Jump 088: Master Of Magic

Jump 088: Master Of Magic

Location: Arcanus, January 1400
Race: High Men
Identity: Drop-In
Drawbacks: [+800] Gaming Classic, Ascending From Hell

[Free]      The Weight Of The Years
[Free]      Place Of Power
[200/1800]  Archmage
[Free]      Runic Aid
[300/1800]  Artificer
[400/1800]  Alchemy
[500/1800]  Magic-Forged Arms
[800/1800]  Runemaster
[1800/1800] Sorcery Link (x5)

Well, wasn't this interesting. I'd found myself in charge of a civilization of humans, one of three factions, on a world with other competing civilizations. Or rather... in charge of a small hamlet. Gnolls, halflings, elves, orcs, lizardmen, insect men (oh, I'm sorry, Klackons)... and with most of my power locked quite firmly away. Well, worse things have happened. At least they were very willing to be organized under m leadership, and it barely took a month before they were ready to work under me, especially having taught them how to make magical weapons effective in even the lowliest soldier's hands.

Their organized religion was useful, of course, in keeping the common man in line as things expanded in a hurry and we attracted more to our growing town. It quickly became clear that there were other wizards in the world who were in the same position that I was, and that there could be only one winner in a race for supremacy. The cities of the High Men grew and expanded, and their priests and pikemen began to march forth to deal with the more troublesome issues with our surroundings and found new outposts. And as they brought magical nodes under our control, my power grew.

In time, local heroes were found to bolster our ranks, to lead soldiers in the field. Engineers built roads between our cities and toward those we aimed to conquer, so that we could efficiently send troops to those ends without them marching for half a year to get to their destination. Trade and transport between my growing towns and cities became much more efficient, of course, but that only grew faster when I began to enchant the roads that crisscrossed our growing nation - rather than travel taking weeks, it suddenly took hours. And this also helped when coordinating strikes and defense. Planning out the growth of the nation afterward was simple, and things were taken in a very orderly direction, although the other wizards had clearly elected to begin focusing their efforts on me, meaning that the High Men were constantly fighting off attacks.

But after a certain point, there was enough stored mana for my purposes. Collecting and sundering artifacts that would otherwise go unused. Mana nodes harnessed for maximum effect. And of course, the gold taxed from my people could be converted into mana directly. With all of that at my disposal... I cast Time Stop.

In the world of stopped time, I cast a trio of global enchantments. Wind Mastery wouldn't help very much quite yet as we were still largely landlocked, but turning the wind against any other wizard's ships at sea to halve their speed would be a cruel but effective tactic. Aura of Majesty... well, all thought me hostile at this point as it was, so working to slowly twist the minds of everyone in the world to regard me better wouldn't hurt. And Suppress Magic ensured that no one else could cast global enchantments. A pity that Aura of Majesty proved useless in this instance, but not a surprise.

And then the armies of High Men marched forth and Rjak's empire of Klackon, putting them collectively to the sword, before time resumed and the world saw nothing but the aftermath of burning insect towns. In the aftermath, I began the longer-term project of uplifting the High Men and bringing them to at least a reasonable standard of living. While I couldn't access my past glories I could still remember them; with that came a standard of living that would be appropriate with the proper use of magic. Indoor plumbing was not foreign, but heated water was, and properly-applied runecraft could produce it on demand. Radio receivers became available, and though they were relatively primitive, they still helped. And quickly paladins were superseded by holy dragoons, carrying longarms. Pikemen supplanted by riflemen. All thanks to the wizards' guild. At least they justified the insane expense that went into their upkeep.

Burning the Klackon cities gave us a great deal of gold. It was a much shorter duration before Time Stop could be cast again, and the victim this time was Kali and her Orcs. Our losses were surprisingly less, even facing up against wyverns, but... well, perhaps Time Stop could be thanked for that, as it only flowed near the High Men. Time moved on the battlefield, but not outside, meaning reinforcements were impossible. In truth, we COULD have gone forth to eliminate another opponent, but instead the ideal thing seemed to be to absorb the outlying independent nomads and barbarians as they were still human.

We found that we'd lost the tempo of the war shortly after however, at least for a time. We were besieged by the other wizards, who'd entered into an alliance. Gnolls, lizardman, and both high elves and dark elves stormed forth with the intent of chopping my growing empire into pieces. Divide and conquer. Were it not for the enchanted roads, they might have succeeded, but being able to move the riflemen that served as city guards to defend effectively did an excellent job of fending off the worst. Even if losses were taken.

Another Time Stop saw to this halting, and the annihilation of the attacking forces as well as Lo Pan and Tlaloc, the high elves' and gnolls' leaders. And once time had passed and our forces had been rebuilt to a sufficient degree, and certain summons had been brought in, there was one more Time Stop. Floating Islands brought dragoons to every corner of the world, and the choice was given to kneel or die. A surprisingly large number chose 'die', but I think we can blame the rabid wizards leading them all. Raven, Jafar, and Freya were put to the sword, all six Towers of Mastery were brought under my control, and Arcanus was at last pacified. I could finally relax and focus on researching the Spell of Mastery.

It was not long until Sss'ra and Tauron began to assault the Towers, however, which was... honestly a little more annoying than anything, at least at first. And then they unleashed their true intentions - they had enough power to overcome my spell to Suppress Magic and cast their own fell effects. Meteor storms rained from the heavens. Patches of corruption began spreading across Arcanus. The forces coming through stopped resembling their base forms and instead were twisted by chaos, mutated, with skin as thick as steel, or wings, or a breath of flame.

The only thing to do was to push back, and push hard. Rather than trying to stem the invasion of all six towers and cut off the invaders, I resolved instead to find a single line of attack. Only one tower saw a counterattack, but that tower saw EVERYONE marching forth - engineers obliterated the roads that led to the other towers and anything near it, while every combat-capable force under my control moved swift as the wind to the remaining tower.

And once they made it through to the parallel world of Myrran, I cast Time Stop one last time, sending them forth to obliterate the other wizards' towers... and their cities.

I would have rather cast the Spell of Mastery, yes. But after a city I was the only remaining wizard, winning victory only by finding myself knee-deep in the dead.