Chapter 9: Teen School for Dumb Stupid Rats

Rhett was pissed. He was nineteen, living on his own, he even had a vaguely-job-shaped activity that he had been doing for a whole day now!

‘This is bullshit,’ he snarled, sat down in front of the table, smushed between two elves who weren’t making nearly enough room.

One was leaned over, an elbow on the armrest and looking half asleep, while the other had his hands in his lap, as stiff as a board.

Worse, fresh off of digging ditches for whatever reason, they were all covered in dirt, and entirely too unpleasant to his snouty senses.

If it wasn’t for the fact that this seemed to straight up be a lesson on magic, (‘It better goddamn be’), he’d have begged off it immediately. He hadn’t done anything wrong, after all, not like these criminals doing their penance here!

Cop looked too amused. He would put sawdust in her woodbeer tomorrow for the crime.

“Alright boys, introduce yourself. Rhett here’s still Naming, I believe, so if he changes his mind, be nice about it,” she commanded.

The first to answer was the sleepy Beach Elf, who sported a black leather tunic, studded with bits of copper and bone, as well as a pair of ear piercings, silver dots tipping each of his pointed ears.

“Murdoom” the sleepy teen answered, slapping his neck after mistaking his long black hair for a bug.

The upright one next to him gave Rhett a smile, pushing up a blindfold made of rawhide as he did to peek out from under it. His own clothes were particularly fine looking, horsehair fabric made up into a thick cloak, with strange, plastic-like beads of material holding it together at the seams.

“The-Endless-Blue-Water-Of-Skin,” he intoned, with a very serious tone. When their eyes met, the teen flushed, shoving their blindfold down and looking straight ahead.

“Smacks,” an Orc boy said, spinning around in his wheeled chair, the skinniest one here, oddly, and the only shirtless one to boot, showing off a large purple tattoo of a pig face on his chest.

Spotting Rhett’s confused stare, Smacks seemed to mistake it for slack-jawed awe. Slapping his chest, he grinned. “I’m gonna kill Bigpig,” he answered.

“Moronic,“ the other Orc responded. “My nickname for now is Grabby, Rhett,” he introduced himself, hands on his knees as he tried to glare the room into exploding.

A more standard member of the species, he was heavily bulky, and his hands looked… Wrong.

Rhett’s eyes widened when he realized Grabby’s fingers looked as if they had been broken, and set wrong at some point in the past, each of the digits subtly crooked, with large knots of bone bulging in several places.

Grabby’s stare was bland as he answered the unspoken question. “Wood thresher. They’re banned now.”

Everyone winced, and a moment later, after chewing over the implication, Rhett’s eyes boggled.

“Uh, well, I’m Rhett, I’m from another world… I have a bunch of hobbies?” he attempts awkwardly. He had never been to an AA meeting, (and woodbeer was his first exposure to alcohol of any kind, but was nasty enough that he didn’t think it counted), but this felt an awful lot like one.

Honestly, though, he was a bit grateful, he had been trying to think of a good way to break that news, and it just kind of slipped out.

Cop looked surprised. “...Huh.”

The teens all looked suitably amazed, but Bookel simply snorted. “That figures. I thought the slave angle didn’t fit,” she commented, confusing the Ratboy slightly.

Clapping a hand to her side before he could think too much about it, Bookel barked out commands.

“Alright, enough gibber jabber, you’ve all got learning to do, and I want to get it done before my coffee’s cold,” she remarked, only just now letting the drink be noticed.

Rhett’s eyes bugged out with greed at the sight of the mug, but he held himself back. Barely.

Slowly settling down, Miss Bookel sank into her own chair, and leaned over slowly, tipping open the book on the table between them.

“Now, the most important thing, to start, is that these are made up. None of you will fit just one of them perfect-like unless you’ve got the bug,” she pointed to the teens-

“-And you don’t get levels, ee-hex-pee, or anything else odd for working at em, before you go and ask something silly,” she jabbed a finger at Rhett, who blinked several times before focusing much more firmly on what she was showing.

Turning the book around, she slid it over and let everyone read what was on the page, pointing out the first portion.

Magical Archclasses

Sorcerer

Magic users who utilize the Mana coming from their own soul, in order to achieve an effect of some kind.

Esper

Magic users who harness Ambient Mana in the air, harnessing the natural magic in the world around them to achieve an effect.

Corporeal

Magic users who control the Mana present in their bodies, from Food and Living, twisting it to their needs to achieve incredible feats.

Specialists

Magic users who harness True Mana, the power that saturates themselves, relying on mundane equipment to perform incredible feats.

Physical Archclasses

Paragons

Individuals who harness the natural qualities of their own bodies. Mastering their racial abilities, Paragons gain a true and deep understanding of who they are, and the birthrights of their people.

Idealists

Individuals who harness the natural qualities of their own souls, mastering their true nature above all else to mold the world to their vision. Law. Oath. Debt. Worth. These things hold power over the Trinity of Reality, above all other things.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Experts

Individuals who rely purely on their mind and intellect, they use a variety of tools, strategies, and skills in order to navigate a magical world through the use of their noggins.

“These are the big ones. Nobody’s any of em, because they’re just there to group up all the little ones you might end up fallin’ into,” Bookel explained.

“They’re only useful because they share a few guidelines, and if you work on one, you might end up not liking the taste of the others,” she begins.

“That doesn’t mean any one’s better than any other, and it doesn’t even mean getting into more than one of them is better or worse than just focusing hard on a single Archclass, or even a single Class of ability,” she explains, her focus seemingly more on good social behavior, than actually using cool, mystical powers.

Glaring at everyone, she makes sure they’re listening.

“You get into habits, working on your skills, and you start getting proud of yourself for making em. You’ll want to share your tricks with everyone around you, and you’ll probably get pissy when they get pissy at you, cause they’ve got their own little tricks up their sleeve and don’t want to pollute them.

“It’s immature, and I don’t want to see it here or anywhere else.”

Only once everyone nodded enough times, and with enough fright did she finally continue.

“Good. Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, they aren’t all the same, either. No matter how you slice it, for example, a Corporeal is always going to have the most raw power out of anyone. A Wizard flies first, but a Martial Artist flies fastest,” she explained, her focus on Smacks and Grabby in particular.

“Likewise, a Specialist is always going to be easier to figure out. There’s a reason Knights and Paladins are famous, and it’s because you can pump them up with materials instead of sense,” she explained, glancing briefly at Rhett.

“What about the others?” Smacks interjected.

“What about the others? You’re all too sillyheaded to be an Expert on anything, and your parents would have to teach you the other two. I’m not an Orc, a Ratling, or any flavor of Elf,” she barked.

The teens all grumbled at this, save Rhett, who was listening attentively.

“But for the benefit of our newcomer here…” she finally nodded at Rhett.

“Most people on Earthrealm have an appendix, and that appendix holds special bacteria from your parents. Demons have something similar, just no organ for it, it’s all over em,” she begins.

“Paragons figure out how to use their Appendix Ability to do wild things. Orcs can make things better by breaking them,” Smacks nods frantically, and Grabby nods a moment later, clenching his fists.

“Elves can treat things like a body of water. Drow in particular have what’s called Fleshseep for it,” she nodded to Murdoom and Blue, who looked unused to the word Drow.

“And I don’t remember what Ratlings do,” she admitted. “You’re too tiny to be a regular Ratperson, mind you, unless you’ve kept shrunk this whole time, but the bigger sort can take on animal traits. Metaphorphosis they call it,” she finished.

“Soul stuff’s beyond me,” she shrugged at the unspoken question. “Demons like to joke and say we’ve got ‘Ork Powers’, but I haven’t the slightest idea what they mean, and nobody else does either,” she shrugs.

“What I do know is that they say Mundanus Extremus involves Soul Power. Some people just get really, really good at stuff. Mad Scientists figuring out new Laws of physics and the like. Crazy, the lot of them,” she shrugs again to really emphasize the shruggitude of her opinion on the matter.

Taking a long pull from her coffee, just to piss Rhett off some more with envy, she moved on.

“It’s the Chrome, by the way, Rhett,” she answered, confusing him.

“What is?” he asked in turn.

“Why your apron wipes out dirt. It’s the Chrome. Sis made it for you, right? It’s a Specialist thing. Chrome is…” she hums, trying to remember.

“Chromium is either [Shiny] or [Clean], I can’t remember which, and I don’t have the periodic table in front of me,” she apologized. “But the point is, that’s it’s true nature, and the fresh, untainted mana coming out of your soul Attunes to it. Becomes it,” she explains.

“It’s not so much that there’s anything special about it either. Everything you wear, even stripping down to your skivvies, attunes your True Mana into a True Attunement. Plant fibers [Further Plants]. So clothes mend on their own over time, for example,” she pointed out.

“What’s special isn’t so much what you’re wearing, mind you, it’s more that you know what it’s doing.

Rangers do it one way, Knights do it another. If you wear all sorts of things, and you know what they’re doing, and you rely on it, people will call you a Ranger. If you wear just one kind of thing, and that’s your entire job, they’ll call you a Knight,” she said, balancing her hands like a scale.

“Knights are special, because they take this even further. A little chrome apron lets you clean better. What if you wore an entire suit of chrome, then? Wore it and trained in it all day and night, and you bought a little puppy, and got it a suit of chrome barding, and rode it around all day?” she asked.

“A Knight would be the kind of fellow to figure out what happens then,” she then answered.

“So Knights are… Stronger?” Smacks raised a hand in question.

“What’s better at cutting, an axe that’s bigger than you are, or a box of saws, knives, and chisels?” she asked in lieu of an answer.

“The axe,” he nodded, receiving a smack from Grabby. “Ow! What gives?” he complained.

Rhett’s eyes widened. “It’s like minmaxing,” he interjected, confusing everyone around him.

“Like uhh… Okay, in Smash of Mans… No, you guys don’t know what that is…” he struggled awkwardly, blushing under his fuzz at everyone’s stares.

“Say I got something that erased dust, right? And I got something else that ground stuff into dust,” he attempted, miming putting them together.

“That’d be sandstone,” Bookel offered, nodding kindly at him for his benefit.

“R-right, so if I had a Sandstone… Hat? And this apron, then I’d be able to like, cut through stuff! Turn it into sand with the sandstone, and then erase the sand with the chrome!” he exclaimed.

Bookel smirked.

“Why go to all that trouble, can’t you just,” Blue began, cut off by a tut from Bookel, and a glare from Cop.

“Don’t, boy, he’s thinking, which is better than most of the kids I teach,” Bookel nipped.

“What? Is there something I’m missing?” Rhett asked genuinely. Cop smiled awkwardly in return, raising her own hand.

“If you’ve got a way to move mana around, you could use sandstone magic on its own. Remember what I said, about mixing Mana and Dust?” she asked.

Rhett clapped his forehead. “Right, the sandstone magic would just… Turn the sand it grinds into dust?”

“There’s a bit more intricacy to it than that, but for raw Mana, yes. It wouldn’t happen with what you described. True Mana doesn’t quite work the same as the normal variety.” Bookel clarified.

“Now, Murdoom, I understand you’ve been begging your folks for some Argon. What kind of Occultism are you wanting from that,” Bookel asked, but before he could answer, a low rumble caught them all quietly off guard.

It came in waves, a thump, followed by a slowly growing rattling noise. Everyone but Rhett shared serious, or otherwise fearful looks.

Bookel’s mug danced off the table, and nobody spoke as it shattered into a puddle of wasted black.

“What is that?” Rhett asked, only for another interruption to interject, that of a loud bell tolling overhead.

“Bigpig,” Cop said quickly, scooping him up in her pudgy hand, and closing tight over him as the rumbling grew into small quakes.

“Boys, go to your folks, now, I’ll take care of Miss Bookel,” Cop ordered, Rhett’s head popping out from between her fingers with a faint pop.

“S-should I be worried? What the hell is a Big Pig?” he asked, but didn’t receive an answer,

“I can take care of myself, go pin down your own shop,” Bookel snapped, reciting a string of strange gibberish, pointing to her shelves as a transparent, glowing crystal spread over the books and papers.

Cop’s brow furrowed, but she finally nodded. “Rhett, I know you’ve got that little place of yours, but it’s not safe right now, I’m going to take you back to the shop, okay?” she asked, but didn’t have much intention of hearing his answer.

Pinning him close and hurrying through the rattling timber streets, she slammed the door to her shop behind her, and dumped him on the counter, hurrying as fast as she could around the shop to prepare.

To prepare for Bigpig.