Morah and I walk out of the room and into the foyer, where the other four are waiting for us. Daniel’s outfit is very similar to mine, but without the coat and in dark gray with brown accents. Doctor Hari is standing next to Daniel, wearing a black and red dress, with gold caps on the end of her horns. Elsine and Halon are waiting by the door, clearly ready to leave.
We walk outside, and I expect a fancy carriage or something to be waiting for us, but instead everyone just looks at me expectantly. I sigh, loudly, and then ask for directions before portaling everyone there.
The building that’s hosting the ball is in the middle of the guild district but is owned by the city for events, Morah says. It almost looks like a Victorian cathedral with all of its towers and arches, built out of a dark stone with many windows. It’s impressive and imposing, towering over most of the other buildings surrounding it by a story or two. Outside, several city guards are checking guests' identities as they enter the building.
The six of us get in the quick-moving line of well-dressed partygoers and wait until it’s our time to enter. The guard immediately recognizes Morah and quickly lets all of us in and hands a piece of paper to a well-dressed man, who announces us as we enter the ball.
Elsine and Halon are the first to get announced and let into the party, followed by Daniel and Doctor Hari, and then Morah and I.
“Citylord Morah Baradia and Initiate Ray Alder.” The well-dressed dragonborn announces.
He’s the only other dragonborn I’ve seen besides Rayke. I wonder if they’re less common than some of the other races. Humans seem to be the most numerous race here, but only by a little bit. It’s very diverse overall.
I walk next to Morah as we round the corner and enter the ballroom, a massive chamber that has been very extravagantly decorated. Carved tables with gold inlays, hanging chandeliers with hundreds of mana stones, some kind of magical paintings on the wall that almost look like a video is being played, and much more that I’m sure I’m missing. Everyone is incredibly well dressed and mingling all around the room. There are probably about one hundred and fifty to two hundred people in the room, most of whom are the guests, but there are a few servers as well, carrying trays of food and drinks while weaving through the crowd.
Almost everyone in the room is looking at us now, which causes me to push a little bit of mana into [Concentration] and use it to keep myself calm. Not as much as I would use in a fight, but enough to push my current nervousness down and get my palms to stop sweating. I make myself put on a friendly smile and walk into the room with Morah at my side.
“Are there normally this many people attending?” I ask while slowly extending my spatial senses out to cover the entire room. A few people seem to notice this, somehow, but I try my best not to be intrusive, and nobody says or does anything, so I should be good.
“There are a few more people here than usual, mostly initiates brought by Barad’s guildmasters and noble houses. I’m going to go find a few people who have been avoiding me. Don’t get in too much trouble. Don’t take too much shit either.” She says before leaving.
Most people have stopped staring at us now, but a few are still looking my way, and one guy is trying to subtly scan me with his mana from the other side of the room. I block his first attempt, and he quickly pulls the mana back to himself and stands up a little straighter. I don’t think he expected me to notice that. A few other people also probe me with their mana, and they all react the same way, backing off as soon as I notice them.
I walk around until one of the servers passes near me, and I grab a drink from her tray, some kind of orange drink, slightly alcoholic from the smell. I hold it in my mana hand and sip it as I walk around and observe people. Most people seem to have some kind of enchanted item or items on them, probably more defensive if I had to guess since no one is wearing armor. A few people also seem to have some kind of subtle mana defense active as well. The guy who tried to scan me earlier has a layer of mana against his skin, hidden under his clothes. From the feel of it I can tell it’s some kind of defensive skill that feels very fluid and flexible.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Daniel is already drinking with a group of four people dressed in colors similar to him, grays and browns, which makes me think they’re probably part of some kind of earth, stone, or metal guild. It seems like they’re getting along well, so I should probably also do some networking, especially as a freelance space mage. I bet there are a lot of people who would appreciate a non-spacers guild space mage.
I decide to start my mingling with the first guy who tried to probe me with his mana. He’s a human dressed in blue and black robes, expensive-looking ones with nice embroidery of ocean waves all over them. I start creating a rift a few feet away from him, which he notices immediately and probes with his mana but does not interfere with. After about a second, I appear standing in front of him. His eyes look interested but not surprised. I [Inspect] him as soon as I can, and I’m sure he does the same to me.
[Level 54 Wavewarden Hydromancer]
A water mage of some kind? That explains why his skill feels fluid and flexible while also feeling dense and sturdy. I really want to test it out and see how it holds up to a spatial edge, but unfortunately now is not the time. Before I can introduce myself, a tendril of mana reaches out from him towards me. Another probe, much sturdier this time.
Instead of blocking it like I did last time, I just send out a huge burst of raw mana to overwhelm and dissipate it, which seems to surprise the other man. I then form my own tendril of mana and send it toward him with the intention of examining his water barrier thing. He quickly forms a square barrier of raw mana that stops my attempt in its tracks, so I start examining that instead. I think he has a skill similar to my [Mana Shaping] and [Mana Sense], but better. The barrier he made is solid, like really solid. I think it’s better than what was protecting the training arena at the Baradia compound.
I pull my mana back and try to form a barrier like that myself, taking inspiration from the few barriers I’ve studied and the way my [Beast Mana-Heart] crystallizes. I create a small coin-sized barrier and try to make it as sturdy as I can with all my relevant skills. I pack it full of as much mana as it will hold and demand that mana to solidify. To become solid and strong, and to never break.
A tendril of the water mage's raw mana reaches out to my barrier and examines it the same way I did to his before he starts to test it. His mana shifts into a spike and launches at my barrier, which manages to deflect the small projectile but gets a spiderweb of cracks in return. The mage looks slightly impressed and recreates his barrier, slower this time, almost like he’s showing me how to do it.
For the next ten minutes we go back and forth testing each other's barriers. Every time he tests one of mine, it either cracks or shatters completely, and when I test his, I do almost no damage to it because I can't get enough force out of [Gravity Shift] yet. One time I get slightly frustrated and put a spatial edge on the tip of the projectile, which only gets a small smile from my new friend as I launch it. All I managed to do was scratch his barrier as well, and he didn’t even seem surprised that he blocked it.
After a few more minutes, he looks at me and gives me a nod before walking off toward the middle of the room. Not a single word was exchanged between us, just two mana enjoyers enjoying mana. I hope to meet that guy again. It shouldn’t be too hard to find out who he is.
Over the next hour I talk to a few people and groups who come up to me, mostly just introductions and niceties. It feels like a few of them butter me up a little bit, which I just go along with. It seems like a few of them want to speak to me in private, but no one ever makes a move to get me into one of the side rooms. I expect they either want me to join their houses or have some kind of job for me from the way they look at me.
The announcer guy occasionally yells out names when people arrive, but none of them I recognize, so I just keep socializing. A few interesting people come up to me, but they never do any more than introduce themselves and make small talk. I wonder if this ball is just going to be a rather boring night until I hear the announcer finally call a name I know.
“Guildmaster of Barad’s Spacers Guild, Loranor Hargreeve, and Claria Cynthwell.”
I immediately turn my head to look at the door he’ll be walking through, finally about to see the man who has been the most interested in me since I got to this planet. He’s sent me six letters so far, one to the house that I just moved into today.
Before he enters, I start to feel a pressure against my spatial perception field from that direction, like something is pressing up against it and pushing it back. I realize what it is just as Loranor enters the room. Our spatial perception fields are butting up against each other, fighting for control of the area.
Before, I was only letting out enough of my spatial perception to fill the room, but now, I let it all out, keeping the area the same but making the field much denser. I use [Concentration] to condense it even more, making my claim over the space in here much more solid. Loranor only has a field that stretches about thirty feet away from himself, and I see it shrink and condense under the pressure of my own field. He tries to fight back against my overwhelming pressure but only manages to gain back a few feet before we settle in a stalemate.
Loranor seems very surprised to have met any resistance to his spatial field and very annoyed once he realizes he lost the battle, but he hides it well. He scans the crowd for a second before his eyes land on me, a flash of disappointment in them as he sees me. He turns and says something to the woman next to him, a Veltark, with purple sparkly hair. I wonder if Silth’s hair will be like that too when he grows up.
Not wanting to be a bitch, I teleport as close to Loranor as I can, just outside of his spatial perception field. I [Inspect] him and the woman as soon as I can.
[Level 37 Portal Technician]
[Level 48 Negotiator]
Now, it’s my turn for disappointment. Level thirty-seven is all? And such a lame class too. I got a pretty similar class for my selection but passed it up due to it being too specialized. And what’s with the negotiator? Does he plan to do business deals?
“So, we finally meet, Initiate Ray Alder.” He says.