Alex's adventures (Patreon)

Alex sighed as she examined her pathetic excuse for a knife blade resting on her anvil. It was a lopsided creation that was also rather uneven along what should have been its blade. She resisted the urge to smash it a couple of times out of frustration. She glanced over at her father who was happily working on forging a knife on another anvil under the direction of the elf in charge of the metal shop. Lynette was probably the bulkiest elf she had seen so far in Abby’s world. While her arms didn’t look like corded tree trunks or anything she could tell that Lynette was used to working with them most days. “Yeah… I’m not even sure this would cut butter.”

“It’s not that bad…” Lynette glanced over at Alex’s project then spent a couple moments snickering before finishing her statement, “for a beginner. You‘ve got to walk before you run.”

Alex scowled at the uneven blade. “This would be easier if I could use magic.”

“Maybe but without understanding how you’re supposed to make a blade you’ll just get a crappy weapon compared to the masterpiece that you could have created with real skill.”

“So you’re saying that blades created by magic are worse?” Alex asked curiously.

Lynette shook her head. “No, I’m saying that if you understand both you’ll get a better weapon when you’re done.”

Alex gestured toward her blade. “Any suggestions on what to do with this monstrosity?”

Abby snickered as she placed her blade into the forge to heat it up. “Scrap metal?”

Lynette shook her head. “Toss it on the table for now. I’ll use it when I show you how to put an edge on your blades. It’s not quite as bad as it looks, my first attempt wasn‘t much better.”

Alex sighed. “Now you’re just lying.”

“Only a little bit but I put in the time and got better. I’m sure that we’ll have you forging blades of legend before too many centuries pass.” Lynette grinned.

“That makes me feel so much better,” Alex replied a touch sarcastically. “I’m hoping that it doesn’t take years, let alone centuries to learn to forge a blade.”

Abby used her tongs and pulled her sword blade out of the fire to check on it. “I have faith in you.” It didn’t look quite the right color so she stuck the piece of metal back into the fire.

Daniel set his knife blade down on the anvil then put the tongs back in their holder. “I’m just happy to find something we can work on together as a family.”

Alex looked suspiciously at her father’s blade, it looked a lot better than hers. “Are you sure you haven’t done this before?”

“I played with a forge in high school but we didn’t actually get to make knives or anything too interesting because of safety concerns.”

It was a bit hard for Alex to wrap her head around the school system being worried about people making knives. She guessed that if you could be cut by a blade and you weren’t used to walking around with a bunch of armed magic users that might or might not grow up into psychopathic warlocks then she could see where you might be worried about knives. Even still you could buy knives from stores so she didn’t really understand the problem with making them. It was probably more of that stupid logic that some government official had come up with. “Weird…”

“The government we know and love,” Abby replied sarcastically as she pulled her piece of metal out of the fire and continued shaping it with her hammer.

Marie spoke up from where she'd been watching her husband and daughter work, “Speaking of weapons, I still haven't seen the arena yet.”

Alex turned and looked at her mother trying not to appear as unsettled as she actually was. “Sure, when do you want to go see it?”  

Marie frowned slightly as she noticed her daughter's unease about the arena. “No time like the present.”  

Alex turned and looked at Abby. “If I'm not back in twenty minutes, come save me.”

Abby snickered as she continued working on her blade. “I'll come check on you as soon as I finish my blade.”

Lynette flashed Alex a 'helpful' smile. “Go have fun, we can start over once you get back.”

“My second attempt can't be much worse.” Alex forced herself to smile as she took off her leather apron, set it on the anvil then started walking toward the arena. She wasn't looking forward to her mother's lecture on safety once she saw the arena battles.

Marie followed her daughter wondering just how dangerous the arena was if her daughter was reluctant to show it off.  

Alex mentally reviewed her options as they approached the arena. She tossed the amusing if useless idea of conjuring a puff of smoke and running like a movie ninja as soon as it popped into her head. That left her with only two viable options, she could get into the arena and fight a bunch of monsters to show that it was 'safe' or they could watch a fight in the arena and hope the contestants weren't anything too scary. She doubted her mother would appreciate her fighting a horde of enemies which left watching the arena battle as the only viable choice, she'd just have to hope that the monsters weren't overly impressive.  

0o0o0

Alex felt like cursing as they walked into the arena and saw a group of six students from the realm creation club signing up for an arena fight. 'Great, so much for a nice monster on monster fight,' Alex complained mentally. She forced herself to smile as it wasn't their fault they'd picked an inconvienent time to sign up for a fight and she would have been happy for their help clearing monsters just about any other time. “It looks like we get to watch a team fight.”

The leader of the group turned and smiled at Alex and Marie. “We're going to take out the griffin now that we've seen what it can do against Marvin's golem.”

“You've been using golems to scout the fights?” Alex asked in surprise.

“You didn't expect us to go into a fight blind, did you?” He asked with amusement.

Alex shifted unconfortably as that was exactly what she'd been doing for most of her fights. “I guess not, I've just been watching the battles and putting together plans from that.”

Marvin spoke up, “That's a good start but nothing beats a golem that you can puppet for seeing how the monsters will react to human shaped opponents.”

Marie wasn't sure how easy creating golems was but it sounded like a decent way to cut down on surprises. “That would certainly be safer.”

The leader smiled. “Exactly. Now if you'll excuse us, we're off to defeat a griffin. Hopefully it will drop a set of reins that let us summon it as a mount or something cool.” He turned and headed toward the stairs going down with the rest of his group.

“Good luck.” Alex was relieved that the group seemed to have their stuff together. She made a mental note to talk to Ivy about golems when she got the chance. “Let's head upstairs and watch the fight.”

“Lead the way.” Marie followed her too quiet daughter up the stairs and over to a couple of seats with a decent view of the arena floor. “What is stopping the monster from flying up here and how safe are the fights?”

Alex considered lying for a second and saying it was perfectly safe but she doubted that her mother would believe her. “There is a force field around the stands that keeps the monsters from escaping or attacking the crowd and they should be fine as long as they keep their armor spells up and have a halfway decent plan.”

“I hate the thought of you risking your life...” Marie trailed off as the gate on the far side of the arena opened revealing a strange horse sized creature with the body of a lion and the head, wings and front feet of some monstrous mutated bird. “I thought griffins were supposed to be magestic looking?”

“It just depends on who created the griffin. The arena monsters are pulled from everyone's subconscious that helped create the realm.” Alex shivered slightly as she thought about the evil version of Devon. She was sure that there were other examples of monsters that had come from someone's nightmares but nothing on that scale.  

Marie frowned as one of the girls on the team ran toward the griffin while the rest of her team started gesturing like Alex sometimes did when she was using magic. “What are they doing?”

“A couple of trap spells, some type of temporary conjuration and the girl charging the monster is an illusion...” Alex trailed off as the charging girl vanished when the griffin hit the trap zone and a pillar of fire exploded.  She watched as dozens of glowing purple chains burst out of the ground and wrapped themselves around the gryffin's wings and legs.

Marie winced as one of the magic users gestured and dozens of spikes made of sand burst out of the ground and impaled the griffin. “Nasty.”

Alex winced as the stench of burned feathers hit her nose after the group used half a dozen fire spells to finish off the trapped gryphin before it could break out of the traps. “Not my favorite smell.”

“Nice teamwork. Is that how you fight them, traps and ranged spells?” Marie asked curious how her daughter normally fought the monsters.

“It depends on the monster. Mostly we just use ranged spells and try to keep the monsters at a distance if we can,” Alex admitted.

“It almost makes me sorry for the monsters,” Marie admitted.

“Don't be, they're just spellwork and programming unlike the townsfolk who adapt and learn.”

Marie scrunched up her nose. “Not to cut this short but maybe we should leave before our clothes and hair soak up the stench of burned feathers.”

Alex was just glad that her mother hadn't overreacted or started screaming about putting herself in danger. “That's a good point,” she admitted as she stood up and headed for the exit. “Where do you want to go next?”

“I wouldn't mind seeing the castle and the lake,” Marie replied as she followed her daughter trying not to think about everything that could go wrong in the arena.  

“I can show you the castle and I'll work on the lake tomorrow.” Alex wanted to have help when she tackled the lake.

0o0o0

Abby grinned as she looked at Alex's partially completed sword that the blacksmith was examining. “At least this one looks like a sword.”

Alex stuck her tongue out at Abby. Sure it wasn't perfect but no one would look at it and mistake it for something other than a sword blade unlike her first couple of attempts.  

Lynette looked down the blade of Alex's latest attempt at a sword. “It's certainly better than her first attempt.”

Alex snorted. “I think a piece of flattened rebar would have been better than my first attempt.”

“You have the basics down, it just takes practice.”

Alex flashed Lynette a smile. “Thank you for helping.”  

“You're welcome,” Lynette carefully handed the blade back to Alex, “though if you really want to repay me, you could start by restoring the lake so that I don't have to haul water as far.”

“Restoring the lake is at the top of our list of large projects.” Abby glanced at Alex. “We can probably deal with it tomorrow when Cael and Devon show up.”

“And after that, the castle.” Alex wanted to finish restoring the castle and have Abby claim the realm before someone tried to steal it. While she doubted Cael or Devon would try to steal it, the magical club liked to brag about their accomplishments which meant that the realm wasn't exactly secret.

Abby snickered. “Queen Abby has a nice ring to it.”

Lynette laughed. “In that case, we'll have to make sure your blade is fit for a queen.”

Alex asked, “What's the next step? Grinding?”

“Not this time, we're going to heat it up then let it cool very slowly overnight so that grinding it is easier.”

Abby asked, “In other words, once we heat it up, we're done for the night?”

“Right after you help me clean up,” Lynette replied with amusement as she walked over to work the bellows.

Abby grinned as she picked up her best blade. “Cool, I want to hit the arena a bit tonight to take care of the rest of the small stuff.” She looked at Alex, “If you're up for it?”

Alex used a pair of tongs to put her blade in the forge to heat it up. “My parents went to dinner with one of my mother's friends from work which means I'm free for a bit of fun in the arena.”

Lynette said, “Good, I'm looking forward to having the lake filled.”

“I'm looking forward to finishing the whole realm.” Abby knew it was going to take a while to finish the entire realm but with any luck they could finish up the major sections and claim the realm in a couple of days.

0o0o0

Alex tossed a ball of fire at the large troll that Abby had wrapped up in conjured black chains. “I almost feel guilty about how easy this is.”

Abby looked away from the disintegrating monster and over at her girlfriend. “Why?”

“Because they aren't even close to a challenge,” Alex admitted as she gestured and sent a swirling vortex of blades at the other three trolls who were charging them.  

Abby shivered slightly as the trolls briefly resembled several chunks of meat stuck in a blender before they faded away leaving behind a hunting horn. “Where did you pick up that spell?”

“I recreated it from a book on old spells that I picked up in the library,” Alex admitted.

“It's certainly effective. Are you up for another fight?” Abby asked hopefully as she gestured and summoned the horn to her.

Alex glanced at her watch then looked back at Abby. “We might as well, we have plenty of shops to unlock and I've got at least a couple of hours before my parents get home and I have to check in.” 

“Good, I want to see what other shops we can unlock.” Abby turned and headed toward the exit to the arena so they could kill a couple more monsters before they called it a night.

0o0o0

Alissa knocked on Alex's bedroom door. “Phone.”

Alex yawned as she woke up enough to turn and look at the door. “What?”

Alissa snickered as she opened the door and held up the cordless phone. “You have a phone call.”

“Who is it?” Alex asked sleepily as she sat up in bed.

“Sally, she wants to know if you want to go to her birthday party Saturday?” Alissa tossed the phone into Alex's lap, “Daniel said that he'd drive you if you wanted to go.”

“Oh, right, yeah.” Alex picked up the phone and hit the mute button to unmute it. “Hey Sally, I'd love to go.” She hadn't hung out much with her friend since the other girl had moved a couple of years ago, she still saw her at martial arts but that was about it other than the occasional party.  

Alissa closed the door then headed back into the living room. “Mission successful, the teenager has been woken.”

Daniel looked up from the alchemy book he was reading. “You sleep in way more often than she does.”

“It's a skill,” Alissa replied with amusement.  

“How did Marie take the arena?” He hadn't had a chance to ask his wife about it as he hadn't wanted to bring it up while they were driving to the dinner and she'd crashed out in Alissa's room last night after they got back.

“She's more than a little worried about Alex but seeing the other group of magic users planning things out helped. How are you doing with it?”

Daniel glanced toward his daughter's room then used the ribbon attatched to the book to mark his place. He closed the book and set it on the end table. He lowered his voice, “Not happy is an understatement. Intellectually I know her armor spell should be good enough to keep her safe but she's my daughter and I worry. I'm trying not to fly off the handle and set rules that I can't enforce but it's my job to protect her.”

“You can't really lock her up in a tower, that never ends well.”

“I could try,” he replied with amusement.  He heard his daughter's shower start. “I should probably start some breakfast, any requests?”

“Pancakes,” she replied promptly.

“That's easy enough.” He was looking forward to and dreading watching Alex's match today to unlock the lake. He stood up and walked toward the kitchen to make breakfast.

Alissa grinned as she sat down in Daniel's chair and picked up Alex's book and started reading.

0o0o0

Ivy followed Cael and Devon out of the doorway that connected the school to the realm then glanced around at all of the changes over the last couple of days they'd been dealing with chores and family obligations. “They fixed the streetlights and at least half a dozen shops.”

“It's looking better,” Devon admitted.

“Diffinately.” Cael smiled as he saw Abby and Alex walking up the path toward them with another girl following them that he didn't recognize. “You've been busy.”

Abby grinned as they walked up. “We wanted to unlock the rest of the shops before we unlocked the lake so we spent a couple of hours last night killing monsters. Before I forget, this is my sister Sarah, try not to corrupt her Ivy.”

Ivy pouted. “Why does everyone assume that I'm the evil sibling?”

Devon laughed. “Because Cael would make anyone look evil.”

“Point,” Ivy admitted.

Cael glanced between Devon and Ivy. “I'm not sure if I should be offended or not.”

“There is nothing wrong with being a nice guy,” Alex pointed out.

Sarah turned to look at Ivy. “What's your specialty?”

“Creating monsters,” Ivy replied with amusement.

“This could be fun.”

Abby shook her head. “Great, I knew this was going to end in tears.”

0o0o0