Chronicles of the True Wizard

Sensing Felix growing more serious Noah nodded and sat at the main table in the center of the room. Felix gestured for Benjamin and Amelia to sit as well. Will and Alan were already seated next to each-other and were showering Nova with attention who was happily basking in it on the table. They quickly sensed something was wrong though and both went silent, though they continued to pet Nova.

Felix waited a moment or two so he could build his resolve and for the tension to build just a little, “I’m getting kicked off of the planet.”

Noah immediately stood up, his chair scratching against the floor loudly, “What? What do you mean?”

“I got a special quest in the World Event. Instead of participating in the final vault, I… there was something else I had to do. Anyways, I… barely, succeeded in the quest and it was totally worth it but one of the conditions was that 6 months from now, I would have to leave Trenus and the integration as a whole.”

Noah shook his head as he tried to process everything, “Where will you go? Why? I don’t… What will happen to… your tower, your continent?”

“Wait, your continent?” Benjamin, Will and Alan all said in unison.

Felix nodded seriously, he was expecting all of these questions, “I was granted portal coordinates to the capital city of the multiverse so I’ll head there. Why? Not entirely sure but I think it’s worried I might screw with things a little too much. That or it’s protecting all of you just in case I go crazy. For the continent, not sure but I’ll probably have to choose a descendent. Tower gets to come with me.” Turning to Benjamin, Will and Alan, “Yeah surprise, I’m the Stormbringer. It’s my continent. I thought Noah told you that’s where I was living, outside of the city?”

All three of them looked at Noah with a frown then Benjamin said, “He just said you were camping while killing things in the wild.”

“It was too complicated.” Noah said then turned back to the more important topic at hand, “Portal coordinates? You can open portals now?”

Felix nodded, “Yeah. Which is something else we should talk about. Before I leave, I was thinking we connect up any of the Major cities that we can with portals.”

Benjamin put his hand down on the table, “Hold on… You think The System is worried about you… killing us?”

Felix shrugged, “I have no idea. That’s my best guess. If it was just giving me an opportunity, it wouldn’t have banished me from ever coming back.”

“Are you really that much higher level than us?” Alan asked meekly.

“No. I’m currently level 176 in my race.”

Alan frowned, “Then…”

Felix quickly verified nothing had changed, “My familiar is level 353 for context. I can’t explain it all but… things seem to be a little different for me. The reason I stayed behind, the special quest, gave me some cool magic items that I could definitely see… Well let’s just say I could see someone else being tempted to slaughter every living thing on the planet.”

Alan’s hand immediately recoiled from petting Nova, “Someone else?”

Felix smirked, “Well, I have no intention of doing that.”

Will overexaggerated his relief, “Thank System for that…”

“So what about the auction?” Noah asked.

Felix leaned back a little, “Right, we should figure out what the plan is so we can buy anything we might need. I thought the… news might influence your purchases too so…”

Noah nodded once, “Yeah, it will… What do you need for the portals?”

Felix tilted his head up as he thought, “We should pick up as many flawless crystals as we can for mana batteries. Raw D grade materials for portal surfaces and rooms to contain them. Buy any defenses and weapons you might need for the city once I’m gone.”

Noah nodded seriously having fully entered city planner mode, “Ok, are you gonna go with us to the auction?”

Felix nodded, “I have no qualms with that, assuming that’s how it works I guess? Otherwise, we can find each-other.”

Noah lightly nodded as his head was clearly somewhere else, focused on planning and figuring out what was next, “Yeah, you can use the city’s coffers for anything you need as well.”

Felix smiled though he didn’t think that would be necessary and he definitely didn’t mind spending a little bit for the city out of pocket, “Thanks.”

Noah quickly moved on, his brain actively thinking through everything that needed to happen, “I guess we need to shift the government over a little sooner than we thought.”

Felix smiled, “Yeah, I can transfer the city over to you whenever you’d like.”

Noah shook his head, “No. Transfer it to the council when we set that up. Also… maybe we should wait until there’s just a month or so left.”

Felix shrugged, he understood the reasoning and did not mind being a nuclear deterrent for a little while longer, if that became necessary, “Sure, just let me know.”

Noah bit his bottom lip, “I’ll find somewhere to house the portals, probably don’t want them inside the city.”

Felix tried to seem as agreeable and cooperative as possible, he was kind of dropping this on him out of the blue so the least he could do was help as much as possible. He did respect Noah after all and appreciated all he had done in Felix’s stead with the city, “Wherever you’d like.”

“Wait, so that’s it? Your leaving and you can’t come back?” Will asked, ceasing the slight pause in the previously rapid fire between Noah’s planning and Felix’s immediate agreements.

Felix turned to him and almost chuckled at how shocked he looked, “In 6 months, yes.”

Will looked to Alan then back to Felix, “Can I have your continent?”

Felix snorted, “No.”

Alan elbowed Will in the arm, “It was worth a shot…”

“Speaking of, what are you going to do with that?” Noah asked.

Felix shrugged, “Gift it to Atalus? Escape route maybe?”

Noah tilted his head, “That’s not the worst idea…”

Felix nodded curtly, “Think about it and let me know if you have a use for it. I obviously can’t use it. If you can’t think of anything, maybe I set up a portal and let all the cities use it as a training ground or a neutral meeting place or both. Besides that, I also have some items that someone might find interesting. I am not in the need of cash right now and I’ve been told there’s a perfect match for one of the items here already.” Felix pulled out the Dragon Mother’s Ring and held it out to Noah, “Could you make sure this gets to Kenneth before the auction? I don’t want him buying anything this might overlap or interfere with.”

Noah reached out and took the ring, taking a second to identify it himself then he nodded, “Sure thing.”

Felix stood from the table, “Is there anything you need from me before the auction?”

Noah nodded, “Yeah, let’s go over some initial plans.”

Felix just nodded curtly once again, “Of course.”

Nova noticed Felix getting up and the others leaving so they ran across the table and nestled into Felix’s robes.

Felix and Noah spent a few hours running around the city collecting and taking stock of the materials they had on hand. Near the end, they stopped by Henry’s forge to get him working on platforms and rooms for the portals.

Henry managed to get Felix to stay behind as Noah ran off so he could run some ideas by him. At first Felix thought he was going to be looking at spell-cannon designs but that only took a few minutes.

Henry looked to Felix seriously, like he had been waiting to ask this question for some time now, “So, what do you think of my class?”

Felix shrugged, “Seems fine to me.”

Henry nodded, evidently relieved by Felix’s approval, “Really? You think it’ll work out with the cannon? I still need some physical stats for working in the forge and surviving but it gives a good amount of intelligence too. I just stuck with what I knew for the world event, wasn’t quite ready to test it all out just yet. Maybe in the next one.”

Felix mentally shrugged as he realized Henry had probably evolved his race before his class. He hadn’t waited to synchronize them. Before now he hadn’t thought of any reason someone wouldn’t synchronize them though honestly, he hadn’t thought about it for long.

Felix just shrugged, “Yup, seems good to me.”

Henry nodded and continued clearly to “I’m hoping I can evolve my profession into something with a higher rarity that hopefully gives more stats but for now, it should do the trick. As for skills, what do you think of these.”

Mostly to be polite, and because Henry had helped Felix a lot over the last year or so, Felix stuck around and listened to all of Henry’s musings. He hid his annoyance as best he could and offered insight where he could but ultimately, Felix didn’t care. He wasn’t sure if he was being asked because he created the original cannon or because he was the strongest around, but he was not invested in trying to figure out an optimal build for someone else.

Ultimately, even with his own class, race, profession and skills, he was taking what sounded cool and interesting or what Grim recommended. He wasn’t thinking about it too hard because he didn’t have enough information to theory craft it. All he really wanted to do, all he really cared about, was magic. Casting spells, enchanting and figuring out how mana, spell forms and nodes all interacted, that was what really interested him. That and harrowing battles, though those had brought him eerily close to death as of late.

Once he managed to slip away from Henry’s barrage of questions, Felix went and sought out Benjamin who seemed to be somewhere in the residential district. Felix flew over multiple neighborhoods of middle class housing until he arrived at a larger estate with a massive backyard. Checking his map, Benjamin seemed to be alone so he dropped down in front of the building and knocked on the front door.

“Furniture delivery!” Felix jokingly called out.

After a few moments, Bejamin opened the door, “Felix, I thought you would be busy with Noah?”

Felix nodded, “I think we have everything we need figured out. I also wanted to get you the furniture as soon as possible so you would know if you wanted to buy anything from the auction.”

Benjamin looked a little surprised, pleasantly so, “Oh, thank you. Did you already deliver some to Will and Alan?”

Felix shook his head, “No, came to you first.”

Benjamin shook his head, “Oh, you should give them whatever they need first. They actually have other people living with them. Here, I’ll go with you.” Benjamin walked out and closed his front door then led Felix down the street to the house directly next door.

Felix looked back at Benjamin’s house, which was just a couple hundred meters away, “You guys live right beside each-other?”

Benjamin smirked, “Yeah. Noah offered us a selection of houses and land because of our contributions in the war, back in the tutorial… and maybe a little nepotism. This is Alan’s house, the one on the other side of mine is Will’s.”

Felix looked over and saw another similar looking house to Benjamin’s, “You said you don’t have anyone living with you?”

Benjamin shrugged, “Had a wife back before the tutorial but she passed ten years ago now, cancer. The treatment made her infertile and so we never had kids. After my tour in the army where I met them, Will and I ended up helping out with Alan’s kids a fair bit while he worked through his PTSD. They even call me uncle. Now we both help out where we can with Will’s kids.”

Felix couldn’t come up with anything more to say other than, “Sorry…”

“For what? Life’s great. Shit sucked back then but it’s better now, we got through it together.” Benjamin chuckled, “If you have trouble hearing that, don’t ask about Alan’s family.”

Felix asked before fully processing Benjamin’s words, “Why?”

Benjamin smirked, “Well, you asked. His wife died in her tutorial. His kids were old enough to have moved out so he doesn’t have to take care of them but it was still… hard… on all of them. And us I guess but you know… she wasn’t our wife or mother, just a close friend.”

Felix was having trouble formulating words, while that all sounded awful to him, he was having trouble empathizing and didn’t want to seem rude, “Oh…”

Benjamin shrugged, “It happens. He’s been dealing with it rather well. I think it’s because he dealt with his PTSD that now he’s more… capable of dealing with that kind of thing? I don’t know but… it’s one of the reasons I think he’d make a great scout leader by the way.”

Felix hung his head a little, it seemed like an appropriate thing to do to him, “Yeah… I guess.”

Benjamin took a big breath and brightened his tone, “Anyways, things are good now. We have meals together and hang out all the time when we aren’t out grinding levels.”

Felix just nodded, even though to him, that sounded slightly painful, “That sounds… nice.”

Benjamin smiled and nodded, “It is. Anyways, as I said Alan’s kids are old enough that they moved out the year before the tutorial. Afterwards, they moved back in with him, here. I figure since they’re older and mostly higher level, they will get more use out of the higher grade furniture.”

Felix frowned, “Mostly?”

Benjamin smirked, “One of Will’s kids took to the tutorial like a fish to water. She loves everything about it she almost hit D grade in time for the world event. That might not sound that impressive to us, but she’s 13.”

Felix was genuinely surprised and his face showed it, “Woah. That is impressive.”

Benjamin smiled and nodded then turned to the door and knocked loudly, calling out, “It’s Benjamin and Felix, can we come in?”

“Sure.” Felix heard in response. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .