"The genius of a Mage???? Are you serious? Just because he's intelligent?" The old man was a little surprised. After all, Orcs weren't a race born with a talent for spellcasting. The most common spellcasters among them were Shamans. Even Sorcerers were rare, let alone Mages.
"Of course. Solam is still so young, yet he's already so intelligent. That's the most important talent a Mage needs. On top of that, he's an Elemental Shaman, which means he has an excellent grasp of energy." Shamans and Mages were two entirely different kinds of spellcasters. Shamans cast spells by using their high Wisdom to commune with the elements and spirits of the world, which made their magic relatively passive. Mages, on the other hand, were more proactive. They controlled energy directly to cast spells. But when it came to Elemental Shamans and Mages, their ability to sense energy was the same.
Everyone's perception was different. Some people were especially sensitive to energy, making them well suited to become Mages, Elemental Shamans, and the like. (In the eyes of all Mages, the elements were simply different manifestations of energy; in essence, they were one and the same.)
Some people had a stronger sense of spirits and nature, giving them the chance to become Clerics, Druids, or Spirit Shamans. (For example, people said to have yin-yang eyes, who could see ghosts, were especially perceptive in this regard.)
Others had a stronger awareness of the physical world around them. They could become Rangers or assassins.
The other professions simply didn't require as much perception as being a Shaman did. And being an Elemental Shaman didn't guarantee that someone could become a Mage, either, because Mages had exceptionally strict Intelligence requirements. If they couldn't even remember a spell model, then being able to connect to the Weave wouldn't do them a damn bit of good. Besides, Mage spellcasting was extremely precise. The slightest mistake could cause an accident. At best, the spell would fail and backfire, usually leaving the caster badly injured. At worst, the spell would mutate and blow the caster sky-high. Without a sharp mind, you simply couldn't handle the profession.
High Wisdom wasn't necessarily useful for becoming a Mage, but any high-level Mage was sure to have a high Wisdom score. After all, Mages advanced by meditating over a long period and communing with the Weave, forging a closer connection to it. This naturally improved their perception. So high-level Mages definitely had high Wisdom, though it was specifically focused on the Weave and energy. Clerics and Druids also relied on this method to advance, but they communed with different things.
Solam's excellent ability to sense energy was clear from the fact that he was already a level-five Shaman at just sixteen. Add his extraordinary Intelligence, and he was a Mage in the making.
Old Arando excitedly explained to Kramsh just how exceptional Solam was. It was clear the old man had decided that Solam should follow the path of a Mage.
"With Solam's talent, he'll surely become a legendary Mage one day. Then, even if we can't get our revenge, Solam will be able to avenge me."
Seeing how excited Arando was, Kramsh got a headache. He almost felt bad about pouring cold water on him, but some things had to be said.
"Arando, I'm not trying to discourage you, but there's one big problem we can't get around: who's going to teach him? I don't know much about Mages, but I do know becoming one isn't easy."
That wasn't the only problem. A Mage's education didn't depend on talent alone. The most important thing was money. Yes, money.
To become a Mage, talent mattered, but money mattered even more. Knowledge cost money, spell models cost money, magical equipment cost money, and magical experiments cost money. These things were manageable in the beginning, but later on they became staggeringly expensive. There was a reason Mages were said to be both wealthy and perpetually short on cash. They could earn piles of money with almost any little thing they did, but they spent it even faster. They were bottomless pits that could never be filled.
In fact, a major reason so many Mages leaned toward evil was that they were driven to it by money. After all, honest work couldn't compare to the money you could make by doing bad things. Kill someone, rob them, and you'd be set for life. That was true in every world.
Hearing Kramsh's words, Arando gradually calmed down. Right—who was going to teach Solam? He was an Arcane Knight. Though his profession belonged to the Mage side of things, he wasn't a true Mage. If Solam apprenticed himself to someone else, that would cost money. And apprenticing to a Mage wasn't like apprenticing to someone in another profession, where they'd take you in for free and feed you, too. To a Mage, knowledge had a price. If you wanted to study under one, you had to pay first—and the price would only keep going up.
Paying to learn spells was a universal rule among Mages. If you weren't even willing to pay, did you think you could become a noble Mage? Keep dreaming.
What did ordinary apprentices do if they had no money? They borrowed from their mentors. And don't overestimate a Mage's scruples. Their interest rates usually weren't too high, but the problem was that one loan wouldn't be enough. If you wanted to keep learning more advanced magic, you had to borrow again. Before long, you'd realize that you'd spent the first few decades of your life as a Mage working for your mentor.
And that was considered relatively generous by Mage standards. If you got a mentor like that, you could thank the gods. If you ended up with an evil mentor, congratulations—you might never be free again. You'd sign a magical contract beforehand, so you couldn't just refuse to pay. The consequences would be severe. And if you were even unluckier and got a completely deranged mentor, you could forget about freedom. You'd be lucky to survive.
That was basically how every Mage organization formed: low-level Mages owed money to high-level Mages, who in turn owed money to the organization's leader. It was a chain, one link after another.
Why did Mages advance so slowly? Sure, it was true that advancing as a Mage was difficult. But the biggest reason was that they spent all their damn time working to pay off their debts. How were they supposed to improve when they had no time to train?
So Arando quickly came to a decision. Raising Solam to become a traditional Mage was out of the question. He'd barely managed to escape with some of his belongings, but what could he do with so little money? Even if he were still the leader of the Ebon Blade Knights, he couldn't afford it. After all, he'd turned to slave trading because he was short on money himself.
Then a thought suddenly struck Arando. Right—he'd been thinking too narrowly. He could simply train Solam to become an Arcane Knight.
For one thing, he had the complete Arcane Knight tradition. It would still cost money, but it would save a great deal. And his inheritance was remarkably complete, with no problem carrying all the way to legendary rank. There had been legendary Arcane Knights in Arando's line, and he himself was a high-level Arcane Knight. He was absolutely qualified to teach Solam. At seventy, he also had plenty of experience and could help Solam avoid many unnecessary detours.
Besides, the Arcane Knight was a profession invented by the greatest arcanists of the Netheril era, the most glorious age in human history. Though it was difficult to master, once an Arcane Knight reached legendary rank, he could wield power that was in no way inferior to that of a legendary Mage. Arcane Knights had fewer Spell Slots, but they could still learn legendary spells just like Mages. Add to that the combat prowess of a legendary knight, and all in all, they really weren't inferior to legendary Mages.
And this way, his branch of the tradition wouldn't die out. It would also be a fitting tribute to his mentor.
The more Arando thought about it, the more sensible it seemed. Without hesitation, he told Kramsh what he planned to do.
After hearing him out, Kramsh said nothing. He simply held his drink and thought it over carefully.
"Well? Is it going to work or not? Give me a straight answer." Arando was nearly beside himself with worry. By the time Solam was old enough to avenge him, Arando himself would probably have been dead for years. But if Arando had no hope of taking revenge himself, wasn't raising Solam to do it the best solution? He didn't want to drag Kramsh into it because even with the two of them together, their chances were slim. But now that Solam represented a glimmer of hope, how could Arando sit still?
"Hmm. It's not that it can't work. It's just, what about Solam's Shaman profession? You know Shamans and Mages don't exactly go together."
"Pfft, I thought it was something serious. We can just get rid of his Shaman profession and have him focus on becoming an Arcane Knight. That'd be even better." Arando breathed a sigh of relief. As long as Kramsh wasn't objecting, everything was fine. Besides, how could a profession like Shaman compare to Arcane Knight? Never mind everything else. Once an Arcane Knight advanced far enough, he'd be able to use spells to extend his lifespan. That alone made it much better than being a Shaman.
For the record, Arando was qualified to use Ioulaum's Longevity. But the spell model was incredibly expensive, and the spell also required a magic circle, a magical laboratory on the level of a Mage Tower, and extensive life-altering experiments before it could finally be mastered. All of that required a fortune. Arando wasn't lucky enough to enjoy that privilege. (Ioulaum's Longevity was a ninth-level spell created by the demigod Ioulaum. It was a groundbreaking spell that could greatly extend a spellcaster's lifespan.)
"If it were really as easy as you say, I wouldn't have anything to say. The problem is, the Shamans in the clan have already decided that Solam has a chance of becoming a legendary Shaman one day. You know how highly Shamans are regarded in Avalon. Believe me, if I told them what you said tomorrow, they'd raise a huge fuss."
Kramsh still hadn't told him everything. A huge fuss was the least of it. Kramsh could guarantee that if Granny Karom—if that old woman—found out, she wouldn't just make a fuss. She'd teach the old man a lesson in Avalon's traditions with her heavy flail.
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