Kingdom of the Weak

14. Fire

Back at the north side of Frontier Town, Cruel Rose was tearing her hair out.

“Somebody! Anybody!” She shrieked, holding up the book of Basic Fire Magic. “Tell me what this word means!!”

Her wisest gang members were trying to make sense of it. Most of them couldn’t read, but the few who could did their best to figure out the overly long word. “In… inside something…? Invincible…? In syllable? In scribble?”

“It’s a something ‘tion’.” A younger ‘reader’ gangster exclaimed.

“I think it has something to do with the magic Sigil…” somebody else said.

“Forget it!” Rose roared. “Give it here!”

Ignoring the words on the page entirely, she pressed her hand against the magic sigil and activated it the way she activated the magic scrolls used for slave-bonds…

BOOM! An explosion lit up the Cruel Rose Headquarters.

One youngster gangster ran around screaming. “My hair is on fire! My hair is on fire! My hair is on fire!!”

“Put it out! Put it out!” someone else yelled.

A third person tried to blow on it, only to get bowled over by the panicked burning man as he dashed for the kitchens. More shrieks erupted and there were a lot of crashes.

Meanwhile, everyone else tried to put out the flames in the main hall.

“Quick! Stamp it out!”

“Aargh! My foot! MY FOOT!!!”

“Water! We need water!”

“In the kitchen!”

“Where’s the water! Where’s the water barrels?”

“He broke them! He rushed straight into them with his hair on fire, and broke them both!”

“Water! We need water! Somebody get some water!”

“Oww! Hot, hot, hot…!”

“It’s getting bigger! What do we do? What do we DO?!”

“Run! Every man for himself!”

Screaming, yelling, fighting each other, the members of the glorious Cruel Rose gang fled from their headquarters as it began to burn.

***

Meanwhile, Remian had ten new scrolls Inscribed before he ran out of Tier 1 magic ink.

Six were basic Fire Bolt spells. Each would shoot out a fist size ball of fire at the speeds one might use to throw a rock. Two were Smoke spells, which didn’t really burn much, but provided a lot of dense, choking smoke. One was a Torch spell, which stuck a fist-sized flame onto a certain point of an object, typically wooden sticks.

The last one was a Bonfire spell. While it, too, was learned from the book of Basic Fire Magic, this was not actually one of the ‘basic’ spells. It was actually there just to show off to new students how powerful fire magic can be. Someone had put an Inscription of it right at the front of the book filled with warnings and cautions on how to use it and to keep anything flammable away from the direction you were facing.

When Remian tried it, he had carefully directed it against the barbecue pit, and had thought to conveniently roast some raw meat while he was at it.

As for the result… both the barbecue pit and the meat were so badly burned, Markus hired Tim to do the cooking from then on.

Remian idly smiled to himself as he pictured Cruel Rose reading the book of fire magic and testing out the first Inscription in the secrecy and privacy of her treasure vault…

That would be the end of her treasures!

Back where the book came from, at a high level city like Ecclesia or Black Dragon city or Ceres, mages would be everywhere and a small wild fire bursting out unexpectedly at a kitchen stove or a sand pit would be little more than a child’s prank. There should easily be enough high-level mages around to deal with it promptly and effortlessly. Any random person on the street should have a scroll or two in hand that could do as much damage or more. Heck, any random carriage driver could do more damage driving his carriage recklessly.

But out here in the Frontier, there weren’t all that many people capable of dealing with magical slips and spills. Maybe Ye’Tuo or one of the other Slayers, but certainly not the average gang thug. In fact, those guys were more likely to set themselves on fire.

Sure enough, Remian thought he could hear screaming in the distance. Over from the north side of town, there appeared a sudden column of black smoke.

“I’m gonna have to get that book that soon, before they burn the whole town down.” Remian sighed. “Charlie’s going to be so mad.”

Right. Charlie was the airship mage who sold the book to Remian in the first place. He was very insistent that he not let the book fall into wrong hands. He was totally going to yell at Remian for losing the book, even for a good cause.

Still. They had to get that book back sooner or later. It was likely going to cost him, but Remian relished the idea of barging into Rose’s place with an angry Senior Mage at his back.

As for how much of their own homes and possessions they burned down in the meantime… well, there wasn’t much Remian could do about it until Charlie got here.

“Everyone ready?” Remian called to his crew.

“We’ve been ready for hours! We were only waiting for you!” Mindy retorted.

***

They marched over the Blood Rabbit burrows, passed the quarry on the other side of the hill, and then followed the stream to its source.

There it was; one big yawning opening large enough for even Carrie to walk in upright.

“I’m not sure I can do this.” Mandy confessed. “I’ve only had a couple hours of practice using Scrolls. I don’t know much about magic.”

“It’s just using magical items.” Remian stole a line from Max. “It’s like using a knife in the kitchen. Nobody is asking you to forge the knife itself. Just use the finished product.”

“It’s easy.” Mindy encouraged her.

Each of the Summers sisters had a Smoke Scroll, and a Fire Bolt scroll, the ones which had the most Casts stored in them. Remian himself had a Fire Bolt scroll and the Bonfire scroll. The remaining Fire Bolt scrolls and the Torch scroll had been given to Kairos as payment for the ink.

Along with Mandy and Mindy, there was Max in his full gear complete with shield and three short spears. On the other side, Carrie and Vigil approached the cave entrance cautiously.

As for Tim and George, they were left behind back at the Iron Legion camp with the barbecue and garden respectively.

“Let’s not go in there blind.” Remian decided, looking at the cave. “Smoke it out.”

Mandy and Mindy raised their Smoke scrolls and triggered the Inscriptions. Mindy’s scroll lit up and a smoking chunk of what looked like embers went sizzling into the cave. Thick black smoke billowed everywhere in moments and there was an angry roar.

“Steer clear!” Max warned, raising his shield. “Get back!”

Carrie crouched, baring her fangs. Sharp claws extended into the ground.

But nothing happened. Whatever was in that cave did not come running out.

“More smoke!” Remian called.

This time, Mandy’s scroll lit up while Mindy’s fizzled. Another smoke bomb went hurtling into the cave, doubling the spewing gas.

Still, no response.

“Is it still inside?” Max asked dubiously. “I mean, I’m sure we heard something earlier, so…”

“Fire Bolts!” Remian raised his own scroll.

All three lit up and blasted into the cave randomly.

At last, there was a furious roar. An echo of thought pulsed out from within. [Fire?! You send fire against me?!]

“Everyone, get back!” Remian yelped. “Something’s wrong! Something is very, very wrong!”

“Cover!” Max raised his shield and braced.

“What does that mean?!” Mindy asked.

“Go hide behind a tree or something!” Remian barked. He himself ducked behind a large rock.

The angry roar sounded again. [You like fire so much? Have some!]

Out from the cave came a Fire Ball the size of Remian’s head.

“WHOA!” Remian leapt away from the rock as the Fire Ball exploded. The ground and the air shook; dirt and flame scattered. The rock itself was generally unharmed, merely seared, but the outburst of heat that had surrounded it was no joke. “Since when did bears use fire magic?!”

[Since now!] from the cave charged a large brown bear with a strange polished black stick in its jaws. It twisted its head to one side so that the stick pointed toward Remian and… [Fire Ball!]

Remian ran for his life.