“One of the boys came back with a severed hand,” Sebas spoke with a frown.

Jeremy took the last sip of his tea, finishing his breakfast while his butler read him reports from the previous day. He had a lot in his mind — the spires, Happenstance, the villagers, the strange chasm in his yard, and Mason’s visit.

“I assume you’ve dealt with it,” he glanced at Sebas. “The injury happened during a training and retrieval session — the boy shouldn’t have to pay for the Lifesaver™. He’s fine, right?”

“Not exactly,” answered Sebas. “There were complications during the regeneration.”

“Complications?”

“Fisher had some sort of silver arm when he got back,” the butler explained. “Siege said the boy shaped it from the metals they gathered in the mines. It was functional but it required mana to move. I have it with me.”

Sebas pulled out a silver arm from the air. Jeremy still couldn’t figure out how he did the trick — space magic was not his forte.

Jeremy studied the silver arm. It was well-made and quite smooth to the touch. He sent a sliver of mana into it, but it remained motionless. He glanced at Sebas in confusion, before giving back the hand.

“I couldn’t make it move either,” Sebas confessed. “But Warden and the other boys could.”

“Never mind that,” Jeremy shrugged. The farmhands’ powers were tied to their connection to the earth — or the primordial entity that governed the mana of the earth. Delving deeper would serve no purpose without the same connection.

“You said there was a complication.”

Sebas nodded, putting away the metal hand. “The boy took a Lifesaver — but instead of regrowing his hand, a silver one grew.”

“Interesting,” Jeremy nodded. He maintained a calm exterior, but his thoughts were racing. Was it a mithril hand? Could they cut it off again and regrow it? Could he do the same to the other farmhands?

“You will not be cutting the boy’s hand, Master Jeremy” Sebas chastised him.

“What? How?”

“You’re drumming the tips of your fingers together and you’re smirking like a mad man.”

Jeremy stared at his tented fingers, wondering how they got there, before moving his hands to the table. “I won’t be cutting any hands,” he declared somberly. “Any problem with the new hand? And did the boy have an idea how it happened?”

“Aside from the glaring difference, it seemed to function as well as his old one,” Sebas replied. “Fisher said it had something to do with his stronger connection to the earth. That and his desire for a silver hand.”

“Did the metal grow from his body?” Jeremy wondered. “That seems highly unlikely.”

“It didn’t,” Sebas frowned. “The boy took his Lifesaver™ by the chasm. Molten metal from the earth flowed up to his hand as it was regenerating.”

“Hmmm,” Jeremy shrugged, uninterested. “Any other matter I should be aware of?”

“One miner found a strange door in the mines.” his butler answered “Siege went to inspect it yesterday, but he said it wasn’t dwarven. I plan on going after our talk.”

“A strange door, you say?” Jeremy’s eyes gleamed. It could be a vault of riches or a lost city of some unknown race. “You can go, Sebas. I’ll be heading out to the duke with Uncle Mason in a few minutes.”

“As you will, Master Jeremy,” Sebas bowed before leaving.

Jeremy stayed on his chair for a couple of minutes after Sebas left, thinking about what his butler told him. Fisher’s injury was unfortunate, but not beyond his expectations. Siege was there, so he was sure nobody would die. So was Shelby — but the snail had a different perspective on injury. She could regrow her body parts, after all. A boy merely losing a hand would not have been enough for her to take action.

If someone did die, then the dwarf was not as reliable as he believed — but that wasn’t the case. He trusted his own judgment. Then again, perhaps Siege needed a few more training sessions — just to be sure.

***

“Are you ready old man?”

“Why you little —“ Mason stared up at Jeremy. When the wizard said he would handle the trip back, he thought he meant he had a carriage of his own — not that they would go by snail.

The snail was huge. Its pale white color was a stark contrast to Jeremy’s black robes. All the wizard needed was a scythe and he would be the embodiment of death — and he was pretty sure there was one in a farm.

“Not bringing your scythe?” he joked.

“Not today,” Jeremy shrugged. “Shelby needs it for her golem. It should be on the fields working with the boys. There — the one in red armor.”

Mason followed where the Blackstaff’s incorrigible son was pointing, seeing a human-like golem plowing the field. There was a staff sticking out of its back — and a ghostly blade emanated at its point. He actually had a scythe!

“You use your golems to till the field?” he remarked, concealing his surprise and outrage over the scythe.

“Nah, that’s just Shelby.” Jeremy laughed. “She keeps an eye on the boys. The golem is like a familiar that she can control. Strangely, she needs my staff to do it.”

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

The snail shrugged in displeasure or disagreement.

“Of course, Shelby. Staffany is his own person.”

“Your familiar has a familiar?”

“She had apprentices before I did,” Jeremy laughed. “Now get climbing, old man. The duke is probably waiting for us.”

Mason stared at the huge behemoth of a snail. He didn’t fancy riding the thing, but Jeremy seemed eager to have him ride it. The snail’s shell had handholds that he could easily reach, and he had no problem climbing it. It was strange, sitting atop the snail. It would be a long drop if he fell off — but that would be unlikely, given how fast the snail could go. The trip would be a long one.

“Go, Shelby.”

The snail started to move at a walking pace — just as he expected. Mason was about to complain — but the snail began to accelerate, moving faster than he thought was possible for such a huge creature.

“Nice, right?” Jeremy turned to him.

“Hmph!” Mason pouted. Still, the ride was quite comfortable. It had none of the bumps of riding a carriage and the snail barely made a noise. It felt like they were sliding on the ground or even flying over it.

They avoided the road. The snail was too big and disruptive to normal traffic, and he assumed Jeremy had run-ins with adventurers and ordinary people going about their way.

Halfway through their journey, the snail slowed its pace — its flail-like feelers moving ab about as if detecting something in the air.

“Is there something wrong?” Mason turned to Jeremy.

The young wizard frowned, leaning towards the snail as it began clicking and chirping. He thought the sounds were strange for a snail, but he knew little about the creatures — especially ones that grew as large as the one they were riding.

“Shelby said there were ants underground,” Jeremy turned his gaze to the path before them. “She counted five of them — but there might be more.”

“Ants?”

“Big ones,” Jeremy clarified. “They don’t usually stray far from the forest. What could have brought them here?”

The first of the ants erupted from the ground as they passed, barely missing the giant snail. Jeremy seemed unconcerned, even turning to him and smiling apologetically.

“I wanted a couple of these ants for the farm — but these ones are too feral, as if something messed with their heads.”

Mason could only nod, not knowing what to say. To him, the ants posed little to no risk — aside from the awkward nakedness if ever his body was eaten. That wasn’t true for Jeremy and his snail, but it seemed like the two were calmer than he was.

He noticed that they were moving from one point to another instead of trying to get away from the giant ants. Jeremy and his snail were a perfect union of man and beast — an unstoppable aegis and a spellcasting wizard. The ants didn’t have a chance.

That was until Jeremy jumped off the snail.

“Take care of Mason, Shelby,” he yelled as the huge ants moved to surround him. “This will only take a minute or two.”

Mason’s eyes locked on the ants as they closed in on Jeremy. “Why would he do that?” he blurted in frustration. There were talks about the recklessness of the Blackstaff’s son — how he would put purposefully put himself in dangerous situations ever since he was little. Seeing it firsthand was alarming — and the ants looked dangerous.

His words were met with a series of clicks, chirps, and whistles.

“He doesn’t want us to get dirty! What kind of reasoning is that?” he raged at the snail, astonished at how the wizard could give up his advantage for such a simple reason.

“He’ll be fine? Ants are just pests?” the snail’s words didn’t make sense to him. “He doesn’t even have his staff!”

It took him a while to realize he was talking to the snail — and that he could understand the creature. It made no sense. He never studied any language that dealt in clicks and whistles, but he instinctively knew what the snail was saying.

“You should go help your master,” he urged the huge snail as he jumped off its shell. “I’ll be fine here.”

The snail turned to him, tilting its head as if confused. It went on a rant about how she was obedient and how the ants stood no chance against her master.

The thing considered itself a “she”. What other strangeness—

Shelby! It raged with its strange clicks.

Was the snail reading his mind? That seemed preposterous. Even the King’s mind mages couldn’t get through his thoughts.

Reading your face, stupid softie!

“Why you overgrown—“ the words died in his mouth as Jeremy’s scream rang out across the barren land. It sounded like one of frustration rather than pain — but he could be mistaken, given the sight before his- eyes.

One of the last remaining ants held Jeremy’s severed arm in its mandible. Even without that horrific injury, the wizard didn’t look too good. His robes were in tatters and there were acid burns on the exposed parts of his body.

The ant lunged again, and Jeremy could only hold his other hand to ward off the attack. The creature’s mandibles were about to take off the wizard’s other arm when a dull light emerged from the wizard’s hand. The two stayed still for a moment, before the giant ant slumped to the ground, smoke coming out of its mouth.

Two more ants still thrashed on the ground. They were alive, but their mobility was cut short with their legs. Mason watched Jeremy approach one of the creatures, plunging his hand into its mouth and summoning the dull violet light. He did the same thing to the other one — strangely risking his arm to kill the ant.

Jeremy was smiling as he walked towards them. The wizard took something from his robe and ate it as he neared.

“Shelby, I need clothes.”

The snail stood unmoving for a few seconds before nodding.

“Time to change,” the wizard smiled at him.

The snail suddenly lunged at Jeremy — seemingly engulfing him into its body, swallowing him whole. Mason stood there in shock, not knowing whether to run or just let the snail devour him like it did its master.

Instead of attacking him, the snail merely glared at him, clicking in annoyance and berating him with insults.

“There there, Shelby. Be nice to the old man,” Jeremy emerged from the snail, wearing a new set of clothes. His arm was still a stump, but it seemed to have grown a bit longer.

“I remember something about the ant shells fetching a decent amount of gold,” he explained. “The only way to keep them whole was to burn the ants from the inside.”

“You did all that for gold?” Mason was indignant. "You risked your life — even losing an arm!"

“Why not?” Jeremy innocently smiled at him.