Traveling Magic Shop Part 3 (Patreon)

"You shouldn't let the girl walk around without clothes," a fat and rather dumpy looking woman told Myst in a snide tone of voice that screamed self righteous bitch.

"It's a work in progress," Myst replied as he took the coins an old man with more than a couple of missing teeth handed him, doing his best not to get pulled into an argument.

"You should beat her until she gets the point," a bald man in his late thirties with a spare tire suggested.

Myst handed the old man the tin of magical breath mints then turned to glare at the man that was wearing a seven pointed star. "You should leave."

"What?" the man sputtered. "Do you know who I am?"

"No and I don't fucking care," Myst replied as he grabbed a bottle of apple juice for the woman that had several gashes on her hands from a broken bottle, what little patience he normally had towards religions having evaporated at the man's suggestion that he should beat a child.

"Show some respect, I'm a knight of the Seven," the man ordered.

"This should help, it helps with healing," Myst explained as he handed the magic cider to the woman, making a point of ignoring the knight.

"Thank you," the woman told him and took a drink, causing her gashes to quickly and visibly close.

"Heretic!" the knight screamed as he reached for his sword at his belt. "Using magic is a sin!"

"We're in the North," Eddard cut in as he stood up as the woman scurried away from the man wearing a chainmail shirt. "Put the sword away."

"It's unnatural!" the man shouted in Eddard's direction. "I challenge," he paused as his brain caught up enough to realize that challenging the lord of the North's son to a duel would most likely result in him losing his head, "the shopkeeper to a duel for insulting the Seven!"

"Magic isn't illegal here, nor is speaking your mind," Eddard told the man.

"He insulted a knight," the man snapped.

"I'm not a knight and this isn't the South, but if you want a fight, surrender your sword and I'll fight you with my fists unless you're craven," Myst offered, trying to make sure he could actually win the fight.

"Craven!" the man sputtered as he angrily unclipped his sheath and sword from his belt and put them on the table. "I'm going to enjoy this!"

"I seriously doubt it," Myst replied as he slowly walked around the counter, taking the time to study the man and to give people a chance to clear some space. 'He's too frustrated and arrogant to take this seriously and he's let himself go. Then again, you're not as quick as you used to be,' he admitted, if only to himself. "Ready?"

"Ready!" the man replied as he brought his fists up.

"Lord Stark!" Myst exclaimed as he 'looked' at the door. He stepped forward and slammed his right fist into the knight's jaw as hard as he could when the knight turned to look at the door, putting his weight behind the hit and dropping the man like a bag of potatoes.

Brandon shook his head, unable to keep the amusement out of his voice, "That was a cheap shot."

Myst shrugged. "It's not my fault that he got distracted when I gave it my best battle cry, he's supposed to be a knight. What sort of knight gets dropped by a shopkeeper?"

"A bad one," Brandon complained. "Nice hit."

"Do I need to make sure he's unconscious?" Myst asked as he made a show of wiggling his fingers, trying to pretend that the only reason he hadn't broken his fingers was luck rather than years of martial arts training.

"Take him to the drunk tank, he can sleep it off," Brandon told two of his father's guards, knowing his father wouldn't be amused by a southern knight challenging a civilian to a duel.

"With pleasure," one of the guards said as he grabbed the 'knight' by his ankle and started dragging him toward the door, rather amused that the so-called knight got dropped by a single lucky punch.

"Does the cider work on old injuries?" one of the guards asked when he noticed that the gashes on Mildred's hands were gone.

"It's worth a try," Myst replied as he grabbed another bottle of cider and a tin of mints as the guard was missing a couple of teeth. "You should buy some magical mints and pass them around, your friends will thank you and you won't have to deal with their breath."

"Not a bad idea," the guard agreed as he fished a couple of coins out of his coin purse.

Myst plastered a smile on his face as he worked on selling his limited stock of healing items, fairly sure he was going to regret knocking the man unconscious or at least regret the trouble knocking him unconscious was going to cause.

0o0o0

"How are you doing?" Myst asked as he walked over to the table where Lyanna was reading a book.

"I've been better," Lyanna admitted as she looked up from the book on combat magic that she was working her way through. "Where did you get milkshakes?"

"The shop came with a magic milkshake machine," Myst replied as he set one of the chocolate milkshakes in front of Lyanna.

"What do they do?" Lyanna asked, wanting to make sure it was safe before she drank it.

Myst sat down in the seat across the table from Lyanna. "They awaken your third eye."

"Physically or spiritually?” Lyanna asked, thinking about some of the students at the school that had three eyes.

"Spiritually," Myst replied with a chuckle. "It basically permanently awakens a magic user's ability to see magic or gives someone without magic the ability to see magic for a couple of days."

"Bottoms up," Lyanna said and took a sip of the shake, wanting the ability to see magic without resorting to a spell. "I'm going to miss having shakes with my friends."

"Sorry," Myst offered, not sure what else to say.

"It's not your fault, I'm the one that made friends with figments of my imagination," Lyanna admitted as she glanced around at the shelves filled with books that were starting to glow as the magic in the shake took effect.

"True," Myst agreed and took a drink of his own milkshake.

"You're not supposed to agree," Lyanna complained.

"I'd be more worried if you managed to spend five years at the school without making friends," Myst admitted as he studied the flickering magic that surrounded just about everything in the room other than their clothes.

"Probably," Lyanna admitted.

'Here's hoping things work out better than they did in the books,' Myst thought as he worked on finishing the rest of his chocolate shake.

"What type of classes are you planning on taking once you get to the school?" Lyanna asked, trying to distract herself from thinking about her own problems.

Myst finished the last of his milkshake and set it on the table which caused the glass to vanish along with the last dregs of the milkshake coating the inside of the glass. "I'll probably try a little bit of everything but I want to focus on magical item creation if I have a chance."

Lyanna nodded. "Makes sense considering the shop and it gives you a way to give people magic without spreading the ability around."

"That's the idea," Myst agreed, looking forward to learning how to use magic.

"Does that mean you're ready?" Lyanna asked.

Myst glanced at the dictionary sitting on the table then opened the choose your own adventure book. "As I'm going to be."

"Have fun," Lyanna told him, glad that she'd worked in the library so that she knew how to use the dictionary on the off chance that she ran into a word that she didn’t know.

Myst tapped the option that said Student and blinked when he found himself in a poorly lit gym that looked like it had seen better days, surrounded by over a hundred adults of various ages, the youngest being mid to late twenties judging by their appearance. He had just enough time to glance around the room before a man dressed in a canary yellow business suit snapped his fingers, causing the sound to echo across the gym like a firecracker.

"If I can have your attention, we can get this party started," the man announced as his suit changed from canary yellow to a neon yellow that was almost painful to look at. "I've been hired by Slutlife to bestow the abilities of a warlock on everyone present."

'Slutlife? Seriously?' Myst thought, wondering if it was too late to leave as he didn't want to get locked into a contract with a company filled with monsters.

"Everyone has signed the appropriate paperwork and waivers and selected their compensation and payment options, either a contract with the office or payment for my services. If anyone has issues, see the legal department." The man shifted into a mutated tentacle beast that was a kaleidoscope of shifting colors, some of which seemed to fade in and out of visibility, and a multitude of tentacles that moved in ways that made him feel like the floor was moving under his feet.

Myst frowned when he noticed eight people in the crowd collapse, looking like they were having an epileptic seizure. 'That explains the waivers. Why are people staring at the beast in horror? The suit was worse,' he mused, not sure why people were having issues with a tentacle demon that looked like it was made out of a rainbow. He felt a shiver go down his spine when he noticed a couple of people were staring at the creature in awe or possibly lust, like they were having a religious moment or like they'd just caught their idol's underwear at a rock concert after they'd tossed it at them.

"Fuck yeah! Give me more!" a woman shouted out, screaming her lungs out as she started pelvic thrusting toward the eldritch beast.

"Stay Puft!" one overweight man in a suit shouted as he tried to hug the air, looking for all the world like he was seeing things that weren't there.

"Fuck me Mrs Frizzle!" a man in his fifties or sixties shouted as he started stripping out of his business suit.

"Demon sex!" a woman in her thirties shouted as her hand turned into a tentacle and started stripping out of her exercise sweats.

"Monkey balls!" a rather fat guy shouted as he started running around grabbing at the air like he was trying to grope people.

"Great, they've lost their fucking minds," Myst muttered, keeping part of his attention on the people that seemed to have lost it so he could avoid them, something made a lot harder by the fact that he suddenly felt like his legs and arms were made of lead. 'Fuck, I suddenly feel like shit and we've got lunatics running around loose.'

"Leroy!" a man shouted as he ran face first at a wall, crashing into it a second later, “Jenkins…” he trailed off as he lost consciousness.

"Ants! Ants in my pants!" another overweight woman said as she started stripping, trying to get the imaginary ants out of her pants.

"I could have done without seeing that," Myst muttered as he turned his attention away from the woman who had tentacles coming out of places he was sure they were normally supposed to go into, at least according to all the Hentai he’d seen.

"Same," a young man in his early twenties agreed quietly, his voice slightly slurred. "Are you an agent or freelancer?"

Myst glanced at the young man that now had a slimy black and purple tentacle for a left hand. "I'm guessing freelancer, I just signed up for magic lessons."

"Makes sense," the guy agreed. "Having a bit more power can be the difference between having your soul ripped apart and getting the girls."

"I'd rather avoid having my soul ripped apart," Myst replied as he moved out of the way of a woman that was groping at the air blindly as she stumbled towards the wall behind him. "Is it always like this?"

"Pretty much," the man replied. "Every couple of months the Company runs a recruitment drive and gives out magic to the desperate, occasionally we'll pick up a new agent or office personnel."

"Makes sense," Myst replied, knowing that a lot of people would risk nearly anything for magic, including their immortal souls. "How long do we have to stay here?"

The man checked his watch which had started to run backwards. "Another five minutes, give or take."

"Too many eyes!" one woman shouted out before pulling out a spoon and gouging her left eye out.

'Yeah, everyone has lost their minds,' Myst thought as the woman tossed the eye to the eldritch abomination. He wasn't particularly surprised when the eldritch abomination ate the eye like candy though he was a touch surprised when the eldritch abomination pulled an eye out of one of its tentacles then moved over, using several other tentacles as feet to place its eye in the woman's empty eye socket, replacing the missing organ with a glowing sphere.

"I need a chainsaw!" one guy shouted.

"I need a rubber ducky!" a woman screamed as she changed into a giant anthropomorphic duck.

'Have I lost my mind or was it already gone?' Myst mused as he moved away from a crazy naked woman with glowing blue eyes and a pussy filled with teeth that was begging for someone to fuck her. 'I feel like my limbs are going to fall off,' he complained as he slowly made his way towards the doors, finding the process far more difficult than it should be.

"Feel free to leave or stay for the orgy!" the eldritch abomination announced as the doors to the gym swung open, revealing an alley.

'Yeah, not a chance,' Myst thought as he continued walking, wishing he had a cane since he felt like shit and his legs weren't working like they were supposed to. He was just happy that enough people were distracted that he didn't get run over as some of the saner people rushed out. He sighed in relief as he 'escaped' the gym and found himself in a cobblestone alley rather than a gym filled with madmen and hallucinations.

He glanced behind him, not sure if he should be surprised or worried about the fact that there was a blank stone wall behind him, the door absent. He glanced around the alley to make sure no one was going to jump him then focused on his Upgrade ability and himself, trying to figure out what he'd ended up with.

"What the fuck?!" he sputtered when he noticed that his strength and endurance had dropped enough that he had a feeling he'd lose an arm wrestling contest against Rose. 'Okay, don't panic, you can fix it, you just need to get somewhere you can afford to burn the mana… over and over for about a year.'

Myst smiled when he glanced at the icon for his mana pool and realized that he actually had a good amount of mana now. 'That should make everything easier.' He glanced at his talents and laughed when he realized the deal had given him a decent collection of talents.

"Whispers of the Damned?" he muttered when he saw the talent on his talent list. 'You can harvest a single spell from monsters or magic users that you kill. That's a quick path to the dark side, not exactly unexpected though considering the source. Pyramid Scheme?' he mused as he checked the description for the Pyramid Scheme ability.

'You have the ability to act as a patron yourself, granting lesser versions of your powers to others in exchange for whatever it is you want. Yeah, that's worth getting crippled,' Myst admitted as he checked his next ability. 'Speak and understand any language you come across, nice.'

He sighed in relief when he checked his new Sleepless perk and realized that he could still sleep if he wanted to, he just didn't need to. 'Just as well, sometimes you just need to turn everything off and decompress.'

He checked the Sharp talent. 'Sharper mind, making you able to think and react faster. That should come in handy in a fight.' He checked the warrior and the Intuition perks. 'Naturally skilled at using my abilities in combat and a decent amount of knowledge, I'm going to have to work on that. At least Intuition boosts my talents at wielding magic and figuring out how to use my powers. Hopefully this means I won't be dead last in the class.'

"Hey old man, give me your money!" a man in a leather swashbuckler-like outfit demanded as he walked over holding a rapier that was dripping shadows.

'This would be a lot easier if they'd downloaded a bunch of spells into my mind,' Myst through as he pulled a small bag of coins out of his pocket and tossed them to the man, causing the bag to land a couple of feet away from him as his strength wasn't what it used to be. "I don't want any trouble."

"Are you sick?" the thief asked when he got a better look at Myst and realized that his arms were withered and he looked like shit.

"Probably," Myst admitted and promptly started coughing.

"With what?" the thief asked as he took a step back and covered his mouth with his arm.

"No idea," Myst coughed again, not bothering to cover his mouth and doing his best to keep it from turning into an actual coughing fit that would leave him on the ground. "My ex is a witch."

"On second thought, keep the gold," the thief decided, not wanting to risk catching a magical sickness for any amount of money.

"Try silver and copper," Myst replied.

"Yeah, fuck that," the thief replied then turned and left, not interested in getting involved in something that a pissed off witch cooked up.

“I can't say I blame you, I feel like complete shit,” Myst complained as he walked over and grabbed the coin purse, finding it harder to pick up than it should be. He put the coin purse back in his pocket and headed for the street, figuring he'd have a better chance to avoid getting stabbed on the main street than in a 'dark' alley.

Myst stopped and stared when he reached the entrance to the alley and saw a street filled with people that looked like they couldn't decide if they were going to a nude beach or a renaissance fair since most of the people walking around weren't wearing shirts. "I might need to ditch the jacket."

"Are you one of the new students?" a girl wearing a red cloak and a pair of shorts asked as she studied Myst's strange clothes and aura.

"New students?" Myst asked as he turned to look at the person talking to him. He forced himself to focus on her eyes rather than the teenager's cantaloupe sized breasts, if only because he doubted he'd survive her kicking him in the nuts.

"Professor Laffer's School of Magic," the girl replied. "They're taking new students for the rest of the weekend."

"How much is tuition?" Myst asked.

"It's free as long as you maintain a minimum grade point average, it's paid for by various donations," the girl explained.

Myst sighed in relief. "Where do I sign up?"

The girl gestured down the street. "At the school, it's four blocks."

"I appreciate the help," Myst replied as he started walking in the direction she'd told him.

"No problem," she assured him and headed off to do her shopping.