Rum woke up to the smell of exotic sauces and fried shrimp. As he opened his eyes, his little brother Amez stood above him, grinning.

  “You are a sound sleeper. I got you some food.” He gestured at a chair next to the bed, where two bowls of nutritious goodies waited. “Eat up and–” he gave Rum a mouth-corner smile, “–can you please clean yourself up? My customer is here and, while I’ll happily tell him I got my big brother staying over in the back of my shop, however right now, that looks like an excuse for me helping the homeless. And I don’t want to get a reputation for generosity. At least not more of a reputation…” Amez’ lips widened to a full smile. He glanced away. “There is a rumor I am a bit loose-pursed when I get drunk.”

  “Okay, I’ll clean myself up.” Rum leaned upright, feeling refreshed after a proper bed for a change. He slid across it next to the chair, grabbing a spoon. “Do you have a place I can do that?” His right hand lifted a spoonful of sauce-covered rice to his open mouth, his left picking up and holding a couple of fried shrimps waiting for their turn.

  “You could try the local baths down the street of the front door. If I give you some money, you could sneak out the back and walk around. Slip them some extra and they’ll also…” Amez looked skeptically across Rum’s clothing, “clean up your robe. Can’t do much about the long-term damage to it, a seamster will have to fix that. Or replace it more likely. But the people at the baths could clean some of your stains at least.”

  “Okay” Rum slurped sauce, and Amez slowly shook his head, watching his big brother a significant amount of the sauce take up residency in his beard. “Just give me the money” Rum continued between slurps, “and I’ll go there when I’m finished.”

  Amez took his gaze off the messy beard to make eye-contact with his brother. “Thank you, Rum. I figure you don’t care much about how you look and smell yourself, or how the tears in your robe are slowly undressing you. Ehem” he fake-coughed. “But MY world has a lot of people who probably will care.”

  “Yeah yeah, go take care of your customer” Rum waved the spoon at him, before focusing on his food. Amez didn’t immediately go, but watched his long vanished brother some more, as if savoring the sight. Then, as Rum made an extra loud slurp – perhaps on purpose – the little brother left.

  Upon finishing the bowls, the older looked to their side, at a small pile of silver coins. That’s good money. The kind of money he hadn’t had in a long while. He stood up and started walking towards the far back of the shop, before a thought came to him. Could I fix myself up, with my own magic? He’d never really worried much about the problem, but right now it seemed like fixing clothing and cleaning his body would be useful spells for him to have. Catching himself a single step from the back door, Rum decided not to do as he’d told Amez. Instead he looked around. He found a mirror in the spare bedroom lying in a corner. He picked it up, dusted it off and leaned it against the wall on a stool. Looking at its reflective surface, Rum could clearly see that his face, robe, and most everything would indeed look, to most eyes: like a total mess. I must look at least ten years my senior. The wear of poverty had aged him, visibly. But not irreversibly, maybe, he added.

  Rum began pacing, back and forth, mumbling to himself. His thoughts quickly burrowed with all seriousness into the nature of cleanliness and the nature of fresh clothing. What separated bad odor from good? How would a spell make clothes into clean clothes? What does it really mean to have undamaged fabric? Rum stopped pacing. Instead he sat down on the bed, closed his eyes and sensed his mana, his magic. Mana needs structure. Mana needs discipline. But, it also needs autonomy. I can’t direct everything. The latter was something Rum had discovered by introspection and experience years ago. The details of bending, twisting and shaping reality was something too much for any human mind to manage. But one couldn’t let the mana run loose either. The mana needed limits, paths to follow, and objectives that were practically solvable.

  In the end Rum considered the human taste towards undamaged clothing itself, and the human taste for odors. The aesthetics of taste were not something straight-forward enough to make a spell out of. Particularly since I, by all experience, have no taste at all. All I ask for in clothing is that it’s soft and shield me from the elements. In this regard, I will clearly need help. I will need to borrow someone else’s sense for aesthetics. Rum considered this for a while. Then he had an idea. Flipping over into the ethereal, parallell realm of magic, the wizard reached out into his surroundings. What I need is an aspect, some personality trait to encode into my spell. I need a spell to mimic personhood, to mimic TASTE. Rum’s mana extended like tentacles, expanding outwards, roaming, searching around the shop. My brother, his customer. Would they have taste? He lingered with them. No, not the kind I’d need. Not the kind worthy of a SPELL. The mana reached out further and sought personalities down the streets, prodding for people in shops, taverns, and finally – a bathhouse. Rum sensed its people, and going in to inspect them, found a person that made him pause. There was a restlessness to this person, a focus of intensity – nay – as Rum watched, it became clear that this person he was observing was a man, and he was obsessed with the dirt of the younger woman’s body that he was scrubbing. This man must loathe dirt, hate it. In his motions he seems beset on vanquishing all uncleanliness from her body. He dwelled on the man, studying him some more. When the man was finished with the body, he walked over to a dress and, grabbing it, set about rubbing a stain off his customer’s dress. A vanquisher of uncleanliness in clothing too. As Rum became increasingly sure of his target, his mana latched onto his subject. Probing and grasping at his subject’s body and mind, he gradually, then suddenly, felt this Hater of The Unclean come under the totalizing arresting control of his magic. Away from Rum, over across the street, a man collapsed to the floor. For a second, Rum became intensely concerned that he’d hurt the man. Others were clearly rushing towards the scene as far as he could tell. However, Rum was not here to seize control of the man. I merely seek a copy of your hate for uncleanliness. Only a copy, only the blueprints of your vengeful affection for cleanliness. For as is the case with most hate, I believe yours is a mirror to love, and in you, is a love for making things clean.

  Unknown to the world, Rum touched The Hater’s mind, the cleaner’s instincts, desires and memories. He didn’t so much sense them as distinct things – he had no psychic abilities of course – but he wrapped them all up, bundling them together like a packaged personality. From that package, Rum fashioned and conjured a ghost of mana, a spitting image of a person’s will, made from his own mana organized to mirror what he’d found. Releasing his control of the subject, the wizard dragged the mana ghost outside, up and along the streets, back home into Amez’s shop.

  There you are. Rum pulled the mana ghost through the walls and into his magical being. He held on to it here. Working on it, structuring it into the shape of a projectable magic, before finally bringing it into his mind as a permanent spell.

  The wizard opened his eyes, stood up from the bed he’d been sitting on, and looked across the room to the leaning mirror. His lips came into motion, and he spoke, quitely. “Clean Body.” A whirling twirling air of magic began circling about him. Gradually, slowly, over a few seconds, Rum’s beard was trimmed and kempt, the dirt of his robes vanishing, and his skin polished clean. His appearance was put into stark order, and when that all was over, the magical winds died down, and he looked like a new man. Smiling at the image looking back at him, he sat on the bed eagerly, closing his eyes and reaching out with his mana again, searching for a great seamster in the neighborhood. But – you shouldn’t do that, a thought surfaced in his mind. Look at what you did to that last man. Would you call that RIGHT? Could you tell yourself, with the full honesty of your heart, that you are not spreading fear in what you do? That you are not exploiting ignorant people, unaware of what is happening to them?

  Rum’s eagerness lagged behind the thought, and he roamed the streets, until he came upon a shop, and inside, a candidate – a great candidate in fact. But as he reached out towards the person, the thought caught up with his actions. He halted. And sunk with the weight of his conscience, unable to proceeed. He lingered in the room, with a woman tending to a customer. Back in Amez’ bedroom, Rum’s breath went in, and out, iiin, and out, his heart weighing his planned action.

  He let go of it. His own magical self retracted back over streets, into the building, and back into his body. There, he opened his eyes, and after second, bit his lip, his excitement curtailed, momentarily. He thought hard about it. Quickly, he realized his only path forward now. He sprung to his feet, and ran out the back door.

  He found the shop after a while and stopped outside it, staring through a coarse window at the shape he knew must be her. He tried to lower his shoulders, to relax, to not let excitement overtake him. In the end he sighed slowly to himself, calming himself, and opened the door.

  CLING-A-LING! announced bells.

  “Hi, I am a wizard, and I need to cast a spell on you. Is there something I could do in exchange, for you to let me do that?”

  In what transpired next, Rum quickly discovered that, barging into a place, and announcing you’re a wizard intent on casting magic on someone, is not a very effective method of gaining the minimum of trust that such an action would require. Even as he was pushed out of the shop with the end of a broomstick and shouted at for being a “crazy beggar”, he tried to offer Amez’ money, but was only given a mouth full of broomstick fibers instead as he stumbled backwards out the door.

  Okay. Not an option. Rum thought about what he should do next. He concluded that this particular seamstress was never going to let him do what he wanted. But, he added mentally, she’s not the only one in the city.

  In the next half hour, two different people, a seamster and seamstress, both summarily expelled him from their establishments. One of them banning him from reentering for the rest of his life. He was about to give up when he found at last another seamstress, a young woman who’d recently opened her own shop. When he entered he tried something different this time.

  “Hey, seamstress. I am a wizard. By my clothes I may not look like much, but I can cast real magic. Can I prove it to you, that I am what I say?”

  At first, the woman found Rum an inexplicable presence. But she had no customers at that time, and wasn’t busy.

  “I don’t know what a wizard wants in my shop. Though I could guess” she eyed his attire, or rather, the partially lack there-of. “But fine. I haven’t seen much magic before. Not up close anyways. What can you do? I’m not paying you anything.” She grew hesitant when she realized that Rum looked an awful lot like a beggar, though his clean skin and tidy beard contrasted heavily with the idea.

  Rum mumbled a spell, then he raised his thumb, and WHOM!, a flame erupted at the tip, burning like a tiny torch. He went over to a candle in the viscinity and took the liberty to light it, even though it was still morning and the room was full of light from outside and from lamps in the shop. Rum extinguished his flaming thumb with no visible motion, and looked over to the woman.

  Next he convinced her to let him go to her kitchen, where he found a piece of stale bread. Mumbling a spell, the wizard turned it into a freshly baked piece. He broke off a piece, eating it to demonstrate that it was both edible and tasty, before giving her a chance to taste it too.

  After that, she believed he was a wizard, and when it was time to tell her why he was really there, he told her the truth: that his spell would allow him to make clothes for himself, if he could cast it on her. At which she didn’t even ask for a price, but just flatly rejected the very notion as “that’s impossible!” And that was how he got her to agree for him to cast magic on her.

  He found a chair, closed his eyes, and reached into his magical being, reaching outwards with it, expanding it to fill the room. Finding her magical being in the room, he grasped onto her.

  He was more careful this time, more attentive to the subject in his experiment. He’d asked her to sit as well and was glad he’d done so, because as he entered her with his magic her body was arrested just like the previous one, and as he pulled his new mana ghost back into himself, she collapsed a?sp, her body curving forward and falling. However, just as she was about to hit the floor, her hands managed to respond, reaching out and catching the floor before the rest of her would.

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  “Whath” she said, breathing heavily.

  Rum said nothing as he completed his second spell. The woman was left to recover on the floor, and so she did. With time passing, she recovered enough to get up and stared at Rum, who still had his eyes closed.

  Then – Rum’s eyes snapped open and he shot up from the chair, nearly tipping it over. A smile spread over his mouth, and he gave it to her, before he walking over to the shop’s full-length mirror in a corner, and looked into it, mood full of exhilarated expectation. His hand touched his brown robes, and two words came out. “Renew Clothes.” Before the eyes of the seamstress behind him, and his own staring into the mirror – the robe changed. It repaired itself, every tear being erased by cloth being conjured out of nowhere for the purpose of sewing itself back into the fabric. But that wasn’t all, somehow, the robe also dyed itself in waves of color flooding the fabric everywhere. Looking down at himself, Rum could gradually witness his robes becoming something much fancier than he’d started with, as patterns of detailed geometric figures and mystical landscapes formed across the surface in hypnotizing motions. When after a short time that really felt like a much longer time, the transformations slowed down to eventually cease and become a final product, Rum moved his hand and gently touched the new robe. The material seemed all the same as before, but the dye had completely altered its outward identity. “Hah! Ha-ha!” Rum bursted with joy. He looked up into the mirror again, admiring the effects. It’s long since I’ve felt this fresh, this good, this handsome. Or at least less of the complete loser people usually treat me as – and as I’ve been used to having to see myself as. With this look I’d definitely get into that tavern the bouncer tried to keep me out of.

  Rum turned to the seamstress. “Thank you. I promise to compensate you for this experience in any way I can, in whatever way the future provides. Right now, I don’t have much to offer that is adequate for what we’ve made together, but if you ever see me in the future – don’t hesitate to ask me for a favor, or several. You’ve earned them.”

  Smiling, Rum went towards the shop’s door. “And by the way, my name is Rum – like the drink. The wizard Rum.” He left the shop before the woman had been able to find her words.

  The wizard Rum decided he had to share his success with his brother. He marched across the streets, back to the shop, where he went in through the back door – and opened the door into the work area. There was Amez, stretched over the back of a slightly small, topless woman lying on a table. On her skin Rum’s brother was carving a large piece of bodily artwork.

  “Back already?” Amez said, not taking eyes off his work. Rum smiled brightly, something Amez couldn’t see. But the woman looked up at him.

  “Hi” she said, in an indifferent tone.

  “Hey” Rum replied, oblivious to her tone. “Amez–” Rum continued, walking up to the other side of the customer, “–guess what I just figured out?”

  “What?” Amez said softly, not looking up. “I just created two new spells! A cleaning spell, and a repair spell for clothes! I used them just now and they work phenomenally. Very easy to use, requires almost no effort, and the results are perfect.” He gestured to himself, even as Amez’s eyes were occupied. “Look!”

  After a few seconds Amez finally looked up. His eyes took a moment to absorb Rum, then they went wide with surprise. “You tell me you did that” he nodded towards Rum’s clothes, “just now?”

  “Yes!” Rum almost shouted with pride. “Oh wow” Amez said, “maybe you should try making money off of that. I know many people who would probably pay handsomely for having a quick fix like that available.”

  At this Rum’s demeanor changed into a not-this-again-expression. “Look Amez” and Rum put his arms together over his belly, “I don’t need a job! I need to do research. And this was a fantastic piece of research!” He untied his arms and waved it around one of them while talking. “What if I had spent my time magicking away people’s bad moods instead of spending time inventing amazing spells like this!? Eh? This spell would not had been invented, and the world would’ve been worse off for it. No. I’m needed for this new magic! Now, let’s talk less about my work and more about your work.” He gestured to the customer on the table. “What are you making for this woman?”

  At this the lady turned her neck around as best as she could without moving her back, and replied in place of his brother. “This woman has a name, and it is Elrith Heart-Piercer. And it’s a name you should remember. I’ve pierced many hearts, with my little boy Martin over there.” She pointed across the room towards a huge crossbow leaning on the wall. “And what Amez is making for The Heart-Piercer is a tattoo that will allow me to fill my piercing bolts with Mana Bombs. It’s a very powerful enchantment, and GODS’ DAMN expensive.” She rolled her eyes as if dizzy. “I’ve had to save up six months of dungeon loot in order to be able to afford this.” She threw a thumb over at her back.

  Rum scanned the tattoo with some interest. “Well” Amez started, “you’ve to save up 6 months of dungeon loot because I’ve had to invent a brand new tattoo for you. That takes a lot of work. And so you can see Rum” Amez glanced at him, “you’re not the only one inventing things. Us working people also invent new stuff. This tattoo enchantment will allow her to quickly imbue up to three bolts with a Mana Bomb that detonates on high velocity impact. For a non-mage she’s going to be carrying a huge pool of mana through this enchantment. It’s going to take you about three days though Elrith, with your passive mana recovery, to recharge each Mana Bomb. This enchantment will have to be your reserve weapon. Only for when you really need it.”

  Nobody said anything. Elrith lay there quiet, being worked on. Amez continued on her back. Rum stared at the work being done in quiet contemplation as minutes passed.

  “Inventing on the job” Rum finally mumbled. “Heh. That could actually be quite stimulating to new ideas. But I’d need to have a job that is at least as varied as yours Amez. I can’t do a job where I just cast out spells like a manufactory for magic! I need an environment conducive to creativity. What I need is a challenge!”

  “Maybe you should try adventuring?” Elrith offered. “I’d say being threatened with dismemberment and death on a daily basis has made me very creative. It teaches me tactics, good reactions, and good habits. But most of all, it teaches me to constantly reevaluate myself, to think new. Like you want to do. I understand you’re a mage of some kind? Why not try joining an adventuring team? A good mage is always in demand, not enough of the university graduates dare to enter the dungeons. They prefer for us to pay them for buffs and enchantments instead of getting in there and do the fighting themselves.”

  Rum didn’t immediately reply and instead looked up into the blue, pondering and stroking his newly tidied beard. “I’m not really much of a fighter. It’s not that I’m afraid – before you jump to any conclusions! I’ve faced some terrible things over the years. I once outran a tree monster the size of barn, if a barn could stand. I just don’t like the part where you people kill the evil creatures. I prefer to leave them alone.”

  At this Elrith leaned up a bit, causing Amez to say “ah-ah-ah!”, before continuing when it appeared she’d stopped moving.

  “You do realize” she said, “that if we adventurers didn’t kill the evil creatures, you all here would suffer daily? We keep the evil lords at bay, and trim the numerous lairs of goblins before they manage to form hordes. You know the history, don’t you? Three hundred years ago, dungeon lords, with hordes of goblins, completely destroyed and plundered the three lost cities, a fact most people seem to forget. The three lost cities of the south are now big occupied ruins for the most part, besides the elves, and some of the older smallfolk, there’s barely anyone still alive to remember the details. But goblins still build lairs there, on our doorstep, trying to expand, and magelords still build new dungeons there. You might even run into necromancers, or evil witches and evil wizards. But nobody from Ermos can go there anymore, except those who dare the danger, like us. Ermos City was created by the few people who survived that invasion, you should recall that mage. So – to be an adventurer is one of the greatest callings you can have. If it weren’t for the adventurers creating the adventurer guilds and organizing our dungeon dives and raids: today there could’ve been four lost cities.” She put up for fingers for emphasis.

  Rum looked into her eyes, stroking his beard and considering her words. After a short time of mutual staring, he took his hand away from his beard and started playing with the silver coins he had in his hand. “Oh, that reminds me!” He said, looking down at the coins. He handed them over towards Amez. “Here’s your money! I didn’t need them, so you can have them back.”

  Amez looked up and at the hand for a second, then shook his head. “No, you keep them. You’re going to need some money soon enough. And this way you don’t have to ask me for any.”

  “You know” Elrith Heart-Piercer began, a hint of temptress in her voice, “dungeons offer lots of loot – for a good mage. Good money loot too. Also, as I just said, it’s a very honourable profession. You will do something good: protect people. And get rich doing it, aaand–” she lifted a finger, “–get some inspiration.” She nodded at him meaningfully.

  Rum’s hand returned to his beard, stroking it some more. “Huuuh. Let’s say I might be interested in trying that out. How would I go about getting a party to do dungeons with?”

  “Oh! Glad you’re interested!” And for the first time The Heart-Piercer appeared to smile, and brightly so. “You know, my party is in need of a good mage. Are you a good mage – what was your name?”

  “My name’s Rum. Amez here is my little brother. I’m visiting him.”

  “Oh, Amez’s brother! That’s interesting Amez” she looked at other, “didn’t know you had a brother.” Her artist’s eyes met her, briefly.

  “He’s been gone for six years,” Amez started, just a tiny hint of annoyance in his voice “so honestly I didn’t know entirely either.”

  “Oh.” She looked back at Rum. “Alright. What’s your level? You know any useful spells?”

  “My level” Rum made a bit of a pained grimace, “is something of a mystery to me really.”

  “What do you mean? What is your level?” Elrith raised an eyebrow.

  “It’s lower than you’d expect, but my level doesn’t reflect my real usefulness. At least it shouldn’t. I think I’m a lot more capable than my level would suggest.”

  “Which is?”

  “Uuuhm…” Rum held his breath, hesitating and looked pained. “Eight” he sighed outwards.

  “What!? Just eight? That’s way too low for dungeon dives. Sorry but we won’t be needing you” Elrith shook her head and went back to resting on Amez’s table, a disappointed expression on her face.

  “But I swear!” Rum exclaimed. “I am much more capable than my level would suggest. Didn’t Amez just tell you how I’ve been gone for six years? I’ve practically lived the life of a solo adventurer already! I have lots of experience with survival against nature, people, beasts and monsters. My magic is so sought after in fact, that I’ve been paid hundreds of gold just for a single spell!”

  “Alright” The Heart-Piercer gave in, and pushed herself slightly up again, producing another “ah-ah-ah!” warning from Amez. “Answer my previous question: do you know any useful spells?”

  “Spells...” Rum appeared to think. “Like what?”

  “You know: healing, attacks, traps, buffs, debuffs – conjuring weapons. That sort of thing.”

  “Mmm…” Rum sounded. “My spells work a bit different than most normal spells” he tried explaining. “Most of them were created for survival. But I’m quite adaptable! I could probably heal minor wounds pretty good. I’ve had to deal with a lot of bruises, cuts, and those sorts. I don’t really have any offensive spells right now.”

  Elrith looked at him, quite unimpressed. “But WHY–” Rum continued immediately, sounding almost desperate to sell his worth as an adventurer, “–don’t you tell me a spell you’d want to have. And maybe I could get that spell, very quickly.”

  “Oh” she said, a bit surprised. She, like most people in Ermos, were not used to being able to wish for and pick spells like they were colors off a palette, or the shapes of a piece of bakery. Everybody knew that magic was difficult and demanded many years of study. It wasn’t something one just picked up. One couldn’t just open a spellbook one day, practice a bit and then know the spell. But Elrith wasn’t one to argue, so she just lay down again, thinking loudly. “Hmm, we are going to Jorteg’s Dungeon tomorrow. That’s a level 30-40 dungeon. It’s not a particularly difficult dungeon, but occasionally Jorteg – the dungeon lord that rules over that place – will have some witches that can be quite tough to bring down. Inexperienced groups have been killed by the surprising abilities of these witches. They are particularly good at mind spells and lightning spells. The mind spells can make you confused, so you don’t know who you are or who anyone else is. The lightning spells are pretty nasty too. They build traps out of lightning enchantments, to catch prey for ritual sacrifices. They use people as components for magic – totally disgusting. They also turn our weapons and armor against us by temporarily filling them with lightning effects. In battle we may have to strip away all our metal weapons and metal armor, or else we’ll be slowly shocked to death by our own gear. Those witches are nasty people.”

  “If–” and she looked up into Rum’s eyes, quite serious, “–you think you could make a spell to counteract those witch spells. If you did that, I’d want you in our party for sure, low level or not. Otherwise, if you can’t really help much I suggest you go down to the guild hall of Ermos’ Finest Adventurers. That’s the name of the guild by the way, they have some starter programs for beginning adventurers. They’ll help you put a party together and maybe you’ll start off destroying some roaming skeletons.”

  Rum continued to play with his beard. “I think” he began, “I could arrange something that’d work against confusion and lightning. Could you give me at least a day? I’ll get started right on it! Just tell me where you guys are meeting next and I’ll show up with the spells, if I can get them in time. If I’m not there, you can leave without me.”

  “Okay” she said, willing to play along, if only out of curiosity. Though Rum sensed her lack of faith in him. “Meet us outside of Ermos’ Statues of Heroes. Tomorrow before noon. You know the place?”

  Rum nodded. He might’ve been gone for some time, but he still basically knew the city. Even if its people had changed a bit in the last six years, the basic outline of the city was the same. The Statues of Heroes were a selection of past great warriors that had defeated the horde that Elrith spoke about. Yes, he already knew the stories. After all, history had been a favorite subject of his. Even if it had been focused on magical history, it did discuss some of the great mages of the past. And these mages had now statues of themselves in what was essentially a large garden just inside the city’s southern city gate.

  One day, his mind echoed, one day to figure out a counterspell.