Lord Jerald sighed, putting dowter and leaning ba his chair. This was the sed year in a row that Floatspire vilge had been struck by a disaster, so he was going to have to put his power to use. After having been struck by a crop blight, they had sent a notice that they were uo provide their taxes of food, as they couldn’t evehemselves for the whole year now. As if that wasn’t bad enough, they had also reported rge numbers of twisted beasts lurking in the forest, making hunting incredibly dangerous. He had thought that after st year’s beast swarm that the Church of flict had opposed, it would have calmed down.
After a few moments of thought, Jerald grabbed a new sheet of paper and began writing up his response. He couldn’t allow his people to starve, so he would have to redirect food towards them, but he also had to keep enough food flowing back to the capital as well, so he would have to raise the taxes oher vilges for this year. As he wrote dowice that all other vilges would have to provide 5% more, a messenger came in with another letter.
Setting his pen down, he accepted the new letter, the messenger bowing before he left, then began to read. Blightfall vilge had its own disaster now as well, but reported they had mostly ha, with a bit of loss to their livestod a handful of vilgers dead. sidering for a moment, he put the letter down and marked out Blightfall vilge from the increased taxes. He didn’t want to take too much from them when they had already lost a fair bit.
Upon finishing the draft for tax ges and food redistribution, he began another notibsp; To deal with the beast problem, he would need a good amount of manpower, so he would call for two hundred of the least trained of his men and fifty of his most elite. This arra should allow a good training experience while also having enough foraintain safety.
After a few more minutes of thought, he decided that it robably a good idea to push back the wilds a bit as well, and grabbed a third sheet of paper. He was aware of a number of bandit groups in his nds, but they had not been harmful enough to send forces to wipe out so far. This was a good ce to ge that. Many of the bandits had turo crime due to temporary difficulty, and only remained so because they would be punished if they returned, so he would offer them a pardon for most crimes if they productively aided in a campaign against the wilds.
Of course, he wouldn’t pardon anyone who raped or murdered those they stopped, but most of the tales he heard said that the main groups were quite polite despite their situation, only taking a small fra of what was carried, and even proteg from roups. Due to this, he had high hopes for their cooperation.
As he fihe third notice, he put away his pen, picked up the papers, and headed outside. Opening the door, he saw that someone had left anift on his porch, a quite pretty gzed pot. Smiling at the gratitude of his people, he put it ihe door before tinuing on his way. Fortunately, the scribe lived in the middle-css district as well, so he didn’t have to walk far.
He still sidered it a waste that some other nobles insisted on the highest of luxury at all times, shaking his head at the idea of it. He was able to do much more for his people by living a modest life instead, though it would be o have someoo help out. Arriving at the scribe’s shop, he left his letters behind with instrus on how to pass the copies out, theurned bae.
**********
Morris paced along the baly of the spire, watg Kel flying high above. He could hardly believe the news he had received from his former student, to think that the Church of flict, even if only a small group, would ever work with an awakened… It was going to be iing to see if they would keep their word, he certainly couldn’t risk them harming Amilya’s daughter when she arrived, so he would have to keep an eye on things when she appeared.
With a sigh, he stopped his train of thought and resumed his work, pg a hand on the head-sized mana stoing on the pedestal and linking his mana to it. Reag his mind out, he began pulling in the ambient mana and funneling it into the stone. He carefully watched with both eyes and manasight to ensure he didn’t cause an overcharge, pulling away several mier.
Mrabbed the mana stone and headed bato the tower, carefully bringing it down several floors to a storeroom. Within, he passed several racks of simir charged stones before pg his in an open spot. He sidered charging aone, but ultimately decided to go che the apprentices first.
As he no longer had to carry anything, he headed to the hollow core of the spire instead of the stairs, pg a hand and foot against the bare wall of robsp; eling his earth magic, he formed a small ledge and a handhold, then braced himself on them and stepped off of the entry ptform. With a small nudge of his mana, his earthen structs slid down the shaft, rapidly dropping him around fifty floors before he slowed them to a halt. Reversing the process, he stepped onto the entry ptform and removed his structs, then turo head towards the apprentices’ baly on this level.
As he arrived, he gnced around, seeing that most of the apprentices were w on charging finger-sized stohough a few had rger ones, ranging up to fist sized. Cheg with his manasight, he noticed that his favorite apprehomas, had improved again. Rather than pulling randomly, he seemed to have gotten the hang of trolling where he grabbed ambient mana, as he was catg the majority of the leakage from the others around him. Perhaps he would be able to advance soon, since he was showing such progress in his trol.
As he turo head bato the tower, he spotted a young woman charging three sto once, and stopped to watbsp; On closer iion, she rimarily charging one in her left hand, while using one in her right hand to siphon the leakage from the first, switg to the third stone every few seds without toug it. He was gd to see that someone was using his trainihods, and even expanding them. Far too many of the young folk thought they could just focus on power, ing their trol, and then pihey were not allowed to advanbsp; Perhaps this young dy would be able to join Thomas soon.
After gettitention, he nodded and gave her a thumbs-up before returning to the ter of the spire and asding back to his floor. As he returo the baly with a discharged mana stone, he spotted the arm gem glowing beside the doorway. Morris carefully hurried to the pedestal to pce the stone down befng down from the edge. Far below he saw rock walls rising to block off a se of the courtyard as a writhing brown mass emerged from the tunnel opening within it.
Taking a careful look, he firmed there were no civilians at risk, and pulled several ks of rock from the rge block beside the door. Twisting his mana ihem to fracture all but the outermost part of the rocks, he then hurled them down towards the enclosed area. Several seds ter they impacted with a loud bang, shattering into razor-sharp shrapnel and spraying the area. Even as his attack was in progress, he saw the results of several es striking as well, bolts of ice, fire, and other stones flying down from both above and below his floor. He khere were wind mages too, but from so high up he was uo spot their ws.
With the number of strikes, he didn’t bother with f another of his own, instead simply for a moment until the walls began l again. Evidently it was only a small outbreak if the guardians sed the warning ditioo safe again already. Since he did not o provide any more assistance, he returo the pedestal and began siphoning mana into the stoo recharge it.
