DMS Chapter 17

  “There are several groups of militia patrolling this town, and because we’re a frontier town, most who joined the army would become powerful, if they survived, because of the number and power of the monsters that attack us,” Anuel answered.

  They paused for a few minutes, and Flinx started asking the priest more questions.

  “I want to journey into the forest to attack the monsters there so I can gather the resources that I’ll need to increase my power. Is that allowed?”

  “Of course. Why would we stop anyone from killing monsters? The fact is, if somebody like that arrived, we usually don’t expect them to survive for very long. Again, this is a frontier town, and that meant the monsters in the forest would be extremely powerful. It would be best if you registered in the Adventurer Guild since they will provide you knowledge that you might need.”

  “I was accidentally teleported here, probably from somewhere very far away, because our language is different. I’m just glad that I can speak and write the local language, even if there are still some difficulties. Again, thanks for teaching me.”

  “You paid for it, and you paid a lot. Are spellcasters normal where you came from? It’s quite rare here, though they’re powerful. There’s only a couple of mages here in this town, the mayor’s wife, and the captain of the guards.”

  “Spellcasters are rare? How is this town surviving?!”

  “Warriors can fight the monsters, not only the mages. Of course, mages are powerful, and they have means that most people could only imagine. I believe that the mayor’s wife's grandfather, the old wizard that was assigned here, supposedly created some sort of hidden magic that makes the monsters avoid this town.”

  Their talk continued for quite some time, and Flinx learned a lot more things that were commonly known by citizens, like prices of different things, like the price of a room at an inn and the food that would come with it.

  Flinx then asked the priest if he could continue staying in the chapel.

  “You can stay here as long as you like. The salt that you’ve gifted me is enough for you to rent that room.”

  “You don’t need to include me in your food budget,” Flinx told Anuel, and the old priest just smiled and shook his head.

  “Can I continue learning the language from you?” Flinx asked, and the old priest laughed and told him that, of course, the lessons could continue.

  Anuel also advised Flinx to read the books in the chapel’s small library, so he would learn more about this town. After their talk, he followed the priest’s advice and headed directly to the small library. He knew where it was located since the old priest had shown him around during his first few days of staying in the small church.

  The library did not capture Flinx's interest back then since he didn’t know how to read the local language, but now that he knew a little, it would greatly help his proficiency if he started reading the books there.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  For the next few days, aside from learning the language from Anuel, Flinx started spending several hours a day in the library. Reading the books there was a challenge for him, and he even had to take notes so he could ask the priest the meaning behind the words or the sentences. His time in the library did help him tremendously, and after a few more days, his proficiency in the language grew so much that he almost sounded like a local. That was when the kids started losing interest in him.

  A few of the curious ones did stay and started asking him a lot of questions about where he came from. He finally resorted to translating some of the fairy tales that he knew to the local language and telling them to the children, and he knew that it was a mistake since, after the first story, an army of children started coming.

  Anuel had to scold the children, and to compromise, he scheduled a story-time hour in the afternoons with Flinx for the kids.

  Flinx didn’t mind telling fairy tale stories to the town children. It was only going to take him an hour to do so, and it was good practice for his language learning. When he started using the Minor Illusion spell to tell the stories, it had almost gotten out of hand.

  When he first started using the minor illusion spell, half the children ran off, and the rest looked at Flinx as if he had suddenly turned into a monster. Good thing that Anuel was there and pacified the children, telling them that Flinx was a spellcaster.

  Flinx was using the spell to show fanciful castles, flying carpets, wonderful things deep beneath the sea, scary forests, and things of that nature. He avoided showing extremely scary stuff like monsters and ghosts since his audience was children. He wanted to convey a sense of magical whimsy, not frighten the kids into having nightmares.

  The first storytelling spiced with the Minor Illusion spell only consisted of around six kids, and they were at the back of the chapel. The next day, though, the kids grew to around 20 kids, and Anuel, who started listening to the stories, asked Flinx to transfer inside the church. The third day, the number of kids grew again, and this time, there were a few adults in the audience. But soon, the whole church was full. Anuel admitted that the daily attendance exceeded the number of worshippers on worship day.

  It wasn’t too much of a problem since the story time was only about an hour, but a lot of the town’s people knew that there was a wizard staying with the priest in his small chapel. What amused Flinx was, Anuel started collecting offerings from the adults by passing the collection bowls, and the priest didn’t even offer him a cut. He just laughed it off since he didn’t need the priest’s coins.

  At the very least, his command of the language grew, and soon he was talking like one of the locals. Anuel, the old priest, did ask him once what other spells he knew because Flinx had only shown or implied around three spells to the priest. The first was the Minor Illusion spell. The second was his spell that was keeping him and his belongings clean, and the last one was the magic that was keeping him fed. That one was just smelled by the church’s inhabitants, but Flinx declined to answer the priest.

  The storytelling that Anuel had now limited to thrice a week made Flinx a little famous. Soon, he was visited by two of the most important people in the town on separate days.

  The first one was the wife of the mayor. She was accompanied by several guards. According to the old priest, she was one of the two known resident mages in the town.

  “How can I assist Lady Beldor?” Flinx asked the lady mage.

  The mayor of the town would always assume the last name Beldor upon receiving the office, so every mayor and his wife would always be called Lord and Lady Beldor.

  “I’ve heard that a powerful mage took residence in the small church of Isthia, and we wanted to greet said the mage,” Lady Beldor softly said.

  To be honest, Flinx was highly impressed by the lady’s noble behavior. He knew, though, that it could be an act that nobles learned during their childhood. He was a little afraid, though, since the lady mayor was wearing a mage's robe and not a noble’s gown as one would expect from a noble.