The ship slowly approached the Sredinan harbour and stopped just a bit off the wooden pier. The large wooden front of the ship was lowered as a brow-bridge and the students unceremoniously disembarked. Their luggage would be taken to the dorms, and so they could simply leave. Their only responsibility was to pick up the keys to their rooms before the reception closed.

  Jim really didn't understand why one wouldn't; noise complaints and uncleanliness weren't really an issue when magic became involved. That’s what he’d heard most knights complaining about whenever the two schools mingled.

  "I don't like letting go of my trunk like that." Jim heard another student complain as they started scattering on the pier, most going in different directions.

  "I don't really understand why they're so insistent that they take it." Another one agreed.

  Jim wondered if he should tell them that it was an overall decision made not to give them a reason to try and carry their trunks to the school dorms telekinetically. Lots of people had gotten hurt by this train of jostling and floating luggage in the past.

  It wasn’t Jim’s fault that the street urchin had jumped in front of him like that…

  "You're not going to the dorms?" Lebowski asked as both of them reached the main street. The boy would be going to the left along the busy road full of carriages, jewellers, and blacksmiths. The academy was in the western part of the city, on a small hill. The dorms were situated in several of the apartment buildings below the hill, necessitating a small hike for lessons every day.

  "I need to go to the bank first. Get some more spending money," Jim said with a frown. "Then I'm going to file a complaint at the governor's office. Or the gendarms. Anyone, really. The professors were supremely unhelpful." He sniffed.

  "I could give you enough for a carriage," Lebowski offered in between hiccups, starting to sway in the heat of midday.

  It was already hot in the city despite it only being March. The rune circle was giving off heat undisturbed above, helped along by the sun. August would be unbearable.

  "Use it yourself, you look like you're about to fall over," Jim said, and the two boys clapped each other on the shoulders, the fatter and drunker of the two getting himself a carriage which he barely made it into with the help of the driver. A sturdy-looking grey-haired man with a neutral face who seemed used to such antics. He'd be glad for having provided the service. Lebowski was a good tipper when he was drunk.

  Jim, for his part, turned around and started walking down the busy street towards the financial district. It was further away from the port than the blacksmithing one for simple logistical reasons. Considering the biggest exports of Rotto were the weapons, armour and jewelry crafted from the black iron of the Hrust mountains, it was useful to have these businesses close to the port.

  The city’s banks could be found more towards the middle. Their location didn’t matter as most money was transported by mages who knew how to open the gate spell. It eliminated the risk of bandits and pirates, which heightened the prestige of the bank. Mages were expensive, and nobody cared that, on average, one lost less money during normal transport even accounting for dangers than if one hired mages to avoid the risk completely. Having mages work under you provided a sort of prestige not many other things could.

  As he walked past the clanging and the shouting, which slowly transitioned into hawking and shouting, he lamented the fact that dimensional spells were some of the hardest to create, use and learn. It was one of the few fields of magic that actually interested him, but considering that even people who tried very hard to succeed in the field sometimes didn't, he didn't feel like wasting his time.

  He was here to get his combat mage status recognised by the guild through his education and leave. Live out the rest of his life in leisure, coasting on reputation and family connections.

  The shouting suddenly got louder.

  Jim paused in his steps as he beheld the spectacle in front of him, what seemed to be a large group of farmers protesting in front of one of the city's grain silos. A city official was standing in front of the door to the silo, flanked by two guards in black armour. In front of him was a teeming mass of farmers, peasants and what looked like normal Rottan citizens. Too intimidated to rush in, but not intimidated enough to remain silent.

  Not caring about the content of the words, but about the fact that the road was decisively blocked, Jim swerved into a small alleyway. Counting his prophetic dream, he'd been living in Sredina for a full year. He knew the city.

  Rushing past abandoned barrels full of trash and a homeless person or two sleeping on the floor, he tried to exit the alley as quickly as possible onto the parallel main street. His eyes flickered about, staying alert, which is why he noticed the three shadows peeling themselves from a set of doorways in front of him to bar his path. Quickly turning around, Jim saw that there were similarly three bandits standing behind him. He analysed the group and his blood ran cold. Filthy men in ragged clothing, but oddly well-preserved hairstyles, surrounded him. None of them had visible weapons, but several were hiding their hands behind their backs, or in their coats, clearly gripping something.

  "In broad daylight as well," Jim muttered to himself. "What is this world coming to?" he asked. Two robberies in one day? How come future Jim hadn't had to deal with such issues?

  One of the ruffians stepped forward, giving him a somewhat charming smile that revealed a row of perfectly well-kept teeth.

  "Hello friend, would you mind making a donation to the needy?" he asked with a fanciful hand gesture while the two behind him chuckled.

  The young mage looked back to check that the other three weren't approaching him before he pulled himself together. His magical skills had come with him from the future. He didn't really have anything to worry about. "Just to make sure, is this a robbery?" he asked as he raised a hand towards the man who'd come forward. He seemed a bit more unsure now.

  "Ehhhh, maybe?" the bandit asked, while moving his left hand in a weird gesture. As if calling for something. Jim glanced backwards and saw that the three behind him still weren't approaching. Not particularly caring about the fact that the bandits seemed to be getting cold feet, Jim called upon a magic missile. A ball of rapidly spinning mana formed on his palm, and he was just about to shoot it at the three men in front of him, whose eyes were widening, before a red form crashed down in front of him.

  "What do we have here?" the new arrival said slowly as they righted themselves up and faced the bandits. Jim cancelled his magic missile and prepped his mage shield just in case. He'd been forced to practice both spells enough in class that they were entirely reflexive, needing no incantation or hand gesture.

  The arrival of this, as he now recognised, woman, seemed to oddly galvanise the leading bandit, who smiled and raised a hand dramatically. "Hand over your money, and nobody has to get hurt!" he shouted dramatically with a sweeping gesture.

  "I don't think so," the newly arrived woman said with a chuckle, flicking her long black hair back with a contemptuous gesture. Her other hand, dainty and small, swung out. But what came out of it was anything but dainty and small. A red beam of light pierced straight through the lead bandit before bending into a half-circle to hit the two men behind him. Then the beam rushed past the woman and Jim to hit the three men behind them too. As one, the six collapsed to the floor like puppets with their strings cut.

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  Jim blinked, never having seen or heard of a spell like that. The interloper turned and smiled, all aristocratic features and hauntingly green eyes, enough to make Jim blush before he could stop himself.

  "We should get out of here," she suddenly said, before grabbing him by his still raised arm and pulling him along with her over the felled forms of the bandits and out of the alleyway. The young mage barely managed to follow, stumbling along over the cobblestones, surprised at the sudden abduction. The woman pulled him along, out of the alleyway, through the main street, ignoring the queer gazes of the pedestrians, and into another side-street.

  They ran like that for a minute before stopping, at which point Jim had to put his hands on his knees and catch his breath. "What was that about?" he asked in between gulps of air. "Shouldn't we have called law enforcement to arrest those louts?"

  The woman shook her head, propped a hand on her hip and frowned. "I might have used a spell I shouldn't have in my excitement," she admitted. "Saving handsome young men is my passion after all."

  Jim righted himself to give a better image of himself. He was still breathing heavily, however. "Well, thanks. But I had it handled," he said, perhaps a tad proudly. Even if she hadn't arrived, he would have been fine. Probably. He wasn't good enough to shield and attack at the same time.

  "I noticed you were about to blast his face off with a magic missile, yeah," the woman said with a frown. "You're a second year at the academy?"

  "First year, actually," Jim said, and it was for the first time in his life that anyone gave him an actual respectful look at that.

  "Already a reflexive magic missile, huh. Bit of an overachiever, aren't you?" she asked. Then she paused as if considering something. "You know, we could use ambitious and talented people like you at our next meeting. We meet once a month to discuss things like politics, magic, and economics. It's a fun get-together of mages and other movers and shakers," she said, a hand disappearing into her large red robe and pulling out a piece of parchment. "Here's the address and time, I'd appreciate it if you came," she said with a wink. Then suddenly, she crouched down, a magical glyph appearing on the cobble-stoned floor under her feet.

  Jim took the parchment, only to freeze mid-fold. He didn’t know her name. "Wait, who are you?" he asked.

  "Call me Alice," Alice said with a grin before suddenly jumping up and away, easily clearing the several floor houses encapsulating the alley they were in and leaving his sight.

  Jim was left standing there, gaping up like a dumbass, his black robes askew and clutching a piece of parchment. He turned his eyes downwards to read it at some point.

  Black Ouroboros

  Social collective of Sredina gathering to discuss recent developments in world politics, economy and magic.

  Next meeting, Evening of the 11th under the church of the god of Transfiguration

  Scratching his head, Jim walked out of the alley, unsure what he thought about the present in comparison to the future he'd seen. On one hand, he'd gotten robbed once, successfully, and once unsuccessfully. Also, he'd been invited to a group meeting of some sort of private society.

  Making useful connections in trade and politics was the secondary purpose to him receiving a combat mage certificate in Sredina, so it seemed like everything was coming together perfectly. He'd been able to take his magical skills from the future, where he'd already passed the second circle certification process, and now he could also focus on networking.

  Things were looking up, and after he offloaded the prophetic information that he'd gotten in his dreams on the academy staff, there would be nothing preventing him from having a nice and relaxing second semester at the academy.

  -/-

  Attempted robbery and the invitation from the black Ouroboros notwithstanding, Jim still had to get to the bank. He was starting to get shaken up by the day that he'd had. Waking up to those prophetic dreams, getting robbed, the faculty refusing to help, and almost getting robbed again. However, he tried not to show his nervousness; after all, it was already over.

  He still walked down the street more unsurely after the most recent incident, flinching every time something moved in one of the shadowed side alleys he passed but refused to enter, and looking suspiciously at everyone who came too close to him. Not many did, thankfully, his black robe designating him as a student. Sredina's normal citizens were very used to the student population that lived in their midst and generally kept a respectful distance.

  He arrived at the bank unmolested, through a path he'd taken often enough in the past and in the future. It was a building situated in a circular square of other such institutions. The white marble congress in which general assemblies were held and policies hashed out between guild heads and other influential figures. Then there was the shining mage guild, the smoky blacksmith guild and the merchant's guild, respectively the most influential guilds in the country.

  The mage guild was responsible for identifying mage potentiates in Mitelos and getting them to the academy, testing the ability of mages who had already graduated or had never attended an academy and assigning them the appropriate rank, and generally serving as a connection hub between Rotto’s larger population and its magical denizens. The other two guilds served a similar function. There was a fourth, similarly influential one, the adventurer's guild, but its seat was on the outskirts of the city, next to the port which connected Sredina and Mitelos. There weren't nearly as many monsters in Riche.

  Nestled in between all those buildings was the bank, made of red brick and wood; it was an imposing building, which, upon being entered, led the visitor into a wide hall with several counters. And several guards. Naturally, the Greater Richean Bank wasn't the only bank in the country, but certainly the only one worth its name. Perhaps the Royal Bank of Sredina was worth the bother if one never wanted to leave the city, where most of its currency was backed, but the Mitelos one was a shambled institution that would be bought up by one of the other two any day now. If they even wanted it in the first place.

  Jim walked across the brick floor to one of the counters on the left, generally reserved for high paying customers and nobles. Withdrawing a promissory note from his breast-pocket, he thanked the lord that whoever had taken his coin-purse had been too uneducated to know that documents were usually more valuable in the long run.

  Thieves, so short-sighted.

  "Can I get to see the ring as well, sir?" the clerk politely asked after having briefly analysed the document and compared it with something beneath their desk that Jim couldn't see. They had a pleasant Richean accent, and already, one hour after leaving Lebowski behind to get to the academy of his lone-some, Jim was beginning to appreciate the sound of his own heritage.

  He put forward his left hand, which had a small golden ring on the pointer finger. There was a black stone with a molten drawing of a coin in the middle. Not because the identification ring usually held the symbol of a coin, but because that was the sigil of Jim's family. Gold coin on black.

  "Gold will light your path, even in death," Jim muttered, reciting the motto as the clerk ambled off to get the requested amount and the coin purse.

  In a way, gold had lit his path. It had put him on the journey he was currently embarking on, with the goal of never having to work again after these dreadfully intense academy months behind him. He reminisced on the happiness he'd experienced in the vision after the end of his certification.

  Pure bliss, really.

  "Here is your withdrawal," the clerk said with a smile as they came back. A coin pouch was deposited straight into Jim's hands. He put it in his inner breast-pocket once again. "Do have a nice day," the clerk said with a smile.

  Jim nodded and left.

  He stood once again in front of the bank. His chore completed, he ambled across the square, considering his next course of action.

  He could naturally go to the dorms first, where he would get himself some wine from one of the crates that Lebowski had brought with him. Then he would sit on his balcony, still looking out at the city from a high vantage point while finishing a bottle, perhaps continuing to read the adventure novel that he'd started recently. A pause, with the vision, he now knew how the novel would end. He cursed. If anything, he would have to walk around and find a new book first. But considering that he was now half a year in the past, there wasn't much interesting literature being released that he hadn't already read in the future.

  He ended up hailing a carriage and settling into the uncomfortable wooden seat as the horses started trotting him off towards the academy. His original plans were ruined, and Lebowski would be passed out by the time Jim arrived at the dorms.

  Perhaps it was a good idea to visit the headmaster now and tell him about his visions. The man would likely be much busier in two days due to the start of year exams. This way, Jim could also get the whole thing out of the way and start relaxing, knowing that other people were dealing with the issue of the monster that was set to appear in that rural village in Mitelos. He wondered for a second if he should also mention the disturbing ritual, but that part was much foggier and weirder. Perhaps that meant that it wasn't fixed yet?

  In the end, it wasn't his job to worry about these things, and perhaps he would still have time to go out afterwards and try to distract himself. Either he would find a book because it would still be early enough for the shops to be open, or he would go to the Red Lantern and eat dinner, perhaps warm his bed with one of the girls there.

  AN: Slowly introducing more of the world. The next chapter is probably going to get tilted "And down we go," if you get it you get it. Looking forward to tomorrow :)

  Still have to post an update schedule for January as well.