A 12-year-old thief. A fireproof shopkeeper. A card magician. A mysterious old man. Fifteen years before our story begins, a scroll was created by none other than Grand Mage Athael. He called it the Ng Ey, and it was famously blank. Indecipherable. That is, until young master-of-disguise Kellyn happened upon it and saw something. - - - - - - - - As he turned the multicolored case in his hands, he spotted the label, which simply read, 'for young eyes only'. His brow furrowed. He opened the case and spread the paper on the pedestal, and his eyes narrowed further. The text, while still written in gold and composed of incomprehensible words, was arranged into paragraphs. It began with a small header followed by a comma, and there was a name signed at the bottom that he couldn't quite make out. Kellyn shifted his hand and noticed a second sheet of paper behind the first. This one used varying shades of gold ink, from lighter yellow to almost brown. Given the boxy, graphical nature of this sheet's contents, it seemed to be a map, but its markings were still in the mage language. "Theaza!" a muffled voice snapped, seemingly from below. Kellyn jumped. "Don't touch that!" He peered around the pedestal and noticed a loose scroll wedged into the floorboards, but nothing more. Time was of the essence. He stuffed the scroll back into its case, satcheled it, and hurried out of the room. The sound of ricocheting water crashed back into the foreground, and he started to run. - - - - - - - - Remember to comment and vote for the chapters you enjoy! Any and all feedback is appreciated. Join my Discord server here: https://discord.gg/nQPP7xNvjC This is a novella-type story, so don't be alarmed if the chapters are short. Cover image generated by Copilot Designer.
12 parts