Human Friend

I quickly choose to refuse the boys request for me to become his familiar. This guy has no clue who I am, what creature I am and he tries to make me his familiar? Who is this guy? After refusing the guy slowly starts to shake as if his body is suffering from something. After looking back closely I see the runes he placed on the table slowly circulating through his skin. The magic seems to almost be back lashing inside his body.

I move forward as I slowly start to try to help send mana through him, but that doesn't help whatsoever as the kid seems to slowly burn up. The Guy was fine one minute but is now blood red do to the mana withdraw, how hard was this backlash? Though I have never failed to cast a spell this is just to horrifying as the guy gets redder and redder by the minute.

The man in the white robe slowly sits down as the energy is slowly dispersed to the outside of his body. After a while I feel bad for the poor bloke as I slowly begin to comfort him hoping to get him through this horrifying pain I see him slowly go through. After awhile the mans condition slowly stabilizes and he looks at me gratefully as a notification is sent to me by shell.

{Master a new friend has been added to your list :)}

Well though it is quite the surprise I guess this is the perfect opportunity to speak with the man using my new communication feature. After a short period of time I tentatively speak through the strange friend feature.

{Connection has been established, communication is now possible}

"hello?" I speak slowly. The man almost jerks up as he looks at my form bewildered. "Hello?" he replies in a very excited manner. "What are you small snake?" he asks with an almost undying sense of curiosity. "Just a standard snake, now please tell me where I can find the man I spoke to before, the man who spoke to me in my mind"

After a little while the man answers confusedly " I suppose that should be Master Noland, though he is currently out of the keep for the meantime because of the recent Wretches, he is the only person here that is proficient with Mental Magic". Though the confusion in his voice is evident it seemed to clear up quite a bit.

"What is your name young man?" I ask the white robed man. "My name is Apprentice Double" Though his voice is shaking it is clear he respects my awesome little form. " SO WHY THE HECK DID YOU TRY TO TURN ME INTO YOUR FAMILIAR" Though I try to contain it anger oozes out of every word I speak to the young man. Double seems to be on the verge of having a mental break down as he replies "I am so sorry, all apprentices are told stories of legendary mages being gifted spirit animals as companions. I thought I was like those stories.". "..." though I want to smack this guy right now I doubt I could bring myself to do it do to the fact that he is the only one who I can currently talk to.

A feeling of anxiety wells up within me as I start prodding him tentatively with questions. "I have very important information and I need to see someone who can take this information and use it well. I'm going to need you to do me a favor ok?" Double stops shaking and replies steadily " No matter what". Okay so far me and him are getting back onto the right foot. "I need you to act as a translator between me and whoever the hell you can find in charge of this place.

"W-w-what?" Double looks astonished by my question. "You heard me the first time, just bring me to whoever owns this scrap of a keep and we can get matters settled." Double looks at me and nods his head though very hesitantly. "I can bring you to the master of the keep, but I am not sure he will accept you, let alone me". "I am sure I can persuade him to let us have a chat, it is for the safety of his people after all.."

Double proceeds to take me through the keep at a startling fast pace and we arrive at the entrance of a room that is guarded with two men in full white armor. " Halt young sir Double, what business do you have to be seeing Master Reginald?" one of the guards says as he approaches us. "Sir guard, I have urgent news for The Keep Master."

The guard inspects the young man intensely as he slowly states " I suppose you can go in, but make sure it isn't about nothing if you go in there bothering him I am sure he will get upset." The guard proceeds to slowly walk back to his post as he assumes a vigilant watch over the dreadfully boring stone corridor we arrived in. Double walks in holding me close under the folds of his robes, though this is kinda embarrassing it snuck me through the guards watch and that's all that matters, I'm sure if I ended up fighting them they would be corpses on the ground and that isn't my current objective for these people.

Double makes his way into a stone room filled with a large wooden table with a large map of the surrounding areas on it. There are books piled high throughout the table as an old man wearing worn out leather armor browses through the books seriously. As we walk into the room the man slowly closes the book he is currently digging into and looks at Double questioningly. "Sir please excuse me, I have brought someone here to talk to you, they state that they have very important information over the Wretches". Double slowly releases me from his robe as I slither onto a small chair by the old man. The man looks at me with almost no change in expression as he starts speaking to double who in real time translates the vibrations he is speaking to me.

"The snake we are currently showing are hospitality to?" the man states. Double looks at me confusedly before I nod. I then state a few words that make double confused and worried " Tell him that the Wretches that are currently coming are not even the bulk of them, here soon a wave of them will come, and slowly they will destroy your small village and many surrounding villages if we don't do anything about them". Though Double says it he says them with fear in his eyes. The man looks at me before stating flatly " And how do you prove that this so called wave is coming?".

I ponder for a moment before replying " I was given a mission, or a quest as I may call it, to help you. I was promised great rewards I have no reason to lie to you ". The man seems to laugh softly as he states another question " What would stop this so called 'quest' of yours to be to destroy us?". The question was fair enough but I wanted to test something. "The penalty of coarse, If I don't accomplish the quest I will lose something that is very important to me." The man stops and looks at me intensely for a few moments. "You have Quests in your System?" the man says with much more energy than before.

He knows about systems as I thought. I curtly nod my head waiting for him to reply to dig more information on the topic. "That is truly bizarre, A beast having Quests, who would have thought" the man breaks into a laughter filled with energy. " I have never heard of an animal who had quests, and I sure haven't heard of any monster who has tried to save humans under this guise" he pauses "lets say I believe you, what would you have me do about this incoming conflict?"

" Simple, I would have you prepare for the creatures you see in your nightmares, the creatures that crawl out of the dark, the ones you can hardly remember. And instead letting you fight them I will stand besides you, with all the power I have I will protect as many lives as I can possibly find."

The room is filled with an dreadful silence. The man looks at double and looks back at me and slowly states " Though I haven't seen him in person I know Double has a good connection with nature and animals, I believe him to be as good a read of animals as I am of men. So I trust you, double vouches for you and that is enough for me to believe in you. Now lets get down to business." The man pulls out a small weathered note book and opens it to a very distinct red page in the book he then says "Let's find out if we can make some sort of deal between you and me, though the quest you have should be binding enough, I want something more than proof. Something more... magical"