The Undying Magician - Book 3 - Chapter 5 - The Radiant Elite
Added 2023-05-18 23:15:48 +0000 UTC The Radiant Elite’s Base
Year 2850 | Month 3 | Day 4
Reginald frowns as he watches Angel lightly burn a non-magician with a simple light magic spell simply for spilling a little tea on the floor of their main building’s roof that they’re meeting on. Not because he feels for the non-magician though. Strictly because he wishes the man wouldn’t bother dealing with them in the middle of meeting.
There’s a time and a place, and this is neither the time nor the place.
“After the men finish dealing with the fraud, we can take the fortified cave the man was using,” Angel continues after the brief interruption.
“And if they have to beat a retreat?” Rachel asks while the other light affinity magician sips at her own tea, ignoring the actions of Angel.
Angel glances at her, only for the woman to add, “He is still a magician, fraud or not.”
“Hmm, guess you’re right,” Angel mutters before stating, “then if they return with news, we’ll just have to deal with the fraud magician ourselves before moving base.”
“I still can’t believe a magician was so bold to make up rumors like that,” the last of the three light magicians, a man named Drake, mutters while shaking his head. “It’s simply arrogance at its finest.”
“I find it harder to believe that the other magicians are actually putting stock in these rumors,” Angel comments as the non-magician servant from earlier returns despite his burns with a freshly brewed pot of tea.
Reginald simply sips at his tea, not adding his own opinions to the conversation. Partially because he has nothing to add, and partially because he would simply be ignored by the light magicians even if he tried adding anything. Because by now he knows that the three idiots seem to feel some sort of misplaced superiority in their affinity.
Ridiculous idiots, the lot of them. But they have their uses.
After a few more minutes of the three light magicians speaking amongst each other, Reginald glances at the other magician in their little group of five – the nature magician. A woman who is even quieter than he is, and who he can’t figure out why is here in the first place.
I’m certain I’ve seen her go off to heal the non-magicians that have been abused by Angel and the other two, so why would she be in a group like this in the first place?
Reginald frowns at that thought, hiding his face through taking another sip of his tea before putting it down on the small plate on his lap and glancing at Angel again. The man is just now starting to go over their full plan that will never see the light of day right when a bullet passes straight through his head, making the man’s already dead corpse fall face-first into the table, startling the other magicians.
And he’s finally here.
Reginald sighs as he creates a barrier of dark mana around him, shrouding himself before he vanishes from sight while moving to a quiet place to watch the proceedings. And just as he expected, the other two light magicians who are still alive immediately make defensive barriers while running for cover. But what surprises him is the sight of the nature magician – he believes her name was Katie Elmwood – looking up in the direction of where the bullet was fired from and not moving at all. Not even showing a hint of panic on her face.
That woman must be here for a similar reason as myself… to test the Undying Magician. But is she testing her for the same reason I am? To see if he has the strength to defeat the Barons? Or is she testing him for other reasons?
It was the entire reason he joined the Radiant Elite in the first place. So that he could accept the hard-drive from that teleportation affinity magician and erase it before the light affinity magicians could see it, leading them to attack the Undying Caverns in a suicidal mission.
Because he has to see the Undying Magician in action to believe the content in the videos he’s seen.
The light affinity magicians in question look extremely pissed at his having vanished the moment the battle started, not to mention the nature magician’s indifference to the death of their ‘teammate.’
A loud explosion sounds from the trees on the side of their base facing the Dark Forest, following which a large fireball strikes the walls, burning part of it down. Then a young man simply walks through it with a sword drawn, somehow having already gotten to the walls from wherever he was at beforehand when he shot Angel in the head.
What stands out to Reginald the most about the man are his glowing crimson eyes that are lighting up the night around him as he simply ignores the non-magicians walking by him, along with the soldiers working under the Radiant Elite who are shooting him. Or rather, ignores them until he gets close enough and cuts them down without mercy.
Reginald feels a shiver run down his spine at the sight before briefly wondering if he shouldn’t have messed with a being such as this one.
Will he understand that I only did what I did to test him? Will he care?
Reginald’s gaze moves towards the nature magician again.
And what about her?
He completely ignores the light magicians who are now starting to bombard the Undying Magician with spells, most of which are bombs of light or beams of light. All of which the magician simply shrugs off. While his clothes begin to burn, that is.
Reginald can’t help but blink at that sight before frowning.
Does he make a habit of getting new clothes after every fight or something?
Before the man can think much on it, the Undying Magician suddenly jumps straight up onto the second floor balcony, then onto the wall a bit higher, and then finally onto the roof where he finds the nature magician still sitting at the table, and the two light magicians making a break for the stairs. But he doesn’t give them the chance, simply using some sort of fire spell to speed him up before cutting down both light magicians with his sword, the sword going straight through their barriers.
Arcadian Metal.
The Undying Magician then turns to look around with a frown, seemingly searching for Reginald while ignoring the nature magician who is still drinking tea.
Is he ignoring her because she isn’t a threat?
“Come out, dark magician,” the man says, making Reginald’s eyes widen in shock.
He knew I’m here?! How!?
After a few seconds of debate, the magician decides that running would be a bad idea if the vampire in front of him can tell where he is despite his cloaking spell. So he steps out of the shadows, his spell vanishing as he does so.
“Greetings, Undying Magician, my name is Reginald,” he says, immediately catching the man’s eyes.
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Comments
Okay. I don’t dislike your story and wasn’t trying to push anything on anyone. As I stated above, I only thought certain aspects about the encounters in this kingdom were becoming a little repetitive and that in any group of people, even a group of powerful people, there are always exceptions in attitudes and behavior and suggested you think about it from a critique standpoint, not demand you do, as again, as I wrote above, I did not know your full motivations and reasoning for writing it that way. If you don’t want to change it and think its perfect as is, that’s more than fine. It’s your story, one which I like, and I don’t know your ultimate plans for the plot or anything like that. They will likely end up better than anything I could come up with. I was just trying to bring some attention to a noticeable pattern in case its something you didn’t notice, (as artists close connections to their own creations means outside opinions can often be valuable in helping look at it from a new perspective), or maybe something you might want to explore further. Perhaps I should have worded “I’m getting tired of”, differently, as what I was trying to convey was that the pattern of multiple very similar iterations of “corrupt fallen kingdom magician attacks or sends someone else to attack first to test mc without considering the implications of pissing of an immortal who has an eternity to grow stronger and get back at them”, “mc repels attack and retaliates and kills a bunch of people and interrogates the rest, until he traces back source of attack and goes to off them”, has the potential to start draining a bit of the tension for some readers. Even if all of these fallen kingdom magicians are corrupt, not all corruption would express itself in the same way, right? Some of the magicians have clearly been a little more intelligent than the others, so the similarities in tactics used by multiple people of different IQ levels, if nothing else, seems a little odd. It they are trying to kill an immortal, or at least an alleged immortal, why are they not testing other means of taking him down? Perhaps it could be explained by a lack of communication between these magicians, but what would explain all of them using such straightforward strategies? Why about the possibility of someone sneaking in and trying to use poison, or some subtle means of tricking him that doesn’t involve straight up combat, like luring him out of the cave then having a force attack his refugee’s while he’s out and using them as hostages to see his reaction or have some leverage? You’ve alluded to his people looking for spys in this chapter, which might suggest that one of them did try, but it was not really mentioned definitely. Maybe nothing about any of his attackers behavior should be changed, but maybe just adding some more of the MCs thoughts about their behavior wouldn’t go amiss. I mean, they keep interrupting his work, so I imagine anyone would get pretty annoyed by that. Is he wondering why they won’t give up and leave well enough alone and planning a way to make all of the interference stop? If not, why? Because he’s become indifferent to the harassment and the consequences that has on the refugees? Again, you don’t have to use or take anything from this, its just my thoughts, and only you can decide if there’s any input of value to be found within. Hell, all of this could become meaningless in the next chapter with a solution or twist I didn’t expect. Just…try to take the fact that I’m giving your writing this degree of thought and investing amount of time questioning and expressing my opinion about it as the compliment to your story and writing skills I meant it to be.
Danielle Warvel
2023-05-19 03:05:57 +0000 UTCAs they say - Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
matt
2023-05-19 01:59:00 +0000 UTCIf you don't like it, don't read it. It has been stated who knows how many times that the magicians in this world are not good people. Especially in the Kingdom of the Fallen. You seem to have a different view of the world than me that makes you for some reason think a dystopian world like this is impossible, so please don't push that view on my story.
WolfShine
2023-05-19 00:38:02 +0000 UTCI’m getting tired of all these magicians acting the exact same way. Did it even occur to any of them that polite discourse might be an option? Just how near universal assholes have been among the higher rank magicians is honestly starting to feel a little unrealistic in a way. I mean, we’ve not met a single S-rank that wasn’t a selfish megalomaniac with no empathy for lower ranks than themselves and no qualms about torturing, exploiting, and experimenting on others on a whim. The only way that would make sense was if magic had a little soul corrupting effect past a certain threshold, rather than just the usual ‘power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely’. Even if that statement has a lot of truth to it, there’s always exceptions. Not every powerful leader is a complete tyrant. Just maybe think about that, because I could be wrong here, but I kinda have a suspicion that it’s like that in your story less because of some internally consistent in-world logic, and more because you don’t want the immortal mc to have an s-rank out or something or anything to take away the tension and sense of stakes of from the story it might otherwise not due to him not having to worry about dying.
Danielle Warvel
2023-05-19 00:35:22 +0000 UTC
