Mana mirror the first ga.., p.10
Mana Mirror: The First Gate, page 10
After my shifts at the butchery, Liz and Ed dragged me into sparring with them. Usually, it was Liz and me against Ed, since Ed was already a Spellbinder and Liz wasn’t, but sometimes it was reversed.
Despite only knowing one combat spell and it not even being an attack spell, Fungal Lock did a surprisingly good job of slowing Ed down. It was nothing extreme, but the extra drain and mycelium bindings helped Liz get off an extra attack more than once.
They tried to convince me to go back to the library and get more spells, but I declined. I’d already pushed the limits asking for the Fungal Lock spell, and I didn’t want to ask for another combat spell until I was at least second gate. I’d be happy to go back and look for a non-combat spell, of course, and a part of me wanted to see Alvaro again.
That Temsday, the letter I found on our doorstep was a little bit different. It contained four missions, unlike the previous week, and the note in the front was rather different as well.
Malachi,
Given your apparent interest in combat skills, it has become clear to me that you’re interested in doing more than simply training at home. As such, I’ve included four missions in this letter: but not all of them are created equally. The first missions from the Spiritwatch and Wyldwatch are simple enough that you should be able to complete both over your two-day period.
However, the second Wyldwatch and Spiritwatch missions are significantly more complex and will likely take at minimum two days, if not longer. As such, there is no feasible way for you to complete all four missions.
If you wish to prove yourself capable, I recommend choosing one of the second tier missions. If you wish to stay the course, complete one of the first.
In addition, from this point onward, I will no longer be selecting specific missions for you. I expect you to work on them on your time, and I may send you offers as well, but I expect you to use your judgment to select the best quests for your skills.
Regards,
Orykson
Interesting. I was actually rather glad he’d be giving me more freedom. If he wasn’t going to bother teaching me himself, then he may as well let me work as a free contract agent.
I glanced at the missions. Luckily, they were clearly labeled, with a one and a two on each of the respective agency’s missions.
The first mission for the Wyldwatch was to relocate a hive of sol-bees from a tree in the forests to a new home deeper in. I’d never heard of sol-bees, but from their name, I was guessing that they were bees with solar mana.
Literal fire bees.
Lovely.
I supposed that I may actually be able to do this mission. If I locked down the hive itself, rather than targeting a bee, I may be able to stop them from emerging and stinging me, which would let me transport them. The only trouble was, I wasn’t sure that I had the mana necessary.
The reward was one hundred silver pieces, which was a fair bit of money, but it didn’t offer anything else.
The first mission for the Spiritwatch was a diplomatic mission – apparently, the spirits in Ilima’s Way Cemetery were becoming unruly. Nothing violent, but seemingly people had been reporting hearing strange whispering in the park at night and seeing a shadowy figure walking around.
Successfully pacifying the spirit or spirits would award me fifty silver and a Lesser Marrow Death Mana Extract.
The silver was fine, but the extract was what really caught my attention. I didn’t know exactly what the extract did, but if it was anything like the Verdant Pasture pills, then I might be able to use it to help catch up the size of my first gate death mana-garden since it was lagging behind my life mana.
Alternatively, it might be more like my first gate Mana Restoration Elixir, only for death mana.
I supposed that I could stop at the pharmacy to ask, but if I completed the mission, I’d get a description on the label anyways.
I started to look at the second missions for the Watches, but then I paused.
The secondary missions were supposed to take two, maybe three days. I had the weekend to do whatever I wanted, but outside of hanging out with Liz – which always felt odd, since she was dating my brother – or just working at the bakery, I didn’t actually have a ton to do on weekends.
I could complete one of the first quests today, then go on one of the second quests tomorrow. It’d stretch into my weekend, but that wasn’t a bad thing. If it took two days, I may even be able to complete the other minor mission on Cretday – assuming no other contractors had claimed it – then head into Solsday lessons with three of the four quests completed, one of them being the quests to prove I could do more than run around town.
If it took all three days, then I’d still have completed two quests, one of them being the quest to prove myself, so I would still count that as a win.
I supposed that I could also try to do both of the more important missions, but that would be really risky, especially if someone claimed one while I was on the other. Waiting a single day was one thing, especially since I’d be able to monitor the papers and make sure nobody claimed them, but I felt like multiple days was a pointless risk.
I marked the Spiritwatch’s mission and tucked away all three. I’d get that one knocked out, then I’d look at the second ranked mission.
It didn’t take long to get a carriage to take me to the cemetery that had been listed. I burnt through my mana sketching the Analyze Life spell on the way, but I saved my death mana. I’d probably need it.
Once I hopped out, I sketched out the Analyze Death spell and began to walk around the cemetery.
It was a strange experience. I could see the energy contained in the human remains deep underground, and it burned with power. Not quite as intense as the forest, but it was more overwhelmingly death. That was obvious, even without Analyze Life.
More strangely, however, there were other peaks of death energy around the graves and the graveyards. Some were faded, so far gone that I was barely able to make them out. Others were solid, clear, and…
Human-shaped.
I took a breath as I realized that I was looking at a field of ghosts. The one I’d tracked down before was a distinct ghost, left after an accidental death, full of emotion and longevity.
These were older. Some had grown stronger with age, but most had grown weaker. They’d certainly lost some of the distinction and clarity that the ghost of the dead man I’d seen had possessed.
I wandered the graveyard, staring at the spirits. Any of them could have been the one that people had heard.
But as I walked deeper into the cemetery, ghosts began to slip away from me, no longer wanting to walk in the area.
“Get out…” came a groaning voice, like the autumnal wind given life and form.
I froze and glanced around. Then I spotted the ghost approaching me.
While the other ghosts had been fuzzy, indistinct shadows, this was sharper and clear, but just as old. They were strangely different from the ghost I’d seen before.
That had been sharp and clear as well, like a fresh painting.
This was more like someone had allowed a painting to stain and fade with age, and then had gone to restore it without having an exact idea of what the painting was supposed to be.
“I’ll leave, if that’s what makes you happy,” I said defiantly, “but I don’t think it will.”
The ghost stared at me, then raised an arm and pointed away.
“Leeeeaaaave…”
“No. I want to help.”
I stepped forward, towards the ghost. It let out a growl, and the shadows in the graveyard began to flicker and grow long.
I walked past the ghost and headed deeper into the cemetery.
There.
A grave had been graffitied and messed up, probably by some teenagers who thought they were being cool and daring. I knelt and picked up the vase of flowers that had been knocked off, straightened it, then collected the flowers and put them back in the vase.
Behind me, I heard a long, slow breath.
“Whyyyy?”
“I told you. I want to help.”
I reached into my ungated mana, which had remained full, since neither of my analysis spells could actually run off it, and converting upwards was so inefficient that I didn’t bother.
I cast a cleaning spell. Technically, the spell was supposed to collect and scrub away food residue, but I figured it may help here, too.
It was inefficient and imperfect, but it did work.
It took me several minutes, but I picked up the broken glass of the second vase and scrubbed the headstone clean, then looked at the ghost. My death mana had long since drained away, but the spirit remained in my view – they must be allowing me to see them.
“I’ll be back to finish this,” I said.
I left and headed to a store, where I got some cheap incense, a vase, and some new flowers. It cost me ten silver, but I was getting paid fifty, so I would still net positive.
My mana had recovered enough to recast my Analyze Life and Analyze Death spells as I returned to the cemetery.
The other ghosts had stopped clumping at the edges of the walls, which I took as a good sign. I went back to the grave, lit the incense, and replaced the broken vase.
As I stood and admired my handiwork, the ghost that had been disturbed approached the grave. They put their hand on the grave and began to fade, their anger leaking away.
“Thank you…” I heard them whisper as they slipped away.
I nodded and affectionately patted the tombstone, then turned and left the cemetery. I reported my success to a Spiritwatch station.
This time, they didn’t confirm my story – presumably because there wasn’t a dead body on the scene that needed to be verified. They just warned me that if it came to light that I hadn’t completed the task, I’d be fined heavily, and had me file some paperwork about what I’d done and what had been wrong.
Then, I was handed the extract and the silver.
“What does the extract do?” I asked the clerk who’d brought it to me.
“If you have a bone spell, taking that potion will enhance your understanding of it.”
I frowned and examined the bottle.
“It’ll help me master and ingrain it faster?” I asked.
“Exactly,” the clerk said. “The Lesser Marrow Death Mana Extract will only really work on first gate spells, but it’s still useful.”
It did sound useful, at that. It wasn’t quite what I’d been hoping – it wouldn’t expand my smaller pool of death mana – but I had no doubt that I’d learn a bone spell eventually. I did have death mana, after all.
I headed home and tucked the extract away with my restoration elixir and then looked over the rank two missions Orykson had given me.
The Wyldwatch mission was a lot more interesting than moving some bees. A village a day’s travel by enchanted carriage – less on a broom, but I couldn’t afford one of those – south of the capital had been attacked by an acidbubble-toad that was using first gate mana to destroy crops and buildings. The Wyldwatch would provide an acid-resistant cage to transport it, but the mission was to catch the toad, then bring it back here so that they could harvest some of its acidic mucus before releasing it back into the western fens that it was native to.
That sounded really fascinating, and my spell might actually be perfectly suited for capture missions. Plus, I’d be helping people out, which was a double victory in my book.
The reward was pretty hefty as well. Five hundred silver, as well as the ability to go to the Wyldwatch Research Garden and choose any magical plant that produced first gate mana. I could then take a clipping of the plant and grow it at home.
The Spiritwatch mission was also really interesting. I’d frankly assumed that it would be related to pacifying a ghost, since that was one of the largest points of the Spiritwatch.
In a way, it was, but it wasn’t a ghost.
An asomatous, a spirit that was the physical embodiment of a concept like wrath or pride or joy, had been patrolling around a town to the north and had been preying on people, infusing them with anger. Several people had been hurt in spontaneous fights that had broken out, and it was only a matter of time before someone got permanently injured.
Nobody knew what had spawned the asomatous, so this was a combination mission. I had to capture the asomatous and bring it back, determine what act of rage had spawned it, then resolve that issue as best I could.
Since the asomatous was capable of using first gate mana, it had to have been a strong source of hate, probably spawned by multiple people at a large event.
The reward was two hundred silver, but more interestingly, it specified that I was allowed to keep the Practitioner-grade spirit trap that I’d be given to capture the asomatous, which could hold spirits of up to second gate in strength.
In addition to the spirit trap, I’d also get a Lesser Eye Death Mana extract, which might help my Analyze Death spell along nicely.
Would that be more useful than the plant and extra silver, though? Could I capture an asomatous at all? I didn’t know if my Fungal Lock spell would be able to hold one in place long enough for me to use the spirit trap, nor how often I’d get use out of one.
I stroked my chin as I thought. I wished I had stubble that I could stroke, but… I would eventually.
I shook my head and refocused on my task, not wanting to slip into annoyance and depression, and instead picked a mission.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
After a few moments of hesitation, I used a pulse of mana to mark the Wyldwatch mission and tucked it into my pocket. I thought the plant clipping could be a useful thing for the garden that Meadow was helping me to construct. Besides, I still wasn’t sure if my Fungal Lock spell would be able to lock down the asomatous – assuming I could even find it.
Five hundred silver felt like a lot, but when I thought about it, it wasn’t nearly as much as it seemed. Two days meant about ten silver an hour, and I had to pay for the transport down to the village, a room for the night, all the food I ate there, and transport back. I notified the attendant, who gave me an acid resistant collapsible cage, and then headed out.
As soon as I got home, I went about sorting everything that I’d need for the trip. It was still early enough that I should be able to make it to the village. I was working, so I’d need to pack another suit. I wasn’t going to be bringing the summer suit – no matter what Orykson said about everyone needing one, I was not going to be caught dead wearing that in a village. It was by far the least concealing of my suits, and small towns could often harbor strange views. Sure, they were generally fine, but I didn’t want to risk it.
I put on my navy single breast suit for now, and packed the charcoal single breast for tomorrow. It would be hot and sweaty, and since I was going to be running around in fields, I’d need to wear my sports bra again tomorrow. At least I could wear a binder there and on the way back. That was something.
Should I bring my Mana Restoration Elixir? If the toad was especially slippery, I might need it.
I bit my lip, then tucked it into my pocket. It was so valuable that I didn’t want to leave it in my bag.
With that, I tossed my duffel bag over my shoulder and headed down into the kitchen. Ed was out somewhere, maybe at work, so I left a note for him and popped into the bakery to let my dad know that I was going on a trip, making sure to grab a couple of the meat buns from the bakery while I was there, then headed towards a long-distance carriage station. Not many of the carriages in the city would be willing to take me all the way out to the village. If I’d been willing to hire a broom or a flying carpet service, it would have been faster, but it also would have been way more expensive. For now, at least, I’d stick with hiring a carriage.
“Good day! What can I do to serve you today?” came the voice of a far too chipper woman behind the counter. I was immediately suspicious – I’d worked customer service for years. Nobody was really that happy.
“I need a ride to South Valley Village,” I said.
“Of course! Will you be needing a return trip?”
“Tomorrow,” I said with a nod.
“Of course! Would you like to book a stay at the Heart Lizard Inn as well?” the attendant asked. She sure did say ‘of course’ a lot…
“Yes,” I said. It might not be the cheapest one in the village, but the village probably didn’t have a lot of inns to choose from to begin with. Plus, often places like this would be a bit cheaper than if you went there yourself.
“Of course!” she said. Again.
The attendant took a few moments to scribble something on a sheet of paper, then cast a set of basic first gate knowledge spells on it before she looked up again.
“That’s going to come out to two hundred and five silver,” she said, her smile still firmly affixed on her face.
That wasn’t too bad, actually. It was still quite pricey, of course, but between the five hundred that the job offered, and the fact that I should be getting my first payment from Orykson soon, alongside what I’d managed to squirrel away over the years working at the bakery, I’d have almost fifteen hundred silver in my bank account.
It wasn’t much compared to the price of the suit that I was wearing, but it was still more than I’d ever had before.
Of course, if I was on my own, that’d cover rent and not much else, but that was why people had roommates. Besides, this was only one job.
I quickly wrote a cheque for her, which she confirmed with another quick first gate spell.
“Excellent! Darren will be out to escort you shortly.”
Darren, as it turned out, was an absolute bear of a man. He stood at least six and a half feet tall, and his shoulders were the size of a pair of boulders.
I was struck for a moment that, while I wanted larger shoulders, maybe I didn’t want them to be quite so… impressive.
The entire eight-and-a-half-hour ride there I spent working on mastering the Analyze Life and Analyze Death spells. Alvaro’s tip was really paying off – I had to drink less Mana Shock, since sketching out the spell didn’t take nearly as much mana as powering it.
