Commander Dahl knew he should be feeling lucky. Having survived the emergency tribunal with his position intact was nothing short of a miracle. Had he not already prepared the memory engrams for the investigators, he’d probably be just as doomed as General Branson. He was well aware that there was every possibility that the tribunal may end up executing the man. In fact, he’d heard that three commanders had already been found guilty of violating the knight’s code and summarily dealt with by the grandmaster himself.

  The grandmaster was nothing if not efficient in his pursuit of his ideal of justice.

  Yet, here Commander Dahl sat, still commanding Dorchester’s forces against the kobalds, leading the fight in defense of the city. Truth be told, it was looking very likely that he may end up being promoted to general himself by the time the investigation finally gets resolved. Never in his wildest dreams could have predicted such a leap in status.

  And he wasn’t the only one experiencing an unexpected promotion either. The grandmaster taking a personal interest in the organization of the military had shuffled the entire command staff around. Where politics and connections used to matter, now there was just the grandmaster’s opinion to consider. Hard-working soldiers who’d been overlooked for years were now being given authority over the pencil pushers and politicians who used to be nothing more than a hindrance they had to put up with.

  Since all of this had been happening, he often wondered what it was about him that the grandmaster approved of. Perhaps it was simply because he did as he ordered, always had. Over the years, he’d become very good at working around the political considerations of the general and the other commanders. He never liked it, but he did it, and he was good at it.

  Even when he’d been given the strong suggestion from the general’s office to take care of Captain Angleton, he’d done everything in his power to make the man’s death mean something. It was the least he could do for such a dedicated soldier of Dorchester.

  But, in the end, that was only a small matter in the sea of violations the general was being accused of. Improper use of his authority, numerous incidents of political favoritism, and misappropriation of resources, among many others. The general would be lucky to keep his head by the time the investigators were finished with him.

  Bursting into the command center, one of his new aides rushed over only to stop at attention. “Sir, we’ve just received a priority request from the keep,” he declared firmly.

  Setting aside his thoughts on the upheaval the army was currently going through, Commander Dahl replied with a grimace, “And what does our esteemed city lord request of us now?”

  Since being more or less promoted to general without the actual title to go along with the position, he’d been receiving all the attention from the nobles that used to be handled by the former General Branson. They rightfully assumed he would eventually be appointed as Dorchester’s newest general, and they were eager to reinstate their political connections with the new head of the army. The self-centered nobility couldn’t care less about his workload, they just wanted to ensure their power base wasn’t affected by the general’s downfall.

  Before, he’d just been in charge of the fighting. Political concerns along with the supply lines were being handled by the general’s office. But now, he was being inundated with paperwork and meetings that he honestly didn’t have time to deal with. He’d already sent a request for aid to the Knights of Oglivarch’s Dorchester headquarters, and he could only hope that the grandmaster would be kind enough to take pity on him and assign him some help.

  The aide wisely chose to ignore Commander Dahl’s tone, answering professionally, “Sir, it’s not the city lord’s office that contacted us, it’s the guard force assigned to the dwarven contingent.”

  Commander Dahl, now confused, replied, “Dwarves? Is the guard actually requesting reinforcements, from us?”

  Everyone knew the subtle competition bordering on dislike between Dorchester’s army and its guard. The situation must be pretty serious if the guard was willing to swallow their pride and ask the army for help.

  The aide shook his head quickly. “No, sir. The ping they sent is regarding our tactical plan for the war with the kobalds going forward. It seems the dwarves requested an update on our force's current strategy and troop deployment.”

  Raising his eyebrows in surprise, Commander Dahl replied, “Did they say why?”

  The aide, still standing at attention replied seriously, “No, sir. They did not.”

  Commander Dahl rubbed his chin in thought. He’d known that the dwarves would eventually get themselves involved in the war. However, he thought they would wait until they at least fortified their new settlement and brought over more of their citizenry.

  Knowing that the call was his to make, he didn’t bother requesting authorization from the grandmaster’s office and instead replied, “Very well. Send them the same tactical plan we sent to House Walker. We’re already going to have to coordinate with their private force, so it shouldn’t be a problem to include whatever troops the dwarves want to provide us as well. Be sure to include the schedule for the meeting we’re having with House Walker. We’ll handle them both at the same time and hopefully, they will agree to fight together. The last thing we need is TWO forces on the field that I have little to no control over.”

  The aide nodded once in understanding, before saluting with a fist to his chest and replying, “Yes, sir. I’ll send it out right away.”

  Smirking in amusement at the eager young aide’s back as the man rushed away, Commander Dahl took a moment to recall how long it had been since he had been an eager young aide trying to impress his superior.

  Taking a deep breath, he forced the pointless thought away and mentally returned to focusing on his duty. As he had been for the past few hours, he filtered through the paperwork he had waiting for him, all the while debating with himself whether or not he was lucky to have found himself in this arguably enviable position. Only time would tell he supposed.

  —--

  It took Nero barely 20 minutes before he got fed up with the fact that he was sitting in a library… not reading the books. The ease of finding what he was looking for through the estate’s Thought Hub was overwhelmingly obvious now that he’d been told it was possible. He had no reason to physically find anything, so he had no reason to stick around.

  When he stood up from the table, he looked down at the trays now half filled with finger sandwiches along with the used coffee cup the archmage had left behind. Looking around awkwardly, he wasn’t sure if he should clean up after himself. ‘I shouldn’t… right? Am I being an asshole assuming that servants will take care of it?’ he wondered.

  Before he could come to a decision, the doors to the library opened. Ms. Davis reappeared with the same two servants from before. In no time at all, she walked up and asked, “Are you finished with your sandwiches, my lord?”

  Nero felt uncomfortable standing in front of her in his armor, seeing as she was calmly standing at attention with her hands folded in front of her waist like a picture of motherly elegance. Behind her, the servants were busily cleaning up the table, combining the various finger sandwiches onto a single tray and replacing the cooling coffee pitcher with a fresh one.

  Trying to sound in control of the situation, Nero replied, “Yes, I’m done eating. Thank you. The sandwiches were great.”

  Nodding politely as she gestured toward the shelves, Ms. Davis asked, “Do you need help finding anything, my lord?”

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  Nero shook his head quickly in denial, replying, “No, I’m good. I’ll just use the copies on the Thought Hub. Um… I think I’ll just head back to my room for now.”

  “Very good, my lord. Would you like any refreshments brought over while we walk?” she asked while turning on her heel and gesturing toward the door with a slight bow, indicating that he should lead the way.

  Luckily, Nero had already figured out how to use the estate’s Thought Hub to find directions, so he started off toward the door before immediately pausing and looking over his shoulder. The two servants whose names he hadn’t bothered to look up were now collecting the coffee pot they just brought in along with the trays and such from before, he said, “You guys can bring the coffee I guess.” Holding up the coffee cup in his hand, he added, “I’m still working on this one. Thanks for looking out, I guess.”

  Walking quickly toward the door, Nero did his best to ignore what was going on behind him. There weren’t many things that could make him feel awkward, but being waited on by fancy people was one of them. At least on the rare occasions he’d gone to an upscale restaurant back home he could make himself feel less awkward by tipping the service staff. Here was stuck just standing there like an idiot while watching them work.

  As he made his way through the incredibly well-appointed hallways toward his room, he did his best to ignore the few servants who bowed to him as he walked by. Right on his tail, he could feel Ms. Davis watching him through his essence field. She maintained a distance of a few paces, keeping herself nearby… most likely in case he needed anything.

  Rather than complain about it, or even bring it up at all, he just sighed and tried to focus on where he was going. He still didn’t feel like this huge estate was his, and he’d never in his life felt so much like an imposter as he did at this moment. He honestly couldn’t wait to get back out in the field and away from all the fuss. That’s where he felt most comfortable. Which was odd, because before he arrived here, he’d never been any type of outdoorsman. But now, he longed for the simplicity of battle and the adrenaline rush that came with it.

  Eventually making his way back to his rooms, Nero took advantage of one of the many couches and settled in for a long session of playing with his link. According to the pings he’s been receiving from Cathleen and Vera, tomorrow he and House Walker’s leadership were scheduled to meet with the army to decide where they would be deploying.

  He did his best to skim the pings for what was important because most of what he was reading was about how poorly he handled the nobles and what possible repercussions he might face in the future. He felt like everybody he knew had decided to send him a message giving him shit about how he’d handled the situation. Even Knight Angleton made a point of stating that tactically it wasn’t wise to publicly be at odds with the council of leadership.

  While he tried to ignore Ms. Davis watching over him while he futzed with his link, he couldn’t help but chuckle at Cathleen’s repeated warnings about not making any hasty decisions until they received the updated intelligence concerning the status of the war. Apparently, the woman had no faith in his ability to think things through before acting. Not that he could blame her… that wasn’t exactly his strong suit. He knew he wasn’t much of a planner.

  Regardless, everything he was reading from them was a tomorrow problem. Therefore he had no trouble ignoring it.

  Instead, he sank happily into the comfy couch and let his mind sink into the library section of the estate’s Thought Hub. Just like he thought it would, it worked similarly to the city’s Thought Hub and he felt his intentions guiding his search. Instead of seeing a long list of titles and summaries, he was guided to several books covering the subject of essence shields. They were even conveniently sorted into difficulty levels and offered suggestions as to where he should start.

  ‘Screw Google, this is how the internet was meant to be searched,’ he thought to himself with a pleased smile on his face.

  In no time at all, he let himself get absorbed in the reading he was doing, completely losing track of his body. While he could still sense the warm cup of coffee he was holding in his hand, the sensation felt muted. Almost all of his attention was on the sea of information he found himself in.

  When he opened a book, it wasn’t so much a text as it was a directed translation he was getting beamed directly into his mind. It was almost like having the ‘meaning’ of what the writer had wanted to pass on being read for him by a voice in his head. He’d messed around with books on tape before, but this was on a whole ‘nother level.

  Unfortunately, the process wasn’t all that much faster than reading, and it didn’t magically allow him to understand what the book was trying to tell him. The information wasn’t nearly as digestible as the pings he received from Vera and the others, and he had no idea why. Rather than get sidetracked by looking up why that was, he instead stuck to the plan and tried to find out what he’d done to create the ‘super mage armor’ that had basically saved his life.

  The first book he looked at was ‘Essence Shields Essential Functions’ by a woman named Bernice Holdenfield. It covered the basics of what Nick and Jennings had already taught him, along with several tips and tricks to make learning how to condense personal essence easier. From what he could tell, he was mostly doing that part well enough already. Although, there were a few things that he didn’t understand and references that he hadn’t heard before. All in all, though, it was basically a review of what he already knew.

  However, there was one section he had to repeatedly go over, as the entire concept it was trying to teach him made no sense whatsoever. Somehow, it was supposed to guide the reader into learning how to constantly infuse more essence into their personal ‘domain’ they created along their body. While the terms the author was using made sense, Nero just couldn’t understand what she was trying to say.

  He’d have to remember to ask Nick about it later.

  One thing that did stand out was the idea that an essence shield was not actually a ‘shield’ in the way he assumed it was when he’d first been taught how to make one. Of course, he’d already figured that part out, but seeing it written out so matter-of-factly was kind of annoying. It was just one more example of how Jennings sucked at teaching, and further reinforced his belief that all classes were stupid.

  The term ‘essence shield’ was created to imply a buffer of personal essence between a person and the free-floating essence that exists in the ether all around them. The ‘shield’ part came when the shield was given a defensive property.

  That of course led to several incredibly interesting chapters about what an essence shield could potentially be used for. According to the author, there were multiple techniques to add functionality to the personal essence a person collected. If Nero was reading it correctly, a person could add air filtration, optical and thermal camouflage, temperature regulation, elemental protection, and even the ability to fly!

  While the book didn’t cover the specifics beyond how one might go about adding a spell function to the essence shield, the subject served as an introduction to the primary ability of defense which was universally accepted as the first and most important function a mage needed to know how to add. Nero, having already learned how to imbue an actual ‘shield’ to his essence shield, mentally mocked the lazy terminology that required translation magic to understand the distinction. He did however find the in-depth description of the proper way to do it helpful, and surprisingly riveting.

  Yet, for all the positives about the book, at no point in time did it mention an effect like he’d accidentally created when he was wrecking the kobald’s. The mage armor he’d created had not required his attention, and it was practically invulnerable. What the book was teaching wasn’t anything like that.

  Hours passed as he worked his way through the book, the coffee cup in his hand having gotten cold long ago. He was so engrossed in his reading that he lost track of time. He was about to move on to the next book in the reading list the Thought Hub had provided him, but he felt his shoulder being gently shaken.

  Blinking a few times to come out of his fugue, he looked up to see the calm and understanding face of Ms. Davis staring down at him.

  “My lord, I’ve been told you prefer to sleep at least 10 hours a day when you are able. If you’d like to head to bed now, you will be able to have time in the morning for breakfast before your meeting at the army command center,” she said in a voice that almost sounded motherly.

  Nero, awkwardly placing the cold coffee on the table in front of him, groaned in annoyance at how tight all of his muscles felt. He hadn’t realized how long he’d been sitting there like a statue.

  As he stood up and stretched, he paused in surprise as he realized that he’d just sat down and read an entire book from cover to cover. And not a little book like a pamphlet, or a kid's book… a real book… like a textbook.

  Grinning widely, he looked up at Ms. Davis and asked, “How isn’t everybody a genius here? I feel like I’ve just experienced an entire class dedicated to Essence Shield functionality in a few hours. How freaking cool is that?!?”

  Smiling patiently, Ms. Davis replied, “Very cool, my lord. Would you like to keep reading, or do you wish to retire for the evening?”

  Nero’s happiness faltered under her professional yet matronly tone. “Um, sure. You can take off for the night. I’ll be heading to bed. I’ve got an early morning tomorrow I guess, and I need to allow enough time before the meeting for Vera to chew my ass out over my spat with the nobles,” he said trying to add some levity to the situation.

  Nodding amicably, Ms. Davis replied, “Of course, my lord. I’ll come wake you at five. That should give you an hour for breakfast and your morning ablutions.”

  Without another word, she walked off toward the door. Nero’s attention snapped to the table where the coffee pot and his cup were, seeing them now inexplicably absent. Narrowing his eyes at the door she gently closed behind her, he muttered, “Now, how in the hell did she do that?”