Fork This Life!

Chapter 41: Destruction Magic Practical Assessment

After the duel, people started paying more attention to me. Before, I was just the weird fork guy. People who weren’t in my classes generally assumed that I was a magic tool. Now, I’m the weird fork guy who beat three guys a term above him in a duel. Of course, the people later in their second year or third year aren’t paying attention. Even if they heard the rumours, they know it’s not actually that impressive.

But in the eyes of the people in the terms around me, it is. People I pass in the hallway mutter about me, and instead of the usual, ‘the heck is that?’, it’s more of a ‘hey, that’s the guy who…’ and so on. As for how the rumours started, well, Iueia and Spark aren’t exactly the type to keep their mouth shut, and there are some people who hang around the duelling rooms to watch.

You might be thinking, well, if it’s just that, then why is it worth mentioning? It wouldn’t be, usually. It’s just the rumour took time to make the rounds, and it seems to have rubbed a particular someone the wrong way.

Joyce. She and I seem to have a verbal clash almost every time we cross paths, now. I don’t particularly care – it’s not as if I haven’t heard worse – but it is mildly irritating, and mildly concerning. Would be annoying if she started physically attacking me instead of just verbally.

So, I’ve done some research on her. Looked through my memories, ‘listened’ in on her conversations, actions… It’s astonishing how much you can learn about someone just from that. Almost immediately, I found out that she is anxious, and then that she didn’t use to be, last term. It’s not her results, those are excellent, by most standards. But it’s obvious in her mannerisms and speech, the occasional outbursts of misplaced anger that she immediately regrets.

I dug a little deeper. She’s a little rough around the edges, and has had difficulty making friends here, but appreciates the few she has, spending most of her free time with them. Turns out she actually spends a lot of time in the library. It’s just that, well, she’s not nocturnal, so we rarely see each other in there. I suppose she might think that I rarely visit the library because of that. And, well, I don’t take notes in class for obvious reasons, but I can still answer most of the teacher’s questions. It’s almost obvious that she’d get angry at me, who ‘does nothing’ and ‘breezes through on talent’.

But all in all, she’s a good person, keeps to the rules. I can relate. The only problem is that anxiety and stress. She seems to be venting on me, fair enough, I can deal with that. The real problem would be if she snaps, does something on impulse. Would be bad for her, possibly me. Then again, not much I can do about what ifs. I can only deal with it when and if it comes.

You know, it feels kind of odd. Joe’s not in most of my classes anymore, just my light magic and fire magic one. Seems he’s doing mostly creation and alteration elemental magic, apart from this one. Don’t know if I should be glad or concerned that I’m not seeing more of him.

“My home is quite a ways away.” Iuiea remarks in response to Spark’s question. “Huh, a ways away. A ways away. That’s funny. Um, the village. It’s pretty small, so everyone knows each other. My family runs a farm, sheep and corn and stuff. It was hard work, but I kinda miss the lambs. They’re so cute and playful!”

“And fluffy!” Spark waves his fists in the air. “I just want to bury myself in their fur sometimes!”

Lamar raises an eyebrow at his antics.

“What?” Spark grumbles. “They’re cute. We have a couple in our village, they provide enough wool for the whole place. Don’t need much when you’re small. It’s great!”

“They’re smelly.” Lamar shrugs. “And messy. I don’t get what’s so cute.”

“You only have experience with them on ships, right?” I ask, continuing as he shrugs the affirmative. “Confined space for days or weeks on end, any livestock would be pretty bad. They’re much better on land. Still smell a bit, though.”

“You can smell?” Spark tilts his head, squinting at me. “I thought those magic tools only let you see and hear.”

“Not… Really.” I reply apprehensively. “It’s complicated.”

“More complicated than formations to control the wind?” Lamar asks.

“You have a point, it’s not actually that complex. Just strange.” I agree, resigned. “And I suppose we have known each other for a while now… I used to be human. That’s why I know what things smell like, and how they taste. I remember.”

“Wait… What?” Iueia turns his head almost completely sideways, floored by my statement.

Lamar frowns, shaking his head slightly. “How does that work? People don’t just turn into another race, let alone a fork.”

Show Iueia, Lamar and Spark Second life. “I died.” I answer simply. “And before you ask, I don’t know how. I was at home, then there was a flash of light, and then I was a fork. From what I’ve been able to gather, there was probably a god involved in… This.” I say, referring to, well, my entire second life.

“Woah…” Spark breathes. “No wonder you’re so smart! You’re probably older than us, right?”

“A bit.” I admit.

“So… Which god?” Lamar asks.

“Your guess is as good as mine.” I say helplessly. “Probably better. I’m not really familiar with the gods.”

Probably could be if I reviewed all my memories on the temples I’ve been past and conversations between the paladins and priests back when we were fighting the necromancer, but I haven’t taken the time to do that yet. Not like it’s urgent.

“First one that comes to mind is the god of death.” Lamar shrugs. “They say he’s one of the most powerful gods, and he oversees death itself. If something odd happened with your death, chances are he had something to do with it.”

“That makes a lot of sense.” I answer, somewhat surprised that someone had some potentially related information. “I’ll look into that at some point, thanks Lamar.”

Overall, I think this went quite well. The revelation of my origins and age didn’t alienate me from the group, and I might have even gotten a clue towards the circumstances of my death, even if only a small one.

“Remember, the contract dictates that when you summon the earth elemental, you have to feed it with mana. Neglect to do this, and the contract will be voided. The elemental will not respond to another summons, and you will have to start again with a new elemental.” The teacher reminds us.

We are standing at the base of the mountain, the one Iueia, Lamar, Spark and I went to last time. It’s an exciting day for the class, the day when we all try to summon our first elemental.

“We worked on your summoning formations last lesson, so there should be no excuses.” The teacher states. “Pick a spot, spread out a bit and put your formations down. We’ll go one by one, just in case.”

The summons go smoothly. The vast majority of the class are only able to summon low tier elementals. They’re small, can’t even maintain a humanoid shape, and are capable of only weak earth manipulation.

There are a couple of people who manage to summon mid-tier elementals. Both of them aren’t as… Naive isn’t the word, maybe… not as innocent as the rest of the students. From the amount of mana they used, I can tell that they aren’t as low a level as the rest of the students.

I myself did the same, summoning a mid-tier elemental. It’s not like the hulking, slightly larger than man elementals that that mole beastwoman summoned – those were probably high-tier elementals – but it’s around the same size as Iueia. A mini-man of earth and rock.

When it comes to summoning elementals, there’s three main mana costs. Obviously, it takes mana to just summon them in the first place. Then there’s the ‘summoning fee’, the mana you give the summoned as payment for summoning them, as per the contract. Then there’s the ‘summoning upkeep’, a much smaller but constant amount you feed the summoned as payment for staying there. The contract itself is also a mana cost, but that’s a once-off. I’ll only have to do that again if I want to summon another, different elemental at some point.

Theoretically, I might be able to summon a different type of elemental if I wanted, but the real problem wouldn’t be the summoning, it would be the contract and managing the elemental after summoning it. Each type of elemental has different characteristics and base desires. Earth elementals are the least intelligent, but also the easiest to manage. The others I don’t know too much about, and that could potentially be a problem if I were to try.

It’s nice having someone to carry things for me. He’s - or rather, they’re - not very intelligent, but simple instructions like ‘wait’ or ‘carry this’ they can follow without too much confusion, particularly if I make them in Terran. Doubt they’ll be much help in a fight, but that’s fine. Just being able to carry things that are more than featherweight is a big help to me.

The earth elemental follows me around to classes, carrying things for me if I need them. These sorts of things – summoned elementals and the like – are permitted at the academy, so long as they don’t cause harm or inconvenience to other students, like I can imagine a fire elemental might. They aren’t allowed in the library, though, but that’s not much of a problem. When it’s not summoned, it leaves behind a small rock, its summoning catalyst. I carry that around with me, just in case I happen to need it.

“So you can’t even deign to carry your own things anymore?” Joyce mutters spitefully, brushing past my desk on the way to the door.

I don’t bother to reply. Experience has told me that she won’t listen to what I say, anyway. Better not to tempt fate by antagonising her further.

“Machite, please follow me.” I instruct the elemental in Terran.

It is a bright morning, and my class heads out for a practical test of our fire magic. Our class of twenty is accompanied only by our teacher, who leads us further away from the academy. Some of the students are jostling each other about, joking with each other and making light of the practical assessment, whether to calm their nerves or just bravado, it’s difficult to tell.

Curious, I ask the teacher, “What will be done with the corpses?”

The teacher glances at me. “The few that we can salvage will be taken back to be sold.”

By the sound of it, he doesn’t want us to turn them into a charred mess. I can do that.

Once we arrive at… this empty area… The teacher opens a bag they had been carrying. “This will attract any nearby monsters.” The teacher states. “There shouldn’t be many, but I’ll be managing and making sure they can only come one at a time. When I call your name, you will need to step forward and kill a monster, using only fire magic.”

Soon enough, various monsters – or beasts, really – emerge from the surroundings, all manner of animals from boar to bobcat congregating towards us.

The other students subconsciously shuffle closer together.

In contrast to their fearful reactions, the teacher is completely calm as they erect a flaming barrier around the class. Even being composed of relatively cool flames, it is enough to ward off the unintelligent beasts, but they remain pacing just outside the barrier, their eyes fixed on the bag and growling aggressively towards any other beast that ventures too close.

The teacher calls out a name and a boy jumps slightly in shock and panic, his heartrate increasing significantly. The teacher gestures for everyone to step back as they erect more barriers to single out a single monster and guide it into a newly created gap in the initial barrier perimeter.

“Begin.” The teacher instructs.

The boy – mid teen, really – doesn’t appear too enthused, but luckily for him, neither is the bobcat opposite him. It seems torn between going for the bag and bolting out of the place with so many people and so much fire.

After taking a deep breath, he recites an incantation, and a textbook fireball sallies forth from his outstretched hand, missing the bobcat but hitting the ground with enough size and heat that it dies anyway, letting out an ear-piercing shriek as it does.

He covers his mouth with his hand, but that isn’t able to hide or prevent the upheaval of bile that spills onto the ground. I’m not too sure whether that’s from killing something or from the smell. I’ve never smelt what burning flesh and fur is like, and I intend to keep it that way, but I imagine it would not be pleasant.

Indeed, not a few of the other students pinch their noses or cover their mouth and nose with their sleeves. The teacher, however, does not. “Fire magic is very destructive, and is effective against almost any living thing.” The teacher shakes their head. “This is one of its drawbacks. I’ve mentioned it before, but something like this has to be experienced to be understood fully. Next is…”

The corpse of the bobcat, most of it burnt beyond any use, is tossed by the teacher outside the ring of fire.

When it comes to my turn, the teacher starts guiding a lion in. “Are you able to handle this?” They ask.

“I think so.” I reply. So long as it’s an ordinary beast, there shouldn’t be a problem killing it, but you never can tell before you try.

I move to the front, and the teacher lets the lion in. It paces forwards, and I hover a bit higher, not wanting to be within easy reach if something goes wrong. It paces forwards, its gaze shifting between me and the rest of the group.

A formation begins to form in front of me, and although it shouldn’t be visible, the lion seemingly reacts to it by charging towards me. But it’s not like I haven’t practiced casting before. I’m fast. Not the fastest, probably not by a long shot, but fast.

Before the lion can cross even half the distance between us, my formation is completed, and a bolt of fire shoots out, faster than an arrow. The lion flinches, turning its head just enough that my shot would miss its target – well, at least if there wasn’t a guidance component in the spell. I adjust its direction, and it plunges into the lion’s eye, the heat causing it to burst as the spell continues beyond.

LVL 6 Lion killed

Experience gained: 105

The lion crumples to the ground, dead.

“Hey, hey!” Someone stammers. “You can’t do that! That’s cheating!”

“Dead is dead.” I reply simply. “I don’t hear the lion complaining.”

“What Gerald did was perfectly acceptable.” States the teacher. “So long as you only use fire destruction magic, any method is valid.”

A few more people take their turns, and I notice something odd. Coming in from the edge of my mana sight, I see a large group of people heading towards us from the west. And not just in our general direction, either: directly towards us.

“Sir.” I say, discomfort already settling in my mind. “There’s a group of people coming towards us from the west.”

“Really?” The teacher squints into the distance. “Probably adventurers. Shouldn’t be an issue.”

“They’re coming directly towards us, sir.” I caution. “And sir, I have mana sight. Speaking just in terms of mana pool capacity, they’re all almost as large as yours, sir.”

“Don’t worry.” He replies. “They’re just passing by on the way to the city. Nobody would attack people from the academy.”

Fine. Think what you want to think. So will I. I might be paranoid, I might just be assuming the worst for no reason, but I’m also a fork, a fork who was born with almost nothing. Partly due to my paranoia, I’m not dead yet, and I plan on keeping it that way.

If it’s a false alarm, happy days.

I drop to the ground. If there’s two places that people rarely look, it’s right above them and right below them. The chances of someone seeing what I’m doing down here are pretty low. I absorb myself a little tunnel and worm my way out of my little harness with form manipulation. It’s useful socially, hearing, talking and reading, but in a fight, an actual fight rather than a duel, they just slow me down and make me more obvious. Still, I can’t just ditch them, they’re academy property. So I’ll just stow them shallowly underground. I can come back and get them later, no problem. A little dirt and moisture won’t damage them… I hope.

They haven’t stopped moving towards us. The teacher is looking in their direction, and I can see that despite what he said, he’s getting a bit tense.

Everyone in this group is wearing robes. Not unusual, as most natural fibres offer better mana conductivity than leather, iron, or steel. Following behind them are two large carts, each pulled by a horse. Both are conspicuously empty. But something else to note… Well, I may not know much about the process of creating magic tools, but from what I’ve read and basic logic, one of the most common – perhaps the most common – component in a magic tool is mana-gathering. It gathers ambient mana to use in fuelling the tool, lessening or eliminating the amount the user needs to inject.

What that means is that someone like me can see that sort of thing, a slow pull of ambient mana towards an object. And these people, there’s quite the suction of mana. Chances are they have quite a few magic tools, or just a couple powerful ones.

All I can do now is wait. If they do end up being friendly, an unprovoked attack would be rude, to say the least. Besides, from what I can see, the simple offensive spells I know might be wholly ineffective. They might not, too, but they probably will be, let’s be honest. They’re coming straight for us, have been for quite a distance. They knew where we would be, so it follows that they know who we are and what we’re doing. In that case, if their intentions are malicious, it would also follow that they are confident about defending themselves from fire magic.

They get closer. One kilometre. Half. Two hundred meters. Everyone’s a bit uncomfortable now. They can see over two dozen robed men, but not in the Wehttam academy robes, heading straight towards them. They can also see that the teacher doesn’t know who the robed men are. That makes them nervous. One hundred meters.

A dozen of them shrug something off their shoulders, a tool containing a spear, and point them towards us.

Ah, crap.

As soon as they start making their move, our teacher makes his as he yells, “Get down!” The barriers of fire flicker once and go out, but rather than attacking, the wild beasts flee, instinctively feeling the magnitude of mana spiralling out towards them as the teacher creates a new formation. Even as the spears take to the air, a new barrier forms, a dome of flame that causes the air to shimmer and the earth surrounding it to be stripped of all grass and other life. The few beasts unfortunate or stupid enough not to have gotten far enough away by now die instantly, the fur on their bodies drifting away as ash and their blood boiling within them.

But I’m not reassured. Not at all. The trajectories of those spears… Unless there’s something seriously wrong with their brains, they weren’t aimed at us, but around us. Containment or a wide area attack seem likely. Neither bode well.

I exit my little hole and thin myself to the shape of a long needle before re-entering the ground at an angle, this time creating an entry hole practically invisible to the casual observer, no bigger than the entrance of an ant’s nest. I bore deeper and deeper, tens of meters down. I doubt the effect of the spears, whatever that may be, will extend underground, but if so I don’t want to be anywhere near it.

The spears land, and their positioning creates the basis for a dodecagram, a twelve-point star. Trails of light snake between the grounded spears in an instant, and then with a flash they encompass the entire area, hitting the teacher and every single student – the sole exception being me.

Everyone drops to the ground, unconscious. The hearts of a few people have even stopped beating, but I can’t do anything to fix that. I have to focus on what I can do. There’s not much time, they’re already coming, and it’s essential that they don’t know about me. It’s too risky trying to take all of them on, even with the element of surprise on my side.

I ascend out of my hole, keeping as close to the ground as I can, using the bodies to ensure that the approaching party has no line of sight on me. I pick a student at random, one of the ones just unconscious, and hide in one of their pockets, reverting to the form of a fork. Then I still.

‘Are they out?’ One of them asks.

‘They’re out.’ Another answers. ‘Quick, go around and restart their hearts. Make note of the ones that are only unconscious, they could be at higher levels.’

They want us alive. That’s something, I guess. Sacrificial magic? No, they would just find ordinary folk, no reason to go to the risk of targeting the academy… Unless the sacrifices need to be magically gifted. But no, chances are they’re holding us ransom. If they wanted information or magical knowledge, they would only want the teacher. The rest of us don’t really have any notable skills that they might want.

Unless… Is any of the class nobility? The children of nobles are more common at the academy than most other places. But then they would only want those specific people, they wouldn’t care about the rest. So… it’s probably not money. They want something from the academy. No clue what.

The robed men go around checking the student’s pulses, using a magic tool that appears to have a similar purpose to a defibrillator when they find one, stopping the erratic heartbeat before they use another tool to restart it. Then they tie their hands behind their backs and load them onto the carts.

Once everyone is on the carts, they yank the spears from where they are embedded in the ground, turn around and get out of there. We travel for, I think, hours. They change direction frequently, and only stop occasionally to cast a spell on the still unconscious students. Some sort of sleep spell, from what I gather from the few things they say to each other. I can only assume it has no effect on me because I am literally unable to sleep.

Eventually they reach their destination, a solitary place I can only describe as a compound. There are a few buildings of varying sizes, all surrounded by a wall which is tall but not particularly thick, probably only good for keeping the interiors away from the eyes of the casual observer. Once inside, they and other people start unloading the students (and teacher) and begin searching them, taking any weapons or magic tools that they find.

But nobody suspects the fork. Nobody suspects the fork, right? Why would they suspect the fork?

Please let them have been too lazy to research the students in the class.

Gerald's Status