Slowly I got up looking around the cave, it was pretty bleak honestly. A roughly fifty foot circle, rough walls leading up to the dark circle I knew was the illusion above me but it looked solid now. It had held up when the people searching above had walked around on it, was it really an illusion? On instinct I focused on my eyes and the magic inside me filled them letting me see the spell above me. I didn’t understand it but could tell it was a complex formation of some sort. Someone had spent a lot of time on that formation, it was far too complex for me to understand.
While I had my eyes working I scanned the walls again to be sure I didn’t miss anything. I caught the faint glow of another formation across from me, another door. Walking slowly toward it, I wondered if I could open it. When I approached the door with my eyes still studying it it flickered when I reach out to it, letting my hand pass through it. Nothing for it, I stepped through the door and suddenly my legs didn’t work, pushed my energy to far with my eyes again. The floor was very comfortable I’ll just stay here for a minute and collect my thoughts.
Once I recovered enough to stand I looked around the new area. Then I blinked and looked around again, it looked like a home. If I wasn’t hallucinating the room I was in was a living room of some sort. There was a small kitchen to the left with a dining area in front of it, across from the dining area was a small library with two complete bookshelves full of books. Right in front of me was a comfortable living room, everything was nicely appointed and comfortable looking. It took me a second to realize I could see clearly, this place was light by magic stones in the ceiling.
Wandering into the kitchen I noticed several runes around the room, I was about to start fiddling with the runes when I noticed a note sitting on the counter.
Too whom it may concern:
Stop dawdling in the kitchen and start reading the journal on the desk by the bookshelf.
A.M
Okay aside from being a bit creepy it told me someone expected this to happen. That wasn’t a bit unnerving, no not at all. I did listen to the note and ignored the kitchen to go read the journal, though once I saw it that got amended to start reading it. The journal was a massive book, at least two inches thick. There was a ring sitting on top of it but I just set it off to the side for now then flipped open the book.
Glad you got the note, welcome to my 132 secret getaway location. I am assuming you also found the ring on top of the book? You should put it on and infuse it with a bit of your energy. Are you still reading instead of doing this? Stop and do it…I’ll wait.
All of the script below that seemed to wriggle and wave about making them unreadable. With no other options I picked up the ring and examined it. It was a simple black ring with a simple silver engraving on the top. It took me a few minutes to recognize the engraving, it was an elegant C/S. There was nothing for it if I wanted to continue I pushed some of my energy into the ring and felt it adjust to my ring finger automatically. I felt a bit of foreign magic push into me, it wasn’t oppressive but it was so strong I couldn’t deny it either. Something about it wove in with my magic, it wasn’t bad but it felt like some sort of binding. I looked down at the ring and caught the text out of corner of my eye, it had quit writhing and I could read it easily. The first line explained so much, both good and bad.
Sorry about that but I needed to bind you a bit. Deal with it, because even if you cut off your finger the binding would still stay. As to why I had to bind you? Well that’s a story but the king and short of it is this.
If you made it this far you have the shards to become a true mage. I don’t know how long it took for someone to get here with the prerequisites but it could be two hundred years or longer considering the rarity of shards. That’s my guess anyway, once the kings started hunting dragons they doomed this realm and did it knowingly. They know the shards are created by them, foolishly they think it will allow them to control the magic and by that the world. I only found out about this by accident, all of the kings are involved. All of them, every race agreed to this. Most of the higher nobility is in on it with them. As I am writing this they are hunting the last of the wild dragons. What they don’t know is that their captive dragons are dying, dragons are far too strong to survive the bindings they have them under.
About now if your newly Bourne (and archaic term for when your shards are absorbed) you’re wondering what you’re supposed to do about this? Back to the binding.
I have bound you to this place for now, once you finish your training you can go and hopefully do the mission. What mission you may ask? There are a few parts to it…
First…remove the nobility who planned this all. To be clear remove means kill.
Second …free any dragons they may still control. They may all be dead but if not free them.
Third…access the clutch of eggs I have managed to secure and birth the dragons to renew the world. Yeah this will have a catastrophic effect on the domain but it will eventually balance itself.
That’s it three little things, now once your binding is released you could always just ignore me and run off to dominate the world your call.
Now to the good news, the ring will give you complete access to this place and my other hideouts, you’ll learn about those during your training. The kitchen is stocked with food to last years, in case you’re a slow learner. There is hot and cold running water, in both the kitchen and bathrooms. I have left a good number of outfits in the armoire in the bedroom, they are all enchanted to auto size and self clean and repair.
Once the rings binding is undone it’s also a rather spacious storage ring and should allow you to take all you need from here. The one rule is if your haven’t read it, you can’t take it. So pay attention to the books. The enchantments on this and my other places will easily last beyond time so there is not worry about that, the formations are powered by the ley lines. No one will make it passed the barrier now that it’s allowed you in, the ring is your key. Remember that the ring is important, don’t loose it.
More of this journal will open as you learn, it will have assignments and offer unique ways to train. Now go fiddle about, eat something and get some rest.
A.M
Well damn, looks like I’m a hermit now. Who the hell was this A.M? His magic was powerful but the knowledge it would have taken to create all of this was the terrifying part. How much planning had gone into this and how had I gained my shards if I couldn’t get in here without them? Then my mind replayed everything, the sharp stabbing pain had come before the illusion. The people searching for shards, all of it clicked into place. I had fallen onto the shards, that must have been dropped in transport at the right time for them to be absorbed. Not the most pleasant way of doing it, you know falling twenty feet onto them, but it worked. How had all of this come about, it was too much to accept as simple luck.
The kitchen was exactly as stated, it was well stocked with food. Food that was way better than anything I normally ate. The drawers turned out to spacial storage, the preserved things perfectly. Thankfully there was some prepared meals with recipes so I could learn to prepare my own over time without starving or eating burnt good food. All that meant that dinner was amazing, currently I was slouched on one of the couches suffering from a full stomach for the first time in years.
After an hour of sitting there trying not to be sick I finally felt like I could move. I got up first to find the bathroom, and froze in the door. The bathroom was almost as large as the kitchen, a massive tub filled one side with runes did I cared to hot and cold water. There was also several I didn’t recognize but managed to work out that they dealt with the multiple shower heads. I had never had anything so luxurious in my life, hell I hadn’t even seen anything like this. I peeled off everything and immediately climbed into the tub. Another hour was lost just enjoying all the bells and whistles, when I discovered the water jets in the tub a moan escaped my lips.
I did finally make it out of the bathroom but lacking my clothes. This wasn’t an oversight on my part they had disappeared. Exploring the bedroom finally I again found myself standing dumbfounded in the door. The bedroom was massive, a bed fit for a king held center court bracketed by nightstands on either side with mage lights. The armoire stood off to the left standing at least eight feet tall, when I opened it I found my clothes. They had either been cleaned and placed here or had been recreated by some magic I didn’t understand, yet.
There was a massive fireplace opposite the bed with full bookcases one on either side. Two comfortable chairs sat with a small table between them in front of the crackling fire. The thing that took my breath away was the window. It was massive and looked like I was hundreds of feet in the air. The view of the wilds was breath taking, even in the night I felt like I could see for miles. I didn’t understand how this could exist, I was underground wasn’t I? The only answer I had was magic fuckery, oh how accurate that statement was.
The massive window turned out to be an door. It could be slide back to open onto a small balcony, well small compared to the bedroom. It was large enough to easily hold the table and chairs that filled one side and the two lounge chair opposite them. When I walked outside and rested on the railing I realized how serious the magic fuckery was. This wasn’t an illusion, I was hundreds of feet up in that looked like a tree. The balcony literally grew from its trunk on a branch, the railing I was leaning on was living wood. I could feel the energy of the world moving though it.
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Somehow I had been transported to this dwelling from the ground and it had happened without me knowing it. The wind outside was crisp but warm, I left the door open as I walked back to the armoire to find something to sleep in. I never made it, falling into the bed was like landing on clouds. Before I knew it I had burrowed into the blankets and was out like a light, my body telling me it still needed more rest.
The next morning I crawled out of the bed to the sounds of life outside the still open door. Bird song and the softly singing wind was a pleasent way to come back to the world. The sun told me I had slept far past morning, but my morning needs drive me to the bathroom before I could get lost in the view. Once that was done I found some comfortable looking clothes and wandered toward the kitchen. Breakfast was lighter than the night before, simple eggs, bacon and biscuits with coffee. I can’t tell you how my heart sang at seeing the black liquid stored in pitchers, especially when I took on out and found it hot and fresh. I sat at the table eating and reading the now revealed neat penmanship.
Your first assignment is reading the first three books and absorbing thier information. The first book is “magic basics” it’s just there to familiarize you with the concepts we will be using. The next two are spells that will help with the rest, the first is “mental acuity” it will let you retain the knowledge you read. You MUST read the first book before using the spell so that your mind throughly understands the magics involved. The second spell is “knowledge absorption” it will let you read and absorb knowledge at 10x the normal rate, obviously this one is so you’re not trapped here for a hundred years.
Learning those two spells will exhaust you, use the last one laying down, it’ll help you avoid back pain.
A.M.
He was right, I finished the book by early evening, the second spell I absorbed on the couch. That’s where I woke up the next morning.