{Alex}

The next morning, I woke with the sun and got dressed. After a poor breakfast, I made my way through the town to what could almost be an airlock. On either side of an open area were two massive doors. It looked like two of the Knights were needed to open and close them. Given the size I had to wonder what they were trying to keep out. I found Captain standing next to one group of covered wagons and a beautiful red Knight. I started drooling as I looked it over. A thousand questions started flying through my mind. The squared cubed law, what did it use for fuel? What was the cockpit like? What were the controls? I would keep going, but my mind went a little blank as I drew closer. It was a thing of beauty. I was already going over changes I could make to the frame, joints and so much more. I needed to get a notepad and pen soon. Maybe I had died on my way to crank one out and wound up in heaven. Halthos clapped me on the back and made me look away from that masterpiece. I wanted to hit him for that but needed to behave. “Good lad you made it.” He crowed at me. “Let’s Introduce you to the everyone else.” He showed me around to a bunch of faceless background fodder. Only two aside from that red beauty stood out. Gotrat is a mage. He was a young fellow in a blue robe that seemed far too large for his skinny frame. He wore oversized glasses and seemed to be stuck in a book, short ill-kept silver hair sat on his head. He merely waved at us as Captain introduced us. Step two found. The other one who caught my eye was a huge woman. She had to be over six feet tall and had dark stripes over her well-toned body. Rounded tiger ears poked out of the top of her head and a long-striped tail waved behind her. She had a mane of long black wild-looking hair. I wondered what it would smell and feel like. She looked at me with dark hazel eyes, sniffed, blushed, and looked away. Her chest was modest, and she had an iron collar with two iron links dangling from the front. I think I just met my first slave and damn she was hot as hell in that tight leather armor. She turned to me sniffed again and looked away. If anything could take my eyes off that Mech would be this muscle goddess. Maybe it had been too long for me? “Strange she normally doesn’t act that way around humans. This is Yen. She is our muscle.” I smiled and held out my hand.

“And what amazing muscles they are.” She looked at me, sniffed again, and looked at the ground.

“Nice to meet you, young master.” She was shy as hell. Somehow that made her not just sexy, but cute at the same time. I was happy the shirt would hide my boner. I did have to look down to double check though. Some guys have more to be embarrassed about than others. I caught her looking down too and smiled.

“Yen, I hope to see more of you on our trip.” she blushed and bowed. Captain was eyeing me strangely as we walked to one of the covered wagons.

“I assume you don’t have provisions for our trip?” He asked with a smile. I knew where this was going. Time for the upsell.

“How much to rent a tent for the trip and remember you did say food was included in the price?” He frowned and swore lightly.

“I had hoped you had forgotten that. A tent rental is two silver for the trip. We also have a store you can look through for a change of clothes and so on for a price.” I nodded.

“The tent for now if you please.” He nodded and left me in the back with Gotrat who was still reading. The sound of grinding metal broke the peace and the wagon started moving. The wizard looked around and nodded before returning to his book. “Say, have you ever trained someone in magic?” He looked up at me, a weird look on his face, like he was only just now realizing he wasn’t alone.

“What?” I smiled at him. I hoped I looked friendly, but I have an evil smile. Not my fault just the way I was born.

“I just got here and have magic. I was wondering if you could help me learn to use it?” He placed a slip of paper in his book and moved his glasses up as he looked at me.

“What class and what is your magic score?” I saw that we were on a dirt path heading away from the city, groups of people were moving around us.

“Metal Magic and my magic number is four. If that means anything to you.” He frowned at me and then shrugged.

“Sorry. That means your mana is a joke. I’ve seen Metal Mages do some crazy shit, but if your mana is only sixteen, you may be able to sharpen swords, but that is about it. You’ll be useless in any fight.”

“Good, good. I don’t plan to fight.” He gave me a puzzled look at my words.

“Five silver to open your channels and another two to teach you magic. Fair warning this will hurt… a lot.” I nodded and handed the coins to him. He pocketed them and moved closer to me. “Remove your shirt.” I did so and he placed one hand on my chest and grabbed my left hand. Suddenly white-hot pain flooded through his palm and into my chest. The wave of lightning flowed through my body, and I just passed out. My last thought was well this sucks.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

I came to lying on the floor of the moving wagon. Gotrat was back to reading. I sat up and wished I hadn’t. EVERYTHING HURT and mean everything. The sun had moved a bit and I knew I had been out for a few hours. I groaned and crawled back to my place. It was a herculean task just to put my shirt back on. What the hell had he done? I felt something strange move through my body. It was like there was now a small pool of something deep inside around my heart. I could actually feel this pool of something sending waves out through my veins. This something was moving through my hands, feet, and even into my brain. He looked over at me puzzled. “How do you feel?”

“Like dog shit, but that doesn’t matter. What is this something I feel now?” He closed his book and looked at me, his eyes wide with shock.

“You can already feel your mana?” A large goofy grin was on the young man’s face as his glasses slid down his nose. I nodded

“It feels like a fluid energy in my body. Like my blood, but not like that at all.” He beamed at me.

“By the great drakes brass balls, what are you?”

“Hungry and thirsty.” He nodded.

“Are you sure your magic was a four?” I nodded at him “You took like thirty points of mana to open your channels so I have to ask. What was your intelligence score?” He looked to be excited about something. I groaned rubbing my arms and neck.

“Twenty-seven. Is that good?” He just looked at me blankly.

“What kind of nightmare balance is that? That shouldn’t make any sense at all.”

“I’m not from around here,” I said waving my hand in the air. Mistake that still hurt like a bitch. I wonder if that cute tiger woman would give me a rub down if I asked nicely? Mind back on the prize Alex. Still on step two. Save getting friendly with women for later. He leaned in closer and looked me over, his eyes full of shock and excitement. “Back off a little. I’m not into guys. Not saying that there is anything wrong with that, just not my thing.” My resting bitch face was in full effect. He backed off and held his hands up.

“No no no. Are you saying you are a Wanderer?” I guessed that means ripped from my home world or whatever to be someone’s bitch.

“Yes.” I nodded. He started jumping up and down and nearly fell on his face. “Magic now if you please.”

“Yeah, but I have to know everything about you and your world.”

“I can tell you when we are a little further away from that place,” I said pointing a thumb over my shoulder. He moved back to his seat and beamed at me.

“Yeah, in the meantime I could hold up my end. You have to start by learning to feel your mana...” he trailed off and looked over at me shaking his head. “Right, next you have to learn to push your mana around your body.” I closed my eyes and pictured the flow. “Took me two months to even feel my mana. Fucking lucky bastard.” I smiled and started feeling the flow of it. It moved in waves and with just a nudge of my mind I could add to each wave going to a part of my body. It made the waves going elsewhere a bit less, but nothing too noticeable. “What the fuck?” I opened my eyes to see a small blue spark on my fingertips. “It took me a year to learn to do that. What the hell are you?”

“Yes, yes, I’m some great evil your people have told stories about or some shit like that. How do I use it?” He reached out handing me his glasses.

“Hold the area you want to affect in your hand and picture what you want to happen. These broke a while back and I had to use glue to fix them. Try to fix them using magic.” I saw the break on the bridge over where his nose would go and could actually feel the glue. It felt wrong. I pinched them between my sparking fingers and felt the metal singing to me. It wanted to be whole again. It missed being strong. Somehow, I knew it was a cheap brass and would break again. It needed something more.

“I need more metal or another type of metal.” He looked in amazement as he placed something in my other hand. It was a cute strongly singing tin. I pulled the zinc out and pushed the tin in at the same time. It turned the weak brass into bronze. This felt amazing. Once I was done, I handed the glasses back and fell on my face. The pool of what I now knew was mana was empty. A Picture formed in my mind as I lay passed out on the floor of the wagon.

NEW SKILL UNLOCKED: METAL SENSE. YOU ARE NOW ABLE TO FEEL THE METAL AROUND YOU AND KNOW WHAT IT IS MADE OF BY TOUCH.

I came to when it was nearly nightfall. The wagon had stopped and once I made sure all my stuff was still in place, I stood and got out of the wagon. It looked like everyone was setting up camp. I checked on my pool and found it to be almost half full. This magic stuff was great, but drained me. I saw my new mage friend talking with Captain. He seemed to be happy as he waved his arms at me. My body still hurt, but something about getting rid of what had to be extra mana had made me feel better. His glasses seemed to be staying in place and looked a bit shinier. I had done a good job on them. Should have charged him for turning them bronze. Then it hit me, I had done magic. I was a fucking metal mage. I walked up to the men with a huge smile on my face. Gotrat turned to me beaming. “How the hell are you up? You emptied everything you had.” I smiled and shrugged at him.

“Is that a bad thing?” He just looked at me dumbfounded.

“Yeah. Normally if you bottom out, you get sick for like a few hours.”

“I guess just another thing I have to hold over the magic-less folks.” I laughed and somehow it still sounded evil. Need to work on that or people may think I’m some dark lord or something. Captain just beamed.

“Good thing you are up. Dinner is almost ready.” I happily followed the two to the campfire roaring in the middle of the setup.

“Never bothered to ask, but how long will this trip take?” Captain smiled at me.

“About a month.” Good, plenty of time for me to get to know that sexy tiger I saw sitting on a log near the fire.