Rhode and his Optimisation Advice Specialist had been seated in the closed office of the respectable, senior army bureaucrat. The door had been shut behind them, and it had been small enough that Rhode had to squat and shimmy to make it through; especially while carrying his heavy autonenhaler device. There was an uncomfortable presence of heat inside the room, and the walls between bookshelves were hung with grisly hunting trophies. Rhode spent a moment admiring the sneering, decapitated head of a giant frog with perfect, dentist approved teeth. It was truly hideous.
Meanwhile, Junior Scholar Tarrop was squirming in his seat, properly intimidated by a simple, but well executed technique which was so effective that it had been mastered across worlds by the powerful to oppress their lessers. Adjutant Fidelity was very busily pretending that his work was more important than speaking to the people he was scheduled to talk to.
“Mhm,” the precisely trimmed man decided. He decisively twirled his moustache and nodded, one finger tracing down a line on a routine expense report for weekly rations. His voice was sonorous, commanding, and had a lilting tone at the end as if he was always asking a question; always challenging. “Yes, that will do.”
Fidelity handed the parchment to a young girl at his side, a military page who bore a short, ornamented knife on her belt and wore a heavily orange version of the Prince’s colors. “Ser!” She dutifully saluted, and then urgently carried the report out of a second door behind them. Then she plopped down in the noble’s access hallway onto the floor. From there, she would play with the handle of her knife, picking at the breamstone inlay until the meeting was over. After all, the office of the adjutant was exactly where a thing like a finance report should belong.
Rhode wasn’t particularly bothered. He was busy with the effort of trying not to die. There was something grimly comforting about it. You breathed or you would not survive. And true, that might be an obvious thing to say, but it was only trivial if your body was healthy. People didn’t realize how automatic the rhythm of breathing was, not until they had to control it on purpose and in every waking moment. In fact, Rhode’s machine ruined Adjutant Fidelity’s timing a bit, as it sputtered just before the half-elf opened his mouth to speak.
They stared each other dead in the eyes until Rhode put the hose on, and made a tiny whistling noise as he sucked in fumes. Fidelity blinked first.
“Adjutant Brand, Ser! Gods keep you. Thank you for meeting with us,” Tarrop nervously provided.
“Yes, ahem,” the lesser lordling recovered. He put his hands forward across the desk and leaned in. “I greet you, insofar as you serve as a representative and proxy for your institution of wizardry.”
Tarrop turned to Rhode. “Well, we’re more of a magisterium, really,” he protested, as if he need to defend his College’s reputation to the homunculus.
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Fidelity ignored the aside. “And you are our first, so called ‘Hero’. Irving of Rhodes. Savior of our people. Benefactor of the largess of our nation, and recipient of measureless magical resources. Resources which might, some might whisper, have been otherwise spent to level our own champions.” The half-elven man twitched his lip imperiously, and that side of his mustache bounced righteously, while the other side kept magnificently still.
Rhode nodded, impressed. He was determined to stay awake, and had decided it would be more polite to wait to correct an authority figure about his name.
“Volcanic sulfurine, heartsblood of a half dozen Yelleurhamshire mega-hogs. Mana crystals of staggering quality and quantity. Mirror-walker eyeballs, purified orihalcum, moonsteel and white-cliff nickel. Thousand-year swamp-grease refined from –“
“Carboplatin and docetaxel were pretty expensive, too,” Rhode offered sagely. It earned him a glower.
Still, the adjutant leaned backwards into his chair. The sensation of heat increased, as shimmering waves distorted the air around him. His daemon spirit flowed menacingly through the room, finding new angles to observe Rhode through.
“He does not exhibit the bearing, nor the character of a Hero,” Fidelity growled.
“Ah, Ser, well I hope you may be reassured to know that our Rhode here has, due to the severity of his condition, been administered a certain quantity of pain numbing agent. Surely, Ser, it is hardly fair to make broad judgement of his conduct under such conditions?
Scholar Tarrop had slipped so easily into exaggerated, formal speech that Rhode narrowed his eyes. He tried not to frown.
The adjutant’s scowl grew deeper lines, but somehow also less intense. The heat of his mirage-aspected aura dimmed. “Of course. His condition. Crippled from the start. Unable to fight, perhaps permanently. Imagine his Grace, the Second Prince’s disappointment to discover that the first of his vaunted heroes had leveled… what is this [Vigorous Ichor]?”
“It is equivalent to the [Vigorous Blood] gene family, Ser. A respectable and storied foundational skill. A very flexible opportunity, Ser,” Tarrop smooth-talked.
“A fine level for a peasant, perhaps,” Fidelity countered, “when we were told this type of vessel was designed to reach the very peak of the might lines.”
“Of course, Ser. But only as one possibility! Our program was always designed to be adaptable to encourage the strengths of the heroes themselves, a factor which cannot be predicted. Instead of cleaving mountains, Rhode might march a thousand miles, fight tirelessly for weeks without rest –”
The adjutant had roundish, oval pupils. They flashed as Junior Tarrop realized his mistake. Rhode simply made a note to himself to investigate whether pupil shape might be the key to telling whether someone was an elf or not. It wasn’t very clear to him, he only knew it was extremely rude to ask.
“Or perhaps he could have, if not for… am I remembering this correctly? [Hibernate]?” Fidelity had the cold expression of a shark.
Chug, chug, chug, hiss, puff. Rhode put down his breather and shrugged. “Don’t mind me. I might need some water, though.”
A bead of sweat rolled down the portly diviner’s forehead. He laughed to prove his lack of worry. “A necessity, given unfortunate realities of circumstance, Ser! But correctable, given time. Why, Rhode has refined his vigor gene to its first star-point. An evolved stamina gene, properly managed, will handily outweigh the other one.”
“Humph,” Fidelity grunted, crossing his arms.
"And, you cannot deny the benefits, should he reach the fullness of his power, of an ability which is capable of branching into longevity lines."
The adjutant's mustache quirked. This time on both sides.
"An eternal defender of the Sacred Kingdom. Safety beyond the lifetime of your children. Of your children's children. Ser, of that, I would say, the Second Prince might regard with satisfaction indeed."