Chapter 8

I had intended to sleep until late in the afternoon, but Katherine wakes me up at 10 a.m. fully dressed in her new clothes and anxious to go shopping for a magic wand. I sigh and get out of bed. I could try fighting with her about it, but I’d just lose again anyway. Wearily, I step into the bathroom to get myself ready. Afterwards, I come out wearing nothing more than boxer shorts, causing Katherine to shield her eyes with her hands. As I spray myself down with a musky Winterspring cologne, I catch her taking a peek through her fingers. Right away, her blushing cheeks light up as brightly as her smile. In response, I just shake my head and keep about my business. As soon as I’m adequately cloaked in cologne, I reach into the sack that I got at Wilmette’s store and dress in my new clothes. Then finally, smelling fresh and robed in rich vestments, I once more feel like a gentleman of noble birth. Ladies beware!

Or so I say. I’m actually not interested in looking for a partner. I just like to flirt a lot. It helps me to take my mind off of more troubling thoughts. Well, alcohol does that too, but between alcohol and women, I retain the slightest of preferences for women.

Thus, with my staff in my left hand and Katherine wrapped around my right arm, I return to the streets of Magali prowling for adventure.

First, the day takes us to the same street where Wilmette the Fashionista has her shop. The prior evening I had noted the location of a magic shop that looked promising through its front window. The shop is called “Cornucopia.” Katherine and I enter into the shop causing two small bells attached to the door to jingle. Behind the store counter, just off to the right of the door, we’re immediately welcomed in by a father-daughter team. Undoubtedly, the older gentleman is the one who crafts the magical items, and the daughter is the one who uses her charm to sell them. I’m sure that it’s an effective strategy considering how much of a doll the daughter is. Her face is pure and unblemished, her black hair is straight in the back yet curled into two large spirals in the front, and her enchanting eyes are colored a rare purple like my own. I walk straight to the counter and pay my undivided attention to the daughter salesman.

“Good morning my lady. I couldn’t help but notice that you have enthralling purple eyes. It’s a trait that we share.”

The gorgeous maiden leans over the counter and stares deeply into my eyes. “Oh look father. He has purple eyes like me. See, I’m not just some freak of nature.”

“Quite the contrary my lady. A peerless beauty like your own is a wonder of nature that should be celebrated and lauded.”

I smile wryly at her and she wiggles in titillation. “Err hmm,” her father coughs, “how might I help you today my lord?”

“I am in need of a quality magical wand. I was thinking perhaps one tailored to the Altruist class, but the specifics of their species slips my mind. Might I take a look at your class guide?”

The shopkeeper reaches for a tome underneath his counter. Straining, he lifts it up and lays it heavily upon the counter. “Certainly, my lord.”

I search through the table of contents until I find the page for the Altruist class. Then thumbing through the manual, I find the entry that tells me:

Altruist:

Primary Discipline: Life Mage (Debutant Life Mage)

Sub Discipline 1: Supporter (Debutant Support Mage)

Sub Discipline 2: Botanist (Debutant Plant Mage)

In a world full of monsters and battles, Altruists are peaceful supporters of mankind. They don’t bring much to the table in terms of battle ability; however, their specialty lies in helping their allies fight at their best.

Turning, I show the page to Katherine. “Does this sound like a class that you would be interested in?”

Katherine reads the entry carefully. “Yes, I like it.”

“Great. The Altruist class has some of the easiest requirements that I’ve ever seen. I suppose by their nature, they value a compassionate personality over magical power. So all that you have to do is learn the beginner spells for Life Magic, Support Magic, and Plant Magic. After that, we can take the Steampunk locomotive down to Arpeggio Academy where you can take the class entrance exam. Your mother told me that you had a Life Magic book. Did you bring it with you?”

Katherine shakes her head negatively. “No, sorry.”

“No problem. I’ll just get you another one. Good sir, I’ll need instruction booklets for Life Magic, Support Magic, and Nature Magic. We’ll pick them up at the counter after we return from browsing the wands.”

“Very good my lord.”

I lead Katherine deeper into the store. Here there are rows of magical items assorted like library shelves. The various shelves contain staves, wands, swords, knives, spears, fans, boomerangs, whips, katars, nunchucks, blowguns, and numerous other weapons and tools that mages and fighters of every sort rely on. Katherine soaks in the vast array of items in astonishment. I’m also impressed at not only the quantity but also the quality of the items present. This is a formidable magic store. Surely, they must do a lot of business.

Of course, great items come at great prices. Before we choose a wand, I want to ask Katherine a crucial question. “Katherine, your mother Margaret gave you a substantial amount of money so that you could purchase the right wand for yourself. I’m curious to know what 60,000 âmes mean to your mother. Like, how long would it take her to earn that much?”

Katherine thinks it over carefully. “Well on a good year after the summer harvest, we can sometimes save as much as 15,000 âmes even after we restock seeds, purchase food, and cover all of our other expenses. So 60,000 âmes is about four years of savings. Maybe a little more.”

I nod impressed. “That’s quite a sacrifice that your mother made. She must love you very much.”

Katherine unleashes her trademark smile. “Yeah she does. My mother and I are really close. Especially since she was my only parent growing up.”

While I normally don’t pry into people’s pasts, I’ve become too curious about Katherine to deny an easy opportunity. But I still proceed with caution nonetheless. “Katherine, if I might ask, what happened to your father?”

Her smile tragically vanishes. “He died before I was born.”

Pitifully, “oh” is the only thing that I can think to reply. After a brief awkward pause, I break the silence saying, “Truly, your mother has made a great sacrifice for you. We can’t let it be in vain. We have to get you the best wand possible.”

“Yeah!” Katherine agrees pumping her fist enthusiastically. We wade through all sorts of irrelevant objects until we come to the Life Magic boosting wands. I know that Katherine doesn’t know how to identify magical items, so I quickly run through a crash course in my head. Once I have my thoughts organized, I begin to teach her.

“Listen Katherine, I’m going to explain magical items to you. To understand the wand that you’re about to buy, you must understand crafting materials and affixes. Almost everything that has a measurable quality in the mage world operates according to the same system. That system is a six-tier system with the levels low-grade, medium-grade, high-grade, superior-grade, ultra-grade, and divine-grade. This system applies to crafting materials, mana plants, potions, and even âme crystals.”

I motion to one of the Life Magic wands. “Wands tend to bolster defensive spells. Staves tend to bolster offensive spells. Both are generally made out of woods. This wand here is made out of oak wood. Oak wood is a medium-grade material. It’s okay, but it’s still on the lower end of the spectrum. It can be used to fashion a decent wand for a beginner mage, but I think that we want to go with one of the higher grade woods for your wand.”

I reach high up on the shelf and pull down an unenchanted whitewood wand. “I’m thinking that we should get you either a cerulean wood or whitewood wand. Cerulean wood is superior-grade and whitewood is ultra-grade. There’s a big difference between grade levels both in power and in price. The wands that I showed you so far are naked wands in the sense that they don’t have affixes. So let me show you one that does.”

This time I pull from the shelf a Rife Cerulean Wand of Zest. “If you look at the item tag on this wand, you can see that its base material is cerulean wood and that it has the prefix ‘Rife’ and the suffix ‘of Zest.’ The prefix and suffix tell you the magical bonuses that the item grants. These particular two affixes are both for Life Magic. ‘Rife’ is the superior-grade prefix meaning that the wand grants a 25% bonus to Life Magic healing and damage spells, and it also increases the wielders ability to resist status magic by 30%. Likewise, ‘of Zest’ is the superior-grade suffix, which indicates that the wand increases the power of revival spells by 20% and casts a continuous stream of healing energy on the wand’s wielder.”

Katherine looks the tag over carefully. I can tell that she doesn’t quite get it yet. She looks at me and remarks, “It’s kind of complicated.”

I disagree, “Nah, it’s all pretty simple and consistent. Once you understand the six-tier system and affixes, then you can understand any items, materials, weapons, or armor in the mage world. But none of these wands here are quite what I’m looking for. Let me go speak to the shopkeeper for a moment.”

I leave Katherine alone to study the wands. Then I approach the front counter to speak with the older gentleman. His lovely daughter is busy helping other customers, so I don’t get to flirt with her anymore. “Excuse me Sir, I was wondering if you had any wands with affixes for both Life and Support Magic. Something of high enough quality to be sufficient for a lifetime.”

The shopkeeper strokes his chin in thought. Then he points his finger upwards as if to indicate that he had a brilliant idea. “We do have one such wand. Let me show you.”

I follow the good sir to the bargain items. He fumbles through a miscellaneous assortment of dusty items until he finds the wand in question. Grinning with confidence, he passes me the wand and steps back. I take the wand’s item tag in hand to inspect its details. The tag reads:

Given Name: Unnamed

Technical Name: Vivacious Whitewood Wand of Exhortation

Prefix: Life Magic, Ultra-Grade: Vivacious: +50% Life Healing & Damage, +40% Status Effect Resistance

Suffix: Support Magic, Ultra-Grade: of Exhortation - +10% Bonus to Support Magic Buffs, Auto-Casts Zeal Spell on Wielder, Auto-Casts Parry Spell on Wielder

I nod in approval. It’s truly a remarkable wand. I doubt that Katherine would ever need such a powerful wand for her purposes, however, I know that this will be her only opportunity to ever get a great wand, so I want to go all out for her assuming that the price is right. Normally the price is listed at the bottom of the tag, but in this instance, it’s not there. “What’s the price?” I ask the shopkeeper.

“It’s on the back of the tag,” he answers.

I flip the tag around and take a look. Instantly, my eyes grow wide with disbelief. “What’s the catch?”

The shopkeeper chuckles pleasantly. “The catch is that there’s very little demand for high-end Life and Support Magic wands. All of the kids these days want elementalist staves so that they can cast big fireballs. You rarely ever encounter anyone specializing in magic that works for the sake of others. Thus, the low price.”

Understandable, and sold. What a steal!

“Katherine!” I shout as I move to the checkout counter. Right away, she moseys along while the shop owner bags our items. In the meantime, the owner’s daughter also returns to the counter. “We should give him the purple eyes discount father,” she says.

The shopkeeper laughs heartily. “We can’t give everybody with purple eyes a discount sweetie. But then again, we rarely see anyone with eyes like yours. So I guess this one time we can do it. What do you say we give you the magic booklets for free as part of the purple eyes discount?”

“That would be great,” I answer, duly astonished by their generosity.

“You’re the first shopkeeper in all of Magali who has hasn’t tried to slay me with unreasonably high prices.”

The kindly shopkeeper laughs again. Smiling, Katherine whips out her 60,000-âme moneybag just as the owner finishes placing our items in a sack. He then tells us, “With the free booklets and the magical wand your total price is 450,000 âmes.”

I look to Katherine for her reaction. I can tell from the crushed look in her eyes that at the very moment he said the price a hammer of disappointment smashed her heart. Confused, she looks at me not sure what to do or say. I had held it back before, but now it’s time for me to tell her the complete truth. “Katherine, I know that 60,000 âmes means a lot to you and your mother, but the fact of the matter is, 60,000 âmes is nothing to the mages of high society. Honestly, that much could fall out of my back pocket and I wouldn’t even notice. I just didn’t say anything before because I didn’t want to embarrass you or your mother. So please allow me to keep my promise to Margaret and get you the best wand possible. But as for the money that she gave you, I want you to return it all to her. I was very moved by her willingness to make such a large sacrifice for her daughter. I think that she deserves to have her money back. So I’ll pay for the wand.”

Katherine lowers her head in silence. I hope that my words didn’t hurt her.

To pay the shop owner, I summon one of my rarely used moneybags and extract a divine-grade âme crystal worth 500,000 âmes. The âme crystal is gold in color and emits a vibrant glow. I doubt that Katherine has ever seen one before, but I suspect that it would be in poor taste to show it off to her now. Discreetly, I hand it over to the shopkeeper who gives me an ultra-grade red crystal worth 50,000 âmes as change. Then finally, I take the sack off of the counter and hand it over to Katherine, who still wears a sullen expression on her face. “Thank you for the discount,” I tell the shopkeeper and his daughter.

“Come back any time,” the daughter says with an extra sultry growl in her voice.

We depart from the store. Katherine trails behind me silently while I try desperately to conjure up the right words to say. I fail miserably at the task. But it’s unbearable to not have Katherine as her normal, happy, talkative self. Maybe if I just start talking, then the right words will come by themselves. I stop walking. Katherine, too, stops behind me. Turning, I begin to say, “Katherine, I…”

Out of the blue, Katherine drops the sack and throws her arms around me. I’m completely blown away by her sudden embrace. As she pulls me tightly to her chest, my mind goes blank. It takes a few seconds before I even have the wherewithal to hug her back. But once I do hug her back, I begin to allow the moment to really sink in. The feel of her chest against my chest is like floating on a cloud or like laying my head upon the most luxurious of pillows. The squeeze of her arms around my arms makes me feel cherished and loved. Yet despite the joy of the moment, when I realize that this is the first time that I’ve been hugged since I left my mother all those years ago, I nearly tear up.

Fortunately for me, and much to my delight, Katherine is not fast to break her hold. So gently I rest my head on the top of her head, basking in her embrace. Then, breathing in heavily, I recognize the sweet smell of her hair as lavender. Its aroma is pleasantly intoxicating. However, I may have breathed it in a little too heavily because I feel a sudden lightheadedness. Or rather that could simply be the result of having so many unfamiliar strong emotions swirling inside of me all at once.

Katherine squeezes me a little tighter and I nearly melt into an emotional puddle. Then finally, with full acceptance, I return the strength of her squeeze and hold her tightly, as if it were all that I ever wanted to do in life. Thus we stand, hugging like fools in the middle of a busy street. But I don’t care. This is one of the happiest moments of my otherwise sad, pathetic life.

“Thank you Souladonis. You’re such a good person.”

“No, Katherine you deserve it. I know that you’ll use your wand well. By the way Katherine, your wand doesn’t have a name. You have to name it.”

“I want to call it Souladonis.”

“No, if you name it after me, then when you call my name, I won’t know if you’re talking to me or the wand. Besides, that’s hokey.”

Katherine makes a cute giggle. “Okay then, I’ll call it Traveler.”

I laugh, pleased with her joke. “I like that. It’s a weird name for a wand. But I like it.”

Finally, Katherine and I release our embrace. Then we begin to walk once more through the streets of Magali. Right away, an idea flashes through my head. I stop Katherine and have her place the sack on the ground. I then take out one of my inventory bags and conveniently place the sack from Cornucopia into the magical bag. Now Katherine won’t have to carry the sack around with her. Once we begin walking again, just as I had hoped, Katherine stands off to my side and wraps both of her arms around my right arm. It’s becoming a habit of hers. I’m glad for it.

After ten or so minutes of walking, we come upon the town center. There seems to be some sort of dance going on at the moment. There is music playing, bards singing, and couples joyously dancing around each other in circles. I pull Katherine along with me intending to join in the dance, but then my eyes behold something wonderful. Just a short distance away on top of an elevated platform, I spot the unforgettable face of Mathilde Barthalamos, princess of Âme Kingdom. She is sitting on a golden throne and surrounded by her inquisitor bodyguards.

“Well, well, well, Soul,” I say to myself. “It looks like we have ourselves an opportunity for revenge.”

Hey guys. I've decided that I can't leave you on a cliffhanger here since this is when the story starts to get good. Thus, I'm posting two chapters at the same time. But! Before you move on, please click the rate button that's to the left of my signature where it says, "Website, Find, Rate." Almost nobody has given me any rate points. Sad face.*

Okay, next chapter.