Adamant Blood

Mark was giddy as he stepped off of the main tram, with Lola right beside him.

The individual trams to Mage Society awaited beyond another check gate, and Lola led the way, flicking a badge out underneath a scanner by the turnstile. The way forward unlocked and Lola went through, and then the turnstile locked again. Mark showed his badge, too, running it under the scanner, and the turnstile unlocked for him as well.

One of the guards on duty greeted him, saying, "Welcome to Mage Society, Blackvein!"

Mark smiled wider. "Thanks!"

Lola's vector was kinda proud right now, but she didn't let her joy show on her face. She simply waited by the individual trams and then got on. Mark joined her. She said nothing, yet. They had already had their talk earlier, and she had been really happy for him. Of course, that joy came with warnings and advice, but all of that advice was mostly in the form of 'practice etiquette more'.

Even if you didn't know what the fuck you were doing, or who you were dealing with, you would usually come out the other end intact, and maybe even better off, if you were polite the whole way through.

It was good advice.

There was more advice than that, of course.

Right now, as the tram rolled through the scanners and the guys in the walls looked at them, Lola quietly said, "As Inquisitors in Mage Society, we must always pry where normal people would normally not pry, but at the same time we never reveal anything until it is necessary for the good of the world to reveal those things."

The guys in the walls were a little scared of Lola.

At least they weren't freaking out about Mark's adamantium reserves.

Mark had come to the Arcanaeum a few days ago to turn in the paperwork and get his ID for Mage Society. He had wanted to go right in and start learning, but he had been told he needed to wait 3 days for the paperwork and ID to be delivered, as per 'normal induction protocols'. So Mark had left, and that had turned out to be the right decision. Mark had been carrying around 190 kilos of adamantium, and everyone had been looking at him like a prized monster kill.

So Mark had made a stop over at Metallic bank the next day.

And now Mark was down to 100 kilos of adamantium, which was as low as he wanted to go these days. That was about 4 liters of black metal; more than enough to cover his entire body and do everything he needed to do with the stuff. It was also 8.5 billion goldleaf, as opposed to 16.1 billion goldleaf.

Mark's Greater Ring of No-Wealth was a pretty high class ring, able to hide the value of Mark's metal quite well, but it was limited to being able to hide a maximum of 15 billion in adamantium. Now that Mark was well below his limit most casual scanners failed to penetrate his obfuscation. Big, industrial scanners still could, though.

But the guys in the walls were more concerned with an Inquisitor in their midst than all of Mark's adamantium.

As the individual tram slipped through into the sunlight and stopped at the interior of Mage Society, Mark stepped off of the tram, saying, "I think this is the first time I've been around you and mages at the same time, Lola."

"Surely not."

"Maybe not, but… It seems like it. Those guys were way more scared of you than greedy for me."

"They'll treat you the same too, eventually. Magefalls are disasters worth killing to prevent, and I know you don't see it now, Mark, but—"

"No… No, I do see it. If I would have known about Kardi…"

Mark's voice trailed off.

Lola simply nodded. "I'm going to the Society office for my normal check in, and then I'm doing my rounds, and then my class. I will see you later, Mark."

"Wanna catch lunch together?"

"I would love to but your first day here will be large," Lola said, grinning. "Enjoy the Vault, and remember to take breaks when you're Understanding things. I teach some History Classes here, with a focus on understanding and healing disasters, and since it's similar enough to Inquisitor training I'll be teaching you, Isoko, and Sally about that here, with Inquisitor lessons reserved for outside Mage Society."

Mark said, "Okay."

Lola did a small curtsy.

Mark bowed in reply, grinning as he did so.

And then Lola left down the right side of the tram, toward Mage Society's main office, both hands carefully folded over each other, her gait strong and serene. People were looking at her, and she was a monolith of strength right now, observing and understanding everyone around her, while they looked at her like she was a promised guillotine.

Some were terrified.

Others were merely normally scared.

Mark breathed deep, and walked forward, down the main road toward the arcanaeum.

In a few days Isoko would be joining Mark here in Mage Society, which would be awesome. She had wanted in when Mark got his introduction letter, so Mark tried to make that happen for her. All it had taken was actually seeing Elaria in person again, the day after the whole Walaria-thing had happened, and Elaria already had a letter of introduction to Mage Society for Isoko, if she wanted it. And she did!

Isoko's Mage Society badge was still in the works, though.

Elaria was a Rank-3-D, meaning Rank 3, Dependent. Her master was Empress Cataclysm herself, who was Rank 2, right alongside Walaria. Isoko could be sponsored by Elaria but it would take her some more time to get sponsored, due to a more-involved vetting process, due to Elaria not being a fully independent person. Also, Elaria hadn't had an apprentice in decades, and Isoko would likely be moved through Aluathan Imperial Society toward some other Master, when the actual process was solidified.

Probably Rekaro Solari.

Isoko had been fine with that.

And so, Mark was by himself as he walked down the grassy road toward the arcanaeum, and he felt awesome. With his illusion belt working well, in conjunction with his Greater Ring of No-Wealth, only a few people instantly recognized him. Most passed him over. Another small portion of the population recognized him as 'new', and that was all.

They judged him for wearing jeans and a teeshirt and a backpack, while all of them were wearing mage robes, and they were happy to see themselves as better than someone, anyone, at all. Standard stuff, really.

Mark grinned as he walked right up to the arcanaeum steps and then further, to the front guard, to present his badge under the scanner. The guy behind the desk nodded toward Mark, and that was it; he had seen Mark coming from the tram station for the last 5 minutes.

And then Mark stood in front of the scanners to go into the actual building.

Bertrand was not on duty right now, but another guy was, and they knew who Mark was. They briefly silenced the scanner as Mark walked through, so that it didn't make a racket due to his adamantium, and then Mark was in! People were in the halls. Some of them noticed Mark, recognized him as a bumpkin, and then ignored him, and that was fine! He was a bumpkin right now! One of the hundreds of people who came by the settlement to see what was what, and to talk to people out in the less-scholarly part of Mage Society. There were tens of offices for various societies inside the walls of the settlement's Mage Society, and all of them had their positions and politics and I'm-better-than-yous, and inside the arcanaeum it was the same.

But the arcanaeum was more of a sacred space than out there, and not because of the learning; the classes, the professor, the whatevers. Arcanaeums were one thing before they were places of learning. Teaching had come later. The big deal was the Vault down below. Every arcanaeum had a Vault, and the settlement's arcanaeum was no different.

Mark was headed there soon enough.

But first! It was time to check up on classes offered and then probably ignore all of that stuff in favor of diving right into the Vault.

Mark went to the front office first, which was over… that way? Probably.

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Mark got a bit lost.

He turned back around, went to the front guards, and asked where the front office was.

Ten minutes later Mark stepped down a hallway, into a front office, to stand before a woman behind a desk. The desk labeled her as Misses Crabber, and this did not look like a front office at all, but Mark supposed that was the point.

The woman looked up from her desk and asked, "How can I help you, Mister Careed?"

"Looking for class offerings and Vault access, please."

"Of course." She pulled out a booklet from behind the desk and then handed it over, saying, "Here are the course offerings. Please return the booklet when you're done. Vault access is down the main hall and through the Big Scanner Tunnel. You'll find out more when you get there."

Mark smiled. "Thank you!"

"Thank you, Mister Careed, for all that you do."

She meant that, too. People who knew Mark treated him better than people who didn't know him at all… which was kinda weird? Didn't he look personable? Maybe not. Anyway!

Mark smiled a bit wider, nodded, and turned around.

Once he was in the hallway he looked at the booklet and decided he had no idea what to take, but a lot of it was reasonable to see, which made him feel a whole lot better about the Mapping he learned from Elaria. The stuff in the front of the booklet was normal. The stuff in the middle was all different, and the majority of the offerings at the arcanaeum. The stuff in the back was 'by instructor allowance only'.

In the beginning there was 'Astral Stretching', every morning at 9 AM and every evening at 9 PM. There were groups of 10 to 20, led by various people. Show up and get help. Basic stuff. 'Mapping the Binding' was also basic stuff, with a class that allowed for help figuring out what your Binding looked like, and mapping it with you. They had to use some sort of machine or someone with a Skiller power, or something like that, to look inside of you, right? Maybe someone like Quark could maybe… Mark had no idea… Meld with your astral body and join you in your soul, and Map your Binding for you? That'd be cool. There were classes that helped with mana control and… Ohh.

"Maybe I'll take 'What is Mana: Basic'," Mark said. And then he added, " 'Magical Languages', too."

Quark replied, "I will make a note of it, sir. And if you want to copy the whole book for viewing through me, I can do that, too."

Mark grinned, saying, "Yeah, but later. Help me see where Elaria is, or Lola… Or Reeni, too? Artificer classes, too… Where are— Ah! Here we go…" Mark read, " 'Enchanting, Artificing, Tinkering; EAT. Required for all future EAT classes. Warning! Expensive.' I'm taking that one, for sure."

Mark flipped through, looking for Elaria or Lola or anyone he knew—

"There," Quark said.

Mark turned back and looked at what Quark highlighted. "History of Disaster, Magefalls and More. Inquisitor Lola Turner. Well there we go." Her class was 'Required for many types of graduation'.

Elaria Valen was all the way at the very end of the book, past restricted options like 'Necromancy' and 'Dangerous Manas'. Elaria was listed under substitute teachers for alchemy, healing, and a whole lot of other general classes.

And this was the first year booklet! The arcanaeum had offerings for all skill levels, though. A lot of the people here, including Tartu and Lenny, were advanced students, who wanted to start on their actual lives while still in arcanaeum. As a result, this place had a bunch of higher order classes that were taught on different days, instead of every day.

The booklet outlined learning tracks for all skills.

Mark saw paths toward Grand Mage, which meant people who could reasonably cast every spell out there, to 1-year students, who only wanted to get a near-Power and then quit. Those would be people like Mark's parents, who had done exactly that and ended up with Fish Yank instead of Telekinesis and Water Cleanse instead of Cleanse. They had had the original spell, but then it degraded, probably… Mark would never know exactly what went wrong there… But he decided he was going to ask someone.

Yes.

That would be his first question to… to someone. Mark expected to take a class about in-depth dives into what made Bindings Bindings, as opposed to mage-based magic, which was easily disrupted with 'failing to use the spell correctly', or whatever had happened to his parents...

Anyway.

Mark went back and handed the booklet to Crabber, thanking her, and then he went to find the Vault.

Down hallways with nice red rugs in the middle and ample lighting overhead, past students in robes of various colors, mostly muted and no black at all, or with normal clothes but with short shoulder capes with red 'IA's on them, for 'Imperial Aluatha'. Professors wore grey mage robes with 'IA's on them on the sleeves. The people noticed Mark, and some of them were surprised. Others were quietly pleased. They bowed at Mark as he walked by, and Mark kinda smiled on the way past.

Everything was bright and magey. Everything was just plain neat!

Mark supposed that Aluatha Imperial Society, the Mage Society that he had joined through Walaria, was the one that ran the arcanaeum here. Maybe 'Imperial Aluatha' was different from 'Aluatha Imperial Society', but maybe not.

The Big Scan Tunnel was impossible to miss, once you got far enough down the main walkway of the arcanaeum. Mark saw it long before he got there. It was like a dark hole into the world, the red rug and the nice hallway with its white walls and brown wood kinda flowing into the darkness, then down, and then to the left, around. It was a spiraling walkway, like one would find at the coliseum, for thousands of people to use all at once as they exited when the events were over.

Mark couldn't feel the darkness with his Union. It was an obfuscation zone.

Every sensory magic was probably obfuscated, though, so he wasn't personally worried. Several people stood guard in the darkness, all of them spotting Mark as he walked close, and Mark wasn't worried about that, either.

Mark walked down the tunnel and the darkness closed in on the edges. He still walked in light, but that light followed him, past the eyes of guards who knew who he was, and one who wanted his autograph but that guy refrained. That guard had a job to do, and that job was to look menacing in the dark.

The Union obfuscation seemed to be imperfect. Mark had a bit of range down here, but more like 6 meters than 600.

A pair of guys walked Mark's way, up the spiral, and they had light around them, too. They bowed a little toward Mark as Mark got close, and Mark bowed back. They had no idea who he was; it was a reflexive, polite gesture.

And then Mark was down at the bottom of the spiral, just a few turns from the top. He faced a well-lit guard station up ahead, like an island of light in the dark. It really did feel like an island, too; an island in the middle of shark-infested waters.

Things prowled in the dark down here.

Mark couldn't feel them at first, but they were there, right at the edges of his light, and he felt them when they tried to claw forward. They felt almost like… summoned creatures? They had no real vectors to them. They were here to attack whatever left the light.

Mark was pretty sure they were little more than deterrents. He felt no personal threats from them at all. The actual threats would come from the actual guards in that dark, guarding the place. It was all an illusion of some sort, Mark guessed; something that you could get around if you were, like, attuned to it, or something? Seemed right. Mark had no idea, though.

Mark walked forward, to the guard station up ahead, sitting in the light.

The masked man behind the guard station was wearing grey robes. Lights hung in the dark behind him, like the eyes of a great many beasts. The guy looked at Mark, his own eyes shining behind his simple mask, and said, "Ah, Mark Careed. Welcome to the Vault."

"Hello… uh… Who are you?"

Mark wasn't sure what he expected, but he did not expect what he got at all.

"I'm the Librarian. I'm a summoned construct from the Capital, imbued into an AI, and given control of this land. I am personally 5 months old, but historically 65 years old, and I have been upgraded a great many times."

Mark had a bit of a pause at that. He reevaluated the churning dark all around them. "… Oh. You're… more dangerous than I thought."

The Librarian grinned in the dark, saying, "Yes. A great many people think this place is not dangerous to them, and it is not. Not truly. But I can do a great many things that people do not expect, and that is to ward them off, mostly, and burn all the books here, in an emergency. They're all copies, anyway, so this is no great loss. But should a person make me commit that most awful of acts, they will be pursued to the fullest extent of Mage Law, and likely executed."

"Seems… Yeah. Seems about right— What about, uh, kaiju accidents?"

Some people from Memphi had tried to sue Mark with regard to the kaiju and the Battle for Memphi, but mostly because he had deep pockets. People tried to sue Sentinel a whole lot worse and those suits got a lot further. A few might even make it to an actual courtroom. But Goro Teshima, Mark's lawyer for the Hero/Villain Program, had gotten all of those suits dropped.

The HVP wasn't here in Mage Society, though, and Mage Society might have weird laws about defending them first in case of emergency. The Slayers and other individual hunting guilds and even the settlement had a whole list of things, planned out in order of importance, to keep in mind during the defense of a city. It was triage, basically.

They hadn't had to do triage since the Battle for Memphi, though, and Mark hoped he would never have to worry about triage for a city, or even a settlement, ever again. But he was on the Kaiju Squad, and that was one of the things they were told to think about occasionally, even if command did most of that thinking.

The Librarian nodded deeply, and it was almost a bow. "Accidents do happen in the defense of a city, and because of that I will burn all the books as a matter of course, should the walls of Mage Society fall. In any case, the specific defense of Mage Society should be far from your mind when battling kaiju, Mister Careed."

"Good to know."

"I have some personal instructions from Second Princess Walaria Aluatha regarding your vault, if you wish to go there now."

Mark was back to being thrilled. "Please lead the way."