The wizard was being kept in a coma in a military blacksite. Headquarters didn’t know how, but they knew that the wizard was the key to unlocking…

Something. He held power, incredible power, and what little records Headquarters had told them that he could be the key to Manifestation. Their soldiers and agents could finally access those same powers that had slowed the invasion for so long. It was rumored that the Wizard’s Guild had used the same power as the Wizard, though the cantankerous old men hadn’t been seen lately. The creation of the Wizard’s Guild and the arrival of the Interlopers line up too perfectly, it couldn’t be a coincidence.

Attaining the wizard’s knowledge was paramount, and to access the wizard was kept in a nutrient vat and fitted with a full dive VR headset. The simulation the wizard was held in was a college, one that gave the wizard the time to enhance his craft, and his notes, research, and technique would be sent to Headquarters. He would teach a class, agents for students, and Headquarters would hang on his every word.

There was just one issue.

“Where are all the goblins?” the wizard asked, looking around the campus.

“The- the goblins?” Professor Allen asked, “Is that, err, a racial thing? Do you mean the faculty staff?”

“Staff? No! The goblins!” the wizard said, “I don’t need a staff!”

“I thought you were going to teach a class on-” Professor Allen started.

“Of course I’m going to teach a class on magic, that’s what I need the goblins for!” the wizard insisted, “How else do you think someone learns magic?”

“Well, I don’t know the first thing about magic,” Professor Allen said, “So I would not know.”

“Listen, I learned magic by studying a spell then camping out in the woods killing goblins with laser beams,” the wizard said, “And I became the best wizard ever. And here you are, a man who doesn’t know anything about magic, that I have to teach a class without any goblins!”

“How did you study magic,” Professor Allen insisted, “You said you learned a spell before your, eh, camping trip. Did-”

“Yes, and then I mastered that spell by shooting goblins with-” the wizard said.

“Yes yes yes, we’ve been over that,” Professor Allen said, “The magic, how do you learn it?”

“By shooting goblins,” the wizard seethed, “With lasers. That’s how the fighter learned to fight, how the barbarian learned to fight, how the rogue learned to fight, how the cleric learned to fight, how the bard learned to fight, and how I learned to fight! By finding things that shouldn’t be alive, and killing them.”

“So that’s it,” Professor Allan said, “I’ll just tell all the students to go find the magic forest critter and then kill it, shall I?”

“Goblins aren’t magical,” the wizard said, “They’re just goblins.”

“You’re sure you don’t want to teach magic through a more sustainable way?” Professor Allan asked.

“Nobody ever runs out of goblins-” the wizard said/

“I mean lectures, study groups, textbook study, practical research?” Professor Allan asked, “Anything like that?”

“Did you just make up those words?” the wizard.

“Book learning!” Professor Allan shouted, “Do you want to use books to teach?”

“Books? You mean have everyone sit around and listen to me while I explain how to cast spells?” the wizard asked.

“Yes!” Professor Allan shouted.

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“Who learns like that?” the wizard asked.

“Everyone!” Professor Allan yelled, “Everyone in the history of higher learning has learned like that?”

"Nonsense," the wizard insisted, "What could that possibly teach?"

"Chemistry, Biology, Mathematics, Physics, Medicine, Psychology, Economics, Literature, History, Geography, Art-"

"Really?" the wizard asked, "People can learn from- from books?"

"Unless your laser goblins can psychically induce knowledge," Professor Allen said, "Yes."

“The goblins don’t have lasers, that’d be stupid,” the wizard said, “You’re using lasers to kill goblins. If goblins had lasers they’d make for terrible spell practice.”

“You-”

“Either way,” the wizard said, “You said that people here keep important knowledge in books? Show them to me.”

“The library across the grounds,” Professor Allen said, “Now, about teaching spells-”

“The library, just available for whoever wants to take a look?” the wizard asked.

“Yes, what part of this do you not understand?” Professor Allen asked.

“That sounds incredibly dangerous,” the wizard remarked, “What if someone uses this free knowledge you leave lying around to summon Quil’Gamoth? What if someone uses the knowledge of, I don’t know chemistry or something, to build a huge bomb?”

“That can’t-” Professor Allen paused. That actually could happen. “People don’t do that!”

“Really?” the wizard asked, “Because I’ve been fighting bad guys almost since we got here, and building a huge bomb sounds exactly like what bad guys would do.”

“Are you saying that knowledge, instead of being openly shared for the good of all,” Professor Allen started, “Should be locked away? Hidden from the public eye? I suppose you think that people who can do algebra should be hunted down and killed. Or that surgeons and doctors should be muzzled, else they’ll tell people how to stay healthy!”

“That does sound dangerous,” the wizard admitted, ‘Tell you what, you tell my student to study on their own time, that’s what I did, and I’ll check through the books in your library.”

“But you’re a teacher here!” Professor Allen shouted as the wizard walked away.

“And I’ve already told you what to tell the students,” the wizard said, “You’re a teacher also, so go teach them.”

The library was a nice place. High ceiling, carpet floor, cream colored walls, plenty of nooks and crannies to sit down in, a computer lab. The librarian at the front desk smiled at the wizard as he walked in. It didn’t smell like anything in here, and the wizard couldn’t hear as far as he normally could.

The wizard grabbed a random book off a random shelf, Applied Chemistry 202, sat down on a big, cozy chair, and started reading.

“I disbelieve,” the wizard muttered as he opened the book. He had no idea how he got here, no memory of starting a job as a professor, and wouldn’t have done that even if he did. Disbelieving didn’t get him anywhere, he wasn’t in a sub-universe was he? That wouldn’t be hard to escape from, just quickly caste a dimension hopping spell.

Winston quietly muttered the incantation and nothing happened.

“Well that isn’t good,” Winston muttered. Not only did the spell not work, but the book he was studying contained information on the building block of the universe. That was dangerous stuff. A well trained wizard would easily be able to warp the world to his whim, and the wizard was the best wizard he knew.

Still, his spell didn’t work. The wizard didn’t feel himself step into some sort of magic blocking field, and anyone who could stop magic should have no problem casting magic. If his magic wasn’t being blocked, then where was he? He obviously wasn’t here, if he was here he would cast a spell and leave. If he couldn’t cast spells, and wasn’t in an illusion, what did that leave? A fae dream world? No, they wouldn’t care about learning magic. Neither would anyone who could create a sub-universe. And the wizard knew he wasn’t in the dimension he came from, this place didn’t smell like anything, and scenery outside the campus was indistinct despite how close it was. Which left him…

Maybe the wizard was going about this the wrong way. His issue wasn’t that he didn’t know where this was, it was that he couldn’t cast magic to leave. So, wherever he was his body wasn’t moving, and the idea of atoms was fascinating! The smallest particle, and if you broke something so small the destruction was absurd! How hard could it be to break something so tiny? It had to happen all the time.

Hours later, the wizard set the last book on top of his stack. Information was so fascinating, and he had spent the day reading books. It was a strange sensation for the wizard. He had also thought of himself a great, learned scholar, but the day spent in study had shown him how little he actually knew. The plane he was born on had always hidden information, and with good reason. Books and scrolls were full of evil summoning rituals! People used them to summon evil things!

But here…

There was so much to learn! So much to know! And none of it was dangerous! Well okay some of it was dangerous, but none of it was dangerous to him! The adventure could wait, the wizard didn’t know how to escape anyway. If the wizard was right and he was stuck in some sort of dream realm, then his captors had his physical body helpless. Besides, his friends would show up soon to save him, they always did and this time would be no different. For now, the wizard had some time to kill.

So, Winston made himself comfortable and got to studying.