Flynn Joins the Mages Guild

After exiting the Inn, I decided to explore the city. It was getting later in the day and with only 2 silver pieces to my name, I didn’t know where I would sleep tonight. While I walked around I took in the sights and sounds of the city. The street food looked amazing, there were so much variety it blew my mind. I heard church bells ringing off in the distance. The people of the city seemed happy to be alive as they went along with their business . It seemed like a prosperous city.

I wish I knew more about this world. I needed to find someone knowledgeable to explain it all to me soon. Eventually, someone might find out I’m a fish out of water and I could be in trouble.

While walking, I noticed a large building a couple of blocks away that looked like a guild hall. Walking closer, I noticed it was a mages guild hall. Hmm, maybe the guild could help me? I was technically a mage, right?

I opened the ornate entrance doors and entered the guild hall. The inside of the guild hall was gilded in gold. Candle lit chandeliers could be seen dangling from the ceilings. It seemed like quite the fancy place. I didn’t know where to go, so I approached a male elf reading a newspaper on a nearby sofa in the lobby.

“Excuse me, I’m interested in joining this guild, where can I go for that?” I said to the elf.

The elf didn’t look up from his newspaper, just pointed in a direction.

“Thanks” I said as I walked towards where he pointed.

Eventually I found my self in some sort of reception room. It was a large empty room except for a huge tall desk at the back of the room. I walked up to the older male human who was manning the desk at the back of the room. I had to stare up at him as the desk was so high up.

The man was dressed in black robes and even had a wizard hat on. He had long white hair and a white beard. He was wearing blue spectacles. When I approached him he looked me up and down as if studying me. He lowered his glasses and said “Can I help you young man?”

“Yes, I was interested in joining this guild, is this where I can do that?” I asked.

“Mhmm, yes this is place to do that. Do you know the requirements for joining?”

“I do not.”

The old man coughed “Well, you have to prove that you have a certain level of magical expertise. Do you have any magical abilities? A vast majority of the people in this world do not.”

“I have magical abilities.” I replied confidently.

“Okay, go ahead and show them to me young man.”

“Well... the thing is, my abilities require a cooldown after use and I’ve just recently used all of my abilities…so I’m currently not able to show you.” I told the truth. Even if my abilities were charged up I wouldn’t be able to show him without a female to mind control nearby.

The old man let out a small chuckle. “Is that so? Usually I would think that a person like yourself is just some beggar who thought he could get a free meal from us or something, however, I have a feeling you might be telling the truth.”

The old man searched through the desk drawers for something and when he found it he placed it on top of his desk. “This here is a magic detecting orb. When a user holds it, the orb will turn a different color depending on the user’s current magic expertise. For example…” The old man coughed and continued “If I hold this orb it will turn black.” He held the orb and it turned black. “There are 10 different colors the orb can turn into depending on the user’s current magic expertise.” He tossed the orb down to me and I caught it. “Hold the orb and concentrate it, let’s see what your color is.”

I held the orb and concentrated on it, after a second or two it started to turn yellow.

“Is yellow good?” I asked.

The old man removed his glasses and placed them on the desk. He smiled and said “Yellow, my young man, is not half bad. I’m actually impressed. You say you aren’t already a member of this guild?”

“That’s correct.”

“What took you so long to find us?”

“It’s complicated.” I replied with a shrug.

I had to fill out some paperwork but soon found myself a bonafide member of the Mages Guild of Fyham. As a new member I was entitled to a small apartment near the guild hall and a small weekly stipend of 25 silver a week until I could stand on my own two feet. It seemed in this world mages lived comfortably, their services were always in demand. The old man, whose name I learned was Shasim, informed me it only took a couple of months at most for the new guild members to move out of the small apartments and into their own larger dwellings. The next couple of days seemed like a blur. I had so much to learn about living in this world and being part of a guild. Shasim, who was the leader of the welcoming committee of the guild, visited me at my small apartment to checkup on me every day. While he was visiting I asked him many questions.

Shasim informed me that 95% of the people in this world had no magical abilities. Furthermore, the guild would only let in about the top 20% of those who had any magical abilities. He told me I was very lucky. He kept questioning me about where I was from, but I kept evading answering directly. He asked me what my power was, but I refused to tell him. This was fine, and not against the rules of the mages guild. Many mages refused to let anyone know what powers they possessed.

I wish I could trust Shasim, spill my guts to him, but I was hesitant to do so. He seemed like a nice of enough guy and I enjoyed his company. I soon got used to my one room apartment and being a member of the mages guild. The guild hall had a bulletin board which posted jobs for the mages to take. This is where most mages got a significant portion of their income from. Shasim informed me as a new member, I should stick to the easier jobs until I knew what I was dealing with. I planned on taking my first job soon, I just had to find one that fit with my skills.

I had been in the fantasy world for about 4 days when Shasim knocked on my door like he had done quite frequently in the past number of days. I opened the door and greeted him to come inside. He looked a little more nervous than usual. As we sat down he swiped sweat from his forehead. “Listen Flynn… I think I know what you’ve been hiding.”

My heart skipped a beat “Oh, what is it that I’m hiding?”

He took a long breath, looked me directly in the eyes and asked “Are you from Earth Flynn?”