13.2 Lumber Jacking

Mayah gathered a bunch of trees with her storage wand leaving the clearing half again as large as it was prior. The deforested plot had deep holes where there were formerly trees.

“Okay, now that the leg is back to 100% it’s time to craft something new while we wait for the cat. I’m gonna enchant a tree grenade and see how it works.” She took a delivery parcel out and put a tree crystal in it, tossed it across the field and ran in the opposite direction. The tree blossomed out and fell to the ground with a thud.

“Now it’s time to get to work!!!” She rubbed her hands together in anticipation.

She put on her enchanter’s gear and strode over to the tree. She placed her hand on it and enchanted the tree. Or tried to. Her mana bottomed out, followed by her stamina. She sensed the mana trying to fill the tree and there wasn’t enough of it to accomplish the job.

This thing is about to blow.

She only had time to yell, “DUCK!!!” Before the inevitable happened.

Shards of wood pelted her and knocked her back as pieces of bark and hardwood drop upon her and flew everywhere.

“Wow!” she said as she laid there for a moment. That was until she was scooped up and smashed against a familiar bosom.

“Fluff!! Are you alright?”

Mayah pat Margaret on the back. “I’m okay Mags.”

“Are you sure? No concussions or debuffs?”

“Nope. Perfectly okay. Well, almost perfectly.”

They stood up and Mayah examined the tree. Her enchantment had destroyed a large chunk of the tree. The damage extended in a ragged circle, making both ends look like something had chewed them.

“I wonder…” she mumbled to herself. She waited for her mana and stamina to refill and went to the tip of the tree since it was smaller and pulled up her analyze tab. The half of a tree spun around until it locked in all the data. The tip of the tree was about fifteen-foot-long only the first twelve feet was trunk. It had a diameter of about a foot and a half at the bottom and about nine inches before it became the topmost limbs.

She outlined a long cylinder around just the core of the tree and held the tab open, overlaying it on the tree. She reached out to begin the enchantment when a hand spun her around.

“You’re not about to do THAT again, are you?” A stern-faced Margaret waggled a finger in her face.

“Yes, Mags I am. Not as poorly as I did last time though.”

“How’s that?”

“Well, I just figure out that my mana is limited to a certain volume of matter during an enchantment. So if I can contain the mana into that volume, I may have a chance of succeeding with the tree grenade.”

“How dangerous is that going to be?”

“Maybe,” Mayah answered with a shrug.

Margaret scowled at her.

Mayah had a very serious and deeply disturbing thought about her own mortality.

If I die doing this Grax and I won’t be able to stay in the dungeon.

As nonchalantly as she could Mayah said, “Hey Mags, let’s add you back to the party.” She then sent Mags a party invite.

“You forgot to add me back to the party. And what would have happened I you had died?”

“You would have been here alone.”

“Until Grax respawned.”

Mayah looked away.

“You mean alone alone?”

Mayah cowed as Margaret's voice raised.

“Yeah…”

Margaret accepted the invite hurriedly.

“Young lady… what would have happened if I had died during Deanna’s attack.

“You’d have been kicked out of the dungeon.”

“By myself?”

Mayah nodded guiltily

Margaret’s scowl deepened. “Wait till I tell Grax.”

“C’mon, I didn’t die. You didn’t die. No harm no foul, right?”

“As much as you hold us to a higher standard there is no way you can dodge this one. You shall be subject to the full Grax inquiry as punishment.”

Mayah whined painfully, “Mmmmmm…. Yes, Ma’am.”

“Now that the punishment fits the crime. Do you really think you can make the tree grenades work?”

“I was about to find out with this test.”

“Well, I’ll let you get back to it. Stay safe, dear.”

“Doing my best.”

Margaret gave her a smile. And Mayah turned back to what she was doing.

She overlaid her analysis of the tree back in place and focused on her cylinder. She went to the broken end of the tree as the cylinder went up the center of the tree and was only accessible there. She touched it with one finger, took a deep breath, and began her enchantment. As the mana flowed forth, the tree tried to drink up all of her mana, but she forcefully tried to throttle it back. The flow slowed down considerably and she attempted to slow it down even further. It soon turned into a trickle of magic that held it from dropping over 30 points every second. This, in turn, allowed her to add her regen into the equation as every second she would add almost 17 points of mana. She was using only 13 mana per second. As her mana flowed, she examined its path and analyze kicked in showing her the routes that mana was flowing. She focused on the cylinder and pulled in the excess mana that had traveled out to the leaves, limbs, and surface of the trunk. It began to collect towards the cylinder and her mana was still at one quarter and dropping much slower than any enchantment before. With a burst of willpower, she forced the mana to compress into the cylinder and she still had mana left. She let the excess mana leak from the cylinder evenly filling the wood and permeating the fibers. When she was down to 5% she thought grenade and the enchantment ended.

Ding!!!

Enchantment Level 9

Infuse an object with your mana creating a new item by altering its base structures. Properties and qualities of enchanted objects will vary with the amount of mana used and the quality of the object. At higher levels, you can use mana from external sources. The amount of mana will depend on the enchanter’s level and the level of enchantment placed upon objects. Objects created with mana from external sources may retain some traits of the external source.

Cost 100 mana

- 92% Chance that failed enchantment will destroy any objects involved.

- 8% Chance that the enchanted object will retain two or more of the external object’s properties.

You have received 15 skill tree points. You have 78 unspent skill tree points

DING!!!

You have upgraded the enchantment skill:

Mana Control 2

You have gained a basic understanding of how to form and shape mana. This allows you to visualize the flows of mana you produce while enchanting. You will have greater control over size shape and density of mana you can project. Denser manas will be easier to handle and the rarer or less dense manas will be easier to coalesce into manageable densities.

All mana usage costs 12% less.

For upgrading the Mana Control enchantment skill tree without a trainer or unlocking its prerequisites, you have received 50 skill tree points.

You have 128 skill tree points remaining.

DING!!!!

Enchanted Grenadier Level 6

Shaped Charges? Oh yeah!!! Shaped charges.

You can now shape the areas that will explode within an object. Creating focused blasts that will produce more shrapnel and physical damage.

Grenade will deal physical damage based on the type of material used and magical damage based on the type of spell you use. You will be able to better determine the level and the fuse of the grenade in higher levels. Damage will rise in higher levels.

Fuse length: Adjustable (2-10 seconds from activation)

Cost:

85MP

Damage:

60DP/per cubic inch

Chance of stun:

35%

Chance of temporary blindness

35%

DING!!!

You have Created a New Item

Name:

Tree Grenade

Type:

Shrapnel Grenade

Energy:

2,256 (12 per cubic inch)

Enchantment:

Grenade

Grade:

D (Unique)

Material:

Wood

Weight:

572 lbs.

Damage:

50 blunt trauma/60 explosion and shrapnel

Range:

10 Foot diameter (The farther from the explosion the target is the lower the damage will be.)

Durability:

70/70

Set fuse length (2-10) seconds. Default is set at 2 seconds

Y/N?

Activate Grenade

Y/N?

For creating new items in Majesta

50XP (bonus)

Ding!!!

Level Up

Pretty Princess Cuddle Fluff

Level 23

13544XP till next level

You have 2 unassigned Stat points and 4 unassigned Attribute points to assign.

Mayah did a little dance and assigned her stat and attribute points.

2 points to mana, 2 points to intelligence… She paused for a moment thinking about how mana control had kicked in. If my regen is high enough to overcome the draw of the enchantment, I can literally fill things with mana even if I have less mana than the enchantment needs. I still can’t stop pushing my HP regen though, so I’ll alternate between endurance and constitution every level. This time endurance gets it.

She added 3 points to intelligence and 1point to endurance and examined the short version of her sheet.

Name:

Pretty Princess Cuddle Fluff

Race:

Princess

Alignment:

Chaotic Neutral

Title(s)

High Empress of the Pie Mountains, Enchanted Seamstress, Enchanted Grenadier, Enchanted Armorer

Raider Mark(s)

Imps of Avarice

Class Skill:

Engineer

Class Skill Points

Specialization:

Runes

25

Level:

23

XP:

13,544/13,553

Hp:

1926

Regen:

20.55HP

per minute

Stats

Strength

23 (+10% Equip Bonus)

Max. lift:

177 +17lbs

Mana:

49

Mana pool:

1470

MP Regen:

20.07 per sec.

Stamina:

39 (base 37 +2 equip bonus)

Depletion rate at max effort:

.33SP

per sec.

Regen:

37.83 per min.

Attributes

Bonuses

Constitution:

26 (Base 22)

+15%

Endurance

27 (Base 23)

+21%

Intelligence

54 (Base 43)

+28%

Presence:

19 (Base 16)

+21%

Perception:

14 (Base 12)

+27%

Agility:

12 (base 19+1 equip)

+17%

Her HP was climbing nicely and her regen across the board was rising drastically. She would fully regenerate her health in 93 minutes. And her stamina regen was almost infinite at this point.

I’ll be able to stop adding to endurance and constitution soon. And I’ll be able to focus on Mana for what I want. I may be a bit of a glass cannon in higher levels but I’m sure I’ll figure out how to fix that by then.

She gave her chart a satisfied nod and turned back to the tree grenade and looked at the information.

Shrapnel grenade? Okay, if you say so. And I only added enough mana to get 12DP per cubic inch. I wonder if this is gonna pack enough punch to do what it needs to. She thought about it for a second. Only one way to find out.

She pulled out her storage wand, activated the grenade for 10 seconds and ran from the base of the tree up to the tip pulling the wand behind her with all the strength she had. She wondered if the tree would explode before she had it fully sealed. As she struggled, and the timer ticked down, she threw her mana into the wand, increasing the buzzing noise of the wand. The tree finally began to get sucked into the runiverse during the last five feet and she got it into the wand with 2 seconds to spare.

“Mass vs runeagram surface area. May have to do some experiments to determine how much energy I’m expending and what the best solution is.”

She walked over to Margaret. “Hey Mags, how’s the engraving going?”

Margaret looked up from her vise that had an arrow clamped in it on an arrow. “Pretty good. How is your tree grenade coming?”

“I was just coming to you to test that out.” She offered Mags the crystal.

“Where do you want it?”

“At least one hundred feet away from us.”

“I can do that.” She affixed the crystal to an arrow and launched it over the field. It struck and one second later a tree blossomed almost straight up. Before it could even fall flat, it exploded into shrapnel that flew out ten feet in every direction.

When the debris settled, they walked over and examined the tree. There were some parts of the tree trunk that were whole with pieces blown off of them. Towards the tip where it was the thinnest, the trunk was obliterated. Chunks as large as Mayah’s head lay strewn around along with large splinters and mulch.

“Well, I guess we don’t need to worry about firewood for a while.”

“Guess not. But it needs more bang.”

“You do love to make dangerous toys.

“Best toys to have in a dungeon, Mags.”

“I guess you’re right.”

“I’m gonna try this again. Thanks for the help out.”

“Anything for you, dear.”

Mayah tossed out another tree. About thirty-five feet tall with a base about two feet in diameter. She broke off one of the lower branches. It was about 9 inches in diameter at its base and tapered down to about 3 before completely branching out. It was about 9 feet long and activated her analyze on it.

Instead of a cylinder I’ll use a flexible rectangular prism one inch high and one inch wide and then I need to determine the length as I go. That’ll give me easy to judge cubic inches and help me calculate the damage.

Mayah activated her voice recorder and got ready to make a note.

“Ahem… Mana control experiment one. Can I slow down the flow of my mana to allow my regeneration rate to overcome the drain of my enchantment, thereby creating a bottomless well for me to access?

“Test one. I will attempt to create a flexible rectangular prism and try to reach my max storage capacity allowed by my enchanted grenadier ability. While I’m fairly certain that I could reach this capacity on smaller objects I am more interested in using my mana control to extend the time of the enchantment. That would allow me to reach the desired capacity in larger objects beyond my present capabilities.

“I will test to see what capacities I can reach and how much control I have over my mana during the enchantment.

“Step one I am building the prismatic shape into the limb of wood I am using for this experiment. Making sure that the volume is a whole number of cubic inches—for ease of calculation.

The prismatic shape is now 113 cubic inches in volume. To fill this space to the maximum of my capacity, I would need 6,780MP. My current Mana pool is only 1470MP which is roughly 21.68% of the needed mana to accomplish the job.

I am now beginning my enchantment and my mana is being pulled out extremely fast. I have managed to slow it down at the ¾ mark. I am focusing on lowering the draw from the object to let my regen pick up for the draw. Every second I can extend the enchantment will add 20MP to the final project. I am now down to the halfway point. Mana draw is down to roughly 30MP per second I have no instruments to judge this and am judging by the movement of my mana bar.

“It has taken another 10 seconds to get my mana bar to reach the one quarter mark and the mana draw is still steady at about 30MP per second. At this rate, the enchantment will end soon.

Mayah let her mana drop to five percent and then cut off her flow of mana with the thought grenade.

“I could hold the enchantment for roughly 100 seconds and the item information says I have imparted it with 3,112 energy. That’s only 27 energy per cubic inch. I hypothesize that if I can minimize the initial draw to match the slower draw of the enchantment that presents during my forced suppression of my mana flow that I should be able to impart up to 4,295 energy into the grenade.

“There are only three ways I am left to increase the amount of imparted energy. 1. Increase my mana pool a goal that I focus on every time I level. 2. Increase my regeneration rate to be higher than the 30MP per second draw I experience. 3. Reduce the draw through the use of skills abilities and any other means that I come across.

“This brings me to my final point. I need to find out what the mana draws are for different materials. Metal is definitely more mana intensive but I don’t have any large pieces of metal to experiment on so those tests will have to wait for later.

She ended her recording and sat with her thoughts.

At least now I know how much mana I can hope to imbue into something. But how do I stop flooding the object at first? It was always just push as much mana as I could into an object because I didn’t have any control and I needed to get it done as fast as possible. Now I’m getting up to the finesse levels and I need more info.

Now I’m really mad that I passed out last night I had so much work to do. Anyway, time to hit the forums for a bit.

I’ll read while I channel my mana into some trees.

…..

“That guy was giving off serious boss vibes. I thought we were gonna have to respawn,” Ziggs said flashing red and yellow.

“Me too, trashbot. Me, too. And that brings me to this point. Booms how do you manage to find a quest everywhere we go?”

“I just listen. That guy felt like we were stealing his time, and then I thought what if tried to pay him back.”

“And you did all of that without needing a new change of shorts?” Ziggs asked.

“I figured it was worth a shot. New shorts or not.”

“Well now, that we’ve gotten breakfast and a few supplies what should we do? Gummish said they’d be back around eleven.”

“Maybe we do like Taur said and go to the library.”

“That… That actually makes sense.” Mephi said

“And let’s pick up a map of Drahtspule, so we don’t get lost,” Ziggs added

“That makes even more sense. This city is humongous.”

Mo went to the closest vendor in the marketplace and asked for the nearest place they could get a map. The vendor gave them directions to a store about a five-minute walk away and said, “It says something family maps. The name slips my mind at the moment.”

They followed the directions and found themselves standing in front of Crassel’s Family Mapmaking. In a smaller text right below, it said for all of your cartography and surveying needs.

“Does anyone else think it’s weird that this shop is owned by the Crassel family?”

“Do you think it’s the same Crassel?”

“It might be. But let’s make sure we get what we need before we mention it.”

“Why?”

“In case Crassel’s personal reputation is in the doghouse. No need paying more for something just because we’re guilty by association.”

“Man, you sure can make sense sometimes.” Mephi slapped him on the back.

“Why do I have the feeling that you’re milking me for gaming techniques?”

“Man, you sure a keen intuition there, bud. One day you may even be a real boy.” Mephi slapped him on the back again.

“You too, Ziggs?”

“I’m a lady. We always pay attention to what’s going on around us. In case we need to, ya know, pull somebody's file and read them the riot act.”

“Awesome,” Mo groaned. “Let’s go get us a map.”

They walked through the door making the tiny wind chimes ring, alerting the owner who yelled, “I’ll be right there.”

A woman about thirty years old or so came out front covered in an apron that had multicolored ink smudges on it. She was wiping her hands off and threw the rag behind the counter before walking out to greet them.

“G’day there, welcome to Crassel’s family maps how may I help you?”

“We were looking for some maps.”

“Well, we definitely have those. Would you like to be more specific?”

“To start a map of Drahtspule,” Mo said.

“Maybe a map of dungeons and places to level?” Ziggs added.

“And add some places to get other types of resources as well,” Mephi added.

“Ah, now we have an idea of what you want. I can provide a map with ten levels of accuracy for certain qualities. A level one street map will get you literally the streets and will miss alleys and walkways and anything else. No buildings, no markers, or any other available data. A level ten map will give you a map with multi-angle views, as seen on our most recent surveys. Those happen every three months or so, so the information is very current. You can add a map of the sewer and the map will take on a three-dimensional aspect showing you the heights and depths of the surrounding land.

“There are services that I can add to your map allowing them to add any data you find. And if you do find something and bring it back to us, we will pay you handsomely for it. There are services that update your map with crime reports and monster attacks.

“The cost mainly comes down to what size map you want, how detailed you want it, and what services you want added to your map.”

“And how do these maps update?”

“Well, you either stop at the local information broker and pay a nominal fee per service. You come to a local mapmaker, such as myself, and again you would have to pay the fee. Unless we work out a deal. Or for the very rich you get a service that will self update the map. Those services update anywhere from monthly to hourly depending on how much you pay.”

“Okay, let’s start with Drahtspule and the surrounding countryside.”

“For the level one map that would be 70 silver. It goes one hundred miles from city center.”

“How much for the level 10 map?”

“3 gold 10 silver.”

“Okay, we’ll start there. what other features can we add besides the sewers?”

“Besides sewers, we have the rogues map. That one is a bit more dated as they change as soon as we publish them and it’s harder to get the new one until a criminal gets captured and shares the map for leniency. It has over-roof travel ways some underground and sewer paths. It’s nice to have in case you get into a bit of trouble. We also have trade maps. Those are maps specialized for each trade showing hotspots for their activities.

“For instance, the alchemist’s map shows all the alchemist guild, the alchemist’s shops, and alchemist’s supply shops in the city. And it also shows places in the countryside where you can find certain plants and ingredients.”

“Do you have a trade, booms?” Ziggs asked.

“Not I. what about you two?” Mo asked.

“Wait a minute,” Ziggs said turning to the saleswoman. “Do you have maps for certain class skills?”

“I most certainly do. I’m assuming that you all are paladins due to your odd appearance?” The trio nodded. “So far very few maps for the new class skills have arrived. But if you find any information and will swear an oath that you haven’t sold it to anyone else first, I’ll pay top dollar for your map information.”

DING!!!

You have been offered a quest:

The cartographer’s need

The Cartographer and Map maker Stella Crassel would like to bring her your Class Skill specific map information. As Paladins arrive in Majesta information about their new and exotic class skills is limited. Stella wants you to bring her the information first.

Time limit: No time limit

Rewards: Better than average payment for your map information

Failure: If someone has already sold Stella the information you attempt to sell her. Or you have sold the information to someone before Stella.

Do you accept?

Y/N?

Mo accepted the quest and said, “So, from the quest I just received, I’m guessing your name is Stella?”

“Yes, it is, Stella Crassel. Pleasure to meet you all.” She shook everyone’s hands warmly except for Ziggs who didn’t show her a hand.

“I’m Booms. This is Mephi and Ziggs. So let’s get back to the business at hand.”

“Yes, yes, lets.”

“I want to know if we’ll be able to share this map?”

“Maps are singular items. It someone in the party has a map they can share it with the party. If the party member leaves the party, then they will only retain their own personal map. If the person who leaves the party is the map holder, then the map goes with them.”

“That is good to know. In that case, I will be buying my own map.”

“So will I,” Ziggs chimed in.

“Well, I guess I am too, then,” Mephi said with a chuckle.

Stella went back behind the counter and pulled out three sheets of paper. “Let’s begin with a map for Booms and if either of you wants features that we talk about let me know and I’ll make a mark on your map order. Sound good?”

“Works for me,” Ziggs answered.

“Same here,” Mephi replied.

…..

Mayah Had decided that using whole trees for grenades was beyond her at this point, but she was practicing another skill. Splitting trees. She was enchanting a cross-section of the tree and then turning it into a grenade. She would activate the grenade and then use the explosion to make smaller sections of tree. Which she would enchant as grenades, in turn.

She had six-foot logs laying all over the place waiting to be enchanted and was making more by the minute. She was mumbling to herself as she worked.

“I wish analyze could calculate volume so I could know exactly how much mana I would need to dump into each enchantment. Each tree is a completely different circumference and not being able to tell is killing me.”

She was analyzing as she worked creating a cross-section in the wood and filling with what she hopes was the correct amount of mana to make the tree split cleanly. So far, she had erred on both sides of that equation.

“Too much mana and the ends explode with shrapnel. Not enough mana and the tree doesn’t completely separate and I have to do it again. Too thin of a cross-section and it doesn’t pack the punch it needs unless I add too much mana and then shrapnel. To wide a cross-section and it doesn’t have the power to break evenly.”

At this moment she was trying the narrowest cross-section she could because she felt that was where her answer lay. She imbued the enchantment and then thought grenade. She set the timer to 10 seconds and walked away. After a muffled whoomph sound she walked back to find that the edges though not flat were much smoother than before.

“Okay, I’m getting there. That initial rush of mana is still making it hard to judge my mana flow. What if I start the enchantment before I touch the wood? Will that work?”

Her brow furrowed. She moved to a new section of tree, analyzed and set her zone, as she’d begun calling it. She activated her enchantment. And nothing happened. She moved her finger closer and tried again. Nothing.

She moved her finger closer and felt a tingling as she cast enchantment. Her mana started to drop but extremely slowly. She held her finger there willing her mana into the log. And her stamina started dropping as well.

Wha..?

She continued willing the mana to shape into the disk in the tree and then felt a resistance. She thought grenade and stopped her enchantment.

DING!!!

You have learned the enchantment skill:

Mana Projection

You have learned that the basic nature of mana isn’t based in touch. Mana flows all around us and can be projected outside of your body. You will now be more aware of and be able to control exterior flows of mana near your person. Your sensitivity and control using your own mana has increased.

Sensitivity:

15%

Projection range:

6 inches

For learning the Mana projection enchantment skill tree without a trainer or unlocking its prerequisites, you have received 50 skill tree points.

You have 178 skill tree points remaining.

“Well, I’ll be.”

She opened up her Skill Tree tab to see if she could upgrade it but it sat at a dead end.

“Shaz. Looks like I’ll have to level this the hard way.” She sniffed. “Still totally worth it.”

She touched the tree and activated the grenade for 10 seconds and walked away. It whoomphed and she went back to examine the almost clean cut.

“YES!!!” She did a little victory dance and moonwalking and spinning with a dab finale for good measure. “I’m doing it so good,” She sang. And made a few more sections with her new technique. Feeling the resistance she cut the enchantment she’d think grenade and cut the flow. Each time was almost perfect.

“Now that I got that down it’s time to figure out the mana rate I channel at so I can up the total amount of mana in the enchantment. And then we’ll move on to which shape gives the most bang for the buck. Small condensed shaped enchantment or overall enchantment.”

Step One What happens when I move outside of the projection field during an enchantment? She found a log that was about the size of her torso and began projecting her man into it. Then she snatched her hand back, stopping the flow. A small section of the log that was imbued with mana exploded, leaving a pockmark on the log.

Okay, now we know what happens when I do that.

She began projecting her mana into the log again and watching her mana bar it was taking about 27 mana per second.

Not as good as I’d hoped but I’ll take anything at this point.

She stopped the enchantment and moved on to the next phase.

She found two logs that were roughly the same weight and did her slow enchantment for the first one. which drained her stamina roughly 1MP for every 100MP she imbued into the wood. For two minutes and twenty-six seconds she held her hand two inches away from the wood. After that, her stamina was drained down to her last point, and she placed her hand on the wood to watch her mana drain at the normal 30MP per second. For another fifty seconds she held her hand there and then thought grenade.

She ID’d the grenade and found it had 5,404 energy.

That’s even better than my previous calculations of 4,295 energy. It’s still not enough for a whole tree but I’m liking the way this is going, even though it does take a long time.

She went to the second tree and repeated the process using the central cylinder method. She received the same results for both give or take a few energy points. They both had a 50-foot diameter blast zone that Mayah was loving.

“I guess it’s because there’s more energy concentrated in a smaller piece of material.”

She activated each fuse for ten seconds and placed them into the runiverse, one at a time, of course. She marked the one with the cylinder with some ink because they both identified as tree grenade and then she strode over to Margaret.

“I was wondering when you were going to come show me something,” Margaret said looking up from her work.

“Well, since we’re waiting for the cat again, I figured I’d get some work done.”

“What were you working on?”

“Fine tuning my mana control. It was maddening, but it led to something good so I’m okay with that.” She held out the two crystals. “Which one do you want to try first?”

“Which one do you suggest?”

“That’s like asking, which child is your favorite.”

“Every parent has their favorite, but they just won’t tell you that.”

Mayah grimaced at Margaret while the grandmother just smiled innocently.

“Fine, let’s go with this one first. It’ll make a better baseline.” She handed Margaret the unmarked crystal.

“See I knew you could pick your favorite.”

“I’m not sure about that yet. It could turn out to be a dud.”

“Same with your favorite child.” Margaret smiled innocently at Mayah.

“Get going, lady. I’ve got work to do.”

Margaret chuckled and strapped the crystal to the delivery arrow.

“How far downrange?”

“A little further than last time. This one has some oomph to it. Matter of fact, drop it in between some trees so we can see what kind of damage it does to the surrounding area.”

Margaret aimed and fired. The arrow landed between two trees at the edge of the clearing and the log bloomed back into reality. It sat for 4 seconds and then went off with a crack that made Mayah and Margaret duck their heads and check the skies. The trees surrounding the blast zone were swaying wildly from the concussion and a cloud of splinters and debris was still falling to the ground.

“You weren’t kidding about oomph!”

“I guess I wasn’t. Okay next.” She handed Margaret the marked crystal. “Put it far enough away from the first one that we can examine both scenes independently.”

“You got it, boss.” Margaret chuckled again and nocked the arrow. It flew across the field landing in between a group of trees and a log appeared from nowhere and sat for a few moments in which Mayah and Margaret covered their ears. They still felt the boom in their chests as one tree toppled over instantly and it left another leaning precariously. The last tree had a giant gouge taken out of the trunk and might fall over if it didn’t stop swaying soon.

“Well, I’ll be. What did you put in those logs?”

“5,404 points of mana.”

“How did you get so much?”

“It’s because I’m so intelligent.”

Margaret stared at her stone-faced.

“No, really. I swear it. Hand to God.” She raised a hand to the sky.

Margaret’s face didn’t change.

“Look Mags it’s because I have 43 points in intelligence along with bonuses it shows up as 54 on my sheet. My Mana regen is sickening. Full regen, from 0 to 1470, in 1 minute and 13 seconds.

“That fast?”

“Yep! What’s your highest stat?”

“Perception.”

“Why?”

“It helps with my aim.”

Mayah nodded.

“What’s next?”

“Agility.”

“Why?”

“Because it helps me nock and draw faster and avoid being hit.”

“And after that?”

“Constitution and endurance.”

“If you had more intelligence, you’d be able to shoot more shadow lightning. And resurrection doll would probably level faster. Which brings me to my final point. You really need to be using life drain.”

Margaret hung her head.

“Don’t be sad, cast it. It’ll help keep us alive.

“I guess that means I need more mana, too.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I have to drop a doll in order to cast life drain.”

“Oh Mags, oh Mags oh Mags. You poor unfortunate soul. So sad, so noob.” Mayah stroked her back. “Anyway, ready to check out the damage we did?”

They walked across the field and found the scene covered in mulch. Besides some forearm sized kindling, there wasn’t much left.

“I would hate to be next to that when it went off.”

Mayah knelt down and examined the sawdust letting the powdery wood fall through her fingers. “I wonder what would happen if I added a few Over (F) runes.” She mumbled to herself.

She stood up, looked over the scene and noticed the bark blown off of the trees facing the explosion. The damage to the wood underneath was minimal. She rolled that over in her mind.

“Next site.”

“Right behind you, dear.”

They walked over to the other explosion. Cords of wood lay thrown about like someone set off a bomb under a Pile of firewood. Mayah instantly noticed the multiple impact marks on the tree trunks. The tree that hadn’t fallen over was hanging on by a literal thread.

“Eyes up Mags. This tree is scaring me. I’m gonna take it down before it takes us out.”

She wrapped her runeagram ribbon around it. And pulled it into the runiverse, and Mayah relaxed.

“Okay Mags, what do you see?”

“A whole lot of destruction.”

“Correct. But what makes this explosion site different from the other one?”

“The other site had smaller pieces of wood that were pretty evenly spaced as far as coverage goes. This one looks like a bunch of cannonballs bounced through here.”

“Exactly! The first one gave us a nice concussive wave plus small shrapnel. It’s more of an anti-personnel grenade. Meaning it would work better on soft targets or anything with little to no armor. The second one doesn’t care if you have armor or not. It’ll rattle you like a bean in a tin can.”

“Interesting. So, which one are you going to focus on today?”

“Which one do you think will help us in Clacker’s alley the most?”

“Definitely the second one. Because you said we need crushing damage.”

“Right you are Maggy-Pie.”

“Maggy-pie? Really?”

Mayah shrugged.

“Well, that takes me back to me being a baby in bell-bottoms.”

The image of Margaret as a child wearing bell-bottoms flashed into Mayah’s mind. But it had Margaret doing John Travolta’s signature disco point. Mayah chuckled.

“My grandpa used to call me that name as a child.” Margaret let out a happy sigh. Then she wrapped Mayah in a warm embrace.

“What’s this for?” hugging her back.

“A thank you for helping me remember good times.” She smiled down at Mayah. “Now let’s get back to work so we can be ready for the cat when he gets here. It’s about 11 and I want to see these beauties in action. Also, they’ll scare the cat silly if we surprise him.”

“Good idea Mags.”

“Okay, where are you on engraving arrows?”

“I think I’m about good.”

“Wanna work on the stamps?”

“I don’t see why not. You’ll be able to enchant them after the logs of doom.”

“Yes, I will. Mwhahahahaha…. Mawahahahahaha…”

Margaret just chuckled at the sinister scientist.

…..

“Finally, you’re here!!!”

Grax fully materialized by the portal stone. “Sorry you know my pod gets here tomorrow and I’ll be in all week. Mom got all clingy. Since I’d be there, but I wouldn’t be there. The only reason I even made it back in is she has a conference call for work. She would’ve made me watch some sappy film with her and I would’ve been bored out of my mind.”

“Okay, I can understand that. I might still give you guff about it. But I understand.”

“Thanks, Fluff. Hey, Mags. Now that I’m here what’s the plan?”

They stared at Grax and then, in unison, all three of them pointed at the cave entrance and chanted. “We go that way and kill things. Wash, rinse, repeat.”

“So in the good news department, I don’t have to log out till breakfast. That should be close to two days in-game with no interruptions, and then I’ll be in it to win it.”

“Now that is good news. So let’s check in and make sure we have everything in case we get railroaded into another dungeon.”

“Good idea.”

“Mags where are you with arrows?”

“I’ve just about doubled the amount of delivery arrows I’ve started with. And I get arrows back when I loot downed mobs so I’m doing pretty good.”

“And you still have the whip?”

“Sure do.”

“Grax how are you on stilettos?”

“Getting on the low side.”

Mayah huffed.

“I know, I know, but I’m here now.”

“Anything else you need?”

“Nope, just throwing knives.”

And we’re pretty flush with grenades. I still wish we had more crushing damage for the boneheads.” She snapped her fingers. “Idea!”

Pulling out a piece of paper, she drew the rune for twain on it. She enchanted it and then pulled out happiness giving it a quick kiss. Then she activated the rune and a stone copy of happiness appeared in her off-hand. She tossed it to Grax who fumbled to catch it.

He swung it around his head fairly easily. Even though that was closer to knee cap level.

“I’m the knee-capitator!!!”

Mayah laughed. “Would those help you out at all? They are literally just earthen hammers. Slap it against the ground a few times and you’ll see what I mean.”

Grax did as ordered. “Wow, that’s pretty flimsy.”

“But I could give you a couple hundred of them.” She said smugly.

“Sold to el Gato Destrucción!”

“Awesome. Mags can you help destruction cat with stilettos and I’ll pump out hammers for both of you and well leave in about half an hour?”

“Sounds wonderful to me, dear.”

Mayah put her hand out palm down. “Bring it in, gang.” When the others put their hands in the chant began.

“Fluff ‘em up, Cut ‘em up, Raise ‘em up!!! GiiiiiiiiiiiiT GUD!!!!”