Eli Grayson used to be a relatively normal man. He lived in suburban Toronto and owned his own business building AI applications for a living. During one of his morning runs he saw a man breaking into a house and attacking its inhabitants. He intervened, putting his years of martial arts training to use to stop the man.
That act caused Eli’s world view to come crashing down. The man revealed that he wasn’t a man at all - he was a satyr, or a half-man, half-goat demon hybrid – and an assassin. As they fought, Eli’s latent magical powers awakened and he had a vision of a mysterious being named ‘Athena’, who informed him that he was something called ‘Royal Blooded’. He ended up eking out a victory against the satyr by blasting golden beams of pure magic through the satyr’s throat. Afterwards, he was nursed back to health by the 3 attractive inhabitants of the house – a high elf princess named Aria Hightower, and her handmaidens: a coldheart phoenix named Freya, and a dryad named Lilliflora (or Lilly for short).
Whether due to his heroism or natural physical attraction, the 3 women took a liking to him and introduced him to the hidden world of magic and magical creatures. He quickly learned about mana, a mysterious energy which was absent from Earth but present in every other realm. It had several fantastical properties, including mutating magical beings to have longer lifespans and changing the ratio of women to men to about 6:1 – causing polygyny to be the norm. The fact that Earth had no naturally occurring mana meant that most humans couldn’t hold it in their bodies, which left them unable to cast spells.
Eli was different though – as a ‘Royal Blooded human’, a quirk in his DNA meant that he had mutated the ability to absorb mana from others, whether it was in the form of a spell or an enchanted item. He wasn’t immune to magic per se, but his mana absorption ability meant that he was far more durable against magical spells than most. He could also learn spells across any of the various types or ‘schools’ of magic much faster than others, mastering in months what normally took others years or even decades. All told, a fully awakened Royal Blood was a force to be reckoned with, and several of the most prominent humans in history had secretly been Royal Bloods.
His awakening immediately made him a threat to the larger magical community. Aria confronted him with the fact that the ruling magical council would likely want to execute or enslave him to keep him from telling other humans that magic existed. She told him about how the council believed that humans were xenophobic and terrified of anyone different from them. Magic users certainly fell under that category, and if humans knew about magic they’d hunt down and exterminate every magic user they could find. While it was difficult to imagine a lone regular human standing against a spellcaster or a magical being, regular humans greatly outnumbered magic users and their ever-advancing weapons technology would more than make up the difference in a fight. In an all-out war, the magical community would be gradually destroyed.
For that reason, the council zealously defended the secret of magic. While they wouldn’t learn of Eli’s awakening immediately, eventually one of their magical wards would detect him and they would come for him. A fully awakened Royal Blood would give them pause and be able to demand better options, but with his nascent abilities he was nowhere near powerful enough to resist them.
As a show of appreciation for saving her life Aria invoked an ancient elven tradition, claiming Eli as her ‘fiancé’ to justify taking him through a magical portal back to the elven realm to hide – at least until he could control his magic well enough to stand up to the council and demand a 3rd option. While the move shielded him from the council, it embroiled him in elven politics of her home nation of Eyilean. A particularly virulent anti-human faction led by Aria’s brother Anar seemed determined to force him out, making him as uncomfortable as they could at every turn. He learned that Anar’s hatred of humans had been encouraged by Princess Icitra, a member of the royal family of the rival elven state of Avallonè.
Despite setbacks, he integrated himself into elven society – learning their language and customs. He practiced magic with Talaedra, a wizened wood elf woman who had served the Hightower family for centuries. He won over Aria’s father - King Faelor Hightower - and his 3 wives by helping link the satyr assassin which came after Aria back to the numbered bank account which paid him.
In between training, learning, and investigating he found time to enter an elven martial arts tournament called the Verinthas. He quickly became a minor celebrity after defeating a powerful female orc warrior named Naz and a female desert elf named Zebeyana bint al-Ramil. During the tournament, Zebayana – or Zee, as she preferred to be called – shared with him that she worked for the Avallonè royal family as a double agent embedded with the CIA, passing human secrets back to the elves. She also revealed that Anar had tried to pay her to kill him during their fight, but she’d refused. Before they could confront Anar with the accusations though, he disappeared. Eli ended up defeating Zee in the final round of the Verinthas and was given an enchanted ring as a reward which he could use as a sort of ‘mana battery’ to replenish his mana supply.
Meanwhile, Eli’s ‘engagement’ to Aria blossomed into a real relationship. To both of their surprise, after the two of them had sex for the first time Eli gained access to her spatial magic, giving him control over gravity – something that eluded him during his magic lessons. Their bonding also gave Eli the ability to assume the form of a high elf. Not only that, it increased Aria’s power, allowing her to master new spells at an accelerated rate as well as empowering her existing repertoire of spells.
After their first night together, Aria’s duties as a member of the royal family called her away to negotiate a trade deal with the leaders of Coldwater, a city of magic users which was concealed on a floating iceberg in the arctic ocean on Earth. Eli accompanied her, along with Naz, Lilly, and Freya – the former of which Aria had hired as a bodyguard, and the latter of which was born and raised in Coldwater. During the journey, Aria encouraged Eli to take the other women as his girlfriends and form a harem – something which she revealed each of the other women were interested in.
She overcame his initial hesitance to the idea by reassuring him that given the gender disparity, it was normal for male magic users to have multiple female partners. On their last night in Coldwater Eli kissed Freya, but they were interrupted before they could do anything else. Aria was brazenly attacked by human assassins and was only saved by the quick thinking and decisive actions of Freya and Eli – albeit at the cost of one of Freya’s sisters lives. In the aftermath of the attack, Freya decided to stay behind in Coldwater and mourn her sisters passing with the rest of her family while she helped to rebuild the city.
Returning to Eyilean, Eli was confronted by the fact that while his plan had been successful in saving both Aria and Coldwater, it had also cost Freya’s sister her life. Aria comforts him, recommending that he speak to Lilly, who she reveals studied as a psychologist. The two of them confess their love, and Eli resolves to redouble his efforts to learn magic so that he can protect the people he cares about. Those lessons are put to the test several weeks later when a group of humans with guns attack the palace, almost succeeding in killing Aria before they’re stopped by Naz – who Eli rewards with a kiss.
Together with King Faelor and Queens Selendis, Morathi, and Aurora, Eli and Aria link the human attacks to the satyr’s assassination attempt. Eli and Zee trace the numbered bank account back to a human corporation, and infiltrate its offices. There, they discover that Anar has been using a powerful magical artifact to mind control homeless humans, sending them through a portal as disposable shock troops against his enemies.
They retreat to Eyilean, finding that Anar had used his mind-controlled troops to enact a coup in Avallonè, killing the royal family and installing a power hungry Icitra as the new queen while framing humans for the entire affair. Together with Aria, Lilly, Naz, and Zee, Eli infiltrates Avallonè’s castle and kills Anar, stealing the artifact and showing the populace the truth. Icitra is maimed and deposed as queen, but Eli spares her life out of mercy.
On their return, Aria’s father and mothers accept Eli’s actions as necessary and embrace him as family. He has a therapy session with Lilly, after which the two of them have sex.
İ was reading your other story just now.
Welcome to this one! Synthesis wraps up today, and I’ll be posting on this one for the next few months.
Why was Icitra spared? Don't remember what happened in-story. She sounds like a genocidal maniac in the summary.