at the last moment, he was livid.
After sitting there silently for a little while, Inari realised that he’d been gone from the grandhall for roughly an hour, he’d spent so long browsing this library that he had forgotten about his expedition group entirely. He hoped they weren’t worried about him, but ultimately his mind was largely preoccupied with thought of what his aptitude meant, and also what his lack of ability to capitalise on the tome he found, actually meant for him. ‘I can’t even go to the city and ask for someone to translate it, this book contains a guide on how to practice curses and also magic that isn’t even explained to most people, fuck sake what can I even do?’ Inari ran through his options mentally while he slowly trudged back to the grandhall to meet with the others hopefully. As he made his way down the corridor he made sure to remember roughly where the library was so that he could bring the others back to make sure they all made the most of this, it would set them all for the foreseeable future if they could each get out with a few impressive tomes.
As Inari approached the opening back into the grandhall he heard hushed talking from what seemed to be Marce and Marke if Inari had to guess. He rounded the corner and the two snapped to him and raised their hands before visibly relaxing at his presence, ‘that’s concerning’. Inari was about the ask them what was going on before a shadow in the corner of the room, directly behind the father and son duo, seemed to wriggle and pulse, ‘that’s far more concerning’ was all Inari managed to think before the shadow burst out and leapt towards Marce and Marke with a feral snarl. Inari was in the middle of warning the two before a small spear of light impaled the creature from the side and banished it to what Inari would assume was Ohm’s plane, that was the only place things like that creature actually came from, unnatural abominations.
Yera strode out into the dim light, holding another short spear of light in her grip, she looked at the dark spot on the ground that seemed to be all that was left of the creature she just slew with a single throw, “Could have been a better throw but hey ho, live and learn” Yera said with a small smile before turning to the others in the group and shrugging at their confused expressions. “Where were you!?” Marke shouted at Yera, causing her brows to furrow slightly and her eyes to squint ever so slightly, her visual signs of anger were clear as day to Inari, even in this dim lighting. “Excuse you? Do you want to try that again before I make you follow a similar fate?” She said while tapping the floor with her foot, right on the remains of the shadow creature. “We paid you to protect us while we searched for tomes to help out aptitude searching, we could have died!” Marce exclaimed at Yera while emoting with his arms, sporting a rather pathetic expression of terror on his face while he did so.
Yera snorted and didn’t bother to deign them with an answer before asking an entirely unrelated question that made Inari raise his brow in her direction out of habit, “Did you tell any others that you were coming here? Just in case the worst comes to pass and we all perish, yknow” Yera said with a casual gesture and a cheerful laugh that seemed to horrify Marce and Marke both. “No of course we didn’t, you told us not to!” Marke replied with a whine edging into his pleading voice. Inari was listening with half his attention until the last part of Marke’s sentence, that had caught his full attention. ‘Why did she tell them not to inform others where they were going? Apart from alerting the other Wanderers as to what we were doing, I can’t think of a logical reason for saying not to… maybe she was being paranoid? That doesn’t sound like Yera…’ Inari contemplated for a moment before once again catching Yera glancing his way with an unreadable expression, however this time Inari shivered involuntarily.