Nero Walker, Book 2 Ch.53 (85) (Patreon)

Arch-mage Jennings was waiting at the teleportation hall. He hated waiting. He leaned against the wall, tapping his foot with impatience. Any minute now, the replacement for that idiot Cranston would be arriving, and he promised Mathers that he would show him around.

Mentally, he felt around for the connection he had to the communication crystal in the Mage Tower in Hennings. It was still there, but no one seemed to be using it from the other side. Grimacing, Jennings realized that even THEY didn’t want to watch him wait.

He looked around the transportation room. The five technicians were fiddling with the receiving controls, isolating the local essence signatures and filtering out the interference. They must be preparing for receiving a targeting lock. It shouldn’t be too much longer. Huffing in annoyance, he tried to distract himself by watching Nero train. Currently the young man was being choked out by that Averett woman. After admiring her technique for a few seconds, he mentally moved on.

Jennings had subtly placed scry-markers on several people. It made paying attention to what was going on much easier than trying to isolate their essence signatures every time he wanted to look in on them. He cycled through his favorite subjects with a mental scrying window.

The city-lord was currently arguing with that idiot Lord Bevin. The man was convinced that Dorchester would fall due to having a relative in Hennings that was an adherent to the Fateweavers. Apparently, his relative had secretly warned him that this beast wave would raze the city. Jennings snorted at the thought of those fools being proven wrong… again.

Moving on, he checked on the city-lord’s children. The son was sitting in a carriage, far away from Dorchester. The idiot was currently arguing with his guard. The boy had no idea that the guard may be ordered to kill him if he didn’t stop acting like a moron. His sister wasn’t any better. She was currently yelling at a servant for not cleaning her bedroom properly. Shaking his head, Jennings realized the entire family needed a reality check. Mentally rebuking himself, he realized that the city-lord wasn’t so bad. Her kids sucked though.

The general was meeting with the city engineers. He was actually making some real progress on getting the essence cannons back on the walls. The man had impressed Jennings. There weren’t many people who were capable of being sly while also being direct. Jennings reminded himself to pull some strings to help the general out a little.

The trade commissioner was in a meeting about essence crystal pricing. The moron was recommending that they create a proposal for shipping out the reserves in order to sell them at the current high price, rather than wait for the influx of new crystals to depreciate the stocks. Jennings paused his viewing, and sent a ping to have the man’s plan exposed to Lord Cosgrave.

Since he had arrived, he had cultivated a few people who were in positions to deliver his warnings without them being traced back to him. It was always good policy to not get directly involved, that way people didn’t expect him to help. As he pondered that bit of wisdom, he was shaken out of his introspection by the astra-platform activating.

The essence in the room roiled and a young woman appeared on the well lit platform.

He heard a technician call out, “Transport successful. Confirmation of receipt sent to Hennings. Welcome to Dorchester.”

The woman wore a gentle smile and stepped down from the platform. She looked over at the technicians and said, “Thank you for the smooth transport. You’re all a credit to your profession.” She walked across the room and presented herself with a bow to Jennings. “Mage-adept Catherine Newbanks, reporting for duty as the new court mage. It’s a pleasure to meet you sir.”

Jennings didn’t stand up from his leaning position on the wall. He looked at the whip-cord thin woman. She was an average height, with gentle features. Her pixie cut black hair complimented her large dark eyes. She wore a soft smile and seemed perfectly at ease with his obvious appraisal.

He said, “I thought that kid Paddington was being sent?”

She replied easily, “I challenged for the position this morning. I apologize for the delay. The new paperwork had to be filed for me to receive permission to teleport in his place.”

Jennings chuckled at the gentle woman. He said, “You took him to an arena? How did you get him to agree to the challenge?”

Still smiling like a nun, she said, “I told him that he was too pathetic for any position in Hennings, and they were just sending him here to die. He should just let me take his place, and he could go back to doing unimpressive research on whatever stupid idea he was currently working on. Paddington was offended, and challenged me to an honor challenge. I accepted, and then bet my yearly wage against this position. My words were proven true, as I defeated him easily. After he was resuscitated, he filed the paperwork for our change of position. Now I am here.”

Jennings stood up from the wall and casually asked, “You chose not to wager soul-death?”

Mage-adept Newbanks shook her head gently, and said, “I didn’t want to kill him. Pathetic mages are still useful to the tower. I just wanted him to return to what he was good at. He wouldn’t have liked it here anyway.”

Nodding, Jennings said, “Well, I think you’ll love it here. Come along, we have a lot to see. I’ll introduce you to some people, and tell you who is worth knowing. I plan to hand over all of the court mage responsibilities to you as soon as possible.”

As they walked through the halls, she listened to the arch-mage as if he was the most interesting man in the world. Her subtle display of sucking-up wasn’t lost on Jennings, and he found it charming. She asked, “And if you don’t mind me asking, what will you be doing sir?”

Jennings didn’t miss a beat and responded, “Whatever the hell I feel like. Now let’s first stop over at the local Mage Tower and get your identity filed as the new court mage.”

Mage-adept Newbanks didn’t seem offended, and just nodded as if she weren’t surprised at his response. Arch-mage Jennings decided at that moment, she was his new favorite person in Dorchester. He really liked it here.

-----

Nero’s day went exactly how he had expected it to. Cathleen didn’t seem to notice his improved body stats at all. She spent both close-quarters combat, and weapons training tiring the medics by systematically destroying Nero. It didn’t seem to matter how much he had improved, all he could do was get better at delaying the inevitable. His combat casting class with Specialist Howard didn’t go much better.

Nero noticed that his psychic field had improved a little, he thought it was due to his increased ‘presence’ stat. But it didn’t make much difference in his training. He still spent the entire time dodging spells and now had the added task of trying to take control of the specialist’s constructs. Every time Nero started to feel comfortable, Specialist Howard added something that resulted in a skewered Nero. The man even started varying the spells. The first time Nero felt a plasma burn, he screamed like a girl. Nick had found it so hilarious, that he had fallen out of his chair.

Unsurprisingly, Nero had learned a great deal about healing over the past few days. He had watched the medics heal him whenever possible. Although he hadn’t seen them cast ‘resuscitate’, he had seen them fix his limbs and organs…. a lot. In fact, he was pretty sure he could regrow a limb at this point. The spell-form was complicated, but Nero had seen it enough that he was confidant that he wouldn’t have any issues with it.

When he asked to see the spell-form for ‘resuscitate’ in action, Specialist Howard had just laughed and said, “You’ll see it when you actually manage to kill someone.” Once again, Nick had laughed his ass off. Nero silently vowed to do just that. But regardless of Nero’s resolve, Specialist Howard had learned his lesson, and now treated their exchanges like games of chess. Whatever Nero tried, the man countered it without any problems. No matter how dirty Nero played, nothing worked. As much as it annoyed Nero, the constant failures were enlightening.

By the end of the day, Nero went to dinner without a shirt again. As usual, he only had rags for pants, and his boots were in pieces somewhere. By this point, the sight wasn’t anything special, and none of the recruits batted an eye.

Nero walked into the dining room with Nick. He was ignoring the man’s recounting of his favorite ‘Nero deaths of the day’. Seeing his acquaintance Marie, he tossed her and her squad a wave. She waved her fork in acknowledgment and returned to the conversation at her table.

Nick said, “That’s that group of monster-hunters you were talking about?”

Nero nodded, and said, “Yup. We usually spend morning training together. We’ve talked a few times after dinner, but you know how it is. There isn’t a lot of time here for anything other than training.”

Nick and Nero collected their food and joined Rose and Cathleen at their table.

Cathleen looked at a bare-chested Nero and said, “I see that your combat casting class didn’t go any better than your physical combat classes.”

Nick snorted, and said, “I don’t typically get to watch you training Nero, but if it’s anything like what he just went through, I’d might actually start feeling bad for him.”

Nero was chewing on some vegetables and spoke with his mouth full. “Bite me,” he said with some venom, although it came out as a mumble.

Nick and Cathleen chuckled, but Rose didn’t seem to find the situation funny. She was frowning and asked, “How can you handle dying so much? Doesn’t it get to you? I’ve been resuscitated before, and the black void gave me nightmares.”

Nero shrugged and said, “I actually find it comfortable. It kind of feels familiar.”

Nick piped up excitedly, “It’s probably due to -”

Nero interrupted him, “Stop, I don’t want to hear it again. I know what you’re going to say. It’s because of my experience in the higher planes or whatever. While we’re on the subject, I need a book on that too. I want to understand all those references you and Jennings keep making about the different planes. Like, what’s the difference between the higher planes and the upper planes, or are they just different names for the same thing?”

Surprisingly, it was Cathleen that answered him. “The higher planes are no longer associated with the material realms. The upper planes are higher than ours, hence the name. They are where the gods reside.”

Nick added, “There is more there than the realms of the deities. There are other material planes, with different inhabitants. For example, the Fae realms are rather close to us if I remember correctly.”

Rose chimed in, “Don’t forget about the lower planes. There are the different hells and purgatories, right?”

Nick nodded, and said, “Yes, there are just as many lower planes as there are upper planes. In many ways they are similar, but they are also drastically different. Souls traveling the lower planes typically don’t join the cycle of reincarnation. Some do, but usually they are ripped apart by the denizens of the hells.”

Nero was shocked. It was odd to hear people speak so matter-of-factly about life after death. He had known that they had studied it extensively, but it was still difficult to accept. Nero had to remind himself that this was a fantasy world. ‘Don’t let the steak and potatoes fool you. You are in a place with magic and elves. This probably isn’t even cow,’ he thought to himself as he stared at the piece of meat on the end of his fork.

Trying to focus on the conversation, Nero asked, “And what about the higher planes, what are those?”

Nick said, “They are planes of existence that are purely ethereal. They but up against all of the material planes. They act as a buffer between us and the void. You must have crossed them when you came from wherever you were. It is there that the souls are wiped clean and reintroduced to the material planes. They are difficult for us to view, but they CAN be studied. Several thousand years ago, Arch-mage Devon succeeded in his efforts to track the soul of his late wife through the cycle of reincarnation. It took 50 years, but he found her in a small boy on another continent. He couldn’t travel there, but he spent the rest of his life watching the boy grow up. It’s was a sad, but interesting, paper.”

Cathleen said, “My mother read it to me when I was a child. I liked to think that someone was watching me train, hoping for me to be a great warrior like my previous incarnation. My mother was kind enough to leave me with that delusion.”

Rose and Nick smiled at the ‘cute’ story. Nero however was flabbergasted. He dropped his fork onto his plate and said, “Your mother read you a research paper as a bed-time story?”

Everyone looked at Nero like he had just asked why water was wet. Nick said, “What else was she going to read her? Children don’t have enough knowledge to understand anything more complicated.”

Nero asked, “What about something that isn’t non-fiction? Something with a moral lesson or whatever.”

Confused looks were exchanged among the three of his dinner companions. Rose asked, “That word you used, ‘non-fiction’. Doesn’t that just mean ‘true’? And wouldn’t moral lessons have more of an impact if there were real examples given?”

Nick responded, “I think what he meant was...”

Nero shook his head in defeat and stopped listening. There was no point arguing with crazy people who believed in logic. He returned to his meal and remembered a time where people chose to believe in whatever made them happy. It was a great time to be alive, the arguments were so much fun.