The University of the Northern Lights was growing. It was starting to become impressive to look at, and not just for its location in a high mountain valley.
The older part of the university had been built upon Duke Cradel's keep. The Wizard Cradel had ruled the small valley from his keep for decades, eventually swearing fealty to Lothar in return for being mostly left alone to do his research, as long as certain taxes were paid. After Lothar's fall, Cradel had surrendered to Jend and Aida, with one provision: That he be allowed to continue his magic research, and continue to keep training his apprentices. The newly royal couple had agreed, and in the following years they'd built upon it, first providing the funds to turn the keep into a proper College of Magic, then adding the College of Healing to go along with it, creating the University of the Northern Lights.
A more generally scholarly college was added a few years later, and then, more recently, the College of Engineering.
It was a beautiful early spring day as Princess Myla and Lady Scarlet flew in on their mission, so Scarlett first took them on a pass over the growing town, now the fourth largest town of the kingdom. The keep was still there, although with half of the walls removed and with its main hall turned into a lecture hall. From the keep grew the rest of the campus, a collection of almost two dozen buildings and three large inhabitable trees. Most were built about two large squares, with some of the research buildings spread part-way up the mountain, well away from the town, as is sensible for both magical and engineering research.
They landed at the designated campus dragon-landing pad, where they were met by Professor Lash Grdkr, a bookish orc academic in her early thirties. She wore a fur-trimmed cloak in the blue and green colors of both the university and the nation.
“I will be with you today as Acting Dean and the representative of the College of Writing and History and Other Things on the board,” the professor said as she met Myla and Scarlet and began walking with them toward the administration building.
“What happened to Dean Lagor? Is she ok?” Scarlet asked.
“She is on a historical research project, and is currently in a tomb, battling some sort of horror. A few of the grad students and one of the security guards have gone to help her penetrate further into the tomb. They will then hold the demi-lich in place long enough for her to conduct the interview.”
“Ah, I see,” said Myla. “Would you like us to go help her, after the board meeting?”
“I don’t think it is necessary. It is just a paper for a journal, and she already has a co-author,” said Professor Grdkr. She paused for a moment, and continued, “Which reminds me. Do you think you might join us here as a student, Your Highness? You are seventeen now, and usually the students join at sixteen. You'd love it here, and we’d love to have you.”
“Well, you know, my parents think that we need to be with them to learn all the royal family types of things, and they are good teachers themselves,” replied Myla.
“But there are so many possibilities here now. You could take classes at three of the colleges here: The College of Healing, of course, and the Cradel College of Magic, where your friend Bedo is, and in our new management program at CWHOT: Entrepreneurship in Formerly Evil-Wizard-Ruled Regions. Or, you, Lady Scarlett, might be interested in that program.”
“Would I need to take the Intro to Healing classes?” Myla asked.
“No, you would probably test out of the first two years of Healing.”
Scarlett lowered her head to have it between the two chatting humanoids. “But back to the other thing you mentioned…. What is your Entrepreneurship program like?”
“We are trying to do something really new, for students to develop modern perspectives across the arts and magics. It encompasses not just magic and management but is fully cross-disciplinary and includes practical, commercial uses for engineering. Next semester we are adding necromancy to the humanoid resources portion of the program,” explained Grdkr.
“You know my mother doesn’t approve of necromancy. Something about it being an unholy abomination,” said Myla.
“Oh, she will come around if wage inflation starts to bite. You know, labor shortages are manageable if you use outside-the-box thinking!” said Professor Grdkr.
“The program sounds interesting,” mulled the dragon as they continued walking. “What do the students think of it so far?”
“Well, we didn’t ask them, but they will like it, I’m sure.”
They reached the main hall. The meetings of the College Board were not usually held there, but given that they'd known that Scarlett would be coming, they'd thought it a good idea for this meeting.
Inside, Myla saw the members of the board seated around a large circular table. She knew them all: Duke Cradel, who was her boyfriend's father and, more importantly for this meeting, Dean of the Cradel College of Magic. To his left was Emmyth Fenmenor, Dean of the College of Healing, and her mother's lifelong friend. She was still a member of The Circle, and Myla thought she could probably count on Emmyth as an ally in the meeting.
Across the table, about as far from Duke Cradel as they could be, were the co-deans of the College of Engineering, Engineer Rukael Redbane, an older dwarf with a short gray beard, and Engineer Ciarxai Clufs, a male goblin in his mid-thirties. Myla knew they’d recently been testing an improved catapult with a much longer arm and counter-weight, and she knew they might be eager to see how they performed in the field.
Professor Grdkr sat down next to Engineer Clufs.
Between the two groups sat Alu'iza Komtogk, who was theoretically a distant cousin of some sort to Myla, a powerful sorceress and leader who had ruled the orcs of the Black Rocks in the far northwest of the land. She'd been a vassal of Lothar, and it had taken quite a lot of bribery, threats, and convincing to bring her, her town, and her tribe over to Jend and Aida's side in the wrap up of the war. She was an older orc, approaching ninety years of age, but still strong and vital – Her blue skin showed scarcely a wrinkle, and her long green hair had only occasional flecks of black. She, more than anyone, even Cradel, had built UNL into what it was, and she was very protective of it.
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None of them, even Emmyth, looked at all happy to see Myla and Scarlett.
Chancellor Komtogk briefly nodded her head to acknowledge the arrival of the royal princess, and said “We know why you are here, Princess Myla and we have been discussing your family's request. We have some questions before we can add it to the board agenda.”
Well, isn't this just peak Kingdom of Pelsa? Two orcs, a human, a dwarf, a goblin, and an elf are all working together to be stubborn and ungovernable, thought Myla to herself as she walked in and stood before the table.
Komtogk made a great show of putting down the scroll, and said, “So you want us to send a representative to some ‘vote’ your father is having. Then, if it is successful, you and your father will want us to have every professor and every student above the age of eighteen leave their studies and go to help him deal with something as basic as national defense. Some the government was supposed to be able to take care of based on our tax payments? So our taxes are not enough and now you want to interrupt our vital research here?”
The university and its board members don’t even pay taxes. I understand now why they didn't send Wyndy here. They were too worried that the College Board would be incinerated. Perhaps Scarlett and I can incinerate them anyway…. It isn’t like the College Board would be missed.
Instead of allowing her intrusive thoughts to take over, Myla responded as she had rehearsed, “The nation of Pelsa is in a time of great need. This is perhaps the biggest threat the country has faced since its founding. On behalf of all its creatures, we ask for your aid. It benefits all of us, and, after the threat has been defeated, you and this university will be able to continue your important work.”
Also, bite me, thought Myla as an addendum to her statement.
“Exactly why can’t Jend just work out some sort of peace with the humans. Surely we could just buy them off, or something? Don’t humans just want gold?” Komtogk said, to general agreement around the table.
“While the king and queen have worked hard to maintain good relations with our human neighbors, which you well know, in this case we believe that the Kat’sheth may be influencing the human king’s actions. Are you familiar with the Kat’sheth?”
There was a murmur around the table, and Myla could see engineers were quietly asking Professor Grdkr something.
“Yes, princess, of course we here in this institute of learning are familiar with the Kat’sheth. They are cat demons that are unusually evil,” replied Chancellor Komtogk.
“Right, of course.” said Myla, but Komtogk’s words had caused a question to occur to Myla. “You say ‘unusually evil.’ Is there, like, a normal amount of evil?” Myla wasn’t completely up-to-date on the latest academic research in Evil Studies.
Cradel stood up and began to pace around the room. “Yes. We at my College of Magic, in conjunction with our esteemed colleagues at CWHOT, have studied and ranked the various evil beings in the realm. Anything over 7 and up to 9 BBU’s on the Evil Scale is considered ‘unusually evil.’ A normal amount of evil is between 2 and 4 BBU’s.”
“House cats are 1.8 BBU’s on the Evil Scale, for example,” added Grdkr. “With a standard deviation of 0.5.”
“And what are the Kat’sheth?” asked Scarlett.
“8.7 BBU’s,” replied Cradel.
“My gods! That is almost 9!” Myla was very disturbed by their high rating.
“And they have a larger standard deviation than house cats, just over 0.8,” added Professor Grdkr.
Our kingdom is in more danger than I had realized, thought Myla.
“That is even worse,” said Scarlett. “They have a large standard deviation!”
“Aye, we hate large standard deviations,” said the dwarven engineer.
“Large deviations can be managed,” said the goblin engineer.
“We must stop them!” said Scarlet.
The engineers started murmuring questions to Grdkr again. Emmyth put down her quill and backed her chair away from the table.
“Yes, we must stop them,” said Dean Emmyth. “You can count on the support of the College of Healing. We will be there with you in any battle! Even two decades later, I am still a second lieutenant! We will help you vanquish our enemies, we will heal them to death, we will…”
“Wait,” Komtogk interrupted, rather loudly, “as per the statues of the University of the Northern Lights, any decision for actions of the university outside of those enumerated in Section 7.2 of the statues must be decided unanimously by the College Board.”
After a short side-conference with his college colleague, the Engineer Redbane “You and the nation have the support of the College of Engineers, Princess Myla.”
“Yeah, yeah, let’s get the humans!” added Engineer Clufs.
“CWHOT supports the princess’s request,” said Professor Grdkr.
“I’m not convinced,” said Duke Cradel. “I think we need further consideration before we make such a decision. Sending the students and professors to war is very different than the mission of this institution of higher learning, and I do believe we should pause and have a few days to consider the implications.”
Scarlette spoke up, in her best deep, threatening dragon voice, just like her mother had taught her “I should mention, that The Royal Princess Myla, and myself, were considering donating ten thousand Pelsan Gold Tails to the University. We would endow the SFAC Professorship of Applied Magic.”
Cradel leaned toward Komtogk and said to her, “You know, I suppose we can vote for Jend’s idea and send a few students. We could make it a new class, Combat Wizardry 201, and the final exam will be the defense of the country against invaders. If they survive, it will be recorded as a ‘B+’ on their transcript, otherwise it will be recorded on their transcript as an ‘F,’ and they will need to retake the course.”
Komtogk replied “Hmmm... yes, that is perhaps a good idea. Maybe a few of the students, for class credit, for one semester. From the Colleges of Magic and of Healing. Do you think we should lower their tuition for the semester if they take part?”
“Oh, gods no!” said Cradel. “We can add a combat training fee. And a combat experience fee. And they will be required to buy their armor from the university store.”
There was a general agreement around the table.
“We can add it to our year-end bonuses,” said Komtogk.
“Hmm, good idea,” said Clufs. “Sending students to war is indeed a lot of extra work for the administration.”
Professor Grdkr raised an additional point: “I would note that the Vatharian side will certainly contain many wizards from the Magic Institute of Carstones. If it is known that our side has numerous wizards from the University of the Northern Lights, and we win, then UNL's ranking will surge above that of MIC.”
Something of a light came on in Komtogk’s mind. She thought for a moment and said “Only if we win. But do we think that Jend has a real chance to win? Vathary is a lot bigger and can field a lot of men.”
“We all know Jend, and we all know Aida. And now they have Wyndy and Myla and have had twenty years to build Pelsa and the loyalty of all its creatures. Furthermore, let's then add the professors and students of this school to that force. Who do we think will win?” Redbane asked.
Cradel had still been pacing, but in considering the possibility of rising in the rankings, he stopped and looked out the window toward the south. “I've always wanted to smash those arrogant MIC bastards. They were horrible to me at my thesis defense, but there were too many of them to incinerate them at the time. And this could put us in the top five.” Cradel looked excited for the first time that day. Indeed, it was the first time Myla had ever seen him looking excited about anything. “Let’s do it. Let’s throw everything we have at the Vatharian bastards! Everything. I will fight alongside Jend myself!”
“We should design a new scarf with the UNL logo on it. These university people are more cultish than the Fashion-Histas,” whispered Myla to Scarlett as the deans danced around them, cheering in “UNL, UNL” with manic blood-lust.