/Author's Note

Hello Everyone!

This week World Advancement got its first Advanced Review initially it was a little vague but the reviewer kindly clarified on his feedback and provided me with some very helpful thoughts on the story.

So, long story short, if you post an advanced review please make it constructive so I can make this story even better.

Chapter 14:

“This is what my employer says, ‘If you want to save your apprentice then have the boy-mage use his magic to destroy the Eben slums.’” (Fels) “Oh, and you have three days.”

“What?!?!?” Alric, Meredith, and Catherine yelled out.

“Listen, normally I wouldn’t be working for a guy like him but this time I have no choice. That said I’m not a heartless guy so I’ll give you a little bit of help. My employer said to destroy the slums, he didn’t say to kill the slum dwellers. Sure he implied it but in the end all he cares about is his money so you should be fine with just destroying the buildings. I’ll be leaving now, you have three days.” (Fels)

Fels effortlessly picked up the two goons, slung them haphazardly over his shoulder and walked away.

Alric was still laying on the ground in shock.

His thoughts were running in circles, “I can’t believe I lost so easily. He was too strong. If only I were stronger.”

The last of his thoughts leaked out and Catherine heard him.

“Alric, what are you talking about? You just fought THE Fels, the legendary mercenary said to be equal to a small army. I’d say your pretty damn strong already but you’re still young and he has had decades of real battle experience.” (Catherine)

“Fels is really that well known?” (Alric)

“Ah, I forgot that you have no common knowledge about the world. Although Fels raw strength is only on the level of twice the ordinary man he has extraordinary battle intuition, perception, and reflexes. On top of that he is a tactical genius. They say that, while hired by the kingdom, he singlehandedly destroyed a small army attempting to flank the kingdom’s main army. I’m sure it’s exaggerated somewhat but I have no doubt that he was the one who brought about its demise. He’s a warrior that specializes in heavy strikes and quick counters, for someone with no formal training, as you appear to be, a fight with him would end in a second.” (Catherine)

“Thanks, Catherine if you hadn’t explained the difference between me and him I probably would have lost all confidence in my fighting abilities. Instead I will use my defeat today as motivation to get trained properly.” (Alric)

“That’s good. Now, we have to find somewhere to plan our next move, Meredith can you take us to that cabin you spoke of?” (Catherine)

“Alright, let’s go.” (Meredith)

The cabin was located next to a small cave a little ways away from the main town of Berrik.

The cave was situated in a large rocky area that jutted from the forest floor, there seemed to be many minerals that would be useful for alchemy.

Once they got near Alric called out to the other two, “Listen, before we go in I’d like to introduce someone to you. You could call him my companion, or pet. He’ll guard the cabin for us while we are talking.”

Alric whistled for shadow and called out “don’t hide.”

Catherine and Meredith looked around for whatever would be approaching.

When they saw the three foot tall wolf that was a black as a moonless night emerge from the tree line they stiffened and jumped backward.

“Don’t worry, he’s trained.” Alric said.

Catherine and Meredith, still wary, calmed down a little bit.

“Since when did you have a wolf? I didn’t see one when we were traveling together.” (Catherine)

“This is Shadow, actually he was with us the whole time we were coming to Berrik. As for why you didn’t see him…” (Alric) “Hide!”

Shadow instantly turned invisible.

The two stood dumbstruck, still not believing their eyes. Absentmindedly Meredith mumbled out, “holy crap…”

Soon enough though they began to ask questions.

“Where did you get a wolf like that?” (Meredith)

“What kind of wolf is it anyway? I’ve never heard of an invisible wolf!” (Catherine)

“I’ll answer your questions when we go inside, I promised to tell you about my past.” (Alric)

Meredith and Catherine voiced their understanding and headed into the cabin.

After instructing Shadow to guard the cabin he followed inside.

“Now, first of all, I said I will tell you of my past but there is a condition. In order to trust you, and get to know you better I’d like for both of you to share your pasts as well.” (Alric)

“That’s fine, I have nothing to hide. I assume you’re the same Catherine?” (Meredith)

“Yep, I am fine with it.” (Catherine)

“Let’s start off with names, races, and ages.”

“I am Catherine, a proud member of the squirrel tribe, and I am twenty-five this year.”

“I am Meredith Silas, a human, and I am thirty-two.”

“My name is Alric, I am sixteen years old, and my true race is called the Mana-titans.”

“What’s a mana titan?” (Catherine)

“I don’t know what a mana titan is but I’ve heard of giants that call themselves titans.” (Meredith)

“Titans are a race that have the ability to live in the harshest of environments. The giant titans probably live in an area with very large predators, A magma titan would live in a volcano, An aqua titan would live in the sea.” (Alric)

“So that would mean that mana titans live in an area filled with mana?” (Meredith)

“You are correct, my race lives in a large cave deep beneath the mountain outside Berrik. This cave was formed by intersecting mana wells and has a level of mana that would be harmful to ordinary living creatures.” (Alric)

“So you are from a race nobody has heard of before? Wow, no wonder you kept it a secret!” (Catherine)

“Now I’m going to tell you the two abilities inherent to my race. No matter what do not tell these to anyone.” (Alric)

“We promise to keep it a secret.” (Catherine and Meredith)

“One the mana capacity of mana titans is many times larger than that of any other race. Two we possess the natural ability to use body strengthening.” (Alric)

“So that’s why you were able to purify the lake and put up a fight against Fels!” (Meredith)

“On a personal level I have next to no knowledge about the use of magic and I have an abundance of knowledge on natural processes that do not involve magic, which I know as science.” (Alric)

“Since we do not have much time I won’t delve much deeper into the specifics of my past but those are the most important things to know for now. Catherine it’s your turn.” (Alric)

“Before I told you how I had left my home village due to my wanderlust, but I did not tell you the reason I became a physician.” (Catherine)

“Originally I had planned to just wander around living off the land and learning about new plants.”

“I decided to become a physician when I visited a small human village.”

“Upon entering the village I knew something was wrong.”

“The streets were empty in the middle of the day and there was nobody working the weed infested fields.”

“Originally I believed that the village must have been abandoned so I decided to move on.”

“However, when I was about to leave I heard sounds of crying coming from the nearest house.”

“I entered the house and called out ‘Is someone here?’”

“I heard the crying stop and someone yelled ‘No! Don’t come here! I haven’t heard your voice before. It’s not too late for you, Leave!’”

“For reasons I still don’t know I ignored the yelling and continued forward.”

“What I saw in that house shocked me to the core.”

“There was a man lying in a bed, he was deathly pale and covered in blood encrusted lesions.”

“When the man saw me he cried out in mortal terror, ‘GODS NO! PLEASE, PLEASE, I DON’T WANT TO KILL ANYONE!’”

“I ran to his side and said to him, ‘please calm down, I am of the Beastman race, we can’t get human sicknesses.’”

“He coughed and weakly replied ‘Thank god, I don’t know what I would have done if I passed this hell onto another.’”

“I asked him, ‘Is the rest of the village like this?’”

“He replied, ‘yes, they all got the sickness, most likely many of them are already dead.’”

“I said to him, ‘I’m going to stay here and help this village as much as I can. I probably can’t cure you but maybe if I help you all to eat and drink help will come or you’ll fight it off.’”

“From then on I stayed at the village helping the dying residents hoping things would take a turn for the better.”

“But the days passed by and the villagers only got worse and no help came.”

“They started dying one by one and I gave up hope of them being saved.”

“Still I stayed until the end, keeping watch and whispering kind words as the breathed their last.”

“Soon enough I was all alone in that village of death.”

“Filled with despair I cried out against the world shouting, ‘Why?!? Why didn’t someone save them?!?’”

“But soon enough I realized that I could have saved them if only I knew how.”

“After that I vowed to myself that never again would I sit by as people die of sickness and I set out from that empty village to become a physician.” (Catherine)

As Catherine finished her tale the cabin was filled with silence.

Apparently, even Meredith was unaware of this aspect of Catherine’s past.

Catherine attempted to force her usual lighthearted smile but as tears continued to roll down her face it wasn’t convincing at all.

*Sniff*Sniff “J-just give me a moment I’ll be alright.” Catherine said weakly and then proceeded to start sobbing.

Meredith put her arms around Catherine to comfort her.

After Catherine had calmed down Meredith began her story.

“My real name is Meredith Silas and as you can probably guess due to the fact I have a family name I was born a noble.”

“In my childhood I lived in a well off noble household.”

“While I was still young I enjoyed everything that being a noble had to offer. Good food, nice clothes, a beautiful house.”

“I had servants that would perform all the necessary duties in the house.”

“For a while I truly enjoyed being a noble.”

“However, as I was approaching my teens I learned something that turned everything around.”

“I heard from some of the other noble girls about arranged marriages and that someday I would be married to a man I didn’t know.”

“I was worried, but I reassured myself that my dad would pick a good guy for me even if it was arranged.”

“I gradually became more nervous as my coming of age neared and I began meeting all the possible candidates for my marriage.”

“There were a few that were okay, but there were a lot of old men and even worse some of them already had wives.”

“Still I trusted my father thinking, ‘Surely, he’ll pick a good guy’”

“That all changed after my coming of age ceremony.”

“My father called me into his office and said ‘follow me you are going to meet your new husband’”

“I followed him, nervous, but when I entered the room I saw that my worst fears had been realized.”

“The man was someone that my father had said was very important.”

“But I didn’t care about that because the man was someone I had met before.”

“He was an old and arrogant man that had a sadistic personality.”

“I somehow managed to make it out of the marriage interview without breaking down.”

“But that night I grabbed what money I had stashed away and escaped from the house.”

“When I saw that man I realized that my father had never truly loved me, he had simply been trying to use me as a tool to sell away to obtain power.”

“I made it easy for anyone looking for me to follow me to the forest where I cut my self and spilled my blood over the ground and trees.”

“I then bandaged myself up and ran in the opposite direction.”

“I then made it to the next town over where I hired some travelers to take me to the academy.”

“Having faked my death, I started my life over as a student.”

“There I learned of my interest in alchemy and studied to become an alchemist until my graduation.”

“After graduating I moved around until I found Berrik and set up shop.”

After Meredith had finished Alric only had one more question.

“Now, who is this apprentice that Fels mentioned?”

“My apprentice’s name is Christy.” (Meredith)

“She’s fifteen years old and was born in the village.” (Meredith)

“When she was little she was the biggest troublemaker. She had this insatiable curiosity that would always get her into trouble.” (Meredith)

“One time she actually poked a bear with a stick, good thing it was tame or else she would have been chow.” (Meredith)

“Anyway due to this curiosity of hers her parents were fed up. They realized she needed an outlet for her curiosity so they asked me to take her on as an apprentice.” (Meredith)

“She took to it right away, absorbing all the knowledge I had learned over my life at an amazing rate. She truly is a genius.” (Meredith)

“This brings us to our current problem. I want to save Christy, but there’s no way I can destroy the slums to do so. We need to come up with a plan.” (Alric)

“I have a spell that can find out where she is but she is sure to be heavily guarded.” (Meredith)

“I have an idea. If I can use the same cloaking magic as Shadow I can get in to her with no problem. The problem is I could only use it on myself and not her so I would have to fight my way out.” (Alric)

“Can you do that? What if Fels is there?” (Catherine)

“That’s where I’ll need Meredith’s help. I can’t train physically in the time we have left, but I can learn new spells. First I’ll have to learn the cloaking spell then Meredith will teach me some of the spell’s she knows.” (Alric)

“Alright! Let’s do this!” (Meredith) “We’ll save Christy!”