Dorian Quillford Perpermin III

If you are to believe the last four issues of Wizard Power Scaling Monthly, then Dorian Quillford Perpermin, at least at the time of me telling you this tale, is the fourth most powerful wizard in the realm. Obviously, there are many debates surrounding the rankings perpetuated by the readers of the magazine. Such as that Dorian, who has the ability to both create and exist in light is more powerful than Filo Malplena, the current fifth most powerful wizard and God King of all frogs.

My reader friend, I know exactly what you are thinking. It is impossible to even doubt the fact that Dorian is stronger than Filo. I mean, even if all the frogs in the world came at them at once, he could just jump into the nearest beam of light and teleport away. But then I have heard the Frog King fans counter by saying that if he could create a frog bigger than the universe, which if you believe Fantastic Wizard Adventures chapter two thousand, he technically could, then there would be no light for Dorian to escape into.

Good Gods, these normies don’t think about logistics! I need to write an angry message board letter about this!

I for one, find this to be absolutely preposterous, and I cannot believe that those people would call themselves Fantastic Wizard Adventures fans. The nerve, honestly.

But dear reader, this isn't about me and my rather geeky proclivities. This is about the subject of our story, the somewhat bored and reluctant wizard that is currently stuck in a convention hall signing autographs. Oh gods, I can only imagine the smell.

Please, do come in.

***

“What’s your name?” Dorian asked the sugar addled snot bubble opposite. As the child bounced up and down on his toes, Dorian stole a quick glance at the adults next to him that he presumed to be his parents. They were tired, just like the other faceless gold dispensaries. They didn’t care who he was. If the kids got to see their hero of the week, they didn’t care.

It was a good thing he didn’t either.

“John.” The kid said, wiping another round of snot on his jeans.

Dorian forced a practiced smile. “And what do you want to be when you grow up, John?”

He thought for a moment. “A snail.”

Gods.

Suddenly, the smile on Dorian’s face became a little tighter. The fourth most powerful person in the world and they are doing meet and greets. He should be out slaying a dragon or defeating the dark Lord or repairing a village hall.

Anything but this.

“Do you know I used to fight dragons?”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yes. And bandits and Titans and all manner of scary things! I once scaled the unclimbable mountain of Sysmon and-”

“Oh! I went up there in a cable car!”

“Ok well! Did you also swim the boiling lake of Nyx to catch the famous golden crocodile?”

“No sir.”

“I’m not a sir.”

“No, not sir. My brother’s best friend’s cousin went across Nyx in a steam powered paddleboat once though.”

“I see. Well, this has been lovely, but you’re the last person today and I need to go home. Do you have another question before we wrap this up, champ?”

“Yes!”

“What is it?”

“Who do you think would win in a fight between the Ice Wizard Real E Frigid and an ant? Because my friend said the ant, but…”

Before little John could finish his ramble, Dorian had vanished.

***

“I told you I was done with this!” Dorian threw a cup across the room. Thankfully, it was only plastic because when it drifted passed his manager’s face, it clipped her on the way through. Ever the stoic, she waited until he had calmed down before speaking.

“Oh, but Dori poo,” she said sarcastically. “They love you. Don't you enjoy seeing their smiling cheerful faces as you sign autographs for hours and hours and hours? You seem to have got it down to a fine art. I wonder if you even need me anymore.”

“Get bent.”

“Hey, I'm not the one with the identity rainbow. I don't enjoy being your manager either. I find the way you live to be… excessive.”

Dorian scoffed. “Excessive?”

“Well, I didn't think you would embody the character of the Rainbow Wizard quite so well.”

“Okay Maddison. I am sure that it must have been nice to be born into a wealthy family and have all the privileges that you have had. What school did you go to? It couldn't have been a very good one because if it was, you would know that. We're not actually characters that exist in books. If I wanted to, I could use a beam of light so concentrated it would dissolve your fucking eyeballs.”

A smirk appeared on Maddison’s face as she strutted towards Dorian. Upon reaching him. She bent down, so they were making eye contact. “But you're not going to do that, are you? As painful as it is for the both of us, the land has been at peace for a very long time. Which means that people like you need people like me to make you money. It's capitalism Dorian, and it's what happens when we don't need to deal with such peasant behaviours as adventuring.”

“And what exactly would you do if you damsel in distressed your way into a Warebear nest? I know I wouldn't want to pull you out.”

“Oh, you silly, silly… Whatever you are. I have people for that.”

“I’m nonbinary Maddison.”

“And I am a woman of the one God. The one above everybody who created man and woman in his image.”

“…. You want to run that one by me again?”

“Facts override feelings, Dorian. These people may love you now, but the minute you stop being the star of their favourite novel or play. They would join me and put magic freaks like you in a line to put a bolt between your eyes. Of course, that won't happen if you keep making me money.”

Cue massive wizard eye roll. “You know you really need a man.”

“I’m saving myself for marriage!”

“Right… you want to tell me what the one book says about loving your neighbour?”

“Just keep making us rich, MR Perpermin.”

“Fuck you.”

“That’s not appropriate language to use in a discussion.” Madison said with an amoral grin.

***

Whoever thought it was a good idea to have a convention in the Celestial Realm should be hung, drawn and quartered. I mean sure, fundamentalists of the One God like stories as much as the next person, but Dorian couldn't attend events like these with at least one person in a panel telling him that the Wizard Adventures and its related media have gotten ‘too political.’

Bloody philistines.

If it wasn't for people like him, these white picket fence bastards would all be dead. Every time there was a dragon attack or a goblin raid, one of them would call out for an adventurer or a wizard and, due to our ridiculous sense of moral duty, like clockwork, one of us would save people.

Dorian was not pro war, but they found it funny that as soon as all strife and panic had gone from a populace, the first thing they do is try to find something to fight about again. Dorian was the hero while they were dying. Yet as soon as their lives were secure and safe, their name gets dragged through the mud.

RAINBOW WIZARD DORIAN QUILLFORD PEPPERMIN III CAUGHT IN BED WITH ELVEN CROWN PRINCE. That headline is permanently etched into his brain. It is with those words that they knew the age of heroes had ended and the age of satire had begun.

***

Saint Augustus Park was the crown jewel of the Celestial realm. With its many acres of fields, mazes and gardens anybody can get lost anywhere within its grandeur, by choice of course. This being the Celestial Realm, it was impossible to experience any negative emotion that wasn't actively sought by the participant. Most of the time the inhabitants went about their day in ignorant bliss of anything else, content in their superiority. But then again, it is easy to be superior when you don't know other people exist.

Dorian expected that this is what leads to people like Maddison and her ilk. As if to prove a point, Dorian spotted a man with a megaphone surrounded by a group of people shouting. They really didn't want to go back to Maddison and her zealotry, so they sat down and observed.

This was a big mistake.

“And lo, the One God tells us to cast out the sinner, to shun them and curse them. For it is only then that they will crave the love of our God and-”

The pressure in their head became too much. They thought they were past this. All of the noise in the energy, all of the name calling and exclusion. They were doing so well, if only they drowned themselves in being famous, if only he could be at the top the pain and the noises, and the shame would go away.

It was at that moment that Dorian decided they didn't care anymore. Making a grand spectacle of waving their arms around, they created a rainbow in the sky from the light generated from their fingertips. They would have hoped that the people would have appreciated the light show that was so graciously manifested by their God.

Unfortunately, they are a little cleverer than that, but only a little. It was then that Dorian was chased off the Celestial Realm And began falling through the clouds. They didn't really have any wishes or hopes or dreams or last thoughts. If it was going to be done, they wanted it done quickly.

Perhaps he was better off going back to being the boy that nobody knew. They thought about their family, their brother and how at this moment the family were probably telling him how proud they are of him and how successful he was. Dorian thought that if he could just exercise his power, demonstrate his worth that they would love him too.

And then it was just the wind. He didn't wish for anything anymore.

Actually, there was one thing. They really didn't want to come back as a frog.