The Asshai's Bloodmage

 It was almost midnight when our ships lowered their sails and dropped anchor, so I thought it was normal not to see anyone in the port of Asshai. There were a few anchored ships that varied in size, but there were at most ten or less since I didn't count the vessels too small to be called ships. The fact that they were completely empty without a single sailor made it seem like a ghost port with haunted ships. The excited comments I heard on board before we approached were completely silenced and all I saw was a bit of fear from almost everyone.

Soon a skinny boy ran up to where we were disembarking. He was very thin and wore a blood red mask. The mask was somewhat familiar in my memories of Earth, and Aisha had already told me about the shadow men, natives who were born here. He is at most 14 or 15 years old or maybe their size is like that, he soon approaches and speaks in the common language:

"Welcome esteemed gentlemen, the names of the ships have been removed so I could not identify where you are from, if this is your first time in Asshai I would like to offer my services as a guide I charge only 3 silvers per day or 1 gold for two weeks."

Right behind the boy, I see a chubby man trying to walk fast and come towards us, a strong man with a huge backpack on his back and a lady with a cane walking slowly. Before everyone gets close, I take out a coin and gold and throw it to the boy and say:

"I am a merchant and I need a lot of things, I will pay you 1 of these per week, right now my passengers need an inn to stay. Besides that I want to buy a house, and maybe a store in the city but that can wait for tomorrow."

"Yes sir…?"

"You can call me Boss, now guide us to the nearest inn first." He waves and says:

"(This way, Sir Boss)"

But before we start following him, the fat man arrives and says he is a merchant who wants to buy and sell cargo. I tell him to discuss the details with the captain and that we will close the deal tomorrow. The elderly woman grabs the hand of one of the passengers and says she will read the woman's future. She is soon left behind while we follow the skinny boy. The last man starts shouting that he sells protection against the shadows of Asshai and starts setting up his tent. A few more passengers are distracted by him. I leave them behind as well and start walking towards a street near the port.

Even the simplest houses here are made of black stone, just like the ground we walk on, the river intertwines with the streets imitating a dark and empty Venice. The boy explains the names of the streets, but it seems he is not very fluent in the common language since he called me boss as a name and not a title. Less than 10 minutes later most of the passengers and I arrived at the inn, Henry, Will and the crew stayed on the ship to protect the cargo until tomorrow, but I still saw the chubby man board. Well, Henry only has the right to negotiate his own share and the crew's so I am not worried. The inn is a large house made of the same black stone that is everywhere, it has 2 floors and its width easily takes up three or four blocks. Despite the enormous amount of windows I only see about 10% of them with some form of light, it is already quite late so I deduce that there are no lights because everyone is sleeping.

After some queueing, I manage to find one of the largest rooms and invite Omar and Fatty along with the Asshai'i boy to get some more information. I don't need to sleep, the inn was created so that common people could have a place where they could safely store their luggage and I could also have the ship available as soon as possible. I can already hear several beeps from the system, but I ignore them for now. I didn't pay attention to the man selling "protections" and the old woman who said she could read the future precisely because she didn't understand anything about the city.

"We've finally arrived in Asshai, let's make a toast." Our masks were made so that our mouths would always be free and we could eat in public without any problem, so we felt comfortable even in the presence of the Asshai'i boy. After the toast with the expensive Valyrian wine with my friends Omar and Fatty, I turn to the boy while I put another drink on the table and some luxurious snacks and tell him to eat too. He fiddles with his mask and I see that he kept the mouth part and without blinking, he starts eating.

"You are very generous, Sir Boss."

"Just Boss is good enough, you can call my friends that too." I say the last part in the Asshai'i language and he quickly stops eating as he understands the word and realizes the words that came out of my mouth in the magical language.

"I understand Boss, I'm sorry I didn't understand what the word meant. By the way my name is Salim, normally merchants want to bargain for the price I charge, and pirates try to use threats and violence to obtain information. But you are the first being so generous, I think I got lucky on my day."

"So, someone from your people always stays there at the port to do this kind of work, Salim? And those 3 who arrived on the ship with you? What do you know about them?"

"We stay in pairs or trios so that there is always someone there in case another ship arrives. The fat man represents one of the groups of merchants in the city, there is another group besides him, this one belongs to the few aristocrats of the city. I will explain about them tomorrow morning, both of them will offer fair prices since they have an agreement, just as I was lucky, the common merchants were lucky since it was their day to receive visitors. Only the man does not stay at the port, he was woken up by another companion of mine as soon as his ship was spotted from afar. The lady was also warned by another companion of mine about his arrival."

I see, they divide the priority of the cargo into two groups that change depending on the day and the representative is just an intermediary between the ships and the various merchants of the city... It is a fair system if everyone plays fair, it is not very common among merchants. And what about the strong man and the old woman?

"It's not in everyone's interest in the city to have their food and water prices inflated. The man who sells protection is a charlatan; most of his stuff has no effect whatsoever. And the old woman used to have some power, but these days she can barely read people's fortunes by hand. If you're looking for real magic, come back to the port during the day and I'll show you some people who know something about it. There are places in the city that sell real magic items and other magical ingredients. Of course, temples are always an option for those looking for quick power."

"Actually, my friends and I want to find a magic teacher to teach us. We already know a thing or two about it, we just want to know if you can recommend someone with a good reputation."

"I see, Boss, you're also lucky. There are over 100 talented Bloodmages, Priests, Shadowbinders, and Necromancers in the city, but none of them are seen very often, and accepting students is even more difficult. Only 7 of the most talented ones usually recruit regularly, and 3 have already accepted students in the last 10 years. The last 4 usually recruit large numbers of students, but even that only happens from time to time, and they will only recruit the most talented ones."

We were all surprised and Omar asked: "There are really so many who are considered talented? Do you mean that there are even more who are less talented? What qualifies them as talented here?"

"I'm not sure what qualifies someone as talented because I'm not an apprentice, nor do I know the titles that mages use, but all of these 100 or so are called Masters."

Fatty then asked another question: "So what can you say about these 4 Masters who recruit a lot of students? Why do they do this?"

Two of them are Shadowbinders who work for the aristocrats and the common merchants. They receive large amounts of resources from these two groups so they recruit apprentices to do tasks for each group in exchange for magical knowledge, joining one of them means you work for the Merchants' Alliance or the Aristocrats. The third is a Blood Mage who is suspected of being a servant of the temples, he doesn't say anything when recruiting students for his tower, but most of his students after a while start voluntarily joining the various temples. The last one is a Shadowbinder who raises wild animals and some exotic plants in his tower. It is said that his students are recruited to take care of his gardens and animals. That's why I said you were lucky, the first 3 are always recruiting but the last one only recruits once every 40-50 years. Of course he requires a certain talent from the recruits unlike the other 3, but the good thing is that he doesn't have many ties to any group in the city, besides that, he only recruits students for a period of 3 months, but there are still 3 weeks before the recruitment ends."

Omar nods, already decided, and Fatty does too. They seem to have already made their choice, and the last option really seems much better compared to the others. The so-called Masters are the best choice until we understand better how things work here, and we should take advantage of this rare chance that happens once every 50 years. Otherwise, we might end up doing tasks for merchants or having to wait a few years until some Master recruits us as unique disciples.

Special thanks to the Patreons:

Magic Apprentice: Parsa, Pato Senalima, Axel Bour, Gabriele Sulpizio, Vinnie, Jan, frimorigo, Scott Robertson and Takatchi!