Inheritor Of Magic: The Magi King

As the day wore on, it became immediately apparent that their need to stay underground was mostly over. Nobody wanted to get lost in the woods before they knew where the hazards were and how the monsters were behaving. So, they were hanging around on the surface, chatting and cooking lunch, and they didn't seem to be attracting any attention at all.

If anything, the creatures in the woods had moved away from the gathering of people, viewing them as too much trouble to bother. That was a more normal reaction for animals, but it was directly contrary to the personality of the monsters of the Frozen Wastes.

By the time the Faerie woke up to come out and look at her handiwork, there were over thirty people gathered at ground level, laughing and joking while relaxing against the tree trunks and waiting for news from the next group of scouts.

So far, all of the reports had been the same. The monsters that were in the Forest had calmed down. The treants liked to troll people by pretending to be trees, then jump scaring them, and there were no signs of any wandering witches or misplaced army units within the boundaries of the Forest so far.

They were still waiting for messages from outside, but they had been in radio contact. Everything was calm, and only a few groups of wayward soldiers were moving in the Wastes, none of them a full army unit, and none of them visibly taking away Coven Witches.

That was the best news that the locals had heard in a long time. It gave them hope that this mess of a winter was drawing to a close and that they could enjoy their new forest without interruptions by artillery.

Wolfe smiled at the little Fae, who was happily flitting around the area, admiring trees and collecting nectar from some of the fruits growing in the canopy.

"Is it going to stay this warm all the time? Or will it adapt to the local climate now that it's been created in the Wastes?" Wolfe asked her as the faerie took a seat on a nearby branch.

"It will stay warm. I hate the snow. Hate it." She replied happily while brandishing a tiny blade that would count as a sword at her size but was being used to cut open a fruit pod.

"What about the monsters outside? Will they flock here because of the food and the warmer weather? It would suck if they flooded the area, and we ended up with a load of aggressive beasts to deal with."

The Fae shook her tiny head. "The Fae Forests self-regulate. If there are too many creatures, they will be redirected out, just like the outsiders."

She flitted away for a moment and then came back. "We should tell the scouts that they can leave and come back. They were in the forest when we cast the spell, so it will recognize them as belonging, but the people from villages outside the perimeter will just keep getting lost unless they are invited in or have an escort."

Wolfe gave a sigh of relief and offered her his assistance in getting the large fruit cut into manageable pieces.

"Is there anything else that I should know about?"

She tapped her chin as she thought, flying in lazy circles in front of him. "Oh, yes. Don't step in any mushroom circles. They have a strange habit of taking people to the Fae homeworld at random. You would be just as out of place there as I was in the snow.

Warn the witches too. All of them smell like Curses and Dark Magic, so if they end up in Faerie, they would likely be captured on sight and possibly just killed to save the time of interrogating them. They might have lost most of their power, but we didn't.

"All of them smell like Dark Magic? What does that even mean?" Wolfe asked, not understanding the reference.

He used Demonic Magic, which had an aura of the underworld on it, but Witch Magic was just Witch Magic, to the best of his knowledge.

"Fae are sensitive. Like the damage from Curses, which is huge and obvious, when Witch Magic is used to harm others, it changes their aura, and all the Fae can tell that they're Black Witches.

I doubt there are any White Witches left in this world, except for my summoner, because the others haven't had time to corrupt her yet, but there are still some in Faerie."

"Got it. I will warn them. It's likely just as unknown to them as it was to me. Do I smell like black magic as well?" Wolfe replied.

"You smell like Demon. It's a mix of curse and undeath that makes them really easy to spot. I feel like I should mention that it's really important that you, in particular, don't go to Faerie before you cleanse that curse from you.

Unlike Black Witches, who get their aura because of their actions, Demons smell evil by nature, but some of them are tolerable. Barely. Sometimes. But they're definitely not welcome, and you really don't want to find out where they will send you if they think you ended up in Faerie by accident."

"Back up. There are actual Demons? Not Cursed Magi, but born Demons?" Wolfe asked.

"Of course. One of your Witches is even part Demon. But that's not the point since that Demon was likely a Cursed Magi. But yes, there are whole realms full of them. The Familiar Demons are strange since they're all technically undead, and for the most part, they're not even real Demons. They just share the name since it fits so well."

Wolfe sighed. "I'm going to need a notepad to write down all this new information. I don't suppose you know anything about the Magi, do you? Where their lost cities might be? What happened to them? Where I might get some knowledge?"

The Faerie began to laugh, sending golden sprinkles of dust everywhere. "I'm not even from this world. I learned about your species in school, but I've never met one before. We don't have them in Faerie. They were supposedly really weird and reclusive, but if you had a problem with the Elements, they were the ones to go to.

But nobody has seen one since, like when my mother was young, so who knows if there are even any left. There wasn't a lot of them, to begin with, since they spent all their time meditating in the mountains for enlightenment and eternity or whatever it is that Monks tell themselves."

Wolfe smiled at the mental image that matched the remains of the Lumix Family house so well. A bunch of recluses who had used magic to do everything so they didn't have to leave their rooms, and even the door to the house was spelled so that you couldn't enter unless you were at a high enough level to be worth their attention.

The spell had mentioned that all the staff were magical constructs, and the room was a luxury apartment, so there really wasn't a need to leave except for social interaction.

But if they were notoriously into meditating on the truth of the universe, they might have skipped that whole 'social interaction' part entirely.