A large thud of Andy’s weighted chain came crashing down besides Zach. Swiping the screen close Zach looked over at Andy to see him wrapping his chains back up his arms. He wore a frown on his face as he walked over to them. “James…. James look at me!” James black mop of hair snapped as he looked up at Andy’s wrinkled face. “Cast your healing spell! Alexa, pick up your broken shield! Zach what do you think you were doing staring at your reward screen while additional rabbits around!” Furious Zach quickly moved to Andy and punched him in the face. It probably would have been a lot more effective if Zach had increased his strength and that Andy wasn’t carved out of the stone of the earth. So as his knuckles hit Andy square in the jar, the pain that erupted from his hand as his knuckles split and he heard a pop in one of his fingers, he was pretty sure that he had done something stupid. Andy’s frown deepen, he looked over to James and Alexa and shouted, “Go on back to the village! Now! Move it!” Zach’s two party members quickly ran back to the village as he stood there holding his hand. “Well Zach, seems like you have something to say. So are you going to say it or act like a child?” Gritting his teeth, Zach looked up at Andy and spoke his mind. “What the fuck was that?! You nearly got us killed, Asshole! Your daughter was part of our group and that rabbit put a hole in her the size of my thumb! I can’t believe you risked her life?!” Andy took a moment staring at Zach. “My daughter is one of two reasons I give a shit about anyone or anything. So let me be clear, you ever question my love for my daughter again and I will break your arms and legs, have you healed, and do it again. You get the one pass because you have no idea what it is like to be a father. My daughter choose to be fighter instead of a mage like her mother. It was one of the proudest and horrifying day of my life. In order for her to survive as a fighter; she must know pain, fear, and hate. All those things that make a fighter great I was supposed to keep her safe from as a father. So I had a choice, I could refuse to teacher her how to fight and let her risk her life and mind, or I could accept my daughters choice and teach her with respect for the woman she wanted to become.” Andy gave Zach a tired look, “I marched you lot out here so that you could face a rabbit together. Yes, you just had your first weapon lesson, but James and Alexa had been practicing for months. I made sure to scare away any other rabbits as you fought off the one, and if you hadn’t been able to kill it, I would have stepped in. So tell me that you at least learned something from this!” Zach felt the throbbing pain in his hand, and choke back the curse that wanted to come out. “I… I learned that Alexa would follow my orders if I had a good idea.” Andy peaked up one eyebrow as if to ask if there was anything else. Zach grunting through a brief spike of pain spoke again, “I learned that James won’t run in a fight; that Alexa can fight through pain; and that we can work together.” Andy grabbed Zach’s hand and put pressure on the broken finger bone. Zach screamed as the bone snapped back into alignment, Andy took out a small gourd that had a cork stopper on it. Popping off the top Andy splash greenish glowing liquid on Zach’s hand and then told him to drink it. The stink that came from the gourd was overwhelming. Thinking it best to drink if fast like a shot, he took as much in his mouth as he could and shallowed. The taste of the potion was somewhere between fresh grass clippings, sweaty old workout clothes, and old onions, but as soon as it hit his stomach Zach felt a wave of energy burst out and then concentrate itself down into his hand. Zach let out a sigh of relief as the pain in his hand went away. Flexing his hand he looked up at Andy, “Go on, perhaps next time you can trust me. Now, I believe Milly is waiting.” Zach took off at a run seeing that Alexa and James had stayed just behind the ward stones waiting for him. The wound that Alexa had was now a hole the size of a pencil and James was casting once again to close it up. As for James, the severe cuts in his arms were already starting to close. “So what did my father say?” Alexa looked at Zach with a bit of defiance and perhaps… respect? “He said that we learned the most important lesson that we could have… that we can trust one another in a fight.” Zach looked at Alexa as her eyes got wide and she opened her mouth trying to find something to say. Thankfully, James interrupted the embarrassment his girlfriend was going through. “Perhaps, but I realized something… I am a coward.” The way James said it, made Zach feel as if James was ashamed but knew it in his heart. “When I saw that Horned Rabbit I was so afraid that I just froze. I couldn’t speak, hear, even move, and then I heard Alexa’s shield crack and I tried to cast Healing Aura on Alexa but… the words. I just tripped over them again and again. Alexa, I just kept thinking about what if you died.” Alexa gripped James face and kissed him, and it was at that point Zach realized he needed to leave. Quietly walking away from the two lovers as the sorted through their emotions Zach wondered about himself. He too had frozen for a moment, but then instead of fear… he felt anger at the idea of wasting his life, and so he fought. “Thanks by the way, Grim. I don’t know why I went back to stabbing the rabbit after seeing its soft underbelly.” Grim appeared as a small flame at the edge of his vision. “You were thinking that now you know how to hurt the rabbit you wanted to kill it, and thanks for the recognition.” As Zach continued to walk towards the small clearing with the tree that he had seen Alexa and James at yesterday. “Do you ever wonder as to what was their plan on why they installed a city core out here?” Grim asked. Zach stopped for a moment and turned towards Grim. “What are you getting at Grim? Maybe Andy and Milly were just trying to setup a small village to be free?” Grim snorted. “They could have done that without a City Core. No, a City Core can use mana to summon buildings or give golems instructions as how to build buildings. Yet they settled in a small area with a small mana node, not a ley line or major mana nexus, and they only brought with them a handful of weak families. They are working with the barest of resources.” Zach sighed, “What’s your point Grim?” Grim laughed, “I think they are simply hiding something. Maybe some of the families come from slaves, or maybe they are wanted by an alliance of City States, but for some reason they decided to forgo noble support and ranger maps. Nobles would have given them lumber, seeds, livestock, iron, and at least 20 families with more to come. Ranger maps would have told them key areas with Major Mana fonts, which would have fed the City Core enough mana to house everyone and create several needed buildings. So if they aren’t hiding anything, why not take those resources?” Zach stopped and looked at Grim again. “So why tell me now? You want me to turn these people in? You want me to run away to another town?” Grim’s flame turned blue for a moment and then spoke, “No, I think we need to become more powerful and truly reinforce this place.” Zach’s look of surprise must have been enough for Grim to continue. “Zach, Andy and Milly are decent folk, they care about the families working around them. By the Gods and Goddesses, no one in their right mind would have cared about some twig of a girl because to them it would have been an investment of power and time, but Milly choose to read Courtney's talents and placed value on the girl even before knew how powerful she could be. Call it a hunch or the pull of this place’s mana, but I think something is coming and just hiding this place isn’t going to be enough, so I think we need to help protect it.” “Well fucking great Grim! So basically a shit storm is coming and you have no idea when or how big. Your advice is to become more powerful. Ok great… let’s do that, I will just go to the free lessons that Milly is offering.” Zach shook his head thinking he couldn’t believe what Grim was talking about. There was nothing he could do. “Actually, there is something I think we can do. When I examined the quest to build a wall there were three different options on how to create it: Golems, Mana, or Materials. Mana, uses a set of mystical instructions to basically summon the wall. While Golems follow the same instructions, while the mana or materials are given to them. However, I have been absorbing your memories on Computer Programming and I think you might be able to improve on the instructions.” Grim said. Zach looked at him for a moment and spoke, “So magic and computer programming are one and the same?” Grim turned blue again before he spoke, “In some ways yes, in other ways no. The magical language in the core is based on a rune or symbol system that can changed based on the surrounding runes or where it’s placed in a diagram. So unlike computer code statement like 'Loop', which tell the program to do an operation again and again, a statement like 'Hold' in runic language can mean different things depending on what’s before and after. An example would be like "Hold Fire" meaning shape it in the air, unlike "Fire Hold' which would stop Fire mana from coming to the next operation. However, just like a computer language once the instructions are powered they run and produce a result. So I believe you and me can figure out where waste of mana is coming from and we can even improve the results. If we can… the Gods and Goddesses give out bonuses in Divine Points. Seems they hate actually writing instructions and the servants they had did it weren’t the best at the job.” All Zach could do was simply groan. It seemed like his new life would be filled with magic and combat during the day, but at night he was going to be back to his old life. Deciding he had enough of this conversation, he went off to the clearing to find Milly was sitting there meditating. Smiling he sat down waiting for Milly to finish with her meditation. Gently she opened her eyes and looked at Zach. “Ah Zach, welcome. I take it the fight with the Horned Rabbit was unexpected.” Milly slowly arranged the mana cores in front of Zach as he explained the fight and how James responded afterwards. The only thing he left out was the kiss between the two. Smiling Milly nodded at Zach response and sat quietly thinking, with a soft whisper she spoke a language that Zach didn’t understand. “Well, if I had my guess James and Alexa will be a little while, which will give us all a bit of time to talk.” Grim appeared in his small flame form besides Zach. “So let’s talk about magic skills before we get started. Zach, what skills did you and your companion pick?” Smiling at Milly because he was proud of him and Grims handiwork, Zach opened his character sheet and spoke, “Well, we purchased Golem Creation, Core Creation and Imprint Skill. However, I bought upgrades for Grim as well, Commune with Spirits and Contract Making.” Milly nodded and then asked for Grim to explain how each skill worked to Zach. Grim turned a shade of purple for a moment and then started talking. “The skill Golem Creation came with the knowledge on how to draw the ritual circle to combine the Elemental, Mana Core, Contract, and Golem Body. Once drawn, I can help Zach with focusing his mana. It also came with the understanding on how to connect the mana channels of imbue objects to the Mana Core so that the Golem body could move. Lastly, it came with the specific knowledge of how to imprint the contract bond on the Mana Core allowing the elemental control over the body. Additionally, the Imprint Skill allows Zach to focus on one of his other skills and Imprint its knowledge and existing mana channels into a Mana Core for the elemental to use.” “As far as the Skill Core Creation, at its most basic level Zach can take Mana from a core or take his own and form one. I know the ritual of creation and how to solidify Mana into a solid. As far as, my upgrades go, Communing with elemental spirits will allow me to get better contracts with elementals and even talk to ones that we have bound allowing us to upgrade them. We needed the upgrade of Contract Making to complete the ritual, so I know how to make a mana bond on intent to a Mana Core.” As Grim finished, Zach seemed proud at this moment of his key skills they at least fit together and he had the secret hope of a synergy bonus down the line. Milly nodded at Grim, “Excellent description Grim, now would you be so kind as to show Zach the skills I say: Arcane Inscription, Mana Manipulation, Mana Reinforcement, Mana Theory, Spell Imbuement, and Ward Construction.” As Milly said it blue screen appeared in front of Zach. Divine Store Item: Skill: Arcane Inscription Divine Store Cost: 10 DP Item Description: Purchasing this skill will give the person the ability to paint, chisel, or write mystic runes over an imbued item creating a separate magical effect layered over the existing one. Each level up to 25 will increases the amount of mana you can put into the effect without interfering with the object by 2 mana points. (Unlocked) With the Companion Bloodline this item can become an inherited skill for 5 DP. Divine Store Item: Skill: Mana Manipulation Divine Store Cost: 10 DP Item Description: Purchasing this skill will give the person the ability to focus the arcane energy of mana on the fly. Normally, a spell can’t be altered once casted, but with Mana Manipulation and focus that is no longer a problem. Each level up to 25 will increases the amount of mana you control and alter without vocal or hand gestures by 1 mana points. (Unlocked) With the Companion Bloodline this item can become an inherited skill for 5 DP. Divine Store Item: Skill: Mana Reinforcement Divine Store Cost: 10 DP Item Description: Purchasing this skill will give the person the ability to add additional mana to a spell to increase its effect before it blows up. Each level up to 25 will increases the amount of mana you can add by 2% of the spell cost. (Unlocked) With the Companion Bloodline this item can become an inherited skill for 5 DP. Divine Store Item: Skill: Mana Theory Divine Store Cost: 10 DP Item Description: Purchasing this skill will give the person insight into spells and the mystical language upon which they are built. Each level up to 25 will allow the user to perfectly understand 3 runes. (Unlocked) With the Companion Bloodline this item can become an inherited skill for 50 DP. Divine Store Item: Skill: Spell Imbuement Divine Store Cost: 10 DP Item Description: Purchasing this skill will allow the person to move mana channels in an object and place a known spell in it. Each level up to 25 will increases the amount of mana you place in an object by 2 mana points. (Unlocked) With the Companion Bloodline this item can become an inherited skill for 10 DP. Divine Store Item: Skill: Ward Construction Divine Store Cost: 10 DP Item Description: All beings have a natural ward they call their Aura. By purchasing this skill it will allow the person create layers on top of their aura to protect them against specific mana and outside forces. Level 1 will give the user one additional layer on their aura at a cost of 35 mana points. Each level up to 25 will increases the amount of mana you can place in the layer by 5 mana points. (Unlocked) With the Companion Bloodline this item can become an inherited skill for 5 DP. Looking at the skills then at Milly, all Zach could say was, “Well… Fork!” Somehow it just felt strange cursing in front of Milly, like cursing in front of your mother it was strangely inappropriate. Milly giggled at the curse and spoke, “Well, I don’t know if it’s that bad Zach. Most Magical Academies teach these skills as beginner courses, mainly because of their practical nature. If anything most Mages will only increase their skills in Mana Manipulation, Mana Reinforcement, and Ward Construction. The other three I have always felt were there for the academics. Though Mana Theory allows you to understand principals behind spells, cores, and a bunch of other things which helps increasing the spell mastery, but unless you get the skill up to Master level it really is just a support skill. As for Arcane Inscription and Spell Imbuement, well they are nice way to make a little bit of money or create personalize gear. However, I believe all these skills can be used by you to make you a better Artificer.” Milly raised her hand and spoke, “Inventory.” The space around her hands quickly distorted. Looking at the space, Zach saw fragments of images almost as if Milly was placing her hands into a thousand shards of a broken mirror. When she removed her hands, the distortion closed and she had three books with her. Placing the books in front of her next to the mana cores, she started by picking up the heaviest one first. The tome was bound in red leather and had silver stamped corner guards. Lettering had been tooled into the cover of the book in a circle with a large rune in the middle of it. “This book is about Mana Theory and will go over how to perform Reinforcement and Manipulation. This is not a Skill Book, but a manual for trying to obtain the skills. You will need to read it and understand its principals before you practice any of it. I would suggest you only practice its suggested techniques while I am near, but I remember all too well waiting to try something immediately. So I will give you a warning first… Never practice with destructive spells.” She placed the book on the grass in front of Grim. The second one was dyed blue leather and had an almost energy about it. A clear crystal was set in the middle of the cover with copper runes placed in a spiral pattern around it. “This manual will go over Arcane Inscription, Spell Imbuement and Ward Construction. Practice as much as you want with this, the worst that can happen is the mana you try to force in an object falls apart or explodes, and that should rarely happen. Sadly, you wouldn’t really be able to practice any of this without some Mana Manipulation or Spells.” Placing the book on top of the red one, she picked up the last book she had. The books cover was made from wood, and yet as Milly held it the wood seemed to give like a soft sponge. Small bits of moss seemed to be growing on its spine and red enamel paint showed the picture of a complex gear. “Ahhhh… lastly a Golem Manual. We were able to get this at a discount because the manual is actually a Golem. A life elemental was joined with the manual, part of its contract is that it will share its knowledge with you, as long as, you feed it a little life mana and share knowledge of Golem construction with it.” Placing the book down in front of Grim made him squeal like a little girl. The flame seemed to jump up and vanish into the book immediately. Milly smiled placing her hand on the cover of the book and stroking it gently. “I am glad it has brought Grim so much joy. When he is done conversing with the spirit could you please have him place the books into your inventory?” Zach nodded at Milly question. Taking Zach’s hands she sat quietly for a moment. “So you are attuned to Dark, Earth, and Life mana, but I get the sense you really don’t know what that means. So first I am going to height your attunement by sharing my own.” Slowly an energy began to leak from Milly’s hands into Zach’s. He felt a warm energy slowly going up his arms, making its way through his veins and tendons until it hit his heart. Calmly, Zach felt the dull thump thump of his heart as the warmth continued outward all over his body. When the warmth spread into his head, Zach began to feel a presence outside of him. Looking around he had no idea, where it was coming from until his eyes came across the willow tree. As wind rushed through the leaves, making the tree moved back and forth, Zach felt energy going up from the grown into its limbs. There was a sense of wonder as he realized that this energy wasn’t from the world, but a different plane. The tree had pierced through the veil that separated the realm of Life mana and this world, and just like the tree Zach could feel the veil almost inches from his face. It was like a blanket that was covering him, and all he had to do was reach past it and be there. Zach, knew that his hands couldn’t reach it, so something in his soul reached out and tried to get past the veil. As it did the energy that was coming from Milly slowly receded, and his perception of the Mana Realm of Life went away. A small tear came to Zach’s face as he thought about how close he was to passing through. Milly embraced him, as Zach came to grips with the feeling of lost. Rocking Zach gently back and forth Milly spoke, “Its ok Zach, don’t focus on the feeling and let it fade from your mind. I promise you that you will get there one day.” It was a few minutes of deep silence from Zach and Milly’s encouragement before the separated. Milly waited until she was sure that Zach was ready and then spoke. “Attunement, is being able to perceive the elemental realms. At the lowest levels of cultivation your attunement is like a slight hum or itch that is barely noticeable. As you raise in cultivation your attunement becomes better and eventually you can move past the barrier between realms. All beings are able to attune themselves to all elements, and this is best done before they advance in a level of an element. For instance I am attuned to all elements, but my greatest levels of cultivation are with Earth, Life, and Water. Eventually, as I cultivate more and more Life, my sense of it will drown out all other elements and I will eventually gain powerful control over Life spells.” “Every mage is based on several aspects. One is the amount of mana in their pool, this gauges how strong of a vessel their soul is and what it can wield. Think of it as magical strength, if you had a mana pool of thousand you could life tones of stone without breaking a sweat. The second aspect is their element cultivation rank and level. Each level have 10 ranks, and they progressively become harder and harder to obtain. An element cultivation level is about control, at level of earth initiate you can summon stone, but have no idea what type of stone you will get or be able to shape it. You can strengthen your body a little bit, but will become sick from the impurities of your summoning. The last aspect of a mage is their spell mastery, spells like mend are predetermined mana constructs that can be used with relative ease. They have a chant and gestures that let you summon mana into them without having to have a great deal of control. As your mastery of the spell raises, you don’t need to chant or gesture as much, until you can finally simply think about the spell and release its mana.” “These aspects really give measure to mages, because if someone has ten thousand mana and casts a spell that could destroy a city, they can still die if it takes them days to cast it. While its just as impressive for a mage to cast healing aura as quick as a blink of the eye, but if they can only do it twice then they are pretty useless.” Milly stopped talking and looked down at the Golem making book. Coughing politely she waited for a moment, and then rap her knuckles on the book. Slowly, Grim came back out from the book and took his place. “Grim, would you please take the books into your inventory so that Zach and I can continue.” With a flash Grim and the book disappeared. Milly told Zach to join her mana pool for the next part. Once again the darkness of the void greeted him. However, on his barren island there seemed to be a small medallion hanging in the air at the middle of his land. Slowly walking over to it, the medallion appeared to have a rune on one side and on the other a triangle with three pictures at its points. One of the picture looked to be a spool of thread and needle, below it to the right seemed to be a spider on a web, and the last one was appeared to have writing on a piece of paper. For a moment the medallion flashed bright and Zach almost reached for the bronze surface, but suddenly he stopped unsure of what it would do. Looking around Zach saw Milly’s great island in the void and willed the island to move towards Milly. However, as a few minutes pass Zach realized that nothing was happening. Sitting down he realized that Andy had never told him how to move the island around. Looking back up at the medallion, Zach wondered if this was the physical representation of the spell Mend. Zach’s curiosity kept coming back to haunt him. Why a medallion? Why the triangle? Why was it just hanging there? Looking back at Milly’s island he thought it was getting bigger, so Zach waited patiently. It took about half an hour before Milly’s mana pool softly bumped against Zach’s. Appearing out of the woods, Milly looked at Zach and then at the medallion. “Well, I am impressed. Most people try to take the talisman trail before I can ever get to them. So before you take your trail, how about we first form your golem.” “Yes, Milly I would much rather form my first golem then get the spell. What do we need to do?” Zach said. Milly smiled and called out into the void for Grim. A ghostlike child appeared besides Zach and smiled. Zach instantly knew it was Grim, the child looked to be blonde with a buzz cut so close to his scalp that it was almost invisible. Looking up at Zach with blue eyes and dimples in his cheeks, he motioned Zach to look at his clothes and Zach began to laugh at the stone wash blue jeans and black t-shirt with the lettering, ‘Binary. It’s as easy as 01, 10, 11!’ Milly looked at Grim and didn’t seem to notice the unusual clothing choice. “What’s so funny?” Milly said. Grim looked at Zach and whispered, “She only sees the light image of me.” Looking back towards Milly, he spoke, “Do you mind if I invite Sentos?” Milly shook her head and slowly a green mist began to arise on Zach’s island. The Green Mist began to take shape, it was about three and half feet tall with arms so long that they reached down to his shins. Green vines with red thorns began to move in the fog and form into limbs and a body. Leaves with a purple pattern grew out at odd intervals. It was the elementals face that caused Zach to shiver. Sentos had a face like a mountain lion, blood red thorns formed rows of teeth, roots came out like whiskers, and his eyes seem to glow with a green light. As it opened its mouth, a sound of leaves rustling in the wind came out and Grim nodded back to the Life Elemental. “Zach, this is Sentos the Life Elemental in the book. He extends greetings and wishes us well on forming of our first golem. He is also hoping that you cultivate your life mana some more so he doesn’t quite feel as out of place.” Zach bowed to the Elemental and went back to Milly. Milly looked at everyone and then spoke, “Very well Zach, on the ground before you picture a perfectly formed crystal without any color.” Zach focused on the ground thought of a diamond that had been in his mother’s wedding ring. Cut and polished, it showed with beautiful brilliance. “Now pick up the rock and dirt around the area you are focusing and squeeze as hard as you can.” Zach reached down into the dirt and gravel. Scooping it all up in his hands, Zach started to squeeze it all together like he was making a snowball. Grim came over to Zach and spoke, “Don’t just try to pack it together. Think about what kind of pressure your mothers diamond must have survived. Think about the pressure you felt right before a coding deadline. Think about the greatest pain you have ever felt and push it all into the dirt in your hands.” Zach felt everything that Grim was saying and pushed all those feelings into his hands. Over and over again the images floated into Zach’s mind as he tried compact the soil. Final’s for his university, he had studied for weeks and cramming as much information into his head. The dirt in his hands shrunk. There he stood asking Susan Rose out for the first and last time, sweating like a fool hoping against hope she would say yes. Zach felt the sharp gravel rocks break and his hands came closer. He remembered sitting at his first interview being asked questions about a thousand things that didn’t matter and him being three weeks behind on his student loans. A great thunderclap sounded and as Zach looked down in his hands, bits of dirt and rock fell from his hands, and yet there in the middle of his right hand was a diamond the size of a small pea. Everyone was clapping as Milly spoke, “Congratulations on your first mana core! Depending on what type of element you want for your first Golem, I might be able to summon some of the materials for you.”