Valtor stepped up onto his front porch. He was tired. And sore. It had been two decades since the end of the last great war, and he retired from his position as field commander of the Barbarian Berserker Corps. His higher ups had begged him to stay in the field, but he made the counteroffer to stay on and train the next generation or two instead, and they had begrudgingly acquiesced. Now though, age, and a much more relaxed diet and training regimen, were catching up to him.
In the twenty years hence, he met Lye’ta, the dryad woman who would become his wife and mother of their three, half-human/half-dryad, children. Lye’ta was beautiful, and like most magical creatures, didn’t suffer from the rigors of age typical to other beings. Where Valtor was very visibly in his mid-fifties, Lye’ta still looked early twenties despite actually being a couple of decades older than him. Age and appearance didn’t matter to them anyway, they were happy and had a happy healthy family. He stood on the porch looking out across their fields and continued to reminisce. Money wasn’t an issue, his military pension, and wage as a training officer, coupled with a good investment banker assigned specifically to help out the soldiers meant money would never be an issue.
This was coupled with the fact that Lye’ta was a dryad, a magical humanoid plant creature that had an affinity to growing things. After their wedding, Valtor bought her a farm and paid to get it up and running and run it she did. Their farm rapidly became the biggest food producer in the district. Times were good, and now that their kids were all school aged, they focused more on their jobs to keep busy and time with each other.
Because of all this good fortune, Valtor had instituted the house rule that every night, everyone puts everything on pause and sits down together for dinner. He knew that everyone in his family would probably long outlive him so he wanted to have as much time together as he could. He wanted to give them lots of fond memories of him.
“Vaaaaalll, dinner!” He heard Lye’ta from inside. As he opened his front door, he was tackled by three tornados. No, not tornados, children! Children with entirely too much energy.
“PAPA! YOU’RE BACK!” shouted Leanna, his youngest.
“Like a vertebra” he replied to her confused face, and then they both started laughing.
He let the children lead him to the dinner table, bantering all about their days and what they learned at school while he watched Lye’ta serving the dishes on the table. They shared a look and a smile. “She’s so beautiful”, he thought.
He picked up a fork and turned to look at his plate as the room was suddenly bathed in darkness along with a faint *pop* of displaced air. “What the name of the Maker?” he asked aloud, “Hon, did something happen with the generator? Hon?” no answer, no sounds of kids either.
As his eyes settled into the dim light coming through the windows from the dusk, he realized he was alone in the house. “What in the…” and he headed out the kitchen door to the back yard. All the field golems, that usually worked diligently and non-stop were slumped and unmoving, all of their lights off. That’s when something tickled the back of Valtor’s memory. Something half-forgotten from long ago. A warning everyone said was crazy. He sprinted around his house, entering the front yard and looking across the district toward the city and realized what had happened. All of the lights were gone, every one, except for the fires slowly starting that he could see. The age of mana had ended.
Valtor dropped to his knees and screamed himself hoarse.
*5 YEARS LATER*
Valtor sat back on his haunches, listening intently to the young idiot in front of him monologuing. He felt the tightness of his bindings and thought could almost discern what knots they’d used to tie him up. His goggles itched next to his nose.
“…And THAT is why the Counterville Cannibals were able to catch you! You’re going to feed us for a week!” the idiot laughed. He began to continue his rant, but Valtor interrupted him, to his visible annoyance.
“Sonny, sonny, sonny, I get it. The pull of the ego, you NEED people to realize how badass and smart you are, how you’re the best leader of the Cannibal Carnival—”
“COUNTERVILLE CANNIBALS!”
“Right, right, that’s what I said. I get where you’re coming from, but I need to ask you, have you ever heard of the Barbarian Berserker Corps?” and the cannibal laughed.
“Of course!” he said sarcastically “They were all killed in the skirmishes after the magic went away and they all lost their strength, bunch of pathetic losers. Why?”
“Well,” Valtor began, “The thing about the corps was, not all of them died, and not one of them used a lick of mana”, he smiled, and everything went red.
——
Valtor awoke on his knees. “Am I still kneeling or kneeling again?” he asked out loud to himself.
The sky overhead had some light, but he couldn’t tell the direction the sun was in, so he didn’t know if it was dawn or dusk. His club was sitting next to him. Good old Drake. It had been a while since he and the war club had had a good chat. Granted the club never replied, but their conversations were decent enough Valtor had thought.
As his wits slowly returned and his senses came fully online, Valtor was aware of several things. One, he was covered in blood and viscera, two, none of it was his own, three, he was surrounded by cannibal bandit parts in various states of carnage, and four, their entire camp was destroyed with some of the remains of it being on fire.
“I hope it was worth it” he muttered to any cannibal hearing organs that might still be nearby.
He got up, a bit stiff and sore, picked up his Drakebone Maul and slung it over his shoulder. He made his way to the freshwater spring where the bandits had made their home and drank using a ladle made from a bleached human skull “waste not want not” he said, muttering an apology to the skull.
After his thirst was satiated, he decided to head to see what they had for transport and then he saw them. Desert wind skiffs. Sail boards made for surfing across the desert dunes using the powerful winds. Valtor smiled and, after securing his gear and club, set out on a skiff.
He followed the stream that flowed from the spring knowing he’d reach some kind of settlement eventually. After about three hours of sailing into the morning light (turns out it was dawn after all), he came upon a small village. Upon seeing his skiff in the distance, the people started ringing a gong and running for cover, locking, and boarding up their doors and windows.
Valtor pulled up outside their town and walked into the village square of the now, apparently abandoned, hamlet. “Hello?!” he yelled. “Villagers?! I come in peace!”
“Look, I’m not a bandit, cannibal thing. I, well, I brutally killed the lot of them and left their pieces in their camp by the spring head. Look, I’m a field commander of the Barbarian Berserker Corps, none of you have anything to fear from me.”
“You mean you WERE a field commander” said a voice from behind a barrel. A feminine voice. “The berserkers were defeated when the government collapsed after the mana left.”
“I suppose you’re right” he replied “but old habits die hard. And name dropping being a leader of a heroic group of soldiers who protected the innocent can only help build trust, right?”
“Unless you’re a liar…” the voice replied, then continued “You know,” it said, “you don’t sound much like a dumb brute.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I am, years of conditioning from my wife just corrected my way of speaking.” The girl finally came out and smiled.
“Anyone who would find a wife to tolerate him long enough to fix him can’t be all bad. Come out all of you! What’s your name barbarian? Or would you just prefer ‘Barb’?” she smiled again.
He laughed, “I’m Valtor, and I’m pleased to make your acquaintance.” He offered his hand.
“Oh, fancy words, I need to meet this wife of yours.” She quipped back, accepting his hand and shaking it. Valtor’s smile faltered but didn’t fade entirely.
“So, tell me about the bandits, how long had they been raiding your village?” The girl noticed he changed the subject but didn’t press.
“3 seasons on and off” she said, “The Counterville Cannibals, more like Counterville Cranium…voids.”
Valtor smirked, “So I take it this is Counterville?” Valtor gestured around him.
“Oh, more of that barbarian brilliance,” she began, smiling “but yes, this is Counterville, or what’s left of it.”
“They really were cannibals?” Valtor asked her.
“I don’t actually know, *I* don’t think they truly had the balls, but lots of people did go missing over the last 3 seasons. Part of me thinks they just used what was going on to try and bolster their reputation.”
“Makes me almost feel bad for letting them set me off…” he muttered.
“Don’t worry, they had it coming. Stole medicine that led to people dying, actually did kill townsfolk, stole food that led to some starvation. I just don’t think they were cannibals.” She finished.
“Welp, I’m gonna help you improve and fortify your town, but then I want something in return.” He said causing her to raise an eyebrow.
“You’ll have to talk to the elder.” She said, looking away. “FATHER! Come here, he has a proposal for you!”
An older man approached, about the same age as Valtor, “Thank you, stranger, for taking care of the bandits. I am the elder, and I see you’ve met Nadja. She says you have a proposition for us?”
“I do sir,” Valtor began “I noticed you have a magicar parked in that shed.” he said pointing at the vehicle.
“Yes, it was the only one in our town, we used it to travel to the ocean and trade at the port there, but we’ve since had to abandon it for obvious reasons. We modified the trailer it towed to be towed by a horse, but it’s very slow going.”
“I’ll make you a deal; if you give me the car, in return I will improve your town in every way possible.”
The elder looked at him skeptically. “How?”
“Well first, I’ll teach you all how to make medical supplies and set up a duty rotation schedule for maintaining your stores. Then I’ll teach you all the most in depth field medicine I know. After that I’ll teach you everything my wife taught me about farming. Irrigation, companion planting, crop rotation, animal-based soil regeneration, swales, wind breaks, and water storage. Then we’ll work on making and maintaining improvised weapons and you’ll all get a crash course in using them and how to practice with them. After that I’ll help your men refurbish the trailer to be comfortably towed by two horses instead of awkwardly towed by one, and I’ll fix both of your single-horse wagons. Get you running a proper caravan for trading.”
“You would do all this for us, for nothing more than the broken old magicar?” The elder asked incredulously.
“That and some assistant labor to help with all the projects and with the repairs I want to make to the car.” Valtor nodded.
The elder smiled “It’s a deal!” and shook Valtor’s hand, “come, let us feed you and give you a place to sleep and we start tomorrow.” And with that they went to Nadja and the Elder’s house.
Dinner was succulent pork and chicken, along with some sad vegetables and salad. Valtor ate heartily and thanked them profusely. They put him up in their guest room.
Over the course of the next few weeks Valtor stayed with the people of Counterville, accomplishing everything he said. He had, in a couple months, transformed their town, giving it back some of the civilization he thought it might have lost. The people were most happy and agreed to everything he asked.
They helped him dismember the sand skimmer and fix its sail and steering mechanism to the magicar. He took some supplies and a smart and diligent worker named Krine and “set sail” for the bandit camp.
It took them the better part of a day to get back to the camp, moving a whole car with one sail, but they made it. That night they made camp in what was left of the bandit’s camp and the next morning set to work disassembling the rest of the sand skimmers.
Over the next few days, Valtor and Krine worked diligently to build an entire array of sails onto the frame of the magicar. Attaching all the pulley systems to spots in and around the old steering wheel. With some trial and error, Valtor got pretty good at driving it, and after about a week they headed back to Counterville, covering the distance in one forth the time of Valtor’s original trip following the stream.
They got back to the town and Valtor bid Krine, Nadja, and the rest of the town farewell, but not before the elder could heap supplies onto him, and then headed out in his refurbished mag—no, his Sandcar, with Drake the club in the front seat beside him.