“So, you are saying that Crudele can cast magic without any external mana sources because he, in addition to being the most powerful man in the Republic, is also a super giga mage? Is there anything that guy doesn’t do?” - asked Dolor.

  “Precisely. Why are you acting surprised? Are you perhaps disappointed that Crudele is not just a man who randomly happened to find himself in a position of power, but a truly powerful magic user?” inquired Petros rhetorically. "We comfort ourselves imagining rulers as weak cowards hiding behind titles, Dolor," Petros said, casually dispelling the restraints. "But real power isn’t accidental. If Crudele was truly just lucky or weak, someone stronger would have already crushed him."

  Dolor wasn’t listening to what Petros was saying, since he was busy rubbing his sore wrists covered in burn marks from Petros’ restricting seals. His head was spinning, and his vision was blurry, which was not surprising considering the sheer amount of stress he had been subjected to in the last several hours.

  “Barco! My good man, would you kindly bring some fresh clothes for our guest here? And tell the staff to set the table for me and Lance Corporal,” commanded Petros.

  Barco, who had disappeared from Dolor’s sight and mind, suddenly reappeared seemingly out of nowhere, curtly nodded towards the Captain, grumbled something under his nose, and headed out the office door.

  “Ok, so what am I supposed to do now?” asked Dolor, slowly regaining his bearings.

  “You are asking me? I have no idea. As I said, turning yourself in is always an option,” responded Petros.

  “Stop it, Petros, I am not fucking turning myself in. You said it yourself, considering the mess I am in, I doubt they will let me off with a warning.”

  “Oh no they won’t, that’s for damn sure Lance Corporal. I’d venture to say they would most likely torture you for information and then either perform a magic lobotomy on you, forcing you to become a mindless war zombie meat husk, or just kill you, in case they don’t want to deal with you or take any risks,” said Petros who was now holding the dagger between the tips of his index fingers and twisting and turning it ever-so-subtly examining the magicarm from every possible angle.

  “Well, then why would I turn myself in?” wondered Dolor

  “Because that same outcome awaits you regardless of whether you turn yourself in or not. But by turning yourself in, you will at the very least spare me, or any other poor bastard unfortunate enough to get involved with you, a lot of unnecessary trouble. Come on now, Lance Corporal, you are a military man, so you must remember the third rule of the Republican Military Codex, don’t you?”

  “Think not of yourself before the Benefit of the State…” Dolor’s head began to hurt again as the recitation of the Codex came with a healthy side of Revolutionary War PTSD. These were memories that Dolor did not want to recall. After all, these memories were the reason Dolor was living like so many semi-homeless, traumatized ex-military drunks and ether addicts who existed in the Capital’s shadow, seemingly invisible yet great in number.

  “Verily, Lance Corporal! Yet despite the Codex’s instructions, you are selfishly placing me and other innocent citizens of the Free Republic in danger by letting the stench of your criminal acts sully the innocent patriots of Lestralla.”

  “Here are your clothes. Sorry, I didn’t find any diapers for you, Piss Corporal,” said Barco with a wide, toothy grin, placing a set of old military fatigues near Dolor.

  “Hey, you know what, fuck you, I had a hard day, and I don’t need this shit, okay? Can a man not even wet his pants when he gets zapped by lightning and beaten almost to death?” Dolor was slowly returning to his regular self, finding energy again to quip with Barco.

  “Matilda, you can tell them to bring the food in, I’m ready to eat,” said Petros, seemingly to no one, not paying any attention to the argument between the orc and his uninvited guest.

  The door of the office opened, and a slow procession of the Lower Deck’s staff entered the office carrying a small dining table, chairs, and trays with delicious-smelling food. The giant orc carrying the dining table with ease walked into the center of the office and gently placed the table on the carpet, making sure not to disturb a single fiber of its luxurious weave. The other servers then followed up by quickly covering the table with an expensive-looking tablecloth, placing the chairs opposite to one another, and methodically setting plates of food on the table. As stress began to wane and adrenaline levels in his body began to subside, Dolor’s hunger, which was normally high due to inability to find food consistently, let alone good food, was now back with vengeance. The sight of delectable pig roasts, elaborate smoked vegetable platters, freshly baked bread, cheese, and sweet wine penetrated his mind through his nostrils and was now driving Dolor insane. Dolor thought to himself that if he did not need Petros’ help, or even if he knew he could overpower him, he would engorge himself on every single crumb of food on that table.

  “Please, Lance Corporal, be my guest,” Petros approached his side of the table and gracefully pulled the chair back, sat down, and courteously pointed towards the empty chair across the table, inviting Dolor to sit down.

  “You don’t have to ask me twice,” Dolor approached the table, barely containing himself from the impulse to dive headfirst into the food.

  Petros poured himself a half-full glass of wine and began pouring some into Dolor’s glass, ensuring that his guest’s glass would be filled by three-quarters, thus leaving no doubts about the host’s generosity. He placed the bottle back on the table and sat back in his chair while holding his glass by the stem.

  “To new opportunities, Lance Corporal,” Petros toasted towards Dolor and smiled so authentically that Dolor began to catch himself in realization that he subconsciously wants this elf’s approval, despite what he had done to him minutes earlier, or maybe in part because of it.

  Stolen story; please report.

  “To new opportunities, Captain,” Dolor returned the toast, trying and failing to mimic the grace with which Petros toasted him. The diners brought their glasses up to their lips. Dolor wanted to hold his fa?ade for a bit longer, but the smell of the wine near his nose hit him so hard that he greedily pulled back his head and emptied the entire glass in two big, loud gulps. The sweet taste of wine and its gentle sour burn immediately caused Dolor to freeze for a second to realize that he had just tasted for the first time an alcoholic beverage that would have never been accessible to someone like him.

  Dolor liked alcohol, but it would not be right to call him an alcoholic. He managed to function and was doing as well as a homeless, manaless war veteran could hope, alcohol was merely an occasional escape from the thoughts of his sorry state. He found that same relief when an occasional odd job would come his way, giving Dolor a brief sense of purpose and distracting him from thinking too much. These same jobs would give him a couple of tickets he could spend on the cheapest moonshine swill he could get his hands on to get him through to the next odd job.

  “Are you alright, Lance Corporal?” Petros asked with a genuinely puzzled expression on his face. “Is the wine not to your liking, perhaps?”

  “It is…it’s the best wine I have ever had. Is this even made from grapes? I never realized anything could taste this good,” said Dolor, still trying to grasp what he just experienced. Yes, he was stressed and hungry, but he had been hungry and thirsty before, during the campaigns, and he never experienced anything quite like that. His body was shivering from waves of warm, fuzzy pleasure washing over him, as if the wine was radiating heat from inside his stomach. It was so good that Dolor forgot about the pain of his injuries for a moment.

  “Yes, it is made from grapes, but not just any regular grapes, but magic-infused grapes. The agromages of the Republic work hard to create magic that can enhance food in various ways, increasing its taste, nutritional values, and various other characteristics,” said Petros, taking another sip.

  “Wait, they do it with magic? Why doesn’t all food taste like this, then? Also, can I have another glass?” he pleaded with a barely audible whimper in his voice.

  “Because, young Dolor, magic is not free. You realize that, right? Since most people are not magekind, and most magekind are not good enough to cast this type of magic, the number of people who can even attempt to cast something as complex as agromagic is extremely low,” Petros started methodically cutting a piece of meat on his plate. “Please, eat, don’t be shy now.” Dolor graciously nodded and began digging into his meat as well.

  “And besides,” Petros continued, “even if you do manage to scrap together a team of several agromages, the demands for mana would be so large that to use agromagic on a large scale would be impossible, even if all dust mines in the land were to be swept clean.”

  Dolor was listening intently, but the sheer enjoyment of the juicy meat and soft creamy mashed potatoes was affecting his focus. “Oh yeah? It’s…very interesting…that this would be…the case,” Dolor was experiencing something like a food delirium, he caught himself realizing that going from eating almost nothing for two days to eating the best food available to anyone was arguably a form of torture too, sending his body into pleasure shock and causing him to lower his guard. This was not just a dinner; this was the second phase of his interrogation by Petros.

  “You see, my dear Dolor, rather than using magic to cast a spell over all the fields in the country to make the crops weather-resistant, a team of agromage researchers, having essentially limitless state mana resources at their disposal, can at best produce a tiny handful of enchanted seeds that will yield more weather-resistant crops. This wine, for example, was made in a unique magekind-exclusive winery, with access to a small batch of magic-infused grapes. So, as you can see, agromagic is a very mana-intensive and demanding process that can not be scaled due to several decades of magekind neutering. Today, there is almost no one left who would have the required manapool capacity and the abilities to perform something as complex as agromagic.”

  Dolor only understood something about the food being very expensive, his brain was now experiencing a sense of euphoria that he did not think was possible. After experiencing so much pain his entire life, he felt a profound sense of calmness and joy. His shoulders dropped, and tension left his body. Dolor leaned back, breathing heavily with his eyes red and wet from tears. He could not speak and wanted this moment to last forever, prepared to give anything to make it happen, even his life.

  “Magic is the basis of our Republic, Lance Corporal,” Petros continued, ignoring Dolor’s ecstatic breakdown, “…and mana is at the heart of magic, so it is even more important than magic itself. Why do you think we use manatickets as our currency? Each ticket is not just a piece of paper backed by our military might or the strength of our industry, but backed by actual mana. You can walk into any branch of the Republican Bank and cash in your tickets for mana cartridges, which you can use to cast magic. It’s not something the manaless would ever need, so most citizens are not aware that this is the case, just how they are not aware of the existence of agromagic, which is officially not acknowledged as such.”

  Petros pierced a piece of roasted meat with his fork and elegantly placed it in his mouth, making sure to chew thoroughly before swallowing, wiping the corners of his mouth, and then continuing to speak.

  “In most people’s understanding, agromagic is a name for spells that change the shape, color, or smell of a food item, like making purple rectangular corn that smells like cheese, but still tastes like corn. But those things are mundane, easy, and boring, real agromagic, the one that is about changing the structure of the food itself, that’s something that can only be reserved for the cream of the crop of the Republic. Neither the manaless masses nor even the vulgar magekind paupers can ever be allowed to know that something like this exists, without justifying why it should not belong to everyone, which ostensibly goes against the Leader’s doctrine, so best not bring this up anywhere else, Lance Corporal,” Petros interrupted his monologue finally acknowledging Dolor’s existence.

  “And how did you get access to such food?” Dolor finally regained his consciousness. His head did not feel foggy, but the opposite, he felt intense focus and appreciation for every word Petros said.

  “The privilege to enjoy such expensive foods is one of the few perks I still have since leaving my service to the State,” Petros picked up a napkin from his lap, gently tapped the corners of his mouth, folded the napkin, and put it inside the inner pocket of his jacket. “Come with me, Lance Corporal. Let’s go for a short stroll to help the digestion.” Petros got up from his chair.

  “Wait,” said Dolor, “I haven’t even finished my food.”

  “Are you sure?” asked Petros, looking at Dolor’s plate.

  Dolor followed the Captain’s gaze and was surprised when he discovered that his plate was empty and suspiciously clean, as if someone licked it clean. It was impossible. he just took a bite, finishing the pate would have taken him 30 minutes at the very least. “Did I eat all my food?” Dolor asked pleadingly.

  “You most certainly did. You left it no chance, it was a grisly sight, I tell you, but you devoured the whole plate while I was answering your question,” said Petros with honesty in his voice.

  “Why can’t I remember it?” asked Dolor.

  “Perhaps your palate is not so refined,” answered Petros cheekily. “Come now. Let us walk a while; There is something you need to see, Lance Corporal.”