Elminster was old, often lost in reveries of vanished friends and ruined places.
The ghost called "Yesterday" haunted even the mightiest wizards.
He'd long stopped adventuring himself, so for years in Shadowdale, he welcomed countless adventurers.
He listened to their tales, gifted them rare items, and watched them set off again, promising to return.
Most never did.
Adventuring was a deadly trade.
So, the old sage turned to planeswalkers, their tales of other worlds far more captivating.
A rusty construct planeswalker told him of a machine-only world, fighting daily for parts and power.
A barbarian planeswalker, barely verbal, communicated via sand sketches, sharing apple pie with Elminster.
Not all planeswalkers were friendly. Some tried robbing him, but his magic flowed like instinct, thrashing them before ejecting them from the crystal sphere with a warning never to return to Faerûn.
Why did Elminster know so much about planeswalkers? How had he met so many?
That's why he was Shadowdale's sage, not just its archmage.
His long life was a gift of time, a legendary tale spanning gods and mortals, too vast for days of storytelling.
Now, he sat with two new planeswalkers, listening to a warrior's exploits.
Perhaps an old tale: ordinary folk in a dungeon, facing powerful undead without a cleric.
A string of adventures, stumbling into undead at every turn.
"Thrilling story. Your world's crawling with undead? Life must be tough," Elminster said, stroking his beard. The sunlight had shifted, bathing Shadowdale in warmth. He loved it here.
He looked at Su Ming with sympathy.
"Not bad. Guns and cannons make undead easy," Su Ming said, perched on the windowsill, watching Elminster's micro-expressions for hidden motives.
But the old sage seemed genuinely absorbed.
He frowned at tense moments, beamed at triumphs, and grinned like he'd won the treasure himself when Su Ming's tale ended in riches.
Elminster was a stellar listener, making the exchange a pleasure.
Still, Su Ming only confirmed the sage had no ulterior motives. The goddess of magic behind him? Less certain.
Smiling, Su Ming showed Elminster another pistol. "Some dwarven smiths craft firearms, but they're bulkier, cruder."
Elminster knew guns. His nimble fingers and sharp mind quickly found the safety, firing at something in the room.
His servant scrambled upstairs, cowering at the landing. "My lord, no more dangerous experiments!"
"It's fine. Just testing a new toy," Elminster said, inspecting the magazine. "Clever. Integrated powder and shot. Genius."
Su Ming grinned, sipping his bottle. "Want to hear my companion's story? Her world just faced an evil planeswalker invasion."
Elminster's face grew serious. He returned the gun, sat up, tapped his pipe on his knee, lips pursed, beard twitching with displeasure.
"Fair lady, tell me in detail. By magic itself, if I can help, I will," he said to Ciri, casting Comprehend Languages and Glibness to communicate.
Divination magic was arcane—ten minutes of understanding alien tongues, then forgetting. Unexplainable.
Ciri glanced at Su Ming. At his nod, she recounted her tale—fleeing through endless worlds—from another angle.
Elminster's expression stayed grim. If Su Ming's story was mere adventure, Ciri's involved a world's fate.
A rogue planeswalker cabal could threaten Faerûn.
Ciri kept it brief: the invasion's cause, events, and her world's victory.
Elminster focused on the Wild Hunt's travel method. "Naglfar, a ship of dead men's nails… I've seen something like it. Not nails—everyone's got those. A spelljammer, a ship crossing crystal spheres. One reached Waterdeep's coast once."
Su Ming's mind sparked. Spelljammers were a world-crossing method, but not Faerûn's specialty—more a derived rule.
Elminster drifted into memory, recalling a green ship with translucent, insect-wing sails he'd seen as a young man off Waterdeep.
Aboard were an ordinary mage and odd adventurers.
They didn't linger, just fished, then vanished in a green magical glow.
Elminster, watching from a cliff, saw they avoided contact with this world.
He studied crystal spheres for a time, but the cosmos' infinite knowledge outstripped a mortal life.
Unless he turned lich, chasing it was futile.
Still, spelljammers intrigued him. He'd love one.
He scoured Netherese ruins for records, as they'd mastered floating cities—close to sphere travel.
But that step was a chasm. The Mythal couldn't bridge it, and Elminster didn't know how Faerûn's magic could.
He needed to board a spelljammer to study it.
"Master?" Ciri, arms crossed, looked exasperated. She'd finished, but he was lost in thought.
"Sorry, lass. Old men wander in memory," Elminster said, unembarrassed, changing topics. "Your friend knows spelljammers but not how to build one, right?"
Su Ming did know spelljammers, always seeking ways to cross worlds with people or cargo.
He knew his and Ciri's world-walking marked them as planeswalkers—default legendary, near-divine in this setting.
Gods? He'd seen plenty.
He "bought land" across worlds but didn't play cards. Planeswalkers' power-drawing wasn't his goal.
"I'm into spelljammers, but like you said, I don't know how to make one. Look at me—a brainless warrior," Su Ming said, gesturing to his heavy armor and massive sword.
Elminster coughed, maybe on smoke. Warrior, yes—legendary, even. Brainless? No planeswalker survived without wits.
The sage patted his chest, admiring Su Ming's bold-faced lie, reminiscent of his own youth. "I'm sorry for the lady's world, but I can't help much. I'm no planeswalker."
He glanced at the blue bird outside, lingering on a branch, then continued. "Others in Faerûn study spheres. The drow academies in the Underdark, Thay's lords, even Netherese liches, might have insights."
"If I find a spelljammer's blueprint and materials, you'd venture out?" Su Ming raised a brow.
Elminster mused. "I love adventure. Young, I roamed the continent, abyss, and hells. I'd see beyond the sphere—to view our world from outside."
Su Ming rubbed his chin, handing him a cigar. "I can answer that now. It looks like a dragon's eyeball."
At the school gate, Su Ming met Ciri, showing her the campus. Only days had passed since he left.
In Faerûn, he'd chatted with Elminster, learning useful bits, like dragon ecology.
The real prize was Elminster's gifts: a large bag of holding and magic items.
Faerûn specialties—scrolls and charged wands, usable without the Weave.
Back home, Su Ming gifted them to Ancient One.
She was thrilled, loving unknown knowledge, though the alien runes and energy flows puzzled her.
That made them worth studying.
Watching Ancient One munch spicy strips while analyzing a Knock scroll, Su Ming felt he was breaking Marvel.
As long as she didn't build a Weave, he'd let her be.
Ciri had tested the saddlebag in the Witcher world. Sadly, cross-world storage failed.
But Elminster's bag worked in Marvel and DC, making Su Ming's storytelling worthwhile.
The sage seemed to nudge him toward Faerûn adventures, tempting him with spelljammer knowledge and hinting at help building one.
For now, Su Ming had no interest in mage councils or liches. He had crops to tend.