The Golden Caliph, Khalil al-Assad al-Zahir (Master of the Enlightened Throne, Most High Sovereign of the Land of Fate, the Worthy of the Gods, Scourge of the Unbeliever, Confidant of the Genies), stroked his long, thin beard and pondered his Orb of Scrying for a moment, gazing down into the inn that the weird party of adventurers were staying at. In his time on this earth-almost 102 years now-he had never seen such a mismatched group. Not the races, mind you, but the clear difference in power between the person and the items they carried.
Things appeared to have settled down. The adventurers had gone to bed-but only after announcing their actions and speaking gibberish. He knew nothing about them, which wasn’t all that irregular. Adventurers had a tendency to be from some isolated village or the slums. It was that his spies had claimed they literally appeared out of nowhere. The inn they had chosen to appear at had one of his spies stationed there-the barkeep.
That happened from time to time with teleportation. The problem was that one must be familiar with the place one wishes to teleport to. And not one of them had ever appeared there in his spy’s reports until now. Not from the neighboring villages either. They had somehow appeared just outside his city. That was alarming.
There was a knock at the scrying chamber’s door.
His Great Vizier stood there, awaiting permission to enter. Khalil gestured. His Vizier stepped forward.
“Sir, we have our spy’s full report.” His Vizier bowed and presented him with several great scrolls.
Among the scrolls were incredibly detailed pictures of the adventurers. He was relieved they weren’t dangerous and seemed very eager to help. But why did they want to help him? How had they managed to glean the location of the Crimson Corsairs when even his spies could not, merely from reading a few reports?
Perhaps he needed better spies.
He pulled out three pictures in particular-the Rhox, the Brenneri, and the kobold, and placed them on the wall. There were other pictures on the wall. Crimes and serial murders had been solved right here by him, though the palace would never disclose the Golden Caliph’s hobby of personally hunting down criminals. Once an adventurer, always an adventurer.
After a moment’s hesitation, he also placed the Leonin on the wall, slightly away from the other three and tapped his chin.
His spy had informed him the otter had some sort of mental control. He’d somehow cheated many games, though had seemingly cast no spell. Even talked his royal guards into letting the group keep their weapons when visiting him. Watching an armed group walk into his throne room had been more than disconcerting. He was looking forward to seeing what his mages had learned about the magically influxes.
The otter’s powers were rather obvious-some sort of charm spell keyed to his voice. But the other two were more perplexing. He’d staged a minor incident outside the palace, hoping to lure them into showing what they could do, but that only led to disappointment. Khalil himself had watched the incident from this very room.
What did interest him was that after the battle they literally became stronger. He didn’t need the mages to tell him about the influx of magical power that flowed to them. Khalil had visually witnessed them glow with a golden light.
When the light had faded, the whole group looked more physically refined. He wasn’t sure if anything beyond the physical had changed, but he had followed the spell-casters and realized they’d somehow managed to literally learn more spells in just a moment. It took seasoned adventurers months, even years to master the very basic elements of any individual spell.
One of them, the gnoll ranger, was infused with a spell that involved teleportation. What most people would call Horizon Walkers. But far more advanced than his level of experience would indicate. Prior to the skirmish at the palace steps, he had literally no such power. And yet, now he could clearly sense power Abjuration magic emanating from him.
The kobold was crafting some kind of vessel of war in the warehouse they’d rented with the gold he’d given them at the docks. It perplexed him, because the spells and level of technology were well beyond anything he’d seen in this world. And, in his younger days, he had seen the entire world. It was far, far more advanced than some tribal kobold who hadn’t even gone to the Academy could hope to create. More disturbingly, he’d seen the kobold transmute precious materials from pieces of steel and bits of glass. That could very well destroy the economy if used the wrong way.
Another, the Benneri, was crafting some of the most splendid outfits he’d laid eyes upon. Of all the adventurers, his physical form had changed the most after the power up. He’d been rather sausage-like and overfed. His fat had started sliding off him, though he’d kept his pear-shaped appearance. Instant weight-loss, probably twenty-five pounds gone in an instant.
Speaking of weight, the Half-orc had actually lost muscle mass and gained weight. He went from the most well-muscled wizard the Caliph had ever laid eyes upon to a weak, plump scholar in an instant. It was almost as if…the Caliph paused, pacing the room in thought…like they were blending into their roles, fitting in better with the world and roles assigned them.
“Caliph?” His Vizier spoke.
Khalil turned and saw one of his sages hand the Vizier more documents.
“It appears our mages have compiled the spies notes and the magical influxes and have painted a picture of what exactly had occurred today.” The Vizier glanced at the documents, “And I must say it is the most disturbing new I’ve ever read.”
“Hand it over.” Khalil growled impatiently, quivering with excitement.
The Vizier did so. Khalil stared at the documents, flipping through the scrolls over and over, unable to believe what he was reading.
“Is this accurate?” He demanded. “You aren’t rubbing my lamp, are you?”
“No sir. No lamp rubbing.” The Vizier smiled. “Exciting, isn’t it? The implications…”
“Not another word!” Khalil warned and went back to reading the compiled report. “Send spies to ascertain the location and true nature of those artifacts.”
“Shall I prepare them to extract?”
According to the reports, they had four artifacts, each one as powerful as the next. How could he use this to his advantage? Did he want to attempt to attain the artifacts, possibly revealing his knowledge and interest in them?
“Not yet.” Khalil stroked his goatee.
No, he decided. He would, however, keep close eyes on them, and if the opportunity arises-such as if they suffered an unfortunate accident taking out the Crimson Corsairs-he would use that opportunity to seize them.
“I shall send them immediately.” The Vizier bowed.
The Caliph pondered on the matter heavily. They could easily decimate him. Had the opportunity to do so when they entered his throne room. But they didn’t. And despite having such powerful artifacts, they were more than willing to work for a pittance of gold and fame.
He read the reports.
At 12 PM sharp, Time had Stopped for exactly 15 minutes and 4 seconds. When Time resumed, 7 adventurers were sitting at a table in the back of the inn. They appeared dusty and well-traveled. They spoke to each other, calling one of them Lancer and another Drew and Drake, respectively, before they were reprimanded and use whatever cover names they were now going with.
After some research, his spies reported that a Leonin named ‘Lancer’ was stationed here three weeks ago. However, he appeared to be in his barracks room at this moment. He was due to go on patrols at the end of the month. Patrols that would take him to the towns that ‘Hasta’ had referred to.
No Brenneri named Drew or Kobold named Drake had ever been reported.
They overpaid the barkeep enormously in plain gold coins, none of which were stamped with any official markings. The Brenneri then engaged in card games, where he appeared to be using some kind of charm spell emanating from the golden hoop earring.
The kobold appeared overly delighted with his body, as though it was a new form. They were all eager to ‘go on an adventure’ and seemed undeterred from fighting a large criminal organization like the Crimson Corsairs. The Leonin and the Gnoll had apparently managed to uncover the locations of the Crimson Corsair’s main operations on the mainland after reading a few vague reports and making inferences to it all being a ‘story’.
More importantly were the artifacts. There were four, one possessed by the otter, the kobold’s bracelet, and two rings on the Rhox’s horn. All Legendary-Level artifacts. Far beyond what any beginning adventurer should ever have. They then walked here, the otter flirting with the Rhox and attempting to use his charm spell on his and failing.
Khalil wondered why the Rhox had turned down the otter. Khalil himself was straight, but he’d had a homosexual fling or two in his hundred years. When you were biologically immortal, variety was the word of the day. Transmutation magic emanated strongly from three of the artifacts and the otter’s earring radiated Enchantment. One of the Rhox’s ring had strong Conjuration magic as well.
“Caliph, our spies have returned with word on the artifacts.”
“And?”
“The magical artifacts have completely disappeared off their person.”
“What? There’s no way for such powerful artifacts to simply disappear like that. Do they have a bag of holding or some such extra-dimensional space to store them?”
“None were detected.”
“There was…something else, sir.”
“Yes?”
“Just before the magic items disappeared, they all announced their future intentions. Then they spoke some vague nonsense and the items disappeared.”
“A command word or phrase.” Caliph stroked his goatee. “So that’s how they hide them.”
“Your orders?”
“Keep a close eye on them, especially that otter. The others have restraint, but he is using it repeatedly. And next time we speak to him, insure my double is the one talking to him. I’ll view the interaction from the safety of this chamber.”
“It shall be so, Golden Caliph.” The vizier bowed. “And what of the Rhox? His artifacts are twice as powerful.”
“Until we know what powers he possesses, keep your distance.” Khalil spoke. “Transmutation and Conjuration magic that powerful is dangerous. Have our mages work on ways to keep their artifacts from disappearing, in case they became a threat, of course.”
“Of course.” The Viziers lips curled into a smile. “It shall be so, Golden Caliph. And the kobold?”
“More Transmutation magic. Appears to be able to convert matter into another form of matter.” Khalil read from the report. “Make everything overpriced. Force them to start pouring currency into our economy. But only them. It will be a huge windfall and stimulate our economy.”
“As you wish.” The Vizier left the room.
Khalil sighed, studying the pictures on the wall.
Where had they come from? Who were they, really? And what were they doing in his kingdom?
Their artifacts were interesting, but what truly caught his attention was the potential skill growth they all had. If that sort of thing were available to his own warriors, training recruits would become much easier. Elite units on the field in a year or less, with the kind of growth he had seen. Years of knowledge in days. Wizards, especially, who slaved for masters for over a decade before secrets were revealed to them gaining knowledge after a small altercation.
Khalil wanted the artifacts so badly. They were treasures to rival what the Great Caliphs of old, before the Djinni Wars, once held. Truly, those adventurers were under-qualified to possess them, they were things only he should have. But he would temper his greed and wait.
The adventurers were complacent and completely unaware of the presence of his spies and he would keep it that way while they were still useful and malleable to him.
And when they ceased to be useful, well....then he would come for them with everything he had.