As Edenia wanted to prevent spies from Domitor or other organisations from entering the city, multiple different security measures were put into place, both magical and physical. A combination of both was the official attire all scholars on Edenia were forced to wear: robes in specific colours which were manufactured by the Magician's Guild and imbued with special enchantments which would make them not only easily recognisable as official clothing of the guild but also nearly unforgeable. Those who tried to forge them regardless and were caught doing so would not live to tell the tale.
The 7 Schools of Magic each were assigned a certain colour, with the exception of Ethereal Magic, as followers of all religions refused to cooperate with the Magician's Guild out of fear that they would lose the miracles given to them by the gods for sharing their secrets with heathens. Visitors and magi which were yet to receive an official rank by the guild were given brown robes, while officials of the guild, such as law-enforcement and lecturers were given black robes. While lecturers had to display their school of magic in form of a coloured armband, law-enforcement was given black robes which had the symbol of magic, the Star of Gemini, stitched onto their backs in white thread.
One's rank within the guild was determined by a committee consisting of scholar's who were already recognised as having contributed more to magical research than most others and thus have received the highest rank one could achieve within the guild, that of an Archmage. The committee was led by Edenia's guild-master, who himself was required to be an archmage to receive this position.
The committee decided upon the rank of scholars in accordance with two criteria: their contributions to magical research and their magical aptitude, as measured by the Ordo Siderum, a magic-item crafted from two components: a certain metal-alloy, the composition of which was only known to those who were tasked with building and maintaining the tool, and a pitch-black crystal-ball, which was placed on top of it. Upon channeling one's arcanum into the device, dots of pure light resembling stars in the night-sky would appear within the dark crystal. The number of stars that would light up depended on the quality of the arcanum it was supplied with, which was considered the clearest indicator of a spellcaster's might. The highest number of stars that have ever been witnessed to appear within the crystal-ball were 9, and there has not ever been a single recorded incident of no stars appearing without either the device having been damaged somehow or the one using it being born with a spirit and therefore not possessing any arcanum to begin with.
To have at least 6 stars show up while using the Ordo Siderum was considered the minimum requirement before one was even able to apply for the rank of an archmage. Archmagi not part of the committee were granted more freedoms than lower ranked magi and were thus allowed to wear their own robes as long as they visibly showed the star of Gemini in some way, and they were given an additional title, a nickname of sorts, which was decided upon by their peers to prove that one has been accepted among their ranks. However, as spellcasters tended to have a most unusual sense of humour and a downright abysmal naming sense, these nicknames could turn out to be most unflattering for the ones who received them.
Malakai Nefas was one such unlucky archmage. The Infernal Archmage, is what they had come up with, as he was unmatched in his prowess of fire-elemental magic within the Magician's Guild, but also generally known to be impatient and quick to anger. And angry he got, if one was unfortunate enough to call him by his nickname when he was in earshot. Nefas thought of his new 'title' to be not quite as witty or amusing as his colleagues when they came up with it, and tended to vent his anger about it by setting those who used it on fire. Not to kill them, of course, just to give them a good scare...and a burn-scar to remember it by. Though no matter how much he resented it, there was nothing to be done about it, as his actions only further cemented it into the minds of others as the right choice for a moniker. His tendency to overwork apprentices and drop them as soon as they were no longer capable of following his instructions did not help his case either.
So how was it, that the spellcaster regarded as devoid of kindness was now standing before a child he had just saved from being murdered by a group of bandits? Was he just trying to vent some anger on what was considered the scum of humanity, and saving the child had merely been an afterthought? Or was there perhaps a spark of compassion for fellow humans hidden in the dark obsidian he regarded to be his heart, compelling him to help those in need if they are right in front of him? Whenever he was asked, he would just call it a whim of his, though he himself was not sure if that answer was truthful.
No matter his true intentions, he now saw himself confronted with a problem. Nefas was not one to leave any business unfinished, and since he had decided to save the child in front of him, the spellcaster now saw himself responsible for its life.
The child, a boy about 7 years of age, with hazel coloured hair and clothed in the simple fabrics of commoners, looked at the old man in front of him with his tear-filled, purple-coloured eyes. Despite his entire body quivering before the elderly spellcaster in his black robe covered in golden symbols with bright red ornamental hems, which had just killed 10 bandits in the blink of an eye and turned them to ash, the boy raised his hands and aimed them at Nefas, intending to defend himself.
An orange-coloured, glowing spell-circle formed before them in mid-air, as the boy shakily recited the ancient words taught to him by his father, and the 2nd-Tier spell
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The boy awakened in a rather large bed, and, upon realising that he neither recognized the bed itself nor the room it was standing in, started to panic. Before he could do anything else, however, his gaze was drawn to the old man sitting in a chair next to him, who had made his presence known by clearing his throat. He had short, dark-brown hair with silver streaks running through them, and a short, well-trimmed beard. His face showed a few wrinkles, and the orange, almost fire-like eyes under his bushy eyebrows seemed to pierce the boy's heart like a red-hot iron.
The man was wearing the very same black robe that was decorated in all kinds of runes he was wearing when he met him, and he held a long wooden pipe, the head of which had been carved into the shape of a dragon, making it look like the smoke came out of the dragon's mouth, in his right hand, from which he drew some smoke, which he then exhaled in the form of rings.
The boy tried to get out of bed, but his body was still nauseous from having exhausted all his energy with a spell, so he only managed to sit up at the edge of the bed, next to the smoking mage.
"Calm down, child! No ill shall befall you in my home. The bandits who attacked you have fallen by my hand and I have brought you out of harm's way.", the old man said with the deep voice of a man that had lived for decades.
Instead of calming him, the mage's words caused the memories of the attack to resurface in the mind of the child.
"W-Where am I? Where are my parents?", he asked, his voice shaking with fear.
"As I said, this is my home. Regarding your parents, they were among those who fell at the hands of the criminals I rescued you from.", he responded bluntly, as he intended to neither sugar-coat the truth nor lie to the boy.
It took a few seconds for the boy to process the information he had just received, but shortly after, fragments of memories returned to him, making him relive them in his mind as if he was a spectator. His parents telling him that they saved up some money, so they would be able spend a weekend in Merdelum's capital, and that they were even able to afford to drive there by stagecoach. His joy to finally see the world outside of their small town, and the anticipation at what would await him once they arrived. The sudden shock as one of the wheels of the coach broke off, and the shouts from outside as they were surrounded by bandits. His parents telling him to hide inside the carriage until they called out to him, and then...
The realization hit him like a horse running at him full speed. His father's stern, but loving gaze, the feeling of his mother's warm embrace, the laughter they shared with one another, all gone, forever. He imagined his parents, broken and lifeless on the floor, and started to scream. As his scream of terror turned into cries and tears of grief, the mage beside him, instead of trying to console the child, continued to smoke his pipe and waited, his expression slowly growing tense as he started to tap his right foot in annoyance before he finally had enough.
Malakai Nefas rose from his seat and emptied his pipe into a glass ashtray on a small, wooden night-stand situated next to the bed, laid down the pipe next to it and snarled at the boy.
"Enough already!"
The sudden movement and raised voice of Nefas startled the boy to a point where he stopped crying immediately.
"What is your name?", the man asked while fixating the child with a mildly irked expression.
"A-André-.", he responded, still overwhelmed by the situation.
"The name of your family?"
"...erm...T-Te-n...", the boy stammered, but was soon interrupted by the impatient archmage.
"To be frank, it matters not right now. Well, André, despite not even being old enough to be left alone for more than a day, you have arrived at the crossroads of destiny already. I will grant you one of two choices, as it was by my will that you were spared of whatever fate those low lives had in mind for you, thus becoming responsible for what will happen to you from now on. Keep in mind, your decision is final, so prepare yourself to follow through with it.", the archmage warned him, causing André to grow ever tenser.
"The first: I will return you to a relative, or, if you either do not remember having any or turn out to be the last of your name, to an orphanage in or near your hometown in Merdelum. The second: As you seem to be attuned to fire-elemental magic, which just so happens to be my expertise, I will grant you full scholarship under my tutelage. However, my teachings are harsh and many a student who came to me for guidance had their will crushed by them. Do not fool yourself into thinking that I will take pity on you and lessen your workload because of your circumstances, but as long as you follow my orders, I will make sure that your expenses and accommodation are taken care of, and your talent will not go to waste. The choice is yours to make, I await your answer by tomorrow at noon."
And with his last word he walked towards the door on the other side of the room and left.
All the new information he was just fed combined with the memories of the robbery now flooded the mind of André, making him more nauseous than before. He needed some fresh air. With shaking, unsteady legs that reminded of a new-born deer's first attempts at walking, he walked towards a nearby window, and opened it. While steadying himself with his arms resting on the windowsill, he took a few deep breaths and examined his surroundings.
The room he was in was on the second floor of brick house which was situated near the border of what looked like a big city. To his left, there were a few houses next to and across the building he was in, all of which were placed along a large, busy street which ended in a platform-like square. Beyond the square, there seemed to be a cliff, and, to his shock, not too far beyond the cliff, there was what appeared to be a mountain floating upside down. To his right, he could observe a sea of buildings, all of them made from the very same bricks as the house he was in, though no two of them looked the same, as their sizes, roofs, and colour differed in varying degrees from one another. The street continued on past all the buildings until it reached what looked like the centre of the city, a large town square with an enormous, almost needle-like white tower in the middle, surrounded by a few smaller spires. André had heard stories from his parents of this city, as his father had told him that he had lived there for some time: The City of Magic, Edenia.
The boy turned around and examined the chamber in which he found himself. It contained two expensive looking bookshelves full of heavy tomes standing at the wall to the right of the chair in which the mage had waited for him to wake up. To his right, next to the window, there was a round, wooden table, the legs of which had been designed to look like an unlit campfire. On the table he found a porcelain plate with all kinds of fruits on them, next to a crystalline jug of water and a drinking glass which looked like it had been carved from a diamond. He decided to eat and drink while thinking about the words of the mage. He only ever knew his parents, and they told him that his grandparents had died years ago. Should he take up the archmage's offer to study under him?
After finishing his meal, he decided to go back to bed and sleep, as maybe all of this had just been a bad dream, and he would awaken in the carriage the next morning in Caelum, surrounded by his parents. With the exhaustion of all that had happened to him catching up to him again, the boy drifted into a, despite all that happened, completely dreamless sleep, as the water he was provided with had been mixed with medicine that calmed the mind.
André awoke the next day, bathed in cold sweat, seemingly at dawn. The boy looked around, and, upon realising that he was still in the home of the mage that had saved him, realised that what he hoped to be just a vivid nightmare was indeed cruel reality. André could no longer cry, as he no longer felt any sadness, only vast emptiness. He stared at his empty hands while trying to order his thoughts, until he was greeted by a knock, and, as he did not give an answer, by the man behind the door, as he had decided to just enter the room.
"Good morning. I see the medicine did its work and you have calmed down. Have you been able to make a decision?", the old man asked expectantly, before sitting down in the same chair he had sat down the day before.
André looked up from his hand, and, after having made sure that it was what he wanted, gave his answer. He was going to trust the man who had saved him and become his apprentice.
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Several years had passed after the incident in which André Tenning lost both of his parents, years of learning and rigid training under the tutelage of Malakai Nefas. As he had promised, Nefas' teachings had been unbelievably arduous. Any mistake of the apprentice was met with physical punishment, and even if he managed to follow his master's instructions to perfection, he did not receive any praise, as it was expected of him. Nevertheless, no matter how strict the archmage's guidance became, he never came to hate his master, as all the work thrown his way distracted him from his childhood trauma.
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Ultimately, a few weeks after having turned 18, the day came on which he was given his final task, which would conclude his apprenticeship and turn him into a fully-fledged member of the Magician's Guild. He was to go on an expedition into the Grattiel mountain-range, where an entrance to an Abyssal Rift, or, as they are more commonly known as, a Divine Dungeon, had been uncovered by a wandering bard, who saw himself under-qualified for a task such as clearing a dungeon on his own, thus relying on the Magician's Guild for such work. André was not expected to clear the dungeon by himself either, but to merely scout it out as far as he deemed safe, to get a feel of what type of dungeon they were dealing with.
Without delay, he made his way towards the village of Anvalier, which was located at the foot of Grattiel near the border of Yhose and asked for information about the dungeon. The villagers, from which he tried to gather information, seemed to behave weirdly once he came into contact with them. Their speech seemed as if they were reading their every word off from a piece of paper as they spoke, and when he asked how or when the dungeon had been found, none of them could give him a clear answer.
Though he grew suspicious of what he was told, he still decided to follow the instructions he was given, and made his way up the mountains, towards the location the entrance was supposed to be. After an hour, he found the cave which was described to him, and decided to check his equipment before entering the dungeon. He had prepared himself for anything which could have waited for him inside of the dungeon, even going as far as preparing his most powerful fire elemental spell, the 6th-Tier spell
To his surprise, the dungeon had been devoid of anything, except for its core, which he found after a brief walk through a long corridor in an otherwise completely empty room, a most untypical layout for such a structure. Dungeons were believed to have been created by the gods to test mortals and bestow them with rewards for completing their trials. These rewards entailed all kinds of treasures, from ordinary gold coins and gemstones to masterfully crafted pieces of equipment and even relics crafted by the gods themselves.
To find a dungeon which did not contain anything except for the dungeon-core itself was an event so rare that it was considered a myth. Despite all of this, André found himself in such an abnormality, as he managed to find the core immediately after walking through a rather long, featureless corridor, which had been illuminated by torches. He looked at the crystalline, glowing orb of crimson colour, which bathed the entire room in an eery blood-red glow as it floated in the middle of the large room and decided to slowly approach it. André was told that dungeon cores were always of an azure colour, so the thing floating in front of him could have been some kind of trap set in place to kill unwary intruders.
Once it was within his reach, he decided to lightly tap the orb with his staff, before quickly jumping back to the room's entrance. André waited, never letting the orb out of his sight, and listened. Minutes passed, but he did not dare to move.
After a while, he did the same thing again, though he smacked the core with all his might this time. Upon colliding with his staff, the orb started to crack, causing the young apprentice-mage to dive towards the corridor connecting the room to the cave's entrance. He observed as more and more cracks started to form, until finally, the orb burst, and a metallic object could be heard dropping to the floor as the torches, which had lit up the dungeon until now, went dark. André quickly cast the 1st-Tier spell
Nothing had changed, with the sole exception being a small, black, metal figurine, which depicted a flying Wyvern, a lizard-like creature, the front-legs of which had evolved into strong, leathery wings. Wyvern were considered the most commonly found of the 7 sub-species of the true-dragon family of beasts, with the others being Mantas, which were able to soar like fish through the skies and oceans due to their unique kite-like appearance, Drakes, which though flightless were known as the physically strongest of all dragons, Kirins, dragons who take the shape of certain beasts and were often confused with them, Wyrms, which are likened to enormous snakes with legs, Leviathans, which were feared as one of the great horrors of the oceans, and Tyrants, the most powerful of them all.
'Heh, looks like this graduation exam is going to be easier than I thought', he thought to himself with a grim chuckle and slowly approached the statue, just in case there was a trap placed for those who destroyed the orb.
As, again, nothing changed, a long, drawn-out sigh escaped André, as he prepared an identification spell to determine the metal-figurine's origin. To his surprise, however, the spell did nothing. He recast the spell several times, just in case, but something seemed to block his attempts at appraising the metal figurine. Nefas had told him, that there were only two reasons for such a thing to happen. The first option, which was most likely, was that this item absorbed all kinds of magic that came into contact with it, or at least disrupted the wavelengths of the spell somehow. This could indicate a curse, making it imperative not to touch it directly. The second one, which was highly unlikely but still in the realm of possibilities, was, that this was a divine item, or even a relic of the gods, as normal identification magic was incapable of appraising a magical item of such power.
Hoping for the second option while not disregarding the first one, André decided to carefully pick up the figurine with a cloth and carry it back to Edenia with this makeshift bag, where it could be appraised with more powerful magic.
Surprisingly, his way back to Edenia was just as uneventful as the rest of his journey, which gave him enough time to think up a story that would push him into a more favourable light than just saying that he found the core of the dungeon completely unguarded. He returned to the house he had called home for the last few years and retold his made-up story to his master, in which he had valiantly fought against a yellow-scaled drake, a flightless dragon of the air-element which possessed incredibly high agility, but was vulnerable to fire-magic, and just barely made it towards the dungeon core, destroying it and killing the drake in the process.
Nefas had his suspicions about this obviously lying apprentice of his but chose to not let any of that show on his face, especially after the small dragon statue had been revealed to him. The old man could not believe his eyes as he tried to appraise the item, as he too was unable to reveal any information about it. His doubts about his apprentice's story disappeared, as this could only mean that this item was of at least divine quality, and at best could turn out to be a relic. For the first time in decades, the face of the old man formed a genuine smile, and he happily congratulated his apprentice on his find, deeply disturbing André in the process, who had never seen a positive change in his master's emotions before.
Together with Nefas, the apprentice mage now made his way towards the great needle like building in the centre of the city, the Ivory Tower, which served as the head office of the Magician's Guild, to report his findings and register the figurine. There he would receive the official scholar-title, the robes of an elemental mage, and a reward for discovering a powerful item and donating it to the guild. André began to daydream during their walk, thinking about better his life was going to become in the near future and how he would spend the money that he would receive. This, however, caused him to not pay attention to what was right in front of him, resulting in his collision with a Thaumaturge, a spellcaster attuned to Reality-Magic, the profession of whom was indicated by the dirty and slightly torn yellow robe he wore. Unfortunately, this caused André to drop the cloth containing the small statue.
Time seemed to slow down around André, as he watched the statue, the object which could become the ticket to achieving his goal of changing his life for the better, leaving his sleeve and gradually approaching the ground. His mind began to race, as he did not know what a sudden impact with solid ground would do to the magic item. Through his studies he had found out that there were incredibly fragile magic-items, which even broke because of the raw Mana flowing around them having slightly changed in concentration. This meant that he could not use a spell to keep it from hitting the floor. Therefore, despite his prior concerns about making direct contact with the metal figurine, he decided to lunge towards it and catch it with his hands, a mistake which would cost him greatly.
Upon making contact with the figurine by catching it, the statue began to dissolve and seep through André's fingers like a waterfall of silver liquid. The metal-like substance now started to flow throughout the streets and quickly spread through the entire city within seconds. To the horror of those who observed the event, they recognized the patterns formed by this liquid to be magic runes, symbols required to form spell circles. Before anyone could attempt to disturb the circle, the liquid started to glow, and a blinding light engulfed all of Edenia. Once their eyes had recovered from flash, a dreadful, beastly scream rang throughout the city. Above Radix, the main island of Edenia, an enormous, black-scaled wyvern was now floating through the air, surrounded by dozens of smaller, crimson-scaled ones.
A dragon's scale colour was determined by the element they were born with, as dragons were categorized as beasts and therefore always born with spirits. The element of dragons also determined their behaviour, with those born with one of the 4 Core-Elements Fire, Water, Air, and Earth, which are known as chromatic dragons, usually being more feral and generally weaker than those born with other elements, which were known as metallic dragons. Among these metallic dragons, the black-scaled ones, who were born with the neutral element, were considered both the most intelligent and the most powerful, as they received abilities unique to their sub-species in exchange for the elemental-breath attack dragons were known for. In the case of wyverns, their breath-attack was replaced by a powerful beam of pure energy, an attack the black-scaled wyvern over Edenia was now all too eager to demonstrate.
With another blood-curdling scream, a large ball of pure energy formed within the dragon's mouth, and a beam of concentrated energy was fired at Edenia's smallest island, Flos, cutting it in two and causing it to drop out of the sky. The attack caused André and Nefas to recover from their shell-shocked state, and the archmage immediately started to shout out commands to all who surrounded him.
"Those who know magic above the 5th-Tier, attack the crimson wyverns and protect the city, the archmagi are going to focus on the black scaled one, all others need to either attack from the outer platforms or evacuate, as they will not be of help within the city due to the barrier! Make haste! One metallic dragon is bad enough, this many might be more than we can handle without proper preparations! André, I know you probably spent your arcanum in the dungeon already, so take this teleportation scroll with
Before André could object, his teacher had cast the 3rd-Tier support-spell
Now magically accelerated, Nefas quickly made his way towards the centre of Radix. All other magi, who had recognised the yelling mage to be the Infernal Archmage, sprang into action as well. André could see a few magi fire spells into the direction of the approaching crimson wyvern, others ran towards the platform at the end of the street, as they were built outside of Edenia's barriers, making it possible for them to get off the flying city with the help of weaker spells.
André felt bad about having lied to his teacher, leading to him believing that he would not be of help in this fight, but he knew that saving the apprentice mages inside of the academy was more important than recklessly going into battle, leading to him casting the
Edenia was not prepared for great-scale invasions appearing in the middle of Radix, as each of the 6 islands surrounding the main island was supposed to prevent such a thing from happening, together with the anti-magic barrier on Radix itself, which was powered by the giant crystal in its core, as the amount of energy it produced far exceeded the amount needed to keep the islands afloat. Therefore, the alleys of Radix were not planned with easily escaping from it in emergency situations in mind. The 3rd Magical Academy of Edenia, which mainly focused on teaching the basics of magic to new apprentices, was the furthest away of any of the 6 outer platforms on Radix, which meant that it was the hardest to evacuate from.
Upon André's arrival minutes after he had started his sprint, he saw the teachers and senior-apprentice magi of the academy fighting a crimson wyvern, which had already managed to kill a few of them. The crimson colour of its scales stemmed from the element of darkness, which was able to raise the dead and turn them into undead monsters, making crimson dragons especially troublesome enemies. The fallen magi, which he recognised to be teachers of the academy, had become zombies under the wyvern's control, which, despite not being able to cast spells anymore, had their physical abilities increased due to their transformation. Though as magi generally neglected physical training, this boost in strength was not as significant as if it had been someone with a fighter-background. Even so, the zombies were still enough to distract the remaining magi and make it harder for them to get rid of the wyvern, which seemed amused by the situation and thus decided to watch its prey struggle instead of going in for the kill.
Quickly assessing the situation before him, André immediately activated the
André felt the familiar nausea and skull-splitting headache of having cast a powerful spell, but he did not have the time to rest. He told the survivors of the attack to gather around him, as he would use the teleportation spell to evacuate them. As they gathered around him, he chose a small village in Merdelum, as the target for the teleportation spell, as Edenia's current location in the sky would make it close enough to make it possible for him to return to the city and continue the fight together with the other magi. After the teachers made sure that everyone still among the living had gathered, André activated the spell-scroll, which burst into green flames, and multiple massive, green glowing spell-circles began to form below the group. Reality started to shift around them, and, after mere moments, they were surrounded by the small stone-houses of farmers which were located in between a large forest and the seemingly endless planes of the Éclat dukedom in Merdelum, the small village of Flekling, André's birthplace.
The casting of two high-tier spells in short succession took quite the toll on André's mind and body, despite the downside of the second spell having been compensated by the arcane crystal, making it hard to stay on his feet. Despite this, he had prepared for such a thing to happen back when he planned his journey to the dungeon, thus having bought a set of potions which would recover his arcanum immediately after being drunk. The magi he had saved started to thank him and ask what was going on within the city, but André paid no attention to their chatter and just downed all of his potions as fast as he could. The effect was immediate, and his headache started to dissipate. However, as he looked towards Edenia and prepared the 5th-Tier small-distance teleportation spell known as
The flash quickly evolved into a ball of pure light, rivaling the sun itself in its intensity, which started to expand outwards until it engulfed the flying city in its entirety. It was an explosion of never-before-seen magnitude, the shockwave of which shattered the windows in Flekling and pushed its inhabitants like a strong gust of wind, even though the village had been many miles away from the centre of the explosion. It took a few minutes for André to regain his eyesight, as he had looked directly into the light.
After his eyes had readjusted to the normal brightness around him, he slowly looked towards where Edenia had been mere minutes prior. The image before him drained all the strength he still had from his body, and he fell to his knees, the sound of people shouting and running around in panic slowly fading into the background. With wide open eyes which still focused on the same spot in the sky, a large halo of clouds where the former city of magic had floated in the sky, he started to chuckle, which turned into a maniac cackle. Visions of the past flooded his brain, the death of his parents, his life in the city, his teacher.
"You got to be kidding me...", he said to no one in particular, as his manic laughter turned into sobs and tears streamed down his face.
Edenia had fallen.