So it is done

Prevention is better than the cure

Jonathan slowly breathed in the cool night air, then swayed his legs in the air, looking down at the ground at the city below, at Mantle. How much distance from here to the ground, he wonders? A mile, maybe even two. It would be a long trip to the ground...

Jonathan exhaled and rubbed his face with his hands. Whiskey, of course, was a good punch in the head, but Jonathan remembered what the old man had once said to him.

Don't go to bed drunk if you want to wake up alive...

Jonathan wasn't quite sure what the old man meant when he said it - but just in case he followed the advice. The old man never advised him anything stupid...

The Old man, ha... The old man knew what he was talking about...

Jonathan rubbed his face again, then yawned slowly. Even after such a shake-up, he wanted to sleep, now he really would like to go to the dorms, to his bed...

Everything in the world has ceased to have any meaning. It's just... It all happened so stupidly and so suddenly. It shouldn't be that way, life should develop in its own slow way.

Thousands of others like him have gone through this. They first studied, they passed, then they were introduced to the council. After they received their well-deserved title they would become a free agent of the Order. They had their old contacts, teachers, acquaintances, friends... All their damn society, the whole damn Orders to help them slowly gain experience.

They would gradually grow and develop, becoming better and better magicians. In the beginning, when they don't know their heads from their asses, they would run to their teachers for advice. For their first few months the student remained only formally independent and would ask their teacher for advice on anything they do.

Then, gradually, they grew, developed, received knowledge not in theory, but in practice - gradually, slowly, they became truly independent. Just a couple of years - and the new magician became not only formally, but also really self-sufficient while still having connections with his teachers, with his colleagues. Someone could help and explain his questions.

Man is a social being, all people want a society similar to themselves. The Order of Hermes was imbued with politics, connections, services for this very reason. Because the Order was one of the most united of traditions. And although within the Order a bani Quaesitor may have hated a bani Veriditas, who once stole his girlfriend from him, when they faced problems, the Order would throw back their enmity and help each other.

For only a short while and not always, but usually it happened that way.

And so for everything that supported him to be thrown away so suddenly...

Jonathan wasn't stupid. He did not consider himself a stupid person and did not hear anyone ever call him a stupid person. Therefore, he understood that even the old man had few chances to get out of that... Stuff. Most likely, he's already dead.

Jonathan was smart enough to understand this, but... It didn't mean that he was ready to accept it so easily.

Damn old man, ha... He was his father - not only a foster father, but a real one. And suddenly, just like that, with a snap of the fingers, Jonathan had lost him. Lost all of his instructions, advice... Ironically, he walked along the Umbral path - and unexpectedly he had lost both his real and his metaphysical path.

It was just so unexpected, so stupid and so accidental...

And so, rather than being on a mission assigned to him by the Order or the old man he was free to do whatever he wanted. He was no longer in the Academy where there are guidelines on what to do and what not to do, he was simply 'living'. In life, where there was no correct answer to the 'task' assigned to him. In life, where he could choose any option, and no one could tell him otherwise. If he chose the 'wrong' option, he would not be given a low grade, the wise teacher would not have shaken his head in disappointment and he would not have been sent to additional classes. Jonathan could choose to do whatever he wants, there is no 'wrong' or 'right' answer, only action and consequences.