Chapters Not The Typical Kind Of Wizard
Today had been a good day, no, a great day!
I couldn’t help but smile after the all the antics hanging out with my friends, it had been even more fun after we had arrived at the local anime/games expo at the local community centre. Sure I probably could have done without the earache from Michel, my more “mature” friend telling me that the whole thing was for weirdoes, even though he’d never been to any in his life and just didn't want anyone else to have fun, sometimes he just made me wonder why I still hung out with him.
Shrugging off the stale thoughts I hummed one of the new anime openings that had wormed its way into my head while slowly making my way outside, considering whether or not it might be worth watching. Somewhere along the line we had all lost track of time, it was starting to get dark and the winter nights had been rather harsh the past few days. So rather than put up with the cold I decided I was going home while the going was good, and after hunting down and saying goodbye to all my friends (all bloody twelve of them and their friends) I was just leaving the building.
But something felt off.
For once in a long time, I had left a convention with roughly twenty pound sterling left of my planned spending money, and nothing to show for the brilliant day of laughter and shenanigans. I felt like I was leaving a free food stand without really eating anything, metaphorically of course, after all food and drink was what I had spent most of the money on.
For a brief moment, I was actually half tempted to go back in and just buy the first thing that caught my eye, though I really didn’t want to spend half an hour or so picking around the stalls just for something to reflect on. Sighing half in mirth, half in defeat, I took a step from the doors out into the twilight of the town, feeling a small shiver race down my spine as a cold breeze nipped at my exposed face.
That was when reality suddenly reasserted itself. Mid second-step, I had to pause as a looming figure seemed to materialise from nowhere in the corner of my vision. Jolting round in fright, even fearing for my life briefly, I was silently elated to find no real danger, just some person in a rather large coat tending to a small stand gesturing at me to come closer an take a look. I thought it odd to place himself outside in the cold, the thought didn’t linger long as my eyes took in what was laid bare on the table in front of him.
All assortments of videogame, anime and cartoon paraphernalia was spread out before me like a treasure hoard, I almost couldn't believe my eyes as they searched greedily through the various objects I could easily see, taking note of various ones of interest. I saw a replica handgun from Aldnoha.Zero, an anime I had recently been introduced to and enjoyed perhaps a little too much, Martian design and very well pained to the point it almost looked real!
There was also a sword or katana like weapon that was presumably from the videogame Warframe, if the design was anything to go by, and some sort of egg shaped figurine with legs and a large cannon from something vaguely familiar but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
But the last thing I found took the cake, and all my common-sense.
A full size replica of the original vanilla wizard staff from the Magicka game series laid across the top of a small leather bound book. It looked almost like the prize centrepiece of a collectors’ grand spending spree, and had I had the money it probably would have been mine in a heartbeat.
I recognised the get up. Resident Evil four, the infamous arms dealer. The character had always given me the creeps, what kind of ulterior motive the guy must have had always plagued me as it was exceptionally odd that he just showed up out of nowhere selling weapons of almost every kind.
Clacking my teeth together to stop an involuntary chuckle of nervousness, I asked how much the item was.
“Hmm, that little masterpiece… have to admit I’ve had a little difficulty shifting this one, not many seem to recognise it…” I could almost hear the smile in his voice, the words almost dripping with silken interest. It did not help that I couldn’t really see his face and that alone unnerved me more. “Well, I could let it go for, let’s say… around twenty pounds?”
Coincidence, not something I had always been a huge fan of. I let it slide but my gut was telling me to ask for more information, to make sure this was not some kind of trick. My brain on the other hand was more focussed on the immense bargain, while trying hard not to let the conflict show on my face.
“Just twenty? May I a…”
“Now or never boy! quick before I change my mind!” the man suddenly chided, the mirth in his eyes showing me that I had not done a good job of hiding my doubts.
With a defeated sigh, I gave in. it was almost impossible resist the temptation of such a prize even though all I wanted to do was slink away as quickly and quietly as possible from the almost imposing figure. Pulling out my wallet I grabbed the last crisp note and slowly passed it over the table, the man took it gently from my grip before hefting the staff up and over to me to hold. I had to say that the person who made it did more than perfect as it looked exactly like the ones in the game, even the gently blue glowing crystal hovering in the crook of the crescent moon like shape at the top…
…I had to do a double take. That had not been there before.
“Oh, and before I forget!” I turned to man, my eyes shooting wide in a mix of fear and dread as two yellow silted orbs gazed back, a hand roughly shoved the book the staff had been resting on under my free arm. “Don’t forget or loose this book, you’re going to need it.”
All at once the world began to blur, my head felt like someone had just beat me over it with a rock. The only thing I could register was the sensation of falling.
Then everything went black.
Author's Note
Welp, this is the first story I've written in a while. Feel free to tell me what you think!
Not The Typical Kind Of Wizard
Chapter 1 - A Graceless arrival
I awoke to the sound of birds, which was odd considering I rarely leave my windows open at night, or the curtains for that matter…
Swatting my hand over my eyes, I opened them briefly to let the light of the sun leak through my fingers without blinding me. My whole body ached like I had just fallen out of a tree and my head felt like I might have had a mild concussion. Reaching out with my other hand, I intended to check the time on my phone which was on the bedside table. When I found what felt like a large wooden stick I sharply sat up and uncovered my eyes in one quick motion.
What I saw chilled me to the bone.
It was a nice day, a beautiful day, but all around me was nothing but grass and densely packed trees. To state that this was not my bedroom at this point would have probably caused me to have a mental breakdown. Perhaps fortunately however, nary a sound could be heard except for the delight of birdsong which was oddly calming to my instantaneously shattered nerves. Looking around only revealed more of the same, what appeared to forest expanding in all directions with nothing and no one around sending more and more shock into my already stunned mind.
It took me a while, to say the least, to get my mind back in some form of working order. After taking in my surroundings, I looked down at myself half expecting to be stripped naked with various forms of graffiti drawn on me with permanent marker or some other similar prank. What did greet me however, was nothing of the sort, I was clothed but in a strikingly unfamiliar robe, it held onto my shoulders and flowed with a slight loose flourish around my person, tightly bound around my middle by what could only be described as a leather belt. It covered me completely with a bright red fabric and golden yellow trims stopping just short of my ankles, and while I could not see underneath I could feel that it wasn’t touching bare skin.
The whole situation struck me as something out of a novel, yet it felt so real, a shame really that I would have to wake up soon. Carefully I laid back down, arms behind my head as I tried to ignore the world outside in my mind and sleep…
Opening my eyes again, I stared upwards at the canopy the closely interlocked branches created high above swallowing repeatedly at my suddenly dry pallet. This was real, undoubtedly real, with a deliberately slow and methodical process I began wracking my mind for any kind of explanation for waking up in a forest, in clothes that blatantly were not mine, with my head feeling like I had had an accident with the underside of a car.
Yet it felt so peaceful just lying there. My mind began to drift aimlessly for a while after coming up blank, instead turning to more farfetched ideas and fantasies. Curious, I again reached for the unfamiliar object my left hand had found earlier. Quickly finding it where I had left it, I quickly registered the feeling of smooth, possibly polished wood, I tried to lift it but the angle and size made it difficult to do without digging my hand underneath. Once I had it in my palm the object was swiftly lifted up into the air to a position where it could easily be inspected. For a moment my mind refused to register what it was, the blasted thing was certainly familiar as the crystalline object within the crescent brought the foggy memories to the surface.
That damned merchant, did he have something to do with this? He was the last person I saw, I think, my brain still felt too hazy to come to any major conclusion. On what felt like impulse, my right hand groped the grass on my opposite side, almost instantly my hand found the cold touch of metal, relatively flat with what felt like a handle, a hilt?
A sword, I realised, the rational part of my brain that still functioned disallowing the motion of my hand to bring it up to meet the staff above me. That would not end well if I dropped it.
I took my time, allowing for the aching in my person to slow to a dull throb and then lapse into a simple sense of fatigue as my heart slowed to a steady rhythm. Slowly, I began to get up off the ground. The grass and soil, as strangely soft an inviting as it was, was not a suitable place to go back to sleep like I had tried. Body protesting again the whole way like it thought it had a say in the matter. As I took my time I searched my memory for other valuable possessions, coming up frustratingly empty. Names, familiar faces, quirks and such, all had vacated my head leaving an empty chasm in their wake. My head was a jumbled mess, barely thinking in one single straight line while my body protested the abuse of having to leave the comfort of my patch of grass.
Under most circumstances I would have tried to console myself, talking to no one in particular usually helped me rearrange my thoughts, but my parched throat denied that. Instead, I took to managing what was currently in my possession.
Looking the staff over I felt a little bit of anger swell, the conclusion was that I had bought it so I may as well keep it. It would serve as a decent walking stick at least. The sword however must have either been a replica or a museum piece the blade was so dull it was practically a club rather than a sword, a simple piece with a hand guard that looked to be gold plated, suppose it could be worth something, I placed it carefully blade down in the belt, using it as a makeshift holder. The robes felt like satin or silk of some sort, something fancy like that. With the evaluations coming forward, my mind slowly began to clear up, the strange haze of the sudden situation slowly beginning to fade.
Taking in a long drawn out breath I quickly surveyed my surroundings again to try and get a grasp of where I could possibly be, only to let out tremendous sigh when all I found out was that trees never tended to allow one to find their bearings without difficulty or actually moving. The problem was I had no idea which direction would lead where. Selecting at random could potentially lead to only becoming more lost, but at the same time I possessed no immediate knowledge to allow even so much as an educated guess.
Again I stopped, looking around and admiring the luscious forest, or woods (I was never very good at remembering or identifying the difference), the leaves looked as if they were just beginning to brown.
The thought of how long I could be lost out here for before finding civilisation weighed heavily on my conscience. As I kept walking I could feel the tiredness still seeping into my body, I presumed it probably wouldn’t be long till I was forced to take what would probably be the first of many breaks.
What felt like an hour or so later, my progress was still as slow as ever. I had contemplated taking a brief nap but the thought of being stuck in the middle of nowhere in the dark quickly changed my mind. I slugged onwards, trying to avert my footing away from various tree roots and large branches, it was obvious that no one came out this way often since there were no well-worn paths in the dirt to follow, which left me just as lost as I had started. The only reason I did not believe myself to be walking in circles is because I had yet to turn off the straight path I had made in my mind.
I was tired, I was frustrated, and worst of all my body ached but for some reason I felt the need to keep pushing onwards. Blindly walking through the forest was quickly becoming a chore but finally progress was made.
In the distance I spotted another break in the trees the sudden elation brought my second wind as my pace sped up until finally I could feel the light of the sun on my face once again. Breaking through the tree line I only just noticed that I had practically been running the last few feet, my breathing attesting to the exertion, I relaxed again with more deep breathing while taking a heavy seat on the grass I began observing my new surroundings.
My heart leapt in joy, I had found what looked to be a village in the distance, yet as I admired it, the more tired I felt looking at the distance between it and myself. Not only this but there were strange details that were missing, things you wouldn’t normally see unless you looked for them like phone lines, aerials, or any kind of sign that the place was inhabited. Except for mass off birds flitting around above it the place could well be empty.
My second, and by far strangest observation, was that the birds above the village seemed to be moving various masses of white which could only be assumed to be clouds, which would be impossible if it was not for it happening right in front of me. The birds were also off in colour, unlike the buildings though, they had a far wider spectrum of pastel hues.
I awoke again with a start, my heart skipping a beat. The feel of grass between my clenched fingers bringing back what had happened earlier, waking up on the hillside was peculiar and set off a large feeling of de-ja-vu. I had determined that this whole thing had been real already, but can you really blame a guy for hoping.
The sun had gone down and the land was beginning to darken, the strange birds from earlier had disappeared and the buildings they had been flying over was now the only source of light in the distance.
Any longer sat here however and I wouldn’t want to leave, so with a clear place in mind I again got to my feet. It was then that I remembered the staff. The damn thing had laid almost dutifully beside me the whole time I was out, a faint glowing from the crystal being the only thing reminding me it was there. Picking it up carefully I examined it closely noting how the glow seemed much brighter in the dimming light.
I should have been thinking about just what the heck was going on… yet somehow I had stopped caring. By this stage all I wanted was at least some answers, so I began walking while I thought over what I already knew.
As I walked I watched my feet. Having dedicated my time to my surroundings more than anything I hadn’t noticed my new foot ware that matched my strange get up which were a strange pair of odd leather like shoes with long curled back toes. No laces, just slip-ons, yet stranger yet they hugged my feet comfortably as if they had been tailor made. Then again the same could have been said about the whole of the current apparel.
Red robes,
I stopped walking.
Yeah, I felt like an idiot that I hadn’t realised sooner.
Looking down at the belt I now remembered the design exactly, a gold trimmed plain red robe, brown leather belt and shoes and a face completely hidden by a…
Reaching over my head and down my back I found the hood….
I was dressed as a wizard from Magicka, the same game that the staff was from, even though I don’t remember putting any of it on. Then again I didn’t remember much of anything, and my head was still losing focus too easily. I had been spacing out so much trying to remember what had happened that I had worn out the topic. It wasn’t much of an issue however as there were more pressing things to think about, putting one foot in front of the other I travelled onward with the decision not to continue thinking about that for a while, there was still a high chance that this was just some messed up joke even though I had the sinking sensation that things were already far beyond normal.
Reaching the bottom of the hill I almost tripped as a fallow field embraced my feet, the grass reaching above my ankles and void of any obvious path like the woods. I kept a rhythm while walking since my legs seemed to have recovered enough to move at a decent pace, still, the footing was rough and every now and then I tripped a little. The staff proved only so useful, catching more on the clumps of grass than supporting my weight. I ended up carrying it over my shoulder by the time I finally found a long cobblestone path leading to the village.
Seeing it up close was strange, don’t get me wrong I usually love being in the more rural areas of the town I lived in, but this was straight up old fashioned. Most of the buildings looked to be pre-dating Victorian times.
This time I didn’t stop walking as I thought about just what was going on. All of the buildings, and I mean all of them had similar styling, some just had a few different colours here and there… and were slightly smaller than usual.
I… I couldn’t really be in Midguard, surely?
I realised I had a fake smile plastered on my face only after it started to crack, my mind was starting to have another brief meltdown as I walked into the village borders. A happy looking sign donning the name Ponyville stood firmly to the side of the road as I walked on by, my eyes taking in the letters but my brain was having none of it. I had never heard of this place before, in life or in game, but I definitely was not in England anymore.
Casting my eyes around as I continued, things only seemed to get more bizarre. More and more buildings began to stand out as drastically different. One looked like a fancy tiered cake, another looked like a gingerbread house that had a cake dropped on it. It was after walking for a good few minutes just looking around like an idiot that I saw the thing that finally broke me.
A treehouse.
Not a tree-house, a literal, honest to god, treehouse actually made out of a tree that had grown out of the ground.
That was it, after all the work I had done to wake up, try and reassert and rationalise everything that I had taken in around me, I finally admitted I was in la-la-land and that someone must have either spiked my food or hit me with enough concussive force that I was stuck in a permanent state of lucidity. My feet carried me on, not even seeing where the path was or what was around me anymore, bumping into something I looked down to it only to find a bench, just a normal, elegantly curved bench. I didn’t bother to look at it in detail, my mind overloaded as it was, and sat down heavily, nearly falling over as the bench proved to be a lot lower than anticipated which forced me to stick my legs out to avoid injuring myself.
I rested my forehead in one hand as my stretched mental capacity worked overtime to process the floods of information and panic. I was doing well, I slowly managed to pull myself together again as I found myself performing another round of deep breathing exercises. The dizziness creeping into my head though was more than a little unwelcome.
“H-Hello? Are you ok?” came a voice from in front of me, uncertain and concerned.
I looked up, expecting to see a doctor, or at least someone human. What I did find, was a small purple coloured thing resembling a pony, with overly large eyes and a distinct horn protruding from its forehead. All thoughts at that point stopped, my entire being felt like it had just momentarily frozen in space and time as our eyes met.
We stared at eachother for almost a minute, before it blinked and opened its muzzle.
“Err, hello? Can you speak?” the same voice as before ushered from its lips.
I am not usually one for being so faint of heart, but hearing those words, clear English, from its mouth drove me over the edge of insanity, everything shut down. I could almost feel my eyes rolling into the back of my head as the world around me dimmed back into the inky black from which I had arisen twice in one day.
Jeez I was going have trouble sleeping tomorrow.
Author's Note
Hey folks, here is the first chapter. I still have to admit it's been a while since I've written any kind of story like this in general, so I apologise if my style of writing seems off or changes at all. Constructive criticisms are always welcome!
Anyway, this chapter was a little shorter than intended but I felt it worked rather well for the time being.
Not The Typical Kind Of Wizard
Chapter 2 - Introductions and Situations
Consciousness came fleetingly at first. My head was pounding so hard I could just about hear the blood pumping in my ears. Then suddenly I was awake, yet all I could see was black and the air around me felt cold, almost like someone had just taken away my blanket while I was sleeping.
I found my recent memories slowly surfacing, with a half-hearted effort I brought my hand to my face. Muttering could be heard somewhere in the distance, too quiet to understand. As my palm found the bridge of my nose the fingers reflexively went to work rubbing my eyes before moving to help me sit up. Now my eyes were open I could see that I was no longer on the bench. Looking over my shoulder the bench sat impassively behind my prone body.
Realising that I must have fallen off it I made to stand up, stumbling slightly as my legs nearly let me down. That was when someone decided remind me that I wasn’t alone.
“Woah there, careful, you already fell over once!”
A purple figure rushed forward to support me only catching me just in time as my weight shifted precariously to my right where the sword hung. My bare hand rested on the back of its neck and I could feel the softness of the strangely fluffy fur, it was an oddly grounding sensation as the world around me came back into focus again. Taking another of many deep breaths that day I carefully righted my balance and stepped back towards the bench to sit down again.
“You ah, dropped this by the way.” Looking up I found my staff floating in a purple aura mere inches from my face. Peeking from behind it I could see the horn of the pony like creature glowing with a purple aura in tandem with it. Gently, with a slightly shaky hand, I took it. Placing the butt of it against the floor I lent on it a little.
“Um, thank you.” It came out a lot meeker than I had wanted, she (or at least she sounded female) didn’t seem deterred though, her eyes seeming to light up as I spoke back.
“Ah, so you can talk.” she smiled a friendly, disarming smile before coughing delicately into her foreleg.
“I saw you walk past my home a few moments ago. You looked… confused, and I was going to ask if you were ok but then you suddenly fell over and…”
“Could I ask a question?” Stopping mid ramble, she quietly closed her mouth again before nodding.
“This may sound a bit, crazy. But, where am I?” my throat was still dry making my voice a little raspy, but I managed to ask none the less.
“You’re in Ponyville, but if you mean what I think you mean then, you are in Equestria, west of the Griffon kingdom.” Her answer was exactly what I expected it to be. The sinking sensation I had had on the way to the village returned, I was definitely not on Earth anymore.
Swallowing heavily I let my eyes wander up towards the clouded heavens as it dawned on me that the trader who sold me the staff must have definitely been the one who did this.
“Well... damn.” I muttered, a strange mix of surprise, anger and depression beginning to set in.
“Pardon?” the innocent voice was lost on me, it took me a moment to even register that she had said something. Once I finally looked back I tried my hardest to put away my emotional distress for the time being. Focusing more on the here and now was a far better idea since I had no idea where to begin.
Magic, a loose term for the ability she had used to lift my staff, it wasn’t just some form of prestidigitation. No, it had been undoubtedly real. While she had been close to it there was still no physical contact, yet as I took hold of it there had been a brief moment of resistance before she had let it go. Not only that but the, admittedly cool, glowing effect kind of gave it away.
Then I looked back to the staff as my thoughts gnawed at me. A world that was completely new to me, arriving dressed as a character from a game I knew only too well, a character that also could use magic.
I sat up straight as I remembered something, something that had apparently been crucial if his words were to be believed. I felt about on my person noticing to some disappointment that the robes didn’t have any form of pockets. I chanced opening the top of the robes around my neck a little to see underneath and what I saw confused me a little, though it did explain some things.
Under my robe was a basic set of linens, they weren’t as soft as the robes but they were probably more durable, the set of what looked to be very simple leather armour over top of them however rang up a couple of questions. The parts consisted of a cuirass that mostly covered my chest, though for some reason there was only one shoulder piece on the right side, and greaves. I could also feel the grip of what could only be a set of bracers around my arms. What I was looking for though was found placed over my heart held securely by a set of vertical and horizontal leather straps with buckles. The armour was one thing but the book I had been given with the staff however, was not something I thought was supposed to be used as a form of protection.
Then again, you hear about events where a phone or other such objects had saved lives before.
Rather than fiddling around with it, I contemplated just how it was I hadn’t noticed the extra weight, and the fact that I even had it at all, to be honest. I was learning not to question it by this point, there was either a reason, or not. During my self-inspection I hadn’t noticed that the unicorn had returned and I jumped as she cleared her throat.
“Oh, thank you.” For once in all the time I had been here, I smiled. Gently accepting the glass from the aura I gingerly began to drink. It immediately felt like relief was flooding my system.
Once I had set the glass down on the bench next to me I looked up to find the unicorn looking me over. It took some time until she spoke again, and when she did what she said was something I had yet to think about.
“Now that that’s out of the way I realised that I have yet to introduce myself, my name is Twilight Sparkle, student of princess Celestia.” She spoke with a casual authority, which was obviously expected with a prestigious title I supposed. Though with my mind in its current state and only just coming to terms with everything I didn’t pay it all too much heed as another realisation presented itself.
Not only could I not remember hardly anything about back home, I couldn’t even remember my own name.
“Um, my name is… my… name… I can’t remember.” At that Twilight gave me an awkward smile somewhere between disbelief and worry.
“I, suppose for now you can call me Red.”
It had only come to mind because of the robe.
“Ok, Red. May I ask what you are doing out here at this time of night?”
For a moment I thought of a serious answer, for a moment, what came out of my mouth however.
“I don’t know, what are you doing out here?” My childish smile received a deadpan glare, I don’t know what possessed me but I carried on. “Honestly, shouldn’t a budding student like you be in bed by now?”
“I’m not a filly, and you aren’t funny.” She muttered, which earned her a chuckle before I let the attempt to lighten the mood dissipate back into the empty quietness from where it came. I took the moments distraction to ask myself the same question.
“Look, I… I just… I don’t know.” I relented with a sigh. For all intents and purposes I really was at a complete loss for any reasoning what-so-ever.
“You- you’re kidding right?” Shifting from mild annoyance to incredulous, she looked me over again, her eyes lingering on my face, the staff and sword in turn.
“Seriously, I have no idea what’s going on here. I have no memories of anything that happened before I woke up. All I recall is… well, waking up in the woods back the way I came.” Deliberately omitting the details about who I presumed sent me here may not have been the best of ideas, but with what little I knew at this point I didn’t want to complicate things further.
“Oh… wow. You woke up in white-tale woods? Did you hit your head or something?” She was genuinely sympathetic, but now it was my turn to return the deadpan look. While it would explain how I had felt, it wouldn’t explain suddenly being there, and as I voiced this before we both, again, lapsed back into silence.
It was agonising, so much so that I had to change the topic just to get talking again.
“So uh, your kind rather common around here I take it? No offence, just where I’m from…”
“Yes, Equestria is our homeland after all, home to Earth, Pegasus and Unicorn ponies alike!” Her attitude was friendly again, still wary though, probably not so blind to the fact that I was just making idle conversation. Knowing that there were apparently three different races of these ponies along with the mention of griffons earlier made me feel as if I might have hit the loony bin jackpot. “And then there are the Alicorn Princesses, Celestia, Luna and Cadence.”
“Oh-oh-oh-ok, ok, well it’s safe to say that life here is going to be a lot different to back on Earth.”
“So, you’re from another world? Well that does seem like a plausible explanation since I’ve never seen someone like you before. Speaking of, what are you exactly?” The bluntness of her attitude was briefly unnerving, almost as if this kind of thing was a daily occurrence for her.
“I’m a human, or homosapien, if you prefer scientific terms.” Her smile turned thoughtful for a moment before she seemed to have an idea.
“So, you have nowhere to go right? Since you just got here, if you want you can stay at my library till morning? Don’t want to be leaving someone new out in the cold.” At her mention of cold, a shrill breeze tore through the street. For the most part the robes kept me warm yet the night was still young and with such a kind offer I could hardly refuse.
“If that would be alright, thank you, I take it you live in that tree there?” Nodding furiously, she turned around and began to trot away
“We might want to hurry. I don’t know how long it will be till tonight’s thunderstorm will start.” At that I stood up and followed her back to the tree-library-house. Literally the kind of place a bookworm would fantasise about. As we walked I noticed a couple of interesting details, firstly, Twilight was actually quite tall, her head was about chest height not counting the horn. Secondly, that it was already starting to rain.
We got in just as it started to pick up, oddly timed as it was. The place was big, warm but most importantly, inviting. The fireplace was already lit and I could see some strange green and purple scaly thing toasting marshmallows over it. As for the rest, well, there were definitely a lot of books, quite a ways from the fireplace of course. An armchair and a settee positioned comfortably around where the heat could reach, and another doorway that presumably lead to some form of kitchen stood not far off. There was also a staircase, but I didn’t want to be rude by nosing around.
“Hey Twi, uh, sorry I kind of ate some of yours since you took so long.” The little reptile thing called, not even turning to look at us as it concentrated on evenly cooking the sugary treat.
“Spike, we have company for tonight, say hello to… Red.” As it turned round, its eyes went wide.
“Wow… Twilight, what is that?” It was fair play really. I could only just guess that he was some kind of small lizard, a drake maybe? On the other hand while I had jibed at Twilight, indirect revenge aside, I had to admit essentially being called an ‘it’ was not something I was used to.
That was not the only thing that was going to take some getting used to though, was it?
“Are you ok Red, you keep spacing out?” Twilight was once again worrying about me, understandably so since I had appeared to miss her entire conversation with Spike, even he was now looking a little worried. I struggled with my thoughts for another moment, an errant hand scratching at the back of my neck.
“Honestly, no, I’m not alright.” I said with an awkward smile. “There’s not much I can do about it at the moment though.” Twilight just nodded sympathetically while Spike scratched his own head perplexed.
“So you uh, really have no memory of how you got here?”
“Where I woke up is crystal clear, but how I got there from my world is nothing short of a mystery” While it was not a complete lie I did feel a little guilty.
“Man that must suck. Well, so long as you’re cool you’re good in my books! I don’t know where you’re going to sleep though.” Admittedly it had been kind that Twilight was letting me stay the night, but I think getting to sleep, never mind where, was still going to be a bit rough with how much rest I had gotten earlier even though passing out from shock probably doesn’t count. On top of which my brain was still ticking over with how to process all this new information it was receiving. All I wanted to do really was curl up and sort my head out, didn’t look like that was going to happen any time soon though with everything happening.
“For tonight you can have the settee if you want. The guest bed unfortunately needs to be replaced after the frame got broken and while the mattress may be comfortable the floor is quite solid.” She visibly winced, obviously recounting whatever the event was that caused it.
Smiling and thanking her, I decided to take another sit down as we all walked back towards the fireplace. The seat was definitely comfortable, a bit low again though as my knees ended up above my waist. It was however comfortably large. Spike hopped up alongside me as twilight took to laying on an elongated armchair closer to the fire, watching closely as she grabbed a marshmallow with her telekinesis from a bag left on the rug and just held it over the fire like it was an everyday occurrence, which for them it probably was.
“So, Red. Since I take it you can’t remember anything about where you come from perhaps you could tell us a little about yourself instead?”
I am twenty years old, fresh out of education from college, I had had plans to go into university after a year or two of solid work at my job. I loved playing video games and watching shows in my free time while getting out and seeing friends as often as I could. I tried to go into detail to test just what I could remember…
…Turns out it was not all that much.
Family, friends, acquaintances, work, play, was all I could remember, but like looking back on an odd dream. Details were blurred, names were non-existent, and places were muddled and confusing. I shook my head solemnly as I began to stutter the last attempt, my brain coming up blank.
“I-I’m sorry, that’s all I can remember.” I finally looked up from the floor, feeling hollower than when I first sat down. Twilight gave a supportive smile, but a twinge of pity did not manage to escape my eyes as she slowly got out of her chair. Now that I thought about it, I hadn’t really looked at Twilight before, now as I watched her slowly get up to come join spike and myself on the settee I got a proper look. I took a moment to really take in Twilights appearance, besides the purple fur, her mane had a nice contrast of dark, slightly more blue, kind of purple with a single dark and lighter purple stripe. Her horn was shallowly spiral fluted and the tip was rounded much to my surprise.
She also had a starburst mark on her flank, I refrained from asking though to avoid being rude. Other than that her appearance was that of an actual pony, if ponies had an almost cartoon appearance and belonged more to myth than real life. As my mind began to wind down she sat on my other side.
“Maybe we should come back to that later when you’re in a better state of mind. For now, are there any questions that you would like to ask?”
By the fourth I was starting to feel a boiling anger swelling up inside me, biting my tongue to prevent any profanity I shook my head.
“M-maybe later, I think I just need some time to… think.”
She smiled sadly as she got of the seat, levitating Spike onto her back in the process.
“I understand, this is still quite a lot for you to take in. Thank you for answering what you can, I’ll try and write up some theories about what may have happened for you to get here before bed. For now maybe you should rest, there is food in the kitchen so feel free to help yourself.”
I listened for a moment to be certain they had gone before taking off my robes. Looking them over thoroughly they were exactly as I had remembered, the hood was also a separate adornment that sat over the robes shoulders rather than being fully attached. Looking over the armour I slowly removed that too, separating the book from its buckles, the strings at the sides of the chest piece and bracers more like thin leather ropes than I had expected. Finally slipping off the shoes and setting everything aside except the book and my linens, I laid down on the makeshift bed which turned out to just be big enough.
It was going to be a long night, I didn’t feel tired and my head was filled with so much clutter that I probably would be tossing and turning anyway. So it was time to really look into what I was in for.
Picking up and opening the palm sized book to the first page was rather uneventful. It looked like some kind of index with only page numbers listed while all the places where the titles would be were blank. The font was a fairly average size and overall the first two index pages squeezed in ten pages each vertically. There were six index pages.
It didn’t take a genius on the subject to figure out what this was. A book for magicks.
There were two already present as well on the second page, the basic couple of haste, and revive.
My hands shook slightly as I looked for the corresponding pages and as I found them a sudden unease washed over me. Their descriptions were almost as I remembered them, element symbols and all.
Lightnng – Arcane – Fire = Haste
So it was supposedly possible for me to use magic, well…
… this was going to get interesting.
_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--_--
It was three in the morning.
I knew because the hanging clock at the other end of the room told me so, along with its incessant ticking.
I had been awake most of the night, and by most I meant all but one measly hour of sleep that had come at the expense of finding out it was far easier to sleep on the floor than falling off the far too snug cushions on the settee.
Falling off of low lying seats seemed to be a thing at the moment.
Regardless I had spent the time dredging my memories for anything related to the game I appeared to be from, with a strange amount of success in comparison to normal memories which was quite irritating. Lore, spells, and other titbits started to come back to me, but not the magicks. It made sense since I was imitating a game character, I would have to find the tomes.
Funny as it was though, I was still angry and scared at being stranded in a completely unfamiliar world where even the lore was of no use. Not only that but magic being real, while fascinating, was in itself rather worrying. Twilights magic was rather refined, Wizard magic… not so much.
Fire balls, lightning strikes, furious snow storms, death beams and many more such hostile spells could be bristling at my fingertips at any moment. On the flipside though, healing life, water, shields both magical and earthen were also a possibility, though I had to wonder just which game I was “playing” as. There was one of the games which had a similar ability to levitation, but not knowing left me hesitant to try.
There was just one other problem though, if it was true that I could use magic, then how? In the games you had to press the corresponding keys on a keyboard, and I didn’t have one of those just lying around on my person. The staff didn’t offer any hints nor did the sword, which I had politely left far away by the front door, leaving a rather confusing problem. I supposed that the old RPG mindset of concentrating on what element I wanted could work, no guarantee but it was better than nothing.
I sat up slowly, letting my eyes adjust to the dark room I grabbed the staff lent against the seat behind me and decided on my first spell. Life had the least destructive properties of all the elements that I knew, even the shield element could cause its own brand of havoc since passing through it was impossible without either breaking it or waiting till it faded, so life was the first thing I settled on trying.
Sitting on the floor cross legged with the staff in my hands across my lap I… well… meditated I guess.
Thinking hard about the green icon while sitting as still as possible, I was almost tempted to start the humming that people usually did while just sitting there for so long with my eyes closed, expecting something to happen. Thinking it through I should have really kept my eyes open, though concentrating as hard as I could meant distractions outside my head would not be welcome, changing my thoughts slightly to try thinking about healing and growing flowers something finally happened.
There was one little detail that I had momentarily forgot about as a weight suddenly settled over my shoulders and back like a quilt had been gently placed over me, reflexively opening my eyes the glimmer of green light that met me momentarily blinded me.
Fluttering around just at eye height left me stunned as it swooped around randomly around my person, reaching a hand out it reacted instantly flying to my open palm where it held still enough for me to look at it clearly.
It was exactly as it should have been as far as fluttering green ball of light goes, at first I smiled, I had done it. I had successfully summoned an element! It quickly turned into a grimace as I realised this didn’t fix the ever growing list of problems. If anything it actually created more, after all, what reason did I have for having this ability?
Regardless I chuckled quietly to myself, a fantasy world with fantasy powers, something a lot of people could only fantasise about back home. Now here I was living a literal dream.
I was just going to have to get used to it I supposed, nothing more to do until I could get home after all. Letting go of the little ball of light I watched it for a few moments. The weight on my shoulders was pleasant, a warm quilt like I had thought earlier, and it also felt powerful, like at any moment it would become some profound energy that could alter the very fabric of reality. Which in a way, it would.
The moment the little element light shot to the staff a feeble green beam shot from the tip at the ceiling. Dropping the staff in panic, thus cancelling the spell, I jumped up to inspect any damage.
So now Twilights home had a set of ceiling flowers.
Great...
I was certain that I should have been worried, the noise that the beam had made wasn’t loud but if Twilight or Spike saw the flowers then questions would certainly be asked. Not to mention she might not exactly be happy with the new additions. Self casting completely forgotten I hastily made for the kitchen to grab a chair.
Strangely the chairs were fairly normal, or human like in this circumstance, perfect for standing on, dragging it through into the living room I made to grab the offending flowers.
When I said human like, I forgot one key problem. As I stood on the chair and reached for the flowers the chair rapidly began to tilt and wobble, I was able to grab the flowers but they disappeared into magical sparks as my hand closed around them.
Then the chair fell backwards, and my face found the floor.
I laid there quietly, listening for if anyone was coming down the stairs to find the disturbance. It didn’t take long before the sound of hooves could be heard clopping down the steps.
Author's Note
Sorry this chapter has taken a while, I've recently started a new job so I haven't been able to spend to much time typing.
Not The Typical Kind Of Wizard
Chapter 3 - Brief Respite
The time was now four-fifteen in the morning, and my accident had sadly not gone unnoticed.
As I sat on the now upright chair, I examined the little drop of blood that was creeping down to my lip from my left nostril with the mirror Twilight had been kind enough to let me borrow.
Fortunately, my nose was not broken in any obvious way. My pride however used its new wound as a profound statement to remind me that standing on unstable objects to grab things was not a good idea.
Using the tissue, also provided by Twilight, I dabbed at the blood causing it to smear before I cleaned it up completely. Once done, I scrunched up a piece into a small knot and stuffed it in to stem the flow.
Taking in the quiet early morning atmosphere, I calmly set down the mirror and looked at the previously mentioned pony who looked back with mirthful eyes from her prone position on the settee, a hoof covering her muzzle as she tried to hide her giggles at my expense.
“I suppose I can say that the fall knocked some sense into me.” I muttered, causing her to finally break down in to a fit of laughter. Being physically sound I had to admit finding someone face down and backside up on the floor after something silly like this would be quite funny, if painful. Trying to forget the fact that if I had been unlucky enough I could have been hospitalized, I did laugh a little myself, though it ended up feeling a bit awkwardly forced.
Self-casting would really be useful if something like that happened.
“So Red, why were you standing on one of my chairs?” The sudden question brought me out of my reprieve, and I looked at her blankly for a moment considering an answer. I did consider a lie, but there wasn’t much chance that admiring the woodwork would be considered normal from the inside of a tree.
Scratching the back of my neck nervously, I told her the blunt truth.
The silence was deafening.
For a moment Twilight rubbed her eyes before inspecting the ceiling of her home, before looking back in confusion.
“Where are they?” she asked plainly.
“Well, you see, I forgot they were only made out of magic, meaning that after a few seconds they vanish.” The more I talked, the more she seemed to look at me with uncertain glare.
“So, you’re telling me that you cast a spell that I couldn’t detect, in my house that made flowers out of raw magic, grow out of solid wood without damaging it?”
“They didn’t grow out of it more as they grew on it. They weren’t real flowers.” I muttered, trying to solidify the statement.
“Is there something I’m missing here, I think you must have held out on what you really are Mr. Human…” The look I was now on the sharp end of was bordering on scientifically predatory.
Rising my hands defensively I pushed the chair back a little across the floor.
I looked down and to the side, unable to continue looking at her large eyes, uncomfortably shifting in my seat. The silence was once again palpable with the large green elephant in the room.
“So, you don’t have any inherent magic, and you have no basic concept of spell casting, so how did you cast it?” To this I grimaced. Of course she would start digging given the short conversation that we swapped last night.
“That’s not entirely true, I knew of the magic I now possess, it just doesn’t work the way I remember it doing.” Taking a deep breath, I decided it was probably the best time to jump into the deep end even though this was moving forward far quicker than I had intended.
Motioning for Twilight to get comfortable I began to think about how to explain my additional situation. As she sat on the floor I made a point to lay the staff on the floor between us, giving a weather eye glance towards the sword at the door too for good measure to help me jog my memory.
“As I may or may not have already told you, my world does not have magic, but we do have stories. Tales, fiction, myths, you name it. Many of them will involve a magic of some nature. There was one rather odd… or should I say a few odd tales that spoke of a world that had wizards.”
“These wizards were an odd bunch in comparison to many tales before them. That was not what made them unique however. Their power stemmed from eight elements and to use them they drew the power in from the world around them in select combinations, channelling them into these kinds of staffs…”
“…or into other such artefacts to generate spells and magicks.”
“So, you just woke up with the ability of something you only knew of in fantasy, an ability that manifests magic in eight different forms through specific objects?” I simply nodded, mixed emotions in my head frothing as I still tried not to think about it too much.
“You have really landed in a strange predicament haven’t you?” She smiled, catching me completely off guard. The conversation yesterday had proved to me that she was a very inquisitive pony, one who would ask plenty of questions.
For her to just stop was something unexpected.
“You could say that again.” Smiling back, I still felt uncomfortable, and something felt off about how chipper Twilight looked.
Slowly, she stood up and walked past my left side before circling back on my right, before I knew it she was circling around me, eyeing me up as I sat there watching her out of the corner of my eye.
To say she was really beginning to unnerve me was an understatement.
And that was right before she smiled at me and spoke.
“I think this deserves a demonstration.”
Her sudden exclamation caused me to flinch, before a deep cold dread began to settle in. Internally I could feel my stomach starting to tie into a knot. Memories of chaotic barrages of spells flying every which way, people and creatures turning to mush as large boulders crushed them, arcane beams scouring their flesh while cones of frost froze others solid. It was brief feeling, but I felt moderately more tired for it, the thoughts fell away quickly though leaving me anxious.
“Uh, I’m not so sure if that’s a good idea, at least not here. I mean what if I accidentally damage something or something explo-”
“Its fine we’re not close enough to the books for them to be in any real danger from such things. On top of that whatever happens I have more than enough magic of my own to handle it.” Her overconfidence, while a little inspiring, made me cringe internally. That was usually the kind of line that happened shortly before everything hits the fan.
Swallowing heavily I looked her in the eyes somewhat hoping that at least a fragment of that confidence would rub off on me. I had barely begun to know the mare and I already could tell she was the kind who could quite easily cause her own trouble if she couldn’t find it. The only supposed blessing was that I already knew the destructive powers of this magic even in its simplest form.
Playing a game and using the real life thing are two completely different things.
In the brief moment that I had been uncertainly staring into the violet depths lost in thought, she had come to a complete stop. Not even noticing her concern I slowly stood up, taking the staff up with me.
“Ok…” The first mutter from my lips was simply a reassurance for myself.
“Aww, but you said there were eight.”
“Twilight, please don’t. The reason I’m doing this is… is because I haven’t got a feel for the rest yet. Like I said, the magic is not in a form I’m familiar with and I don’t want to cause a hazard.”
Resigning with a sigh she walked back over to her seat to watch, so now the only issue was repeating what I had just learned. Only I had a better idea, one that could help put across my point a little better.
It took a moment, thinking about my stance and how I had achieved the previous cast, Twilight slowly shuffling closer to the edge of her seat, notebook poised. Her posture was strange, as she sat on the cushion like a cat, tail twitching from side to side impatiently.
Again I took the stance with the staff pointing towards the ceiling, legs slightly spread in a firm stance as I thought hard about pushing an imaginary energy outwards from around me.
What happened was actually rather spectacular.
The moment I had thought it, feeling the pull of the powerful green energies rush inward, the lights flew to the staff like before, shooting down it like lightning before exploding at my feet into a bright green ring of energy that expanded outward from my feet.
As quickly as it appeared, the ring disappeared as it reached its limit, though it had not gone as far as I had been expecting it had the desired result as Twilight watched with wide eyes as each flower soon began to fade from the centre of the ring outwards. After about a minute all the flowers had vanished into fading sparks of energy just as someone suddenly decided to speak up from somewhere behind me.
“Wow, what kind of spell was that?! My stomach ache’s all gone!”
Pausing, I slowly turned my head to look at the small drake standing mere feet between myself and the stairs. The faint green glow of the elements healing effects fading quickly, I guess it proved that it worked as intended.
“So, when were you planning on telling me that that magic also heals people?” She asked with a sly grin. I nodded absentmindedly before confirming that I had been planning on telling her after the cast, accidentally healing Spike had not been a part of the idea but it had worked in my favour.
Twilight quickly finished writing down her notes before placing the pad on the table and looked at me.
Looking up at her, I simply stated its canonical name, “Life.”
Nodding with a gentle smile she watched me for a moment as the silence continued further, Twilight seeming just taking a moment to drink in the atmosphere while I tried to stay awake.
“You know, you’re not really all that much of the talkative type, are you?” The question came softly, yet it still caused me to sort of space out. I felt every little barricade I had erected against the torrent of dark foreboding thoughts crack a little more, another self-imposed facade to somewhat quell my unease slowly being worn down. After a moment or two, I decided on a slow and deliberate response to really set the light on my mood, predicament and how poking me with a metaphorical stick was not helping any.
“Well, I’ve woken up in another world with talking ponies and magic, discovered that I myself am now a wizard from a rather familiar setting with barely any memory of my home, family, friends or really much of anything.”
I paused for a breath, winding up for the rest of my rambling while trying not to raise my voice.
“Furthermore, during the night I realised that not only can I not properly remember any of those things, the lore and history of the very world that my new abilities stem from is almost like it was burned into my mind. There are still details missing but nothing major. By extension I am essentially now a walking talking magical powerhouse, with almost no limit to my magical power save the few elements I wield with no idea or predetermined intention as to why I find myself in such a world drastically different from my own with said power, and I am actually scared for my life and the safety of those around me because of such. I am almost constantly cursing whatever power that brought me here for either their blatant disregard for other peoples’ lives or how they are potentially are doing this for their own amusement all the while debating if maybe I am only seeing one side of this situation and in reality I am either dead, dying, comatose, clinically insane, vividly hallucinating, vividly dreaming or genuinely in another world, in a list from worst case to best case scenario. Lastly, if the latter is true then what is the reason for this world specifically and why was I sent here.”
Rant over and slowly opening my eyes after realising I had closed them in thought I found that Twilights own eyes had crossed, the sudden avalanche of my response negating her comment with a rather harsh and grim painting of my inner thoughts. Truthfully, unloading all this mental baggage felt like I had just dropped a lead weight that had been pulling me down, or at least one of a few. The purple librarian in front of me seemed at a loss for words which as oddly satisfying as it helped me show how lost I felt after being suddenly shoved into all this.
There was a slight bit of guilt though, I had tried not to just dump everything on her like this yet after yesterday’s fumble of being unable to right my thoughts I couldn’t help but blurt it all out at once.
“I’m sorry, I hadn’t realised just how difficult this has all been for you.”
“Well I have to admit, things have been a little weird and awkward since we met. I’m sorry for pushing but you just seemed so down in the dumps that I thought opening up might help you a little. It seems that I was wrong.” A frown slowly dampened her mood as we watched each other, in truth I must have looked like a mess, no morning shower, barely any sleep, in no fit state of mind.
I was kind of used to it though, stress and I had a long standing relationship from what I did remember, and though it was the one wearing the pants I always had a few cards up my sleeve.
“Hey, look, water under the bridge. Let’s not dwell on it, Ok? Forgiven and forgotten, you were only doing what you thought was best.” I managed some measure of a smile, half-hearted as it was. “For now let’s get something to eat, eh?”
A short time passed after we went into the kitchen from the impromptu demonstration of my new abilities. Surprisingly I had found that this world still had the black miracle drink of the gods (a.k.a. Coffee) and my mood slowly improved from there. Soon I found myself making small talk as we ate a healthy serving of jam on oven cooked toast, I even went as far as to explain to Spike what really happened with the spell I cast.
It was only as we began to wind down from the morning strangeness that I realised just how rushed everything had felt since I got here. Now as I sat here eating breakfast and drinking the only pure wake up elixir with a talking unicorn and a baby dragon, did the situation really begin to sink in properly without causing a meltdown.
I was in another world, not mine, not Midguard, which probably meant that things weren’t going to work quite the same as either of the two. I thought back to what I was thinking back in to when I was in the woods (or forest, still not too sure), thinking that I was literally in a dream world of most cartoon, videogame or anime enthusiasts. I guess I was not far off with that assumption, though that would depend on the individual, to me this whole thing seemed like some attempt at mashing two things together and hoping they worked.
Mentally shrugging I looked back to Twilight as she happily tipped back the last few drops of her own brew, her plate empty and a look of determination on her face as she set the mug down. Spike on the other hand was taking his time, his Jam also mixed with a strange combination of a crushed emerald and amethyst. My own breakfast was only a couple of bites away from being finished and my first mug had been downed long in advance while my second dwindled at a steady pace.
I wondered to myself how long it had been since I had simply sat down and appreciated breakfast like this...
Shaking my head gently I pulled myself out of the reprieve, the more I tried to remember the more I felt like I was clutching at straws, there was no point dwelling on it right now until I found the reason for why I was here. That wasn’t going to happen by just sitting around admiring the small porcelain plates on the table.
Of course the dread still lingered, but it was now fully under control with an objective clearly in mind.
“Ok, Red. Since it seems you might be here for a little while, how about I introduce you to Ponyville properly?” Twilight beamed.
Smiling back, feeling much better for the time to clear my head, I nodded in response.
I had no idea neither what this world had in store for me, nor what my goal might be or even become.
Yet as I stood from the table I decided that this first step should be a simple one.
Try and grasp just what kind of a world I was in.
Author's Note
Ok, third chapter, finally got this far!
From here on out I plan on trying to make these chapters a fair bit longer but LIFE has had me quite preoccupied. I will try and get the next chapter done as soon as possible.
