Book 1 - Chapter 56 (Patreon)

“I think I love her Micah,” Trevor’s eyes were misty as Micah’s spear knocked his aside with a clatter of wood on wood.

The stag snorted, expressing Micah’s sentiments perfectly.

Micah noticed the distracted man shifting onto his back leg, distracted and off balance.  His leg lashed out, catching his brother behind his knee and sweeping the man’s legs out from under him.  Trevor tried to reset his feet, but Micah’s enhanced body attribute overwhelmed his frantic readjustments.

Trevor spilled to the ground, the impact knocking the wind out of him.  The deer blinked impassively and unimpressed at the two of them before returning to eating grass.  Micah sighed as he stepped forward and extended his hand to help Trevor up.

“I can swear that animal is mocking me,” Trevor glanced at the chewing buck as Micah helped him to his feet.  “There’s just something about the way it flicks its ears at me that’s downright insolent.”

“I mean,” Micah shrugged slightly.  “It is mocking you.  I can’t tell its actual emotions yet, but I can pretty much confirm that.”

The deer grunted in agreement, its face still buried in the grass of the clearing.  Micah smiled slightly at the slight bob of its antlers as it tried to pull a particularly obstinate clump of vegetation out of the soil.

“This is rather disheartening you know,” Trevor grinned as he bounced back to his feet with Micah’s assistance.  “It’s one thing for your kid brother to beat the crap out of you, but having his animal friend make fun of you too?  That’s another level of soul crushing.”

“Have you tried not getting distracted in the middle of sparring?” Micah asked, a hint of a smile warring with his stern tutor persona.

“But I love her Micah!” Trevor gushed.  “Just the way the evening Sun lights up her eyes by the dock or the way she smiles when I tell a stupid joke.  It’s like the entirety of Karell falls away from me and it’s only the two of us.”

“So soon?” Micah chided, clicking his tongue as he shook his head slightly.  “What about Anna, stolen away from you by Warrick?”

“Who?” Trevor asked, blinking in confusion.

“The neighbor girl,” Micah chuckled.  “You kept ripping up Mom’s flower gardens to produce bouquets for her.  I’m not sure whether she’ll be happy that you’ve given up on the girl or upset that you’ve destroyed all of her hard work for nothing.”

“Oh her,” his brother dismissed his former unrequited love with two disinterested words.  “She lacks a fraction of Claire’s grace.  Anna’s pretty, but compared to Claire she’s muted and drab.  If Warrick wants her, he can have her.”

“I’m sure Claire is great,” Micah said, ignoring Trevor’s mumbles of dissatisfaction, “but if you’re going to be an adventurer, you need to focus on sparring.  How else do you expect your spear skills to improve if you spend all of your time mooning over a girl you just met a couple days ago.”

“I guess,” Trevor grumbled, picking his spear up.  “This still doesn’t seem fair.  Your spear skills are so much higher than mine that these fights don’t really seem to have a point.”

“Try using your enchantments then,” Micah shrugged as he shifted his grip on his spear and brought it up into a ready position.  “If you can’t keep up with me normally, there’s no shame in using the tools I’ve given you.  You’ll need practice to incorporate the bursts of speed into your abilities.”

Trevor grinned and blurred forward, his spear leading the way.  Micah cursed under his breath, the image of the burning runes on Trevor’s bracers searing themselves into his vision as he threw himself to the side.  

The spear tip rushed past his face, a handbreadth form from scoring Micah’s cheek.  He fell toward the ground, the sudden dodge throwing off his balance.

Micah planted a hand on the ground, pushing off and tucking himself into a roll that brought him behind Trevor.  The older man’s legs blurred, the wind and time magic speeding his steps as he whipped around to face Micah.

The butt of Micah’s spear swung in a crescent, cracking into the side of Trevor’s knee with a sickening crunch.  Even if his brother’s enchantments let him move faster than Micah, he needed to be looking down to see the attack coming.  Whether it was Micah’s skill level or simply his greater battle experience, the blow took Trevor completely by surprise, caving his leg in sideways.

Trevor collapsed, his face locked in a silent rictus of shock and pain.  The spear fell from nerveless fingers and clattered by his side.

“Shit,” Micah mumbled, fumbling the words to augmented mending for the first time in years as he rushed over to his injured brother.

His second attempt succeeded, snapping bones back into place and reconnecting frayed tendons.  Although the wound was not yet healed, everything was in the correct place and given time it would heal on its own without any ill effect.  The third casting finished months of natural healing in a matter of seconds.

Micah leaned back, breathing heavily.  His exhaustion was more mental than physical.  He still had plenty of mana left, but the sound of the knee shattering like cheap pottery made him shudder.

The stag stepped past him, pushing its muzzle into the side of Trevor’s face.  The man smiled weakly at it before patting the top of its nose.  It turned its head to Micah, concern in its deep eyes.

“That was my mistake,” Micah responded, grimacing.  “I’m not used to having a spear with as unyielding of a haft.  I only intended that to sting enough to drop you to the ground Trevor.  I didn’t really plan on breaking anything.”

Trevor chuckled as he sat up, shaking his head.  “I used an enchanted item to give myself super speed and tried to stab you in the face with a surprise attack,” his eyes twinkled slightly.  “I think I gave up any right to complain about someone getting hurt when I started things with an ambush.  Plus, you fixed me up right away.”

“Still,” Micah shuddered, the image of Trevor’s knee collapsing repeating itself in his memory.  “I know that I’ve been pushing you hard.  I don’t want to rob you of your most vibrant years, but I need your help.  I’ve tried to do it with just the deer and myself and there were-”

He stopped speaking, a frown darkening his face as the chill of Elsewhere’s mists ran down his spine.  Trevor cocked his head at Micah.

“Consequences,” he finished, his mouth set in a narrow line.  “Once my mind attribute goes up a couple of points, I can summon us one or two daemons to help out, but my arrogance has been the end of me before.  I don’t plan on summoning anything until I’m ready and sure that the process is free of any taint.”

“I’m not a complete idiot Micah,” Trevor flashed a grin at him.  “I know that any guild I join is going to force me to train for a while before they’ll send me out into the wilds with a team.  I suppose training with you is just more efficient.  You specialize in the spear and you can heal me if I screw up.  What more could a trainee want?”

The stag snorted at the two of them and turned around, its interest waning now that Trevor was healed and moving freely.

“Actually,” Micah responded thoughtfully.  “It might not be a terrible idea for you to join the Lancers sooner rather than later.  We’re going to need access to dungeons soon and I’d prefer to not have to sneak into them at night.”

“Oh?” Trevor asked, perking up.  The deer stopped and glanced back at the two of them.

“Of course,” Micah smiled impishly, “they’ll just baby you for the first couple of months.  The stag and I will train you up.  Monster dens aren’t as good as dungeons, but we can raid a couple of them for practice.  I think both of us could use some levels and training as a team.”

“That sounds-” Trevor caught himself.  “Wait.  Why is the deer my teacher too?  I get that you’re some sort of time traveling super magician or something, but you know.  It’s a deer?”

The stag pointedly chuffed out a lungful air.

“It’s been putting down eager yearlings for longer than you’ve been alive Trevor,” Micah laughed.  “It was the king of the forest once.  It spent decades defeating rivals and killing predators.  Before its years caught up with it, it was the mate of every doe for leagues.  It’s only young now due to my magic, but the stag has more fighting experience than almost any adventurer under level fifteen.”

The buck preened, its ears flicking upward as it raised its head to bask in Micah’s praise.

“Shit,” Trevor grumbled.  “So I’m the new guy then?”

“Don’t worry,” Micah winked at him.  “I won’t let the stag bully you too much.  Just let me know if it starts forcing you to buy food from town for it or something.”

Trevor chuckled, standing up.  Micah joined him as the deer pushed its nose into each of their necks in turn.  Micah’s fingers curled in its fur as a wave of nostalgia washed over him.

Things weren’t perfect, but they were moving in the right direction.  He was stronger, both in level and in absolute power than he had been at the same time in the last timeline.  He’d already gathered another companion and soon they’d be able to evolve the stag into Telivern.  Then it was just a matter of-

“What’s next?” Trevor’s question interrupted his woolgathering.  “More sparring or should we move on to practicing magic?”

“There’s no need to be that sour about magic,” Micah patted the deer’s flank before turning back to Trevor.  “I know I forced it upon you, but I’ve found that an overly focused combatant is at a disadvantage.  If you don’t have any range, a caster can rain spells down on you from afar, but if all you can do is cast spells, a properly trained melee fighter can chase you down before you can do more than cast a single spell.”

“My martial art can close the gap,” Trevor replied mulishly, his hand gripping the spear tightly.  “There’s no need for me to focus so much on outside arts.”

The deer butted its head against Trevor’s side, shaking its antlers slightly as it looked at him with disappointment.

“The stag is right Trevor,” Micah tapped his brother’s spear with his own.  “I know that your martial art is a good one.  Lunge, returning spear, and wind crescent all form a solid core for you to work on.  At higher levels you’ll gain limited defensive moves as well.  Still, you should at least know wind shield and air knife.  Wind shield will protect you from arrows without you having to actively block them, and at a high enough level you’ll be able to pepper an opponent at range with air knives until you can take them down with lunge or returning spear.”

“So spell practice then?” Trevor asked morosely. 

“After a fashion,” Micah replied as he opened the Folio and paged through it.  He read the page for a minute or two before looking up with a smile.

“One of my first missions as a proper adventurer,” Micah snapped the book shut, “was to put down a pair of shade panthers that were hunting a local farmer’s sheep.  I suspect that they’re already in the area even if they haven’t started attacking civilized lands yet.  How does a group exercise to put down a pair of monsters before they can become a problem sound?”

“Uhhh,” Trevor’s eyes darted from Micah to the stag.  “I still remember that our first series of fights were a deliberately painful lesson to try and expand your horizons.  Are you sure we’re ready for this?”

“Shade panthers are stealthy,” Micah shrugged, “but their magic is weak.  They only have a little bit of wood and earth affinity.  The biggest concerns will be spotting them and then finding a way to deal with their speed and explosive power.  The deer should be able to notice them, its kind are naturals at avoiding predators.  As for the panthers themselves, each of us can take one with the stag providing help as it’s needed.”

“That sounds reasonable,” Trevor spoke slowly, clearly looking for the catch.  “You said that this was one of your first missions as a proper adventurer, but I thought you spent most of your time putting down nightwasps once you joined the guild.  What sort of level is a ‘proper adventurer’ to you?”

“It’s not a matter of level Trevor,” Micah slapped him on the back cheerfully.  “The guilds don’t consider you as anything more than an amateur until you survive a dungeon delve.  Just think of the leg up you’ll have on your companions once you join the Lancers after you complete a couple missions of this level.”

“This sounds like a bit much Micah,” Trevor’s knuckles were white as he gripped his spear.

“Just think of it as a story to tell Claire,” Micah replied with an easy laugh.  “We’ll have to sell the monster parts at Haarvash’s anyway so it will be a great conversation starter for her.”

The stag snorted at Trevor’s discomfort.  Micah was willing to bet his last point of attunement that it was the deer’s equivalent of laughter.