Less than a week...
That's how long it took for Triss and Ian to learn our language and start to operate more or less fluently with terms, and all thanks to Ciri, who was able to teach Grobik the native language and he literally during the training explained to the girls what and what is called.
"So...what can I say..."
Ian sat on a chaise lounge and watched our group in full assembly, which I was able to accomplish by sending a group led by Sol to the site of the girls.
"...among you, only Becca and Panam have the gift of magic."
"Here we go."
Judy was clearly upset.
"...and I'm already dreaming of fireballs and teleporters..."
"Don't be upset, magic is in all sentient beings, but when Ian spoke of a gift, he meant a certain threshold from which it made sense to teach classical magic. The kind of magic she and I have, but there's another school of magic, Witchcraft."
"Is this about the signs?"
Ciri looked at Triss with interest.
"Yes. Ian and I have studied this in our time and I can tell you that the sigils are the same spells, only reworked by mages so that the altered minds with far less magical potential can fend for themselves. After all, when witches were created monsters around the world were much more numerous, so they tried to strengthen them ..."
"Yep, and then destroyed..."
Ian only shrugged at these words from Ciri.
"...the need for them no longer, well, so think people and kings, in this matter, they are surprisingly hard-headed and believe that if their squad can kill a couple of drowning, as well as if the service as an advisor there is a magician, then witches are no longer needed.
"Uh-huh...
Ciri was the most acerbic.
"...that mages are running around the world saving people and killing monsters..."
"And that's the other side of the question... training a wizard is much more difficult and expensive than training a witch."
Ciri snorted.
"Tsiri don't snort, you know that Ian and I look at many issues differently, but in this matter I agree with her. Just let's calculate on the training of a witch requires about fifteen years, training begins in four or five years, in ten are mutations after which again training, but already significantly strengthened and profile. In fact, the only thing you have to pay for here is mutagens, but their... now I'll tell you a terrible secret, any magician can make them."
"What?!"
"Yes, Ciri, Triss is right, except that she doesn't specify that at first they will be much inferior to those perfect mutagens that were used on Geralt, so the total body enhancement will be forty percent less, but the mortality rate will be much lower. And you'll need to add nutrition to the cost of training. That's basically it. The rest of the costs will go when the witch needs to be released into the world and he instead of an unsharpened ogolok should be given armor and two swords."
"On the other hand, to train a wizard requires a huge amount of expensive ingredients, and no, these are not the ingredients from which witches brew their compositions, those are mostly publicly available, but at the same time toxic, they can be collected in any forest, but then the witch will have to drink detox and lie in bed for 24 hours, but otherwise it will not affect him. But the mage to achieve results, not having the same strong body, must use much more rare herbs ... Think about nutrition, the bodies of monsters and humans, which are also needed for training, the search for places saturated with magic, in which, among other things, there are monsters that need to get rid of ... And the training itself is at least twenty years ..."
"Uh... So witches are just a mass-produced commodity to be prepared for slaughter?
At my question, Ian wrinkled her nose slightly, but nodded.
"Crude, but true. The more so that a magician with no training can do nothing, and the same witch doctor, who had not undergone mutation, would at least kill the drownings. So some of the students could be initially released into the world at the age of fifteen, without mutations, which increased mortality during the execution of orders, but people were saved much more simply due to the fact that the witches around the world was a lot, and the bulk of the problem is still monsters against which enough ordinary trained warriors, for which it is enough to know their habits."
"But in any case, a hundred years from now, the institute of witches will have to be revived again."
"А?"
Ciri stared with shock at Triss, who picked up the story behind her friend.
"Why are you so surprised?"
Triss shrugged.
"Vaughn, judging by the look on your friend's face, he understands the reason, and you, too, if you paid more attention to theory, would understand why it should be done. You can understand, you just don't have enough data yet."
The girl looked at me.
"Why don't you explain it to me?"
"A law of nature..."
I shrugged.
"...when one niche species disappears, another will take its place. It's rough and not quite right, but it gets the point right. To put it simply, there used to be monsters, they were the most terrible predators and people were afraid of them, to fight them created witches and over time it was they killed most of the monsters, and then witches almost destroyed ..."
Ciri's eyes widened with shock.
"Witches are almost gone and monsters are starting to breed again. To kill all of them was in principle unrealistic, because many live in areas inaccessible even to the witcher, there only by air or portal can be reached, but mages on such enclaves of monsters, as a rule, do not care..."
"Exactly..."
Ian picked up after the silenced Ciri.
"...but these enclaves have a limit to what they can feed, and periodically monsters spill out of them. And with the fact that there are almost no witches now, they just scattered around the world and do not really attack people so far as the usual food they have enough ..."
"But time will pass and all the territories will be divided, and they will eat something to eat and again there will be mass attacks on villages, and not drowning, this good and now enough, but dangerous monsters and then people will again think about creating witches."
"So..."
I interrupted Triss, who wanted to continue her lecture to Ciri.
"...So you can teach us these witch signs and we can use them in battle?"
"Yeah... Although we don't know everything, as you realize, we do have four signs in our arsenal..."
That's what Ian told me.
"And what kind of signs are they? What can they do?"
"Axius - temporary mind control, Igni - fire jet from the fingers, Kwen - protection that does not allow to inflict a level on the one who applied this sign, Aard - actually an air push, and Sonm - a sign that makes the target fall asleep.
"Signs for all occasions..."
I nodded thoughtfully, recognizing the usefulness of these signs.
"Exactly."
Triss nodded proudly, confirming that she, too, possessed the signs.
"Are you familiar with these signs because you had an affair with one witch and just couldn't help but pick up different things from him?"
Odeh's girls turned up their noses a little. I didn't dare to go further and hint at the possibility of gaining not only knowledge, but also diseases. After all, they were wizards and could take care of themselves on that side of the issue.
"I don't understand, even from your stories and Ciri's stories I realized that Geralt is a walker... how did you manage to build a relationship with him?"
"What about you?"
Yen curved her lips in a sarcastic sneer.
"Oh, don't..."
I shook my head.
"...my relationships are built on mutual trust and love. My girls know that I don't need anyone but them, and if I want to scratch my dick while I'm in town, at some distance from them, I won't run to prostitutes or seduce another girl."
"Well, well, well..."
Tris decided to back up Yen's disbelief and nodded at my words.
"Well...actually, I've never seen David go to the side..."
"And that didn't happen..."
Panam shrugged her shoulders.
"...Yeah, he's got a harem, so it took us a while to get used to each other, but neither of us were really opposed to expanding the family..."
"You're strange. we Wizards are used to being possessive... the only ones with our men, the only ones in their lives, and because of that."
"And that's why you put up with all of Geralt's infidelities?"
"Well..."
Triss looked slightly embarrassed and looked away.
"It's me and Ian's thing. The others wouldn't stand for it and the best he could do would be a couple of nights and a breakup."
"Hmm. I mean, Ian I can understand."
I looked at the girl with black hair, who frowned momentarily and glanced at Ciri.
"Someone has a very long tongue..."
"You're wrong..."
I shook my head.
"Hmm?"
"She didn't say anything, just that when we were discussing how she could be bound to the elves she mentioned the Genii, that making a wish for them would do it, and when you first showed up at the junkyard we could hear you talking. So..."
I shrugged.
"I'm sorry."
Ian looked at Ciri with guilt in her eyes...
"Forget it... let's get back to discussing business..."
Ta didn't hold a grudge against her and just brushed off her ... foster mom?