ALL NOVEL Chapter 63: Grades
For ages untold, the gods worked across Kaltis, creating wonders great and small. Even the presence of Faust’s creations, Erebog and Bilieth, was tolerated in those happy days following the battle. After Illunia and Assuine created the first dragons, the other gods desired to create a thinking race of their own, but they quickly found that without Illunia and Assuine’s aid, the creations failed. It was in these trials that many dangers that still roam Kaltis today were created.
-Unnamed Dwarven Text
—
“Gather ‘round!” Underbrook’s magically amplified voice boomed, waking Kole from his slumber.
He bolted up, looking around for danger at the sudden outburst, though no one noticed as everyone had begun to congregate around the two professors.
“This week, we are doing something else new!” Underbrook announced with cheer. “I’d like to give my dear Ganik worshiping colleague Tigereye here the privilege to share this wondrous addition.”
Tigereye looked on as Underbrook spoke, unamused by his theatrics.
“You were all graded,” Tigereye said, meeting Underbrook’s volume without magical aid, though lacking the showmanship. “We made a leaderboard. Here are the results.”
A burst of colored lights flew from Underbrook’s hands, into the air, accompanied by whistles and pops. Distantly, Kole sensed the lights and sounds drawing on the Arcane Realm, a brief flicker that was gone as quickly as he felt it.
He reflected on the sensation. It felt similar to what he’d sensed whenever Theral vanished, only more familiar. The magic was clearly not powerful like Theral’s teleportation spell, so why could he sense it?
Illusion? He thought, but discounted that. Few had created any wizard spells that drew upon that Font, all instead still using the illusion spells of the past that drew on the Fonts of Mind, Light, and Sound, in different combinations to get the desired result.
Light and Sound. He decided. Those Fonts were connected to Illusion. He had sensed the weak spell through his connection to the Font of Illusions.
As he thought this, everyone else was whispering amongst themselves. Behind the illusion, up on the wall, a formerly bare section of stone was now replaced with a list of names and numbers.
Ice Picks 9
The Forsaken 8
Risen Dahn 7
After the top three, there were a large number of teams with 6’s, and then a handful of teams with lower scores.
“This is the leader board,” Underbrook said. “We have included your grades from the week prior, though we didn’t share those with you then.”
Kole looked around his classmates to see that all those around him were looking at him and his friends.
“Second place!” Zale said, trying to muster some excitement from a distracted Kole, grumpy Rakin, and aloof Doug.
Kole saw that one of the other groups getting attention was Gray’s.
Great… Kole thought. He didn’t think beating Gray publicly would help their dynamic any.
“I bet the Ice Picks are Sleet’s team,” Zale mused, getting a "hmmp" of agreement from Rakin.
“Sleet?” Kole asked.
“Yeah, she’s an Ice primal. I bet they got a 5 today. I know they did well last week, but I doubt they got the 5 then.”
As if listening in, Underbrook continued, “The Ice Pick group, lead by Sleet Icecliff, received the class’s first 5. Sleet, using her knowledge of the local environment and local customs, immediately caught the elemental thief as he returned to town, and returned the baby elemental to its blizzard.”
Sleet Icecliff? Kole thought, stifling a laugh at the name. He’d known the girl’s name had been Sleet, which in itself wasn’t too bad, but the clan name of Icecliff on top of it was a little too on the nose.
That set his mind wandering on some terrible names his parents could have given him.
“That’s not fair,” someone whined in the crowd.
“You’re right!” Underbrook agreed enthusiastically. “And neither is life. Sometimes a party specializing in fire magic fights a group of trolls, and other times those same trolls eat a purely martial group. You’re all unique. How you choose to apply your talents is as important as what those talents actually are. Don’t pursue missions you are incapable of completing.
“So, if there’s no further adolescent whining, I will continue.”
He paused as if inviting another complaint, before continuing.
“The Forsaken and Risen Dahn teams both received fours, for both using their ample free time effectively and finding a solution to the elemental problem. The Forsaken, lead by Zale Wood—“
Rakin and Kole shared confused looks behind Zale as she beamed, but both shrugged, not really wanting to be considered the team lead.
Underbrook spoke on through their exchange. “—didn’t realize the threat the young elemental posed, but due to their familiarity with the population, they quickly found the target of the elemental’s rampage and reunited them, battling the elemental quite capably as they sought out the fox.”
Murmurs broke out among the students and all eyes turned to Zale’s team at the claim they’d fought the elemental with any degree of success.
“The Risen Dahn, lead by Gray Holder, quickly found the elemental fox when it entered the tavern, bringing it to the town’s attention. When the elemental attacked, the target was clear, and they quickly turned the creature over, preventing any large disasters.”
Underbook continued on, highlighting deeds of particular merit other lower scoring teams achieved, and used a crystal to project scenes from the event, though none showed Rakin in his battle against the elemental. Many of the groups completely failed to halt the elemental’s rampage before it found the fox in the inn, but they were still able to earn up to a 3 from how they handled themselves prior to the failure.
Kole had known the elemental to be terrifying, but watching it destroy the inn with hardly any effort really highlighted why all the other teams were impressed by Underbrook’s pronouncement.
When Underbrook dismissed the class, they all headed to the dining hall for a much-delayed lunch.
***
Amara met them at the dining hall with a gift in hand. But, on learning they’d experienced a whole month in the dungeon in a single morning, she quickly forgot about those and pestered them with questions.
“Did you notice any seems in reality? Did you all experience the time dilation at an equal rate—wait, what is your rate of Will recovery any different than usual?”
She pummeled them with questions, not even waiting for an answer before thinking of a new one. They answered as best they could between bites, but it had all seemed rather ordinary from their perspective.
“Actually…” Zale said, interrupting one of Amara’s questions, “I did experience something strange.”
All eyes turned to her and she went on.
“When I shifted into the void, it felt different. Normally it feels like I’m hanging from a cliff over a bottomless pit, with the Arcane Realm away in the distance, but this time I felt like I was floating. I could see the Arcane Realm and the Material Realm out there, but I wasn’t at risk of falling away.”
“What, so we were like, already in the void?” Kole asked. “The Ethereal Realm?”
“I don’t know,” Zale said with a shrug. “I’ll talk to Uncle Tallen about it tomorrow. But, It wasn’t the ethereal, I’ve been there, and used my ability, and it felt different from that.”
This admission to having been to the Ethereal Realm invited another barrage of questions from Amara, to which Zale knew very few of the answers. In the end, Amara wrote down all her questions in a notebook, intending to ask Mage Tallen the next day.
The prospect of asking the questions to the companion of her own hero, the master runesmith Levar, seemed to invigorate her.
“I’m out of here,” Rakin said, once he’d finished his meal and grown tired of the interrogation.
“I should go too,” Doug said more politely, “I have to get back to the Glade, that frozen wasteland was exhausting, being so detached from Assuine’s power.”
“You’re going to let them?” Kole asked Zale, surprised she wasn’t trying to push them all into another social outing.
Rakin shot Kole a threatening glare.
“Yeap!” Zale said, cheer wiping away the interrogation-born weariness. “I need to get ready for a date.”
“Oh,” Kole said, remembering now about Harold. It had been a month
He hadn’t wanted to go do anything, so he was uncertain why he felt so disappointed. In fact, he was very eager to return to his room and review his old spellbook. He’d made a lot of progress the last month, but he hadn’t had access to all his spellform samples and notes, and he thought he could knock out another version of Magic Missile tonight if he pushed it. He also had to do some research into his progress on Thunderwave before getting a chance to talk to Mage Tallen the next day.
“Good,” he said, after a pause. “I have to do some spellwork tonight anyway.”
Zale shook her head disappointed.
“You just spent a month doing that! Don’t you want to, I don’t know, go outside?”
Kole glanced out the window and then shook his head.
“No, I need to get back to the library.”
“Don’t forget to study the runes,” Amara reminded Kole. “I think I’ll have the new repairable version ready this week.”
Kole made a note to try to remember to get around to her workshop before the end of the weekend.
“Oh wait!” Amara quickly added, “I almost forgot!”
She pulled out her bag and produced four stone disks.
“I made these,” she said, passing them out.
Kole examined his closely and noticed similarities in design to the tracking device Amara had made, though he didn’t recognize any runes—not that he thought he could even if they were the same. The disk was divided into four pieces with simple non-rune lines. Each section had a Light rune on it, but beyond that, Kole was lost.
“I got a hold of some very small gem fragments, and fashioned these with them.”
At the mention of the gem, Kole saw that the disk did indeed have a very tiny ruby set in the center, almost invisible, its size so small.
Holding her own up, Amara explained the function.
“It took me all week, but I was able to get the runes simple enough to fit the intent in those gems. If you put a finger onto any of the sections and imbue it with Will, the corresponding rune will light up on everyone else’s device. I’ve established a code using all sixteen possible binary permutations—
Rakin held up his hand, stopping her.
“Nope, too complicated,” he said.
His tone was brusk, but he was inspecting the device with obvious interest.
“Ignore him,” Zale said, giving Amara the courage to continue.
“Sixteen possible combinations to signal different messages.”
She passed out a slip of paper with a chart and cleverly laid out system. There were messages for places to meet, The library, dining hall, Roost, and the study group hall, as well as indications as to how urgent the request was from immediate-life-threateningly-dangerous to whenever you get the chance.
“They will only last a couple weeks if we don’t use them every day and try to prearrange things as we have. I couldn’t afford any alchemically treated materials for a side project like this,” Amara explained, looking down sullenly as if the durability was a great failing on her part.
“These are great!” Kole encouraged. “That’s plenty of time, and it will be great in emergencies.”
“Yeah, this is amazing!” Zale added.
Amara looked up, her remorse disappearing at the praise.
Rakin even shook his head in a noncommittal approval. They talked about their plans for the devices a while before breaking up to go about their Friday afternoon plans.
“Just so everyone knows,” Zale said before they all left, holding up her device. “I can’t actually power runes, so I can’t send messages with this.”
At the pronouncement Amara’s head jerked to Zale, questions seemingly about to burst forth from her mouth.
Zale held a hand up, a gesture that seemed very effective at forestalling Amara’s tirades.
“You can ask me about it tomorrow. I have to go get ready.”
Amara deflated, but sullenly agreed to add the questions to the list she’d already started.
As he left, Kole was beginning to feel bad for Mage Tallen, and the interrogation he was in for.