Written in the Cards Part 3

Derrick glanced at the stone shed where Sarah was gleefully looking through Mr. Henderson's scrap metal to see if there was anything they could use to create a mirror dungeon then focused on Zaldar. "I'm surprised you're not planning on getting revenge."

Zaldar shook his head. "Just because I'm pissed doesn't mean I'm going to throw my life away, his guards have four or five combat cards each."

"That's because he's the baron's fifth son," Lisa Henderson warned them. "He's a little shit but his mother adores him."

"Only reason he's not dead," Mr. Henderson muttered, having considered killing him on more than one occasion for various reasons.

Mist glanced at the woman that looked to be in her thirties, if you ignored the bit of white at her temples. 'So much for reasonable rulers.'

"That sucks," Zora grumbled, annoyed that they were getting away with killing family.

"Life isn't fair," Zaldar told her, not particularly concerned about personally getting revenge since all he had to do was get the 'broken' wheel to his great aunt by the end of the month and the bastards responsible would be dead within a week thanks to her curse cards. "Besides, I'd rather survive to tell the clan what happened, uncle Zar should be able to get a vision of the person that cut the wheel if we can get the broken wheel to him by the end of the week."

"Which would give us a better idea of what we're dealing with," Zora admitted as Sarah hustled over carrying a rusty hoe with a weathered handle that didn't look like it would survive being used with any enthusiasm. "What did you find?"

"A hoe," Sarah replied with a smile. "Can we sacrifice it to Mist's skill?"

"I thought you wanted scrap, that's a perfectly good hoe," Mr. Henderson complained.

"Liar," Lisa scolded her husband, not sure why he hadn't tossed it years ago. "It was shit when you got it from the smith fifteen years ago and it's falling apart."

"It was the only one he had," he argued, unwilling to admit that he'd been blind drunk when he bought it because of celebrating his granddaughter's birth.

"You can have it," Lisa told Sarah, curious about the man's card.

Sarah handed the hoe to Mist. "Do your magic."

"Sure," Mist replied as he focused on his rusty hoe and activated his Demonic Treasury skill, causing a floating door sized silver mirror to appear out of thin air in front of him as the hoe turned to dust in his hands.

"So much for getting the seed item back," Tiffany muttered as she studied the ornate mirror that was floating a couple of inches off the ground, tossing her plan to have him use the skill on one of their cell phones.

"Do you want to go first?" Sarah asked Mist.

"Not particularly," Mist admitted. "I don't have a weapon and none of my cards boost my physical abilities."

"I'll do it, I have regeneration and a gun," Derrick said as he pulled his saw-off shotgun out of his pocket.

"How much ammo do you have for your gun?" Molly asked, not sure this was the best use of his remaining ammo.

Derrick pointed the gun at the ground and switched the safety off. "Two in the gun and twelve in my pockets but I'm planning on using my card skill so I don't have to worry about ammo."

"I should probably transform," Victoria admitted, hoping her transformation sequence wasn't as bad as she was expecting.

"This is going to be awesome!" Eric squealed, looking forward to seeing an actual magic girl transformation.

Tiffany grabbed Eric by the shoulders and turned him around so that he wasn't looking at Victoria. "Don't be a pervert."

"Come on, everyone loves magic girl transformation sequences," Eric complained.

'He's not wrong,' Ted thought, knowing better than to say shit or stare.

Lisa gestured toward the barn. "You can change in the barn."

"Thank you," Victoria replied as she grabbed Sarah's arm. "Let's go, I need a second opinion."

"Okay!" Sarah agreed as they headed for the barn.

'Damn it,' Ted thought. 'We'll probably get to see it later if it's not too questionable.'

"I'll be back when my skill runs out," Derrick told the group then stuck his hand into the mirror, surprised that it felt a bit like sticking his hand in water. "It feels like water."

"Could be worse," Mist replied, wondering if they should have waited for Victoria.

"Yep," Derrick agreed then stepped through the mirror. He frowned when he noticed the two foot high garden gnomes that were walking around with rusty farm equipment. 'At least they're not cackling or giggling,' he thought as he glanced between the shed/smithy, the stone chicken coop and the barn, all of which looked identical to buildings on Mr. Henderson's farm. He glanced behind him to make sure the exit was there then turned and looked at the stone mansion. 'No wagon, no people but all of the buildings are here,' he mused as a cow walked out from behind the barn with three garden gnomes standing on its back holding a rusty rake like it was some sort of lance. 'Is that the boss or just another unit? Does the place even have bosses?'

'Whatever,' he thought as he activated his Bullet Time ability and started shooting the gnomes, glad that his power seemed to come with some form of ear protection as the continuous 'thunder' would have resulted in hearing loss.

0o0o0

"Not having internet sucks," Sarah complained as she swapped her cell phone to airplane mode so it would stop wasting power trying to connect to a network that didn't exist.

"Yep," Victoria agreed, annoyed that she couldn't check any of her favorite stories for updates.

Sarah selected the stopwatch program she'd downloaded to time her friends. "Ready?"

"Ready," Victoria agreed as she pulled her attention away from the glowing crystal mounted on the wall that provided a decent amount of illumination and activated her transformation ability.

Sarah pushed the button as Victoria floated off the ground, curious how long the transformation would actually take. She pouted slightly when Victoria's clothes turned into sparkles then flowed together turning into a black and bronze leather outfit with a short banded leather skirt without actually letting her see anything that wouldn't be covered by a swimsuit. She pushed the button when the transformation finished and dropped Victoria back to the ground. "Huh, five seconds."

"Nice, everything is covered…" Victoria trailed off as she flipped the back of her skirt up to check her underwear and realized that her panties were just a touch short of transparent. "Or not."

Sarah snickered as she put her phone back in her pocket after turning it off to save the battery. "It could be worse, it could strip you when you change or take twice or three times as long."

"Point," Victoria agreed, thinking about some of the anime she'd seen where the transformation was like twenty to thirty seconds of nudity and sparkles. 'Is this my fault because I always thought the show would be better if the magic girls weren't wearing panties? Or maybe the gods are just perverts?'

"You should test some of your moves," Sarah suggested.

Victoria took half a minute to move around and do some cartwheels to test out her improved physical abilities, finding everything a lot easier than it should be. "I could get used to this."

"I'm going to make everyone a weapon when I get a chance, do you want a sword, a stake or an axe?" Sarah teased, thinking about one of her favorite shows.

"I'm not a slayer," Victoria replied with a grin as she headed for the door to the barn, with a spring in her steps.

"Never said you were," Sarah replied with a grin as she followed the older girl outside.

"Seriously? You got turned into a Roman Legionnaire?" Eric asked as the girls walked back over, surprised that she hadn't ended up with some type of elaborate costume.

Ted gave the girls a thumbs up, glad that Victoria hadn't ended up with something impractical.

Victoria gave Ted a smile then focused on Eric. "It beats ending up with full length robes that I'd end up tripping over or some type of pink princess gown."

"Where's your sense of drama?" Eric asked.

"In my other pants," Victoria replied without missing a beat as she turned to look at the floating mirror. "Do you think he needs help?"

"No clue," Mist admitted. "I figure he took five to ten seconds to glance around the dungeon then used his ability. Since he didn't come back after two minutes, he probably used it twice which means he'll be back in four unless he's on the ground because he ran out of mana."

Lisa shook her head. "Running out of mana just makes you feel sort of empty, it doesn't make you collapse or anything."

"Good to know." Mist relaxed a touch when Derrick stepped out of the mirror holding an old fashioned shovel with a solid looking handle. "Any trouble?"

"No, I used my ability twice and shot everything I could see from the mirror. It was basically a copy of the farm with two foot gnomes running around with rusty farm equipment. I didn't explore the house or the barn or grab most of the loot but they dropped about twenty rusted hoes, five pitchforks, seven shovels and a bunch of potted plants when they died."

"You should probably check the house for traps," Lisa told her husband, figuring that if Mist's skill copied the house it might have copied her husband's rather extensive collection of traps.

"Fine," Mr. Henderson muttered as he conjured a pitchfork and stepped through the mirror, not seeing a reason to leave the traps in place if they were copies of his traps.

"Can I have one of the shovels if they're in good condition?" Lisa asked, wanting an extra shovel since her husband kept 'forgetting' to buy one when he went to town.

"You can have this one," Derrick replied as he handed her the shovel, not particularly worried about it as there were half a dozen more in the mirror. "I just grabbed it to make sure the loot didn't vanish when I left."

"Doesn't hurt to check," Lisa offered as she examined the shovel. "Some of the card abilities have odd requirements or reactions with other abilities, including only working for the person that actually has the ability."

"Makes sense," Mist agreed, glad that he didn't have to kill the monsters himself. "Speaking of loot, I grabbed the cards from the dead guy when we got summoned. Is anyone in the group a good cook?"

Victoria shook her head. "Sorry, I can cook a couple of meals but I wouldn't consider myself a good cook, why?"

"One of the cards gives you the ability to conjure food that heals people but you have to be familiar with it," Mist explained.

Lisa nodded. "I've heard of cards like that, they can make you a fortune if you're in the right profession or end up nearly useless if you can't cook."

"I might as well be the Take-Out Queen," Tiffany admitted.

"Does tuna and noodles count?" Sarah asked.

"Nothing wrong with tuna and noodles," Eric argued.

"Mist?" Sarah asked.

Mist shook his head. "I can cook a decent collection of things but most of it boils down to rice and meat, tuna and noodles, spaghetti or tacos or things like hamburgers and things you toss on a grill but I'm sort of hoping that someone can do better."

"Sorry, that's about what I've got," Ted admitted.

"My mother is a professional chef, I can cook just about anything you'd want to eat," Molly admitted as she held her hand out. "I'll take it unless someone else can do better?"

"Nope, I'm with Tiffany, the closest to baking I do is tossing a pizza in the oven and setting the timer," Derrick admitted.

Mist pulled the cards out of his pocket and handed the food card to Molly. "The other card conjures unseen servants that can repair and clean."

"What rarity is the servant card?" Lisa asked thoughtfully.

"Rare," Mist replied. "Does it matter?"

"Yeah. Common summons are usually weak or stupid and you can't train most of them because they're a blank slate every time they're summoned. Uncommon summons are generally stronger and or smarter and you start being able to train them. You also start finding cards that let you summon more than one minion at a time. It usually reduces the summon's abilities or there's some drawback like the summons sharing strength or the mana cost increasing the more summons you have out. Rare summons are generally strong and reasonably intelligent or intelligent with some special ability, most of them can learn."

"Can I have the servant card?" Molly asked hopefully. "If we can train them, we might be able to use them for scouts or gardening."

"No objections here," Derrick offered.

"You're good," Ted said.

"Go for it," Eric suggested, wanting to keep his options open in case they found better cards.

"I doubt they'd make good clerks. What do you think?" Tiffany asked Lisa.

Lisa glanced at the card that Mist was holding. "It depends on the card, there's a decent chance that they'd be intelligent enough considering the rarity but you'd probably need to invest a significant amount of time to train them."

"Hours, days or months?" Tiffany asked.

"You're probably looking at weeks or months and that's assuming they're mentally flexible enough," Lisa warned her.

"I can probably loan you a couple of servants," Molly pointed out.

"In that case, go for it," Tiffany suggested, figuring that would let her save a card for something better.

Mist glanced at Sarah and Victoria to make sure they didn't care then handed the card to Molly. "Have fun."

"Thank you," Molly replied and used the card before someone could change their mind. She focused on her new ability and pushed mana into it, causing an ethereal and faceless figure to form in the air that looked like a legless mannequin made of wisps of fog. "Can you speak?"

"Yes," the summon replied in a whisper that seemed right next to Molly's ears.

Mist shivered as he felt a presence that he couldn't see. "Can anyone else feel that?"

"The draft? Yeah," Victoria replied as she glanced around, wondering where the feeling was coming from.

"What?" Tiffany asked. "I'm not feeling a draft, are you okay?"

Derrick glanced between Tiffany and Mist. "I can't feel anything."

"Nothing," Eric agreed.

"Are you going to summon your minion?" Zora asked Molly.

"I already did," Molly replied as she pointed at her minion.

Tiffany focused on the direction that Molly was pointing. "That's disturbing, probably just as well that I didn't use the card."

"Are there cards to see invisible creatures?" Mist asked Lisa.

"Of course, there are also items," Lisa said as she studied the wispy and legless humanoid that was floating in front of Molly. "You should probably see how much they can lift and if they can attack people."

"Fifty pounds and no, we're not allowed to attack anything other than vermin," the servant offered in a whisper.

"It said that it couldn't attack anything other than vermin and fifty pounds," Molly told them, having figured out that they couldn't hear it when they didn't react.

"That makes sense," Lisa mused. "Most cards have some sort of restriction or a high mana cost to balance things."

"That sounds like it would be perfect for spying," Zaldar piped up.

"All good servants are spies for their master," the servant offered, sounding amused.

"Sounds useful," Molly replied with a smile, glad that Mist had shared the card.

"They'll probably have a hard time dealing with wards," Lisa warned Molly.

"We'll figure it out," Molly replied, not particularly worried about it.

"You should probably have one of the servants pick up the loot." Mist turned to look at Derrick. "How many monsters were left?"

"I killed three of the boar knights, there's one left and I didn't check the barn," Derrick replied.

"Boar knights?" Victoria asked.

"Some of the gnomes were riding on the backs of animals and were using rakes like lances. I'm not sure how effective they would have been if I'd let them get close but I didn't want to get gored so I shot them in the head until they stopped moving. It took a couple of shots each so you should probably be careful," Derrick warned her.

"I'll be careful." Victoria stepped through the mirror.

"Pick up the loot on the ground and pile it near the mirror," Molly told her minion.

"Thy will be done," the servant replied in a whisper than flew through the mirror.

"We should probably get them gloves and hats," Tiffany suggested.

"Or robes," Eric suggested.

"What's wrong with invisible minions?" Molly asked, doing her best not to laugh at the look Eric gave her.

"They're creepy…" Eric trailed off as he realized what he'd just said. "It's gone, right?"

"Maybe," Molly teased.

"I don't feel a draft anymore, so probably," Mist offered, having noticed Molly's slight smirk.

"How come you can sense them?" Molly asked as she glanced between Derrick and Mist.

"People with magic cards of sufficient rank can generally sense magic items or creatures with magic, it gets easier with practice," Lisa offered.

"That's good to know," Mist replied, glad that he wasn't just imagining things.

Eric glanced at the gypsy wagon. "Do you think we can get a wagon if we use part of the wagon for your skill?"

"No clue," Mist admitted. "How much of the broken wheel do you need?" he asked Zaldar.

Zaldar shook his head. "Probably all of it but you can use the other spare wheel if you think you can get more spare wheels."

Mist glanced at the wagon. "It's worth a try. Worst case, we can always take the wagon apart and rebuild it."

"We'd probably want to do that anyway so I can add springs," Sarah argued.

"Springs?" Zora asked.

"They're basically coils of metal that compress and absorb some of the shock so that you get a smoother ride," Sarah explained.

Zora's eyes widened and she smiled. "That would be fantastic."

"Do you have a slate I can borrow or something to make notes with?" Sarah asked Lisa hopefully.

"I'll get you a journal, someone in town has a card that transmutes organic material into journals so they're cheap," Lisa replied then smiled as she remembered something her granddaughter had mentioned yesterday while chattering about her friends. "Actually, if Mist is willing to awaken someone's cards for trade, I know someone that might be able to get you a ton of journals."

"Might?" Mist asked.

"I knew Jenkin's father and grandfather, the journal card runs in his family which means Jenkin's younger sister might get it, especially since she was apprenticed to a scribe before her parents had a tragic 'accident' after pissing off the mayor when they refused to sell her as a whore."

'So many quests,' Eric mused, figuring they had a lot of things to fix before they could leave.

"Someone needs to kill the bastard," Ted muttered.

"I've considered it," Lisa admitted. "Unfortunately for Azara's future happiness, her brother is inclined to sell her when she turns sixteen so that he doesn't end up tortured to death. If you can awaken her cards before the end of the month, she'd legally be an adult which means she can technically leave town and avoid the entire mess."

"We're going to have to sneak her out of the town, aren't we?" Mist asked, wondering how much trouble the mayor was going to cause.

"It would certainly be easier," Lisa agreed. "Legally, you'd both be in the clear if you just walked into town and awakened her cards but the mayor would absolutely try to have Azara killed for snubbing him."

"So much for high fantasy and knights with a code of conduct," Sarah grumbled.

Lisa shook her head, wondering what type of a world they came from. "Knights generally follow orders, that's what they're paid to do."

"I'm happy to help as long as the plan has a reasonable chance of succeeding without everyone getting killed by insane nobles," Mist told her.

"Yeah, any plan that ends with us dead is a horrible plan," Eric stated.

"Agreed," Ted stated, wishing he had access to a decent lab so he could make enough explosives to deal with the so-called mayor.

"Don't worry, I have a couple of ideas," Lisa assured them. "Let me grab the journal and the town map then we'll see what we can come up with while my husband finishes disabling the various traps in the house."

"Sounds good," Mist told Lisa then turned to look at the rest of the group as Lisa headed for the house. "What do you think?"

"I think the mayor needs to be kicked in the nuts until our morale improves," Sarah stated.

"We're going to have to figure out how to deal with his guards," Tiffany pointed out.

Molly nodded. "We should probably check to see if his guards can spot invisible minions."

Mist shook his head. "I'd be surprised if none of his guards were magic users and shocked if he didn't have a magical item to spot invisible creatures considering Lisa didn't say they were particularly rare."

"That's fair…" Tiffany trailed off as Victoria walked out of the mirror with a large gray horse. "Did you get a horse for loot?"

"Unlike the pigs, the horses calm down once you knock the riders off," Victoria replied smugly.

"Huh," Mist muttered, surprised that the horses could be taken out of the mirror. "That makes pulling the wagon easier."

"Does that mean I get to keep the horse?" Zaldar asked hopefully.

"Go for it," Victoria said as she handed the reins to Zaldar. "We can probably get another horse when we jump into the wagon dungeon."

"Did you see Henderson?" Mist asked, curious if he was done checking the house.

"Yeah, he was tying up a scarecrow," Victoria replied with a grin.

"Why did he need to tie up a scarecrow?" Eric asked.

Victoria chuckled. "They're constructs, they try to hit anything living that gets near them which probably includes birds."

"Isn't that a safety hazard?" Tiffany asked.

"They're straw, they're not particularly strong," Victoria explained. "I doubt they'd be able to hurt a child or at least not seriously hurt them."

"How long until you have enough mana to use your bullet time again?" Mist asked Derrick.

"At least a couple of hours," Derrick admitted.

"We're going to have to work on that," Mist mused as he spent the rest of his mana upgrading Zaldar's gypsy card, trying to get it to the point where it was more useful.