Low-Fantasy Occultist

Nick opened his eyes.

After such long days of battle—both in the literal and metaphorical sense—the transition from sleep to waking usually took a toll: a lingering fog in the mind, a stiffness in the joints from sleeping in a leather chair, and a slow crawl back to full awareness. Not today.

He blinked, and his thoughts were like a polished glass pane. Power hummed within him, a slumbering ocean waiting for acknowledgment from its master. The exhaustion that had driven him into the chair the night before was gone.

Sometimes he still wondered whether he was dreaming it all, but no, he’d truly become a Prestige mage.

It wasn’t the end of his journey, as even in Floria, Marthas awaited and plotted, beings as far above him as he was above mortals now, but it was hard not to feel satisfaction curl in his belly at how far—and how fast—he’d come.

He stood, idly summoning warm water and a breeze to clean up. The sunlight streaming through the windowpane cast a harsh glare in midwinter, but now that things had settled, he could admit that the view of Toneburg recovering beyond the wall was a pretty one, with its snowy roofs and curling smoke.

Three days had passed since they fought. Two days spent in grueling diplomatic talks and one night of true rest. Now it was finally time to deal with the aftermath.

Once he was presentable, Nick walked out of the study and descended the grand staircase.

The Elpen estate was a hive of uneasy activity. Servants in newly stitched liveries worked alongside broad-shouldered soldiers who’d answered the Elpens’ call, clearing rubble from the corridors deemed of lesser interest.

There was a tension among them, almost as if they feared everything would come crashing down, but the truce still held, bound by the ink of the treaty and the looming threat of the Crown.

Any misstep would be harshly punished now, and Nick had no doubt the Shadows were still lingering, keeping an eye on things to make sure nobody dared break the King’s Peace.

Not that they seemed very worried that it was their own doing that led to things exploding in such a fiery fashion. But then again, any man a Shadow kills is a traitor in the eyes of the Crown.

He found Rhea in a long, vaulted gallery in the eastern wing. The ceiling had caved in at the far end, letting in the biting cold, but she didn’t seem bothered by the chill.

He took a moment to observe her, and to him, it was clear she’d also grown stronger. Probably around level eighty by now. It doesn’t seem like much compared to my achievements, but she has to be among the greatest talents of our generation.

She stood before a massive canvas depicting a sprawling mechanical aqueduct. The painting was blackened by smoke, its intricate details obscured beneath a thick layer of oily soot.

With a glass vial in one hand and a soft linen cloth in the other, she dabbed a clear, pungent liquid onto the cloth and gently rubbed a corner. The black grime dissolved easily, revealing the vibrant lapis and gold paint beneath.

"The soot binds to the linseed oil far too easily," Rhea said, sensing Nick's approach without turning around. “Trying to scrape it with a blade would mean losing the paint. I brewed a solvent just for this.”

Nick stopped beside her, watching the meticulous work. “A new brew?”

“If it can be called such," she murmured, wiping away another streak of black. "Pine resin, distilled spirits, and a drop of quicksilver do not make a masterwork, but it works well enough. I tried it on other, less important works before, but now I can restore this.”

Seemingly noticing his curiosity about who created the painting, she gestured toward the barely visible figure of a man watching the waters flow. “That is my great-grandfather. He designed the city’s aqueducts and was considered a patron of the city before the Ultimers drove us underground.”

Once she finally passed her cloth over it, revealing the hidden features, Nick was struck by the glowing orange eyes he knew all too well. There was almost no magic in the painting, beyond a preservation ward cast through runes hidden in the canvas, yet it almost felt alive. “I’m surprised the Ultimers allowed such a thing to remain here. This is a pretty powerful reminder of your family’s past.”

“My great-grandfather was well loved in the city, and destroying or hiding his work would have been a sign of disrespect to its history, even after they drove us out," Rhea corrected, her shoulders dropping. She lowered the cloth, staring at her stained fingers, looking troubled.

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Patiently, he waited for her to speak her mind and was eventually rewarded.

"I can clean paintings, Nick. I can mix mortar to repair the walls. But when I look at the ancestral archives, the runes my grandmother spent her life studying, I see only locked doors.”

"You are an Alchemist," he pointed out gently. "Not an Artificer.”

"Exactly," Rhea whispered. She turned to face him, her eyes swimming with conflicted feelings. "I crafted a Master-tier solvent from a Behemoth's core and could rightfully claim my apprenticeship was over. I possess knowledge that could revolutionize the Guilds in Toneburg. But Master Ogden could teach me how to refine it, how to build a true foundation. With my grandmother fading and Gaelen still recovering, forced to rule a broken house, how can I pack a bag and ride south?”

Nick leaned against the wall and took a moment to craft a response. "A house requires more than one pillar to stand against the wind. If you stay here, busy yourself with restoration, and force yourself to read Artifice texts you barely comprehend, you would only deny House Elpen the Master Alchemist you are destined to become.”

Something about that seemed to strike her, but before she could speak, bootsteps crunched over the debris littering the hallway.

Gaelen walked into the gallery wearing a fresh wool tunic, his left arm tightly bound in a clean linen sling. Dark circles under his eyes spoke of restless nights, yet his jaw was set with rigid determination befitting a Lord.

"Nick is right," he said, stopping beside his sister.

Rhea flinched. "Gaelen, I cannot leave you alone while everything is still so undecided.”

"We have enough ghosts haunting these halls, sister," Gaelen said softly. He reached out with his good hand and rested it on her shoulder. "We have already sacrificed much; it is only right that you finally have your time to grow. Go to Floria. Finish your apprenticeship with your master. Learn everything the old man has to teach. When you return, you will build an alchemy wing that rivals the King's own laboratories and bring greater glory than anything our ancestors have achieved. I will oversee the restoration of the Forge and prepare for your return.”

Rhea stared at her brother, searching his face for any sign of resentment. Finding none, she let out a shuddering breath and wrapped her arms around his neck, burying her face in his good shoulder. Gaelen held her tight, resting his chin on the top of her head.

After a long moment, he looked over his sister's shoulder and met Nick's gaze. The young Lord’s expression tightened.

"I have a favor to ask," Gaelen said, his tone cooling from its earlier warmth.

Nick pushed himself off the wall. "Name it.”

"The Ultimer estate," Gaelen said, pulling back from Rhea and adjusting his sling. "Ephor is dead. His direct heir fell in the first skirmishes against the dark dwarves almost a year ago. Their lineage is severed, but the House remains. Right now, a flock of second cousins and ambitious nephews is holed up in their manor, looting their own vaults and squabbling over the succession. The treaty grants us reparations from their accounts, but the division of the remaining spoils must be handled with great care, lest it spark more trouble down the line.”

"You want me to oversee the division," Nick guessed.

"I need you to go handle the whole succession in my stead," Gaelen admitted, looking as if it pained him. "If I walk into that house and look into the faces of the people who drank and made merry while my family was betrayed and broken... I will draw steel. I will kill them. And Mordhau will use the breach of peace to strip the Forge from us.”

“I’ll do it," Nick promised. It wasn’t exactly how he’d meant to spend his last days in Toneburg, but he wasn’t one to leave a job half-finished.

The walk to the other end of the noble district offered a new view of Toneburg's scars. The cold bit at the exposed skin of passing servants, forcing many to bundle up in furs and layers, but Nick simply ignored the chill, adjusting his internal temperature without a hitch.

The streets were still choked with debris, overturned carts, and the lingering scent of pitch, but crews of workmen were doing their best to restore order, and earth mages smoothed the cobblestones with ease. Within a few more days, nobody would be able to tell that anything had happened.

Well, nobody who didn’t live through it. The echoes of those chaotic days, however brief, will be felt for a long time.

Given that he’d personally killed the heads of two noble lineages, he’d know.

The Ultimer Estate sat atop a raised plateau overlooking the entrance to the merchant district. It was a fortress of black stone and wrought iron, imposing and austere, lacking the warmth of Elpen architecture.

A volatile standoff was brewing outside the towering gates.

Fifty Black Hound mercenaries stood in a loose half-circle with blades in their hands, their breath pluming in the freezing air. They were staring down twenty surviving Ultimer house guards.

The guards wore polished plate armor and held a rigid line across the courtyard entrance, clearly unwilling to attack given their numbers, yet neither willing to give up.

From the feeling he was getting in the ether, blood was seconds away from spilling.

"You lost the war, lackey!" a scarred mercenary spat, stepping forward and tapping his halberd against the ground. "Your Patriarch is dead, and any protection he might have offered is gone. Step aside and let us take our due, or we’ll carve you like hogs!”

The captain of the Ultimer guard raised his shield, his knuckles white. "This is still a noble house! We will yield to the Crown, not to dogs!”

With a mere thought, Nick rose ten feet, then twenty feet into the air, floating above the standoff. His dark coat snapped in the unnatural gale swirling around him, and he released the tight grip of [Sovereign’s Parsimony], allowing a fraction of his power to drop over the street like a descending portcullis.

Mercenaries and guards alike gasped, their lungs struggling against the sudden pressure.

"Drop the steel," Nick ordered with deathly calm.

The mercenary leader looked up, eyes widening in raw panic. He dropped his sword, which clattered loudly to the ground.

A moment later, the Ultimer captain lowered his shield, his knees buckling under the gaze of the Eidolon floating above him. Within ten seconds, seventy armed men were kneeling in the snow, the argument over the silver cart forgotten.

Nick drifted down, his boots touching the stones without a sound.

"The looting is finished," Nick declared, walking past the kneeling mercenaries. "Take your men back to your base. Inform Varg that the Ultimer accounts are frozen until the succession is resolved. I will oversee the delivery of your spoils myself.”

The mercenaries scrambled backward, eager to put distance between themselves and the man who could kill them with a glare. Nick walked through the open gates, leaving the shivering Ultimer guards behind.

Not one dared to follow, and his lips curled into a darkly amused smile.

Oh, this will be fun.

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