ARC III
CHAPTER ONE: Studying
Disclaimer: Not Mine.
The end-of-class chime sounded, and everyone sighed as another long day of classes finally ended.
Louise - like the rest of her classmates, returned her books to her school satchel, and headed for the door. Unlike her classmates, she didn't do so while chatting to her friends. While they all talked gaily about what their plans for the evening were - an expedition into the forest to look for some rare ingredients, study, and - if she heard right, an attempt to sneak a peak into the womans' bathing area, none of those conversations included her.
Though with that last one, she wouldn't have wanted it to anyway.
Where before the conversations would have been about her - as the subject of ridicule and the butt of jokes, now she was just...
Ignored.
Politely, and respectfully, but still ignored.
Louise sighed. This was what she had wanted, right? For them to leave her alone? And it was better. Truly, it was. Without the practical jokes and the constant teasing, she was finding it easier to study. Somehow though, she thought it'd feel better.
While the other students headed for the dorms, Louise headed in a different direction. Still passing students, but from other classes. Other years. Almost as unknown to her as her own classmates though, really.
They weren't even really ignoring her. If there was group work, they would work with her readily enough. If she asked a question, they would answer, politely and nervously, then find a reason to be somewhere else.
Louise finally arrived at the classroom she was heading for, and entered with a sigh. Mr Colbert, it seemed, had already arrived, and looked up from the book he was reading. 'Ah, Miss Valliere. Such a world-weary sigh for one so young. What ails you?'
Louise reddened slightly at being caught out. 'Nothing of importance', she returned evasively. 'Mr Kelbart's maths lessons always leave me tired.'
Mr Colbert nodded. 'He does push his students hard, but he gets good results.'
He paused to gather his thoughts.
'Since this is your first extra-curricular class, and since your tutor for the day has yet to arrive, we'll go over the details of what we're doing here. You probably know this already, from the letter you received from the princess, but it doesn't hurt to confirm.'
Louise sighed internally, and nodded. Why did teachers always feel the need to monologue when they needed to fill time?
'Given the powers your familiar hold, and the strength it can lend to Tristain, the princess and her advisors have decreed the university shall provide you - and hopefully your familiar, additional training. While your familiar has many powers, it's easy to make mistakes in crisis situations, and the best way to prevent that is through prior preparation. That will mostly come through training and drills.'
Louise sighed and sank into her seat. Just what she needed. An even longer school day... But she had suspected it would be like this.
'It's not all bad...' But Mr Colbert was interrupted as a plump older man bumbled into the class - with what looked to be a giant stick insect attached to his back. He set a collection of books down on a desk, breathing heavily.
'My apologies for keeping you waiting', he wheezed.
Mr Colbert waved away his apology, and finished up his speech while the new teacher recovered his breath.
'Now, as the teacher most familiar with you, I've been assigned your head teacher. I'll be assigning a variety of tutors, such as Mr Angburt here, to help you with their specialties. Mr Angburt's specialty is in possessing familiars, and he's here to teach you to do the same.'
20 MINUTES LATER
Louise concentrated like the teacher had showed her, wondering if it would work...Felt the link inside her, exactly like her teacher said it would be there, stretched her awareness through it, and... Suddenly she was there.
It was different than her teacher said it would be. Her teacher had suggested she lie on her back the first time she tried, in case she got disorientated and fell over, but it wasn't like that at all. She didn't feel like she was in two places at once, it wasn't making her sick, she...
She waited...
No..., she wasn't. She wasn't getting any confusing thoughts that weren't her own, and she knew exactly who she was.
The only thing different was the rectangle she could now see. Hadn't even 'looked at' yet, since she'd been bracing for the disorientation Mr Angburt had led her to expect.
Having come to terms with the new sensations - as her tutor had taught her to do, she only now started paying attention to them... the rectangle seemingly becoming brighter, or larger, or more clear, perhaps.
It was... odd.
It was like a painting. Of a waterfall. With a half-woman, half wolf meditating under the water. But there was a large rectangle of white over the top of it, decorated at the top with a series of unrelated tiny drawings - of nothing Louise could recognize.
On the white rectangle itself, was line after line of the most perfect printed writing she had ever seen... though... looking at it, it did look just as good as the text that appeared whenever her familiar was talking.
And the image wasn't still... Especially the white rectangle. Even as she watched, the text all slid up the rectangle... the page? The whiteboard? ... Slid up, anyway, exposing blank white space below, which quickly filled as an invisible scribe wrote... erased, corrected, and filled in once more.
Louise tried reading some of it, but it made no sense to her. Seemed to be asking if William was Free or not.
Whoever this invisible scribe was... and... well, it almost had to be her familiar, didn't it. Hadn't he said something about a magic viewing screen once? Maybe it wasn't just used for games.
Anyway, it seemed her familiar had finished writing. Judging by how much text kept being cleared and replaced, her familiar was having trouble finding the right words. Louise... was a natural scholar. Magic didn't come to her, but she'd never had trouble finding the right words, the right answers, the right study techniques. She had seen others struggle in the same was as the invisible student in front of her. Get frustrated and give up. And yes, even as she watched, a white arrow darted up to a corner of the whiteboard/page thing, and the rectangle of writing disappeared.
The arrow darted over to some of the smaller pictures on the left, hovering over one, before another white rectangle appeared, this one filled with multiple pictures of folders. The arrow darted over one of them, causing the rectangle to change it's contents once again.
Was the arrow her familiar's golem here? What would it even be like to possess an arrow? How could it even see?
But the arrow had been busy as she sat musing... changing the contents of the rectangle a variety of times, before it finally showed a collection of... it looked like artwork. The arrow hovered over the first, and it enlarged, and Louise saw an astonishingly detailed picture of a girl wearing... Oh!
The picture changed to another, similar picture, with a girl wearing even less, with her hands reaching down between...
Louise flushed, and quickly broke the connection.
'Miss Valliere?' It was Mr Angburt, with some concern.
Fighting down her blush somewhat, she looked up. 'Yes', she muttered. 'It was successful.'
Mr Angburt beamed at her. 'First try? Excellent. So what did you see?'
Louise flushed again, looking down at the wooden desk. 'I... I really couldn't say, Sir.'
Mr Angburt frowned. 'Well, it's to be expected. We'll try and work on your focus, and we should have you seeing what he can see in no time.'
Louise frowned, but remained silent. She was quite fine NOT sharing his vision...
A FEW DAYS LATER
Brent sat in front of his computer, home from uni and ready for his first cross-dimensional tutoring lesson. He'd spent most of his Sunday setting it up. His assignment involved dissecting a number of different philosophical papers, and he'd needed to create a contraption for his Tristanian tutor to pre-read the material.
He originally thought it would only take a hour or two - load up a space minecraft clone he occasionally played, copy and paste the text into one of the LCD panels, and insert some code to have the text slowly scroll down. The contraption had ended up taking the whole day to set up though. Even coding it so it scrolled took a lot longer than he expected, and the scholars told him it wasn't enough - they really needed some way of scrolling up and down through the text. This should have been the work of ten minutes or so. Just adjust the 'textMovement' variable when the scholars pressed a button on the button console. Which led to the second, and much more time consuming problem. The button console wouldn't register their button presses. Possibly because you needed to tap the 'F' key while your curser hovered over the button, and the scholars had neither 'F' keys, or a cursor.
Hours of frustration, code, and careful queries to message boards later, and Brent had finally hit upon a working solution. The 'game' seemed to register them as NPC's. He set up sensors on different sides of his contraption, which when triggered, changed the text scroll speed. It was a clunky, inelegant solution, but it worked.
Brent just hoped the support the scholars could offer him would be worth the Sunday he'd wasted setting it up. It had been fun, but if he'd spent that time researching his assignment, he wouldn't need the scholars' help in the first place. Not that he actually would have spent a solid six hours on his assignment like that...
But that had been Sunday, and this was Monday. Since the contraption tended to dematerialise when he logged out, he'd needed to leave his avatar idle in it's stall in the rebuilt familliiars' stable this morning, while he went to Uni for his classes. Hew as back now though...
He leant forward, his fingers sliding to their accustomed place on the keyboard and mouse, and his avatar sprung to life, once more startling the stablehand who had been gawking at it. Brent considered apologizing, but he had a lesson to attend.
His avatar - this time, a man in a bulky spacesuit, clumped his way through the castle grounds, swiftly making his way to the room assigned him. The two Scholars were there, already, waiting for him. One of them he'd met a dozen or so times now, a Mr Cobert, he thought. The other he'd met the first time this morning, when he was setting up the contraption. A Mr Bood or something. And now that Brent thought about it, Mr Bood didn't seem too happy. Maybe he found the readings as tedious as Brent did?
The man quickly disabused him of that notion. It wasn't boredom. It was anger.
Apparently, the material he'd been given was considered heretical.
Apparently, his tutor was not a Tristanian scholar at all, but was merely stationed there. By the Church. To keep an eye on the academic body, and guide it away from lines of thought deemed heretical. Such as the material Brent had given him to study.
These were all things Mr Colbert told him after. All Brent knew at the time was he was behind in the assignment because he'd spent his time setting up the viewer, the scholar was supposed to be helping him work through the readings, and instead was going on about the theological implications of the material. Mr Colbert's information could have been useful BEFORE he told the scholar his opinion of theology, the Church, and religion in general. His tutor had responded with a tirade of his own, before storming out, shouting dire threats, and slamming the door behind him.
Brent had initially winced at Mr Colbert's explanation of his tutor's reaction, but then shrugged.
'Well it's not like the Church can do anything, even if he does manage to convince them.'
Mr Colbert, still somewhat shaken at Mr Bude's tirade, frowned and shook his head.
'You're being too short sighted.'
Brent shrugged. 'They can declare me a heretic if they want. Imprisonment? A public flogging? Death by burning? They can't really do anything to me that'll stick. If I die, I respawn. I don't feel pain, and I don't own anything. The way I see it, there's really nothing for me to worry about.'
Mr Colbert narrowed his eyes. 'And what about Louise? 'Not your problem?'
Brent paused, then shrugged, feeling a little uneasy.
'Well... they wouldn't hold her accountable. Would they?'
Mr Colbert just shook his head.
'You're her familiar. A master is always responsible for their familiar's actions.'
Mr Colbert smiled grimly, before continuing.
'It's worse than that though. Familiars are bound to their masters for life. As you mentioned, you're effectively immortal here, but if Louise dies, you lose your connection to this world.'
Brent waited.
Exasperated, Mr Colbert explained.
'You don't seem to realize the position you're in. With the power you've demonstrated, you, on your own, are able to overcome armies. Destroy or conquer cities. Overcome even the most powerful of mages. You yourself are invulnerable, but if the Church or one of the neighboring countries decides you represent too much of a threat...'
He paused
'All they have to do is arrange the death of a Miss Valliere, and you disappear. Your power, your potential, your threat... gone. As you said, you are essentially invulnerable, which means any action taken against you HAS to be through Miss Valliere.
Brent felt a bit queasy.
'But surely they wouldn't kill Louise just to get to me.'
Mr Colbert shrugged. 'The Church wouldn't. Not for heresy. They would certainly charge her for any heretical acts you committed, but given her family's political connections, she'll likely get off fairly lightly. Perhaps a substantial fine or a light flogging. Of more concern is other conclusions the Church may come to.'
Brent waited, an uneasy sensation in his stomach.
'You were summoned here. From another world. You display powers that could destroy kingdoms. These powers give off not even the slightest hint of magic - the gift the Progenitor left us.
You bring ideas deemed heretical, and just spoke openly against the Church. It's not unreasonable for the Church to assume you're an agent of the Deceiver. That Louise made a deal with the Deceiver to gain you as her familiar.'
Brent's first reaction was to laugh. Him? A demon? But he settled for sighing. 'So the Church thinks I'm a demon?'
'Not yet, but given the impression you gave Mr Bude, it's a conclusion they're likely to come to. And yes, consorting with demons DOES carry a death sentence, no matter who your parents are.'
Mr Colbert gave a sigh of his own. A rather long, world weary sigh. 'But - perhaps I'm just borrowing trouble. I tend to predict the worst from those in power. I have been right in the past, but far more often, I'm wrong. Perhaps the Church will see past their paranoia and see the person behind that body you wear. Perhaps the neighboring rulers wouldn't stoop to murdering children. Especially if you're careful never to use your powers to threaten them. It's best not to even worry about this, for now.
He paused again, looking around the empty classroom.
'It wouldn't hurt though, if you worked to fix Mr Bude's impression of you. But enough of that for now. Right now, you have an assignment to write, and are missing your tutor. I may not be as learned as Mr Bude, but I did study the material you provided, and am willing to help. Now - what can you tell me about your assignment requirements?
Brent, distracted, looked around his desk for the assignment sheet. It was a good five minutes before he remembered he had never printed it out, and he needed to access the Uni website to download it. Although Mr Colbert had told him not to worry, there was a uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. He'd known intellectually that this wasn't some game. But the fact that it was all through his computer made him forget sometimes. That the 'characters' here had agency, and would react against anything he did. That even though he was invulnerable, those around him weren't. That he wasn't able to load to a previous save if he screwed everything up.
Still, as Mr Colbert said, he has an assignment to study for. He gathered his notes, did his best to put thoughts of Louise, of politics and of religion out of his mind, and started laboriously working his way through the readings.
TWO DAYS LATER
Brent and Louise stood in the courtyard, Mr Colbert in front of them, three strangers behind him.
Brent wasn't even sure he should be here. The assignment, and it's looming deadline sat at the back of his mind, an ever-constant worry.
Still, he'd literally just spent an hour at the library, and got absolutely nowhere with it. He'd stalled with it, and putting in even more time right now would only get him more frustrated. Better to take his mind off it by doing something else for a while. Hence his attendance here...
This particular meeting had been decided some time before, as part of his side of the bargain with Tristain. In order to make use of his abilities, he had to discover how they had been reinterpreted within Halkeginia, and find which games were suited to which tasks. The three strangers Mr Colbert had just started introducing were likely... yes. A general, who bore a striking resemblance to the blond fop he'd dueled a week ago, a diplomat, and a lady in plate armor introduced as the captain of the musketeers.
Brent frowned internally. It seemed a doubling up of resources to him. The diplomat for diplomatic skills, and the general to teach the strategies and composition of contemporary armies, but what would that leave for the musketeer captain?
Internally, he shrugged. He'd find out in time. In the meanwhile, thanks to his internal musings, he'd completely missed their names.
The following hour passed by in a blur. It truly was an excellent distraction from his assignment. He had developed a rapport with general Gramont, and learned as much as he taught. He'd grown up on games like the Total War series, so the intrica of commanding an army was already an interest of his. The logistics that went behind an army on the march was far more interesting than he'd imagined, and his ability to bring an army to the field without needing a following train of luggage wagons almost made up for their lack of mage support.
Though he had heard the Total War franchise were working on a Warhammer game. It wasn't supposed to be due for a few years, but if he was able to bring a greater daemon onto the battlefield, no amount of mages would be able to defeat him.
On second thought, that perhaps wasn't the best idea ever. It was exactly the sort of thing that would bring the Church to launch a crusade against him, so perhaps he'd have to stick to conventional forces.
The diplomat... He still couldn't remember his name. That had proven less useful. Or more frustrating anyway. The diplomat spoke of courtesies, and treaties, and traditions, economic benefits and taxes, and it might as well have been in a foreign language for the good it did him. The only thing he got from it was the idea of using characters from RPGs with high charisma stats to persuade important people here. Something that trivialized his problem with Mr Bood, providing he was able to even speak with the Church Scholar any more.
The captain of the musketeer force had proven a surprise in a number of ways. Incapable of magic, commoner-born, and much lower in the social structure of Tristain than any other tutor he'd been introduced to. She had a no-nonsense approach, and focused much more on the tactical rather than strategic level. She spoke of practical things. How he and his master could be transported to where they were needed, how they could do it without being seen, what their rules of engagement should be, and how to prevent their actions being traced back to Tristain. In short, Brent surmised, she was the medieval equivalent of Special Forces. Still terribly direct, and more at home on the battlefield than covert operations, but at least familiar with the concept.
She was also the only one who breached the idea of how to contact him when he wasn't in-game.
They had developed a somewhat crude method - where if they needed him, Louse would tell him to 'stop moving'. Every hour or so, he'd log into a game on his phone, and try moving his character. If he couldn't, he'd get home and log in as soon as he could.
There was a lot to be desired from this, but the time they'd set aside for this session was almost up. Both the nobles and Brent himself had things they needed to do. It would all no doubt be improved later on.
Brent caught Louise looking at him out of the corner of his eye, and frowned slightly. Why was she even here? She had mostly been left out of the talks, and had only really been included in the discussion on how to get in touch with him. She'd also been more quiet than usual, now that he thought about it... Less willing to throw in her opinion, and just quietly... keeping an eye on him. Watching him. Brent shrugged. The musketeer (Agnes?) was asking him about stealth capabilities of different games, and there were only a few minutes left until they all had to leave. Louise could wait.
Louise watched her familiar quietly as the nobles boarded their respective carriages to be taken back to the capital. His jerky movements, and the way his eyes refused to focus on anything were still unsettling, but Louise felt she was starting to be able to see past that, just a tiny bit. Her lessons with Mr Angburt had continued, and she felt she at least had a glimpse into who her familiar was, outside these poorly animated puppets he wore. She had seen his constant struggles with his study, read over his shoulder at some of the conversations he had with his friends, and even been able to actually see some of his world through what must have been his world's version of a play.
She blushed slightly as she thought of some of the other things she'd seen. It seemed men were perverts no matter what world they were born in. Women were named the fairer gender for a reason, she thought in equal parts embarrassment and smugness. Such a vulgar topic held no interest for them.
Kirche flashed briefly across her mind, but there were always aberrations...But she was getting sidetracked. In the end, that side of him didn't really matter. What mattered, to her at least, was his role as her familiar.
Her glimpses into his magic window was starting to give her an inkling of who he was. And she could tell - this was still all just a game to him. He had said he knew it was real, that they were real people. But she could tell it wasn't real for him. They were just a distraction, something to take his mind off his struggles with his studies.
She hadn't forgotten her conversations with Mr Colbert. Her fears that her familiar wouldn't return to her were slowly coming back. There was supposed to be a bond between familiar and master, and there quite clearly wasn't between them. His studies weren't going well, and it was only a matter of time till he lost interest in Tristain. Watching him through the link, hearing from Mr Colbert on how his studies were going, she had a growing certainty that one day, he'd just decide to stop coming. Unless she did something.
She licked her lips, stepped up...
'Before you go - I need to talk to you. Privately.'
Brent turned, taking in his 'mistress', showing no surprise. Not that he was able to, of course.
'Uber...' She started. 'Or... Brent? Mr Colbert mentioned your true name is Brent?'
The figure in front of her nodded it's head awkwardly, staring glassy eyed into the distance. But Louise was becoming used to it now.
'I've been talking to Mr Colbert. Also...'
'Also, I've been taking lessons. Additional lessons, I mean. In how to bond with my familiar better.'
The figure continued to stare past her, into the distance. She fidgeted.
'My first lessons have been in how to see through the eyes of my familiar. Through you.'
The figure turned to look at her, and she blushed.
'I've seen you study. That's all. Just study. But... your study...'
She hesitated.
'I've also talked to Mr Colbert. He's a good teacher, he is, I know it. But the field he's tutoring you in... he hasn't studied it. I don't think he's the best tutor for you.'
She hesitated. But she was already here. There was no going back now. 'While you were on your computer. One of the times, I saw the material you were reading. Saw you studying it, saw you taking notes.'
The figure continued to stand there, waiting for her to get to the point.
'I can help you. The material made sense to me, and I could see you struggle with it. Mr Colbert isn't the best for this subject, and the other teachers won't help for some reason, but I can help you.'
She looked down, a little. 'I guess you might not believe it, but I'm a good student. I think you...' she trailed off. No, that was wrong. She looked up, more determined.
'You need my help. To study. You suck as a student. You really really stink. But I can help you get better. A familiar's actions reflect their master, and I'll not be shamed by having a dullard for a familiar.'
Behind the monitor, Brent blinked, and started reaching for the Alt-F4 keys. But he paused halfway there. She was right... He did need help...
He paused, thinking.
As irritating as the girl in front of him was, if she was as good a scholar as she said... he'd swallow his pride. Give her a chance at least. He wasn't getting anywhere on his own, and Louise was right. Mr Colbert was struggling to understand the material himself.
Louise waited, as the figure in front of him froze for several seconds.
Finally, his response came back. 'Fine'. The slight distortions to his voice doing nothing to hide the irritated edge to it.
Louise gulped. He wasn't going to make this easy, was he? But it was studying, not magic. She could do this!
AUTHORS NOTES:
Mr Bude is a French scholar from the Renaissance period, but beyond that, any similarities are entirely coincidental. Mr Kelbart and Mr Angburt are complete fabrications.
I don't actually have the wallpaper I briefly described Louise seeing, I made it up.
Authors Note (more):
I suppose I should apologies about the wait, but I think I've been doing that for every chapter I've released in the last three years or so, and it's getting a bit monotomous.
For the longest time I imagined I wouldn't be writing fanfiction any more. I spent five months living in Taiwan, attempting to establish myself as a teacher, and the everyday adventure of living in a foreign country was enough that my stories paled in comparison.
Perhaps not uncoincidently then, I started writing this chapter again one or two months after I returned to Australia. It's gone through a lot of edits, and as long as it is, still had huge chunks cut out of it. Overall, I'm quite happy with how it turned out.
The section with Mr Bude had two pages worth of backstory and arguments cut from it. It did do a good job of explaining Mr Bude (and the Church's) position, but ultimately was rather dry and clunky. If anyone really wants to read through it, let me know and I'll send it to them.
Should you expect more frequent updates now I'm back in Australia?
Honestly, not really. Writing is something like a phase for me. I'm interested in it for four months or so, then get interested in some other project, like Arduino's, programming, learning an instrument, photoshop or so on. You can expect future chapters at some point, but probably not more than one or two a year.
As for my Ranma Beats story, I don't even have an outline for the next chapter there.
On a side note, I wrote this chapter while working in the Tiwi islands. I started about a week after I arrived here, and I'm posting this literally about an hour before I leave.