Ar'Kendrithyst

Erick collapsed in his chair in the library, emotionally drained.

His mere participation in a very necessary criminal proceeding resulted in people getting out from a dangerous situation. He had no idea what their situation was, exactly, for the problem was between humans and incani, and it was either some complicated Quiet War bullshit, or some uncomplicated hatred. But Erick had rescued people from kidnappers; at least that much was true, wasn’t it?

… He would find out more from Teressa, when she got back, and if she didn’t know any more about whatever had happened to those people, or if she couldn’t say, then he would drop it, then and there.

And another thing! He honestly had no reason to mistrust Merit as much as he did; the woman had undoubtedly saved his life with her patrols around the district, and she definitely saved his life all the other times she worked in the background, making Spur a safer place for people like him.

And then there was the development of him having a ‘vote’ on allowing nobility into Spur. And he was part of the ‘ruling class’, according to Apogee. And he could control the weather and was apparently a ‘Hero of Veird’, according to his possible Abilities. He was already an ‘archmage’...

Erick wasn’t quite comfortable having this level of political power, or this much influence in city events, or any of that. Sure, he had the freedom to do whatever he wanted, but all this power also made life and the decisions he made much more complicated.

But he didn’t want to become a hermit...

Erick leaned back in his chair, and stared at the ceiling for a long time, as he listened to Ophiel chirp and sing in quiet violin sounds on his perch.

Was this the life he wanted? Or did he want something simpler? What ever happened to raining on the Farms and playing with magic?

Oh. Right. Shades happened.

Erick closed his eyes. He breathed. He relaxed. And then he opened his eyes and kept on keeping on, just like the song.

Mog’s rock was still in his pocket. He fished it out, sat up, and began experimenting with [Strike]. First, he tapped the rock with this thumb, normally. Nothing overt happened; he just tapped his finger against the alchemical iron and felt its weight in his hand.

He tapped the rock with a [Strike], and noticed a disconnect, somewhere between the thought, the action, and the effect. A weirdness, unlike he had ever felt before in his magic. But this wasn’t magic, was it? This was a Health-fueled skill.

[Strike] happened a fraction of a second before his thumb touched the stone, causing his finger to lurch toward the rock, like a sped-up video, jamming his thumb in a way that probably would have caused him pain; his [Personal Ward] flashed, the tiniest bit of white light. When the [Strike] was over, Erick pulled his thumb away from the stone. A small dent was there, but it was so small that maybe Erick just hadn’t noticed it before now.

He briefly checked his Status; his Health was still full. He had spent some HP to [Strike] the stone, but it had already regenerated. He struck the stone again, trying to get his timing down better.

Twenty [Strike]s later, he had figured out some of the skill.

[Strike] worked better when you were already on track to hit properly, when the usage of the skill was more like a part of the flow, instead of as a last second course correction, or an impetus to action. It could definitely act like a last second correction, though. The skill could even take hold of Erick’s thumb to hit the rock when Erick held his thumb back, but was ready to [Strike] if needed. Both of those methods of [Strike] seemed inferior to [Strike]ing correctly in the first place, and letting the skill empower your motion.

When he held his thumb back, and was not even looking to [Strike] anything at all, using the skill did nothing except make him a little more awake, and aware. Not aware of anything in particular, much to Erick’s chagrin, but more like an awareness borne of too much caffeine, and no need for that caffeine; an undirected desire for some unknowable direction, that would never come.

It was a strange experience.

The next experiment was channeling Health through [Strike]. Erick held his palm upward, like he usually did, and admitted to himself that this part gave him a bit of apprehension.

In all his other experience of channeling Health through anything, be it [Silent Movement] or [Perfect Hearing], the channeling of the skill brought nothing but static, or worse, to the parts of the body used in that skill. When Erick channeled Health through [Perfect Hearing], his ears filled with noise. Health channeled through [Ultrasight] brought static to his sight. Channeling through [Swift Movement] brought his body to a state of twitchy, explosive movement. [Silent Movement] caused his body to just plain stop, including his breathing, so he didn’t experiment with that one, much.

Channeling Health through [Strike] was an undirected, feeling-out-the-world in terms of ‘can I break this, or not’. It did not channel through his open palm. [Strike] channeled through his perception of the world.

Erick cut the skill. He took a look around him. Nothing had changed. He was still in the library, with the shelves of books and the comfy chairs and the overhead lights for easy reading, but it seemed different. Like he was feeling a memory violence in his sight, but not at all.

Erick channeled through [Strike], again. Once again, the skill did not come through his hand, though he had tried it that way; the skill came through his entire body.

He stopped. “That’s fucking weird.”

He channeled again.

Same weirdness. Same drive to action, but without an outlet. So he tried an experiment. He held the rock in one hand, and hovered his other hand over the rock, and instead of channeling the skill like he normally channeled through his palm, he pretended his hand was the ‘weapon’ and channeled through his rigidly held pointer and middle finger.

His paired fingertips fizzled with white light, and then the channeling was out of his control. The skill activated, without his desire to activate. His fingers struck the rock, as his entire mind filled with the need to injure. He blanked as the [Strike] finished. Everything seemed to turn calm, and happy. Like a dam had released, or a weight dropped to the floor. Or post-orgasm.

Erick laughed, and then continued to play with [Strike] until it was leveled.

Strike X, 10-40 HP

Level 1: Deal 1.0x damage with your weapon

Level X: Deal 2x damage, + 2x damage

The Skill seemed to never lose its level 1 form, but around level 5, the skill had started to allow for extra damage types. That was good for actual battle, of course, but a single tap of a Force empowered [Strike] had dented Erick’s alchemical iron rock. The rock was not meant for heavy duty [Strike]s. But as for [Strike] itself, the damage type was as easy to change as thinking in a different way.

It was a short hop from there, to testing out every damage type Erick knew of that was contained in Mana Altering. Erick discovered what many people had already known, long, long before him: the extra damage types of [Strike] were based off of Mana Altering’s options.

Mana Altering X

Bludgeon, Slash, or Piercing Damage

Force to Light, Blinding, Variable Cost

Invisible Force, Variable Cost

Force to Thunder, Disorient, Variable Cost

Force to Fire, Burn, Variable Cost

Force to Ice, Slow, Variable Cost

Force to Lightning, Paralyze, Variable Cost

Force to Decay, organic damage, Variable Cost x1.5

Chain, Variable Cost x2

Combine Effects, Variable Cost x3

Generate new effects. Variable Cost

Requirements: 10 Willpower

When Erick switched types, the Health cost of [Strike] reflected the new damage type. Setting it to Decay, gave Erick a [Strike] box that looked like:

Strike X, 10-60 HP

Level 1: Deal 1.0x damage with your weapon

Level X: Deal 2x damage, + 2x damage

Erick discovered an anomaly: ‘Chain’ did not work for [Strike]. Attempting for Decay and Chaingave no change, but Decay and Lightning, did.

Strike X, 10-225 HP

Level 1: Deal 1.0x damage with your weapon

Level X: Deal 2x damage, + 2x damage

Fire, Lightning, and Ice, made:

Strike X, 10-703 HP

Level 1: Deal 1.0x damage with your weapon

Level X: Deal 2x damage, + 2x damage

Erick got out a piece of paper, and with a lot more testing, worked some backwards math, and a formula. He didn’t work out the whole formula on his own, though, because halfway through, the math began to look familiar. He reached behind himself and pulled out a book from his library shelves, and sure enough, Erick had remembered correctly. What he was seeing here was the same formula for determining base mana costs for Mana Altering on tier 1 Force spells.

Bludgeon, Slash, and Piercing had a 1x multiplier. Every single ‘Variable’ cost was considered a base 1.25x multiplier in the book, but in practice it was not always that way, but for the first time, Erick saw why the book designated ‘Variable’ as ‘1.25’; they got that number from [Strike]. Decay was 1.5x, but that too was not a perfectly described multiplier, except for here.

The ‘Combine Effects’ was the tricky part. When you did that, you had to take the previous costs and multiply them all together, and then multiply it by 3, for each extra effect. The Expected Cost of a 3 Mana Altered Force spell ended up as:

[(A x B x C) (3 x 3)] x Base Spell Cost = Expected Cost

And what did a Fire, Lightning, and Ice [Strike] cost?

1.25 x 1.25 x 1.25 = 1.95

1.95 x (3x3) = 17.57

17.57 x 40 = 703

Exactly as listed under the Fire, Lightning, and Ice [Strike].

That was just the Expected Cost, though. In practice, spells never combined so cleanly, and outside of Mana Altering and tier one Force spells, things got very tricky, very fast. As a general rule of thumb, and as the vaguest of guides, dealing 200 damage for 50 mana was good. Anything past that was wildly hard to guess at the costs, but most learned mages could give you a rough estimate of what you would expect to pay for a spell to be considered ‘good’. That estimate was usually based on the costs of the spells you were combining, some difficulty multiplier for going up the tiers, and the complexity of your desired magic.

… And the size of the spell and the scope of the targets and how the spell avoided some targets or zeroed in on others, and a whole host of other variables.

That much math was apparently, and simply, not the case for the extra damage portion of [Strike].

Erick giggled, then said, “Warriors have it easy, eh?”

On a whim, Erick tried to combine [Strike], [Rebound], and [Ward], with the largest concern given to transforming physical damage into a wave and then turning it back on the enemy.

A blue box appeared.

Strike Reflection Ward, instant, Personal Ward, 199 mana per second.

Reflect basic [Strike]s used against you.

Erick was not expecting success, and his expectations matched the outcome of his experiment. It was only a tier two spell, though. He tore it apart, letting the pieces of the combo fall back to their respective corners of his soul. He could try again tomorrow.

But [Strike] was pretty fun. Maybe he could make some other combos, in other ways?

How about a ranged [Strike]? [Conjure Weapon] for javelins?

He said to himself, “Sure! Why not! Let’s add another fun experiment to the ever growing pile.” He conjured a blackboard next to him with taunting words already written upon its surface. “Oh holy shit. I still haven’t done any of that.”

Combat experience. (never ending)

Support Jane. (happily and hopefully never ending)

Monster knowledge.

Finding allies.

-Odaali (And Greensoil Republic?)

-Archmages (Syllea, in particular)

-Oceanside

-Wasteland

-Gods? What can gods even do? Probably have to go with champions.

Uncovering the purpose of Candlepoint. (And dead people!)

[Teleport Spell]

[Teleport Object]

[Teleport Other]

[Gate], via Fork and Wayfinders (Archmage Tenebrae, too)

Another [Familiar]

Create Stat fruits.

Support Guard and Army and Guilds with rings

Keep Spur safe

Community Garden Council, and necessary rains (make staff of rain?)

Enchant staffs of my other spells; [Exalted Storm Aura]

[Renew]; still haven’t figured that out.

[Control Weather] artifact for Sininindi.

“Oh no! Wait. I did the rains.” Erick erased that from the board, and smiled. Then he lost his smile. With conjured chalk and an expertly controlled Handy Aura, Erick added a few more goals to the bottom of the list.

Pure Melee Reflection Ward? Aura? Which is better? Try for aura, too.

Remake all Basic Tier spells that I can.

Find out nobility’s goals.

True All-Stat enchantment.

Mana Generation spell for Jane.

Ranged [Strike]. [Conjure Flying Striking Weapon]?

Ritual spells?

Cooperative Casting?

Erick read his list for a while, then thought about a melee reflection aura. It had Aurify in its combination, so he could try right now, instead of waiting another day. So he did.

Strike Reflection Aura, instant, self, 212 mana per second.

Reflect basic [Strike]s used against you.

Another failure? Maybe he wasn’t imagining [Strike] correctly. That was probably it. He tore apart the spell as he looked to the top of his list, at ‘Combat Experience’, and wondered when Kiri would be back. He could use some more sparring.

But for now, Erick looked upon his goals, and decided, “Time to knock out some [Teleport Spells].”

Ophiel twittered on his perch, by Erick’s chair, fluffing himself up before he let out a happy smattering of violin chirps, then blipped away, out to the Crystal Forest, happy for some action. Erick summoned another one to sit back down on the perch.

Poi walked into the Library, lightly holding a rod of [Treat Wounds].

Erick smiled. “Nice timing, Poi.”

Poi just smirked, as he sat down in the chair across from Erick. He picked up a book of his own, and started reading.

- - - -

With a dozen white wings, stretching out to catch the wind, Ophiel flew across the orange sands of the Crystal Forest. Clouds lingered in the sky above, and the day was not quite as hot as usual, but the air was still warm, and smelled lightly of static, and rain. Wind trickled through Ophiel’s feathers, as his eyes scanned the dunes below. Here was as good a spot as any.

Feathers, wings, and eyes, lined with light, bright and expansive, as Ophiel’s sight and senses competed with the minor shadows racing across the expanse below, cast by the clouds above. Ophiel won, pushing back the dim darkness, as he gathered light from everywhere and folded it around himself, forming a house-sized expanse of gently glowing brightness.

Ophiel dipped down to the ground. He was not fully light, not right now; merely lined in radiance given form and function. Wind still brushed against his body, but he no longer held himself up with air; there was no need. He picked up a clump of dirt with hands made of brilliance, and shaped it into a stone with a bit of other magics. When he stopped his shaping, the boulder was a good meter across, but Ophiel lifted it like it was nothing.

With a tug and a shift, the boulder moved into the light, dull orange rock flashing to neon orange, and held in place with a firm grip.

The neon rock flickered under concentrated thought, moving left and right inside Ophiel’s brilliant aura. And then it ripped apart, shattering through the space like a bomb going off, tearing apart light and ripping through Ophiel.

Wings disintegrated. Eyes cracked and broke like smashed marbles. Feathers vanished.

- - - -

Erick came back to himself.

“Hmm,” he said, before sending another Ophiel out into the desert.

- - - -

Ophiel hovered over a vast, bright land, much further north than before. Here, there were no shadows, only the bright, bright sun. He picked up an orange stone and turned it neon, again, but he also turned his entire self to light, as well.

Neon orange brilliance stretched into a possibility curve; it could be here, or there, or over there.

And then it was an explosion. Ophiel’s lightform body briefly pulsed away from the epicenter of the failed experiment, like a cloud of light cast into the wind, but he reformed almost instantly. There was no need to resummon Ophiel, this time.

- - - -

Again. Again. Again.

- - - -

Erick read the black book the Wayfarers had given him, looking for clues. Three hours later, Erick started making dinner. After Teressa came back and dinner was over, and she couldn’t talk about what happened to the kidnapping victims, Erick sent his Ophiels back out to the Crystal Forest.

- - - -

The sun hovered in the western sky, casting long shadows across the wavy dunes below, turning the world red, gold, orange, and many shades of blue darkness. Gentle winds blew from the north, as Ophiel, bathed in light and light itself, hovered over the twilight land.

At a touch of intent, boulders raised from the sand, to turn neon under Ophiel’s influence. And then neon stretched; here and there at the same time, like the world rippled at a point, light flexed back and forth. Neon orange was two places at once, its original and a new spot, not too far away.

The rock dropped outside of Ophiel’s influence. It was no longer made of light, as it crashed in the shadows below, cratering a tiny, tiny part of the world.

Ophiel trilled in violin harps, thrumming reality with a happy, fresh sound and light, that radiated in all directions like a minor second sun, for the briefest of moments.

- - - -

Erick came back to himself, to see two blue boxes hovering in front of him.

Special Quest Complete!

You have remade a Basic Spell.

Since you do not already have Teleport Object, here you go:

Teleport Object 1, instant, touch, 25 mana + Variable

An object you touch moves to another known location, within 1 kilometer.

Erick picked up an unimportant book from the shelves; an easily replaceable treatise on weather patterns of the world. Holding the book in his right hand, he cast. The book appeared over his left hand. He caught it, and giggled.

The book blipped back and forth, from one hand to the other, a few times, before Erick turned his attention back to Ophiel, still out in the desert.

- - - -

Ophiel zipped through the twilight evening, back to the cubic meter sized boulder he had cast out into the world. The boulder was now in pieces; broken from the fall and barely distinguishable from the crater it had created. With a bit of [Stoneshape], the boulder came back together, for more experimenting.

A thousand arms of wind and intent reached out from Ophiel’s winged body. The [Familiar] touched the stone, holding its hefty weight into the air, as he supported the extra mass with a few more hands pressed against the ground.

Blip went the stone, passing from one side of Ophiel to the other, instantly reappearing in other airy hands, on Ophiel’s other side. Wings shifted as weight transferred, and Ophiel steadied himself.

- - - -

Erick checked his mana. That single blip had cost him close to a 25 mana, while blipping the book had cost him the base, Clarity-cut cost of around 12 mana. The boulder was just north of ‘medium sized’, but maybe it was the weight that caused the cost to rise? [Stoneshape X] allowed him to work large sized amounts of stone for 50 minutes, for 100 mana, and a large size of stone was roughly a 5 by 5 by 5 cubic meter of space, or 125 cubic meters of stone. [Stoneshape] always cut when he reached that ‘large-sized’ limit, though. He couldn’t just pick up a small house and move it around for an hour. He could, however, pick up a small house and move it over a meter or two.

‘Large sized’ wasn’t always uniform among every spell, or among every caster, but for Erick, ‘Large sized’ was generally 5 to 7 meters across. A large amount of weight, however, like that in his [Teleporting Platform] spell, was only 5 tons.

Teleporting Platform, instant, 197 MP + Variable, 204 MP per person + Variable

Create a mobile, hovering platform of stone that moves quickly at your discretion. Supports a large amount of weight. Lasts 1 hour.

You and the people or objects on your Teleporting Platform appear in a known location, max 1000km distance

… So how big of a stone ball could Erick blip?

- - - -

Ophiel descended to the ground and pulled on a 5 by 5 by 5 section of sand, lifting the rock up into the air, scattering smaller stones and glowbugs out of the way. He had to recast the spell once, but that was fine. Sand rushed underneath the floating stone, to fill the void left behind. When the sand below had turned stable again, Ophiel let the mass drop, whumphing the house-sized boulder into the land. Sand billowed outward, as the shockwave from the drop vibrated a small part of the Crystal Forest.

Mimics, some dozens of meters away, some hundreds, jolted to life, before settling back down; whatever had disturbed them had done so far enough away that they didn’t care, or so close, and so strongly, that they dared not investigate.

With a hand made of intent and air, Ophiel touched the stone, and blipped it away, directly up, two kilometers straight into the sunset sky.

- - - -

Erick briefly came back to himself, as an unexpectedly strong spell rushed through his body, leaving a chill in its wake. That was a lot of mana! He checked his Status.

He said, “Over three thousand mana! Ha!”

- - - -

Ophiel hovered away from the future impact site, as he watched the sky above.

Slowly, the stone came into view, like a dot half orange and half black, against the gold-red-purple sky. And then all at once, it came faster and faster. The stone descended under the power of gravity, and was made all that stronger for its simplicity. Ophiel rushed to get away as Erick suddenly realized that this would be bigger than he thought it would, but it was too late, and not enough, so he switched to light, transforming to the intangible, right as the stone touched down.

Stone plunged down. Sand erupted into the sky. A vibration cracked through the world, heralding a wave of power and dirt and stone and sand that rushed away from the impact site, filtering through Ophiel’s intangible form like so much dirt passing through air.

When the dust cleared and the sand settled, Ophiel bore witness to a crater more than a hundred meters across, with rims larger than most dunes. The sides were made of sand that was already rushing down the crater walls, but of the bottom, it looked like normal, if darker, desert soil. If the original ‘meteor’ was part of that loamy land down there, Erick could not readily tell. It had likely been destroyed in the crash.

This was an impressive lot of destruction.

And it was kinda fun!

Okay. It was a whole lot of fun.

Erick cast down immense stones from the sky a few more times, in the same location, leveling his magic in the pursuit of joy, spell levels, and knowledge.

… Not like anyone else was around to see his fun times. He had checked.

Over the course of leveling [Teleport Object] to 10, and seeing that the spell now had a max range of 10 kilometers, Erick discovered some fun facts.

A full strength [Prismatic Ward] from Ophiel would not survive a direct strike of a large-sized stone, but an indirect strike that only clipped the dense air, sometimes survived. There was no issue surviving the shockwaves and debris.

He also discovered that he could [Teleport Object] the stone, right before it touched the ground, blipping the stone in place, and ‘bleed off’ all the stone’s momentum. There seemed to be no control over this functionality. Momentum always bled away, every [Teleport Object]. If Erick wanted a spell that maintained momentum he would likely have to make a tier 2 spell.

And now that he saw what [Teleport Object] was capable of…

… Erick had no doubt that there was someone in Spur, whose entire job it was to watch for this type of attack and ‘catch’ the falling stones, so [Teleport Object] could not be so easily deployed against cities. Was this person someone in the Wayfarer’s Guild, perhaps? That seemed likely.

But what happened to the object’s momentum? All that ‘bleed off’ energy had to go somewhere, maybe? What happened when spells produced byproducts—

[Cleanse]. Right. Duh.

Was [Cleanse] the solution to stray spell phenomenon? Where would [Teleport Object]’s stray phenomenon go? What would it look like? Was [Teleport] causing stray spell phenomenon all the time? Was Erick overthinking this whole thing? Probably.

Anywho! Back to learned facts:

By combining [Force Bolt]s innate ability and desire to touch things from afar, with [Teleport Object], Erick managed to make:

Teleport Ranged Object, instant, long range, 30 mana + Variable

An object you touch moves to another known location, within 5 kilometers.

- - - -

Erick came back to himself, smiling and laughing. He looked over to Kiri, sitting across the library from him, and said, “— Oh! Kiri! Welcome back! How did it go?”

Kiri smiled as she looked up from her book, saying, “It went great. I can’t really talk about it, but I can say that they’ve taken the Charisma belt and they are investigating the Stat. Charisma seems pretty scary, though.” She gestured to the blackboard Erick had left up, saying, “But that’s more impressive than what happened to me. That’s your goal list, isn’t it? I especially like the ‘Mana Generation’ entry.”

“Oh yeah.” Erick said, “I have absolutely no idea where to even start on that one.” He asked, “What does a good [Melee Reflection] look like? Do you know?”

“No idea.” Kiri said, “I always felt I was better served by [Blink]ing out of a warrior’s [Strike], than trying to reflect it. [Strike Reflection] only works on [Strike], too. So if they don’t [Strike] you, then you’ve just wasted mana you could have spent in other, better ways.”

“… It only works on [Strike]?” Erick said, “I was hoping for a [Melee Reflection].”

Kiri smirked. “Maybe, when you get [Teleport Other], you can try for a [Delayed Teleport Other] that activates if someone tries to deal more than 100 damage to you. You’d have to include an intent scanner in the spell, or perhaps a velocity scanner. They might get one hit off on you, too, so you need to ensure that they only ever get the one.”

Erick thought about that for a long moment. He said, “That’s a good idea.” He asked, “So what does a Mana Generation spell look like to you?”

Kiri leaned back in her chair, thinking, looking at the ceiling for a moment. Sunny curled up from around her neck, flickering green light down her serpentine, feathered length. Kiri turned to Erick, “I thought about the answer to that when I saw the board, but I honestly have no idea. Meditation doesn’t actually increase your regeneration, you know?”

“Yeah. It just opens your soul to the mana, allowing it to flow into your reserves.” Erick said, “And your reserves are dictated by your Willpower, or, more accurately: your ability to hold onto mana without having it turn into rads inside of you.”

Kiri nodded, saying, “Hence, I have no idea where to even begin for Mana Generation.” She said, “Obviously, you can just eat potions, and that works, because of the rads and the component herbs dissolved in the potion are designed to let the imbiber take in the mana in the crushed rads, without the rad reforming in their guts. But you don’t want potions. You want an actual spell you can cast on yourself, right?”

“Right.” Erick said, “My main worry is that the casting of such a spell would lead to monsterfication.” He added, “Or require a material component, and thus become a ritual spell.”

“I imagine any type of Mana Generation spell would have to be a ritual spell, with minute long cast times, and such.” Kiri said, “But that’d be fine. Getting your mana back in minutes, without the use of potions? Sure? Why not? Better than risking the condensation of intestinal rads.” She conceded, “But still: possible monsterfication.” She glanced back up at the blackboard, saying, “Such a spell seems like it might lead to this [Renew] you talked about, before.”

Erick frowned. He thought. He looked back to his board, then to Kiri, asking, “How so?”

Kiri let her words come out, half thought, “Renewing an ongoing spell is like filling the holes created by spell degradation caused by exposure to unaligned mana, right? While Mana Generation would be like filling the holes in a person’s empty mana reserves with properly aligned mana—” Kiri paused, suddenly smiling, as she said, “Oh hey! That sort of works, doesn’t it?”

Erick smiled as he laughed, then said, “Maybe that would work! Neat!” He said, “I wasn’t thinking of it in that way. I was thinking more of the creation of mana, itself.”

Kiri went, “Oohhh.” She paused. She scrunched her face. She said, “Nope. No idea how to do that one. Mana is neither used nor created in spellwork. Even if a person is inside an antirhine room, where mana doesn’t move except to stay inside… the mana isn’t used up or created by any known spellwork. If mana was created, then the room would burst its surroundings, or generate rads in the person, or in the space. If mana was used up, then it would crunch the space inward.”

“They had to use smaller spells in those experiments, though, right?” Erick said, “Those were small, room-sized experiments. Maybe bigger spells could create mana?”

“… Eh. I don’t know about that.” Kiri offered, “But you could build an antirhine room and test some of this out, if you wanted? Do some experiments? It’s ungodly expensive to make, but I bet the guard or Silverite has some leftover antirhine walls that came out of that Daydropper stuff, maybe?”

“Eh.” Erick said, “Maybe.” He waved off the idea, saying, “Not important. Too many things to do already. [Renew] is a large enough problem to work on, especially if I could make it possible to use on a person, to restore their mana reserves.”

“This talk has me thinking...” Kiri said, “I think I’d like to make a [Mana Generator] spell. One that actually produces new mana.”

“Pff! Why?”

“Because...” Kiri looked a little shy, as she said, “You once told me of the size of the universe, but I’ve already read about the size of the Old Cosmology, and all the old planar systems and how they worked, and how you could journey from one end of known space to the other, and never reach the end.” She said, “But the Script is the only thing that keeps Veird alive, that keeps the mana here, and allows magic to happen. And that’s… Well it’s terrifying. As far as I know, new mana is never made; it’s only recycled. But if we had a way to make new mana we could make those spaceships that you talked about. Once we got that, we could plant [Script]s on the other rescued planets of this New Cosmology, and expand to places untouched by Melemizargo and other monsters.

“Maybe, one day, we could even travel around our Sun System, like they used to in the Old Cosmology.” She shrugged, adding, “Maybe the universe wouldn’t seem so impossibly large and scary, if we could explore more of it in the safety of the Script.”

Ophiel chirped on his perch, as Sunny flickered different colors, and Erick felt a swell of pride in his chest for his apprentice.

“Kiri!” Erick smiled wide, then said, “I never knew you had such large ambitions!”

She laughed, saying, “I don’t! Not really... But it’s a nice thought.” Her eyes got a little wide, as she casually stared off into nothing, saying, “The universe is too damn big and too darn small, all at the same time.”

Erick said, “You know: There’s that quest for a spaceship on Candlepoint’s quest board.” He warned, “If you worked toward such a goal, then it would likely get stolen by Darkness, and made into a weapon so the Shades could escape Veird, and destroy everyone left behind.”

“… Oh. Right.” Kiri, mortified, said, “Then maybe I won’t work on Mana Generation.” She added, “But… Now that I think on it... Someone else has to have solved this problem, already, if for no other reason than for the thrill of new magics. Maybe Melemizargo already has this spell?” She added, “Melemizargo likely already has every magic there is, and a lot more besides.”

“Ah. Yeah. Maybe? He is the old god of magic… But he’s been insane for a long time, so...”

“Maybe his magics never got used to their greatest effects?” Kiri said, “Melemizargo’s plan for ending it all has been going on for a long time, but he never really succeeds, thank the gods. But. Maybe… Maybe he already has many of his pieces, but they’re all over the place? If that is his true goal? To burn it all and then return to the Old Cosmology?”

“Scary thoughts! But ultimately, unsolvable, as of this moment.” Erick smiled, saying, “I made some lemon cookies while you were out. Let’s talk more about goals over some snacks.” He got up from his chair, asking, “And then, perhaps, a spar?”

Kiri smiled, enthusiastically agreeing, “Yes.”

Erick led the way out of the library, but paused at the archway, and turned back for a moment. With a quick Handy Aura swipe, he marked ‘[Teleport Object]’ off from his own list of goals.

One down! Many more to go.

- - - -

Over lemon cookies and honeyed tea, for it was too late for coftea, Erick and Kiri spoke of magic and spell formulas, of monsters and mysteries of the world, and about allies, and enemies. Tomorrow would be the first day of the last month of the year. In three weeks, Festival Week would begin, and after all of those celebrations, Water Season would come to Spur, once again. Erick kinda wanted to visit Teressa’s people for Festival week, for there was something fun going on there, for sure, and Teressa seemed enthusiastic about the idea.

… He also needed to get around to talking to Archmage Syllea, and visiting her then might be a good idea.

Sparring with Kiri was a rash idea, soon forgotten; it was too late. Sitting and sharing stories was much better.

Erick said, “I’ll have been on Spur for a year, in about forty five days. [Call Lightning] will come into the Script in, like, 65? Something like that. Maybe sooner. Particle Mage, too.” He added, “It was the beginning of summer in my world when we popped over, but it was spring when we got here. Or… the end of winter, actually.”

“What was your climate, like? Where you lived?” Kiri asked, refilling her tea, and Erick’s. “Right now, it’d be snowing back in Tower Town.”

Erick picked up another lemon cookie, saying. “Snow. I miss the snow. Great fields of soft white that crunched under your boots, and all the forests had a deep, cold sound. Lakes cracking under ice freezes. Cold so deep it shattered trees, sometimes.” Erick looked away, thinking of another time, and place. He said, “There was a softness to that sound, that I’ll never see again. I would never be comfortable enough to enjoy such a vista on Veird, I think. Too many monsters.”

Kiri smiled softly, to herself. She sipped her tea. “I would like to visit a world without monsters. I had an older brother when I was four— I still have a lot of brothers. But… He had just Matriculated but it was heavy winter. He went out into the snowfields one day, searching for monsters to fight. He never came back.” She said, “Someone found his body the next day. He was about four kilometers north of the city walls, in the ditch beside the road. We think bandits got him and dumped the body where it would be found.”

Erick felt a lurch in his chest. He said, “That’s awful Kiri. I’m sorry that happened.”

“At least they dropped the body where it would be seen.” Kiri said, “Some people don’t even get that.”

Erick shivered. “That’s… terrible...”

Kiri said, “Yes. It was.”

“How’s the rest of your family, these days?”

“They’re all in Odaali, now, working on—”

Erick heard someone walking to the kitchen, moments before Poi walked into the room, wearing loose pajamas. He rubbed his eyes with the back of his bluescaled hand; he was not fully awake.

“Si—” Poi yawned, huge, then said, “There’s an Ancient Stone Elemental coming toward Spur, from the north east. Estimated time of arrival is 3 hours. Either of you two, please kill it?”

Erick said, “I’ll take this one.”

Kiri giggled, asking, “You will?”

“I have a spell I want to try out, and a walking mountain is the perfect target.” Erick said, “[Teleport Object] and [Stoneshape], like you said for [Comet Swarm] however long ago you said.”

Poi said, “Here,” as he sent Erick a telepathic image of the location, and added, “Back to bed.”

Kiri asked, “Where is it?”

“Nope.” Poi said, “You get to watch Erick.”

“Ah.” Kiri looked down at her cup. “Right. Yes. Of course.”

Erick asked, “And that reminds me. Either of you two know if there’s someone in Spur who looks out for falling rocks and blips them away? To stop them from impacting the city? And if so, why was that boulder allowed to fall on my house?”

Poi rattled off, “There are several people like that, and there are velocity attuned [Alarm Ward]s cast high above the city to warn of any lethal, major attacks. The stone triggered nothing because it was below the threat threshold.”

“… Really?”

Poi said, “Yes. The dropping of stones is a minor problem that we usually just deal wi—” He yawned again, then continued, “That we usually just deal with, as any city would deal with attempted murder.” He lazily added, “Or attempted… whatever. The Guard can’t, and shouldn’t, protect from every little thing.”

Erick smiled. He said, “Go back to bed, Poi. Thank you.”

“Aye, sir!” Poi half-mocked, as he smiled and walked away, scratching his belly as he turned the corner of the kitchen archway.

Erick looked to Kiri. “This might not take long.”

She smiled, and refilled her cup. “I want to see the aftermath, though.”

“Of course.” Erick summoned another Ophiel, and sent him blipping away in a flash of white light.

- - - -

Stars glittered above in the black expanse of the sky, while half moons held on the horizon, casting silver and pink light across the dune-filled land. Cold winds blew from the north. And the world vibrated under a thousand thousand stone legs.

Because down below, a mountain walked the land.

A hundred meters wide, and fifty tall, the three peaked, minor mountain range of a monster rolled across the dark dunes. Faint orange glows held in the deeper cracks of the stone beast, a cross between lava and light, revealing the magical nature of the moving mountain; as if its movement wasn’t revelation enough. Down on the ground, in front of the roiling dust storm that the beast threw into the air with its travels, glowed bright orange orbs, each the size of a person’s head, or smaller. They were the creature’s eyes, and they were focused on the prizes ahead of them; not only the bounty far ahead, in the city of Spur, where countless people vibrated the ground with their tiny lives, but even right ahead of the monster, where smaller monsters tried, and failed to hide their true nature as food.

Crystal mimics tried to run away from the oncoming mountain, but they could not get away, either from the immensity of the Ancient Stone Elemental, the monster’s power, or from the multitude of orange eyes around the edges. Those orange eyes locked on the mimics, but the mountain did not change course; it did not need to. Spikes of orange stone lifted up around each fleeing mimic, trapping them and pulling them down into the dirt, to feed the mountain.

Far in front of the monster, Ophiel’s wings whistled on the wind, as he flew down to the ground, and cast, chunking a huge hole into the floor of the Crystal Forest.

Another, fainter whistling carried on the wind.

In the open sky above, the black expanse of night was briefly altered by a subtle addition; a bit of stone, raised high above, that caught on the lights of the moons, turning that ever-so-small part of the sky to something other than darkest blue.

The stone descended.

- - - -

The stone fell to Veird, crashing into the mountain, exploding through the Ancient Stone Elemental, transforming the monster into a volcano erupted.

When the dirt and dust cleared. There were two mountains, now, and a lot of smaller orange eyed elementals wandering around, searching for enemies. Ophiel watched, as Erick’s mana refilled, and elementals rejoined, reforming the moving mountain. Ten minutes later, the mountain was back, but it only had two peaks, this time.

- - - -

Erick spied the spell notification, among all the kill boxes.

Stone Fall, instant, super long range, 6000 mana

Teleport a large sized stone into the sky, to fall upon a target, dealing massive physical damage.

Well that was less than optimal. Erick tried again, but slightly different, adding [Force Crash] and Mana Altering to the spell, to create something new.

Force Crash X, instant, long range, 100 MP

Rain small destruction in a medium area, dealing 15 + WIL damage per crash. Lasts 1 second. 15 crashes.

- - - -

A minor moon appeared in the sky, then blasted apart into a hundred smaller orbs of compacted stone, that suddenly descended with whistling strength. The shotgun attack filled a minor part of the sky before it crashed against the entire mountain and the surrounding land, scattering elementals to the air, but breaking nothing. The mountain continued, slightly smaller after the barrage of stone, but still two-peaked, and headed for Spur.

… Ophiel threw out a [Withering], just to see what would happen.

Nothing happened. There was no water in rock elementals, after all.

- - - -

Erick looked at his second, new spell.

Stone Crash, instant, super long range, 6500 mana

Cast a large size of stone into the sky, breaking it into a hundred rocks to fall upon a super large area.

Erick showed both his new spells to Kiri. “Do these look good?”

Her eyes went wide. “Uh.” She said, “But?” She collected her thoughts, and said, “You could try for smaller, fire imbued [Comet Swarm]s. Elementals are hard to kill because you have to change their element to kill them. Throwing stone at stone is fun, but ultimately you’re doing a lot more than you need to do. You could be spending mana more efficiently.”

Erick said, “I knew that.”

Kiri raised her eyebrows, as she looked away. “Sure.”

“I did!” Erick laughed, then said, “I’m just having some fun, testing out magics.”

“Those stone spells are fine.” Kiri said, “Not very useful for smaller scale fights, though, or actual damage, unless you manage to directly hit something.”

“The next experiment should fix that.”

- - - -

Ophiel flew wide, around the reforming mountain, while Erick recovered his mana. It didn’t take long. When he was ready, Ophiel descended, back to the ground, to hover over a boring, normal dune. The dune did not remain boring for very long. Dune turned to stone, and flaming light, and then vanished, all at once, only to reappear in the sky like a minor sun.

The sun broke into stars, then stars descended.

Stars met stone, and exploded into light and fire, turning the night briefly to day, as shrapnel littered the land. A mountain became flaming, bright debris. Stone elementals burned, or flashed to dust, as white firelight held the night in its tight, relentless grip. Ten seconds, thirty, a full minute. Elementals died, returning to the land from whence they came. When the white fire finally passed, there were no more orange eyes in the dirt, and the mountain was no more.

The mountain was barely a small rise in the normal features of the Crystal Forest.

- - - -

None of the monsters Erick had killed were high enough level to give him anything close to resembling a level of his own, but the spell he had gotten out of the night was pretty good.

Firelight Comet Swarm, instant, super long range, 8100 MP

Cast a large size of Firelight Stone into the sky, breaking it into a hundred smaller pieces to then fall upon a super large area. Deals massive initial damage + 5x WIL, and 10x WIL damage per second for 60 seconds for all in affected area.

Shadow aspect magic turns solid.

Deals double damage to dark and shadow aspect creatures and objects.

Erick smiled. “So this seems good.” He showed Kiri.

Her eyes almost bugged out. “And you made it at tier 2? Just now?”

“Yeah.” Erick said, “I think I’m getting the hang of this magic thing.”

Her voice got a little distant, and quiet, as she asked, “What did you put into it?”

“[Teleport Object]. [Stoneshape]. [Firelight Shift]. Mana Altering, 500. [Force Crash].”

Kiri gave a weak. “Haaa.” And then she sat straight. A green fire burned in her eyes, as she said, “I want to see it used. Did anything survive?”

Erick checked back to the mountain’s remains. He came back, and said, “Maybe?” He sent Kiri the location of the monster. “Once my mana comes back, I can show you the spell.”

Kiri smiled.

- - - -

Sunny, green and bright, hovered in the dark night, next to Ophiel. The not-couatl flickered green colors, happy to be out in the sky. Ophiel replied in trills and whistles, then led the way to the ground.

Sunny and Kiri watched as the sky filled with a hundred flaming, white comets. The spell descended upon the land, just as an orange eye lifted from underneath the sand. The survivor did not survive, this time.