The Scholar's Tale (Original Fantasy)

Sidestory: Choice Of Freedom

Ib had not travelled alone much, in this incarnation.

In what it nowadays looked back on as a cursed infancy, it had spent time on and around the fleet of its birth, like most Midworlders. Afterwards, cast out and mindless, it had drifted about aimlessly, until Mharra had happened upon it. The machinations of its greater self, to set up the empowerment of its avatar in this realm. Ib could not begrudge itself without feeling insane, but void, could it really not have tried something less awful?

'You know, it kind of says everything that you're mad about playing yourself and not doing the same to so many other people.'

Ashe was one of those people you felt as if they were clinging to you regardless of distance. The fact she could speak silently, into minds, regardless of the distance or time separating her from her intended interlocutor only amplified the feeling.

'That might be because I'm so focused on myself I don't see others as people,' Ib spat acidly.

'Aye, exactly,' the dragoness replied, obviously choosing to miss the sarcasm. 'It might actually be worse that you're aware and doing nothing about it than if you were ignorant. Acknowledging a problem isn't a solution.'

'I'm sure the cult leader could tell me all about that.'

To an arcane eye, the grey giant's broad shoulders would have appeared shrouded in smoke, of a darker hue than its own silver-steel skin. Had one possessed a sharp mind's eye, they might have glimpsed the vague reptilian maw and eyes like embers at one end of the cloud, but the island Ib now strode across was not populated by people of such talents.

It was, in many ways, a typical Midworld settlement: a spit of land not much more than a league across, upon which a hardscrabble fleet had happened. Having felt down on their luck on the seas, the sailors had decided they might as well spend a few years, maybe a decade or more, in the relative safety of the island. Midworld's ever-fertile nature meant trees and other resources appeared upon newly-formed islands overnight more often than not, sometimes as one watched, when they didn't form right alongside them.

This land had plentiful lumber and stone: there was no home without shingle or stout beams, nor any that stood lower than two storeys; most had three floors, and the largest matched some hills in height and breadth. For anything more they'd need steel, or some way to flout the world's laws, and human mages were rare in Midworld, rarer than in most of its counterparts. It was a lucky fleet that had one, and more, ones with power, were ofttimes considered a blessing.

To be considered a curse, they had to go against the mundanes' will. That was laughably easy, in a practical sense, which given Midworlders' dispositions, meant there were enough fleets cursed with spellslingers.

Ib made its way to this town's main inn - the most well-appointed one, that is -, as inconspicuous as a dust mote in the wind, for all its bulk.

There was something to be said about being able to free oneself from the burden of others' attention.

Ashe tagged along, in a manner more similar to shifting her eyes than to keeping pace with the giant. She also kept the commentary going. 'Oh, I know. You're going to flatten that building and rip everyone inside limb from limb because their awful culture doesn't involve everyone voting on everything.'

'How'd there be any limbs left to rip off after that?' Ib grumbled. 'And no, I'm not.' Why would it? By that "logic", every lackwit and madman would get to weigh in on important decisions. Might as well enhance animals, plants and fungi to think like people too, wouldn't want to leave any opinions unheard, no? Why, do the same for rocks and sand grains and-

'I can tell you're ranting at me in your head, you lump.'

'Lies.'

'Which?' she smirked, a red slice in the middle of her manifestation's face. 'You're not ranting? Or I can't tell you are?'