Enchanter
Chapter 1 The Outlaw
Things in the kingdom were worse than ever. The army couldn’t able to fight off even from a handful of brigands, not to mention a more serious opponent. The harvest from the fields definitely seen better days. The infrastructure of the capital looked like after the dragon attack, but without the dragon. Relations with neighboring kingdoms have ranged from “almost neutral” to “frankly hostile.” The treasury only had enough money to pay for the growing demands of the royal court. And these demands grew and grew…. When I dreamed of becoming the High Enchanter of the kingdom, I did not mean THIS kind of kingdom.
Yes, and “The High Enchanter” was too strong word. It’s not so hard to be in charge when you’re the only one. Although, there was one girl… However, it doesn’t matter. All qualified enchanters left this cursed by Gods place long ago, so my career progression was legendary swift. Just like my fall. Being in the role of the only firefighter in the city engulfed by fire, I tried to do everything possible. Or not.
The first problem I had to solve was the orcs. In recent years, the orcs literally flooded the entire country, attacking travelers on the roads, burning villages and even attacking small garrisons. At first, their packs did not cause great fears—oddly enough, most of them consisted solely of females. Alas, we soon learned that the orc females are much stronger and more ferocious than the males. In a one-on-one battle, the human had almost no chance, and to send a well-organized army against them was too expensive for an impoverished kingdom like ours. Yes, and to impose a pitched battle to the orcs would be problematic—they rarely gathered in big troops, preferring to randomly move around the country in small groups or to build hidden shelters in forests and mountains.
The actions of the orcs were just as difficult to analyze as their movements. The actions of the orcs were just as difficult to analyze as their manoeuvres. They not only robbed and killed, but raped their victims. One of my colleagues, shortly before turning over to the side of the enemy kingdom, suggest the theory that the orc males became barren, and their females are looking for a way to have offspring. The theory was not confirmed. Firstly, young orcs regularly appeared on the battlefields, and their reinforcements weren’t become smaller from year to year. Secondly, orc females raped not only men—and they are not so stupid to not understand the difference. And thirdly ... orcs and humans cannot have common offspring. Apparently, everything that the orcs do, they do solely for their own pleasure.
Convinced of the impossibility of a purely military way to fix the situation, I decided to approach the solution of the problem magically. And I enthusiastically set about developing special anti-orc spells. My first idea was to create effective spells that cause direct physical damage. Small troops of trained battle sorcerers, attacking orcs wherever they appear, could cope better than regular army. Maybe. However, I soon became convinced of the complete inconsistency of this idea—the orcs turned out to be too tought and would quite have time to overtake and kill the hapless opponent before he finish to cast a spell. And how to find volunteers, when you are the only enchanter in the country, and the neighbors are not only not eager to help us, but would also be happy to dance on our graves?
Rejecting the idea of ??attacking spells, I began to develop spell to suppress the minds of orcs. Orcs may not be absolute animals, but their minds are weaker than humans have. Orcs maybe not the absolute animals, but their minds are weaker than humans have. I appreciated the prospects of this work—if I had succeeded, we would not even fight the orcs. It would be enough just to control their leaders and force them to leave our lands... Or set them to fight our other enemies. I already anticipated success, fame, wealth and a place in world history as the greatest winner of the orcs and the savior of mankind, but my vanity stumbled over an abomination called “ the objective reality”. For my experiments, I needed test subjects. Alas, the royal soldiers were in no hurry to hunt orcs in order to capture prisoners, preferring to sit in fortified garrisons and almost literally eat taxpayers’ money. The only test subjects of my research were two wounded orcs, a male (a great rarity in our lands) and a female, bought from travelling adventurers. The male turned out to be more mentally resistant than the female, but much less tought, and died earlier than I had achieved any success. The female turned out to be quite malleable, and my new orc enslavement spell had its effect—the captive, almost without any resistance, complied, obediently executing my orders. I was elated, but, unfortunately, I could not built upon the success—the next night drunken guards set a fire in which the only proof of brilliance of my ideas was perished. The only way out was to hire mercenaries to catch new orcs, and it costs not cheap. Unfortunately only the queen had so much gold.
The main problem of our kingdom were not the orcs, not brigands and the enemy armies. The main problem of our kingdom was our queen. She was stunningly beautiful and stupidly stupid. And also—amazingly greedy and narcissistic. When I came to her with a request to finance my work, she only laughed—why did she should to care about some miserable commoners suffering from orc attacks? Instead, she ordered me to enchant her crown to glow in a darkness and surprise everyone at the dance...
Of course, I did not plan to create glowing crowns, when my country is plunged into chaos. Instead, I decided to refine my orc enslavement spell a little and enchant the queen — after all, her primitive intellect was not so different from the orcish. And do not think that I did this only because I was horny by the thought of power over a beautiful young queen (although this is so) or that I wanted control over the whole kingdom (this is also true). Just believe me! First of all, I had felt my patriotic duty, and the rest would be just a nice bonus. Would be…
I knew that her narrow mind could not resist my spell. But what I didn’t know was that my predecessor had cast a powerful protective spell on the queen, and a few days after that, he ran off and join the brigands. Dear friend, if I ever meet you, I will turn your face into a smashed tomato, and be sure I will do it without any magic. My luck that the royal guards were few and incompetent, and to escape from the castle and capital after my failure was not too difficult. Perhaps I should say thanks to my mentor, who taught me not only magic, but also the ability to wield a sword.
Escape was much easier than surviving. I was not able to walk along paths or visit other cities and villages—the guards are already knew how the dangerous outlaw enchanter looks. So, my only option was a forest. Unfortunately, I’m not a forest man, I’m the burgher from the capital. My food was over on the first day, the water—on the second. Fortunately, I took with me really a lot of ale, but drinking it without a snack all day along is quite problematic. The season of mushrooms and berries in this region has already passed, and I was not trained to hunt. And why haven’t I spent a few days learning some spell to lure rabbits? At least I knew how to make a fire—the last time I did it even without the risk to burn the forest around me! And when I once again slept by the fire, wrapped in my warm long cloak, I was awakened by a strange noise.
Someone, or something, was rummaging in my duffel bag. If I were a little more prepared for survival, I would quickly grab my sword and came on alert. But I was too lazy and not trained. I used to rely on spells in everything, but spells are useless if you woke up a couple of seconds ago and cannot concentrate. So I just yawned, and without opening my eyes, shouted in displeasure: “Hey, who dares to run his hands into the inventory of the High Enchanter?” The fact that I was no longer the High Enchanter, but a outlaw, should be remembered. But I wanted to sleep, eat and bathe, so my stupidity was a little excusable. Instead of answering, I heard only a low growl. After a couple of seconds I opened my eyes, and a source of sounds appeared before me. I was watched by two pairs of glowing in the dark and exuding anger eyes. Two pairs of orc eyes.
At that moment I should have been afraid, but I did not have time—a powerful kick in the stomach turned out to be faster. Then a strong hand grabbed my hood and forced me to stand. A punch in the solar plexus followed is completely deprived me of the will to resist. I was ready for a quick death, cursing my hypertrophied sense of responsibility towards the country, which led me to such a sad ending. However, my pessimism turned out to be premature—after a minute I was not dead, but bounded with a rope to a tree, helplessly watching my captors arrogate to themselves my more than modest belongings. Only then I could clearly see the attackers.
In the dim light of the dying fire, two orc females appeared before me. They were a little larger than my now deceased test subjects, and certainly much larger than humans, being one and a half times wider and a head higher than a adult man. They were dressed in pants, sewn from a rough canvas, and in tanned leather vests without sleeves. I immediately noticed their muscular and scarred hands—these girls definitely knew how to fight. Their somewhat elongated faces had almost human features, discordant with their pale green skin, slightly pointy ears, and ominous shimmering eyes.
Being tied to a tree is unpleasant, but not fatal. I was no longer the High Enchanter, but still was the enchanter. And to cast spells, I do not need hands. Pure intent and maximum concentration would be enough. And while the orcs were sharing my belongings, I had a time to completely wake up and concentrate. The plan of my further actions became obvious.
The orcs, having finished their squabbling for poor trophies, finally turned their attention to me. Not many people would have been delighted with the attention of the orcs, but now I was clearly one of them. A larger and aggressive female with a red pigtail on a massive head, throwing off her knotty cudgel and armed with my sword, approached me and, mockingly looking down at me, began to stroke my cheek with the blade. It was good that I was too lazy to sharpen the blade, otherwise I would immediately get a solid scar like the one that crossed her face. My tormentor leaned closer and whispered in an almost human, slightly low and hoarse voice: “Man ... you look fresh. You will used both for fun and for ... meals “. But become an object of fun, and then to be slaughtered for meat wasn’t too combined with my plans.
She looks expectantly, wanting to see the fear on my face. Instead, I whisper my enslavement spell. For a few moments, on her forehead flashes and fade in a violet radiance of runes, visible only to the enchanter’s eye, and she emits a muffled sound. A good sign, the spell has already penetrated her mind, destroying weak protective barriers. I feel the establishment of a magical connection, which means it’s time to act. I authoritatively gave the order: “Cut the rope. Immediately”. She was surprised and looked at me in disbelief, but obeyed. The rope fell to the ground. Seeing this, the second orc, a young female with a black Mohawk, ceased to strange activity (she chewed the leather strap of my duffel bag—why did not I think about it, when I was hungry?) And after the aggressive roar, shouted to his companion: “Bitch, that you are doing? Why did you free the meat? ” Hmm, these orcs speak our language well. I wonder why? Do they have their own language, or have they forgotten it long ago, replacing it with a more convenient one? However, this was not the right time for linguistic research. Much more important was to eliminate the source of danger. So I immediately give the order: “Shut her mouth.” My new slave is rapidly reducing the distance and strike a powerful knockout uppercut to her companion. Standing over the unconscious companion, she turned to me with the same perplexed expression on her face, asking a perfectly logical question.
“Why am I doing what you say to do? Why did I like to do this? Who are you anyway? ”
It seems, at this point I felt unexpectedly strong even for me an attack of vanity. Just a few minutes ago I was a doomed outcast with minimal chances to just survive. Now, boundless horizons of possibilities have opened for me. I will survive. I will return. I’ll save this kingdom. Our nation will rise again. But now I need to answer a simple question.
“You do what I say to do, because orcs are just pets that exist to serve people. You like to obey my orders, because this is your true subordinate nature, and I just opened it to the fullest. Who am i? You can call me Enchanter. ”