Chapter 1 - Errand Run
Malcolm POV
“So you’re a blacksmith?” The girl asked the young man sitting across the table from her. “Wow! That must a rough job.” She was wearing a simple yet well adorned white dress, clearly standing out from the plain clothes of all those around her in the city.
“Yeah, however every once and awhile I take time off to go town to town and enjoy the views, in fact there's a spectacular one right now.” He smiled and leaned his head on his arm. Blood rushed to her cheeks as she realized what he was saying.
“So do you have a job?” He bantered.
“Oh no,” she chuckled, “my father is a well known merchant, Talion Erastis. She puffed out her already quite well endowed chest and smiled proudly. “Really? I’ve heard alot about him. Nothing good thou. “Shush.” He said to the voice in his head.
“What's that?” She asked. He laughed reaching out his hand and touching her hand to distract her, “Oh nothing just talking to myself.”
“You’re weird.” They both laughed. He almost felt bad for the girl, the reason he was even here was because he had to get some more money for the metal for the order he had to fulfill. As he chatted her up some more, the meal came, the meal which he was paying for, but with money he had stolen from her wallet, he wasn’t telling any lies, he never told a lie unless he had too. Now, he may not tell the full truth, but he wasn’t lying.
He had finally moved the bag of money, through levitation, back into her pocket with a few coins so it would still hold its original weight. They continued to talk, he made sure that they did not talk about money though, or else she would check her pocket on instinct.
After the lunch ended, he payed for both his and the girl’s, whose name was Truth, meal and said goodbye. He threw his sack of money into the air and caught it several times, taunting any thieves foolish enough to follow, too little and they wouldn’t notice, to much and they’ll sniff a rat.
He casually walked into an alleyway, followed by two smiling hooded men.
Five Minutes Later
He walked back out of the alley way, unscathed, now holding two bags of coins. “I didn’t even have to pull my knife out,” He muttered. Weakings. The voice in his head said. “Oh don't be mean like that Xerek! We’re just too strong.” He counted the money he had now collected in total. 3 gold from the little missus, 25 silver and 89 bronze combined from the two thugs and some unsuspecting passerby. “This should be enough.”
He followed the dense flow of people and saw a sign with an anvil on it. He shoved his way over and eventually made his way into the store. As the bell above the door rang the old man at counter turned to face him away from the other man, who was like a younger version of the man next to him. “Malcolm!” “Greg! How's the city treating you.” “Not badly.” The old man was bald but had a thick red beard and his clothes were covered in soot and grease. The boy walked by all the shields and armor sets around him and moved straight to the desk and leaned down on it.
“Hows little Zoe doing?” The old man smiled while leaning down on the other side of the counter. “Oh she's doing fine, but you know you should be asking how I’m doing. That wench is a slave driver.” He said sighing. “She shoves me in the forge and locks the door to deal with my dad and get him out again.”
“Ah I remember when she was just a little girl and would practice swordplay with Richard when her parents were in town. Speakin’ of parents your Dad still doing okay.” The atmosphere suddenly got much thicker. “Yeah he still refuses to leave the forge. The fact he couldn’t protect mom from that spectre has got him stuck in that furnace of a building.” The boy passed a sheet of paper with his list of materials as well as the coins he had collected to pay for the materials. The old man passed the sheet to his son who read it and nodded and then walked back. “Well he is still the best in the business. Now I know this is a touchy subject but I think he's gotten better. Hell he’s able to make lesser enchantments now.” The boy sighed, “Oh I agree, I just wish he would take better care of himself.” The silence that ensued was deafening.
“W-well, does Zoe still have that silly dream of being a knight?” The smithy changed the subject to lighten the mood and it seemed to work. “Woah now if she hears you call “Her Destiny” silly, well, I’ll say something nice at your funeral.” They both laughed and the smith’s son walked in with a cart of all sorts of metal and wood. Despite it was a shoddy presentation this place had the highest quality materials for miles. “What’s my change?” Said the boy holding his hand out. The old man took a silver and a few bronze coins and handed them over to the boy who gave a questioning look. “What the hell is this?” “Your change?” “Hahaha” The boy said sarcastically. “The Military is ordering a ton of merchandise for their next set of knights and mages. Graduations coming up and soon it’ll be time for Admissions testing.” “Oh I know Zoe tells me every chance she gets. But come on old man, a discount for buying in bulk?” He shook his head. “For old times sake? For helping a friend? A fellow human being?” The old man laughed. “As shrewd as ever Malcolm.” The old man took a single copper coin from his drawer and gave it to him. “Oh you're hilarious.” The boy took the coins and threw them into his bag as he pulled out a storage ring and smiled at Greg.
“Could you please use this for me.” The old man laughed and walked around the counter and held the storage ring. The gem on it glew blue as all the materials slowly faded out of existence. “It must suck to have no mana at all.” “Oh it does believe me.” The boys eyes darkened. Gregory the smith gave him a small punch on the boy’s shoulder. “Hey that hurt!” “HAHA cheer up kid, you may be weak but you’ve got some downright crooked business habits, if you don’t take over the forge I’m sure you’ll do fine anyway. “Yeah yeah,” the boy muttered as he put back on the ring and massaged his shoulder. “See later Greg.” “See ya kiddo.”
As the boy exited the building he immediately stopped holding his shoulder and followed the main road towards the exit.
He noticed a suspicious amount of guards on duty in the city, most likely looking for him, he should sneak by. He brought out his hand and called for Xerek in his thoughts. Wait, the voice in his head said, I sense magic from those guards. “Hmm, They aren’t magicians so that only means…” Dolls. He smiled, “I hate puppet masters, they think there hot stuff but honestly they can just move some hunks of junk around.” But on the bright side we might have some fun. The boy smiled. “We’ll see.”
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Francis POV
Francis stood in the obsidian black room, a magic circle drawn on the floor. He had twenty wisps all around him, symbolizing the dolls he had roaming the city looking for the thug who beat up two men in an alley. He had enough information to know some of the features of the boy, like his height, hair color, and a few miscellaneous bits and pieces about what he was wearing. “Who wears black in Summer?” He thought. Francis was known as a great magician, even in the wizards inner circle, most magicians can only control seven, or maybe ten if they were talented and focused really hard, but he could summon fifteen without batting an eyelash. He was what was called a prodigy. None of his peers at the University had managed to defeat more than five of his dolls at a time. Certain magicians have talents as being a “Puppeteer”, a class of magician which uses alchemically created dolls. These dolls can be made of wood or even metal, however what matters most is a large piece of a Mana crystal in the middle which is the link between the Magician and the doll. While there are ranks of dolls, a powerful magician’s low tier doll could be just as strong, fast, and tough, as a weak magician’s high tier doll. His high tier dolls skin were stronger than steel and reflexes faster than humanly possible. He was currently on a tutelage trip from the University to this town because one of the most prominent magicians ever, Aldazar, lives here, but he hasn’t given Francis the life of day. He immediately sent him to the guards and told them to “use him however” so now here he is, with puppets around the city looking for some thug who beat up some guys in some alley. Entertaining. None of his peers had ever destroyed one’s heart, they may have disabled them but never destroyed one of his dolls. Ever. So why doesn’t he teach me!?
No one had been spotted yet; he was getting anxious. “Where is he?” he muttered. He suddenly felt a shock. He looked up at the wisps, and one extinguished. The shock of one being destroyed shocked him, but one of the guards standing in room watching yelled asking if everything was okay brought him back. How? Who the hell could have done this? He needed to know. He sent all the puppets to where the last was extinguished the wisps started glowing red, a strange sight for Francis. It is common knowledge for a wizard that the more red a wisp is, the stronger it is, however, his were never darker than a light purple, which is thought to be amazing talent, after all, but now they were red, which is a rare sight to see. But the only way they could do that is if either I or a third party gives them magic. Then he realized that his puppets couldn’t handle much more without overloading. So much mana! How?! He tensed his body as he tried to release the mana from the dolls, but there was too much added to quickly. He yelled at the guard in the room “GET THE CAPTAIN, THERE’S A ROGUE MAGE AND HE'S INSANELY POWERFUL!” Then, his wisps began to die. All of them disappeared, one by one, until the room was filled with only darkness.
Malcolm POV
I forgot just how skilled you are boy. The word boy sounded more like a name than a label. The boy smiled, “Flattery gets you everywhere with me, although we both know how little I actually am doing. All I need to do is release a small percentage of our magic and I can shatter the heart. They were a bit bigger than normal but nothing special.” Back in my day crystals were much stronger than this. It still amazes me how the world has changed. “Yeah I get it. You’re old.” I prefer “Aged”. It makes me sound like a fine wine. The boy chuckled but continued to walk calmly and headed towards the gate, a sack slung over his shoulder. He pulled an apple which he had bought with the meager “change” he had gotten back from the old man and took a bite. “Damn geezer, he thinks he can just cheat me like this?” Come on now we both know how much those materials will be worth when you make a sword out of them. “But still! I’ve gotta maximize profits you know?” Malcolm focus on getting out. The voice said, “But Xerek! I’m hungry!” Suddenly, the hairs on his neck stood up. “Xerek. Mask.” I know. A large amount of mana condensed in front of Malcolm’s face and turned opaque, creating a black mask without any adornments or even eye holes, just blank. The gates closed and a multitude of soldiers came out of the adjacent alleyways. They all lowered their spears, making a circle around him, so that he could not escape. However, two of the men parted and the captain came out with a two handed broadsword. “You have committed crimes against the people of Raven Rock, what say you in your defense?” They are turning this into a public execution, what a stunt.
The boy remained silent. The atmosphere turned thicker, all the guards nervous as they had never had the captain be so ruthless, it must have been something the young mage had told him. “Nothing eh?” The captain said, “Then I shall kill you in the name of justice!” He proclaimed, and charged at the boy. “Uel” The boy said. His eyes became somehow deeper, more observant, but that did not change anything, he was going to die by the hand of the great guard captain Frederick. Frederick brought his sword in a great horizontal sweep. The air quivered as a mana charged blade cut through it. The Boy ducked and brought out a knife that appeared to be of dwarven decent, but let off an elven light. It was a simple knife yet it had a strange glow to it despite its pitch black metal. He blocked the greatsword with his own smaller blade, then brought it up, slicing the blade in two. The boy caught the cut off half of the blade and threw it while jumping back, launching the shard of metal right into the captain’s neck. Blood spewed out and he fell down, but right before the guards to react a huge blast of wind blew them over causing them all to fall flat on their back.
It took them to long to get up in their heavy suits of armor. By the time they were all up one of them had taken off his gloves and was applying pressure to the wound. “QUICKLY SOMEONE GET THE CAPTAIN A HEALER!” Some of them ran of back to their base to get a healer and some come forward to help with the first aid. “Come on captain you can’t die yet! You’ve got a wife and son to take care of.” Said one of the soldiers. “Hold in there.” The first soldier to help transferred his duties to someone else and walked away. He ordered for the gates to be reopened and ran out of the town. As he ran the armor around him blew away as grey mist revealing the boy.
“You were right Xerek!” He said grinning wide, some blood still on face and shirt. “That was fun!” Told you. I never get tired of how you use your magic. “Well you alway told me to just use sheer force but that’s no fun. Hehe.” Kids these days… The boy began to bound across the landscape, vaguely following the dirt road which led home. His great leaps seemed to be helped along by the wind itself and grass would blow fiercer than in a tempest. This is the story of Malcolm Marcroft, the impossible magician.
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Authors Note
Sup guys and girls! It is I, I Can Spell! This is the first time I'm actually writing a story and I have literally NOOOOO idea where I want it to go with this so please also recomend some ideas for the story so I can keep it going! Thanks for reading and if you find any grammar or spelling mistakes please tell me because otherwise my name is worthless. Thanks again!