Illusions were not, as Fel was well aware, a subject he was particularly talented in. They required a sense of artistry, which he felt he had in bulk, and a near-constant sense of focus, which he did not. He was, as a result, more proficient in magic of the prior-preparation or near-instantaneous variety; magic work such as throwing fireballs, creating rituals, chaining lightning, or freely manipulating mana, in no particular order.

But despite his rather tenuous grasp on the subject of illusions, Fel could be certain of a few things. First, Illusions didn't typically harm people. Physically, at least. Second, and more importantly, they didn't run interference on a person's mana pool. That was his point of focus for what had occurred.

Fel scratched at his chin with his previously-frozen arm, directing his attention to Tellas as she walked by his side.

At her insistence, and as soon as it'd become clear that neither of them was injured, the group of four had begun traveling across the mountain again. That wasn't to say everything was forgotten and the event ignored — though Lorn and Horace did seem to have relaxed after realizing Tellas hadn't been hurt — just that they traveled while the confusion was smoothed over. It was a matter of light practicality, given the group's implied time limit. They wanted to reach the day's griffins’ nest before nightfall.

Spinning the metal band Tellas had passed to him in his hand, Fel looked down at it once more. The item was, apparently, the origin of the illusion that had covered her arm. Disabled now, the runework failing to activate without a wearer's mana-pool to draw from, he'd offered to look the object over as a mixed apology and investigation.

It was... interesting, as magic devices went. And the gesture had quite a bit to further relieve the group's tension.

In Tellas's natural state, her right arm was fully-functional but scarred from mid-bicep down. The arm's surface rippled with roughly-raised scar tissue, covering the top half of the appendage. The result of a fire, she claimed.

The device, of course, aimed to hide all that. It was a piece of active, low running-cost illusion gear made to mirror the appearance of Tellas's other arm.

Stepping deftly over a bush of thorns, Fel probed at the enchantment contained within the band.

It did the job well. Beyond the constant visual illusion generated, the device produced a physical overlay. It would, he was informed, create the full sense of an unmaimed-arm while worn. Not that Fel was going to confirm that fact. With 8% of his mana dispersed, a mere 19% of his pool remaining, and the temporary loss of control that had occurred regarding his arm, touching the illusion again was not something he was willing to do.

Still, if true, the arm-band was impressive. Expensive too. The physical component of the enchanter's work would cost... quite a bit, with the price for such work being the equivalent of several months' salary teaching at the Collegium. It was more than he'd have expected even a proficient adventuring team to be able to afford.

Fel handed the arm-band back to Tellas. He wouldn't ask.

"I don't know. Your device seems fine, but I still can't find a reason it would've snapped like that. Maybe the problem's on my end — thinking about it, it probably is — but you should still get it checked by an actual [enchanter] next time you get the chance."

"That's fine, I figured I'd need to anyway." She shrugged and took it, adjusting and then tightening the leather strap that kept the band on her arm. "Though what do you—"

"What do ya' mean the problem's on your end?" Horace, who'd been talking to Lorn a ways ahead of them, dropped back to interrupt. His tone was curious, rather than accusatory, and he seemed legitimately intrigued.

Fel was hopeful in that regard.

Still, he waited until Lorn fell into line with them to answer, humming to himself while he brought his thoughts into order.

"Well, I think it might be a consequence of a class I picked up. Have any of you heard of a [Simulacrum] before?"

The others shook their heads in denial, and Fel frowned. Then he gave a half-hearted shrug.

"Never hurts to ask. But in any case, it seems to be a magic class with... issues. I'm pretty sure it's the source of my life-saving skill, but also that of a few problems I've been having with my mana. This one now, with me having a negative reaction to other's magic, would be rather in line with all that."

He paused to rub some grit from the corner of his eye, and Horace took the opportunity to step forwards.

"Huh. Well, there's no such thing as a bad class— I'm sure you'll be fine, yeah? Anyway, Tellas, I'm gonna' take a look ahead real quick. We should be pretty close— just gotta' find the entrance."

He slapped Fel's shoulder as he left, jumping to and then pulling himself over a ledge, where he disappeared from the group's sight.

When Horace did find the entrance to the griffins' nest, he returned to the group with a nearly straight-through trail. It was a vast improvement over the path he'd taken Fel on earlier in the day.

Their final destination was a cave, its entrance located on an outcropping of the mountain's steeper cliffside. Some small, scraggly bushes, a few reasonably-sized boulders that the group walked around, and a single ragged-edged gully were all that stood in the way.

The group made good time.

On arrival, however, Tellas stopped Fel before he could move in towards the space. The team of three made clear their request that he remain outside for the duration of their work, and after a quick peek at the interior, he agreed. Moving a few meters from the opening in the mountainside, Fel took a seat. For matters of professionals and monsters, he was more than happy to remain uninvolved.

Horace entered first, moving through the interior of the cave and ensuring that it was clear. It was a cavern, really, the interior of the griffin's nest around the size of the Collegium's mess hall. Still, he did so quickly, waving his teammates inside after a few minutes of wait, before exiting the space to stand guard at its entrance.

Shrugging their packs off their shoulders, Tellas and Lorn got to work. First came the ropes, thickly braided and spooling out from the top of the packs. Then, some rolls of thin, metallic mesh, and a few dozen ceramic jugs. A half-dozen smaller items followed. Each was carefully unpacked and laid around the two [Trappers] in preparation for setting everything up.

The jugs were set into position first, following an initial mapping of the interior by Lorn. They placed each in spaced intervals around the edges of the cavern, focusing their efforts near the back and away from the more immediate ventilation. Next, the two began to string up the mesh. Pushing the ceramics further into corners and under ledges, they worked to cover access to each with the thin wires.

For those that couldn't be set into an enclosed position, they used ropes. With all due care, Lorn tarred, sliced, and then nailed lengths of rope to the stone walls, hanging the remaining jars from each. Then, before packing everything away, Tellas and Lorn marked each with a small symbol made from ash.

And that was it. The job took the two team members near an hour and a half to complete, but when they exited, it was with a fully trapped cave at their rear.

They shook Fel awake and waved Horace over as they exited, tired but accomplished. It'd been an uneventful nest.

Fel, for his part, popped to his feet and immediately looked to Tellas.

"Ah! So... how'd it go?"

"Just as well as expected— we're all done here. I'm thinking that we'll come back in a few days to check the nest for stragglers and recover the gear, but there's nothing else to it."

Fel blinked. "No need to stick around, or to set anything off?"

Lorn snorted, then burst into a fit of coughing. He pounded at his chest as Tellas continued, shooting the older man a slightly worried look.

"No, they're set to go off after nightfall; it's one of the more common Skills of our class. Sticking around for when they trigger would be ill-advised, without a way to clear the nearby air."

Ah. That cleared up a few of the questions he'd been pondering over, actually. The ceramics held some sort of poison, then— likely aerosolized. The group's trigger Skill would — he assumed — release it when the griffins came back to roost for the night.

It was basic and straightforward as plans went, and he had little doubt that it worked, considering the group's obvious experience in the matter. Still, it was a bit anti-climatic as far as new experiences went. Not quite the hunt he'd been expecting, seeing as he'd napped through the majority of it.

That was probably for the best.

"Well then, off to another nest?"

"Ha! Gods no — not today at least. We've got another, what, five or six more of them?" Horace paused and looked over to Lorn for confirmation. The older man frowned and held up a hand, then slugged his teammate's arm.

"Don't hit me, I was right!" Horace slugged the man back. "There's none that we could get to today and still finish before nightfall. We'll just head down a ways and set up an early camp."

Fel nodded and waved out a hand.

"After you, then."

The four made camp beneath an overhang, near to the base of the mountain. The open side left a clear line of sight to the griffin's cave, while the rock maintained coverage directly above. A light wind swept through the space at an angle, but it remained manageable as a whole.

Looking skyward, Fel blew out a stream of air. The adventurers had gotten the majority of the camp set up in the time it'd taken him to make a pitstop further off. As it stood now, there were still a number of hours before sunset; he had some free time.

There was something he needed to check.

Finding himself a relatively flat area on the stone floor nearer to the rockface, Fel knelt, pressing a finger to the ground. 19% wasn't much, as far as his mana pool went, but it'd be enough for some light work. Plus, he hadn't yet had the opportunity to test his new Skill.

[Mana Engraving]

A blade of mana extended from the tip of Fel's index finger, and he pressed it into the ground. Flexing his wrist, he drew a circle into the stone, using the hand's joint as the shape's focal point. Technically speaking, it was bad form. Etching from the wrist was prone to mistakes and lopsidedness which could ruin a ritual before it'd even begun. With the assistance afforded to him by [Steady Hand], however, he couldn't really bring himself to care.

Fel extended the ritual from there, branching out a series of three equidistant lines which, for the moment, he left to hang. Two more loops were then added to the developing picture. Their sizes were less than half that of the original circle and connected to its edge, positioned opposite of each other and vertical to Fel's position.

Next came the environmental isolation portion. Moving back to the three lines from before, Fel connected their free-ends together, creating a triangular shape around the ritual as a whole. It would — as the name implied — isolate the activated ritual from light external interference, such as environmental mana or small airborne debris.

And finally, making sure to clear the rock from the spaces where the lines intersected, he dragged out a horseshoe-like loop to pierce through the isolation barrier twice over. The very end of its span distorted into a centralized point which nearly touched the toe of Fel's boot, and he needed to take a step backward to add the mana-intake that capped it.

But then, he was done. [Mana Engraving] shut off with his pool still at 17%.

Backing off a bit further, Fel observed his work. It looked, well, shoddy was the word. The Skill hadn't so much carved away the lines as it had simply melted the stone, sending it oozing out to the sides of the blade. The aesthetic results were questionable.

It would function — he was fully confident in that — it just didn't look as good as it might've. Still, it was a better look for the ritual than its more traditional form, and its flaws were a matter of workmanship, rather than design.

In its current shape, the ritual appeared similar to a wide-bladed triangular dagger, etched into the ground with three circles making up its spine. The 'hilt' was a single mana-limiting loop, interrupted at the end of its length by a caster's circle, imitating the end-cap for a grip.

Perhaps a bit poetic, if Fel were to give it some thought.

More importantly, however, he'd set it up in such a way as to emphasize mana-consumption efficiency. If it worked, the ritual wouldn't take his entire pool when he cast it, allowing him to stick around to see the results. A somewhat necessary change.

The tradeoff would be some additional source material, but Fel had a handle on that.

Stepping over the lines and kneeling again, he positioned his hand over the primary circle and resummoned the mana blade. He paused, then sliced a light cut across his hand's width.

From there, Fel waited. He kept his hand extended until a puddle of blood about the size of his thumb had collected in the center of the circle. When it had, he stood, shook his hand loose, and began to double-check the ritual.

No other organic material in any of the circles? Check.

Carved lines free of loose rock and dirt? Check.

Mana limiter of appropriate size?

Fel paused at the last one and eyed the connection's mid-point.

He wasn't sure. The raised edge of the melted rock prevented an accurate read on the line's ground-level depth. It made measurement... difficult.

Wrinkling his nose, Fel scratched at his cheek and hummed. Normally, such an error would be cause for abandoning the circle. Without prior experience with this setup, and no working knowledge of how the edited design might fail, the risk higher than what was strictly acceptable.

On the other hand, how much did that matter?

Fel hesitated, clicked his tongue, then took a step back.

The mana limiter appeared fine for what he needed. The ritual was low power, running a high-efficiency design, and he'd be personally activating it. Taking a brief look around himself for any of the others, he confirmed that the space was clear. There truly wasn't any harm.

Fel pressed his uncut hand into the center of the caster's circle and began channeling mana into the lines. Small as it was, the ritual lit quickly. Pushed up the hilt and around the edges of the blade, the mana was then sucked inwards, towards the circles that lay in the ritual's center.

He felt a bit light-headed as his pool was drained.

The blood began to glow as the mana circled within the lines. Drop by drop it floated upwards, then disappeared. The drops reappeared not a second later within the smaller circle below, where they began to splatter against the ground.

Fel winced and continued channeling, mana deprivation only half the cause. He continued funneling his mana until each drop of blood had been processed, whereafter he fell backward onto the ground.

Each drop that had been separated had reappeared above the lower circle.

It still wasn't done.

Tiredly, Fel pulled himself upward to watch the ritual's end. As the lines' glow dissipated, and the flowing mana began to settle down, the blood that had gathered in the lower circle began to hum. It started slowly, before picking up in intensity. Then it began to burst apart.

Splattered droplet by splattered droplet, the blood exploded into sparks of blue, and Fel let out a sigh. His mana hovered at just under 2%, but this... this had been worth it. The information was more than worth the price.

Perhaps he'd known. The distortions that had wracked his body in his moments of death? The sudden, violent reactions to foreign mana he'd had with the mana potion and Tellas's band?

Mana-made objects had all sorts of problems. A mana-made body? He'd imagine the issues to be the same.

It was incredible — interesting, at the very least — but Fel couldn't muster up the energy to give it the thought it deserved.

Laying himself down again, Fel closed his eyes. He was done for the day— his head ached, his core ached, and he needed a rest. A quick nap. Another time.

Someone would wake him for the meal. Perhaps it was a poor point to stop, but for now, he was done.

Fel took another deep, tired sigh.

And darkness took him.

[Ritualist Class: Level 6!] [Simulacrum Class: Level 7!] [Skill gained: Mana Healing]