~Chapter Nine: A Mediocre Battle~

"You'd think a culture that prizes strength so much would produce strong people."

***

The first attacks came at me from, unsurprisingly, five directions.

I waved Alex down, fearing that my new butler might not be able to withstand so many hits all at once. That fear turned out to be unfounded, but I don't regret the caution.

Two large snakes made of moving earth tore out of the ground and clamped around my feet, a plume of gaseous poison shot out of one man's mouth and engulfed me, and dozens of needles clattered against my skull and jacket.

A moment later, two of the senior disciples moved into the cloud of gas surrounding me, one with a pair of long knives, the other with a pair of syringes. The latter of the two was surfing over the ground, the earth beneath pushing him along.

It seemed that this sect's combat style relied on two things. The heavy application of poisons and venoms, and some forms of earth manipulation.

Oddly enough, they were neither as impressive as the poison-users I remembered, or as dextrous in their use of earth as a proper Elementalist. A sort of worse-of-both-worlds approach.

Now that I had endured their initial assault and found it wanting, that left me with a rather serious choice to make. Should I retaliate lethally or not?

The option to kill them outright was rather tempting. They had, of course, opened hostilities first, and were violating the most basic of guest rights with no hesitation.

But killing people was generally seen as a sort of last resort. For most people, death was a rather permanent state of affairs.

I decided to take the middle ground.

"Magic Missile."

Ten circles formed in the air behind me, then twitched as they adjusted their aim to that two were facing each senior disciple. Unlike my standard magic missile, which had a rotating, screw-like projectile and an explosive payload, these were shaped to be as blunt as possible and were weakened to move relatively slowly through the air.

Ten glowing green lines traced themselves out in the air, two impacting each of the disciples and sending them reeling back as though they'd just been hit by a club.

They flew back ways, kicking up dust as they rolled and ended up as groaning heaps scattered about.

I tugged at my lapels, then used a minor cantrip to dislodge the earth serpents holding my legs locked. "As I was attempting to say," I said quite clearly. "I am not here for violence. I am here for an exchange of knowledge." A rather one-sided exchange, but an exchange nonetheless. "Please do not provoke me any further. I think that at this point, the next attack against my person will be met with lethal repercussions."

The elder, still standing there with his cane between his feet, glared. Not at myself or Alex, but the young men were strewn about. "Fools! Rise! Rise and defend the honour of your sect. Defeat this heathen or I'll see you all cast out!"

Was the man an idiot?

My question turned a little more broadly as the five stood up, some wincing and pressing down against no-doubt broken ribs. Were they all idiots?

As they threw more needles at me and started the incantations to spells that I didn't recognize, I considered dealing with them non-lethally again. Sure, I had said that I wouldn't do so outright, but those were just words, they had little to no value.

"Greater Earthly Venom Wyrm!" one of the young men shouted as he ended an incantation and, with a burst of displaced earth, summoned a spiny serpent as big around a horse and a dozen times longer. The man seemed exhausted from the casting, but it was rather impressive work.

Unfortunately, I'd seen better spellwork elsewhere, and the various poisons being flung at me was a sign that these people didn't subscribe to the idea that attempting the same thing twice after an initial failure was a bad idea.

I wouldn't fall for the same trap.

"Well, it seems that you lot have a bone to pick with me. Oh ohohohoh!"

I raised a hand and made a flicking gesture.

"Bone Thorns."

I made sure to only target the five of them with that particular spell. It was an old favourite of mine, one that I had discovered while studying a type of lindworm that used a unique kind of bone magic.

The key component of it, as I'd discovered, was the use of the targets own skeletal structure as a reagent. A bit tricky, especially when the target was still using that skeleton, but doable if you were able to beat their Will save.

The first step only made the target feel warm. A natural side effect of the magic coursing through their bones. Magic often had a minor thermal component when in use, releasing heat as a sort of waste energy. I disliked that waste, but in a spell that required overriding a sentient's innate defences, more was often better than just enough.

The next part of the reaction was often described as an uncomfortable itching under the skin. These five, in particular, were soon shifting and twitching, some cutting themselves off mid-attack to reassess.

And finally, the most apparent part of the spell.

Thorns made of the target's bones soon began to sprout out of their skin, often slicing through muscle and sinew on the way out. They grew crooked and uneven horns atop their heads, then more thorns around their faces. The spine, in particular, seemed to grow a disproportionate number of thorns. I suspect it's because it serves as a central hub for the nervous system and tends to circulate a fair amount of magic when using various self-buffs and other such spells.

The thorns didn't just grow outwardly, of course. Most grew within the body itself, cutting into various important organs and the target's brain.

Within a second of the final stage of the spell going off, all five senior disciples collapsed, though they continued to twitch a little as new thorns continued to grow out of them. They would make for rather terrifying skeletal warriors if turned into undead.

I cleared my nonexistent throat. "Now that that is out of the way," I said. "Would it be possible to speak with your leader while you fetch a cleric or a bard... perhaps more than one?"

"You... you bastard!" the elder screeched.

I blinked. "They were trying to kill me. Did you expect me to sit back and allow them?" I waved his concern away. "Nevermind that. I can cast Resurrection myself if you want, though I wouldn't do it freely."

The elder was soon joined by two others who were also middle-aged and seemed to be ready to assault me at a moment's notice. Leaders and instructors, I presumed. They seemed more indignant than angry, which was quite bizarre.

"You have insulted the Four Venoms Sect," the eldest among them, the one that had just sentenced his disciples to a rather grisly death. "For this, you will die."

"That is impossible," I said. "I think this situation is getting out of hand. Perhaps Alex can prepare us a nice cup of tea and we can take a moment to de-escalate?"

All three of them started to wave their arms about, and I could feel the faint tingle of magic about to be cast.

"Or you could continue to escalate needlessly," I said.

"Pit of Fangs!" one shouted.

The courtyard below me started to sink.

"Lesser Cantrip: Hover."

The earth fell away beneath me, relieving a pit a dozen necrometers deep lined with serrated teeth spinning about the edges. Judging by the oily gleam, they were all quite poisonous. An interesting spell that. Not useful in this case, but interesting.

"Blood to Poison!" another elder called out.

That just didn't do anything.

The third elder used a sort of teleportation to appear behind me. Shadow step, perhaps? He brought a pair of long, thin knives down around my throat and into my ribcage. So much for my illusion holding up.

"What?" the man said.

"Eldritch Blast."

The man behind me didn't so much fly away as he flew apart.

Low constitution assassins shouldn't remain in a fixed position like that. It was just a poor application of tactics on a battlefield where they didn't know how strong their opponent was.

The earthen pit beneath me crumbled as the spell ended, and the elder sect member casting that particular spell switched to flinging balls of caustic goop in my general direction. I tapped the first one as it came and set it into a pocket dimension for later study. The rest I made sure to track as they came down towards me.

"Magic Missile."

This time it was a proper cast of my old favourite. A few hundred small circles inscribed themselves in the air around and above me, then they launched a volley of glowing projectiles.

I first used Magic Missile as a young wizard; it was one of the very first spells I used. Back then it had been a simple bolt of magic, with little control and no refinement. Over the millennia I had improved upon my casting somewhat.

My standard variation on the magic missile was a tightly woven hexagonal-cut arrowhead, with an unstable magical loop in its centre, and a head that twisted a bit towards the point. If the spell spun at just the right speed, the head would act as a sort of drill on impact.

The magical loop was an incomplete version of a spell called Produce Flame. A nifty little cantrip used to light campfires and occasionally used by young wizards to light a pipe to impress a bar wench.

When the initial impact of the Magic Missile resolved, the cantrip would activate, expending the remaining ambient arcane energy to produce short-lived gout of flame.

The elder's eyes widened as a hundred homing projectiles tore through his feeble rain of caustic goop. He reacted with alacrity, dropping into the ground and emerging some dozen necrometers away.

If he thought that kind of thing would prevent my missiles from working, he discovered that he was quite wrong when the missiles came raining down on his new position.

The third elder paused to take in the splattered remains of his one comrade, then the burning, hole-riddled form of the other. "Um," he said.

"Yes, running away would be a good idea," I said.

"I cannot run! That would be the coward's way!" he said.

"Do you need a moment to build up your courage before dying a horrible, grisly death?" I asked. "I wouldn't mind the pause. I do want to keep things original, and that would require thinking of some lethal-but-not-too-devastating spell to use next," I said.

"You..." the elder looked at the crowd of disciples still gathered around. I was a little surprised that they weren't stepping in en-masse, but maybe they had some iota of common sense between them all. The bystander effect coming in handy for once. "When the Sect Councillors hear of your tyranny, you will face the direst of repercussions."

I cancelled my hover cantrip, seeing as how the ground had stopped trying to eat me and landed with a slight bend of the knees. I must admit that one of the reasons I didn't just leave myself was because, at the surface, this entire situation was morbidly amusing.

It was nice to stretch my spell casting after so long without, and thinking of ways to use simple spells against simple foes was rather gratifying.

I imagine it would be like a chess master playing against a child.

Maybe I should start acting like an adult in this situation.

***

Answer to the last riddle: Light

Today's riddle: I no longer have eyes, but once I did see. Once I had thoughts, but now I'm white and empty. What am I?

Thank you for reading!

Please do comment.