Total pages in book: 222
Estimated words: 210715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1054(@200wpm)___ 843(@250wpm)___ 702(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 210715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1054(@200wpm)___ 843(@250wpm)___ 702(@300wpm)
The Temples had to be approached with caution. If I barged into the Red Basilica and started spouting things about other worlds, they might declare me mentally unhinged, they could brand me as a heretic, or they would believe me, which could be the worst of the three outcomes. The clerics of Rellas were savvy political animals; the advantages of having sole access to someone from another world wouldn’t be lost on them. They wouldn’t help me get home. They would confine me and exploit my existence to increase their influence.
Contacting the Mage Tower would be even more dangerous. Archmage Damaes Serras, the master of the Mage Tower, was the magical equivalent of a nuclear warhead. Damaes was not the best-adjusted person and that was putting it mildly. In the second book, he turned a knight into a pillar of fire—the man deserved it—and then roasted bacon on a little stick while the guy burned to death. He didn’t eat the bacon. He just wanted to make a point.
The Archmage had to be avoided at all costs. If he figured out that I couldn’t die, he might spend the next couple of decades murdering me in creative ways to see how far he could push my resurrection powers. I had no desire to become an eternal fireball to satisfy Damaes’s intellectual curiosity.
Looking for a way home would have to wait. I needed to figure out a safe place to stay first.
Before I left the room, I’d dumped Lecke’s bag on the rug and counted my ill-gotten gains. The bag felt heavy, but most of the coins inside were dens. I had nine nomas in silver and another five in change, roughly five to six thousand dollars in terms of purchasing power. I could rent a modest room for a couple of months, buy some clothes, and feed myself, if I didn’t make any extravagant purchases. After that, I would have to earn more money.
I finished my tea and refilled my cup.
Robbing some scumbag every couple of months wasn’t an option. My inability to die was magical, but not the kind of skill that could result in meaningful employment. I hadn’t woken up in the body of a trained blademaster or a skilled mage, so I couldn’t take advantage of muscle memory and honed reflexes. I didn’t mind that part. Taking over someone’s body meant that person stopped existing. I hadn’t stolen anyone’s life. I wouldn’t have to pretend to be someone else and lie to their family and loved ones. Whatever happened now would be my life alone.
I didn’t have any professional abilities valued by Rellas. Nobody would be impressed by my expertise in Google Docs integration or my mad driving skills. I was bad at sewing, slightly better at knitting, useless at weaving or embroidery, and too old to be accepted as an apprentice into any guilds or shops. I could make a mean fajita, but that was neither here nor there.
On the other hand, I could probably do more math, despite being appallingly bad at it by modern standards, than most of the educated people here. Fractions, a new superpower. If I busted out basic algebraic equations, I’d blow their minds.
No magic, no fighting, and no trade skills. But what I did have was knowledge. I knew things about this world and about its people, intimate things, secrets that could topple noble houses and upend politics. I could present myself to one of the power players in the city and dazzle them with my secret expertise.
The political landscape of Rellas was dominated by the Eight Great Families. They were wealthy landholders, each with their own personal army and unique brand of magic.
In Rellas, magic was a force shaped by two principles: knowledge and practice. Some people were born with a talent for it, and you either had it or you didn’t, the way some people in our world could smell ants and others couldn’t. That type of magic wasn’t hereditary, and it was rare. Anybody with a predisposition for it could become a gifted cleric or a mage, and if they studied and practiced, they could grow stronger and more powerful. The Temples and the Mage Tower constantly competed for talented recruits.
The magic of the Great Families was something else entirely. You couldn’t have it unless you were born into the bloodline. It was hereditary and limited in scope, but devastatingly powerful. When the Eight Families went to war, the world burned.
The Great Families had been playing musical chairs with the throne of Rellas for the last eight hundred years, and how long each dynasty lasted depended on how good they were at pitting the other seven families against each other. The latest royals, the Savarics, had raised political scheming to an art form, but they’d been growing less and less stable with each generation. Sauven Savaric, the current king, had been teetering on the edge of a full psychotic break for a decade, and the tensions among the Great Families were at an all-time high.