Tales of Arboris

Pairing : Woohyun (Infinite) x Hyunmi
Genre : High Fantasy
Words : 13693
Written By : taemeilin_
 

“JANG HYUN MI!”

Some glassware may have been injured in the making of this moment as a sharp voice, that effortlessly pierced through the wooden structure of the inn and rang in one’s eardrums like a deafening spell, reverberated across the halls. It was a sound that was all too familiar to the target of the call. She’d done it again. The brunette fanned a hand in front of her face in an attempt to reduce the horrific stench her failure had caused. She truly didn’t know why she thought that the two hundred and eighty-third time would be the charm.

Who is this mad scientist setting off stink bombs at inns? Well, she isn’t a scientist at all. Let us get acquainted with our heroine, - or should I say, our heroine in the making - Jang Hyun Mi, a youngin with a dream to become a revered mage throughout the Kingdom of Imperium. She personally liked to refer to herself as a self-apprenticing mage, but experts would classify her as an amateur and the townspeople have coined her the Skunk Mage. Not the most glorifying title, but at least they called her a mage? Anyway, that was the least of her worries.

It was the growing sound of thudding footsteps on the stairs outside her room which sent her into a frenzy. 

‘Time to flee’.

Hyun Mi opened the closest window allowing a small gust of the warm summer day’s breeze to flow into the room. There wasn’t a moment of hesitation as she climbed onto the window sill, and after a sharp breath in, she jumped. Thankfully, her room was on the ground floor. She was not capable of a flight spell yet and she was starting to question if she would ever be.

The sound of the door to her quarters flying open and hitting the wall made her head reflexively turn. It didn’t surprise her that she was greeted by the sight of an innkeeper who was clearly fuming, but she wasn’t stalled for long as her legs knew better and made a dash for the woods. She took the first corner and ran through the streets of Alica, the little town she began calling home after getting kicked out of her actual house.

Her family didn’t hate her or anything but they wouldn’t let her practice magic at home, reason being her practice always ended up in minor explosions and the horrifying stench that followed. Hyun Mi aspired to be a Conjurer, someone who could conjure objects using magic. Conjuring was a specialisation that many found hard to master because the vast majority of mages were born naturally inclined to excel in other areas of magic. 

Also, apprentice mages usually had teachers but being self-taught, Hyun Mi’s progress was significantly slower. If she were being honest though, the scrooge in her just wanted to conjure things so she didn't have to spend money buying them. It must run in the family since her parents didn’t want to send her to a magic academy so they could save the money.

As she bolted past the townspeople, they grimaced and instinctively brought their hands up to their noses to block the wafting odour that still lingered on the aspiring mage’s petite body. If there was one thing she was certainly succeeding at, it was living up to her nickname. Among the gags of disgust, she could hear the fading voice of the innkeeper who was having a hard time keeping up.

The further she ran, the more distant the shrill voice became until it was finally gone. When she felt the coast was clear, Hyun Mi slowed down to a stop, resting her hands on her knees as she caught her breath. She looked up at the familiar path with a smile and straightened her posture. With a cheeky grin on her face and a skip in her step, she frolicked past the warning signs, and into her safe place.

ARBORIS FOREST
(BEWARE OF SIPHONERS!)

The sound of wooden chairs being pulled up and books landing on the table filled the room as fifty tiny tots found their seats in class on their first day of school. Yes, you are still reading the same story, but class is about to be in session so listen up.

As the teacher stepped in through the door the students greeted her in a chorus, “Good day, Miss Maerin!”

“Good day class. Today we are going to learn about general spells and specialisations so you best pay attention because you’re going to want to learn what is unique to each class before you find out what your speciality is going to be.”

All the children looked at each other with expressions of pure joy, they were on their way to becoming mages!

“I’m sure most of you already know that flight, speed alteration, and essence concealment are the 3 general spells that every mage learns while apprenticing. Flight and speed alteration spells go hand in hand while essence concealment exists to protect mages from creatures that want to steal our essence. We conceal it so that they cannot track us down, that is why it is such an important skill to have.”

Upon hearing such grim statements about essence thieving entities, the children seemed ever so slightly terrified. One even dared ask, “What creatures are those?”

Maerin’s brows met in a furrow as she brought a hand to her chin as she hummed in thought, “I was told to lie for your sanity, but for your safety, you should know that Siphoners exist and they lurk in Arboris. They prey on mages and feed on their essence. A mage’s essence is made up of cultivated magic and parts of their soul, so if you lose all your essence, you become a soulless shell.”

A few of the children burst out crying, just as the instructor expected. She sighed at her forgetfulness, it always got past her to give them the disclaimers before dropping the bomb, “Magic Academy of Great Elders has a ward against Siphoners and we reinforce essence concealment before cultivation so they won’t sense you or come after you.”

With that the children calmed down, only light sniffles to be heard.

“Now, can anyone tell me how many mage classes there are?”

“Five!” One of the little girls piped up.

“Very good. There are five speciality classes - Battlemages, Nature Necromancers,  Sky Sorcerers, Clairvoyants and Conjurers. There are also Archmages in each class. Archmages are fully recognised mages who have achieved maximum cultivation, mastered all the existing spells of their speciality class and work on discovering new ones. All five classes play their part in the battle when there is a war but today I am going to share with you what they do when Imperium is at peace. Who here wants to be a Battlemage when they grow up?”

A group of twelve students, among whom only one was a girl, raised their hands to which the teacher nodded in response.

“Battlemages are masters of enhancement spells. They can make their weapons and parts of their body stronger. It’s like they wear an armour of magic! Battlemages often make a living as palace guards or mercenaries. Next, do we have any Nature Necromancer prospects?”

A few other children raised their hands, significantly less than for Battlemages which made Maerin pout. It wasn’t that she didn’t expect it, but it still bothered her. She came prepared though, pulling out a seed from her pocket and holding it in the palm of her hand, making sure that it was visible to the children.

“Crescunt statim.”

The moment those words left , gasps and astonished exclamations arose in the crowd as the children watched a plant sprout and bloom into a rose right before their eyes. Maerin smirked proudly at her success in amazing the kids.

“People often mistake necromancy as controlling dead creatures. While it is true in a way, it isn’t very accurate. Nature Necromancers, as the namesake, can only revive dead plants, grow new ones, and manipulate their growth and movement. They often work in medicine and culinary because they can grow herbs and ingredients. Third up, anyone looking to be a Sky Sorcerer?”

Another group of about five raised their hand.

“Rather self-explanatory, Sky Sorcerers wield the power of the sky. Anything you would imagine up there like the wind, clouds, rain and snow. All of it falls under their jurisdiction and because of their ability to manipulate the wind, they can also fly faster than mages of other classes. Sky Sorcerers are often seen helping towns avoid natural disasters like snowstorms and typhoons.”

Maerin predicted that the number of hands she’d see for the fourth class would be just as sad as for Nature Necromancers, and she was right. When she asked how many wanted to be Clairvoyant only three students raised their hand. It was a pretty standard turn out but regardless of what they wanted, about a fifth of mages turn out to be Clairvoyant after their aptitude tests.

“Clairvoyance is far more riveting than it is given credit for. Clairvoyants have the widest array of spells. The most interesting ones are choosing to see the past of the things they’ve touched, uncovering essence trails and placing tracking spells on people, objects and animals alike. When they get really good, they can even send telepathic messages! They often work as detectives in crime investigation.”

And then it was time for the annual phenomenon to take place on the first day of school.

“Last but certainly not least,” Maerin stressed her words and rolled her eyes at the impending reaction she knew was going to get, “Conjurers, raise your hand.”

Well over half the class raised their hand and even some of the kids that had already raised their hand before got caught up in the monstrous reaction and raised their hand as well. That’s right, practically everyone wanted to be a Conjurer, yet ironically, it was the rarest class to come by. Surely they just wanted to conjure all the toys they could ever dream of.

“Conjurers create inanimate objects using magic, and they generally work as hardware dealers. That’s all for today, I will see you all tomorrow for your aptitude test to evaluate what class mage you are. Goodbye.”

Maerin harrumphed and stomped out of the class like a kid throwing a tantrum. The children looked at one another and shrugged then proceeded to pack up and leave. They supposed all mages were a little eccentric.

Now that you’re educated on the basics, let’s continue with the story, shall we?

Somewhere in the woods, which Hyun Mi and her terrible sense of direction self-proclaimed was the center, a giant rock with a wide flat surface lie. She decided to call it the center solely based on the fact that it was the only part of the forest she had been to which had a clear, open view of the sky. Unlike the rest of the forest which was overgrown and barely allowed sunlight to hit the damp forest floors, the center was like a bald spot on a head of hair and the stone platform was her stage.

Hyun Mi felt at home as she stepped up on the rock and cleared before she began in her best ringmaster impersonation, “Mages and men, dragons and hen! Gather around to witness the one, but not only - Archmage Hyun Mi!”

Following her epic introduction, she changed her stance to one of high and mightiness, closing her eyes and sticking up her nose. She then lifts a hand as if to stop the cheers of the nonexistent crowd. The poised expression turned into one similar to constipation when her concentration shifted and she earnestly tried to condense her essence to cast a flight spell.

“Exaltatus fueris in Caelum!”

Five seconds passed and as usual, nothing happened. A sigh of disappointment escaped the girl’s lips. But as soon as it left, she wanted to it back in because Hyun Mi felt herself being lifted off her feet. Her eyes lit up and she gasped in glee as she looked down to see herself floating off the ground. It was the first time her flight spell worked! The excitement was evident but the glint in her eyes quickly turned into a look of terror as she realized she couldn’t control herself. She just kept ascending and ascending until she was above the trees.

Not knowing what to do she looked around in a panic, and the first thing she took note of was how she truly couldn’t trust her sense of direction. What she called the ‘center’ was clearly offset to the left of the expanse. But then, she noticed a grand castle all the way across the forest in another town. Unsurprisingly, she didn’t know there was a town on the other side of the woods, but a castle could only mean that she was looking at the kingdom’s capital, Volant.

As her mind blanked at the revelation, the ascension stopped.

Hyun Mi’s eyes darted from herself to the ground far below her and back several times, “Hey, I stopped mov- Ahh!”

The mage spoke too soon as her body began flailing around in the sky. She felt like a pair of bloomers in a spiralling laundry vat and it wasn’t pleasant, to say the least. Trying to take control of the situation, Hyun Mi tried a swimming motion in hopes of giving herself direction. It didn’t work in the slightest but for lack of a better idea, she continued anyway. Then it dawned on her, the castle she had seen was getting bigger or rather, it was getting closer.

The Hyun Mi Express was charging straight for Volant and she wanted anything but that right now. Being directionally challenged, she wasn’t looking forward to going through the pain of navigating her way back to Alica. She’d rather crash land in a bush. Determined, she swung her arms and kicked her legs, getting the work out of her life just trying to change the course of movement she was in but nothing ever went her way. Literally. 

She was getting closer and closer to Volant by the second which was a dealbreaker. That was when she decided the best she could do was try to slow herself down somehow and hope that she’d land somewhere safe. Desperate times called for desperate measures, so she was going to cast a slowing spell. Had she ever done it before? No. Would it work? Meh. Would it blow up in her face? Most likely. But she was willing to take the risk.

“Aliquantulus morabor!” Hyun Mi shouted, but nothing happened. She was still headed in the same direction, at the same speed.

She continued chanting the spell several times, thinking maybe one of the times it would work, but of course it didn’t.

When what seemed like the only solution failed, she resorted to the next best thing, “HELP!”

It was in this moment that for once, Hyun Mi wished she had a voice as earthquaking as that of the innkeeper’s. She continued to cry for help as her body hurtled toward the castle, it wouldn’t be long until she’d go splat on the side of the castle tower’s wall. And if that wasn’t how she’d go, the Battlemages standing guard all around the castle were sure to get her.

Hyun Mi squeezed her eyes shut awaiting her impending doom when the wind around her began to calm. She peeked from one eye, noticing that her speed was decreasing and she was gradually descending. A minute later she landed softly in a wagon of hay. The mage blinked a few times fast trying to process what had just happened.

“That was…”, she started and a smile crept upon her face, “amazing!”

She looked and her arms and legs, still in shock that they were in perfect shape before closing her eyes to revel in her moment of relief. She scooched to the edge of the wooden transporter and jumped off, her feet hitting the solid ground after what felt like an eternity. She dusted her hands on her thighs then crossed them over her chest.

Taking a quick look around, she finally noticed a group of Volatan passersby giving her weird looks. Used to the similar side-eyes she got from the Alican townspeople, she shrugged it off with a grin and marched away from the scene, content that she made it out of that life-threatening situation alive. She yelled a small ‘thank you’, hoping that her saviour heard it and would possibly show themself, but whoever it was decided not to. 

That or her spell actually worked…. ‘Pfft, yeah right.’

“Now, how do I get out of here?”

Hyun Mi looked around once then cluelessly set off in a random direction, hoping to find her way back to Arboris.

In Imperium’s king, His Royal Highness Kim Sung Gyu’s castle, the five Elder Archmages of Imperium - who weren’t as old as most may have thought - were gathered for their monthly report meeting with the king. They were known as the Pillars of Imperium as they stood at the five main points of the border to protect the country. 

Jang Dong Woo, the Conjurer. Lee Ho Won, the Battlemage. Kim Myung Soo, the Sky Sorcerer. Lee Sung Yeol, the Clairvoyant. Lee Sung Jong, the Nature Necromancer. All five were the leading Archmages of their class, as was required to be a Pillar.

At a round table, six of them sat, only the king with a chair that was visibly bigger, grander and fit for, well, a king.

“I am pleased to hear that all is well at the borders. I expect this to be the case in the years to come. You are dismissed,” the king’s voice was stern yet kind.

When the king stood up to leave, the five mages rose and put their right hands on their chests, bowing their heads in respect as he calmly strode off. They were then led out by a guard.

“I’m glad that’s over. I honestly hate the feeling when our powers just disappear in His Majesty’s presence,” Ho Won stated blatantly, although he was still on royal grounds. Only he would dare to do so for he knew that even an entire battalion of battlemages stood no chance against him.

Nullification was a trait of Imperium’s royal bloodline. Mages would be powerless in their presence and spells cast from a distance would diminish within the ability’s range. It ensured balance in the dimension and didn’t allow for mages to overstep their boundaries in any way.

“I know what you mean. It happens every month and I still feel vulnerable each time,” Sung Jong added with an exaggerated shiver, glad he could finally feel the essence flowing through his veins again.

The rest nodded in agreement to the statement. Having been mages for a decent portion of their lives, the feeling of having their essence run still even for a second felt unnatural and meetings with the king usually lasted hours. 

As they walked through the halls and out the giant wooden doors of the inner castle, Dong Woo silently whispered something. A moment later, "Myung Soo, think fast!"

Dong Woo had conjured a paper plane and tossed it toward the Sky Sorcerer.

"Ventum," Myung Soo, used to the Conjurers antics, instantly cast a spell which sent the paper plane flying out over the castle's fort walls into town, never breaking his composure.

It didn't surprise any of them at this point, but what did catch them off guard was when the paper plane came back a minute later and landed right at their feet. Myungsoo was sure his breeze had sent the plane further than any regular mage could.

Sung Yeol stepped forward and grabbed the fallen plane.

"Videre praeterita," as soon as the words left his mouth, his eyes turned a multichromatic blue, and a second later turned back to their original brown color.

"It's him," the disapproving look on Sung Yeol's face and the mere two words that followed bothered the Pillars as well.

The melody of a chirpy whistle bounced across the rooftops as the man creating the tune did. Well, because of his activated flight spell it was more like he was float-bouncing, just doing what he always did. Nam Woo Hyun had been looking for something to practice his magic on. Unfortunately for him, he hadn’t encountered any interesting events all day, except the amusing sight of what seemed to be a brown-haired dwarf crying for help as she hurtled across the sky toward the castle. But speed alteration spells were too easy to be called practice, so he called saving her a good deed instead.

It was the sight of a paper plane being guided by a magical breeze that made his day. Already floating, he increased his speed to follow the plane, making sure he did not interrupt the spell carrying it. The mage honestly wanted to see how far it would go and the farther it did, the more excited he got. It amazed him when he followed it to the entrance of Arboris Forest…. In Alica.

Determined to learn of its whereabouts, he picked it up and cast a past reading spell on the item, “Videre praeterita”.

Woo Hyun’s face lit up at the sight of the familiar faces in the flashback. He knew that he couldn’t cast a wind spell as strong as the sender, but he could make up for it in other ways.

“Crescat potentia, remisit, sequuntur,” Woo Hyun had strengthened his arm, placed a guiding spell and a tracking spell on the plane before throwing it as hard as he could with a final gust of wind, “ventum!”

Now that, was what he called practice.

The sun was at its peak and it would only be a couple of hours before the sun had set entirely, but Hyun Mi was still wandering around Volant. It had been hours of her asking for directions and then ending up anywhere but the place that she wanted to be. She knew that if it weren’t for her innate ability to tame animals and have them guide her home, she would have gotten lost in Arboris the moment she set foot inside, never to make it out again.

As Hyun Mi walked along, she noticed something flying toward the town from a distance. She decided to walk in that direction. It wasn’t like she could get any more lost. On the contrary, she actually walked a generally straight path all the way to the forest entrance.

“Finally!” Hyun Mi cried, “Thank you plane!”

Hyun Mi joined her index and thumb at the fingertips then put it to and blew a loud whistle. A minute passed and the faint sound of galloping in the distance gradually grew louder until Hyun Mi’s trusty steed came into view. He wasn't exactly the horse one would imagine him to be. 

The creature generally looked like a horse but his entire build was magical. Not mythical like a unicorn or pegasus but rather his body was made of mist and you could see streaks of electric blue flowing through him, almost like lightning. Although he was a form of mist, Hyun Mi learned that she could still touch and straddle him. She had named him Bluwin.

The mage met Bluwin on her first trip into Arboris. It wasn’t the dreamiest meeting as he pretty much tried to run her over. In her moment of panic Hyun Mi randomly chanted a bunch of Latin words and hoped that one of them would make him stop. She wasn’t a great mage, but she was a model student. Without the opportunity to be mentored formally, she figured the best she could do was memorize an unbelievable number of Latin words, just hoping that it would help her in her journey to becoming a mage. This was because spells were just a string of Latin vocabulary.

But apparently, Bluwin wasn’t the only creature that wanted to attack her, because when she returned to Alica that night, a herd of misty creatures in different forms invaded the town. All of them seemed to be trying to sniff something out but none of the mages knew what. Neither did they know how to deal with them. The creatures weren’t hostile toward the townspeople, but for some reason, none of the town’s mages wanted to approach the creatures. Yet the moment Hyun Mi appeared, all the creatures began to chase her. She didn’t know why, but she also didn’t want to get crushed by a stampede of misty beings.

Hyun Mi tried the spell she used on Bluwin and shouted at them to go back to the forest, and to her surprise, it worked. She didn’t know what the spell was, or why it worked when she couldn’t even cast the most basic spells successfully. She’d tried reading it up in books but it didn’t seem to fall under any of the existing mage classes. Mountains of research later, she gave up, brushed it off and called it a fluke.

After that day, some of the town’s mages gathered and set up a ward at the forest entrance. People could still go through, but those creatures could not. Apparently, it was a sacred ward that required one of each class of mage to cast it together for it to work - and it did because no creature ever came out of the forest again. Bluwin would never get too close to the seal either.

“Let’s get back to Alica,” the petite mage said as she Bluwin’s misty mane. She grabbed onto the reins that appeared in the same misty form and tugged on it while tapping his hind with her legs.

The steed reared grandly and Hyun Mi cheered inwardly as he slowly picked up speed, until he was at full throttle. She loved the thrill and the feeling of the wind sweeping her hair back. Although, she could have done without the occasional bugs that went splat on her skin. She had learnt her lesson the first time she took Bluwin out for a ride and almost had a butterfly go down her pie hole. She definitely didn’t want the metaphor, ‘butterflies in my stomach’, to become a reality.

The ride seemed to end too fast as the steed jerked back down to a leisurely gallop, only coming to a full stop when the forest’s exit to Alica came into view.

With a little sigh and a pout, Hyun Mi hopped off Bluwin and pet him gently, “Thanks for the ride, boy.”

He watched as she left, then whinnied and trotted off after seeing her walk past the ward.

Just as Hyun Mi walked out of the forest, someone took off. Literally, he just shot up from the ground and began flying. She’d never seen him around town before. Maybe he was new or visiting. Either way, if he didn’t know who she was, maybe he would be willing to teach her! Unlike the rest of the town who had witnessed the stench of her failures.

“Hey! You there! Stop!” Hyun Mi called desperately, but he was flying so fast, he probably didn’t hear her over the sound of the wind and just kept going. At least, that’s what she thought.

Woo Hyun, on the other hand, had been trying to ignore the calls and leave as quickly as he could, thinking she had seen him practicing spells from multiple classes and wanted to report him. Using a wind spell to enhance his flight, he ed himself up and out of Alica in an instant.

Hyun Mi huffed in disappointment as she watched her potential teacher zoom away. And he was really good looking too. But that wasn’t the point, she just lost her chance to be taught by someone who wasn’t prejudiced against her. She trudged back to the inn with an exaggerated slouch and her head hung low.

It was chaos at the town’s edge bordering Arboris. Woo Hyun could see it and faintly hear it from afar. As he flew over Arboris toward Volant, he saw the townspeople frantically running from dark figures. Knowing something was wrong he increased his speed further until he could feel the wind force tug uncomfortably on his skin.

When he was finally hovering over Volant, he tried to asses the situation and watched as mages seemed to cower in fear at the sight even though they were expected to deal with the situation. Upon closer inspection, it wasn’t odd. After all, those misty creatures were Siphoners. 

There had never been an invasion in Volant. It was the only reason why the townspeople never had to reseal the forest after one of the mages who had cast the ward spell died, nullifying the spell. It had been centuries since.

Woo Hyun’s first thought was to find some mages who wouldn’t fear the Siphoners and would be able to hold them off. Following the tracking spell he had placed on the paper plane before, he set off as fast as he could to find them.

“Him again?” Sung Jong rolled his eyes as they walked out the castles main door, clearly displeased.

Then again, none of the five mages was happy to hear that their once close friend had found them again. That’s right, Woo Hyun was once friends with the Pillars. In fact, he was one of the top students at Volant’s Magic Academy and people expected him to become one of the Pillars. But Woo Hyun loved magic and learning new spells. He didn’t want to be bound by classes, and so he left the academy to practice in secret. He wanted to become a Jack even if it meant giving up all his chances of becoming an Archmage.

A Jack is a mage who practices more than one class of magic. It is now frowned upon because history penned Jacks as greedy mages that wanted all the power and authority. But it had never been and would never be Woo Hyun’s intention to become evil or power-hungry. He simply loved magic, but everyone thought that’s what all the past Jacks would have said too. So nobody believed that Woo Hyun would be different. Not even the ones he used to call his brothers. The last thing they did for him was to keep his secret.

“I wonder how he finds us every time,” Myung Soo said with clear sarcasm in his voice as he side-eyed Dong Woo who frequently played tricks and caused a bunch of stuff to go flying out the castle walls whenever they’d visit.

The eldest of the group threw his hands up as if to show he was innocent although he wasn’t, “I was just having fun.”

“Even if it is Dong Woo’s fun that sends him signals of our presence, it was still his choice to mess with us,” Ho Won reasoned.

“Forget whose fault it is for a second. Look who’s approaching fast,” Sungyeol muttered and they all turned to watch Woo Hyun flying toward them.

Their faces turned stone cold as they looked at him in his frantic state. It was apparent that they weren’t looking forward to hearing from him but he was more worried about the people of his hometown than the bad blood between him and his friends.

“The town is being swarmed with Siphoners and more of them are coming out of Arboris Forest. Please help the people.”

The Archmages knew how to put grudges aside when it involved the lives of Imperium citizens. Without a second to waste they were on the case, flying off to the scene with Myung Soo far in the lead.

Woo Hyun’s next thought was to find the reason behind all this but he noticed a large Siphoner coming out from one of the alleys. Thankfully the areas surrounding the castle were mostly empty at sundown. Still, he didn’t know how it got here so quickly when most of them were still at the edge of town. Only when the creature spread its wings did Woo Hyun understand. It was a griffin form and if he didn’t approach with caution, it would be his end.

The mage pulled out a few seeds from the small pouch on his belt, and threw it toward the Siphoner as he chanted, “Crescere iaculis.”

A crowd of vines began to sprout and grow rapidly, surrounding the misty form, clamping its wings and legs to immobilize it. The squawked and writhed to break free from the vines and Woo Hyun noticed one snap. Before it could break free, he cast a strengthening spell on the vines and his arms, then sent a telepathic message to one of the nearby castle guards to defend the area.

Woo Hyun conjured a whip and slung around one of the griffin’s legs before hoisting it up and flying away with it. He was headed to where the Pillars were, hoping they would have set up a ward to keep the Siphoners in. As he hovered over the town-tu