I was given a palm-sized sack filled to the brim with palladium coins. It was fulfilling to finally have something to my name. I wasn’t sure just how much it was worth, so I just hoped it was enough to pay for my fees.

After my day of work, I headed back to the inn that I would be calling home for a while. At least until I could get my own place. I walked through the street that was once again starting to fill with people traveling from place to place and came back to the front door of Wang’s inn.

Inside I saw Wang having a rather aggressive conversation with two large men. I could hear something about payment and punishments.

I approached the two men and asked, “What’s going on here?”

The taller of the two men turned his attention to me with a somewhat evil grin.

“This man here still owes us some money,” he said.

“I already told you I paid what I owe,” Wang said with a furious tone.

“You’ve forgotten about the damage fees.”

“You’ve already taken all I have!”

The man gestured to the other and said, “My boy Marco broke his nose on his last visit.”

What he said seemed to be true at least. Marco did, in fact, have a crooked nose.

“I had nothing to do with that!” Wang yelled.

The two were going back and forth and I could tell this man wasn’t leaving until Wang paid him or someone intervened, so that’s what I did. I pressed my hand on the man’s shoulder and pushed him to the side.

“Look,” I said trying to sound intimidating, “I think you should leave.”

“Ha!” he laughed, “Who are you to tell me what I should and shouldn’t do? Someone needs to pay up.”

I pushed him again.

“Just give him some time.”

“And why would I do that?” he asked as he shoved me back, “He’ll just try to weasel his way out of payment. He has the money he should just give up and hand it over.”

I know I engaged first, but this man laying his hands on me pushed me over the edge. I balled my hand into a fist and I threw it straight towards his nose. Before I even landed the hit, I could clearly tell he had more experience in hand-to-hand combat.

He blocked my strike and redirected it over his shoulder. He then used the momentum to pull me closer and he placed his other hand under my armpit. The next thing I knew I had been thrown into the air and slammed down on the cold stone table.

“Try that again and we’ll be coming after you next,” he said as he stood over me.

I still felt dizzy from the hit I had taken, but I could see him pull his arm back to get the last shot in while I lay there helplessly. He started his attack, but with the flick of my index finger that was hidden by my side, I used the levitation to push his fist off course just enough for him to slam his bare knuckles onto the table.

He yelled in pain and held his now-broken hand with his other.

“Agh!” he yelled, “What the-?”

He backed off a few feet and pressed his broken hand into his gut.

“You’ll regret that!” he called to me, “I promise you’ll both see me again.”

He tapped his goon on the arm and signaled him to leave.

Before they could leave I called out to them, “Wait, how much does Wang owe?”

I rolled over and climbed down from the table.

“Twenty-five pal,” he said, “You now owe me five more for the hand.”

“I’ll play it,” I said as I counted the coins in my sack.

I pulled out thirty of the silvery coins and handed them to the man. He snatched them from my hand and left without another word. After he was gone I pulled out a chair and sat by the desk.

“Why did you do that?” Wang asked.

I responded, “I could sense he had bad intentions. I thought it would be best to get him to leave.”

“I thank you,” he said, “You can forget our deal. Your first three nights are free of charge. I see you got a job, and you helped me out. Not many people around here would do something like that.”

“Yeah,” I said with a noticeable lack of emotion.

Wang leaned against the desk opposite from me and said, “Hey kid, are you alright?”

“Yeah,” I said just as an oddly familiar force came over me. My body began to numb and I fell to the floor, losing consciousness on the way. It heard a voice. The same dark voice I heard when I fell unconscious in the forest.

“I know what you are,” it said, “we’re connected.”

The voice faded and I came back to my senses. I was laying on the floor by the desk with Wang standing over me.

“Hey Kid!” he called, “What happened you just fell over.”

“I- I’m fine,” I said while unknowingly pushing his arm.

I had regained my consciousness, but I still felt rather confused. I didn’t know what Wang was doing or saying, and I certainly wasn’t thinking straight. I climbed to my feet and started walking towards the stairs to the upper floor. Completely ignoring Wang on the way. I couldn’t even recall making it to my room.

I opened my eyes several hours later in a daze, trying to remember what happened before I fell asleep. I tried to put together the choppy pieces, but many of my memories from the day before were just gone. Even some from before the fight. It felt like they were stolen from me.

After I was fully awake I packed everything I needed, which was just my shirt that was hanging on the chair, and headed down to the factory for my newly-earned job. I walked out the room, down the stairs, and past the now-empty desk. After I was outside I noticed the streets were empty again.

It didn’t seem to be an issue the last time I visited Liam, so I doubted it would be different now. I lost all sense of time on the trip to the factory, and the hour-long walk felt like just a few short minutes. In no time at all, I was knocking on the door of the factory.

“Hello?” I called, but there was no response.

I called again, “Hello?”

Nothing. I started to worry for a moment, so I reached for the handle and turned it. It was unlocked. Slowly I opened the door. I was still sore from the fight the day before, but as soon as the door was fully opened I was greeted with a wooden staff to the face.

“Agh!” I screamed as I fell to the ground.

“You must think I’m an idiot for pulling something like that!” Liam yelled as he appeared in the doorway.

“Do what?!” I asked while holding my bleeding nose.

I got no answer. Just another smack to the face. I tried to run away from this psychopath, but when I got to my feet to run he just hit the back of my knees. Again, I was knocked to the ground.

I got up again and charged the old man for a tackle, but he was much faster than he looked. He had moved out of my path just in time for me to get a face full of dirt.

“You know what you did!” he yelled at me as he hit my ribs.

I rolled from my stomach to my back and yelled, “Stop!”

It was no use, he hit me again, and again, and again. Each time he hit he had already moved somewhere else. I could never even see him. This old man was insane for sure. He continued to abuse me and never answered my pleas for mercy.

With instinct alone, I grabbed and threw the old man nearly fifty feet into the air with my magic. I instantly regretted this. I saw the frail old man falling, and I was sure I had just killed him.

Liam rapidly approached the ground at high speed. I was mentally preparing myself to clean up a murder scene as I watched. My eyes closed on their own and my body seemed to jerk away just before he hit the ground. Slowly, I opened them again, expecting to see a mangled corpse, but what I saw was an old man standing on his own two feet, leaning on his staff for support.

“So my suspicions were correct,” he said confidently, “you are a magic-user.”

How could he possibly have known this?

“I- I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said while stumbling for words.

“Don’t play dumb with me Kid,” he laughed, “you nearly killed me with it.”

“How did you know?” I asked.

He shuffled towards me from his landing place and poked my shoulder with the end of his staff. Softly this time.

“You aren’t the sharpest one, are you?” he said offensively, “I gave you instructions to give me five thousand pounds of rock in twenty-four hours. The truth is, I wanted you to leave. No normal human could achieve this, not even I. Yet, you gave me eight thousand in less than half the time.”

I couldn’t believe I had been fooled by someone as old as him.

“When I checked the dig site,” he continued, “there wasn’t a single mark in the wall and not a scratch on the pick I gave you.”

I was prepared for the worst. The last time my secret was discovered the outcome was less than favorable. Liam saw the shame I felt, and I received another gentle jab.

“Don’t worry kid,” he said, “you’re right to hide it. The other ones around here won’t take too kindly to magic. Let's go inside.”

I followed Liam into the building where he pulled a small stool in front of the couch.

“Sit,” he said.

I followed his order and sat on the stool. Liam sat just across from me on the couch where he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.

“kid,” he said, “I’m not sure how you came to use magic, but you’re the second magic-user I’ve heard of. You’re just the first with good intentions.”

The fact that there was another mage wasn’t a total shock. I knew someone had written the spellbook. Now, who wrote it was the question.

“Who’s the other mage?” I asked.

“Barron,” he said, “He’s the one who stained the title of mage.”

“So what did he do to cause the distaste for magic?” I asked.

“He built the wall,” Liam said, “He used his magic to build the wall without any concern for the citizens who would be locked out. At least, that’s the reason the ones out here hated him. However, the few on the inside who still remember know him for a different reason.”

“And what’s that?”

“They know him for allowing magic to drive him mad,” he said.

“Mad?” I asked, “How did magic drive him mad?”

“It didn’t,” he said, “only a small few know the real reason.

He paused for a moment and said, “He tried to control the demons and the darkness that makes their being plagued his soul. He truly believed he would succeed and was later devoured by the demons he tried so desperately to conquer.”

“I see,” I said as I started to chew my thumb. If this was the case, then reintroducing magic to the rest of the world would be no easy task.

I looked at him with a realization and asked, “Wait, how do you know all of this?”

“Ha, I thought you would ask,” he said, “I was the lord’s personal guard, and Barron was his mage. The first of his kind too. The lord made Barron cast a spell on his most valuable units. A powerful spell of lasting life. I was one of the first to receive it.”

“Lasting life?”

There was no spell capable of this written in the book. To me, this proved that the laws of magic written in the book are not set in stone. This sparked a new motivation to improve the book, find new spells, and find the true limits.

“So what do we do now?” I asked him.

“What do you mean?” He asked back, “There’s nothing to do. What you need to do is stop slacking off and get to work. This wall isn’t going to dig itself out.”

I wasn’t sure what else I expected. I got lost in the old man’s story and let my fantasies run wild. Nothing I could do would change the effects of the past.

“I’ll pay you extra for your abilities,” Liam said.

A smile stretched across my face at the sound of this. Besides my room fees, I needed pal to feed myself a decent meal. Up until now, I’ve been living off of packs of dry crackers in a cup at Wang’s Inn.

I never thought I’d say this, but I was ready to work, and I was excited to be able to use my magic unrestricted.