The City of Mages
The City of Mages
Plumes of water surged upward. Suspended in the falling brine, Aslan drew a breath, let himself sink for a heartbeat, then churned his arms and swam for the surface.
His companions, dropped into the sea at the same instant, each dealt with it in their own way—except two who couldn't.
Angie was the first.
The girl had grown up far from any river. Swimming was utterly foreign to her. She flailed without rhythm, churning the water to foam, and began to sink.
"Angie! You alright?"
Aslan wrapped an arm around her waist and hauled her up.
Angie had been born and raised in Belus Alpen, where no one ever needed to learn. The moment Aslan stopped her descent, she clung to his chest, gasping.
"Gah—blegh—my mouth tastes awful... I hate this...."
If even Angie, with her light frame and solid strength, was in this state, Aslan could already guess what fate had befallen Tiyamal.
"Young'un... my apologies... I am done for...."
"Tiyamal!"
The dragon-kin's massive body was sinking as he delivered his solemn farewell. His bulk and weight—damnable—made him terribly ill-suited for the water.
He sank fast. Aslan threw an arm around Tiyamal and pulled him up, bracing him afloat.
One arm holding Angie, the other linked with Tiyamal's. Aslan supported both of them, his face set in a grim mask as he fought to keep them buoyant.
He was shaking Tiyamal to rouse him when he turned his head and saw Ereta approaching.
"Aslan, are you alright? Are you hurt anywhere?"
She was floating easily, paddling with practiced strokes, her soaked shirt and pale hair plastered to her skin.
She can swim. The thought came unbidden and stole Aslan's reply for a moment. Ereta gave him a puzzled look, then her eyes went wide.
"Fay...?"
Her gaze was fixed behind him. Aslan turned and flinched at the sight.
Fay was walking on the water. She looked at Angie—clutched in Aslan's arms—with a slight frown, as if the entire thing were a mild inconvenience, and reached out.
"Fay will take Angie. Aslan only needs to worry about the lizard."
It struck Aslan then, what he had somehow let slip from his mind for far too long: Fay was an Elf. And Elves received abundant blessings of nature.
Which meant she could walk on water. He stared at her, momentarily speechless, and Fay caught his gaze. A self-satisfied little smile flickered across her face.
"That's right. Fay is a cute Elf. So Fay can walk on water."
Did that mean an un-cute Elf couldn't? The stray thought passed through Aslan's mind just as Ereta's bewildered voice cut in.
"Excuse me...?"
Ereta could discern no logical link between cuteness and the phenomenon of standing on the sea, and her baffled blinking made that plain.
Fay, either lacking the inclination or the ability to explain, merely shrugged. Tucking Angie under one arm, she pointed toward the harbor.
"There's a beach over there. Should be fine if we reach it, right?"
She was correct; the harbor was not far. Aslan still had no idea why they had been dumped into the ocean, but at least the distance was short. He nodded and began swimming.
Every time his legs kicked through the water, Tiyamal groaned. Now and then, ominously, he muttered nonsense like, "Young'un... if this old one perishes, erect a statue in Belus Alpen...."
Aslan gave the barest responses and dragged Tiyamal onward until, at last, they made landfall.
"Ungh!"
He dumped Tiyamal's massive form onto the sand and expelled a breath that had been caught in his throat.
He wasn't the only one exhausted. The moment Ereta reached the shore, she collapsed on her side, whining, "Aslaaan."
Fay set Angie down, and the whole party was finally ashore.
Angie groaned softly where she lay. Tiyamal moaned and shifted restlessly. Aslan braced his hands on the sand, panting.
"Everyone alright?"
Except for Angie, who lay still—perhaps unconscious—the others each gave their own answer.
"...I'd be fine if Aslan held me."
"Fay too."
"This old one... does not require... embraces."
A motley assortment of replies. Aslan let out a tired laugh at the absurdity of it and pushed himself upright.
His breathing was still rough, and his body was chilled from the long immersion, but there was no immediate threat of death. He looked around the shallow beach that cupped the harbor as he caught his breath.
Patches of violet seaweed lay scattered everywhere, dead and studded with what looked like salt-crusts. The beach was empty of people.
At least, for now.
Aslan and Fay both lifted their heads at the sound of an approaching crowd. From the direction of the harbor, a mass of figures was drawing near.
"Aslan."
"I know."
Some wore robes or light shirts, but most were armored in distinctive breastplates of worked metal and leather strapping.
Aslan recognized what they were the moment he saw them, and his expression soured into chagrin. Unlike Fay, whose hand drifted toward her sword hilt, he did not move his hands to his waist.
They were mages.
Battle-mages of the Manifestation School, to be precise.
It didn't take long for the crowd to encircle the party.
By the time the mages had extended their palms and fingers, all aimed at Aslan's group, a man at the center of the formation barked out a command.
"You have entered the City of Mages illegally! Surrender all weapons and submit, unless you wish to taste the firepower this city prides itself on!"
The words were harsh, but Aslan could see the tension in the mages who had their fingers trained on him.
The tension, the encirclement, the declaration—it all felt deeply familiar.
As if he had seen it somewhere before. He searched his memory, studying the situation, and every time his eyes shifted, the mages stiffened and aimed their fingers more rigidly at him.
'Ah—hold on. This scene...?'
Only when the standoff tightened to the point that someone seemed likely to loose a spell did Aslan finally recall where he had seen it.
Different location, but unmistakable.
This was an event scene.
There were two ways to reach the City of Mages.
One was to procure a ship and enter through proper channels. The other was to cross the sea by swimming.
The ship method was ordinary, so setting that aside, the swimming approach was achievable only if you had dumped every point into Health and maxed it to a perfect 20 from the start.
An event you couldn't experience without that extreme a build. Normally, no one ever saw it. But Aslan was a veteran who had played through the game with countless different setups.
Even though the memory surfaced late, this scene couldn't be anything but familiar.
If his guess was right, the next line was predictable.
'How in the hell did you swim across that sea? Are you a priest?!'
"How in the hell did you swim across that sea? Are you a priest, you bastard!"
Slightly different wording. Aslan noted the discrepancy but recognized the identical thrust of it, and that confirmed he was in the middle of that very event.
Which left him only one move to make.
"Urgh, I feel awful... my head's ringing... damn it...."
Before he could act, someone groaned.
Tiyamal. Clutching his head, moaning, his hand moved toward his ankle.
Toward the hand-axe strapped there. He was clearly drawing a weapon to defend himself while surrounded.
Through half-lidded eyes, his vertical pupils flickered with killing intent. Aslan shouted quickly.
"Tiyamal, drop it!"
Tiyamal flinched and shot Aslan a glare. Aslan immediately shed the provisions from his back and let the Storm Sword fall from his hip.
At the clatter of weapons hitting the ground, Tiyamal scowled, swept his gaze across the mages, and then tossed his hand-axe down.
Though the grimace on his face made it clear he resented having to entrust his safety entirely to someone else.
Fay glanced at Aslan and Tiyamal, then threw down her sheathed sword as well. The abrupt surrender seemed to catch the mages off-guard; they simply stared for a moment without reacting.
Eventually, Aslan had to say the words they hadn't managed to spit out.
"We surrender! I, Aslan Flame-tongue, and my four companions yield to you! We will fully comply with your treatment, so guide us peacefully to your prison!"
A bold declaration of capitulation delivered in a ringing voice. Tiyamal's brow creased. Fay let out a small "Hm." The mages looked startled.
As they hesitated and then began to close in, Aslan laughed inwardly.
This was an opportunity.
Manacles snapped around their wrists, and Aslan's party was led away to jail.
*
The main quest in the City of Mages was simple in its essence.
Interpret the prophecy Angie had dreamed, the vision shown by the Ancient Gods.
Decipher that prophecy to determine the precise location of Kehil, the Throne of the Gods, and uncover the Ancient Gods' plan.
To do that, they needed a mage of genuine skill to perform the dream interpretation.
Because of that, the quest's completion speed varied wildly depending on circumstances.
The mage's caliber, the fee paid, even the reputation built within the city—so many factors played into it that it could take over a month of in-game time.
Working through sub-quests to build reputation, hiring the mage, scraping together the payment—there was no way around it.
Unless you found the fastest route: getting a supremely talented mage to work for free by building an absolutely undeniable reputation with them.
The city's greatest mage, for instance.
It wasn't as if he had intended to fall into the sea.
Nor had he imagined the failed warp would be registered as swimming across.
But Aslan did not let the opportunity slip. He wasn't about to kick away a gift that had rolled right up to him.
Which was why he was now in a cell. His companions had been shoved into separate cells and had all fallen asleep.
Angie, still unconscious from the shock. Ereta, collapsed from exhaustion and murmuring Aslan's name in her sleep. Fay, who didn't need sleep but enjoyed it and had drifted off anyway. Tiyamal, slumped against the wall with his long tongue lolling out.
The dead-quiet hour just before dawn was when the footsteps finally came.
The jailer offered a stiff salute. Light footfalls echoed closer.
By the time the sound had drawn nearly to his bars, Aslan saw who had made it.
Red-brown hair, long and streaked here and there with white, cascading down past both shoulders and her back. The woman had elongated ears and green eyes.
Vivid green, alight with a faint inner glow, thick with mana. Aslan ignored the fact that the mana streaming from those eyes was fixed on him and remained leaning against the wall, watching her.
She stopped in front of his cell and studied him in silence. She looked at him for a long time without speaking, then finally parted her lips when Aslan shifted his seated posture slightly.
"I heard you swam across. Is that true?"
No name, no greeting. Straight to the point. On its face, it was rude enough to make a man uncomfortable, but Aslan hardly cared.
"Yes. I swam."
"Interesting."
Even though he had answered her blunt question with a flat reply, she showed no particular reaction and simply kept looking at him. The emotion in her gaze was faint, but Aslan could sense it.
The deep fascination she was feeling.
Well, it had been that way in the game too. No reason it would be different here.
"Then are you a priest?"
Aslan smiled faintly at the expected question.
"Do I show signs of being a priest?"
"I can't tell. I don't see it, but if you crossed a sea that freezes time itself, I can only see you as a priest."
A cool tone. Suppressed curiosity and interest. Aslan tilted his head, looking at her as if he could see straight through to what she was thinking.
"Are you really going to take that line?"
At his confident counter, she let out a soft "Hmm" and smiled subtly.
A being who had swum across a sea that was supposed to be uncrossable. For someone of her stature, the curiosity was inevitable.
Even if she felt none, investigation was mandatory.
She was the mayor of this city, after all.
The imprisonment event after swimming across was, in effect, the fastest path.
A route that any player attempting a speedrun of Eternal Dominion had to take.
Because without doing it this way, she would never appear.
The Master of Magic from two generations past. The woman who now served as mayor of the City of Mages.
Sometimes called an Orc for her command of sorcery—a hybrid of Beastmen and human blood.
An archmage of prodigious mana and outstanding achievements across every school.
Anna Heleminus.
She would already have surmised that a Last Descendant of the Ancient Gods was among Aslan's group.
On this Northern Continent, there was no human more relentless than her in seeking out the Last Descendants.