A/N: The characters in this story are all non-playable characters from Ultima V who lived in New Magincia and offered help and advice to the Avatar. I got my information from memory and from the Codex of Editable Wisdom, or Ultima Wiki.
Disclaimer: I do not own Ultima; Lord British (Richard Garriott) does.
Title: New Magincian Lessons
Characters: Felicity, Fumiko, Kaiko, Shirita, Tetsuo, Tomoka, Wartow, Yasuda
Genre: Friendship, Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Era: Age of Enlightenment, Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny
"Say, Felicity, send me another of thy fine stout, wilt thou?" asked a young farmer named Tomoka.
"Coming right up," said Felicity, the proprietor of The Humble Palate, an eating establishment in the town of New Magincia.
New Magincia was the town of Humility, one of the Eight Virtues of Avatarhood, meant to serve as a lesson to those with excessive Pride, like the residents of its predecessor, Old Magincia, a merchant community where no one had a twinge of Humility in their souls. Daemons had destroyed it for its Pride, and recently, the tormented souls of Magincia had been at last laid to rest. Now, in New Magincia, humble farmers and shepherds strove to make an honest and lowly living here while serving Humility and its tenets in earnest.
On this particular evening in town, six farmers, Wartow, Yasuda, Tetsuo, Kaiko, Fumiko, and Tomoka, and Shirita, the graveyard caretaker, were having supper in The Humble Palate after another long day's work. The day had been tough on them, to say the least.
"If only we could finish building this beautiful city, perhaps we could stand up to the influence of the evil Shadowlords better," complained Yasuda, a middle-aged farmer who kept his own private farm in the southwest of town.
Tomoka took a drink of his stout and said, "Tell us about it. I cannot understand how Blackthorn could have allowed the Shadowlords to influence him so easily. Then again, I suppose he is more weak-minded than Lord British had thought, always promising to help us but never fulfilling that empty promise. Lord British would never do such a thing!"
"That would be putting it mildly, my friend," said Kaiko, a stressed-out woman who worked on a large farm with Tomoka, Fumiko, and Tetsuo, "We never take more than our share, and we intend to feed the hungry with our crops and meat, but that scoundrel Blackthorn always sends one of his Shadowlords to claim half our harvest for no good reason at all. Poor Hassad! What did Blackthorn have to put him in his palace's dungeon for? The Great Council did nothing wrong in Lord British's rule of Britannia, so Blackthorn's Oppression has no excuse to lay their dirty hands on Hassad or any other Councilor!"
"I share thy pain, Lady Kaiko," said Wartow, an old man who, like Yasuda, owned his own private farm, "but I believe thou art forgetting one simple truth about Blackthorn-"
"Yes, Wartow," interrupted Kaiko, "I know what it is; Blackthorn is not responsible for his own corruption. Well, perhaps not, but that still gives him no excuse to plunder our city and starve the poor. Even mind-influenced people are usually at least partially responsible for their actions, and must suffer the consequences."
"I agree with Kaiko," said Tomoka, "If Lord British ever does return, I hope and believe that he will deal with Blackthorn in a way that befits the Usurper best."
"That is not my point, friends," Wartow said patiently, "Kaiko, Tomoka, thou dost feel some hate for Blackthorn, and Hate can never go with Humility. If thou dost hate him, thy Pride goes deep, and New Magincia is no place for proud people. Thou must not let Hate rule thy actions, not even when Astaroth, the Shadowlord of Hate, haunts this dear town personally, although I am at least glad that thou hast not lost thy focus on the true king of Britannia."
Tetsuo, the youngest of the people there at twenty-two years old, finished eating the fruit he had been served and said, "Thou art a very good man, Wartow, and one of the most knowledgeable about Humility, but ye must remember not to be too preachy about thy opinions and beliefs. Virtue comes from good intent and free will, and forced virtue loses that virtue. So please forgive Kaiko and Tomoka for their anger at Blackthorn, I ask humbly."
"But of course I forgive it, Tetsuo," said Wartow, "As a man who will never hate even the worst of us, I most certainly believe in forgiving and forgetting, and I forgave them before I even responded to their comments."
"I am glad to hear thee say that," Shirita, the only person in New Magincia older than Wartow, said, "for it is also in my mind that one must forgive and love if thou dost wish to walk on a humble path. I shall never forget the ghosts of Old Magincia and their torments, even now, after they have been all laid to rest."
Wartow looked expectedly at Tetsuo. "Though thou art the youngest man in town, young Tetsuo," he said, "I can see that thy lessons in life are being learned more quickly than any of us here had expected. What new knowledge hast thou learned about virtue, if I may ask?"
"Well," said Tetsuo, "I have been thinking a lot about the new so-called ethic laws that Blackthorn installed in the minds of Britannians. They do not inspire people to be virtuous; they only frighten people into doing what is right, with a threat of a terrific punishment if they are not strictly obeyed. They do not allow people to use free will to follow or not follow the virtues, and without free will, the virtue is likely insincere and results in a sham virtuous deed. If one freely follows Humility, or any of the other seven virtues, the deed doer does it in whole sincerity with the good intent of a virtuous man or woman. I do not think that Lord British would allow these laws to be legitimate if he were not lost."
Fumiko, a middle-aged woman, was the only one present who had said nothing as of yet, but now she joined in the conversation, too. "I agree with thee, Tetsuo. There are many people in Britannia who do not realize that Blackthorn's 'ethics' are in the wrong, and follow him almost blindly. Art thou aware of the inhabitants of the lighthouse Greyhaven?"
Her friends all nodded in the affirmative.
"Well," she continued, "though David, the man of the house, is a very decent man from what I have heard, his wife, Charlotte, has let herself be taken in by the influence of Blackthorn and the Shadowlords. She is positively in love with the draconian laws and even their punishments; I heard that she is especially fond of the Law of Honesty, where liars lose their tongues. She is absolutely ghoulish to take such things so seriously! And their son, Anthony, has been indoctrinated with Blackthorn's teachings by his mother to the point where he cannot think for himself anymore! I hope that Lord British, or perhaps the Avatar, can do something for him one day. I pity those who think Blackthorn's ethics still give them freedom. Without freedom, people are enslaved, and Charlotte and Anthony are enslaved to the Laws of Virtue."
"Exactly," agreed Tetsuo, "As long as Blackthorn holds sway over Britannia, people like them will be slaves to corruption. The Avatar must return to stop this tyranny."
"I certainly agree with that!" exclaimed Kaiko, "Someone has to take good old Blackthorn off his high horse and throw him in the gutter! And those perverse Shadowlords should never have existed in the first place!"
"Although I still do not agree with thy passion," said Wartow, "thou art not wrong, Kaiko. Someone has to come and put a stop to this madness before all of Britannia is consumed by the false ethics of Blackthorn, and I think that the Avatar shall be the one to do it, when he is summoned again."
"Dost thou really believe the Avatar will return?" asked Tomoka hopefully.
"Indeed, yes," replied Wartow, downing some of his own stout from his mug, "The forces of good will never allow the forces of evil to get away with their crimes permanently. He will come, and we shall be ready for him."
This lightened the mood in The Humble Palate for a good long while, and they settled back to finish their food and drink.
Yes, thought Wartow, our virtuous hero and our rightful king will return.