‘NARR!!!’
Jack immediately launched an arrow at the first kobold’s head, striking it right between the eyes with the hardest attack he had yet pulled off.
Kobold loses 14HP.
He lunged forward, using his newly-increased strength to deliver a slamming kick straight at the first awaiting kobold’s chest. It bowling-balled straight into the two behind it, knocking the heavy kobold berserkers over and giving Torick the window he needed.
The kobolds moved with surprising dexterity, scrambling away from the door as the gnome mage raised his staff.
Jack worried momentarily about the strength that Torick’s spell would possess.
But then he remembered what Torick had originally said.
He didn’t struggle to summon it – he struggled to control it.
Those were two very different things.
Torick rushed forwards, moved his staff vertically and spun it in circles before leaning forwards, and jabbing it at the air.
Fire poured frantically from the gem at the top towards the kobolds.
And all the while, Torick laughed with self-contentment.
The fire consumed the kobolds, blanketing them with flame and unleashing a torrent of pained screams.
After everything that had happened in the tower, Jack was able to ignore the screams; the fiends in this world worked on a basis of kill or be killed, and dealing with them swiftly was all that mattered.
Jack drew an arrow and trained it a kobold as it scrambled towards them. Firing it off, he caught his foe directly in the chest.
The kobold staggered and fell to the ground, the last of its health failing as the flames flickered in the clearing.
‘We should probably put these flames out before we cause a forest fire.’
‘On it.’
Torick cast several rounds of Nightfrost and put the fire out, covering the scorched earth and the remains of the kobolds in frost that swiftly melted into water.
With the last ember faded, Jack approached the kobolds and tapped the satchels they carried.
Loot: unrecoverable.
It was a small price to pay for taking their foes down this quickly.
They left the kobolds and the tower behind, keeping their weapons drawn in the event of any lingering enemies from the same squad as they quickly made their way back to Silverward.
‘We’re out of here alive,’ Jack said. ‘Time to uphold your side of the deal: what’s going on with you and the whole magic thing?’
‘Magic was never supposed to be my obsession, Jack. My whole life I have been looked down upon…’
‘Because you’re a gnome?’
‘No, of course not. I came from a whole town of gnomes back on my world. But even among gnomes I was never particularly good at anything. I wasn’t even average. I was just Torick the Dull, third of his house. I had friends, but it took me a long time to realize that they were not friends. I was always the butt of the jokes, the stupid one, the cretinous one… Have you ever experienced that, Jack?’
‘I think I have,’ Jack nodded, knowing the feeling but still unable to place a memory in his head.
‘Well, I kept trying to impress them in the hopes that they would like me a little more. It’s the same with any skill, I suppose: maybe it sounds stupid, but I hoped that I could change my standing with them day by day if I just built on it, one part at a time. We used to explore the lands surrounding our town, and one day we came across something strange: there was an old, ruinous temple tucked into a patch of caves. They dared each other to go inside, but nobody would. I suppose I thought that I could impress them once and for all if I ventured inside, so I did. I went so deep into the cave that I could no longer even hear them. But it soon turned out it wasn’t because I was deep into it. I hadn’t even gone that for… They had just left me there. I sought to escape, but I took the wrong passageway and found myself in a hermit’s cavern, lit solely by the glow of a caster’s journal hovering in the center of the room. I didn’t know what I was looking at, of course, but when I took it in my hands, I felt a great surge of power coursing through my being. The cave began to collapse, and I resolved to make my escape. I barely made it out alive with the staff and the journal. When I got back to town I was a sight; covered in dirt and looking like I had just crawled out of a cave… Probably because I had. I kept my magic a secret, but soon enough it got out of hand… But that’s a story for another time.’
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
‘I’m going to make you a promise,’ Jack said. ‘If for whatever reason we ever make it to your world, I’ll make sure that those sons of bitches pay for doing what they did to you.’
‘I don’t harbor any anger, Jack,’ Torick smiled. ‘They gave me the greatest gift I could ask for – command over magic! Well, command is admittedly a shaky definition, but still.’
‘If you say so,’ Jack nodded. ‘I just don’t like bullies.’
‘I apologize for making you feel as if you needed to come along on this quest, Jack,’ Torick spoke quietly. ‘I knew from the moment we met that you were a man of good standing, and not just because you didn’t try to kill me.’
‘Thanks,’ Jack smiled. ‘So are those the only spells that you can conjure?’
‘Eh,’ he shrugged.
‘It’s just I thought you mentioned that you were an elemental mage. Does that include earth, too?'
‘I have earth spells, but they aren’t all that interesting.’
‘Why not?’
‘Earth magic is grunt magic, Jack,’ Torick spoke awkwardly. ‘It’s… Farming magic.’
‘What’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing, it’s just… Not particularly glamorous. Who wants to be friends with the guy who knows how to break stones and clear out fields?’
‘I do,’ Jack laughed. ‘Those are really useful skills. Sure, magic that helps take down kobolds and god knows what else is useful, but those elemental earth spells are the things that actually serve to keep people alive at their most basic level – and when I say basic, I don’t mean simplistic. I mean shelter and food are what everybody needs to live.
‘Right now we’re just looking after ourselves, but if that town of Knightkeep that our undead warlock friend tried to taint hasn’t been wiped from the map before we got here, then we’re going to need to figure out how to deal with them too.’
‘Deal with them,’ he repeated, winking at them. ‘You mean kill them, right?’
‘What? No!’
‘Come on, Jack, it’s just you and me. If we’re building a kingdom we’re going to have to crush some skulls at some point.’
‘We need citizens, not corpses. Keeping people alive can be even more difficult than keeping a dog from eating chocolate… Believe me, I have plenty of knowledge about how people have stayed alive in the past. All I have to do right now is hope that the citizens we come across in nearby towns like Knightkeep are the friendly type.’
Torick kept changing the topic when it came to his earth magic, but Jack couldn’t figure out why.
It was a perfect opportunity to try his new perk.
Jack activated the Dialog Prompt skill and was presented with four options:
Dialog Prompt
Target: Torick
Choose a verbal approach:
- Threaten
- Appeal to reason
- Appeal to interests
- Organize
- Surprise me
So I can choose a line of dialog that’s tailored towards the person I’m talking to. The System just knows.
I just wonder how it’ll actually execute.
Jack discretely tapped Appeal to interests – and felt his mouth literally tip open.
‘People appreciate magic when it keeps them safe, but that’s only out of necessity – what they really appreciate are the peaceful functions of it that make their lives easier, those small things that answer the problems wedged in the backs of their minds on the most primal level, like ensuring that their home is safe.’
What the hell was that?
The words had spilled out of Jack's mouth like a cotton spool unwinding; he could choose what to start saying them, but the moment he did, two things happened: he couldn’t stop until the sentence was over, and the words were spoken with a cadence and tone that sounded totally unlike himself.
Jack glanced over out of the corner of his eye at Torick with unease, wondering if the gnome had caught on.
He had – in the right way.
Torick smiled genuinely as he looked out at the forest.
‘Well…’ He grinned. ‘I suppose that helping with our quest would be a noble cause, and helping the community would be a nobler cause. I shall keep my mind on it, Jack.’
So Mediator abilities work just like spells - once they've been cast, they can't be recalled.
Deep down, Torick didn’t just care about what the group thought of him. There was a part of him that cared about them, and as long as that was there, it was good enough for Jack.