All Chapters of Rise of the Sciencemancer: Chapter 31
- Chapter 40
75 chapters
Ch. 31 The Effects of Raw Seafood on the Human Body
When George got back to Nereia’s estate, he was too wound up to sleep. He’d already missed dinner there, but he wouldn’t have been hungry anyway. Not only was he full of the raw seafood with which Sirena had stuffed him, but his stomach was terribly upset. He remembered learning sometime in his life that fish should always be cooked. Now he knew why. He was no sea elf. He was a human, a terakva. But he knew that Sirena didn’t care. She wanted to kiss him. And how she kissed! That blissful thought almost made George feel better, but his stomach lurched.He would never get inside Nereia’s mansion in time to use the privy in there. Fortunately, the Oracle’s palatial house was surrounded by a private garden, a garden that actually grew plants from the surface world, which must seem like the pinnacle of exotic displays down here. It reminded him of the Melindra’s family’s garden back in Sutter’s Village, where he had broken up with her, but on a much grander scale. There were all sorts of
Last Updated : 2025-05-15
Ch. 32 Floor 118
The two of them were alone. It was a couple of hours into the Period of Family. Young singles, such as George and Sirena, often socialized with others their own age or dated during this time. It wasn’t that they didn’t still feel connected to their families. The sea elf culture, by and large, was very family-centered. However, this was an age and a time of life when young people were exploring ideas of forging their own paths and finding their place in society. George shifted on the soft bench that Sirena called a “sofa” or a “couch”. They were in a lounge near the very top of one of Wonderdome’s skyscraper buildings. The lights were out in the lounge. The illumination came from outside the transparent walls of this lounge level. The view was beautiful and breathtaking. They often cuddled alone up here at the top of the skyscraper, on floor 118 of 120. It was their own secret lovers’ rendezvous. These top dozen floors or so were nearly empty. They contained huge apartments, larger t
Last Updated : 2025-05-15
Ch. 33 The Three Steps to Success in Magic
“The big day is finally here, George! Are you ready?” “I sure am. We’re going to kick some butt.” George lay on his bed in his room at Nereia’s house speaking by video conference with Fin, one of his classmates. Fin and George had become synonymous with each other at the Sea Elf Science Academy, much like George and James had been at the Sutter’s Village primary magic school. One hardly ever saw them separately. George remembered his musings on Floor 118 with Sirena about the sameness of each day that passed in Wonderdome. It turned out that the sea elves actually did have holidays, and a week long one had finally arrived. This time, score one for magic, George thought. Science never produced any holidays. The week long Barolias Festival was dedicated to the sea elf god of magic, who was, probably not by coincidence, the same as the god of magic recognized by the Society of Sorcerers Born. His following was a little different down here, though. There were obvious visual represent
Last Updated : 2025-05-16
Ch. 34 Team Maverick
The gladiatorial arena was an emptied public pool of colossal proportions. When it wasn't Barolias Festival Week, the pool functioned as an underwater park. When the Period of Work was over for a regular non-holiday day, families would come, the adults socializing with other adults and the children getting their necessary daily time in the water for the development of their maturing gill systems. Throughout the pool, there were rings, obstacle courses, and other swimming challenges. These items were dry today and had even been incorporated into the gladiatorial arena as obstacles to make the warrior robots’ field of combat more interesting. George could hardly believe the difference in noise between a normal day in Wonderdome and the cacophonous level of sound in almost every neighborhood that day. The streets were decorated in honor of Barolias Festival Week, in his gold and red colors, and adorned everywhere with magical symbols, mostly positive ones related to protecting, shapech
Last Updated : 2025-05-16
Ch. 35 Team Kraken Goes Down
The MC for the event was none other than Prime Minister Moray himself. “Ladies and gentle-elves,” began, using a device George had learned, early on in his days in Misty’s children’s class, was called a microphone to cast his voice so that all could hear. “We begin this Barolias Festival Week with our Robot Gladiator Challenge. The order the contestants will fight has been randomly selected. Our opening match of the day will be between our reigning champions four years in a row, Team Kraken, and relative newcomers, Team Nautilus. Both of these robot designs are tentacle-based folks, so this could become a tangled up mess. We’ll see, won’t we?” Both Teams stepped out into the arena, both the bot champions and the designers, receiving the adulation of the crowd. Once the match was ready to start in earnest, the designers would step back and leave the bots alone on the field to begin their fight. Team Kraken was clearly a fan favorite, probably THE fan favorite with four consecutive year
Last Updated : 2025-05-16
Ch. 36 Blue Blood
“Sirena, you’re bleeding!” George grabbed Sirena’s hand, which was suddenly very cold, colder than he’d ever felt it. He wrapped her hand in his own tunic and applied firm pressure to it. Wonderdome had a constant, comfortable temperature, so most sea elves went nearly nude, but George, as a human, was habituated to wear full clothing. Her blue, kraken-like blood stained his shirt. “You’re bleeding blue, not red,” he said in a kind of dazed shock. Sirena didn’t seem concerned that she was bleeding profusely. She seemed more concerned with soothing George’s agitation. “I have a rare genetic mutation, George. It makes my blood blue. It’s my mutation that first got me interested in genetics. My whole family has it.” “Really?” “Really. One day, I’ll introduce you to my family, George. One day, we’ll go visit them beyond Wonderdome.” Sirena and George had been dating enough months that George had, of course, heard her life background story, just as he had told her his. Sirena was not
Last Updated : 2025-05-16
Ch. 37 Eldritch Revelations
It took forty-eight hours for Wonderdome officials to declare the Pool of Barolias to be safe for the public to return and for it to be completely decontaminated. No chances were taken, no shortcuts used. After all, in its normal operation on a day-to-day basis, when it wasn’t Barolias Festival Week, children played there.Team Maverick sat around their workshop reading excerpts from articles they were finding on their learning pads to each other as they pieced together what would happen to this year’s Robot Gladiator Contest. Surely, it wouldn’t be cancelled, only postponed.Maverick sat in a powered down mode in a corner of the workshop, recharging his power core. Other bot warriors of more established teams with bigger budgets had their own self-powering cores, containing reactors that would generate power for years or decades. Such things were for Team Maverick, however, beyond their present financial means, and so Maverick himself sat and recharged for hours daily.Also present we
Last Updated : 2025-05-16
Ch. 38 Change Comes
Walking through Nereia’s garden on the way to her house, and his bedroom, George once gain heard the voices of his millenarian mentor and his pocket-sized draconic one as the two of them hung out in one of the many beautiful spots of the garden, not the gazebo this time, but a small ring of life-sized statues of female elves. “Here he is,” Nereia said. “Did your future sight tell you I was coming or was it the sharp ears of a blind woman?” George asked. “Both, actually.” She smiled as she replied. “Aren’t these statues cool, George? They’re of Ner’s sisters.” Starstorm said excitedly. “Ner?” George thought the two of his mentors had become close but he had no idea there were cutesy nicknames between them. Nereia began speaking dreamily, as if she could see the past in a fully immersive vision just as immersive as her prophetic visions of the future. “I had six sisters, George. I was the eldest and I’m still here. I watched each of them pass.” “They were all oracles, too!” Starst
Last Updated : 2025-05-17
Ch. 39 The Priestess of Barolias
“I can’t save him. I’m sorry,” said Dr. Sargasso somberly. “We should call for a priest of Barolias.” “One is already coming,” said Nereia’s bodyguard. Dr. Sargasso rolled up the sleeves of his doctor’s coat and adjusted its collar. “Then, I shall endeavor to keep him with us until the priest arrives.”George stood with several others from Stingray’s family and Nereia’s household, as Stingray hovered near death. He’d lost too much blood, according to the doctor. He was beyond the reach of science to recover. Only magic could help him now. Score one for magic, George thought bitterly.Priests, commonly exemplified by clerics or druids, had the most effective healing magic, much moreso than wizards or mages. Priests experienced a connection to their deity or deities and channeled that power rather than being born with the Gifting of Magic. Giving or taking life seemed to be much more the province of the gods from whom priests derived their spells than of mortals.It wasn’t that wizar
Last Updated : 2025-05-17
Ch. 40 Headed for the Basement
As George settled into his bed, his learning pad on his bed’s end table lit up and beeped. George saw Sirena’s name flashing on the screen. He had totally forgotten that she had wanted to see him that night, for their first time to be together since she’d been working round the clock at the Genetics Institute to learn about the eldritch tissues extracted from the Kraken bot. He picked up the pad and swiped it to accept the video call. “Hey, George, where are you? I’ve been waiting for you.” George could see Floor 118 in the background. He looked at the time in the lower right corner of the learning pad’s screen. She’d been waiting for thirty minutes. George quickly filled her in on what had happened with Stingray, his hunting party, and the shark people. Sirena listened attentively, but when he wound down his story he was a little taken aback by her attitude. The events of his evening and their implications for the future safety of residents of Wonderdome didn’t seem to impact her
Last Updated : 2025-05-17