Town Builder - 104 - Mage College

Chapter 104: The Mage College

The darkness was complete. Mild panic echoed down the defensive wall. A few fireflies were dancing in the distance—no, not fireflies, but magical items with glowing gems. “The darkness is not complete—light spells!” I yelled. Of course, most players never bothered to learn a simple light spell. It was a waste of a slot as there were cheap items on the market that could replicate it. A few globes of light appeared along the wall, created mainly by my NPCs. The light sources were muted, though, only illuminating out to a certain range and then blocked by a foggy screen. Some lights were brighter than others.

Mad Dog had probably already figured it out, but I sent him a message anyway, focusing on the defense of Malcum. “Racial darkvision does not work!” A player yelled out from the wall.

“Focus on the sky,” my voice echoed down the wall as the buzzing sound got louder. “Activate protection from missiles! Activate our shields! I want flaming fireballs with an extended burn time cast into the field of battle!” That was all the commands I got off before black bolts rained down on us. I had to switch over to the Incursion chat as the noise had gotten too loud. The problem was that not all players read the chat.

We weathered the storm of crossbow attacks with adequate defenses. The bolts, which carried various poisons that deafened a player—affecting not only their avatar but also locking them out of chat—caused hallucinations and prevented access to their inventory. Not many bolts got through our magical screen, though.

We were holding against the flying forest dwellers, but that was when the shambling conservators reached the walls. They slammed into the walls, but we had nothing to worry about as our walls barely lost 1% of their health with half a dozen shambling mounds hammering on a section of wall.

The shambling mounds started to fall under our assault, but then a glitter began drifting through the air. The dust cloud sparkled as it entered the halo of the lights along the wall. I checked the busy defense chat to see what the spores were doing to us. Damn it. It caused a berserk state that couldn’t be resisted. The players' melee damage increased, but they also lost health while under its influence. I ordered healers to the wall, but it meant they also entered the cloud.

The level fifty shambling conservators were also influenced by the berserk spores as the health of the walls started to drop quickly as their damage and rate of attacks increased. I yelled and typed in chat to focus on the shambling conservators. The shambling conservators received the berserk damage bonus but didn’t appear to be losing any health as a result.

“Bella, we need you. Light them up,” I told the bunny girl standing behind me. She looked older, either due to the faster NPC aging or simply from experience, as she confidently stepped forward. The darkness had impeded her line of sight, preventing her from targeting the enemy with her spells, but now the shambling conservators were at the base of the wall and well lit by the players defending.

We didn’t see the clouds forming above, but the lightning flashes made blinding strobes of light as they struck. The shambling conservators were only able to take two or three strikes before they were reduced to smoldering piles of vegetation. Bella had gotten stronger, and she managed to remove more than half the shambling mounds, turning the battle again.

When Bella exhausted her aether she got unsteady on her feet, but two guards were there to catch her and watch over her for the rest of the battle. The dragonfly men were causing us a lot of trouble, as it appeared they could see further in the dark than we could. It was getting frustrating as very few of the flyers had fallen since the attack began.

Tanguin, send out the expendables to attack the dryad monarch. We need to have her spell ended,” I ordered. Tanguin nodded, and the gates opened for the cavalry of Blood Knights to enter the field. Each knight had a brilliant sphere of light atop their helm, allowing us to track them as they charged. They had barely circled a quarter of the field when they stumbled upon the monarch.

The players, eager to gain experience and acquire powerful items dropped from the walls, rushed toward the cluster of knights. The fungi-gi spreaders were quickly overwhelmed, and the battle essentially ended. It took fifteen minutes of an intense magical fight before the dryad monarch fell, which also dispelled the darkness and revealed hundreds of dragonfly forest dwellers in the air. From there, it was a methodical removal of the remaining threat.

Then the looting of the field began. My guildmates managed to get all the loot from the dryad monarch and a fair amount of plant essences and crafting materials from the rest of the invaders. While our clean-up was beginning, Mad Dog was having more trouble.

My Dryad is a named monster, Liora of the Thron Court, mate. She arrived with a dozen treant guardians. They are shielding her, and she keeps extinguishing the fire spells we send at them. This darkness is a bloody good trick; we need to figure out the spell.” Mad Dog might have been having difficulties, but he was excited to face the challenge.

“We are in clean-up mode over here. Sending you most of the out members of the guild and a few NPCs with ranged attacks for the flyers.” I said as I tapped out orders like I was an actual general who knew what he was doing.

“Thanks, mate. Should have this under control in no time.” Mad Dog cut the chat, but I watched our guild hat in case something went wrong.

The loot was brought before me.

Epic Gown of Forest (100) +10% to all stats. Nature spell cast time reduced by 25%

Flora Realm Raid Key – opens a portal to the Flora realm for 12 hours, allowing one hundred players to pass through

Twisted Nightsap Staff (50) – cast the tier 10 spell True Night as the level of the wielder

Simple Vine Belt (0) – can be uncoiled to produce 200’ of rope

An excellent haul, except the most powerful item, the gown, required level one hundred to equip. I had it stored in out guild vault immediately. The staff was also sent, and I was sure Mad Dog would come up with ways to utilize it. Tier 10 spells required a 23 in the magic skill to learn. I found the spell description for True Night.

It functioned as we had observed it, but the darkness effect extended out from the caster at ten yards per level of the spell. I already thought of a simple counter to this. You just needed to get above the darkness sphere and target the center from above to target the caster.

Soon things wound down, but Mad Dog had not been able to secure the loot from his named boss. At least we had another successful defense. I eagerly awaited my reward for being the lord of the duchy. When the results finally scrolled, I was happy. My level jumped from 47 to 49. One more level and I could select a new trait, but I already had it picked out. I was also given some more unique titles that I could dispense to players or NPCs.

Anarchist of the Grove, +10% damage to all plant creatures and players

Amateur Mycologist, immune to all spore attacks and effects

Monarch Slayer, +5% damage to incursion bosses

Beneficial titles. I did note there were no player races that were plant in nature, so I assumed the anarchist of the grove was hinting at a future update.

At the post Incursion party, Mad Dog gave me a hard time again for leveling so quickly without killing a damn thing. “How about you make me lord for a day, Tallis? Just one day, the day of the next Incursion?” He was joking, but I honestly considered it.

“Maybe after I reach level fifty,” I said.

Mad Dog slapped me on the back. “Don’t be a fool with your generosity. We need your lord abilities for the Incursions and besides who the hell wants all that responsibility!” He laughed uproariously, but the truth was Mad Dog was already shouldering more of the Duchy’s responsibility than I was. I was more of the figurehead and cash cow.

After the party, I returned to my drafting room with Joy. She was too big to sit in my lap now, but sat at the table, resting her head on her hands. “What is your level?” I asked her as I prepared for another night of copying plans.

“Seven,” she said in a bored tone.

“Are you not happy with that? How are your new spells developing?” I inquired. She had focused on air and fire spells. Air had strong defensive spells, and fire had powerful attack spells, but some spells combined both affinities to make even more powerful spells.

“Seven is fine, but it is sooo slow. My spells are level-capped. It is better to use the affinity cantrips as it levels my magic skills quicker,” Joy said while drawing runes in the air with her mind.

“Do you want to do some monster grinding with me?” I asked trying to figure out why she appeared depressed.

“No,” Joy said as the runes transformed into a Pegasus and the wings animated. The illusion took flight around the room.

“Is it your mother?” I guessed.

The illusion popped, and Joy sighed. Her emotions were clear on her face. She didn’t look like or act like an AI. Or maybe my thought of what an AI was was limited. Before the players joined me and the game launched, I considered all the NPCs as real people. Joy sighed. “She is so busy. Everyone is so busy. Savannah, Bella, you…”

I studied her. “You feel alone and adrift?” Maybe this was too adult a question for her. But she programmed to act like a young teenager, even though she had a massive pool of knowledge open to her.

“I guess,” she said despondently.

“Do you want a job?” I asked.

“A job?” she looked up.

“I don’t think there are any child labor laws in here. I can give you a job—or make you a quest giver—or assign you a profession,” I said while thinking. “What job would you like? All your skills are magical in nature.”

“Can I make up my own quests?” A small, mischievous grin was forming on the face.

“Sure, why not. You have a job in mind, then?” I asked tentatively.

She seemed to be thinking about it for a time before a smile I didn’t quite like formed. “Guildmaster of the Mage’s Guild.”

“Well, the duchy does not have a mage’s guild, so I guess we can work together to design a building for you.” Her smile only got bigger. I went into my interface and sorted through some screens before finding that I could promote Joy to a role in the Duchy. I created the title, Guildmaster of Spellcraft. She would report directly to Kytalia, who was my Master of Guilds. “How is that?”

Instead of responding, she just hugged me. My reputation was already maxed with Joy so I was sure why she did that. “Dad, what about a guild hall for me?” She asked innocently on breaking the embrace.

“Let's see what we can do,” I said, grabbing a fresh sheet of paper. I really wanted to finish the library before the next Incursion, but every evening I sat with Joy as we worked together on creating a building that she envisioned. It took almost three weeks to complete it.

Thankfully, the only emergency in the Duchy was when a player guild entered the Crypt of the Phoenix King without permission. It was an inherent risk of allowing other players to explore the dungeon. The only action we could take was to ban the offending guild from the Duchy. Mad Dog considered requiring all players to sign contracts before entering to prevent such incidents in the future. It was one of the few arguments we had. I didn’t like the idea because I was worried it might reduce the number of players coming to explore the dungeon. The tax the gatehouse was bringing in was growing rapidly, and we relied on that income for running the Duchy.

Mad Dog reluctantly conceded my point but believed we needed to appear stronger like the larger guilds. We were never going to be them, and right now, the players in Phoenix's Rest always joined us to defend it during an Incrusion. If we started to break our goodwill, things could get messy.

The plans for Joy’s mage guild hall came out like I expected—maybe better than I expected.

“Eternal” Epic Mage College, Health: 50,000,000. Requirements: Stone Magic: 43, Woodcraft Carpentry 43, Masonry Foundations 43, Masonry Structures 43, Ritual Magic 43. Spawns 27 Level 50 Mage Instructors (one specialist for each affinity), Special Effect: Six spell training rooms, Special Effect: Ninety-two student rooms, Special Effect: Chancellor’s Authority. Structure Regenerates 1% health every 24 hours (stacks with similar effects)

The structure was a massive tower over two hundred feet tall with seven floors. It would tower over the city. With the plans completed, we were able to work through the details. The mage instructors were the one aspect we had been focusing on. They would be able to teach all low-tier spells, making the college a huge draw for players.

The spell training rooms were illusion rooms used to practice spellcraft. They provided a 100% bonus to spell experience while training inside. However, this was not a major advantage, as the experience bonus in real combat was significantly higher.

The student rooms were what made the college so impressive. I took what I learned from the Rogues Gallery and incorporated it into the Mage College. NPC students received 5% experience toward the next level daily. The only limitation was that their level could not exceed that of the mage instructor they studied under. But if we could get the mage instructors up to level 75 or higher with the quality of construction, we could effectively train our own mages. These rooms could also be used by players, but they would get a 100% experience bonus on earned experience, not the free experience like the NPCs.

The Chancellor’s Authority was due to the time and detail we went into designing the top-level residence of the Mage College. Joy had a lot of input into the layout and runes I included. The Chancellor’s Authority let him or her know everything that was happening in the college. It also gave him or her a 100% percent boost to all spell effects while inside the college.

“There is no spawn time for the mages,” I noted as we reviewed the details with Joy.

“They all spawn at once,” Joy said after a moment.

“How do you know that?” I asked her. I didn’t see any text on it.

“I just do. But there is a drawback. They only spawn once. If they are killed, a replacement will need to be recruited,” she said thoughtfully.

“That is different. Will they help defend Malcum if asked?” I questioned, looking her in the eyes.

“They answer the Chancellor. They will obey her without question unless their AI becomes upgraded. Then they will be able to experience independence. Each of them will be quest givers too,” Joy said seriously. A slight chill went down my spine at that, and I imagined the young girl in front of me giving an evil supervillain laugh. I was about to give Joy control over 27 powerful NPC mages. It was also odd to give control of such a powerful structure to a teenage NPC who was just level seven. She had been appointed Guildmaster of Mages, but I hadn’t named her Chancellor of this building yet. It hadn’t even been built yet.

The amount of essences and materials required to build it was oppressive, but still less than the library, which was nearing completion every day. We were not going to finish the library before the next Incursion, but we would finish it before the next one.

“Can we start stockpiling the best materials to build it?” Joy said with wide, pleading, irresistible puppy-dog eyes.

“We can. Why don’t you focus on leveling it when it’s built? It’s going to take a very long time to finish,” I said caringly.

Joy bit her lip. “Couldn’t you build it faster. Like—much faster.”

“You know that I still have a divine favor?” I said, a little surprised. She just nodded, smiling and maintaining her pleading stare.

I nodded slowly as it was not a bad investment. With 27 powerful mages defending Malcum, it would make Incursion easy. No—defending Phoenix’s Rest, as that was our most important city. It would also be another massive player draw for those wanting to learn spells. “If we use the divine favor to build this, we will get the bonuses from the materials, but we will lose the potential bonuses of the builders.”

Joy rolled her eyes at me. “No, you won't. Just ask mom to supervise.”

All I could say in response was, “Oh.”

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