“Please, enter.” Grand Priestess said, hearing someone knocking on her door. She was a little surprised by such a late visit, because of the bad weather outside.

  “Good afternoon, Grand Priestess.” The Head Librarian said upon entering.

  “Good afternoon, old friend. What brings you to me?”

  “Message from On Taram just arrived.” He said simply, handing over the sealed tube.

  “Please sit.” Elana gestured to the chair. Then she takes a magnifying glass and looks closely at the seal.

  “It looks like the official seal of Dungeon Mistress.” She said. All dungeon masters have similar seals. They can stamp their official letter with the symbol of the god that they represent. However, because they had only one patron god, their letter could be easily mistaken for official church letters. It doesn’t happen only because they don’t send any messages.

  “Yes. I’m sure of it. It had two patron gods and a tower. I saw drawings of the On Taram tower. It’s the same.

  “Yes. Let’s see what happened this time.” Elven priestess breaks the seal and pulls out a small piece of paper. Because it was a short message, she rewrote it on a bigger piece of parchment.

  “It says: When you need to cast a spell, imagine the object and process. Warning. You need to be on the grand master level. Don’t try it before you are at the late master's level. Ice shard + freezing, fire + furnace, stone + chiseling, and air need more trials. Northern kingdoms will receive this message too.” She reads. “This message makes no sense.” She said.

  “It’s a coded message. In the first sentence, it should be and/or, and is only and.” Laibrairain priest pointed out.

  “Yes. But I don’t recognize any usual coding method.”

  “Me too, Grand priestess. I'll check the codes I'm using to see if I find anything.”

  “Please do. I will try to think about it myself. I’m sure one of us should be able to find something.”

  “Regretably, the caravan is on its way. We can’t send any message back,” The old priest sighed.

  “I don’t think this message indicates that something bad happened. But then, why did they send us a riddle?”

  The next day, both of them tried using any known coding systems, but it turned out that nothing matched. On the third day, the Grand Priestess had an epiphany. She was walking next to one of the courts where one of the inquisitors teaches younger holy knights.

  “There are plenty of methods of hiding evidence. Some say even infinite. Please mention one place where you will try looking for them.”

  “Under bed.”

  “Wardrobe.”

  “Pockets.”

  “Stains on clothes.”

  Knights answered.

  “Those are decent answers. But there is one place that we all sometimes forget. It’s plain sight.”

  The Grand Priestess didn’t listen to the rest of the lecture. She hastily went to her office, grabbed a message, and went to the training grounds.

  “Grand Priestess, something happens?” Greeted her commander of holy knights.

  “No, Commander. However, can I ask for your assistance?”

  “Certainly. I will seriously consider changes to their training if our young knights cannot fight without supervision.”

  “Splendid. Also, is the shooting range free?”

  “For the next hour. Then our mages will start their lessons.”

  “Good. It shouldn’t take a full hour.”

  She takes out a message to decide which spell to use. She specializes in fire magic, however, she doesn’t have any knowledge about furnaces. Similar things go with chiseling stone. Freezing should be doable. A heavy metal shield hung in front of her, allowing her to judge the strength of a spell by how loud the impact was and how hard it began to swing.

  At the beginning, she shoots a typical ice shard. Bang was moderately loud, and the shield moved slightly.

  “Quaiet decent spell. Especially that, if I remember correctly, your affinity, Grand Priestess, is fire.”

  “Yes, it is. To be precise, it’s more specialization than true affinity. Our duty requires fighting undead, and fire is the best way.”

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “That is true.”

  “Now I will try something new. It could be dangerous. Please watch me.”

  “Understood.”

  The elven priestess started imagining water freezing in the shape of ice shards. She needed three attempts before she materialized a proper ice shard and two more before she managed to hurl it forward. However, when the shield was struck, the bang was loud, and the shield began to swing violently.

  “Grand priestess?” Commander asked, seeing her heavily panting.

  “Just a little tired. I used a lot of mana.”

  “Understood. Also, congratulations on the breakthrough.”

  “I’m sorry to disappoint you, Commander, but I’m just getting very close to grand mastery cap.” Priestes smiled, checking her path.

  “Achievement still worth congratulations.”

  “Normally, I would agree. But it’s not my achievement.” She gave him a message. “I received this letter three days ago. It cames from On Taram.”

  “I see.” He said.

  “We need to gather mages at the level of Great Mastery and thoroughly test this new knowledge. Then spread this knowledge.”

  “I agree with the first part. But the second could be dangerous. Cultists could get powerful enough to break our defences.”

  “Unlikely. Read warning.”

  “Yes?”

  “Tell me, how many grand master level necromancers, warlocks, or demon summoners have you ever heard?”

  “It’s true that it’s a rare occurrence.” He agrees after a moment of thinking. “But what if they found a way around it?”

  “Two major reasons why it’s unlikely. The first is mana. At least in the initial stage, it’s costly to cast that kind of spell. Second, they hate hard, honest work. And about work, we need to start doing and stop talking.”

  “As you command, Grand Priestess.”

  The next day, all horse runners got one additional scroll to carry to the local main temples. In the meantime, the temple of the Sun organizes lessons for all priests to train them in new siege magic. The Grand Master of god Trinus proposed that term.

  “Nice trick. But you can only use it from a safe place, like a castle wall during the siege. Or as a nasty surprise if cultists try to take you alive. But I guess this siege magic could be handy.” He said.

  Most mages, however, were full of hope. New spells were hard to cast, and not all affinities were understood enough to be used. But their paths show progress. All agree that they lack only an understanding of each affinity to master this new knowledge.

  After a week, when enough priests were proficient in using the new magic, they started teaching army mages and adventurers. Over the next month, the mage's progress matched what many had achieved over the past few years. Even master level mages started leveling up rapidly and entering grand mastery. The scales slowly shift towards those fighting in the name of the true gods.

  When the letter reaches the Citadel of Light, the High Priest and Chino spend a long moment in silence trying to understand it. Every city on the way from Frayharf was adding their notes and observations, so it was a lengthy lecture, especially compared to the first and enigmatic note.

  “Dungeon Mistress. I need to ask. Do you know about this?” Archpriest asked after some time.

  “No. I always understood it just like you were teaching me. I understood the word and that it means a situation when you hurl a spell. First, you create an object, then you throw.”

  “Yes. That was my understanding until now.”

  “We need to try it. Then start teaching everyone.” She decided.

  “Agree.”

  They went to the shooting range. It looks exactly like Frayharf. Holy knights immediately stepped back, making a place for both of them. Archpriest tries first with a fireball. His standard spell was powerful. He trains his skills in every free moment. As an example to the Holy Knights, and also to protect his family. Chino included. Then he added his knowledge about furnaces. It wasn’t much, but his few visits to forges for various reasons allowed him to imagine how they work. His new fireball became hotter, and the explosion almost threw the shield against the wall.

  “Your turn, Dungeon Mistress.” The elven priest said after a moment of calming his breath. The new spell cost him a lot of mana. But his fast regeneration rate, combined with a strong spirit, helps him keep composure. He estimates that with proper training, he will be able to use new spells quite frequently, but at a much slower rate than usual. Regretably, he will need more breaks, contrary to the standard spells.

  In the meantime, Dungeon Mistress prepared her spell. She recalls her chemistry knowledge and was certain she could throw a fireball from burning hydrogen and oxygen, like in a rocket engine. Instead, she chose the crystal shard not to undermine her uncle's position. Diamond, to be exact. Her basic spell was powerful. Judging by the dent, it could penetrate any leather armor. Next, Chino takes a deep breath. In her past life, few people, not even her parents, knew she was a nerd. Despite her career as a J-pop girl group idol, she has two obsessions. Guitars were the first ones, and her fans and family knew it. It aligns perfectly with her image. However, no one knows how extensive her digital library of magazines and online articles was. It easily could rival any music school collection. Because it was a digital edition, her parents didn't know anything about it, and she was able to collect and learn more.

  The second one was crystals. Only her agent and parents knew about it. However, they confuse it with ordinary geology. Parents have mixed feelings about that kind of career, but news about searching for new rare deposits of ores and minerals suggested a possible bright future for their daughter. That's why they even give her books and collections of rock samples.

  Now she was about to create a diamond shard. She imagined how a lump of coal crystallizes deep underground. How enormous pressure and heat organize atoms in a perfect crystal. Then she threw it. Surprisingly, a bang wasn’t louder than before, and the shield didn’t move much.

  The High Priest, the Grand Marshal, and the Dungeon Mistress stood in surprise when they saw the shield up close.

  “I think it should be expected.” The Archpriest smiled as he saw a hole in the half-centimeter-thick metal plate.

  “May I know, Dungeon Mistress, what stone you threw?” Asked the Marshal.

  “Daimond, sir. Both spells were a diamond shard.” Chino replied, unable to believe what she was seeing.

  “I think we should teach the general principles to all mages. However, we need to proceed carefully with knowledge about affinities coming from dungeon masters.” The Marshal said.

  “The question is what they can tell us. Dungeon Mistress, can you tell us that?” The Archpriest asked Chino.

  “I can’t say right now. And I need a few days to try something else. But I need to do that in my private quarters.” She answered.

  “Are you planning to change dungeons?” The elven priest asked.

  “Mostly details will change if my trials go promising.”

  “We will warn people anyway. Can you give us one day?” Ilrune asked.

  “Of course. I need to learn more anyway, before I start doing anything.”