Introduction
This is a short preview of Misplaced Fools, a prelude to the upcoming novel The Futility of Esoterica.
Misplaced Fools is a satirical story about time travel, tenure, and the foolishness of the wizards of the University of Esoterica. I might also take a few jabs at string theory (“squiggle theory.”)
Chapter One
Deep in an unlikely corner of the multiverse lay the world of Orren. Magic filled everything there. The oceans glowed with it, where proud sea serpents posed for anyone willing to draw them. Remote islands shone with soft sorcery and gave tired math professors a place to rest after years of difficult algebra.
Our story begins on the bustling continent of North Arn, in the Western Free States. At its center stood Armenia, a thriving city-state whose markets drew the world to its gates.
Distant ships packed the harbor, loaded with exotic wares. But they carried more than trade. Odd relics moved between them too, passed from ship to ship. Some were treasures, such as the Jewel of the Seven-Armed Goat God Azmed. Others were secrets, such as the motives of those extra-dimensional demons known as cats.
The heart of the city was an old, gray marble college. It was large, worn, and hard to miss, looming over the surrounding streets as might a lurking intruder. It resembled a cathedral, but without any solemn religious symbols. Instead of saints, it displayed dragons, gargoyles, and committee-approved clichés. This was the University of Esoterica, the world’s leading college of magic.
In earlier ages, it trained the mightiest mages. One of them was Esteron, the mage who bound dragons. Even more impressively, he used divination to read the odd secrets of city zoning laws. Archmage Bandorf once battled a demon on the bridge between the Quad and the library. They stopped fighting after agreeing that Fermat’s Last Theorem was unsolvable.
In more recent times? We shall attend a meeting of the Board of Esteemed Mages and find the answer.
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The Board gathered in the so-called Grand Hall of the High Wizards. Once, its stained glass showed archmages combating demons and dragons. Now it was whatever large lecture room they could secure an hour before the gathering started.
The hall wasn’t grand anymore, and neither were the wizards inside. The Board had devolved into a chaotic group of elderly and clean-shaven men (wizards seldom grew long beards. They might not like magic, but they preferred to use a facial-hair growth-stunting spell than deal with an unruly beard). Many slept, slumped in their chairs like exhausted gargoyles. The rest argued about theories no sane person understood.
“Electrothermodynamic accounting is the future!” said one wizard.
“The quantum interest coefficient is not a real number!” another yelled.
“Protons aren’t real! They’re illusions of the nuclear scalar field!” snapped a third. “You couldn’t solve a polar integral if your salary depended on it!”
By reputation, they were the university’s finest wizards. Their ear hair and dazed eyes showed that age trumped talent. None were under fifty, and most seemed to misplace their slippers more often than they cast spells.
“Everyone be quiet!” a booming voice cut through the noise.
Twenty-five heads turned toward the speaker. A large and crusty oak table dominated a heavy marble dais. Seven frail wizards crouched behind it, blinking like startled owls. They wore the Board’s black robes trimmed in crimson. With one poke, they’d crumble into powder, leaving nothing but their robes.
All except Gustavius, the Speaker, who perched enthroned in a padded leather chair at the table’s center. He was rotund, red-cheeked, wild-bearded, drunk on authority. At fifty, he was the youngest Speaker the Board had ever tolerated.
“Quiet!” he thundered, loud enough to make a rampaging dragon reconsider its life choices. To be Speaker, you needed to be abrasive and boisterous enough to outshout a herd of stampeding elephants. Extra credit went to anyone who mistook stunned silence for praise. Gustavius was eminently qualified.
“Good! Now, to business.” He frowned and sorted through a leaning tower of paperwork. He leaned forward in his oversized chair. The high-backed seat could have swallowed a smaller man. But he, broad as a bear, dominated the space.
“One of our members…” He waved toward the cluster of elderly wizards around him. “Mage Runeicus is retiring—at the scandalously young age of sixty!” His cheeks flushed. His glare rivaled a basilisk’s.
“The secrets of the universe bore you now? You pledged yourself to mathematics! And you betray it!” said one wizard.
“Quiet! His health is failing. The bylaws won’t let us keep him.” Gustavius frowned. It implied he’d happily smash that rule to pieces.
He didn’t consider sickness a valid excuse for time off. Sleep was for the dead. Complete paralysis might earn you a few days off. Losing your voice? An afternoon.
“Bring in Brother Tolemy!” Gustavius thumped the desk. The oak doors creaked open, revealing a wiry, white-bearded wizard. Circles orbiting other circles patterned his robe. The wizards whistled and applauded as the wizard approached the dais.
“Brother Tolemy! Do you swear to follow the values of the Order of the Universal Mathematica?”
“Read the Values!” the men beside him intoned.
“Math is the root of all wisdom. Do you agree? Can it explain everything?” Gustavius leaned forward, radiating the zeal of an inquisitor.
“It does, though some fools still argue otherwise.” Tolemy nodded.
“Excellent. The universe is mathematics. Can you reduce it to numbers and equations? Is there one equation that encompasses all of magic? Do you believe in the Ultimate Equation of Everything?”
“Yes, mathematics explains everything—every law of physics and rule of reality,” Tolemy nodded.
“The Creator brought the universe into being by creating the Ultimate Equation. Right, brothers?” He gestured grandly, and the room erupted in applause.
“Only a fool would deny such self-evident wisdom.” Tolemy nodded impatiently.
Gustavius stood and unfurled a large scroll depicting a disk world on the back of four elephants standing atop a colossal space-faring turtle.
“Why show us this nonsense? The world is round!” a wizard booed.
“Silence!” Gustavius swept the room with a deadly glare.
“The Musings on the Chelonian Nature of the Cosmic Foundations?” Tolemy frowned in disbelief.
“Well?” Gustavius folded his arms.
“I think it is the incoherent rambling of the mad wizard Turtur.”
Gustavius raised a brow and unrolled more of the scroll. It depicted a stack of turtles holding up the first turtle.
“Yes, Turtur said every turtle rested on another, making an endless stack. Turtles all the way down.” Tolemy shrugged.
“But we know better. Correct?” asked Gustavius.
“Turtles all the way down! What utter nonsense! It is mathematics all the way down.” Tolemy nodded.
The wizards hollered wildly. “Good man!” one whistled. “Yes! It has to be!” said another. One icy glare from Gustavius ended the noise.
“What do you think of magic?”
“Pointless, as any sensible scholar would agree. We’re here to study the universe. And write boundless stacks of paper, we sit around arguing about.”
“Excellent! Do you swear to use magic only in the most dire emergency?”
“Yes, I rarely find it necessary.”
“And your thoughts on students?”
“They clutter the place and waste valuable research time! I’d ban them if I could.”
“A sensible idea for a university!” Gustavius said, glancing around. “Are you sure we cannot ban students?”
“Sir, there’s one problem,” the thin Librarian asked as his thin fingers fidgeted. He fidgeted with her fashionable blue silk robe.
“Oh yes. Who would pay the bills?” Gustavius nodded.
“Students are broke. That’s their defining feature. Most young men believe that once they have money, learning becomes unnecessary,” said the Librarian.
“Ridiculous! Study exists for its own sake,” growled Gustavius. “But their parents have money. Nobles enjoy our papers because they make them appear smart. They pay us well to help them maintain that illusion.”
He dropped the scroll and snatched up the next one. It showed apples falling and light bending through prisms.
“Oldton’s experimental foolishness?”
“A waste of time, sir.”
“Exactly! Why drop cannonballs from tall trees? Total misuse of time! You don’t learn about the universe by looking at it!”
“No, sir. Wisdom comes from pure mathematical contemplation,” Tolemy said, prompting cheers.
“Good. One more question, old man. What’s the point of mathematics?”
“To reveal the universe’s secrets. To discover the Ultimate Equation.”
“Ah, but some once claimed mathematics existed for practical purposes. Engineering—building bridges, turning lead into gold, that sort of thing.”
“Sir, nonsense. Math isn’t for that. Applied math is an abomination, and you know it.”
“Good man! I declare you the newest member of the Board!” Gustavius announced, arms flung wide as the wizards cheered.
“Brother Tolemy, will you read your latest papers later? We have already read several excellent papers covering hypergeometric theory, interdimensional banking, and multidimensional phase accounting. But your stellar model is revolutionary.”
“I would be happy to!” he grinned as he reached into his sleeves and pulled out reams of parchment.
“But first, a more pressing matter.” Gustavius shook his head. “A practical one…” He grimaced as if he’d swallowed slugs.
“Our coffers are nearly empty,” Gustavius said, scowling.
“What’s the issue?” shrugged the Treasurer. He was a large, bald man with a nervous hump and weary brown eyes.
“This place isn’t free to run! Money doesn’t appear by magic.” Gustavius slammed his fist on the desk.
“That would make my job easier.” The Treasurer frowned.
“We’re running out of money and will need to make cuts!” Gustavius scowled.
“Maybe we could cut back on chalk!” the Treasurer shrugged.
“We did, though it was a minute reduction in expenses. And we’ve already canceled dozens of classes. Cancel them all, and we lose the students — and the money.” Gustavius crossed his arms.
“What about donors? We could claim we need money for…whatever they did three thousand years ago.”
“Experiments? They built giant magnifying glasses and long tubes for smashing particles together. I cannot imagine why. Sounds like a frightful waste of money.” Gustavius shrugged.
“The donors know we don’t do experiments. They enjoy watching us argue. They love it when we pretend to understand our papers — but they’re growing bored.” The Treasurer sighed.
“I heard they want to understand the papers!” the Librarian shuddered.
“It’s crazy! The whole point of academia is to sit around arguing about things you don’t grasp! Why else would anyone get an advanced education? What can we do if they are becoming uninterested?” asked the Treasurer.
“Can’t imagine why. I think it is because they don’t understand the super-silly squiggle theory.”
“Nobody does. That is the point. But the problem is so confusing they can’t even pretend to.”
“What is so difficult? The universe comprises little squiggles in at least nine dimensions!”
“Ten dimensions, you third-rate fool!” screamed a wizard.
“Twelve and a half, you dimwit!” retorted another.
“Gentlemen, please! We need to do something about this. There are two choices. We cut back on luxuries, including books, scrolls, and meals.” Gustavius steered them back on topic.
“I would rather die!” shuddered the Librarian.
“You might need to do actual work. And that’s the problem — some of you may have to go.” Gustavus shrugged.
“We have tenure, and you cannot fire us!” the Librarian screeched.
“We can’t get actual jobs! No one needs vector calculus magic experts or people who take imaginary roots of hyperreal numbers.”
“We’ll starve if forced into practical work! I don’t know which end of a shovel goes down! None of us do!” The Treasurer shuddered.
“Yes! According to the bylaws, they cannot fire us. Not unless we cause a major loss of life or property damage, such as a widespread magical explosion that destroys half the city. Or if caught stealing another’s work without an attempt to bribe them. We must not be friendly toward pupils,” the Librarian stated.
“Or, as the bylaws say, ‘the university risks ceasing to function.’ That means some of you are getting off the academic gravy train.” Gustavius menaced.
“What should we do?!” the Librarian wrung his fingers.
“This is an outrage!” The Treasurer’s nose wobbled.
“Silence, you cacophonous fools!” Gustavus turned red.
“Not until you promise we will all keep our jobs!” A wizard leapt angrily to his feet.
“I cannot promise that. But let’s see what else we can cut.” The Treasurer shrugged wearily.
“What about student housing? Can’t we cram them into smaller rooms? Do they need to eat every day?”
“They won’t attend if they are homeless or more than half-starved. Perpetual hunger defines student life. We reconvene in one week. If anyone has a bright idea, present it then.” Gustavius frowned.
Wizards offering practical ideas was as probable as goldfish solving calculus. But he feared a riot if he pushed scrapping tenure.
“Alright men. Let’s get to happier matters. Tolemy…if you would?” He quirked an eyebrow.
“Oh, yes, of course.” Tolemy leapt to his feet to read his scroll.
“Why do I feel things are about to get crazy?” Gustavius settled into his chair, trying to ignore the knot in his stomach. Wizards rarely caused trouble because they focused too much on their own worlds.
Despite that, the phrase “famous last words” kept getting his attention, like a persistent priest always trying to sell their Guardtower magazine. It was probably nothing…
Outro
If you enjoyed this excrept, I hope you will read Misplaced Fools when it comes out! You will find out more about adventures/misdventures of Albie and Esmer. And we will meet more crazy wizards from the University of Esoterica. You should also stay tuned for when the rest of this story comes out.