Nero Walker, Book 3 Ch.71 (186) (Patreon)

Arch-mage Jennings knew there were lessons that a person never truly learned. Lessons like the easy way is rarely the best way, or to never underestimate an opponent. Even something as simple as remembering to avoid spicy foods before bed was something he couldn’t seem to remember until after he was suffering the annoyance of late-night indigestion.

Nevertheless, he tried his best to learn from his mistakes.

So, as a result of his recent missteps, he was paying careful attention to the local happenings in Dorchester. He would not be caught unaware again… or at least not anytime soon… probably.

While part of his mind was focused on giving himself a pep-talk, his other mental partitions were observing the anomaly through a scry and sorting through the various reports he could find through abusing his access to Dorchester’s local Thought-hub.

He was both surprised and concerned at how quickly Lord Walker had embraced his new rank as a unique. Based on his limited understanding of the young man, he would have thought he would have struggled with his new title and responsibilities a little more. But, through his scry, he could see the young man building up his personal forces, arranging for financial support by essentially buying the loyalty of the Verenas, and co-opting the evaluators into his personal house.

The thought of the evaluators sent a ripple through his mental plane. As the head of the mage council, he knew the evaluators assigned to Lord Walker shouldn’t be here. They were assigned a deep-cover mission to infiltrate and watch over the Royal Academy. Them being in here in Dorchester, fawning over the anomaly like sycophants, arranging for their future as his personal adherents… it was troubling, to say the least.

What was more disturbing was the fact they had somehow been able to completely erase any record of their mission in the Tower of Magic’s archives. As far as he could tell, they succeeded in hiding any actionable link they had to the Tower of Magic. As a result, when they completed their evaluation and filed their paperwork, they’d be legally free to join the anomaly’s personal house without consequence. ‘Troubling indeed,’ he thought to himself while stroking his chin.

With their help, which was shamelessly being abused by the anomaly, they’d taken care of his legal troubles concerning his finances, irrevocably tied House Verena to him, and mitigated his troubles with the local nobility through quiet threats and subterfuge. He’d even seen evidence of them subtly steering public opinion through local link commentators and faction leaders. The amount of support they were giving Lord Walker was baffling, and more than a little concerning.

‘Just what are they planning?’ he wondered.

Sitting in his chair, he sipped his tea as his mind deftly manipulated multiple screens and managed his communication links. All while keeping a close eye on the anomaly’s incredibly confusing actions. Despite his many years of experience, he couldn’t understand why the young man was so set on charging into danger and recruiting his ‘wackos’. ‘While cleverly descriptive, calling his retinue that is more than a little juvenile,’ he thought to himself with a frown.

A few days ago, when he’d gone out of his way to explain to the young man why he needed to stay in Dorchester, he’d never expected this level of recklessness. He’d even worked quickly to influence the quests being offered by Dorchester’s council of leadership to allow him to stay in the Tower of Magic, abusing his natural affinity to perceive essence to support the army from afar. Between the availability of magic tombs and the safety of the assignment, he’d estimated a 93% chance that the anomaly would have leapt at the chance to avoid being on the front lines.

Had something influenced events that he hadn’t noticed?

The memory of the young man’s decision to join in the noble war came unbidden to his mind. He recalled flashes of the multiple times the little bastard had professed his desire to be an all-powerful mage, free to manipulate reality at his whim. The memory of him proclaiming his idiotic and absurd desire to seek out adventure and magic while ignoring everything around him caused the arch-mage to physically flinch with annoyance.

‘Perhaps the personality model I built for him could do with a little adjusting,’ he thought to himself sourly.

Yet, when it was all said and done, he’d gotten what he wanted, hadn’t he? The young man was set to solve this little issue with the kobalds, and he’d more than likely stick around long enough to deal with the density shift and subsequent beast tides, wouldn’t he? As long as Dorchester survived, the Tower of Fate would be proven incompetent, and his plans for social restructuring would continue without disruption.

Even better, as long as the young man survived, he’d probably go through a massive level of growth with all the experience he’d be getting with events and situations he’d never encountered before. Perhaps the arch-mage would be able to glean something from watching how the young man interacted with the ether in a more direct manner than he had been up until now.

The anomaly was special, an untapped resource of amazing potential. Who knows how much the arch-mage could learn from just watching him? All it would take is some subtle manipulations to keep the reckless young man alive. That couldn’t be too difficult, could it?

—--

Nero stared at the poster-sized printout with an expression of disbelief on his face. ‘Has Nick somehow developed a sense of humor when I wasn’t looking?’ he wondered.

Filling the entire sheet was the house crest Nick was proposing for House Walker. Within a white circle with a stylized edge, there was a large gray wall, complete with battlements and a gate. Nero could only assume it was supposed to represent the walls of Dorchester. Above the wall, in extravagant teal lettering, was ‘The House of Walker’, and below it were the house words he’d chosen, ‘Game. Win. Repeat.’. Then, inside the gate, there was an open book, tilted back so that a ball of orange and yellow light hovered above its pages. But, what Nero found truly disturbing was the fact that the little ball of light had black lines forming the evil smiley face he’d arbitrarily proposed.

To Nero, this didn’t look anything like a house crest. Of course, he hadn’t seen what passed for one in this world, so he shouldn’t have been so surprised… but still, he found it extremely off-putting.

Nick, seeing Nero was having trouble deciding how he felt about the crest, helpfully added, “As you can see, I incorporated your house’s colors and words. The gate of Dorchester protects a book representing your desire for magic, and the flame of your essence is fueled by its contents.”

Nero looked up from the overly-fancy, while utterly boring picture, and asked, “And this isn’t going to get me laughed at by every noble who sees it?”

Nick frowned in offense, while Academian Quincy chimed in, “Not at all. The lettering is quite well done. I believe the base language Lord Verena used is rooted in ‘Bansite’ if I’m not mistaken. And the imagery conveys your attitude and beliefs quite well I think.”

Apparently, it was now Nero’s turn to frown, as he looked back at the large poster and bit back the numerous insults that came to mind. ‘Treating an evil smiley face as anything other than an attempt at mockery just seems… wrong,’ he decided.

The crest was, all in all, incredibly detailed. He almost wanted to lean closer to see if he could recognize what was written on the pages of the book. The lettering for his house’s name and words were bordered and shaded, and the outline of the circle reminded him of the Celtic tattoos he used to see on douchebags coming into his store for gaming phones. Even the wall and its gate were detailed and shaded as if they were a picture rather than stock art. Yet, he couldn’t stop staring at the ball of flame in the middle which continued to stubbornly glare back at him.

Tearing his eyes away, he said, “I guess it’s fine. It’s not like I’ll be seeing it all that much.”

Nick, looking about as furious as Nero had ever seen him, replied, “If you don’t like it, you don’t have to use it! It’s not like I spent the past day consulting experts in the archives and having the hells be damned thing drawn out by hand.”

Nero flinched at the rebuke, quickly backpedaling. “It’s not that I don’t like it. It’s just that it represents me too well. It’s like looking into a mirror! You truly nailed it, Nick. Thank you.”

Nick’s frown vanished, his smile slowly returning to his face. Looking down at the poster with a fond look on his face, he replied, “I did, didn’t I? Your fiery and determined personality, built on knowledge and protected by walls of elemental stone, floating in an emptiness that keeps you safe from those you don’t trust.”

Nero’s jaw dropped as he looked over at his friend. Glancing around the table, he was stunned to see Academian Quincy, Vera, and Scholar Idrius all nodding in unison as if Nick had said something incredibly profound.

Looking back at the poster with a grimace, Nero thought to himself with some venom, ‘This touchy-feely, hippy-loving, self-help-obsessed world really ought to go suck a dick.’

Refusing to spend any more time dealing with this, he leaned back from the table and said, “OK. So, you guys can go file that with whoever needs to see it. I’m going to go see how Cathleen is doing with the wackos.”

Vera shook her head and said, “Do you truly have to call them that? It doesn’t even remotely make sense to anyone but you.”

Nero glared at her and replied, “It’s not supposed to. Giving a group of people a name like that is intended to subtly form a sense of camaraderie and kinship. It’s a form of team-building. The fact that it also implies that they are willing to do crazy things for the sake of the W.A.C. will hopefully foster a willingness to follow me into whatever dumb-ass situation I find myself in. At some point, someone will say, ‘We can’t do that?!? That’s crazy!’, and I’ll be able to reply, ‘Of course we can! We’re wackos!’ Not only will it be hilarious, it’s also a totally boss way of controlling the troops.”

Academian Quincy looked over at Nero with an expression of doubt, and asked, “Do you actually expect them to fall for that?”

Nero looked at him in shock. “What do you mean ‘fall for it’? I’m talking about a sense of identity for all of House Walker, including me. From the moment I showed up in this world, I’ve had to embrace the madness just so I don’t end up going insane. You do realize how absolutely bat-shit crazy you all are, don’t you? For God’s sake, you legalized corruption and have state-sponsored psychological testing centers! Me calling my troops wackos isn’t anything other than descriptive.”

Both Nick and Vera looked rather offended, and Nick spat, “They’re not psychological testing ce-”

Nero interrupted him with a dismissive wave. “Yeah, yeah. They are centers for people to go to so that they can find their path. Whatever.”

Surprisingly, Academian Quincy was having trouble stifling his laughter at Nero’s harsh evaluation of Oglivarchian society.

Nero offered Nick a friendly smirk to take the edge off of his insult, letting the man know that he was only joking… well, mostly joking. “All right, I’m off. Let me know if you guys need anything.”

Turning around, Nero headed out to see how Cathleen was faring with the training.

Making his way through the halls of the Verena estate, he used his link to get directions to the basement. While accessing it, he noticed that he had a few pings waiting for him in his inbox. Groaning in annoyance, he tried to go through them quickly as the last thing he needed was Vera berating him for ignoring them at some point in the not-so-distant future.

Among the pings was the quest confirmation Academian Quincy and the general had worked out, along with a formal pass for Nero and his adherents to join the battle outside the walls. Looking closely, he saw that it didn’t have a specified time frame, indicating that he could take as long as he wanted with the training he was doing. Unfortunately, there was also an attached report about how long the mountainside engagement was projected to continue. ‘If we don’t get moving in the next day or so, we’re going to miss all the action,’ he thought to himself with a grimace.

Another ping was from the Tower of Law, updating him on how his exceptions from the exploit he found have changed with him being upgraded to the status of a unique… and probably some more information that he didn’t get to. After reading through a few paragraphs of incomprehensible legal jargon, he decided that he didn’t want to deal with it and forwarded it to Vera. Pausing his steps, he thought it over, then decided to also send a copy to Academian Quincy. The man had made it more than clear that he intended to fill the administrative position within his new personal house.

Next was a comprehensive report from Vera on the financial status of House Verena, along with his projected income as the defacto boss behind the boss. Replying with a quick, ‘Great job! Keep up the good work!’ he marked it as read and moved on.

A copy of his initial evaluation from Scholar Idrius was quickly archived, along with an updated House Walker roster from Cathleen.

As he made his way through the halls, his mind got better and better at evaluating and dismissing what he was reading. ‘If they keep giving me a meeting summary after every conversation we have, I’m gonna freaking lose it,’ he thought to himself while trying to reign in his annoyance with their obsessive-compulsive culture.

Just then, he received a fresh ping from Academian Quincy which covered the Tower of Law's formal acceptance of his house’s crest, colors, words, etc. Growling, Nero immediately marked it read and closed the connection to his pings.

Instead of losing his mind and lashing out in frustration, he focused on the map he’d uploaded from the estate’s hub. Quickening his pace, he made his way toward the training rooms in the basement.

Before long, he started to hear the sounds of combat going on in the distance. The stone walls under the estate made him feel like he was making his way into a large dungeon, and the subdued essence lighting running along the walls only added to the oppressive atmosphere.

After walking down a ridiculously long hallway, he stepped through the overly large wooden doors and saw his adherents broken up into groups, working on physical combat drills. Off to the side of the incredibly large room, he saw Cathleen overseeing several wackos trying to kill each other with what he could only assume were abilities, as they sure as hell didn’t look like spells from what his essence field was telling him.

Making his way across the stadium-sized room, he once again marveled at how magic was so casually used in the building of simple training rooms like this. Whether or not it was some kind of space magic at work or just completely incomprehensible engineering, he couldn’t say. Either way, it was both useful and very, very cool.

Stepping up next to Cathleen, he asked, “What’s cookin’, good lookin’?”

Cathleen was standing in what Nero considered her usual pose, her arms crossed and her spear casually leaning against her shoulder. In response to Nero’s question, she grunted and replied, “They’re all going to die.”

Nero’s eyebrows rose in surprise at her blunt and frightening assessment. Taking a closer look at the combat going on all around him, he couldn’t understand how she came to that delightfully depressing conclusion.

Cathleen glanced over at Nero’s confused expression and reluctantly clarified herself. “They aren’t trained in military combat tactics. If they face anything more dangerous than a group of uncoordinated bandits who do nothing but run at them screaming from the trees, they’re going to get overrun and killed before they manage to get their shields up.”

Nero chuckled at the imagery but quickly dismissed it as simply pessimism. Looking up at her with a smirk, he said, “You know, I went into combat without any training to work in a unit or anything, and I survived just fine.”

Cathleen didn’t bother looking over at Nero, her focus staying on the flashy combat going on in front of her. “You shouldn’t have. You got lucky. The fact that most of the elites around you knew what they were doing was the only reason I didn’t have to pull your body out of the fight to be resuscitated. I also have to reluctantly admit that you are surprisingly skilled for having so little experience,” she said with a frown.

Nero didn’t let her half-hearted compliment get to him. He was well aware of how easily she and any number of people he’d been training with could tear him apart.

Deciding to trust in the woman, as she had accepted the position as his personal general, he asked, “Well, General Averett. What would you suggest?”

Frowning, she replied with a harsh tone, “I told you that you can’t just decide to call someone a general. At best, I’d be your guard captain. When you manage to have a personal force of over 50,000 you can start referring to me as a general.”

Nero snorted. ‘Yeah, like that’s ever going to happen,’ he thought to himself.

Continuing on, Cathleen said, “But if you want my opinion on how to handle this lot, I’d have to say it will take at least 6 months to get them into fighting shape.”

Nero’s eyes widened in shock. Once again, he looked around at the hard-working wackos, wondering how she could have so little faith in them. From what he could see, they were all surprisingly skilled. Hell, every one of them could probably kick his ass if he was being honest with himself.

With what almost looked like a shadow of an evil smirk on her face, she added, “Since we don’t have that kind of time. I recommend we instead join in on the frontlines as soon as possible. They have a basic understanding of a shield wall, and we have 3 people capable of casting healing. Not to mention you, who can both heal and act as an emergency medic. As long as we’re careful, we should be able to recover from any losses we may suffer.”

Nero didn’t like that she was more than willing to lead them to their deaths. However, he had promised himself that he was going to embrace the crazy and that’s exactly what he was going to do. Every one of them had asked to join him in fighting the good fight, and seeking out adventure wherever he found it. Right now, that adventure was just outside Dorchester’s walls… waiting for them. He could almost feel his fingertips itching to cast some combat magic and get back to the fighting. After spending a few weeks out in the wilds, under constant threat, he found himself feeling constrained and uncomfortable with all the safety and security he’d been subjected to.

Nodding, he said, “Alright. I put you in charge of the wackos, so I’ll trust your judgment. Hopefully, you won’t get us all killed.” Smiling widely, he added, “Tomorrow we’ll head out and join the troops beating back the surface incursion. You and Commander Natalie will have command. When we’re in the field, just treat me like one of the wackos. For now, carry on with training.”

Turning around, he started walking back toward the doors. He had some reading to do, along with some serious thinking about how this was all going to work. While saying that he was going to build an adventuring company was all well and good, he had absolutely no idea how to do it when he wasn’t in front of a computer or sitting on his ass with stat sheets and miniatures in front of him.

Before he even managed to get three paces away from her, Cathleen’s steely voice halted him in his tracks. “Where do you think you’re going? Pull out your weapon and join a sparring group. You’re also on healing duty, so be sure to keep your center steady.”

Nero looked over his shoulder in surprise. Unfortunately, judging by the glare she was drilling him with, the woman was utterly serious about his participation.

Grumbling, he started taking off his robes to change into his combat leathers, not even bothering to find a quiet corner to change in. He’d long forgotten what shame felt like after having been showering and living with people in such close proximity over the last few weeks.

As he was pulling down his pants, he heard Cathleen call out, “And stop referring to Ms. Keening as a commander. She’s a team leader at best. Call her Leader Keening, or nothing at all.”

Muttering under his breath, he said, “Like hell I’m going to call someone under my command ‘leader’. I really should have read that stupid organizational chart she made. Stupid useful information hidden inside stupid useless pings…”

Cathleen’s voice snapped him out of his mutterings. “What was that little lord?” she said threateningly.

Looking up from tying the straps on his pants he’d pulled out of his personal space, he replied quickly, “Nothing. Don’t mind me, just go back to terrorizing someone else. I’ll be with you shortly.”

Seeing her nod once in satisfaction before returning her attention to the two people trying to kill each other in front of her, Nero thought to himself, ‘Crazy freaking bitch is going to be the death of me… again.’