Anton enjoyed the performances of the different acts in the square they went into and after a while, he told Fenix that he was ready to meet his uncle who had a wizard friend.
“Are you planning to ask the wizard that you’ll hire to travel with you to your next destination? That would cost you a lot of coins!” Fenix asked.
“That’s the plan and we’re willing to pay as long as it’s coins and not some sort of magic currency.”
“What do you mean magic currency?”
“Well in some of the books I’ve read, wizards had their currency sometimes called mana stones. Do they have something like that here as well?”
“I haven’t heard or seen something like that, and my father has a second cousin who’s a wizard and can’t keep his mouth shut and keeps on bragging about what type of magic he has. If they have something like that, he would have shown us a long time ago,” Fenix said while thinking deeply.
Fenix then led Anton to some part of the city that he didn’t recognize. Truth be told, if Fenix left him suddenly, Anton would have no idea how to get back to the inn.
They arrived at a compound composed of a series of houses. The surroundings were surprisingly clean, and the air smelled like plants and trees.
“Fenix who is that with you?!” A huge burly man shouted.
“It’s a client! Have you seen my father?!” Fenix shouted back.
“He’s inside the main house.”
Fenix led Anton to the largest house in the compound composed of three stories. They entered without knocking but there was someone who was sitting beside the door acting as a guard. Suddenly, it felt to Anton that he entered one of those guilds like a thieves guild or something like that. Fenix, together with Anton went directly to one of the rooms on the first floor of the house and the boy knocked on the door.
Anton heard a deep voice saying, “Come in”, so Fenix and he both entered. The room was an office and a handsome man with olive skin and dark curly hair was seated perusing papers on the table. The man looked like Fenix, but mature and now Anton knew how Fenix would look in the future much like how he knew how he would look based on Anders’s features.
“Fenix, you’re back. Who is that?” The man said.
“Father, this is Anton. A wizard and a client of mine who hired me to be his tour guide in the city for one silver coin a day!”
Suddenly the man moved fast and jumped towards them. Anton was startled so he teleported back away from Fenix and the man suddenly grabbed Fenix and put the boy behind him.
“What are your intentions? We’re not lambs that you can take down easily!” The man shouted and suddenly five men entered the room and surrounded Anton. They moved so fast that with the proper attire, they could be ninjas.
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“Father, what are you doing? They’re rich merchants that just arrived in the city and I’ve seen his father and sister together with their retinue!” Fenix shouted.
Fenix's father visibly calmed himself down and nodded at the other people in the room while he continued staring at Anton. The group of men went outside without saying anything.
“I’m sorry sir. The reason I acted this way is you look so young and you’re paying my son a huge amount of coin, so I thought you had evil intentions.” Fenix’s father said.
“I can understand the high amount of coin can ignite suspicions but what about me being young?” Anton asked curiously.
“Only powerful wizards can make themselves look that young. I’m sorry for what happened. My name’s Kaven.” Kaven invited Anton to sit in the chair by the office table which he did.
Fenix sat opposite him, and Kaven went back to his seat behind the table.
“You look so young. May I ask how old you are?” Kaven asked.
“I’m seventeen this year.”
Fenix’s father was amazed when he learned Anton’s age.
“You’re only one year older than me!” Fenix said.
“You’re very powerful and could already use magic to move between dimensions,” Kaven said.
“His father said that Anton was able to defeat an army of the undead which included some vampires and liches!” Fenix said.
“Not defeat. We manage to escape them,” Anton corrected.
“It was still a feat to be able to do that. How can we help you?” Kaven asked.
“My magic is what you can call bloodline magic. It’s only me who can use it. Not even my father and sister could learn it. When we fought some vampires during our travels, we received spell books as part of our loot and we wanted to learn how to use them, so my family was thinking of hiring a beginner wizard to teach us beginner magic,” Anton told the man.
Kaven stared at him and paused a while, thinking.
“Based on the spell you used to avoid me and based on your reaction to my attack which was devoid of fear, you’re already powerful. Why do you want to learn another type of magic?” Kaven asked.
“Not so much as me but my sister. Seeing me cast my spells made her want to be a wizard and since she couldn’t learn my magic, we decided to check if she could be a regular mage and since we already acquired some spell books, we thought that it would be a good start. I’m curious as well if I could learn other magic besides my own.”
“I see. I understand your sister’s desire to be a mage. When I saw a wizard fighting a monster in the field when I was young, the desire to wield arcane powers grew upon me as well but unfortunately, I don’t have the talent. The talent for wizardry is weird. At first, people thought that it could be hereditary, but it was not. Even if the father and mother were both wizards, there’s no guarantee that their children would be wizards as well. Since I was interested, I read some research about it. The talent for magic would randomly appear in anyone and it couldn’t be bred. A lot of people tried that it caused war hundreds of years ago.”
Anton was intrigued by what Kaven said regarding magic. It probably meant that there were no wizard families since it couldn’t be bred.
“So do you know anyone willing to be hired as a tutor for me and my family?” Anton asked.
“My brother’s friend is a wizard but he’s not in the city and wouldn’t be back for months. The best recommendation I can give is for you to go to the adventurer’s guild and try your luck there. Although wizards are extremely rare, some do work as mercenaries.”
Anton was surprised to learn that there was an adventurer’s guild. He would surely visit it to check it out.
“Father, can I still work with Anton as his guide? They will leave the city in a week,” Fenix asked his father.
“Of course, I’m a good judge of character and Anton looks like a good man,” Kaven said which made Anton roll his eyes.
“Then why did you attack him?” Fenix said while snorting.
Kaven laughed awkwardly and made some lame excuses. After their talk, Anton and Fenix said their goodbyes since it was getting late, and Fenix had to guide him back to the inn.