CHAPTER 11 - I’VE MASTERED THEM ALL

Roeg-Hiam parted with the Silver Wing Guild, they were headed to the same destination but he wasn't going to be kind enough to offer them a ride.

He carried on his journey, rambling from place to place.

During this time he installed and networked a Korra Core in his Airship. As soon as he finished she materialised her Avatar and expressed her delight to be traveling with him. Fortunately the co-pilot took care of the ship while they were occupied.

Magister Roe arrived in Alstroemeria capital city of Bitalistan, the city was massive and built along a serene lake. Forests gave way to farmlands which in turn gave way to suburbs before you got to the city proper. Aside from frequent patrols the guards only made their presence felt at the massive moat and city wall that separated the inner and outer city. There they city guardsmen carried out inspections and charged a toll for entry. A wide class system was evident.

The wall had many enchantments including a flight restriction. Over the outer city Airships and Sky Skimmers moved about freely but only a few flying the Royal Crest's flag could be seen over the inner city. While studying the city during his approach Roe realised why some restrictions may be a good idea. The skies over outer Bitalistan were a free-for-all. He witnessed no less than 3 different collisions in the space of a few breaths and had a few near misses himself. The close calls made up Roe's mind, he landed his Airship and stored it in his Realm before mounting an enchanted carpet and floating leisurely into the city just above walking height.

Most businesses were located along the wide Main Roads so he had no problem finding an inn by asking around. The inn he chose was highly recommended, a place where patrons don't have to worry about having their throats cut and items stolen while they slept. 'The Feather Arms' was located 3 streets away from the inner city wall's main gate, it was 6 stories tall, took up the entire block and business was booming.

It was still early in the afternoon but Roe decided he would go and register himself at the Magic Tower, which was located in the Inner City, tomorrow.

Roe had a hearty lunch and decided to wander the city working his way around the main roads checking out businesses and looking for a potential location for his future store. He found a few likely areas and spoke to the landlords to compare prices and amenities. By dusk he was all the way to the lake docks.

The docks were bustling, work here never stopped. Although no ships departed nor made land during the night, buying and selling of cargo was the most fierce during these hours. Many ships left with the morning tide and those crewmen lucky enough to get shoreleave made the most of it, as such it hardly took any effort for Roe to find a brothel.

There was a weapons check at the door before entering a dark smoky room with pulsing music, a bar and women dancing on stages or flirting with customers.

Roe found an empty booth and took a seat. He ordered a drink from petite beastkin waitresses and waited for a girl to come to him. The waitresses returned and found Roe still sat alone. 15 minutes passed, Roe was finishing his second drink when the beastkin waitresses passed to collect his glass.

"Another one mister?" She asked, her voice was a little horse. Roe looked up and studied her for the first time. He had seen many beastkin before they had a wide range from fully animalistic to barely noticeable. His waitresses fell right in the middle. In his old world she would have been the classic dog girl trope.

She had orange long hair with a fully human face but no human ears, instead she had very expressive dog ears on her head. Her hands were padded, her shaped fingernails actually claws. Her forearms and outer thighs were lightly furred, the rest of her showed normal skin. Around her neck was a magical iron collar, she was a slave. Roe looked around the room, all the females here wore those collars.

Roe returned his attention to his waitresses despite her beautiful face, she wasn't healthy. Just from moving about the bar she was short of breath, her skin was wan, her fur mottled and she constantly suppressed a cough. Roe used magic eyes and saw her body wracked with disease, he was surprised she was still standing.

"Most of the girls are with their regulars, but I'll find someone to send over." She continued.

"Don’t bother." Roe replied. "Bring me a bottle, ice, two glasses and yourself."

The waitresses was taken aback.

"As you can see sir I'm not well, I've been taken out of the rotation, so I don't infect the patrons."

"There are healing potions to fix your ailments."

"You are obviously a kind master, if I were an Elf they may have considered it but for a lowly beastkin like myself. I'm not worth it."

"Well I'm willing to pay to drink with you and as a slave you are in no position to complain, hurry with my drink. And bring something sweet to mix it with." Roe commanded.

She smiled at him sweetly, it was obvious this Lord had taken pity on her. She went quickly to the pit boss to let him know that someone else had to cover her tables since a patron wanted her drink with him.

Her name was Constance, she was naturally playful and she and Roe had a great time telling jokes, stories and singing songs.

It had been a wonderful evening and he promised to visit again.

***

The following morning Roe rose early, dressed in his best Mages robes, checked out of the inn and headed into the inner city.

The price to enter the inner-city was preposterous, ten gold coins.

Fortunately for Roe he had been wealthy for a while and his fortunes were only growing. He paid and asked for directions to the Mage's Tower. With a name like Tower you would imagine it would be easy to find but there were many tall buildings in this city, he could see at least 5 different skyscrapers from the inner Plaza past the wall. The guard gave Roe a friendly smile and accurate directions. He actually refused the Silver coin Roe offered as a tip.

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From where Roe started the Alstroemeria magic tower was the second skyscraper on the left. It was the only one that was all white and seemed to have no windows.

Roe quickly found the building and was surprised to notice there was no entrance. Flicking his magical sight on, the building changed before his eyes. What had seemed a solid stone edifice was actually marble and glass. A modern looking office building.

Roe saw wizards entering and leaving while cloaked in one form of invisibility or another. So he did the same and walked in the automatic sliding doors. Upon entering the building Roe felt his invisibility magic get nullified.

The vast lobby led to a series of golem dolls acting as clerks. Roe read the various instructions carefully until he found the counter marked new registration.

“Greetings Magister.” The golem intoned. “Which field of magic is your major?”

“I’ve mastered them all.” Roe replied. His research had uncovered that mastery in ten or more magic fields would let him apply for the title of Grandmaster.

There were literally more fields of magic than letters in the alphabet. The golem gave him a magic slate.

“Answer as many of these as you can and your aptitude in the subject area will be assessed.” Roe took the slate and sat in one of the comfy chairs arranged artfully around the room.

He quickly went down the line of subjects and answered everything. He made sure to not elaborate more than was necessary, after all he wasn’t here to start a magic revolution. Roe also skipped everything to do with premonition or fortune telling, he found that type of magic truly distasteful, every time you looked into the future you killed possibilities. It was best just to be in the now.

It took Roe about an hour and a half to finish with his slate. He returned it to the same golem doll who placed it into a thin slot and then asked him to put his hand on a crystal ball to read his Mana reserve. The golem then charged him two platinum bars, handed him a crystal membership card and congratulated him. The golem explained how the card could be used as a communication device, it had a mapping function, and would allow him access to both the mage tower’s library and the Mage tower bank.

“Anything you put in your card will be instantly transported to your personal vault. Additional cards are available for purchase for two platinum bars each.”

Roe dropped his blood on the card to bind it. When a magic item was bound it could not be used by anyone else and if stolen returned to its master. Roe took out 100,000 platinum bars from his Realm and put them in his card before looking over his information.

NAME: MAGISTER ROE

TITLE: ARCHMAGE

RANK: SSS CLASS

ACCESS: FULL

DISCOUNT: 10%

FUNDS: 100,000 PLATINUM BARS

CONTACTS: 0

‘It’s a book reader, satellite map, communication device and a bank card all rolled into one, like a Smartphone.’ Roe thought. He would have to make a transfer device like this for Laureline so she could access the Realm vault the way he did, without having to constantly return to the Realm. As it was now she had many chests of gold and jewels in the Airship’s vaults so the issue could wait.

Roe was finally able to register his sigil, the mark he’d put onto all of his creations, every enchanter had one, an appraiser could easily identify the magic in it, registering at the Magic tower gave them a standard to test against.

With his tasks done Roe turned to leave the tower when his new Magic card ‘rang’. The ID said Grandmaster Callum. Roe quickly puzzled out how to answer the device.

“Hello, Magister Roe speaking.”

“Archmage Roe, please don’t leave yet my name is Callum I’d like to give you a tour of the facilities and to meet the other top Mage’s in the Kingdoms. Just hold on I’m almost there.”

Roe returned to his seat and waited. A white haired man burst into the lobby and looked around frantically. Roe rose from his seat and approached him.

“Grandmaster Callum I presume.” Roe reached out to shake the man’s hand. Callum froze in disbelief.

‘He’s so young.’ Callum thought. Roe glanced at his unshook hand and let it drop. That glance brought Callum out of his contemplation and he lunged to shake Roe’s hand.

“Forgive me Archmage, I did not expect you to be so young.”

"Hopefully my results spoke loud enough." Roe replied.

"They did, they did! Please follow me." Cullum lead Roe through the tower, he first showed him the bank vaults. It was a pocket dimension with hundreds of thousands of vaults.

"I don't think they are this many Mages on the planet." Roe commented.

"Oh no, we offer our banking services to anyone for an annual fee, only Mages get access to our library and the 10% discount at our partner stores. Those stores get to wave our annual fee, a 5% discount at their fellow partner stores and post jobs directly with the Mage Tower." Callum enlightened Roe while they moved on to the other levels.

In the tower there was a cafeteria, a gym, laboratories, testing rooms, dormitories and offices. Everything a Mage needed to survive. They even had a fast travel teleportation booth that connected the other Mage Towers.

Their final stop was a greenhouse on the top floor where magical plants were grown. There were 14 Mages waiting for them in a gazebo at the centre of the garden. There were Human Wizards, Dwarven Forge Masters, Elven Sorcerers, Beastkin Shamans and even a Drow Alchemist. Roe had no doubt that they had mastered more than their race's initial magical inheritance. Every person here was at least a Grandmaster.

"Greetings Magis and Magisters, is this some form of Conclave?" Roe asked. The group exchanged looks before a young looking Elf male replied.

"Well we are not recognized as such officially, but we are the most powerful members of the Mage Tower organization. I am Archmage and founder Eclinon. In the 500 years we've been open you are the first Archmage to join." Roe looked around noticing a few others as powerful as Eclinon. Everyone noted those Roe looked to. One of them, a red bearded dwarf, chuckled at how perceptive Roe was.

"We all became Archmages after joining the tower and having access to the Mage Tower’s library." The dwarf named Gemeye clarified. Silent understanding blossomed on Roe's face.

"Come sit with us Archmage Roe, we've gathered from around the kingdoms to hear your story." Callum spoke again leading the way to the table.

Roe joined them for refreshments while he spun a tall tale of finding a pyramid and being sucked into a pocket dimension library. He told them that he was chosen to inherit the Legacy of the Archmage Merlin, how time was of little consequence in the library but he could not leave until he passed a final exam and should he fail he would be killed. Roe elaborated how he studied every subject inside and out for what felt like millennia before he believed he could learn no more and took the deadly exam. He continued his tale with a triumphant exit from the pyramid library which vanished behind him, before concluding with a return to the Kingdoms and the discovery that nearly a century had passed.

His audience expressed their envy over his opportunity before a few of them thought to offer some condolence on any loss of family he may have occurred. A few others expressed their admiration for Archmage Merlin who had left such a wonderful Legacy behind.

With Roe's tale now told the conversation spread over many topics. Roe was able to do more business than he expected, through these new contacts he got a lead on a building for sale outside of the City wall but on the main road, which he would scout in the morning. He also got to know what kind of items other magic users in the city sold. Roe had no problem with competition but decided to avoid doing so with the unofficial Conclave of the Mage Tower.

The Mages spoke late into the night and Archmage Eclinon showed Roe to the Apartment his high ranking afforded him.

Early the next morning Roe headed out to meet the owner of the shop for sale. It was an older couple who once ran a store from the location and lived on the floor above but they were looking to retire with their son and his family in another Kingdom. Roe paid them their asking price with no haggling and the overjoyed elders left that same afternoon. Roe used the time between to once again wander the city. He found some city guardsmen and engaged them in conversation over lunch gaining some insight as to the districts and people to avoid. He paid for their meals and left first, returning to his now vacant building.

With the elderly couple gone Roe planned the layout for his enchanted equipment store, ‘Archmage Roe’s Emporium'. The Archmage title would draw wealthy customers like flies.

The building had two stories and it had seen better days, it was sandwiched between bigger, grander complexes but it's location on the main street was ideal.

For what he had to do next Roe needed his privacy so he built an anti-scrying formation. This would work similar to the Dragon Rule 4: Unhindered, the difference between blocking a Gods' watching with a formation and using the Dragon Rules was the formation was localized to the building or room it was in and the often watching Gods could see you create it. Seeing a human Wizard build an anti-scrying formation before no longer being able to see into his or her building was perfectly logical and needed no further scrutiny.

With the formation up Roe activated his Dragon Rules. As a Mage he could achieve a lot but through the Dragon Rules he could do exponentially more and in a shorter time.

He changed his new building, starting with reinforcing it, adding magical circles throughout the walls and floors. He used his Mana mastery to make some rooms bigger on the inside and used pocket dimensions to add a basement and a space between the 1st and 2nd floor. It was a true Magical Fortress like the Mage Tower. With a department store on the ground floor, his laboratories in the basement, business offices and meeting rooms on the 1st floor and living quarters on the 2nd floor.

Roe added a door to his Realm in his living quarters, installed a Korra Core to control his new base and many Golem dolls of the Porcelain design to act as servants.

Everything was set, he sent out invites to the guilds who had branches in the capital city as well as all the Nobel houses in Bitalistan for his Grand Opening at the beginning of the next week. When Roe received a call.

It caused an uproar in the magical society when everyone received word that the new Emporium was going to be delayed for another 3 months.

Eclinon and the other mages close to Roe were curious as to the delay but Archmage Roe's simple response was.

“Family business.”