Nero Walker, Book 2 Ch.46 (78) (Patreon)

Lord Cosgrave had just finished dinner when her aid said that Lords Bennings, Brinks, and Masters were waiting for her in her office. ‘I’m sure this is gonna be good news,’ she said to herself sarcastically.

Walking with her aide to her office, she asked, “They said nothing? Not even a hint as to what this is about?”

Ms. Chandler said, “No, m’lord. They just said it was urgent, and that they needed to see you right away. When asked why they didn’t just ping you, they said they didn’t want to explain their reason for trying to reach you to anyone. They needed to speak with you first.”

Frowning, Lord Cosgrave said, “Very well, let’s see what has them so worked up.”

When she finally got to her office, she entered without knocking while Ms. Chandler followed her in and then closed the doors. Seeing their nervous yet serious faces, she asked, “All right, I’m here. What’s this all about?”

Lord Bennings spoke first. “House Walker has proved an exploit to the house system. All of the forms were filed this morning. They made sure that an hour had passed after they took advantage of the exploit. The time-stamps are irrefutable, and the exploit is a class 5.”

Standing in shock, Lord Cosgrave felt her gut churn and she fought to keep her dinner down. “I’m assuming that it was already passed on to the Tower of Law in Hennings?”

Nodding, Lord Bennings said, “I verified it personally. It is both brilliant, and diabolical. Had this gotten out, the house system would have been thrown into upheaval. The crown may very well offer the full award for its discovery.”

Looking at the two men, Lords Brinks and Masters, she said, “And it has to do with trade and taxes?”

The two men exchanged a look, and Masters waved for Brinks to answer. “Yes. House Walker reorganized their shipping company and created several new concerns they started alongside House Verena. They figured out a way to legally report massively reduced profits and then pay the profits as a salary to both Vera Salvatore-Verana and Lord Walker. The company will be losing money on paper, but be able to be propped up by them, gaining them a second round of tax breaks. Furthermore, they filed paperwork for the concerns charging each other for their use. They essentially are paying themselves back and forth, reporting no profit, while taking home what used to be taxable company income. Had this been allowed to spread, our current House system would have fallen within a month… across all of Oglivarch.”

Stunned, Lord Cosgrave started to feel her knees weaken. She managed to get to her chair before she started to stumble. Taking a seat she said, “And they reported the discovery to the Tower of Law? Has the exploit been countered?”

Lord Benning stepped forward and said, “Yes. The law is clear, the exploit was countered immediately. No one can do it, and the relevant laws will be reviewed at dawn by the Council of Leadership in Hennings. Unfortunately, as per the law on exploit discovery, House Walker along with Vera Salvatore-Verana are able to take full advantage of it for as long as Lord Walker lives. That is unless the King directly forbids it. However, that is very unlikely seeing as it was Lord Walker who discovered the exploit, and Vera Salvatore-Verena who filed the paperwork, and in a very real way, saved the kingdom.”

Lord Cosgrave poured herself a glass of wine with trembling hands. ‘How in the hells did this happen? How was what they found actually legal? Bennings must have checked before she validated it, right?’ she wondered.

“You’re sure this exploit is valid? Anyone could have done this? They could have just payed out the company profits as salary and then reported a loss? How is that possible?” Lord Cosgrave was practically shouting.

Lord Bennings looked nervous and said, “I checked it more times than I could count. There is no law saying that they couldn’t. It wasn’t only legal as a technicality, it was actually legal. And the thing with several companies being owned by the same people, charging variable prices to affect their reported earnings, that was legal too. It’s just that no one had thought to do it. It was always a point of pride to have a successful company. A noble’s status is dependent on how much they pay in taxes. So why would anyone want to head a failing company?”

Snorting, Lord Cosgrave said in a quiet voice, “Because they could get obscenely rich doing it. I can’t believe this.”

For a full minute the room was silent, drinking in her words.

“So what happens now? I’m not familiar with the protocol surrounding exploits?” Lord Cosgrave asked.

Lord Bennings responded, “A lot of it depends on what happens in the capital. But one thing is for sure, House Walker just became the richest house in Dorchester. Even a class 1 exploit would have a payout larger than the city’s yearly budget. And to think, right now the house is only two people. A proxy, and a recently awakened 14 year old.”

Lord Cosgrave slumped in her seat as her face lost all of it’s blood once again. She muttered, “I can’t even begin to imagine the marriage proposals and suitors that are going to descend on the city in the next few months.”

For the first time, Lord Masters spoke up. “At least it will result in a boost to the trade and tourism revenue. We should host a ball,” he said excitedly.

Everyone in the room stared at the man until his smile wilted.

-----

Nero was sitting on the floor of his room, leaning his back against the bed with his legs crossed. The pillow under his ass provided a nice cushion, and he was enjoying his book. His selection for the night was on ‘listening to the world’.

As he read, he munched on some biscuits he had hidden earlier in his personal space. Nero had swiped them from the dining hall during lunch. Absently scratching his chest, his focus was entirely on his book. He was having trouble coming to terms with what he was reading. It was like the first time he learned that light behaved as both a particle and a wave; he couldn’t imagine reality working like that.

In this world, reality was just too ‘weak’. Everything influenced it. If there was a particular type of matter, that would generate essence, which would in turn affect the matter. Only time could solidify essence into material reality. Nero couldn’t wrap his head around it. He knew it was important to conceptualize it, but it just seemed so ridiculous.

Setting his book off to his side, he sat in contemplation. He was staring at his chair, trying to imagine it as ‘frozen essence’ which was given form by its identity. Focusing his psychic field on the chair, he tried to look at it with more than his eyes. It worked, kind of. With a small grunt, he got to his feet and got closer.

Running his hand over the wooden backrest, he spread out his center to ‘reach’ into the chair. He could sense its purpose, its history. Nero knew there was a name for it back home. Psychics who could look at the history of objects in stories and urban legends, but he couldn’t remember the name of it.

He could almost see the carpenter fitting the slats together to make the backrest. Going deeper, he saw the lumberjack using a sharp axe to fell the tree the wood came from. The deeper Nero went, the more pressure he felt on his mind. It felt like he was trying to swim against a current. This wasn’t what the chair was NOW, its what it USED to be.

There was a ‘pop’ in the room, but Nero was too invested in his experiment to notice.

He felt himself being pulled away from the chair, and forced to sit on the bed. His eyes were glassy, and he was having trouble focusing.

As his senses came back into focus, he looked up to see Arch-mage Jennings staring into his eyes with concern. Nero was confused and asked, “When did you get here?”

Jennings eyes softened and he cracked a smile. “I was alerted to your situation by one of the mages that happened to be looking at what you were reading. When they realized what you were doing, they contacted me immediately. I was the closest person they could reach who would be able to help you. Are you all right?”

Nero nodded. His head was still fuzzy, and he was having trouble following what Jennings was saying. “I’m fine. I was just listening to the world. It’s just so big… you know? The history of everything. Its like a big rug. You can step back and see the whole thing, or you can look closer. Each thread is placed with care. It all comes together to make what we see. But reality isn’t the rug, it’s the threads. But even the threads come from somewhere,” he said, rambling.

Jennings patted Nero’s shoulder, then waved his hand and pulled a glass of water out of thin air. “Here, drink this,” he said.

Nero did as he was told. The cold water caused him to regain a little color, and his eyes started to focus a little easier.

Nero frowned as his brain started working again. He was now sitting on his bed, only in his underwear, and Jennings was standing over him. Looking up at him, Nero said, “What the hell was that? Why are you here? When did you get here? How did -”

Jennings held up his hands to interrupt the panicking young man, and said, “Nero, calm down. Just breathe for a second. I already told you. Think. Focus on trying to remember, it will help.”

Nero nodded, calming himself back down. He started to remember what happened, working backward. He remembered what Jennings said when he showed up. He remembered the ‘pop’ sound. And then he remembered the images he saw of the history of his chair. It was like he was observing the chair’s life in reverse, going deeper and deeper until he had gotten lost. At one point, he was floating on the ether among the essence of the world.

Looking up at Jennings he said, “That was ‘delving too deep’ right? I read about that, but it didn’t make sense. Now I see what they were talking about. Holy crap Nick. It was like I forgot I was a person. Time stopped meaning anything, and I was just essence on the wind.”

Jennings snapped his fingers in front of Nero’s face, causing the young man to focus on him. “Don’t try and chase the memory. You’re not nearly strong enough to ride an essence trail like that. I’m surprised you were able to even go that deep. Every time you delve, you need to remember to hold on to who you are. You are just an observer, not the object your observing. You have to keep that thought in the front of your mind, or you WILL end up in a coma,” he said sternly.

Seeing that Nero was taking the situation seriously, he turned around and put the trouble-making chair to use. Sitting down, he looked at Nero and asked, “So why were you so interested in the history of a chair? You risked a lot to study a common chair. The mages over in Hennings are screaming theories at each other. Please tell me that you weren’t trying to unravel the essence streams that make up the chair. That’s the prevailing idiotic theory.”

Nero shook his head and chuckled. “No. I was just reading about how all matter is made up of solidified essence, and I wanted to get a closer look at how the hell that was possible. I was having trouble understanding this book, and I thought that taking a closer look at what the chair was actually made of might help.”

Nodding in understanding, Jennings said, “It’s a complicated concept which is usually covered during Adept training. I gave you that book so that you would have some idea as to how essence can create constructs, not to try and understand the fundamentals of the material plane. You need to learn how to start small. Answer the small questions, before taking on the big ones. For example, show me how you create a basic construct. It doesn’t matter what you create, just create something.”

Nero nodded and carved a simple spell-form for creating a metal spike. He didn’t fire it, just created the spike. Specialist Howard had shown Nero this spell for launching mini-javelins. It was one of Nero’s favorites.

Jennings watched as the essence was pulled into the spell-form and then coalesced. The shiny iron spike hovered in the air, trapped by Nero’s psychic field. The boy was a natural.

“OK. Now infuse your essence into the spike, claim it as your own so it won’t dissipate,” said Jennings.

Nero did as he was told, and felt the spike anchor itself into reality. It felt more real. Without really meaning to, he delved into it. There was no history, no story. The spike was so flimsy. It was like the world wasn’t sure if the spike really existed at all. Nero’s mind was still examining it when he felt Jennings impart his essence into the spike, stripping Nero of his control. Gasping, Nero recoiled.

“What the hell man? Why did you do that?” he shouted.

Jennings chuckled, held out his hand, and the spike floated over to it and then started spinning. “Just focus your senses on it, then pay close attention,” he said.

Nero focused his psychic field and watched what Jennings was doing. In awe, Nero saw Jennings impart a story into the spike. It was no longer a flimsy construct. Now it was a spike created from the essence of the world, shaped and cared for by an arch-mage. With every passing second, the spike became more and more real. By the time Jennings finished, the spike was as real as anything else in the room.

Nero looked up at Jennings, eyes wide with wonder, and said, “That was amazing! You made it real. How?”

Smirking, Jennings plucked the 8 inch spike out of the air and tossed it to Nero. He said, “That was enchanting Nero. If you’re powerful enough, you can create an identity out of nothing but your will. I don’t know how reality was back in your world, but here, reality is what you make of it. Study hard, but carefully. I don’t want to have to come back here and save you again. Remember to start small. The path is long, and there is no need to rush.” With that, Jennings winked at Nero and vanished with a golden ‘pop’.

Nero stared at the spike in his hand that was once essence, but now made manifest. He said to the empty room, “Challenge accepted old man. Reality is what I make of it.” Playing with the spike, he smiled and muttered, “Damn, that was cool. I wonder if the magic school he went to had a drama department, cause that dude has style.”

Infusing the spike with essence from his center, Nero stored it in his pocket dimension. He wanted to keep it as a reminder. Picking up his book from the floor, Nero returned to his studies with renewed determination.