Fork This Life!

Chapter 43: Questions

“…Just as a reminder, for those who weren’t able to finish the assessment last week, your score will be calculated based on your average performance thus far. For those of you who had less than stellar marks before the assessment, this will mean that you need to work harder to increase your marks for the rest of the term.” The teacher concludes.

It’s been about a week, and things are back to normal. Well, mostly. Even though everyone came back unharmed, it’s still a fact that we were kidnapped in the first place. Trust in the academy’s ability to protect its students, particularly for those in the class and their families, has taken a hit. Not to mention the lasting affect it’s going to have on the students involved.

The advanced fire destruction class is usually one of the more energetic classes. Most of the students in it are engaged and enthusiastic about learning the course content, but since the incident, it’s been much more quiet and reserved.

“How can you be so calm, after what happened?” For once, Joyce’s voice isn’t accusatory, but truly at a loss. “You’re acting like everything’s normal, but… We were kidnapped, for gods’ sake!”

“Yeah, it wasn’t a great situation, and I’d rather not relive it.” I say. “But it doesn’t even rank in the top five worst situations I’ve been through.”

“I don’t understand.” She says, furrowing her eyebrows.

Is… Is she actually listening to what I’m saying? Well I’ll be damned. Bad saying, that. Not really fond of being damned.

“Look, I don’t mind talking,” I say, “but I’d rather talk about it somewhere else.”

“Fine.” She replies, after a moment of deliberation. “Is the library fine? I was going to head there to study, anyway.”

“Sounds good to me.” I reply.

The walk – or float, in my case – there, we spend in silence, Machite following dutifully behind me as it carries my things.

I greet professor Kelby as we pass by the font desk, eliciting little more than a faint nod in response.

We head through to the second section of the library, and Joyce frowns. All of the tables already have people at them. It’s part of the reason why I don’t usually come at this time of day.

“Over here.” I tell Joyce, leading her to one of the tables. It’s the only one with a single person sitting at it.

“Shouldn’t you at least ask if he minds first?” she asks quietly as I plop myself down on the other side of the table.

“Relax, I know him.” I explain. “This is Raymond, he spends most of his time in here. He won’t bother us if we don’t bother him.”

“Exactly.” He responds shortly, nodding at me before quickly becoming re-engrossed in the book in front of him.

“Well, if you say so…” She sits down. “So what did you mean, us getting kidnapped wasn’t in your top five most dangerous situations or whatever? We’re only students, how could you possibly have experience with things like that?”

“I get where you’re coming from. I think most people look at me and assume that’s just how it is.” I reply. “‘Look, that’s Gerald, he can fly and he’s good at magic,’ they say. Nobody ever seems to wonder why. Nobody wonders how I can fly, why I understand, why I know all the answers – well, at least most of the answers. People make assumptions, and they don’t question them, or at least they don’t question them nearly enough.”

“I’m here to try and understand, Gerald, not for you to talk in circles.” Joyce shakes her head.

“Fair enough.” I say. “I’ll give you an example, then: why was our class kidnapped?”

“For ransom money, of course.” Joyce shrugs.

“A logical answer. We had no relation to them or other value, after all, so money is a likely incentive. Except for the fact that that’s dead wrong.” I say straightforwardly.

“What?” Joyce blinks.

“They didn’t recognise Simon.” I explain.

“Why would they recognise Simon?” Joyce asks.

I explain further. “If they were in it for the money, they’d want to know who they were kidnapping. That way, they would know how much money they could expect to get from the families and friends and such.”

Joyce nods. “Yes, but what does that have to do with Simon?”

“He’s rich.” I state.

“He’s rich?” Joyce splutters. “How could you possibly know that?”

“Simple. His grandfather, the one that stepped through the portal and saved us that day, is Theodore Glynphael, creator and owner of an extremely lucrative magic tool business which, among other things, is the sole producer of bags of holding.” I say simply.

“What!?” Joyce squeaks.

“Keep it down, would you?” Raymond complains without looking at us.

“Yeah.” I continue. “If they were after money, they would’ve known about him. Actually, if they were after money, they wouldn’t have bothered our class at all. Simon is much too dangerous a target – you saw the aftermath of what happened when his grandfather found out. Plus, reinforcements from the academy were just about to arrive. If they were after money, they would’ve gone after much easier targets.”

“I… Why did I never think of that?” Joyce shakes her head at herself.

“Because you didn’t ask yourself the right questions, think them through to their conclusions, and then question your conclusions as well.” I tell her. “Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe Simon’s grandfather happens to be a different extremely powerful user of space magic who also has a plethora of magic tools at his disposal. It would be an awfully massive coincidence considering how few users of space magic are at that level of skill, but it’s theoretically possible. But anyway, enough about that. You wanted me to explain myself.”

“I… Yes.” Joyce nods, a little at a loss.

“Thing is, a few of your questions can be answered by answering other, very simple questions.” I say wryly. “For instance, how is a fork born?”

“Forks aren’t born, they’re made by…” Joyce stops as she realises the implication.

“Precisely. I came into being not knowing where I was or even what I was. To this day, my best guess is that the gods made me this way, and I haven’t the faintest as to why.” I say. “Next question. What can a fork do?”

“Nothing, they aren’t alive.” Joyce replies accurately.

“That’s not far off from what I had in the beginning. It’s no exaggeration to say that I’m only here today by a few strokes of luck.” I admit. “Now, back to your original question. It’s not something that you can figure out just by reasoning through, so I’ll give you a break there. The related questions to have asked yourself, however, are ‘where is he from’ and ‘what did he do before coming to the academy?’”

Joyce rolls her eyes. “Where are you from, then? Across the sea?”

“Odwia.” I state. “Another world. The people there aren’t as open-minded or understanding as people here – and I say that knowing that most of the people at the academy consider me a remotely controlled magic tool created by some eccentric artificer. I worked with an adventurer who I befriended, helped him fight, explore, avoid danger and so on. The guy has a big heart, but it got us into trouble often enough. Long story short, some demons wanted to invade, and I ended up going through the portal to destroy it from the other side and prevent them from rebuilding it.”

“Who would believe a story like that?” Joyce shakes her head in disbelief.

“I know, right?” I agree, not particularly caring if she doesn’t. “But yeah, I literally went to hell and back. Still, it was mostly luck. I’m not all that powerful myself, particularly physically. Trying to carry lots of things around myself is difficult and draining, which is why I have Machite here doing the heavy lifting. Anyway, that’s the answer to that question. But the question you really want answered, you haven’t asked yet, have you?”

Joyce frowns. “What are you talking about?”

Ah, if only I had arms to shrug with. “Why it is that I’m better at magic than you.” She opens her mouth to retort, but I cut her off before she says anything. “Don’t, it’s perfectly understandable. You work your hardest to learn and understand something, and then you see someone who knows more about it than you do, but you never see them doing anything at all. Of course you’d get annoyed by someone like that.”

“Alright, fine.” Joyce says. “You were always such a smartass, and it annoyed the hell out of me. So what?”

“Yeah, that’s pretty fair.” I admit. “I was a bit childish in my responses to you. That’s my bad. I’m not great with people.”

She stares at me for a moment before sighing. “How am I supposed to stay mad with someone who keeps apologising?”

“You’d be surprised at how well some people manage it.” I reply wryly.

“They sound like fun.” She winces. “But fine, I was a bit jealous of how good you are at magic. How do you do it?”

“There are four main reasons.” I explain. “And none of them are talent. First of all is experience. I’ve been out in the world, I’ve been in fights with necromancers, talked with paladins and toppled a false ruler. Because of that, I know that when they teach us fire destruction magic, the goal isn’t to be able to create a fireball over such and such size, and hotter than such a temperature, and then project it out with such a speed to hit such a target. It’s to defeat or kill an enemy as surely, quickly and efficiently as possible. Sometimes, that might mean a fireball. Other times, a fireball might not be quick, powerful or accurate enough, or maybe too powerful. What spell you need to use depends entirely on your opponent and the situation.”

“Alright, I kind of get that, though I’m still not believing you did all that. What else?” Joyce nods.

“Knowledge. I know a lot of things that you, and a lot of the other students don’t. I know why fire burns. I know why the sky is blue. I know what water is made of. I know the speed of light. Why blood is red. What happens inside your body when you get sick. And a thousand other things that I can apply and use in my magic to make it stronger and have many different effects.” I continue.

“That really doesn’t help me, you know. I’m already using almost all my spare time to study.” Joyce complains.

“Hey, you’re the one who asked. Kind of.” I reply. “Third is perspective. You’re focused on getting good marks, the best in your class if you can, right?”

“Of course.” Joyce nods seriously. “I’m not here to play around.”

“Well, this is going to sound a bit cruel to you then, but…” I say. “Marks don’t matter. Not much, at least. Of course, passing the class is important, and getting good grades is always a plus, but in a year, nobody will remember who was the top of the class this term. Nobody will care. If you go far enough, people won’t have even heard of this academy, let alone the class. What’s important is learning the tools and methods, and the spells, that will help you in the future. That should be your goal first and foremost, anything else is secondary.”

“I…” She shakes her head. “Whatever. What’s the last reason?”

“Quite simply, time.” I state. “I don’t need to eat, sleep, or anything else normal people do. That means I have maybe ten, twelve hours more per day to do things. And I have no family to care for, no job, nothing except the academy right now. I spend some time with my few friends during the day, which is probably why you haven’t seen me in the library, but all night while everyone else is asleep, I’m studying and practicing magic. I’m not learning things much faster than you, I just have more time.”

“Oh.” Joyce blinks, looking a bit disappointed. “That makes sense. I was just hoping, y’know, that there might be some way for me to learn faster.”

“No shortcut to success, I’m afraid.” I say, in the verbal equivalent to a shrug. “But if there’s one thing you take away from this, let it be perspective. I went to a school once before. Not a magic school, granted, but a school. I went in with an attitude similar to yours. I wanted to be the best in the year, I tried my hardest. It grated on my mind and my spirit. Towards the end, I hated every moment of my learning. And what did I get for it? A couple years later, I’d forgotten half the things I’d learned. I didn’t even bother mentioning my grades to other people because outside of school, nobody cared. It ended up just being one big waste of time and energy.”

“I’ll think about it. Thanks for answering my questions, even if I’m not sure how much of it is true. And sorry for snapping at you all the time. I’ve been a bit stressed lately, even before that happened.” Joyce admits, standing up. “I’d better start studying again. See you again some other time.” She looks at Raymond. “You don’t mind if I keep using this table?”

Raymond shrugs.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” She says, half to herself.

“See you.” I say as she walks away and starts looking amongst the bookshelves.

As I start to ascend to leave the library, Raymond speaks without raising his head. “Interesting story. How much of it is true?”

“I don’t joke around with things like that. It’s all true.” I reply.

“Hm. You know, from a story like that, an individual with some imagination might be led to think you weren’t always the way you are today.” He notes without any particular inflection, almost like a… interested disinterest.

“Is anyone?” I ask rhetorically. “Perhaps the greatest skill that any of us have is the ability to adapt, to change to suit our circumstances. Sometimes we change for the better, other times for the worse. I wonder occasionally what my younger self would have to say about some of the things I’ve done. Would younger me have made the same decisions, the same mistakes? I think sometimes that I was the smartest I ever was when I was just a child, and the years have only made me dumber. More knowledgeable, but dumber.”

“Which is, of course, entirely related to what I said.” He responds with dry sarcasm.

“Sometimes you couldn’t pry my mouth open with a crowbar – metaphorically speaking – and other times I just seem to ramble. Maybe that’s just one of the ways I adapted.” I sigh. “But I should be going. The others will be wondering where I am.”

He shrugs in reply, and I make my way out, leaving him to read at his table. Surrounded by people, but somehow giving off a feeling that he was entirely separated from everyone else.

After our heartfelt chat, Joyce and I become the best of buds. Well, that may just be the slightest exaggeration, but at least we aren’t swapping verbal jabs every time we pass each other. Our interactions still aren’t friendly, per se, but they are at least void of hostility. Polite exchanges, perhaps.

Although I did learn some interesting and useful things in the light creation magic class, unfortunately it does appear that some of the things I wanted to learn fall under the umbrella of illusion magic. Still, it’s not the end of the world. Upon realising that I wouldn’t be learning those particular aspects of magic in the class, I turned my attention once again to the library and perused a few tomes on the subject.

Illusions. The art of affecting the mind and the senses. But not just to fool, trick or beguile them. Illusion magic can also be used to enhance the senses, or to share senses with another. For example, say you are standing on the ground with a bird flying above you. You could, assuming you know how, cast a spell to see what the bird sees, and hear what it hears. The same sort of spell is used in my ‘eye’, but instead of sharing the sight of someone else, it’s what the magic tool sees.

In other words, it’s the type of magic I need to learn if I want to go about replacing my lost senses at some point. At this point, though, that goal is slipping through my tines like wet spaghetti. It just isn’t very viable as a straightforward spell. To cast it in the usual manner, I would practically need to cast two spells in tandem, one to focus incoming light into the area covered by my other spell, which would be ‘reading’ that light and transferring the information to me.

Not that I’m saying it’s impossible to cast two spells at once. It’s entirely possible. But ensuring that the two spells remain at a constant distance and relative angle from each other, and then again from me so I don’t get insanely disoriented, while trying to do whatever else – reading, writing, and so on – just isn’t feasible. I might be able to work out a third spell to deal with the positioning problem or work it into the other two spells somehow, but then I’d be managing either three spells at once or two complex ones.

And I haven’t even started thinking about the other senses. Hearing and speaking shouldn’t be too complex once I learn magic related to air and motion – more precise and complex motion, that is – but I haven’t the foggiest how I would go about replicating taste or smell.

So it seems, at least for now, that I won’t be able to get much further along that line of thought until I learn how to make magic tools. So I guess I’ll be doing basic artificing next term.

Darkness magic in its simplest form, as far as I’m able to observe, seems to act like a barrier of some kind that blocks and absorbs light – and only light. It can’t be touched or interacted with in any way by anything else. Possible uses, I don’t know, blocking the light from getting to an opponent’s eyes? Obscuring something from sight? Assuming the enemy party doesn’t rely on sight, it seems absolutely useless, at least how I can use it at this point.

Water magic. What’s there to say? It’s water. Can you drink it? Sure, but it’s magic after all. It’ll just disappear from your stomach once the spell stops being maintained. Practical uses? Creating bad footing, splashing people… The classic pressurised water cutter is also a possibility, I think, once I learn some more. Probably not very effective unless I can get to an incredible amount of pressure, but mixing in some fine particles as an abrasive, potentially from earth magic, could help ease that requirement a bit.

Fire magic has increased my range of offensive options, of course. It’s fire. I can make walls of it to obscure vision, trap an opponent or prevent them from following. Fireballs - of course. I can make small, incredibly hot bolts of fire to pierce through opponents and quite a lot of other things. No, I haven’t tested to see if it can melt me. I’m not that stupid. Fire magic comes with its own risks, though. Magical fire can produce normal fire, and it’s difficult to control that once it starts. Of course, it’s possible, I just don’t know how to do it. That falls under alteration magic, not destruction magic, after all.

As for formations, that’s more of a difficult subject. It’s more theory-based than any of my other classes, but I think I’ve learned a lot from it. For example, the formation commonly used as a base for elemental magic is a hexagram, with each point representing one of the elements. It’s simple, multi-purpose, and effective. Empty formations, as they’re called, for other types of magic range in form and function. Some may have no circle, some are based on a pentagram or decagram, others, as in the case of holy magic, may be based upon the holy symbol of a god or goddess, while still others require the formation to be composed of specific materials.

Just learning some of them and understanding what types of magic they can – or rather, should – be used for will make it much easier for me to understand magic formations drawn by other mages in the future. I’ve also learned how to design more complex formations that include one or theoretically multiple subformations, although I’m going to have to do a lot of practical, methodical and careful experimentation as well as gain a deeper understanding of the methods involved to get to that point.

I’ve also gotten the Ignitae language skill up to expert, so I’ve set that aside for the moment and started work on understanding the Aquan language, the elemental language of water. It’s my third elemental language, and I feel like I’m starting to see similarities between the languages. Or, rather, similar differences? It’s like… Each language is a puzzle piece. It has gaps that another language might fill, and it itself might fill a gap in another language. Whether or not that has any meaning or practical purpose I don’t know, but I think I’m learning this language a bit faster than the ones before.

Despite the tumultuous event that occurred, the term once again comes to an end, and, after a short break, the new one begins. A bit of time has passed now since the whole kidnapping event, and it’s starting to recede from the forefront of people’s minds. People are starting to relax again, get back into the normal order of things.

I wish that the same could be said for myself. But a part of me wonders, even as I study, even as I develop and formulate new spells, exactly what their intentions were in kidnapping us. A part of me wonders whether we have truly seen the last of them. I, as a student, am of course not privy to whatever investigations or happenings related to the matter may be occurring, but I can’t help but think that if there was no further threat, that they would have announced as such.

A part of me wonders how they knew where we would be. Was it just that the same sort of thing is done every term? I mean, there are a host of spells that could be used to detect or locate our group once we were outside the academy. It wouldn’t be a stretch to assume that they used one. But was our kidnapping the goal, or merely a single part of a larger plan? If the latter, and assuming that plan has something to do with the academy, then they likely have informants, contacts and/or moles inside the academy.

Theoretically, I could observe someone over an extended period of time. It wouldn’t be too difficult to ascertain whether they display any suspicious behaviour, at least if they did so outside areas that block my vision. But the whole student body, and perhaps the teachers too? Not a chance. I don’t have nearly the time and brainpower – so to speak - for that.

I envy how others can perhaps let sleeping dogs lie. Forget about it, move on. But if there’s a chance something is going to happen, I want to be ready for it. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s surprises.

Too many questions. Not enough answers. Uncertainty and doubt cloud my mind. I can’t work like this… Well I probably can, to be honest, but I don’t want to. Questionable motivations, questionable solutions.

There’s no good plan, so it’s time to see if Joe really has answers, or just more questions.

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