Darkness turns to light as I open my eyes, everything in my room is either broken or nowhere to be found. Slowly, I get back on my feet, standing was never that hard... but I have to get up.

Feeling a lot of pain on my head, and not knowing the cause, I try to retrace my steps. There was an earthquake... and something hit my head… maybe I should call someone to take me to a doctor. Where is my cell phone? oh, right, beneath my bed... Grabbing the thing I immediately notice the red, dried blood on my face reflected on the phone screen.

I can't call anyone, the phone is not working… and the internet is out, something to do with the earthquake I bet. I gather my strength to go out to the corridor and ask a neighbor for help. Opening the door, I see the most disgusting thing I ever saw in my life. A mutilated person on the ground. limbs disconnected to the body, disturbing me. Nausea fills me and I feel the contents of my stomach going up my throat. I vomit, not being able to hold myself together against the sight. Close to the cadaver, an eldritch creature looked at me, Similar to a spider, but the size of a dog and 4 legs sustaining the bizarre body. The thing stares at me and I get back to my room quickly. The thing follows me and tries to jump in my direction, I get down and the thing flies through the window, splashing on the ground many meters below. I quickly close the door and…

I vomit again but in real life this time. A weird orange goo stands on the ground next to me. It's the fourth time I wake up to vomit. The only reason I am still kicking is the bleeding caused by the golem magic was cut out when he died, allowing the potion's effects to work again.

And now I am suffering from the side effects of drinking too much potion. I think I drank about 5 or 7 in a day…

My belly rumbles... how long was I asleep? I take a ration to eat, hoping I won't vomit this one too.

Sitting down, I take a deep breath, filling my lungs with air, and calming my mind. These dreams... they are memories from right after that eye in the sky, right? Or maybe they're just a product of my mind, being dreams and all that. It doesn't matter anyway, just the fact I survived is good enough.

♡20/96 Mind 30/75 ☆100/100 P•0/25 S•0/50

I am much healthier now but still in a bad shape. There is no way I can get back like this, my limbs feel weak and I am too vulnerable without my weapons charged. At least no creature came here, even with the exit open...

Alright, I did it. I fought a creature far stronger than me and survived another day, and got something out of it too, seeing my notifications.

◇Fighting is now level 9◇ ◇Fighting is now level 10◇ New effect: You get a mild idea of how much damage you will take when attacked. Precision increases with level. ◇Fighting is now level 11◇ ◇Staff Mastery is now level 6◇ ◇Battle Magic is now level 2◇ New resistance: Dark Magic 1% Electricity affinity is now 55% Arcane affinity is now 45% Time affinity is now 5%

All that just from one battle? I guess it was one hell of a fight after all. I have never been so close to death… Yet fighting both the monster and my own anxiety made me stronger.

But why am I doing all that? Risking myself like this… Do I want revenge? I wasn’t that close to the people of the village… Maybe I would revenge Skelones, maybe I crave justice, to right the world wrongs...

But some part of me just wants to fight, to survive, to become stronger and to fight again...

It does get easier with all the fights. I don't just freeze in front of danger or other problems, I face them now and I wasn't always like that. Becoming stronger also makes me feel less insecure, less afraid of dying from small things. I think I am not afraid of cockroaches anymore too, especially after fighting giant bugs and monsters of bone and stone.

With some effort, I stand up again. Slowly I walk through the cathedral. The marble floor is the only thing well preserved, all statues and walls have moss or plants coming out from cracks while vines hang from the ceiling. I search for some things of interest but all I find are a few metal urns and the broken sword. There might be something about it that might be useful. It was inside the golem after all.

SCANNING ARTIFACT Name: Wave blade (broken) Description: a sword made of a weak alloy. Runes made it capable of sending shockwaves through air and vibrations upon physical contact. Charges: 0/15 Lore: Someone came here before, trying to kill the golem by using vibrations inside it, yet, the person fell to the dark magic wounds and got absorbed by the monster.

That is a fate worse than death, one that could've happened to me if I had made one more wrong move…

I take what is left of the weapon and charge it for a while with the ring. Swinging it, a wave comes out just like with the guy I fought, but this one is unstable, dispersing after a few centimeters. What are the odds of finding just what I was looking for? well, there is a chance this may be a common enchantment, I can see it being a popular choice.

I want to study it later, I got some ideas and plenty of metals to work with.

♡40/96 Mind 40/75 ☆80/100 P•10/25 S•10/50

After charging my weapons some more and eating the fourth ration, I start going back to the hideout.

The way home is almost peaceful. I met a mantis but made quick work of it, shooting 3 arcane bolts, not wanting to risk delaying the fight as I am in no condition to do any heavy effort right now.

Lots of steps later, I am back.

The feeling of light from the glowing fungus in this part of the cave is pleasant as it hits the skin, almost like a sunset. It's also what makes here less cold than the rest of the cave. the moon-shaped river is singing a soothing melody of water hitting stone, making me want to stick into my bedroll for a long rest.

This is a beautiful view in contrast to the things I met at the dungeon. The place has grown on me, I might end up becoming a hermit after all.

Actually... I don't think I could. There is the risk of the Aesirite eventually finding their way here at any moment, so I need to be ready, always alert.

It's finally time for experiments. In Skelones notes, he mentions possible viable alternatives to steel that don't interfere with magic. The iron interference is noticeable, I tried to shoot an arcane missile while holding my iron pan, the result was chaotic. Sometimes it dispersed in the air, others, the bolt flew in random directions, and once, it exploded, damaging me a little. I tried it with the staff too and either harmless sparkles were sent out or explosions of lightning occurred, also damaging me in the process. I don't even want to think about how it would affect the bracelet of time skipping as I don't want to jump 400 years in the future or be erased from time itself.

Curiously, certain passive enchantments work fine on steel weapons and armor, such as weight, quickness, sharpness, durability, and so on.

I need armor and I have just the material for it.

The thing about bronze is that it's not as hard or tough as steel, also more malleable. It's hard to make a longsword out of bronze, but short blades are fine. Also, the gloves should be able to deal with the malleability issue as it can just push it back to shape or sharp it easily.

There are many alloys made of copper. Bronze is copper and tin, brass is copper and zinc. Stronger alloys would be aluminum copper and beryllium copper, the latter almost as good as a steel of good quality.

First, let's test some stuff.

Gloves on my hand, I form a plate of bronze with an uncharged myhrite in the center. I place it on a stone, get some distance, and shoot at it with my pistol. I wanted to see if the gem would absorb magic directed to it, but it didn't work, the bronze plate got a little damaged while the gem got no charge out of it. I shoot more bolts but still no effect, maybe I would need a spell absorption rune or something like that.

Well, the first experiment was a failure but I still have much to test. One thing to help someone learn a rune is to memorize its form, the markings of a rune are directly connected with the effect, so retaining the memory helps to absorb the true meaning of the runes.

I spent lots of hours trying to copy the symbol from the broken sword. The amount of effort I have to make to maintain the symbol in my memory is tremendous. It feels like my mind is blocking it or there is a barrier that I need to cross to access the rune. Little by little I copy parts of it on the notebook, taking hours to finish writing them down. After finishing the first copy, I feel faint energy from it, but nothing tangible. I stop to make a soup with the help of the wand of fire-starting and rest a little before trying it for the second time, which also took lots of hours. Just as I finish making the third copy, the page of the notebook starts vibrating and I pluck it out before any damage is done. I practice the rune as much as I could before falling asleep.

After waking, I don't lose much time, too excited about the experiments.

With the gloves, I take some condensed bronze and shape it into a blade of around 30 centimeters, with a few more for the handle, a gem of myhrite twice the size located on it. the bronze from the dungeon was not in the best state but luckily, the copper corrosion is mostly a superficial one, so I hadn't much trouble with it when condensing the metals back there.

After a while, a long dagger was made. Had I access to a smith, the result would be far better but I am happy with what I got. The metal has a dull shine in an old amber color as I inspect the two-edged dagger

Now, I need something to carve the rune on the dagger, a metal with superior hardness would do, but I don't have one of those, so I resort to a less than safe method.

With the dagger, I cut my finger to draw blood, dropping it on the vampire's knife and carving the rune on the bronze dagger, at the base of the blade, close to the handle. Carefully, I inscribe the marks with the vampiric blade, a red aura around it as I move the weapon slow and steady to forms the marks I memorized the day before. The hardest part is dealing with my tremulous hands caused by my anxiety, but taking moments to breathe diminished the shaking a little bit.

After a few hours of carving and some more drops of blood, the weapon it's done.

SCANNING ARTIFACT Name: Wave dagger of bronze Description: A bronze dagger capable of sending shockwaves Charges: 5/50

As I swing the dagger, a weak wave comes from it. Not nearly as strong as the one from the Aesirite. Time for the second step of the experiment.

I take some papers from the notebook and start drawing the arcane rune on it. This one had much less resistance, easier to memorize as my affinity with the arcane rune is higher. After some tests, I start inscribing it on the sword, on the opposite side of the wave rune.

SCANNING ARTIFACT Name: Dagger of Arcane wave (bronze) Description: A bronze dagger capable of sending shockwaves of pure arcane energy. Residual dark mana is found on it. Charges: 3/25

A success. Testing it with a swing, I feel arcane energy being released at the tip of the blade, a powerful purple wave in the shape of the swing coming out, flying through the air, going as far as a meter from the blade before dispersing it. I expected the color to be blue, but apparently, too much use of the dagger of vampire's fang to inscribing the runes caused some sort interference on the arcane rune. Inspecting it and comparing it to the arcane mark on the wand of the pistol, I confirm my suspicions as I notice a few differences in the markings. Also, the max charges halved, maybe some flaw in the process caused it.

With a grin on my face, I look at my creation. The excitement fills me with energy, the urge to go out and fight is there but I am not done yet. Time for the second dagger.

After some more long hours, I replicate the artifact. The effect this time got slightly stronger but barely noticeable. At least I got lots of skill levels after days of work

◇Arcane knowledge is now level 11◇ ◇Mana manipulation is now level 7◇ ◇Artifact crafting is now level 3◇ ◇Artifact crafting is now level 4◇ ◇Artifact crafting is now level 5◇ ◇Artifact crafting is now level 6◇ ◇Artifact crafting is now level 7◇ Wave affinity is now 30%◇ Arcane affinity is now 80%◇

I call it a day and rest some more.

Rubbing my eyes, I wake up with a big panel open in front of me, I try to wave my hands to close it while I am still sleepy, but the thing stays there. Not being able to make it go away even as I close my eyes, I decided to check what this is all about.

Through study, experimentation and dangerous exposure to the arcane, you attained some understanding of the runes that control magic and learned to make powerful Artifacts out of common materials Specialization unlocked: Artificer Artificers are a rare specialization capable of awakening the magic in objects. They were often used in wars, both supplying soldiers with gear and using it themselves. An Artifact used by an Artificer can be further enhanced, unlocking more of its potential. ◇+25% XP gain for skills related to crafting, knowledge or magic ◇+25% increase to rune affinity gain ◇+25% increase in the power of artifacts you use ◇You can make small alterations on runes when inscribing them, customizing the effect to an extent. (Aura, Bolt, Explosion) ◇Every Artifact you make have a max charge of 10 if you don't use a mana storage rune. ◇you can temporarily mark one object with a rune you know. This Ability lasts 1 minute and has a cooldown of 10 minutes. Accept? Yes No