The city was a mess. Aldous Madley had strictly controlled every wizard within the city since its founding. When the Consortium had made the decision to go public Madley had been strongly opposed, but he couldn’t have been the only city in the world to not through the magical revolution. So, he had demanded certain wizards, friends or foes, to be the ones to staff the Academy. He was very much in control of the Academy and how the programs were to be run. Madley had direct access to every piece of data collected.
The people like Henrietta, who were opposed to the Mad King’s ways were few but had no means to resist. Madley was like a God-King in his city, his word was law. Retta told him that escape wasn’t an option either. Every wizard was tracked conventionally and magically. There had been a few attempts to escape. Danny learned that there were a few other people like Smith, the so-called Generals of Madley, who were functionally Madley’s Enforcers. These generals were swift to track down and execute anyone who thought they could escape.
“This is all a bit cooked, isn’t it?” Danny said with a sigh. It changed nothing about his own situation, but now he at least knew how deep in muck he was.
“That’s certainly one way to say it,” Retta replied, sipping on her coffee. “I’ll support you however I can Danny. I think I understand your plan, if Madley lets you live long enough you might just be able to pull it off.”
Danny hadn’t told her exactly, but it didn’t take a genius, which Retta likely was anyway, to work out what he was thinking. Which was troubling, because he’d somehow have to fool the ancient ruler long enough to become stronger than him, which there was no guarantee of anyway.
“Thanks, what should I know about the city moving forward? Anything important? Sorry, but I’m not sure I’ll keep coming to the classes.”
Retta laughed. “That’s fine, the stuff the Consortium wants me to teach is mostly garbage anyway.” She then paused and thought for a moment. “Madley said he might make you a warden, right? I guess you don’t know much about the prison?”
Danny shook his head. “Smith mentioned it wasn’t a nice place.”
Retta laughed again. “That’s putting it lightly. Aldous founded his city here for a reason. He discovered a rift-”
“-Wait, what’s a rift? Both Smith and Madley mentioned rifts.” Danny interrupted.
“Oh yeah. I keep forgetting you weren’t born into this stuff. A rift is exactly that. A rift in reality. It’s a fracture between our world and another, or a realm. Worlds and realms are different, but I can explain that some other time. These rifts function as doors between Earth and other places.”
“And those are what the demonic cult groups are trying to make? To let demons come here?”
“Yes and no. Rifts just appear. We can sometimes predict them, often not. What the occult groups are attempting is purpose-built bridges.”
Danny let her words sink in for a moment.“So, they just pop up in the wild?”
“Basically. The leading hypothesis is that this is where all the magic on Earth has come from. As we humans are not mana-born, we likely never would have discovered magic if not for outside intervention, e.g. beings from these rifts.”
“Beings? There’s more than demons?” Danny suppressed a sigh, things were getting increasingly complicated.
“Well, yes, There has never been a documented case of contact between us and any other sapient life other than the demons, but the demons have made it abundantly clear that these other lifeforms do exist. We also have frequently discovered proof of sapient life having existed within rifts.”
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“That’s one hell of a bombshell to just drop on me.” Danny thought for a second, “Hang on, where did magic come from then? Who taught us if we didn’t learn it ourselves?”
“Great question. So, we have these rifts that appear now and then, with me?” Danny nodded. “Good. Now these rifts have two types, permanent and temporary, that’s not overly important right now, but good to know. Anyway, these rifts have been here longer than we have, so it stands to reason that someone would have explored them eventually, yes?”
“Delving Wizard?” Danny repeated something he’d heard Madley say.
“Not exactly, they came later. Humans across the world entered these rifts and came back with animals, tools, and/or knowledge. Magical creatures would also sometimes cross over themselves, including demons. This led to humans, learning to, or accidentally, usually by eating one of these creatures, connecting to their mana pools. Give it a couple of thousands of years of trial and error, combined with the occasional piece of awkwardly translated text from a rift, and here we are.”
“Wow, that kinda makes sense I guess.” Danny could only nod along. It at least sounded somewhat logical to him.
“Delving Wizards, which I assume you heard from Smith or Aldous himself, is a unique profession in our world. See, usually, we have no idea what waits on the other side of a rift. It could be a resource-rich paradise or literal hell. Reasonably, most wizards don’t want to run the gauntlet and potentially die, which I should add is a very common outcome for the Delvers.”
“So why do it?” Danny asked the obvious question.
“Power. Resources. Knowledge. All of the above. I mean, look at Madley. The man is easily one of the most powerful wizards in the world, most certainly owing to what he found in his rifts.”
“What did he find?”
“And now we’ve circled right back around to where we started, beautiful. For the most part? We don’t know. Most Delvers never share their gains with the rest of us, and rightly so. The Consortium likes to horde and monopolise. What we do know is that there are two permanent rifts here in Madley. The first is a barren wasteland of floating rock, apparently. The odd property of this realm is that it suppresses mana. It stops a person from manifesting anything outside of their mana pool. Hence…”
“The perfect prison for wizards.”
“Correct, The perfect prison. Madley discovered this and monopolised it. Before the Consortium was as powerful and hegemonic as it is now, Madley could charge whatever he wanted to contain the enemies of anyone who asked. That made him a very influential man, very quickly.”
“You said there were two rifts. So, we have the magic prison one, what’s the other?”
“The other we know very little about, what we do know is that it contains a reserve of a special crystal that holds mana like a battery. These types of crystals can be found in other rifts, thankfully, but whatever Madley has access to is a grade above. The highest quality stuff on the market. This rift made Madley a very rich man, with a large target on his back.”
“Yeah sounds like Madley is a very valuable city to be in control of.”
‘Yep, fortunately or not, Adlous has been one of the most feared Combat Mages for the last few centuries. Many have tried to capture this city, but their bones only lay the foundation for its continued growth. The worst of Madley’s enemies are suffering inside that wretched realm, who knows what he’s doing to them.”
Danny actually didn’t want to imagine what the crazed old man was doing to his enemies in his own private prison world, so he didn’t. He could now slightly understand why Smith had nothing nice to say about the prison. It probably wasn’t a fantastic place to be. Danny let the new information brew in his mind for a while. Madley was even more of an influential figure than he would have realised. “Is this the only magic prison around?” He asked.
“It’s the only rift that’s publicly known to have the effect Madley’s does. There are other prisons that suppress magic in other ways, but Madley’s prison is the only that has no workarounds or potential flaws. It’s just a separate world where mana doesn’t manifest, it’s impossible to cheat that.”
That made it all the more clear in Danny’s mind. If you had a magical enemy that you wanted locked up, Madley was your go-to guy. If wizards lived for hundreds of years like he was gathering, then you could make a lot of enemies you’d want locked up. A lot of very nasty people were likely very reliant on the old man.
“How many genuine criminals do you think are in the prison?” Danny couldn’t help but ask.
“Not many,” Retta replied without hesitation. “Most criminals are dealt with on the spot in the wizarding world. The prison is mostly filled with political prisoners or people on the wrong end of a grudge, no matter what the Consortium or Madley claims.”
Great. So the old man is definitely power-tripping on top of being incredibly paranoid. It just keeps on getting better.