The Fusionist Book 5 -- Chapter 23

Chapter 23

“Form two lines and no pushing! No entry without assessment! We all work together to hold back the Calamity!”

The guard on top of the walls shouted these words every 30 seconds or so as Larek and Nedira joined the surprisingly long lines leading into the already overcrowded city. On their short journey, they passed a few farms that were being worked, but there were only a handful of them that seemed to be fully operational. There were more than what had originally been outside of Tarvada, including one ranch that held what appeared to be a few dozen head of cattle, but it was definitely not enough to feed everyone in the city.

Unlike Tarvada, there were also caravans entering and leaving the city gates, which made the Fusionist think that there were other towns or cities that were doing better nearby which had been able to continue producing food – or they were transporting other goods besides foodstuffs. Either way, it seemed as though the areas around the perimeter of the Calamity were doing much better than other areas, which he could only assume was due to the need to keep them from expanding; while many of the smaller Apertures around the Kingdom could be relatively ignored, many of the Kingdom’s resources needed to be corralled toward the Calamities to ensure they didn’t wipe out everything.

That was even considering that the Kingdom was even in charge of this, or if it was just the remnants of the SIC still maintaining their duty in protecting the people. Even the prejudiced fools from the previous city that threatened to kill him appeared better off than his only other experience with a city, but that didn’t mean they were actually acting under official orders. Regardless, the words that the guard was shouting over everyone entering the city was encouraging, as it seemed as though the people were really coming together to fight against the Apertures, and the Calamity in particular.

“What do you think he means by that?” he asked Nedira. “About the assessment?”

An older man standing ahead of them in line, wearing a dirty set of worn clothing with his hands calloused from hard work, must have heard his question, because he turned around and eyed the two of them up and down. Larek mentally sighed in relief as his new height didn’t seem to trigger the individual, who also had what appeared to be a rake he’d recently learned was used in farming over his shoulder, and he experienced a freedom that he’d never really felt before as the man answered his question.

“You must be new arrivals, I would assume. I’m not sure how you could’ve missed it from where you’re from, but they’re checking for anyone showing Mage or Martial tendencies so that they can either be quickly trained or sent off to one of the Academies or Forts for formal training if they show more promise.”

“They’re still open?” Larek asked, still trying to figure out what was going on in the Kingdom. From his experience in Tarvada, it almost sounded like everyone was simply trying to survive by themselves without any overarching help from the Kingdom or the SIC, but now what he’d seen near the border of the Calamity made him think such a situation was more isolated than not.  “I thought the whole SIC had collapsed,” he added.

“Not entirely, or so I’ve heard,” the man answered. “Of course, I’m not really in a position to hear the details, but apparently the SIC is still in charge of a few key areas, which include all of the Academies and Forts used for training Mages and Martials. It’s the Nobles around the Kingdom that have lost a lot of power, which has consequently converted many of the SIC members into their own fighting forces in charge of certain territories. Most of them still have a tentative connection to the SIC, at least as far as sending new recruits to learn from an accelerated Mage or Martial curriculum – or so I was told when my nephew was sent north to Crystalview Academy a week ago.”

The name of Crystalview Academy made Larek’s mind blank for a moment as he remembered his own experiences there. When he could think again, he heard Nedira asking a question.

“Has there been a lot of people showing signs of being a Mage or Martial lately?”

The Farmer looked at them with a suspicious look on his face. “Where have you been that you—never mind. You must have been quite isolated indeed not to know,” he said, even as he took a few steps forward as the line moved. “Anyways, ever since the beginning of the Apertures, the potential for being a Mage and Martial has appeared at an accelerated rate – and not just in children. Even those who are up to 30 years old have suddenly woken up one day with the hidden potential to become a Mage or Martial, which is why people are assessed before they are allowed into the city of Fairmeadow – along with all the other towns and cities in the Kingdom. Though, apparently not everywhere.” He grumbled that last part.

Larek looked at Nedira, but apparently this was something that she hadn’t remembered from her missing memories. Turning back to the man, he asked, “What happens if they find someone with potential during one of these ‘assessments’?”

“Oh, they immediately pull them aside so that they can start training them to harness their potential and to help with defending against the Apertures,” the Farmer explained. “From what I understand, the process can take a few weeks up to a month before they start showing signs of wielding that potential, but it’s still much faster than it used to take. I think the more formal training at the Academies and Forts can take up to a year before they’re sent back out, but they come back a lot more powerful than those trained for a short time here in the city.”

“How is it you know so much about this?” Nedira questioned.

The man snorted. “Everyone knows that much, though again, apparently not everyone. Plus, my much younger sister was suddenly discovered to have potential at age 27 three years ago, and she was sent to Crystalview as well. I never saw her again after that, but I was told she was assigned somewhere important and is still doing well,” he said, a bit of a tear in his eye at the mention of his sister.

“I’m sorry to hear that, but I’m sure she’s doing just fine,” Nedira consoled the Farmer. “Thank you for answering my questions.”

“Not a problem. It’s not like there’s a lot else for me to do while in line.”

Since the man was obviously a Farmer, as far as Larek could tell at least, he thought he’d ask about the current food situation. He had some Fusions in his bag to help with expanding food production, after all.

“It’s always at the point where it feels like we’re going to start starving, but with shipments coming in from the south and additional monster hunting from the Calamity, we get by,” the man said in response to Larek’s question. “Thankfully, trade hadn’t completely collapsed between us and a number of other cities and towns nearby, though rumor is that all it could take was one more town falling to an Aperture before everything fell apart. Thankfully, the Defend Faction here has done a superb job protecting us all.”

“Defend Faction? What is that?” It sounded familiar for some reason, but he couldn’t place it right away.

“You haven’t—ah, of course not,” the man grumbled good-naturedly again, before moving another few steps up in line. From what he could tell, it would probably take another 10 minutes or so before they were at the front near the gates.  “Remember what I said about the local forces working independently? Well, many of them have joined either the Defend Faction, such as those who reside in Fairmeadow, or the Strike Faction. The first Faction concentrates on defending us against the monsters of the Apertures nearby, closing them and killing their monsters; the latter Faction, which is much more dangerous in my opinion, are focused on pushing into the Calamity and closing the Aperture at the heart of it. Such a venture would be pure suicide from what I’ve heard, and there’s really no need; the Calamity hasn’t expanded in over a year because it’s been stabilized, and it provides us with much-needed monster meat and materials from their corpses. It’s the only reason we haven’t all starved here, in fact.”

All that he’d learned from the man was both informative and a bit worrying. He intuitively understood that the two Factions that he explained were the driving forces behind the way he was approached the day before, as it seemed as though representatives from the two Factions were aiming to take his head and his stuff afterwards for their Factions’ objectives. That didn’t excuse what they did, of course, but at least he understood some of their motivations.

What was worrying about what he learned was two-fold. First, the local food situation, while better than at Tarvada, also hinted that it was a fragile system of trade that hinged not only on a conglomeration of nearby cities and towns working together, but also using the Calamity and nearby Apertures for monster meat. That was perfectly fine as far as Larek was concerned, because they might as well get a use out of what they were already doing, but if just one major catastrophe happened, then the whole system would be thrown out of balance.

It wasn’t his intention to solve all these problems, but he could potentially help them out by providing them with a safety net in the form of his farming Fusions. Normally, he wasn’t looking to go around and provide his help for free to everyone he came across, but it seemed from the Farmer they had just spoke to that the people in charge here were genuinely trying to do their best to protect everyone the best way they could.

But…

…that also brought him to his second worry. While it sounded like they were doing it for the good of everyone, the “assessment” mentioned pulling people out of the crowd so that they could be trained to fight against the monsters in the Apertures. Larek knew firsthand how he had been essentially forced into being a Mage and sent to Crystalview Academy against his wishes – and that had been during a time when everything hadn’t been as chaotic and dangerous as it was now. He couldn’t even imagine what people, especially those older than the normal children that attended an Academy or Fort, had to do nowadays to “train” for combat that they never thought they would ever have to face.

Was it fair? Absolutely not. Was it necessary? Eh… probably? He couldn’t know the exact situation in the Kingdom to judge if it was necessary, but with what he’d seen so far, he wouldn’t be surprised to find that if all of the new people with potential hadn’t been discovered and trained, then the entire Kingdom would’ve fallen long before this point. Did that give those in charge the right to do it anyway? No. But as the same time, Larek really couldn’t see any other way they could hope to survive without doing something similar to what they did.

He didn’t have the authority to change what was happening nor did he have a solution to replace what was obviously necessary to maintaining the safety of the nearby people. Sure, his Fusions would probably help to bridge the gap between needing warm bodies to throw at the Apertures and the effectiveness of the already existing Mages and Martials, but it wasn’t like he could supply enough to fulfil the needs of the entire Kingdom. A city or two, perhaps, but that wasn’t exactly why he was there at the city of Fairmeadow in the first place.

This was just to be a temporary stop where they could find out more information about what was going on in the Kingdom and to find the whereabouts of Nedira’s brother and their friends, which they’d already obtained a good start at after talking to the Farmer, and to get some new clothes for Larek’s altered body. Helping people out was only a secondary objective, and only if doing so wouldn’t cause any delay in his journey north.

In more pressing matters, the Fusionist thought there might be an issue as soon as they got to the front of the line. This “assessment” was liable to reveal that both Larek and Nedira had the potential they were looking for, so how would they react to be pulled aside? Looking over at the woman by his side, she didn’t seem too worried about it, so he just followed her lead.

They chatted about less consequential things with the Farmer, who never introduced himself and Larek didn’t think to ask after a while, before it was the man’s time to be assessed by the guards at the gate to Fairmeadow. He’d been listening to the goings-on up ahead of them as they moved up the line, so the guard’s words weren’t a surprise.

“Step up!” he shouted, gesturing to a spot in front of him. “What is your purpose in Fairmeadow?” the guard then asked in a bored tone as soon as the Farmer was even with him. Larek didn’t hear the man’s response because it was a bit loud nearby, but the guard nodded, touched the Farmer on the arm briefly, and then nodded. “Go on through.”

It wasn’t until that point that Larek was able to determine that the guard, as well as a number of others on the wall and down below letting people inside the city, were giving off the sense of being Martials – and a few Mages, in fact. This, of course, made sense, as they would need to be one or the other in order to determine if one had potential or not – or so he assumed. Nowadays, he could easily tell if someone was a Mage or a Martial by how the ambient energy around them reacted to their presence, but it hadn’t always been like that; he figured that by touching someone who had the potential to become a Mage or Martial, they would sense it in a similar way.

“Step up!” the guard called, gesturing to the same place the Farmer had stood a moment before. Nedira walked up with him, their hands still locked together, and Larek looked at the guard. “What is your purpose in Fairmeadow?” he asked, though opposed to the bored way he had spoken to the Farmer, he seemed much more interested in their answer.

“Just visiting,” Larek responded. “Probably going to purchase a few things,” he added. As soon as he said that, though, he realized that they didn’t have any money. All of it had been lost when his Air Skimmer had crashed and blown up when facing the Sand Vultures, and they hadn’t really needed any in Tarvada because of the unique circumstances they found themselves in there.

I guess I’ll be trading some things instead of just giving them away, he mused.

“Where are you from?” the guard asked, before standing next to Nedira.

“Originally from the north,” Larek answered.

But the guard wasn’t exactly listening as he stared at the woman by Larek’s side. “You a Mage?” he asked, clearly noting her green robe and staff.

“Yes, I am.”

“Good to have you here,” he answered with a small head bob. “Please visit the Faction Commander at your earliest convenience.” Turning to Larek, the man couldn’t keep a frown off his face. “And who do we have here?”

The Fusionist had to admit, he didn’t look like either a Mage or a Martial at the moment. Normal baggy clothes that wouldn’t be out of place on a Farmer, a plain-looking sack over his shoulder, and a Logger’s axe on his waist didn’t exactly scream powerful individual. With his staff stored in his sack, he didn’t even have that as a context clue.

Not seeing any reason to hide at least one facet of who he was, Larek answered with, “I’m a Fusionist.”

The guard looked confused. “A Fusionist? What’s that?”

Wow. I was not expecting that response. “I’m a very particular Mage, one who creates Fusions.” Looking at the guard, as well as the guards on the wall and around the gate, he was somewhat surprised to see that none of them had even a single Fusion on their clothing, weapons, or on an accessory.

Which Larek thought was very strange.

What’s going on here?

One of the nearby guards, a young woman who was wearing a red robe and had an iron mace hanging off belt, overheard the conversation and spoke up. “It’s something only some old Mages know how to do, but it’s practically useless,” she said with more than a little snark in her tone. “It takes entirely too much time to learn and too much time to create them, so they were abandoned years ago with the local training. I’ve heard that the other Academies still teach it somewhat, but they should follow Crystalview’s lead and get rid of it entirely. It’s a waste of time, if you ask me.” She looked at Larek with disgust, which wasn’t exactly new to him, but this wasn’t because of his height; it was because she thought Fusions and Fusionists were beneath her notice.

“Well, if you’re a Mage, then you can still cast spells, so I’m sure the Commander will be able to use you somehow. See him at your earliest convenience. Go on in,” the original guard concluded, waving them inside. But something about what the Martial said caught Larek’s attention.

“What do you mean by ‘able to use me’?”

The guard appeared impatient because they were holding up the line. “Exactly what I said. Anyone entering the city with either potential or previous training has to report to the Faction Commander for mandatory service. No exceptions, even for a Fusion-ator or whatever you are. Now, get moving or we’ll move you ourselves – and we won’t be gentle about it.”

Larek looked at Nedira and was about to turn around rather than get embroiled in this whole “mandatory service” thing, but the guard’s next words stopped them. “And don’t think about running, either, because deserters are killed on sight. We all have to work together to hold back the Calamity, after all, even if a few foolish idiots here and there think they know better. Now, move along!”

The Fusionist only hesitated a few more seconds before he walked inside, dragging Nedira along with him. Once they were inside, the bustling city they had seen at a distance was in effect, as the sound of people moving about, shouting at each other either in anger or simply to communicate, and small-time merchants attempting to gain the attention of passersby to purchase their products filled the area around them. It wasn’t nearly as crowded as Whittleton had been with all the refugees there, but it was close.

Leading Nedira toward an alleyway that would allow them to get out of the crowd, he stopped inside of it and turned toward her. “Shall we go?” he asked. “I can just lift us right out of here and be gone.”

Theoretically, they could’ve left at the gate and the guards wouldn’t have been able to stop either of them, but he didn’t exactly want to cause a scene or hurt anyone. Granted, he wasn’t exactly happy about the ultimatum he was given, but this sounded more like a policy that they had to adhere to than any specific choice on the guard’s part, though he was sure they wouldn’t hesitate to carry out the punishment for deserting or refusing to serve in the first place if it were necessary.

Leaving now, though, wouldn’t hurt anyone, and while they might fire some projectiles at them as they left, he wasn’t exactly worried about anyone hurting them inside of his Pattern box. After they left, he also doubted that any of them would be able to catch them as they fled, so it wasn’t really a concern.

But would it be like this in every city they attempted to visit? Was Tarvada simply unique that the two of them didn’t have to worry about something like what was going on here? He had a feeling that any place where things appeared organized and were maintaining the protection of the nearby areas would be similar in how they treated potential Mages and Martials, even if it wasn’t to the extent where they threatened to kill people that didn’t comply with their orders. Then again, the SIC basically threatened that when he was drafted into the Academy, and to kill his family as well, so it was entirely possible that most of the Kingdom was still following that example.

That sort of put a damper on their search for Norde and Verne, let alone all their other friends. Cities like this were likely to have more information on their whereabouts, but if they had to avoid them so as to avoid being pressed into service, that would hinder their information-gathering efforts.

“Not quite yet,” Nedira said. “We still need some new clothes for you, and I want to gain a little more information while we’re here. I don’t… I don’t remember all of this about assessments and an influx of new Mages and Martials, but from what you’ve told me of what happened in the Sealance Empire, it makes sense that such a thing happened here, too – if before the threat of the Apertures went global. If I can find out more about it, then I might be able to locate where Norde might have ended up.”

Larek paused for a second before nodding. “I agree, but at the first sign that they’re going to force us to participate in whatever they have going on, I’m taking us out of here. Not for own sake, but for our family’s.”

“Agreed.”

With that settled, the two of them rejoined the crowd outside the alley, as Larek tried to figure out how to afford some new clothes. After that, they would go see this Faction Commander and see what was going on here – and hopefully gain some much-needed information in the process.