It was the best of times and it was the worst of times. It was the before and the after. It was the times of mistakes and especially.....the time of magic. But specific times would be June 23, 20900000, BME (before magic extinction). It had crisp, summer feels to the day. The soft wind breeze swirled and swooshed, toppling over the grass like dominoes. The trees swayed in the wind almost like they were dancing. The sun beamed down on the weary dirt path leading to the market. The market was busy, as usual. The stands were filled with handy magic utensils and between them were street performers making beautiful displays of magic, usually using the magic they are trying to sell. I was sitting in the cool shade of a nearby oak tree so I had a view of the market without getting a sunburn. Life was good. So after I felt relaxed enough and started to get jittery, I get up and trudge to the market to inspect a certain stand I had been keeping tabs on.
As I walk to the market, I start to trail back in my own thought. How all of this magic came and made all of this beauty like the tree and the market. A long time ago, a meteor hit the earth and destroyed all dinosaurs. You probably knew that. But what you didn’t know (and I mean you definitely didn’t know) is what happened next. So we were small mammals that somehow survived. We traced down that meteor and opened that sucker up. Inside was a glowing substance. We now know it was magic. We rolled, drank, bathed, and swam in that stuff. Then one of us decided to pick up a stick and wave it for some reason. He must have been good with a wand because the following events were that it shot a blast that sent magic to all corners of the globe. So started the era of magic or the magizoic (Magh-EH-Zo-ECC) era. Truly the best time to be alive.
Now, back to the story! So I had been looking at this specific stand because it had a dual magic kit that came with the main book, a tracker spell notebook, a lightweight bamboo Charmcaster 9000 wand, and a robe with a hat both made from the 3 headed 10 legged giant spider silk and it was covered in blue fur and speckled in stars! It was perfect! Even better, I had saved up enough kryptos to buy it with extra to buy a pack of snickerdoos, the magic snack of the magic world! It was sitting there, waiting for me. I felt like it was calling my name. I saw another little boy with the same gleam in his eyes just like how I had. He was also wearing a wristband saying 62442. I dashed to it, every second getting more and more tempting! He is already at the stand, about to grab it. No more funny business. When I got close I leaped for it, flying through the air like a bullet! I grab it and fall on the other side of the stand, the cardboard casing of the thin parcel rubbing against my tender hands. I put it in my bag and went to pay. The kid walks away, mumbling something like ...Stupid kid...Didn’t want it anyways...won’t know what hit him….
As I was going to go pay, I saw a street performer with a purple blazer and a white buttoned shirt with a red tie and a purple top hat and a small pocket watch tied to a wristband in his front pocket doing a whole magic hat with only a couple flicks of a wand! The best part is he called me up and guessed my name just by looking at me! (It was Peter Murphy if you were wondering). I stayed and watched for a while until checking the time on the guy’s stopwatch. It was 4:30! I was 30 minutes from being late for dinner! Everyone knows you can never be late for dinner! It’s the unspoken rule! I wanted to dash home using a speed spell on myself to hurry me home quickly before dinner, but I couldn’t remember what the technique was. I check in my bag for my old spell book so I can twirl my wand the right way and not turn myself into a raging monster when I grab something that made me stop in my tracks.
It was the book. The same book I forgot to buy. The same book that I stole and needed to return immediately! No matter the time constraint! So I cast the spell and start booking it down the dirt road to the store when the second strangest thing happened to me. A Pterodactyl, one of the more docile creatures in our world, swopped down and bit my parcel while holding it in in his mouth. Even stranger, It had a tag on its leg reading 62442. Now there was a bite mark on it in a triangle shape. But I wouldn’t seduce that easily! I held on to it and didn’t let go, especially when we were rising. He started to turn and I saw he was flying to a castle in the middle of a grassy field. The pterodactyl must not have been too happy to see me clutching his stolen parcel because he started to try and shake me off. I started to slip, my arms rowing weak. I might have stayed on if I had the strength from eating dinner (which is why it is the unspoken rule) I could have stayed on, but with little strength and an empty belly, I slipped.
Have you ever fallen from a high place, knowing that you might croak when you hit the ground unless someone catches you? Well, I haven’t. That’s because this is the magic world! No one ever hits the ground in pain, because we have magic! So I flipped frantically for a spell to prevent the fall that maybe my undoing, every second I get faster like a rocket. Ground nearing, pages turning, feelings worrying, gravity dragging, until I find a spell that can save me. I cast it, then I bang into the ground. Now, let’s think for a moment. In most stories, the story would end there and a whole new plotline would twist out from an insignificant detail. The only thing is, this isn't most stories. So, instead of me splatting on the ground, I bounced off the ground unharmed. You might be asking how right now, so let me explain. It was the spell I cast. I cast a bounce spell on the dirt path so I would bounce on it. So I decided to bounce home after all of this craziness to eat dinner and to hatch the next course of action.
My house was a suburban house in the Magic-Users Housing house neighborhood. The outside of our house was made of light blue wood that smelled like daisies. The roof was covered in ruff and dark purple roof shingles. The house had 11 windows, 7 in the front, 2 on the back, and 2 on each side. There was the garage door at the front of the house leading to the running trail in the neighborhood than to the open road behind it. The only thing is, we have no cars. When you can fly, why waste metal and oil to make a car? We have a front door and a door to the backyard. We also have a chimney that shifts in size so in winter it opens wide for Santa, in summer it opens wide to let in cool air, in spring it closes to let in no bees, and in fall it closes so no cold air gets in and no warm air gets out. Finally, we had just recently installed the solar panels that catch heat from our giant sun. I say giant because the sun has been slowly dying down ever since it was created. After it was this giant size, it became the small earth you know today. Back then, the earth’s atmosphere had caught a lot of ice so the earth stayed regular modern-day temperature. So after I wet to my room and had felt guilty enough, I wiped away my tears and started crafting a plan (after dinner, of course).
I didn’t just plan, I schemed. It was like one of those detectives shows where the paper and red strings were hung everywhere. At one point, my mom came to check on me but left in shock with my new wallpaper choice. So far, I had figured out that the pterodactyl was most likely working for a higher power because I dought it owns a tower and the ability to keep it in check. This owner is most likely a magic user because they tamed a pterodactyl to do their bidding and the only way to tame pterodactyls is to let it chew on your wand. I dought he would have stolen it but as I say it out loud, he might have done it as he did it to my spellbook. As I was scheming up a storm, my door creaked, then an eye appeared in the crack, then the eye disappeared and the door opened. It was my mom, holding a plater of apple and orange slices. She places them on my bookshelf then came to talk to me.
“Hey Hun, you ok? You seem to be worrying about something. If you wanted to remodel your room, you could have asked!” My mom says playfully.
“*giggles* good one. It’s just that…” I pause for a second. Should I tell my mom? I would feel bad for involving her in my plans because that could mess everything up. She might not get it and call the cops on this person. That might seem like the right thing to do in any situation, but you are forgetting one thing. This is the magic world. In this world, there is a 75% chance that the villain will win. They have very strong potential to be a legendary wizard and overpower the cops just from 1 book. My 1 book. The cops are just some of the brainiest and brawniest people in the land. Most of them don’t even use magic! I can’t tell her.
“...I have to solve a mystery for someone for 10 kryptos.” I reply
“Oh, really?” She askes, “well, what’s the mystery?”
“Excuse me?” I question, trying to get her to drop the idea and forget about it.
“Fill me in! Tell me everything.” My Mom says, with a smirk on your face. So I spend 30 minutes making up a mystery on the spot and telling it to my mom. It ended up being that my school janitor wanted me to find their lost dog that had been lost for 30 years and was invisible but had come up in the news and I was to find it before he came back from Botswana. Surprisingly, she bought it. Before she left, she said “Peter, stop lying, please. I know you're lying. Your left eye twitches whenever you lie, and it is practically vibrating at this point. What’s really going on?”. So I tell the truth, only the truth, and nothing but the truth, not twitching or flinching or anything. I tell her about the book, the pterodactyl, being late for dinner, everything. After, her smirk turns into a face of concern. “Peter,” she says “that’s serious.” “I know,” I say. “You could go to jail for that kind of thing!” She says. “That’s why I have to fix it. Myself.” I say in a cool guy tone. “Ok, be safe.” My Mom says before leaving. Then she closes the door, and I decide that is the right time to pack in.
I wake up tomorrow at 5:00, way before anyone is awake. I make some quick breakfast of piggy puffs and 2% chicken’s milk then I set out for that pterodactyl. I had 1 lead on where he was going. While I clutched the book, you remember that tower he turned to? I think he may have his nest somewhere over there. So I test the ground for my bounce spell and, sure enough, I find it still active on the dirt path to the market. I back up from it until I am very far away from it and farther from the tower. Then I charge at the path and when I step on my spell, I push off it then go soaring into the air. I had no idea if I would make it or splat on the ground. The second I pushed off, I started regretting not using a fly spell and started hoping I would make it. The closer I got, the more It was clear of what the castle looks like.
It was a cylinder shape and it was quite tall. It was in the middle of the woods, explaining why there are vines and moss covering its gray cobblestone stones. There were 2 entrances, one near the top and one near the bottom. The roof was pointed cone shape. It had the same purple and ruff roof shingles as my house has. There were 2 openings in the castle. A faint light yellow barrier was around the house. It was a cloaking spell surrounding the whole castle, but I wondered what the cloaking spell was cloaking and why it was cloaking whatever was under it. Unfortunately, I hadn’t aimed like how I had hoped to and banged into a brick in the wall. It was a loose brick and it was already pushed in quite a bit, but it still hurt my head a little. My vision, though a little blurry, could make out a couple of things.
I could see the inner walls were made of smooth, white wood. There 2 couches, one across from me, and one on the left of me. There was a small coffee table in the center of the room with a vase of flowers. There were 2 stairways, one going upstairs and the other going downstairs. There were also 2 green blobs in front of me. As my vision returned to normal, I saw that the blobs I was looking at were actually ogres. They had green skin and caked in gross warts. Their legs were covered in gray fur and black hooves. They looked like they got leg surgery from a goat! They each had 2 striped dark yellow horns and each had breath worse than a guy who ate fish, garlic, and onions, then farted, then that fart was put in a jar of rotten apple cores and black banana peels, then a pig barfed in it and threw mud in it, then a guy sneezed in it then it was left like that for 12 years in the dump, then taken out and had compost put in it, then was and smashed open so it can roast in the sun, then was gathered and used to mop a porta-potty, then was left in the wild to collect dung, then shaken up, and then it melted out of the second jar like some weird goop and they brushed their teeth with it!!! So like those times ∞!!!!!
They were just staring at me, not doing or saying anything. Finally, the one on the right (I’ll name him Ore) said ”who is tiny human? Is tiny human Friend or Foe?” The one on the right (I’ll call him Ger) replies'' tiny human is Friend. Too weak to be Foe!” Then they both laugh and laugh until I wiggle out of the hole I made, fall on the floor, then took out my wand. They gasped, then Ore said “tiny human has stick as the master is! Tiny human stole stick! Destroy tiny human!” The following has been blocked out of the story for being too cool and gross so I will show you in a different way. He hits me! on the hand and we have a high five! So I Zapp him with a heat spell and That warms up the tea for our tea party! He comes at me, using their giant fists toreach up and grabs the ham and lettuce for our finger sandwiches Then something so gross and violent happens that I shouldn’t tell you but I will. ITooted without saying excuse me! Then I walk upstairs.
Upstairs, there is an open floor with some drums and table mats stuffed in the corner. Up some short stairs is the top entrance that is below the control panel for a room with blue walls and in the middle a podium with my parcel on it! But before I could move, something moved in the shadow near the blue room. I didn’t think much of it until I saw who was in the shadow. “Of course!” I said “I should have known! It was you all along!” then that's when it drops. 62442. In other words, MAGIC.
“Who, or what, are you,” I ask, not politely. Before it answers, It steps out of the shadows. An old man comes out of the shadows, wearing a blue, star-speckled robe and a star-speckled hat.”That’s my hat!” I yell furiously at him. When he starts talking, his voice is weak and withered.”You wanted to know what I am, no?”. “Yes,” I say. “I am everything, anything, and nothing.”. Then, he turns into the boy from the market, the street performer, and the pterodactyl. Then he says weird stuff like ” I live in the gap of time and space. I defy reality. I am more powerful than every piece of magic, and when I finish with this galaxy, I will move on to others until the universe has been ridden of magic forever!”. “But, what are you?” I ask “I... am mystic.” he responds, ominously.
All of a sudden, my hand clutches into a fist. “You’ll never claim this galaxy” “Meh,” he says “I’ll move on to the next”. “That will be hard, especially when you are dead”. Before he can pull out his wand, I grab my wand and squeeze it. A wooden barrier forms around my fist, so I punch him straight out of the upper entrance! He gets defenestrated into a tree, then I jump out the window, my wand fist allowing me to use a fly spell. I grab his toes and throw him in the air, where I proceed to blast an ice spell. He turns into a mirror, deflecting the spell onto my feet. I shoot a fire spell, but he turns into a bird and flies towards me, dodging the attack. I break the ice with my fist wand then we get into a fistfight. For a bird, he can fight really well. At one point, I jump up and do a ground pound, making a creator pulling in the building with it. ”No!” The bird yells with fury. The bird waves his wing at the structure and it moves back into place. He quickly turns back into an old man, then says with hopes of me taking pity, “you wouldn’t hit an old person, would you?”. I raise my fist about to deal the final blow when he says “what do you want with me? It’s the book you want.”. He was right. I had done enough damage. I fly away to the opening then go to the blue room and finally get my parcel. But before I could leave, the blue iron door behind me closed, and I was stuck.
I hear a whooshing sound then I hear something open overhead. It was an old man! He had set me up and trapped me in this small room! How dare he lie to me! I swing my fist and a fire spell pops out. It goes flying but bounces back and then goes out. “No magic in there,” He says, deviously “So it’s fairground”. ”What are you talking about?” I ask. “I never wanted your book!” He says “I wanted you gone! Children don’t generate good magic for me to suck out of them! They are useless to me! I only wanted to tick you off! However, when I saw you battle against me and when you made a wand whipper (or the wooden fist as you may call it) with pure willpower, I decided to put you in my magic juicer and suck the magic out of you! Sorry not sorry.”. Then he closes the hatch, revealing some purple goop stains on the hatch door. Is that pure magic? Gross! I hear a soft but high-pitched beep then the room starts shrinking. Then I hear his voice, muffled, say “did I mention that when I said juicer, I meant like an actual juicer and not a metaphorical one? Oops!”. Time to panic big-time.
I run around in a circle with my hands up and me screaming my head off while the walls come in slowly. I have to think fast or else I will die! Then I have a brilliant idea! I can use a spell from the spellbook to get me out of here! I rip open the package (and admire it for a little while) then I flip through the book frantically for the right spell. Feet pacing, pages flipping, walls closing, and time running out. Teleport? No, I would fall down and my wand has a 10-second cooldown, and I will be a pancake by then. Punch out? No, my wooden arm is weaker than this metal. Switch places with someone? No, then they would be trapped and I can’t live with the guilt. I got it. I can accept my fate and be crushed because I am stumped. The walls are pressing on my sides and I am about to be squished when my wooden fist touches the purple magic goop. It starts to glow pink and my last words in that room were “cool beans.”.
I wake up with the book in my hands and my wooden fist no longer is a fist but has thinned and turned into more of a wooden glove. I look around and I see a pink bubble around me. I survived! My wooden glove made a force field around me! The force field disappears and the room has been reduced to nothing. Now nothing separates the control room from the short-stair area. I go up to the control room, destroy the button to turn on the juicer and open the hatch to find a small hole. The old man says “Why you little…” and lunges at me. But I step aside and he falls in the small hole. Then I close the hatch. Before I leave, I go downstairs past the ogres and to the basement, because I was curious about what was down there. I open the one door in the basement and see heaven. Several shelves of old and powerful spell books, a dresser with the bluest, most star-studded, and sparkliest hats and robes I have ever seen, and several cups of different wands, no 2 alike. I point my glove to the corner of the door and a beam of heat comes out, taking out the room from the building. Then I pick the room up using super wood strength and fly home.
I put the room in the garage since the garage is out of use anyways, I take out the front part of the room with a heat beam and make a side door corresponding with the preexisting door and go to have dinner. Then, mom, dad, my little 5-year-old sister, and I chat about the tower and how my dungeon raiders teacher will be proud. Then I remember my book! I tell them I have to run a quick errand and I will see them later. Then I fly over to the market. Total chaos. Stands in shambles, people running and screaming, and some police officers are battling a giant slug beast with 6 legs. I go to the register and put the money on the counter. The lady working at the register held my shoulders and said “look, kid, you should get out of here. Do you think this is crazy? Well, something is telling me things do not end up peachy!”. Then she runs off. I ask about the book but the register lady says “you’ll need it more than I do!”
Surprised, I stroll home. Things happen like this all of the time. A monster comes the sky turns red the clouds turn orange, but then it blows over. It’s pretty common here. But then I get home. And I realize what that lady was talking about. My house is gone. Not all of it though. The room I put in the garage stayed. I get on my knees and clutch the grass. I stare at the open patch of land. A rabbit hops by. A frog hides in the grass. I look down and say with confidence “I have my work cut out for me”.
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