Jasper was understandably surprised by the extremely short notice he was given, but did not complain. Neither did the Ogs. Their de-facto manager had decided to make the demolition request the night before and was just talking about it with the others when Fifteen showed up. As such, they were more than ready to comply and the lot of them were out of the house within ten minutes. Seemed as though they really didn’t have much in the way of personal belongings and just stuffed their clothes and such in whatever container they had laying around – sacks, crates, barrels, even a few buckets. Food and drink were kept in the basement that Fifteen reassured them would remain intact, so there was no need to worry about those. Even if they vacated the premises ahead of schedule, the wizard stayed true to her word and insisted on waiting the full hour before she got busy. As she suspected, the northlanders – all nine of whom were brothers or cousins, apparently – started remembering little things they’d left behind. Each of them ran in to get something at least twice, including Jasper, but that was just a minor distraction for them.
Most of the time the lads just crowded around Fifteen and bothered her with those idiotic questions she so dreaded. The usual suspects like ‘Can you teach me magic?’ and ‘Can you turn me into a frog?’ were there, but the northlanders also mixed in some of the most unhinged things she’d heard in a long while. Like what flavor her flames were, or whether their butts would explode if she lit their farts. Trying to come up with answers that were both accurate and simple enough for them to understand was quite difficult, and as the hour dragged on, Fifteen found she rather enjoyed the challenge. Making lemonade out of lemons, and all that. Despite her best efforts, however, she was forced to admit defeat with an ‘I don’t know’ when Brog asked if she could fly by repeatedly exploding herself. That was some surprisingly spicy food for thought. She’d never considered using her flames as a form of propulsion before, and as suicidal as that idea seemed on the surface, she felt it was worth exploring. Such experiments would have to wait. The hour-long deadline was up, and it was time to get back to work.
First, the ten onlookers had to pull back to a sufficiently safe distance and take cover behind some solid rocks poking out of the ground. If Fifteen did her part right, there’d be a lot of flaming debris. She intended to send them flying away from herself and her clients, but there were no guarantees when dealing with the magic she intended to unleash. Her plan was to perform a series of successive incantations that fed into each other to achieve power levels that would otherwise be impossible. Within the wizarding community, this technique was known as a grand spell, and executing it was no simple matter. Layering incantations made it much more likely to lose control of the spell, which usually meant all of its energy would be reflected unto the caster as feedback.
That was precisely why Fifteen had never attempted her grand spell during live combat. Or much at all, really. She wouldn’t have even learned it if she had anything better to do in her off-time during her last few years as an apprentice at her magic academy. Since then she only ever busted it out whenever she felt the need to show off, as if a grand spell was nothing more than a party trick. The last time she used this multi-part incantation was a year ago when she blew the chimney clean off the guild’s stove facility back in Cherrytown, and she’d be lying if she said she wasn’t curious to see how much she’d grown since. Indeed, this was a rare opportunity to wreck something just because she could, and she’d be lying if she said she wasn’t going to enjoy it. She wouldn’t dare make a habit of it, but Indulging in her inner fire’s destructive impulses was fine once in a while.
So, with no small degree of anticipation, Fifteen planted two of her disposable staves in the soil around her feet and grasped a third. Next, she enacted the secret arcane amplification ritual of the Order of Ash, drawing a circular geometric pattern of light that hovered parallel to the ground at ankle height. She gave the formation a few seconds to finish fanning the flames of her inner fire. As the cloud of dark smoke emerging from her own searing flesh wrapped around her, she did her best to ignore the pain and focus on the first incantation.
“Ignum fortis decantus quatris.”
She tapped the rod in her hand against one sticking out of the ground, causing the former to explode into a burst of embers while the latter was wrapped in a coat of solid flame. Normally it was a bad idea to use the fourth fire form like this. There wasn’t much point in imbuing a weapon with magical flames if it was too hot to handle. Indeed, the way the snow at the base of the burning staff instantly started to sizzle and boil betrayed just how hot that blackening rod of wood was. She only had seconds to make use of it, so she reached for the other spare before the ashen remains of the spent one had even hit the ground and turned her gaze skyward. A combination of urgency and mounting strain on her body caused her voice to raise in volume.
“Ignum expulso aetheris decantus dionis!”
Next came an incantation augmented by three separate metamagics, which was at the limit of the Sage’s current abilities. The significance of using so many words of power could not be understated, even if the theory behind each one was relatively simple. The first and last word signified which school of magic and what form within that school was being employed. In this case, ‘ignum dionis’ was ‘the second form of fire’ – a spell that conjured combustion with the intent of causing harm. ‘Expulso’ was the first metamagic, and it could broadly be interpreted as widening the spell’s area without reducing yield. ‘Aetheris,’ on the other hand, allowed the incantation to draw upon the heat of the celestial embodiment of fire – the golden light of the sun itself. The final metamagic, ‘decantus,’ prompted the amplification circle around her ankles to draw out double the amount of inner fire she’d normally be able to put into a single spell.
An astute observer would realize that all three metamagics added power to the spell in one way or another, and their combination was a sight that could be described as either awe-inspiring or apocalyptic, depending on one’s disposition. Most of the wizard’s audience leaned towards the former, given how loudly they cheered as a dense ball of golden flame appeared out of thin air and hurtled towards the ground. It trailed dense smoke and filled the air with a whistling howl as it fell, but Fifteen could not allow herself to gawk at it. Power was meaningless without direction, and she intended to give that dense lump of energy plenty of both. The sorceress discarded the second splintered staff and reached for the ignited third focus. Her palms and fingers screamed in protest even louder than usual, but she grit her teeth and did not let her grip slacken.
“Ignum! Simula! Decantus! Trionis!”
She couldn’t help but scream out each word of power as she invoked the last part of her grand magic. The dense sheath of concentrated heat wrapped around her staff shot forth and upward. The energy snaked its way through the air at a speed no mortal eyes could hope to track if not for the lingering orange afterglow. It pierced into the falling orb of solidified sunlight and added its power to it, tinting the sphere an ominous red that glowed so bright and vibrant it painted both the skies and the snow-covered ground in its crimson hue. It fell ever closer to its target, causing hot winds to scatter melting powder away from the lodge underneath. Indeed, now that it had descended this close to the structure, one could clearly see the cart-sized meteorite was about to land a direct hit.
This was not Fifteen’s intention as it would demolish the basement she was asked to spare. That was why that third incantation was so important. Even though it seemed to be over and the abused rod used to channel had turned to literal smoke, her control spell was still very much active. The Sage of the Sands reached up with both hands and grasped at the air as if seizing an invisible rope. Straining every mental, spiritual, and physical fiber of her being, she pulled on that non-existent thread with all she had. The immense lump of magic in the air yielded to her efforts and altered its course, turning ever-so-slightly to the right. Judging this a suitable trajectory, Fifteen relinquished control and gasped for air. Her part in this was over. All that was left was to let things play out and enjoy the show. She stood facing the blast zone with arms spread wide as she basked in the beautiful, terrible magic she had woven into existence simply because she could, with no regard if she should.
What followed was a ground-shaking, ear-splitting, lung-scorching, eye-blinding explosion many times the magnitude of Fifteen’s ‘opening statement’ from the day before. The point of impact turned into a spherical cart-sized crater as black as sin, and the soil within thirty paces was scorched dry as the desert. Anything even remotely flammable within a hundred meters just vanished outright, including the entirety of the lodge save for its stone basement and a few pieces of its foundation. An impossibly high, oddly mushroom-shaped cloud of smoke and debris rose rapidly over the epicenter, then hung heavily in the sky. The forest some half a kilometer away shuddered and shook as dozens of its mighty pines were completely stripped of cones, needles, and smaller branches by the gust of wind. The vanished structure’s residents were huddled up about halfway between the abused treeline and ground zero, and were in the throes of a premium dose of shell-shock. It took a solid minute before their senses returned to them, and it was only when the ringing thunder in their ears finally subsided that they were finally able to hear Fifteen.
“HAH HAH HAH! HAH HAH HAH HAAAH!”
However, her unusually loud voice carried not concerns for their safety, but a maniacal, gleeful laughter. By the sound of it, she’d been at it for a while even though she was much closer to the blast zone than the others, and she showed no signs of stopping.
“Miss mage?! Are you alright?!”
Jasper naturally called out to her, worried what such behavior entailed. His fears only deepened when she spun around on her heel. The blast had knocked loose much of her coverings, revealing skin that looked to be burned black with glowing red veins as if she had lava for blood. Though most of her face remained covered, the wide-eyed expression underneath that cloth was undeniably that of a madwoman. This sensation was reinforced by the way she had her arms stretched out to either side with open palms as if openly proclaiming this patch of blasted wasteland as her own domain. It was a claim no sane man who’d witnessed that display would dare to rebuke, especially with that massive smoke cloud looming overhead.
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“BEHOLD!” she shouted with immense vigor. “WITNESS MY POWER!”
What she just unleashed was the grand spell Meteor, and her mastery of it was what prompted the Order of Ash to bestow upon its Two Hundred and Fifteenth Acolyte the title of Torch-Bearer of Destruction.
“QUIVER AND QUAIL! BY MY HAND… the world… shall… ugh…”
Her manic episode ended rather abruptly, her words trailing off as she clutched her midsection, doubled-over, and struggled to stay on her feet. The fire in her veins died out and what seemed to be ice started forming on her burnt skin. Jasper knew a thing or two about mages – like how intoxicating and self-destructive their power could be – but he was still at an utter loss as to what to do. The nine big lads crowded around him were just as clueless. Thankfully, there was someone present who knew exactly what was going on. Bahm suddenly dashed past them, coat smoldering and blazing limbs kicking up hot mud with every step. He skid to a halt by Fifteen’s side just as she fell over his back like a sack of flour. He then turned around and ran off, doing his best to run as fast as he could without throwing her off and leaving the utterly befuddled peanut gallery to wallow in their confusion. Neither he nor his sworn sibling had the luxury of time to explain things.
To put it bluntly, Acolyte Two-Fifteen had fallen victim to hubris and underestimated just how taxing the grand spell actually was when invoked with not one, not two, but three ‘decantus’ metamagics. Indeed, this was the first time she’d ever dared to use the amplification ritual while invoking Meteor. If she tried that stunt a year ago, there was a good chance she’d have flattened not just the stove, but half the guild campus. There was no doubt she’d be excommunicated from the church and branded a witch if that happened, assuming she lived long enough to stand trial. Indeed, her past self would have expired for certain if her current capacity was just barely enough to handle the amplified Meteor without her passing out. It took quite a lot of effort for her to remain conscious, actually. As tempting as it was to just give in and go to sleep, she knew that carried the risk of never waking up, much like falling asleep in a blizzard. Thankfully, Bahm’s blazing pelt was nice and warm, allowing her body to regain a small measure of all that heat she expended. It kept her body temperature from plummeting to lethal levels long enough for them to reach that underground hot spring, at which point he dumped her into the deepest, hottest part of the basin.
It only took seconds for some feeling to return to her limbs, though she floated in the boiling bath for a solid minute or so before she finally pulled herself out. Looking down, she was surprised to find she was in much better shape than she expected. The latest batch of self-inflicted burns had healed up without any new scars to add to her considerable collection, and she wasn’t anywhere as exhausted as she thought she’d be. She even felt a spark of her inner fire that shouldn’t be there. Under the circumstances Fifteen had no choice but to conclude that the rare minerals in the water combined with the wild magic permeating the area to produce some kind of fast-acting restorative effect. The moist heat – for lack of a better term – that she sucked out of that greater steam elemental might have played a part as well.
Whatever the cause for this miraculous property, the guild would want to know about it. Human alchemy had always been the most advanced in the world, and even it couldn’t produce any medicines this potent or fast-acting. It was the closest thing she’d ever seen to the healing potions described in various fictional novels. Granted, there were whispers that such fantastical elixirs were in fact real and the church was simply keeping their existence under wraps, but there were a hundred conspiracy theories like that. Whether the wild claim was true or not, Fifteen felt it was her duty to report this to her superiors and had every intention to do so. She also diligently collected a sample of spring water in a small bottle specifically designed to handle magical substances. The container was lined with lead – a material completely resistant to magic – and would hopefully preserve whatever wild mojo gave the water its curative properties. Assuming it did indeed have any, and her quick recovery wasn’t simply a sign that her heat deprivation wasn’t as bad as it seemed. Indeed, thinking logically, that was the most plausible explanation since she only felt ill once the breeze picked up and buffeted her exposed skin with the cold mountain air. If not that, then the next most likely culprit was her familiar-enhanced constitution, assuming she wasn’t just imagining that.
She’d get those answers in due time. For the moment, she waited until her robes dried off and went out to find Jasper. Fortunately, the man deduced where Bahm had brought Fifteen and met her halfway. She reassured him she was fine and asked him to forget that ‘psychosis episode’ she had right after casting Meteor. He seemed unconvinced, but didn’t press the issue and agreed to stay quiet about it. He signed off on the field job form, handed over the silver and jerky, and then they went their separate ways. Or so Fifteen intended, but both her and the northlander group were headed towards the village of Coleton at the base of the mountain, so they had to awkwardly tolerate each other’s company for a while. On the bright side, the guys showed her the path they normally used to traverse the mountain. It was a much more winding route than the beeline approach she and Bahm took on their way up, but it was safer and circled well around that roc’s territory. Naturally, it being entirely downhill made the trip faster even if it was longer.
Fifteen parted ways with Jasper and the Ogs at the village. She spent the night at the same inn she used before and woke up feeling refreshed, but also a little disappointed. Hot baths were a rare luxury, so depending on the sample results and how Jasper’s ‘resort’ idea worked out she might come back to the Armal Mountains for her next vacation. Definitely booking a carriage in that case. Such idle thoughts occupied her while she set out on the long trek to Cherrytown with a spring in her step. To call this expedition more productive than the Ascot Village fiasco was an understatement of heretical proportions. She secured a good amount of profit, pushed her limits in various ways, got to flex her magical muscles for the first time in a long while, and made a potentially revolutionary discovery. Oh, and she strengthened her bond with Bahm, both in the magical and personal sense. The fact that he carried her on his back without complaint or back-sass meant a lot to her, and gave her hope that her earlier fantasy of riding into battle in style might come true after all.
However, this trip had one more surprise in store for Fifteen, and it was a nasty one. It happened on the third day of the return trip, just after the wizard and her familiar broke camp and started walking. The afternoon was shaping up to be a miserable one already. The good mood from a few days ago had all but given way to the drudgery of foot travel, and those heavy clouds in the distance were rolling in awfully fast. A storm was almost certain to hit soon. In fact, Fifteen could hear the thunder coming in already.
“… Wait, what?”
The wizard stopped and looked around. Why was that booming noise coming from the clear sky behind her instead of the dark clouds in front? She had a bad premonition as she looked up, and sure enough, there she was. Dressed like a professional grappler turned prostitute, with a cocky grin on her face and with absolutely no regard for other people’s peace and quiet – Azyra Stormblood was making her dramatic entrance. Normally Fifteen wouldn’t be all that upset by this sight since she was used to her rival dropping in unannounced like this. However, something was different this time around. Though she was flying to show off like usual, Azyra wasn’t using either her magic or her ridiculously proportioned staff to do so.
She was riding a roc.
A suspiciously familiar, white-chested, red-winged, blue-headed roc.
“GWAAAAK!”
A familiar roc– No, a roc familiar that squawked loudly as it zoomed past just overhead, kicked up a bunch of dust into the pyromancer’s face, and continued speeding off towards the horizon.
“See you in town, loooooseeeeer!”
Azyra naturally did not pass on this opportunity to taunt and belittle her fiery counterpart while leaving no chance for a retort.
“That… bitch.”
A rare, whispered swear passed Fifteen’s lips. She instantly knew what was going on. Just as she suspected, that insufferable loudmouth tried to poach the steam elemental bounty from her. Azyra must have arrived at Armal Mountains a day or two after the Sage left, then ascended using the direct air route, which was how she bumped into that stupid bird. There was no doubt the roc was bullied into submission and then somehow forced to become the wind mage’s familiar. She never had one before – at least, none that Fifteen knew of – and only got that one because she was jealous of Bahm. The saber-tooth sensed something along those lines had happened even without mental hints from his partner, and was just as irked that someone would so brazenly and thoughtlessly copy such a bond.
On the bright side, the loudmouths would have scoured the mountains for a lodge and its residents only to find a scorched crater with nobody around. Knowing Azyra, she probably came to some erroneous conclusion and was speeding back to the guild to snitch on Fifteen. She’d be in for a taste of her own foot once the Sage of the Sands returned with the relevant paperwork. Then the loudmouth would insist the signatures were faked and the guild would have to waste two weeks of some poor sap’s life confirming the details. This would only land Azyra in even deeper trouble, not just for falsely reporting a colleague but also for wasting guild resources.
In short, Fifteen’s nemesis had not only wasted her time, but would invite further misfortune upon herself in some misguided attempt to one-up the Sage. This was a good thing, and a near-certainty. The coerced familiar would flee from her the first chance it got, as well. Objectively looking at it, there was only one ‘winner’ in this situation, and it definitely wasn’t Azyra. That being the case, why did her parting quip get under Fifteen’s skin so easily? The answer was simple. It was because she had to walk like a pleb while the loudmouth flew home in style even though she was, as previously stated, the objective loser in this situation. That injustice was utterly infuriating. So much so, in fact, that the pyromancer had a sudden and drastic change of heart. Rather than taking it easy for a while, she would spend every waking moment from now on perfecting the technique Brog unintentionally hinted at.
Acolyte Two-Fifteen vowed she would become the first fire mage capable of self-sustained flight, or die trying.