Chapter 5
Birdsie
The God-Emperor of Mankind
[AN: 1.9k words or 6.8 minutes reading time average]
Vote Tally
Winning Votes:
[X] West.
[X] Let fights stay the same.
Noble Scion
Hanarei
Fable
Inheritance
Reinhardt
Forgy
official clown business
GumGumChomp
Thatguynameded
Historical Storyteller
ZacksQuest
Vote Tally
Winning Votes:
[X] West.
[X] Let fights stay the same.
*~*~*~*~*
Going west, Stonesnout, and Elmanthir waded through the valleys, heading towards the Tol jungle.
Their path was fairly uneventful. Rather than encounter monsters or animals, they seemed to be a solitary pair of brawler dwarf and human wizard, moving down the natural world. He wondered, perhaps, if Elmanthir, who accepted the path that Stonesnout proposed and led them onward like a natural compass, was purposefully using his divination to steer them away from danger.
Mulling over if such guidance was possible, Stonesnout began to question the wizard from time to time, about magic, and got some answers back.
Magic, apparently, came from a creature's soul. Not everything had a soul, but everything had the potential to have a soul.
Elmanthir used an anecdote to convey the idea: If space and time were a loom, then everything that existed within them was a weave. Souls were like needles, moving through this weave, and if equipped with string and trained in tailoring, they could add their own threads onto the weave. That was magic. However, a needle still needed thread with which to weave, and that's what the nebulous 'mana' was - the raw building block of existence itself, used to fuel spellwork.
Naturally, a mage's own threads weren't on the same level as the natural ones, hence why things like anti-magic existed. Anti-magic, Elmanthir likened to a pair of tiny scissors, which one could use to cut through lesser strings. In that sense, various levels of string existed, and various levels of string could be used depending on the caster's skill and the type of magic they cast; naturally, illusions would be easier to get rid of than conjurations.
He warned Stonesnout that, if he ever practiced magic, he should be careful to make sure he was indeed using tiny scissors, and not swinging around a razor blade. The consequences could be "disastrous."
Continuing his anecdote, he explained that souls are connected - not always, but often - to a mind. A mind was an interesting thing, far more than people thought it was, so much so that before he explained it, he decided to explain the body first.
Every being has a body, and within that body are organs, arteries, nerves. And sentients, naturally, have a brain in their skulls, as well, which governed the entire body. Within the brain lies a good part - maybe a half - of the mind.
Whenever someone thought of something, the brain would send those signals through to the rest of the mind. To the deeper, more subconscious parts of it. And from the mind, those signals went to the soul, which shaped them accordingly into magic.
Stonesnout... found himself slightly confused by the explanation, especially the part about brains, but the wizard helpfully clarified and remarked how curious the dwarf was, and how refreshing it was to educate someone who knew so little of the world they lived in.
In a way, it was better than debating advanced concepts with fellow wizards, or so Elmanthir thought.
Stonesnout, though he felt out of his depth, smiled at the wizard.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Trees up to thirty meters tall formed a mesh of leaves and branches that blocked out the sun and cast down an eerie twilight down onto the bushy forest understory. Moss, mushrooms, tiny plants, and herbs could be found in abundance almost every step, but little in the way of flowers. They did not see many animals, too; Stonesnout spotted a bunny earlier on the second day of travel, but nothing else.
"Are the forests in Albion usually this thick?" Stonesnout grumbled as the branches and leaves brushed uncomfortably against him, the sharper ones leaving white lines on his skin.
"You should see the Great Forest, lad. The trees in its depths are taller than the mountains that are your home," Elman replied, then stopped, and Stonesnout stopped behind him. Looking from the side, he saw that the bushes got even thicker in front of them, like a natural wall.
Elmanthir raised his staff and incanted, "Powers of absence and presence, bend in my eyes and tear all in space to pieces!"
A maelstrom of wind formed at the tip of Elmanthir's staff. The wizard jabbed it forward at the bushes and a distorted tube of slashing, cutting, shredding, and crushing winds shot out, obliterating the bushes and branches into tiny bits and sending them flying away into every direction. This cleared a path for at least another two-hundred meters.
They continued their march.
"How come you speak and magic happens? How does that work?" Stonesnout asked, still annoyed by the brushing of the branch remnants but not enough to squash his curiosity.
"Ah... that's a bit of a complicated question to answer. Well, simply put, I am using incantations to cast certain types of magic more easily. The wording is key."
"How so?"
"It's about the feelings you evoke. Each word has a different meaning and connotation in your mind, and putting them in a certain structure makes you think along certain channels. The end result is that you hypnotize yourself, and if you consciously desire for magic to happen at the same time, your soul will be able to direct it more easily and effectively... Here, let me show you."
They stopped again, and Elmanthir pointed his staff sideways, then said, "This is that same spell but without an incantation. I will simply desire for the same to happen, but it will be weaker without the self-hypnosis. Watch."
A bubble of slashing winds egressed at the staff tip. More unstable and smaller in size than before. Elmanthir jabbed the staff forward and the wind shot out; cutting and slashing, but ineffectually. The winds lacked sharpness, like a dull sword blade rather than the precise and fast shredding from before. On top of that, instead of being shot in a straight tube, the winds lacked cohesion, acting more like an indiscriminate blast with a general direction, and instead of going for what looked like hundreds of meters, they fizzled out just a dozen feet away.
"I lack the mentality and practice of a dedicated wind mage," Elmanthir said, "meaning that my wind spells are weak. I can try to cast them better with incantations, gestures, and other aids, but generally, my specialty is divination. Even without an incantation, I can tune out the bushes and trees as if they didn't exist, and see only animals and inanimate objects. For example, there is a bird's nest on that branch. See?"
He pointed up and Stonesnout followed his finger, nodding in confirmation. A small stack of sticks laid on a tree-branch, with eggs that are yet to hatch. A small jackdaw landed on the branch with twigs in her beak, which she added to the nest before hopping onto and into it, then setting herself there comfortably.
When Stonesnout looked down, he saw Elmanthir had already restarted his trod. "Hey, wait up!" He ran after the wizard.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
After their march through the jungle, the travelers finally made their way out to a thick, stone road. It was fenced with low stone walls with sentries attached to them, where rangers equipped with bows were stationed. Every twenty minutes, they would stumble upon a larger security post, acting also as a barrack, guarded by even up to a dozen of guards per booth with support from mages. And at two-hour intervals of road, one could often find a tavern or a tavern-and-stable where one can water and rest their steed.
Caravans; carriages and wagons of goods traveled in front of and behind them on both sides of the horizon, and so did various people, be it on foot, donkey, pony, horse, and they even saw an elf riding what Elmanthir identified to be a griffin.
And despite their freedom from the accursed branches, Stonesnout's thoughts lingered on the unpleasant forest.
"That forest sucked," Stonesnout grumbled, scratching the right and left sides of his abdomen lightly; he didn't want to pierce the skin, but the itch the nettle left him with was infernal. Damn forests...
Elmanthir, nonplussed, said, "Truly? I wonder where its mouth was!" The wizard grinned wryly.
"Ugh, you know what I meant by that."
"Cheer up, my companion, for we are about to arrive in Trost," Elmanthir said, his eyes narrowed, looking a little focused as he gazed forward. "There is a reason that a whole brand of beer has been named after that city. And you, my friend, will be free to sample it as much as you please."
The annoyed Stonesnout accepted those comforting words and allowed a small, peaceful smile to settle on his face. "That sounds nice. Besides, I've been rather curious about what human cities look like."
It took another two hours before the vestiges of a community began to reveal themselves. Small hamlets, and a village, and in another two, they were staring at solid walls in the distance. They didn't look like stone bricks layered on top of each other, but a single, white-gray body of stone that has been carved, complete with battlements. Even over the walls, one could see the roofs and upper walls of large buildings, houses, manses, stores, churches, and other structures.
They walked downhill and made a short pause near the main gate, which was open, with guards situated at the sides. The traffic here was large, but surprisingly, there was no fee or document check near the entrance.
"Finally, Trost," said Elmanthir. "A scenic city, with excellent taverns, or so I hear. I don't have much business here, but I suppose we could stay here for a day or two."
Stonesnout nodded, his thoughts firmly latching onto the words 'excellent taverns' and his eyes a little glazed. He gulped, feeling a little unclean. He didn't really do much yet, but he couldn't help to ask, "My wage, Elman?"
"Ah, naturally. Here's your whole salary for the last f-" The wizard took out a satchel of coins and was about to hand it to Stonesnout when the latter ripped it out of the wizard's grasp and ran through the gate, screaming something about sightseeing, "-our days..."
Stonesnout rounded the corner into a small square and looked around. The buildings raised from brown and white wood, with clear frameworks and blue windows surrounded him. Busy people walked the streets, among then humans, but also elves and fellow dwarves; more rarely a gnome or halfling, and he was pretty sure he saw a lizardman or something similar moving far in the crowd. Surrounded by costermongers who yelled out the prices of miscellaneous minor products, foods, and doohickeys they sold, Stonesnout grinned.
He had eleven gold pieces and two silver pieces, which was, to put it succinctly: a lot of money. This was the daily expenditure of a noble. He could buy barrels of ale for this.
He understood the details of his contract, even if it was only in spoken word, but a part of him didn't believe Elmanthir was this rich until now.
Finally, pushing through the crowd, Elmanthir joined him, breathing heavily. "There you are...!" The wizard looked at the ecstatic dwarf and favored him with a sympathetic smile. Stonesnout grinned back at him.
"I just wanted to tell you to meet me at the northern city gate tomorrow at noon. Until then, enjoy yourself, Stonesnout," the wizard stated with a firm nod. "If you have need of me, I'll go and see what the local magic shop has to offer. Please, don't make too much trouble."
"I won't," Stonesnout said, a bit whiny, his grin not dissipating. Normally, he'd be annoyed, but this place offered too many possibilities to busy himself with being irritated.
Stonesnout...
Activities [11gp, 2sp to spend; take as many actions as you want, but be reasonable]
[] Go to the best tavern you can find and get drunk. [LOCKED; you will do that automatically]
[] Visit a general store and see what they have.
[] Ask one of the guards where the landmarks are and visit them.
[] Write-in.
Their path was fairly uneventful. Rather than encounter monsters or animals, they seemed to be a solitary pair of brawler dwarf and human wizard, moving down the natural world. He wondered, perhaps, if Elmanthir, who accepted the path that Stonesnout proposed and led them onward like a natural compass, was purposefully using his divination to steer them away from danger.
Mulling over if such guidance was possible, Stonesnout began to question the wizard from time to time, about magic, and got some answers back.
Magic, apparently, came from a creature's soul. Not everything had a soul, but everything had the potential to have a soul.
Elmanthir used an anecdote to convey the idea: If space and time were a loom, then everything that existed within them was a weave. Souls were like needles, moving through this weave, and if equipped with string and trained in tailoring, they could add their own threads onto the weave. That was magic. However, a needle still needed thread with which to weave, and that's what the nebulous 'mana' was - the raw building block of existence itself, used to fuel spellwork.
Naturally, a mage's own threads weren't on the same level as the natural ones, hence why things like anti-magic existed. Anti-magic, Elmanthir likened to a pair of tiny scissors, which one could use to cut through lesser strings. In that sense, various levels of string existed, and various levels of string could be used depending on the caster's skill and the type of magic they cast; naturally, illusions would be easier to get rid of than conjurations.
He warned Stonesnout that, if he ever practiced magic, he should be careful to make sure he was indeed using tiny scissors, and not swinging around a razor blade. The consequences could be "disastrous."
Continuing his anecdote, he explained that souls are connected - not always, but often - to a mind. A mind was an interesting thing, far more than people thought it was, so much so that before he explained it, he decided to explain the body first.
Every being has a body, and within that body are organs, arteries, nerves. And sentients, naturally, have a brain in their skulls, as well, which governed the entire body. Within the brain lies a good part - maybe a half - of the mind.
Whenever someone thought of something, the brain would send those signals through to the rest of the mind. To the deeper, more subconscious parts of it. And from the mind, those signals went to the soul, which shaped them accordingly into magic.
Stonesnout... found himself slightly confused by the explanation, especially the part about brains, but the wizard helpfully clarified and remarked how curious the dwarf was, and how refreshing it was to educate someone who knew so little of the world they lived in.
In a way, it was better than debating advanced concepts with fellow wizards, or so Elmanthir thought.
Stonesnout, though he felt out of his depth, smiled at the wizard.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Trees up to thirty meters tall formed a mesh of leaves and branches that blocked out the sun and cast down an eerie twilight down onto the bushy forest understory. Moss, mushrooms, tiny plants, and herbs could be found in abundance almost every step, but little in the way of flowers. They did not see many animals, too; Stonesnout spotted a bunny earlier on the second day of travel, but nothing else.
"Are the forests in Albion usually this thick?" Stonesnout grumbled as the branches and leaves brushed uncomfortably against him, the sharper ones leaving white lines on his skin.
"You should see the Great Forest, lad. The trees in its depths are taller than the mountains that are your home," Elman replied, then stopped, and Stonesnout stopped behind him. Looking from the side, he saw that the bushes got even thicker in front of them, like a natural wall.
Elmanthir raised his staff and incanted, "Powers of absence and presence, bend in my eyes and tear all in space to pieces!"
A maelstrom of wind formed at the tip of Elmanthir's staff. The wizard jabbed it forward at the bushes and a distorted tube of slashing, cutting, shredding, and crushing winds shot out, obliterating the bushes and branches into tiny bits and sending them flying away into every direction. This cleared a path for at least another two-hundred meters.
They continued their march.
"How come you speak and magic happens? How does that work?" Stonesnout asked, still annoyed by the brushing of the branch remnants but not enough to squash his curiosity.
"Ah... that's a bit of a complicated question to answer. Well, simply put, I am using incantations to cast certain types of magic more easily. The wording is key."
"How so?"
"It's about the feelings you evoke. Each word has a different meaning and connotation in your mind, and putting them in a certain structure makes you think along certain channels. The end result is that you hypnotize yourself, and if you consciously desire for magic to happen at the same time, your soul will be able to direct it more easily and effectively... Here, let me show you."
They stopped again, and Elmanthir pointed his staff sideways, then said, "This is that same spell but without an incantation. I will simply desire for the same to happen, but it will be weaker without the self-hypnosis. Watch."
A bubble of slashing winds egressed at the staff tip. More unstable and smaller in size than before. Elmanthir jabbed the staff forward and the wind shot out; cutting and slashing, but ineffectually. The winds lacked sharpness, like a dull sword blade rather than the precise and fast shredding from before. On top of that, instead of being shot in a straight tube, the winds lacked cohesion, acting more like an indiscriminate blast with a general direction, and instead of going for what looked like hundreds of meters, they fizzled out just a dozen feet away.
"I lack the mentality and practice of a dedicated wind mage," Elmanthir said, "meaning that my wind spells are weak. I can try to cast them better with incantations, gestures, and other aids, but generally, my specialty is divination. Even without an incantation, I can tune out the bushes and trees as if they didn't exist, and see only animals and inanimate objects. For example, there is a bird's nest on that branch. See?"
He pointed up and Stonesnout followed his finger, nodding in confirmation. A small stack of sticks laid on a tree-branch, with eggs that are yet to hatch. A small jackdaw landed on the branch with twigs in her beak, which she added to the nest before hopping onto and into it, then setting herself there comfortably.
When Stonesnout looked down, he saw Elmanthir had already restarted his trod. "Hey, wait up!" He ran after the wizard.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
After their march through the jungle, the travelers finally made their way out to a thick, stone road. It was fenced with low stone walls with sentries attached to them, where rangers equipped with bows were stationed. Every twenty minutes, they would stumble upon a larger security post, acting also as a barrack, guarded by even up to a dozen of guards per booth with support from mages. And at two-hour intervals of road, one could often find a tavern or a tavern-and-stable where one can water and rest their steed.
Caravans; carriages and wagons of goods traveled in front of and behind them on both sides of the horizon, and so did various people, be it on foot, donkey, pony, horse, and they even saw an elf riding what Elmanthir identified to be a griffin.
And despite their freedom from the accursed branches, Stonesnout's thoughts lingered on the unpleasant forest.
"That forest sucked," Stonesnout grumbled, scratching the right and left sides of his abdomen lightly; he didn't want to pierce the skin, but the itch the nettle left him with was infernal. Damn forests...
Elmanthir, nonplussed, said, "Truly? I wonder where its mouth was!" The wizard grinned wryly.
"Ugh, you know what I meant by that."
"Cheer up, my companion, for we are about to arrive in Trost," Elmanthir said, his eyes narrowed, looking a little focused as he gazed forward. "There is a reason that a whole brand of beer has been named after that city. And you, my friend, will be free to sample it as much as you please."
The annoyed Stonesnout accepted those comforting words and allowed a small, peaceful smile to settle on his face. "That sounds nice. Besides, I've been rather curious about what human cities look like."
It took another two hours before the vestiges of a community began to reveal themselves. Small hamlets, and a village, and in another two, they were staring at solid walls in the distance. They didn't look like stone bricks layered on top of each other, but a single, white-gray body of stone that has been carved, complete with battlements. Even over the walls, one could see the roofs and upper walls of large buildings, houses, manses, stores, churches, and other structures.
They walked downhill and made a short pause near the main gate, which was open, with guards situated at the sides. The traffic here was large, but surprisingly, there was no fee or document check near the entrance.
"Finally, Trost," said Elmanthir. "A scenic city, with excellent taverns, or so I hear. I don't have much business here, but I suppose we could stay here for a day or two."
Stonesnout nodded, his thoughts firmly latching onto the words 'excellent taverns' and his eyes a little glazed. He gulped, feeling a little unclean. He didn't really do much yet, but he couldn't help to ask, "My wage, Elman?"
"Ah, naturally. Here's your whole salary for the last f-" The wizard took out a satchel of coins and was about to hand it to Stonesnout when the latter ripped it out of the wizard's grasp and ran through the gate, screaming something about sightseeing, "-our days..."
Stonesnout rounded the corner into a small square and looked around. The buildings raised from brown and white wood, with clear frameworks and blue windows surrounded him. Busy people walked the streets, among then humans, but also elves and fellow dwarves; more rarely a gnome or halfling, and he was pretty sure he saw a lizardman or something similar moving far in the crowd. Surrounded by costermongers who yelled out the prices of miscellaneous minor products, foods, and doohickeys they sold, Stonesnout grinned.
He had eleven gold pieces and two silver pieces, which was, to put it succinctly: a lot of money. This was the daily expenditure of a noble. He could buy barrels of ale for this.
He understood the details of his contract, even if it was only in spoken word, but a part of him didn't believe Elmanthir was this rich until now.
Finally, pushing through the crowd, Elmanthir joined him, breathing heavily. "There you are...!" The wizard looked at the ecstatic dwarf and favored him with a sympathetic smile. Stonesnout grinned back at him.
"I just wanted to tell you to meet me at the northern city gate tomorrow at noon. Until then, enjoy yourself, Stonesnout," the wizard stated with a firm nod. "If you have need of me, I'll go and see what the local magic shop has to offer. Please, don't make too much trouble."
"I won't," Stonesnout said, a bit whiny, his grin not dissipating. Normally, he'd be annoyed, but this place offered too many possibilities to busy himself with being irritated.
Stonesnout...
Activities [11gp, 2sp to spend; take as many actions as you want, but be reasonable]
[] Go to the best tavern you can find and get drunk. [LOCKED; you will do that automatically]
[] Visit a general store and see what they have.
[] Ask one of the guards where the landmarks are and visit them.
[] Write-in.
Noble Scion
Hanarei
Fable
Inheritance
Reinhardt
Forgy
official clown business
GumGumChomp
Thatguynameded
Historical Storyteller
ZacksQuest
Last edited:
