They got me!

They began closing in, but I couldn’t see any anger in their eyes. How could I hurt them? They probably were thinking of nothing but their families as they moved in on me. They weren’t trained killers at all. They were just people!

I only had one choice.

“I surrender,” I sighed, raising my hands in the air. “I’m the Magekiller. I’ll go with you peacefully if you don’t hurt the princess.”

“Could it be true?”, asked one of the customers. There was some chattering, and then a small nod from someone in front of me.

All of a sudden, someone put a sack over my head from behind, and a group of people started to carry me away. I tried to cry out in protest, but the bag muffled my voice, and I could only expect the worst as I felt myself dragged around in total darkness. Even the voices around me were muffled through the thick bag.

After about twenty minutes of being carried around, I was finally thrown onto the ground, and the sack was taken off my head. Looking around, I noticed I was now in some sort of underground area. But far from a dungeon, it seemed somewhat warm and cozy. There were weapons mounted on the wall, workbenches on the floor, and a group of people staring at me. I couldn’t tell what this was meant to be.

I grumbled a bit, dusting myself off. “If you’re here to throw me a surprise party, my birthday is three months away.”

There was no reaction from anyone. They all simply stared at me. Everyone who had previously been on the workbenches was now fixated on me. I even saw some people standing around the princess, and my mind started to wander. Did she turn me in for the fortune? But why did none of these people look like guards? Where was this place?”

“The magekiller!”, cried a voice.

“Our hero!”

I looked around in confusion. The faces around me were all beaming with smiles.

“Hold on… if I’m a hero, why did you kidnap me?!”

One of the men by a workbench came up to me, and shook my hand forcefully. “It would be hard to stroll along with you without someone reporting you to the authorities. And besides, the location of this base is a secret. I needed to really make sure you weren’t bluffing before we took you in here.”

I looked at the man’s face. He had a relatively deep voice for a man who was so short. He had a pair of spectacles, and a few burn marks on his surprisingly thin and nimble-looking hands.

“The name is Cassel. I’m publicly a clockmaker, but I use my basement as a headquarters for our organisation. We’re tired of the mages oppressing our people.”

“A clockmaker? You’re not the sort of person I imagine leading a rebellion.”

They smiled. “Don’t be deceived. I tinker with all sorts of machines, and outfit people with weapons. In Leyth, the mages keep squeezing us dry with taxes, knowing we have no hope of ever resisting or fighting back. We’d been devising a plot to kidnap the town’s baron, but we knew a magical army would come to attack our city if we ever did.

He adjusted his glasses.

“But of course, if the legends about you at the Colosseum and fortress are true, then perhaps we could defend ourselves… Tell me, how were you able to defeat them? Have you found out the secrets of magic?”

I took a few breaths, composing myself. I looked around at the faces in the room. They all looked expectant. They must have been planning in secret for months, maybe years, looking for a glimmer of hope. Turning back to Cassel, I gave him an explanation.

“It may be unknown in Great Leyth, but in the Eastern Lands, gunpowder and cannons are already widespread. In the East, armies use weapons called arquebuses for their armies, and they’re far stronger than any bow and arrow.”

“Gunpowder? Cannons? Slow down, explain yourself!” Cassel cried with a face filled with curiosity and surprise.

“With some explosive powder, you’re able to light a fuse which allows a metal ball to burst out at incredible speeds. It’s so fast and powerful that even magical barriers can’t prevent it. Of course, I crafted a miniature version of the musket here, which is a slight upgrade from the eastern weapons.”

“May I touch it?!”, Cassel asked, looking as if he was about to explode from excitement.

“Go ahead,” I replied. “But don’t break it.”

Cassel looked at all the mechanisms of the pistol in awe. Pulling the trigger would move a piece of flint that would ignite the gunpowder and shoot a ball.

“The main downside is you need to reload after every shot,” I explained. “It’s very primitive new technology… which means I’ve had to bluff my way through a few situations. I’m sure if the enemy knew I only had one shot in my chamber, they’d have turned me into a kebab this morning.”

My words didn’t seem to dishearten Cassel at all, who was still giddy at the idea of a weapon that could break through magical barriers. “Oh, but if you had an army of these, then we could all cover each other as we reloaded the bullets! Please, magekiller, what is your name? And how can I produce something like this? As soon as possible?”

“As soon as possible?”

“The baron will leave his guarded mansion to appear at the Summer Solstice festival in a month. It’s the best chance we have to grab him!”

“Before I give you any of that, I want you to give the princess to me safely.”

“Why, of course!” Cassel gestured to the others, and Cordelia ran up to me somewhat shyly, giving me a hug.

“It was so dark… I thought they were going to send me back to the dungeon...”

Seeing her tearful eyes, I almost forgot how she initially didn’t want to escape from her cell. She looked so genuine that I decided not to make a remark about it. Hugging her back, I turned to Cassel.

“The name’s Seraphine Clay, and if we’re going to make some muskets for an army, we’re going to need a lot of gunpowder.”

“How do we make that?”

“First we’ll need some charcoal, which is the easy part. Then we’ll need saltpeter, which we can maybe produce if there are caves nearby.”

“How?”

“Bat poop.”

Cassel shook his head, regretting having asked, and I continued.

“Finally, we’ll need some sulphur. Is there a volcano nearby?”

There was some brief murmuring, and then Cassel began to scratch his head. “Well, there’s Mount Ley very nearby”

“Let’s go there then! That’s incredibly convenient.”

Cassel shook his head. “Well, it’s called Mouth Ley for a reason. Supposedly, the volcano is the connecting point of all the magical Ley Lines under the country, which fuel its magic. In other words, we might bump into the nobility there.”

I scratched my chin. “Well, we’re going to need a lot of gunpowder if we want to make enough muskets for all of you. So we’ll have to do an extraction mission at night. You can guide me and Cordelia to the mountain, and I’ll write down the materials the others can gather for the muskets in the meantime.”

The prospect of going to Mount Ley seemed to dampen Cassel’s enthusiasm, so I teasingly leaned in.

“What, you want to do a little rebellion, but you’re too afraid to go to a volcano? Come on, I’ll bring my gun with me! We’ll be fine!”

Cassel sighed. “You know, you became a lot less inspiring once I learned you can only fire that thing once…”