Academy of outcasts, p.1
Academy of Outcasts, page 1
ACADEMY OF OUTCASTS
©2025 LARRY CORREIA
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Contents
Also by Larry Correia
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Thank you for reading Academy of Outcasts
Also by Larry Correia
Academy of Outcasts
Academy of Outcasts
Magic and Bullets
Monster Hunters International
Monster Hunters International
Monster Hunter Vendetta
Monster Hunter Alpha
Monster Hunter Legion
Monster Hunter Nemesis
Monster Hunter Siege
Monster Hunter Guardian
Monster Hunter Bloodlines
Saga of the Forgotten Warrior
Son of the Black Sword
House of Assassins
Destroyer of Worlds
Tower of Silence
Graveyard of Demons
Heart of the Mountain
The Grimnoir Chronicles
Hard Magic
Spellbound
Warbound
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One
Iwas fourteen when I decided I was going to be a wizard when I grew up.
It was just another day, working down in a hole, chipping Red, when our tunnel boss gave us an urgently whispered command.
“Don’t move. Don’t nobody move.”
My crew froze in place at Ned’s words, because there were a whole lot of things in a lava tube that could kill a humble crawler like us, real quick.
It gets really dark inside a tube, so we were used to getting around by feel. The cadre had issued Corm and Ned light charms, but they kept those off while we worked. The magical white light blotted out the gentle glow that told us when there were flakes of precious Red embedded in the walls, and that glow told us where to dig. The elemental deposits here were giving off just enough light that I could barely make out the form of Boss Ned crouched a few yards below me, holding perfectly still, one hand raised in warning.
I was on my knees, sweat stinging my eyes, with my chipping hammer clutched in one glove and a steel scrapper in my other. Neither would be a very effective weapon if we’d accidentally blundered into some creature’s den. Not that there was room enough to fight anyway, since the sloping chute we currently occupied wasn’t much wider than my shoulders.
From the sound of his nervous breathing, Corm was a couple feet above me, and ready to flee back toward the surface. Corm had always been the skittish one.
“What is it, boss?”
“Shut up, Oz,” Ned snapped at me. “I’m trying to listen.”
There was a sound coming up the tube, like a wet mop being dragged across a sandy deck. Ned’s ears must have been going bad from decades of hammering, because I recognized what the noise was long before he did, and it made my guts turn to water.
“That’s a gurgler!”
“Calm down, kid. We’re not deep enough for gurglers.” Ned checked the metal band on his wrist. “It’s barely a hundred and fifty in here. Gurglers don’t break through walls where it’s this cool.”
But I knew what I’d heard, and it scared me to death. “We’ve got to go.”
We didn’t know if gurglers had thoughts like a regular animal, or if they were even alive at all. They might have been a natural phenomena of this realm, or some wizard’s lost construct, but in the end, it didn’t really matter, because they’d kill you all the same.
That sickening, sloppy noise came again, much louder this time.
A faint orange light appeared far below.
“Turn back.” Too late, Ned grasped that I’d been right. “Get to the surface!”
Corm was the youngest and smallest, so he was able to roll over and start climbing. It took me a little more effort, then I was clambering up right behind him. Our thick gloves and protective clothing kept us from slicing ourselves to pieces against the sharp rocks, but I still managed to bash my head hard enough it would leave a bruise through my padded leather helm. I risked a glance back toward Ned, who was desperately scrambling, and saw that the orange light was gaining on us.
“Faster, Ned! It’s right behind you!”
Heat rose up the tube from the gurgler, washing over us so brutally I nearly swooned. I’d been suffering before, but that had been the constant, low-level suffering I was used to. This heat was so much worse. This was so nasty hot, it hit me in the lungs like a hammer. I’m talking the kind of heat that would render the hardiest crawler unconscious in seconds and cooked in a minute.
The band around my wrist began to glow blue as the sudden increase in temperature set the protective enchantment off. The air around me dropped from deadly to miserable. The magic charm enabled me to breathe and think again, but my only thought was escape.
Ned started screaming, because the near heat of the gurgler was greater than what his charm could protect him from. Smoke rose past me as Ned’s leather armor blackened and caught fire.
I looked back to see the gurgler filling the tunnel, a blob of half molten rock, churning and hungry. Because gurglers were things of the depths, where the plane of fire was nothing but burning energy, it was slowing down and solidifying as it neared the surface. In the deeper tunnels they moved so fast that by the time crawlers knew a gurgler was upon them it was already too late.
Above shone the crimson light of our sky. We were almost there. I tried to shout for Ned to hurry, only to inhale nothing but pain.
The gurgler’s breath was an invisible toxic gas. It must have been extremely poisonous because it caused the activation of another of the protective charms I’d been issued. The air around my face turned from stinking sulfur to bland and breathable. The only reason I was still alive was water and air magic, but the shoddy charms us crawlers were issued wouldn’t last for long.
I was stronger and a better climber than Corm, which made a big difference even on this gentle slope, so I quickly caught up to him. “Keep moving! Get out of the way!”
Except Corm was stopped at the entrance and shrieked. “I can’t!” He pointed outside. “There’s an Elemental!”
The tunnel was too narrow to push past him to see for myself, but Corm wasn’t stupid. There was no mistaking one of those deadly predators for anything else. When
Encountering one fire beast was unfortunate, but they could be avoided. Ending up stuck between two meant certain doom.
I caught a glimpse of the deadly creature as it stalked past. Bipedal, the thing was gigantic, its flesh made of iron and fire, and so heavy, it’s footfalls shook the ground. In the distance I could hear the rest of our crew panicking as they ran for their lives, for Elementals always attacked people on sight. The second Corm stuck his head out, that thing would rip us to bits.
Death below, death above, we were trapped.
The gurgler got its hooks into Ned and dragged him into it. In seconds, our tunnel boss was just gone.
Corm panicked in witnessing Ned get dissolved and leapt out of the tube, running as fast as he could.
The Elemental flashed by the opening. There was a terrible roar as it struck. A burst of fire rolled over the tube entrance as it pounced on its prey.
I remained there, breathing my rapidly dwindling magic air, in a lava tube hotter than an oven, the gurgler slowly closing in below, and the angry beast screaming its fury above. I felt helpless, terrified, and angry all at once. When I threw my scraper at the gurgler, it hit with a hiss and stuck there, steel glowing and softening, but the thing kept coming.
All I could do was hope the Fire Elemental would move on. They were notorious for their impatience.
An awful minute passed as death inched nearer. The blue glow from the protective band began flickering, as was the white light of the air charm. When either of those went out, the gurgler would overwhelm me before it even reached me. I had no choice but risk the surface.
Whispering a quick prayer to my family’s patron, Ketekunan—the Saint of Perseverance—I took up my pathetic little chipping hammer and climbed out of the hole.
The surface workers had fled back to the safety of the barge. There was no sign of little Corm except for his crawler pack lying there on the black rocks, with smoking claw marks through it. This one was twelve feet tall, so it had probably eaten poor Corm in one bite.
The monster’s great horned head swiveled my way and it snorted fire when it saw me standing there, pathetic. Unable to outrun it, I lifted my hammer and screamed an incoherent challenge.
As soon as two tons of fiery doom began stomping toward me, I forgot my challenge and ran!
The Elemental caught up in an instant. Didn’t even need to hit me to knock me off my feet; its mass shook the ground enough to do so. I skidded across the black rock, then desperately crawled over the steaming surface. Huge claws descended to spear me.
There was a blinding crack of light, and the creature lurched to the side. Sparks flew from its burning hide as magma blood spilled from the hole. Rolling out of the way, I barely managed to avoid getting stomped, even as droplets of blood struck me and sizzled holes through my protective leathers. There was another flash, green this time, and it bellowed in agony as it stumbled away.
There was a lone man walking directly, fearlessly, toward the beast. He held a glowing wand in each hand.
When the Fire Elemental spotted him, it spread its arms, lowered its shoulders, and roared. It was so loud, I desperately covered my ears.
“You are not fit to challenge me, brute. Begone.”
A bolt of lightning leapt between the man and the monster. Flaming blood sprayed as the molten giant was hurled across the rocks. The crackling energy scalded my eyes.
The monster got up, took one last angry look at the man who bested it, and then fled, limping, across the lava field.
“Where’s the rest of your crew?” the mage—for surely that’s what he was—asked me.
Half blinded, half deafened, I was shaking too much to talk, but pointed toward the hole I’d climbed out of. The wizard, who wore the colors of the Argents—the family which owned my family—went over to the entrance and scowled down at the gurgler there.
“They’re all dead?”
I managed to find my voice, “Two crawlers are dead.” I was still too shocked to really comprehend what that meant. “I think the surface crew ran back to our barge.” Which was the smart thing for them to do when an Elemental appeared. Normally we’d have been fine waiting it out, if it hadn’t been for bad luck and worse timing. “That gurgler chased us out of the hole. It ate Ned.”
“An unfortunate waste of valuable laborers.” He talked like a foreigner, having to consider his words before speaking them, but his uniform was similar to the standard armor worn by the Argent family’s enforcers. Only, those men were armed with steel, while this one was armed with magic. He plucked a different device from his belt, pointed it down the shaft, and I flinched at the violent snap. The gurgler let out a high-pitched squeal as it died.
“That thing will trouble you no more.”
Having defeated two deadly beasts as if it was nothing, he went to where Corm’s pack had fallen, picked it up, stuck one hand inside, rummaged around, and came out with a handful of Red flakes. He nodded at Corm’s last harvest, before dropping the Red back into the pack, and slinging it over his shoulder. “Tell your bargemaster your life was saved by Gaul Haddar, and I have claimed this magical element as my payment.”
The wizard walked away.
The rest of my cadre came back to rescue me a short while later. Corm and Ned’s families wailed for vengeance while our trappers went after the wounded Elemental, tracking it by the residual heat of its spilled blood. I’d been burned, though not too bad. I was more shaken than anything. I’d used up two enchantments to survive, the cost of which would be added to my family’s contract to be worked off. I lived while my friends had died. It wasn’t the first time that would happen, nor would it be the last.
Most importantly, that was the day I vowed that I would never be helpless again.
Two
My whole life, I’d heard stories of other worlds. Nice places. Places that weren’t made out of fire.
The handful of outsiders I’d met over the years were all amazed that anyone could survive here. To them, Fogo was a very frightening place. With the sky being blotted out by endless storms, while the land beneath was in constant flux, melting and reforming, mountains growing, bleeding rivers of lava, which exploded into steam as it reached our temporary, constantly boiling, seas. One time a trader visiting from the Core had even referred to Fogo as a nightmare hellscape. His terror had given all us locals a good laugh.
Silly merchant. Hell is where pirates, murderers, and oath breakers go when they die. This is just home.
Yet the trader wasn’t entirely wrong because we were all very familiar with nightmares. Everyone on Fogo had those, because there was no shortage of gruesome ways to die here, and it was a challenge to go to sleep without thinking about any of them. No matter how alert your bargemen were, all it took was one unexpected volcanic eruption and whole families would get roasted to death in seconds. Viscious Elementals were constantly on the prowl. I still wore the scars from where I’d been mauled by a lava dog when I was twelve.
It was hard to imagine other realms where life was easier, where the ground didn’t burn your feet, the air was free of smoke, and it rained water instead of ash, but the encyclopedias insisted this was so. A century ago, one of our kinder masters had bought a full set of all twenty volumes of the Encyclopedia Ettymus to be shared across our barges so our cadre could be better educated.
As a boy, I’d managed to get my hands on most of those books and would read each of them cover to cover, devouring every single article about all the many kingdoms of the Seven Realms, their traditions, histories, and everything in between. Sadly, I couldn’t read them all. Too many volumes had been lost, because paper did not react well to fire, and fire was the one thing we never lacked.
At the time, I considered myself an expert, alphabetically speaking, on all topics from A through the first part of C, G, and a little bit of H, N through P, though a big chunk of O had gotten torn out at some point before I got it, probably to be used as a bargemaster’s butt paper, and volume Z, or at least the top half of the last book, because the bottom half of every page had gotten too charred to read during an Elemental attack. The surviving part was water-damaged and hard to read from the smudging, but I think I got the gist of it.
