Primal Wizardry - A Magic School Progression Fantasy

Ensouled artifacts, for lack of a better word, choose whom they shall Bond. Those taken through murder rarely Bond with their new owners, unless the creator was of particularly unsavory character. It Is however common for items taken in battle to accept their new owners if the creator was martially inclined.

-Deckard’s Compendium of Ensouled Artifacts

—

“This is the longest month of my life!” Rakin shouted to no one in particular sometime into the third week.

Kole disagreed but kept the opinion to himself. He’d really dove into his magical studies, free of responsibilities and the burdens of other classwork. Despite his efforts, his spellbook had failed to reveal any new abilities, but Zale had assured him that was to be expected.

By looking at his aura, she could gage how closely he was Bonded with the book, and at this point, there was hardly any evidence of a bond at all.

“It will grow,” she assured him but then added. “Probably.”

He was not reassured.

Of the four, Kole was the only one to have any measurable progress to show when the end of the white out celebration came around. Two days before the feast that would mark the impending end of the storm, he’d mastered a new version of Shield that cost him 25 Will and in the process he’d ruled out another version of the spell as viable, leaving only 7 more variants to study.

He also thought he was making progress on Thunderwave, but it was hard to tell. He’d added a lot of pieces to the path component that all felt like he was getting close to the Font of Sound, but in the last few days, he’d hit a wall. No matter how he modified the spell, he couldn’t get it any closer to the destination, and the more he tried, the more the spell’s Will cost increased with no added functionality.

Kole could have made even further progress, but during the forth week of their stay, the runes in the inn began to experience issues. The Will would randomly deplete completely from the gem, and the building would plunge into darkness while the cold quickly seeped back in. The first time this happened, the innkeeper Gregory—a generally friendly man with whom they’d gotten off on the wrong foot—stomped up to their room and banged on the door.

“What did you snow-blasted fools do to my runes!?” he shouted between bangs.

Kole was alone in the room at the time answered, dark room now illuminated by his borrowed rune light which he still definitely planned to give back—eventually. Probably.

It took Kole a while to convince the man he’d not done anything, but it wasn’t until Kole agreed to help refill the Will reservoir gem that the innkeeper relented. The runes went out every day or so for the rest of their stay, and they eventually resorted to keeping it at a low level to prevent excess from being drained. Everyone except for Zale chipped in without getting paid under some local law about emergencies.

Kole was tempted to ask to see proof of the law’s existence, but he really didn’t want to have to sleep in the ice tunnels.

The whiteout was expected to last a full thirty days, but it often ran longer. The tradition was for a feast to be held on the thirtieth day to celebrate making it through the confined conditions and to grant an opportunity for people to reconcile from any bad blood that might have developed during the prolonged confinement.

The day before the scheduled feast, Zale called the team together for a meeting.

“Listen. If anything is going to happen, it’s going to be tonight, or tomorrow during the feast,” she explained.

“Why’s that?” Doug asked.

Rakin let out an exasperated sigh and cut himself off from saying something cruel. He’d been short with everyone since they entered the dungeon and accepted the reality of the trial—an expression Kole was certain he would never use again while referring to an ill-tempered dwarf. In Rakin’s defense, Kole acknowledged he’d made attempts to hold his tongue, but in the last few days he’d grown even more irritable.

“Chaos always seems to strike when you least expect it,” Zale explained.

“But… we are expecting it,” Doug countered, still confused.

“I think what Zale means,” Kole said, jumping in. “Is that the feast is supposed to be a point where everyone’s guard is let down? If I was planning some nefarious business, I’d plan for it to happen during a party while everyone’s distracted.”

Doug seemed to understand then, so Zale continued.

“So, no training today. Get rest and stay armed at all times.”

Zale had already taken to remaining armed at all times, so the warning was not for her. As a group, they’d discovered a lot of oddities about this dungeon experience.

There was constant debate among the students of the adventuring program as to whether the events of the dungeon were real or not. Some things, like the sheer depth of details to the whole situation, pointed to the dungeon’s being real. Others, like the fading of wounds, and the odd behavior of the intelligent beings inside left doubt.

As a general rule, the people encountered in the dungeon treated everyone largely the same, regardless of their race. Doug and Zale—when she was undisguised—were treated the same as Kole and Rakin. If pressed, the people would acknowledge Doug’s race as a demonkin, but they didn’t react as one would expect. Similarly in real life, if someone walked around in full armor carrying weapons in an inn, they’d probably be asked to leave. No one seemed to notice or care when Zale did so, however.

So, after a long night of no surprises, the four of them sat down for a Whiteout’s End feast in the inn with the town’s full population—fully armed and dressed for battle.

“That’s a lovely dress you have Marium!” Zale said excitedly to one of the younger women she’d met amongst the townsfolk.

She’d gotten to know quite a few of them in her patrols and general wanderlust.

“You too Zale! Where did you get that? Is it new?” Marium asked in return, pointing to Zale’s sword belt as if it were some fashion item.

Zale’s smile faded a bit at the reality that this person she was interacting with might not be real. She quickly excused herself and returned to her friends.

“That was weird,” Kole observed, to which Zale nodded.

“I hope we get out of here today. Anything amiss?”

“Nope,” Rakin said.

He’d gone around the perimeter of the town’s tunnels. His primal magic was mostly useless here, but he still had a very minor version of his tremor sense if he focused on the ice.

“Same here. Nothing new,” Doug said, having interrogated some rodents he’d bribed to keep an eye out for anything strange.

The group was called to order as the innkeeper came out and made a speech. They were all to travel to the large ice cavern where a table had been set up, and everyone would bring a meal from their own homes to contribute.

They all made their way down through the tunnels, and found the large room decorated with rugs and tapestries, giving the once barren chamber a very homey—if still large—feel. The four stayed on edge as they found their seats, but the meal continued on without any apparent disaster.

When it got to the time of reconciliation, they all listened uncomfortably as the people of the town apologized for what they’d done over the past month, and asked for apologies in return.

“I’m sorry I cheated on you Debra!” one halfling begged near the end of the public apologies. “Please! Let me come home!”

He climbed up on the table and prostrated himself before a hulking human woman.

The woman, only stared at him until he slunk back to his chair.

As if the over-the-top display was a cue, more private one-on-one apologies followed.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t around the last few weeks,” a man near Kole’s group said to the woman next to him, “I was mighty ill. I was cooped up in a room at the inn. Couldn’t keep anything down.”

“He’s lying,” Zale whispered to her friends.

“How do you know?” Kole asked.

He used his primal magic to make himself unnoticeable, and immediately felt the Will drain as Zale tried to fix her attention on him. Ignoring the drain, he looked at the man who spoke, examining him closely. The man was maybe in his twenties and didn’t look exactly well. He seemed pale and malnourished, and he had a bandage on his left hand up to his forearm.

Zale realized what Kole had done and stopped trying to look at him.

“I saw him enter the inn three days ago—from outside. He had a big bag and rented a room. He’s a local I’d seen him before in the tunnels. I thought it was odd that he came in from the outside, but I’d seen others step out before.”

They listened as the woman forgave the man, and then they began to flirt.

“Do you think this is it?” Kole asked. “The mission?”

“Gods, I hope so. I need to get out of this ice-blasted Fauell spawned place,” Rakin complained.

“I’ll check out his room,” Kole whispered, activating his magic once more to slip out unnoticed. Once clear of the large chamber, he turned fully invisible and made his way back to the inn. A few villagers passed him on the way, carrying items for the feast—mostly fish dishes supplemented with items grown in their greenhouses. Some of the tunnels lead deep beneath the ice, opening to caverns through which the ocean below seeped in, allowing the locals to fish.

Kole hadn’t ever seen the man enter a room in the inn, but of the six rooms, he knew the occupants of three others, leaving only two to check. One door he found unlocked and empty and the other was locked tight. A quick rummage behind the bar turned up a second set of keys.

Gingerly, Kole pressed the door open, mind ready to cast Shield as he listened for the click of a trap. When the door was open enough for him to slip in, he ducked his head in to look inside. The room was smaller than the one he shared with his friends, but the largest difference by far was the metal cage in the far corner containing a baby fox made of clear shards of ice.

“Well… that’s something,” Kole said aloud.

The fox creature snapped its head in his direction at the noise, and its blue marble eyes fixed right on him. It cocked its head curiously at him, and its tongue lolled out just as any other canine would.

On close examination, Kole saw the cage was covered in runes, and they were tied into the heating runes on the floor. The fox jumped up to lean against the bars and examine Kole closer but jumped back with a yelp of pain when it made contact and the bars flared red. The contact made the lights of the inn flicker as the Will was diverted to the cage. It was only then Kole noticed how cold the room was.

“I’ll be back!” Kole told the fox, as he closed the door and ran back to find his friends.

He was nearly back when he felt the ground shake and cracks appear along the tunnel walls.