Page 8 of Forgotten Arcane

Ed smiles, “Ah, don’t worry about it, child, that was quite high on the drama scale, I will grant you that, but there has been drama of the same scale before.”

“Can you have visitors?” I ask seemingly out of the blue.

Surprise flashes in Ed’s eyes, and I get the feeling that he hasn’t been asked that before. “Yes, I can have visitors.”

“Would you mind if I came back to visit sometime?” I ask. “I would like to come and visit Mabel, Ribit, and Castle, anyway. I would love to learn more about the Choosing, and how it used to be when it was several teams that competed and not just two.”

Ed’s eyes light up, “Yes, of course. You know the teams now get sent back to their homes and lives, but it wasn’t always that way.”

My eyes widen, “Wait, it wasn’t? What happened to the teams that lost?”

“They died,” Ed replies. “It wasn’t until Trieneliea got shut down that the Choosing changed, and suddenly the losing teams got sent back to their lives. The Choosing was run quite differently. Of course, you know that usually the Choosing had several teams in it competing to be the Warrior Bonded team, and only rarely was it used like it was used for your situation.”

“Not every team qualified to be in the Choosing, did they?” Raiden asks, frowning slightly as he tries to remember.

Ed shakes his head, “No, it wouldn’t make sense if they were. There would be no one left to protect the realms. There was a maximum of five teams that would qualify to compete, and if you think that back then the Warrior Academy in Trieneliea had thousands of students, five teams is an incredibly small percentage.”

“Yes, it is,” Reed replies. “So, four of those teams would die?”

“Yes, either during the trials, if one member died, then the whole team would, or when it came down to the last two teams, and they came into this chamber, the losing team would be immediately taken.”

“Taken?” Raiden questions curiously.

Ed nods, “Yes, the Gods come for them.”

“Wow,” River mutters, “that’s pretty fucking insane.”

Coen nods, “Well I’m glad I didn’t let Kylen kill Fetrick for another reason then.”

Ed smiles, “As I mentioned before, the Choosing no longer works like that.” Clearly done with that conversation, he adds with a knowing smile, “I guess I shouldn’t be at all surprised that you have actually met Castle.”

“Castle’s great, he’s kept me safe,” I reply with a fond smile, accepting that is all we’re going to get to know about the past, Choosing’s for the time being.

“I’m sure he has,” Ed smiles. “Until next time.”

With that parting sentence, he’s gone.

“Dude, sure knows how to make an exit,” Ransom smirks.

“He does,” River agrees. “That was pretty insane what he told us about the Choosing’s of the past.”

“Yeah, no one else mentioned anything about it, but then I guess we didn’t really get a chance to do any proper research into it,” Raiden replies.

“Yeah, that’s true,” Coen agrees. “He said we could come back and visit, so we can ask him more then.”

Evander nods in agreement and then changes the subject once again, “I’m more inclined to believe Ed, than I am to believe the vamp.”

“Yeah, me too,” Griff agrees. “Although I think Lucius’s warning can be trusted, he didn’t say don’t trust them, trust me instead, he just warned us against trusting anyone.”

“Agreed,” Coen says. “I can’t really get a read on these Elders either. I know we didn’t meet them, but even their message is somewhat contradictory. They seem to be helping, but I wouldn’t want to risk trusting them with any sensitive information.”

“I think that’s a good call,” Evander agrees.

“I will add it to the list of things that we need to research when we get back home,” Raiden adds, the wheels in his head turning. I know that if he gets the chance, he’s going to be looking into the old Choosing’s too. They’re far too intriguing not to.

“That list has to be down to the floor by this point,” Ransom says.

I wince, “I hope we don’t forget anything. Like the death magic that we all have now. I know I’m new to magic, but I can’t tell that there’s anything different, and because of the way that my brain works, if it’s not immediately evident, then I’m going to forget that it exists until it smacks me in the face.”

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