Chapter 34: Enchanting

‘Rain batters the tower’ morning already. My only clue the clock on my desk; raining having blocked out the sunlight. ‘Looking out the window;’ I’m flabbergasted by the quantity of water pouring from the heavens. Finding Sling and Chic in the corner of my room, “It's just rain”. ‘Thunder’ “Alright maybe lightning to”

‘sigh’ calming my pets with my presence. I understand Chic; they used to live in a cave after all. but I am positive Sling just wants attention. After they relax notably, I go on with my day. I thoroughly doubt the rain will let up for a while. I watch the rain through my window for a while, appreciating the peace. Something about rain has always captured my attention. With nothing more to be done, I head to my Telepad; going to my room in town.

Allowing the dizziness to pass, finding my room untouched. They will be confused when they check the room; finding it completely clean. Looking out the window from my room, I see clear skies “no rain, freaky”.

Heading downstairs, I find very few people. Just some people sat around tables, talking quietly, and eating food. Some kind of sausage and bread. Finding the women, still rooted by a ball and chain to the same place.

“Good morning, sleep well,” she says before I can get a word in

“Yes, I slept well” Replying politely

“I’ll have the chef bring your breakfast out”

“Thanks” I reply lightly

Taking a seat at a table, the same meal is promptly brought over. This is when I realize I am wearing full Armor. ‘Looking around’ I see a not too small minority of people sitting, watching, and waiting for me to remove my helmet.

‘standing up’ I walk to the desk. “I am gone eat this in my room for privacy” I can see a smile creep up on her face.

“Damn and I wanted to see your face too” dramatically using sad body language with a smile on her face.

“Curiosity killed the cat,” I say as I walk away

I hear her murmur to herself “That’s an odd saying”

Finding myself back in my room, I remove my helmet. Quickly stuffing my face with a tasty sausage. A little grisly but the combination of spices and herbs was divine. Finding the meal satisfying; I head back downstairs to deposit my plate. Handing it to a short young fellow who quickly runs it into the back room.

Happy with the start to my morning I quickly head out. Naively leaving my Telepad in my room.

Unable to ignore the temptation, I use my spare key to head into his room. I just want to see what he's doing in here. I ant never heard a room so damn quiet in my life.

‘Entering his room’ “What in the nether is that” ‘looking deeply at the Telepad’. It has a name, Town room. What's this a list of different places, secret base, home, Magical Tree. Tapping the home button, I find myself suddenly pulled forward, dizzy from the sudden force. Falling over I find myself in a massive stone room. Machines buzzing in the background; “Shit, I best get outta here”

Quickly clicking the secret room button, I find myself inside a stone room, small wires popping up and a path. Curiosity burning, I follow the path I find a trapdoor leading right outside the town. “I need to tell the mayor about this” I ant ever seen anything like this.

Quickly heading back to my tavern, maybe I shouldn’t say anything. This is bigger than what I thought id find.

Walking hastily to the market. I find myself looking through a massive range of vegetables. I purchase a couple of everything, so I can grow them at home. I am especially interested in the melon I found. Rounding out my supply of vegetables I also buy feathers, a nice big pile of eggs, and some milk. I wonder if I throw these will a chicken spawn; yeah probably not. I’ll try and incubate the eggs instead.

Asking around I find the governmental building in charge of renting market stalls, buildings around the market; and buying property. Looking at the prices, renting goes up from stalls to shops to large multistorey shops. You can’t buy the buildings around the market. Sounds actually rather fair. I rent a market stall for the day; 13D let's find it I suppose.

Searching the market's empty stalls, I find each has the initials engraved on the side in bold. Each stall has a letter from A to D, based on the value of the stall. Ones with lots of foot traffic and larger stalls are A; D is the lowest foot traffic and smallest. Nothing to be done; not that rich yet.

Finding my stall, it's simply a box with 4 open counters around it, space under the counters to store things. Knowing I was doing this today I made carpenters garage doors, thin drop-down doors – perfect. Covering the 4 portions of the stall with the doors I close them. I place down an enchanting table. Placing blocks in front of it to obscure it from direct view from the counter facing the footpath.

I place a sigh in front, simply writing; simple enchants 2 silver each; bring your own weapon. Standing with one counter open I wait for customers. And wait, and wait; “So where are all my customers, ‘sigh’ it’s never easy is it.” Finally, after many hours a customer walks by, calling out “Hey sir, interested in a cheap enchant for that dagger on your waste, as my first customer il do it for 1 silver!”

“Yeah, and you totally won't steal my dagger” he sneers

“Yeah, like I spent 4 silvers for today to rent this stall to steal a 5-bronze dagger” face dropping slightly

Face frozen slightly “Fine screw it, you steal it though and I will throw you to the wolves; hear me!”

‘taking the dagger, I walk behind my stall. Quickly enchanting it with sharpness 1 and unbreaking 1 I return the dagger in hand.

“1 silver please” taking great pleasure in watching his surprised face

‘hands me 1 silver’ walking away mouth still open catching flies. That must have been the catalyst because after that I got a large number of people asking for enchants. I had to constantly eat essence berries to keep up. By the end of the day, I had sold upwards of 50 enchants, netting me 100 silver.

Just as I was closing up shop, a well-dressed man walks up.

“I want a high level enchant on my sword,” he says curtly

“Okay, but that will cost extra, how high?” I ask, not perturbed by his tone

Surprised by me not missing a beat “as high as you can”

“Very well I think 30 silver Is fair”

“This is robbery its 2 silver for a low level enchant” a vein throbbing on his forehead

“And the higher level enchants require far more experience” maintaining my stance

A short pause follows before he gives in “Here, best be good”

He hands me a large ornate sword encrusted with gold and jewels, looks expensive. Taking it to the back of the stall, I gut it to fit in all the bookshelves I need for this enchant. I hear his foot tapping impatiently.

Focusing on the sword I enchant it. He was lucky because it got looting 2 sharpness 3 unbreaking 2.

“Here you go sir, it's razor-sharp, far more durable, and far more likely to drop quality items when used to kill things.”

‘Snatching the glowing sword from my hands’ he quickly tests it, finding it scary sharp, and difficult to bend.

“Here is your silver” ‘dropping it on the counter’ he walks away quickly. I don’t mind I just got a massive haul of money.

Deconstructing everything, I placed; restoring the stall to its former disrepair I head home. Noticing odder looks than normal. Word must have spread around. Finding the same inn, preparing to head upstairs but before I climb the steps I get hailed by the owner. ‘walking over’ I find her with an odd expression on her face, guilt; putting it out of mind. “What do you need?”

“Words have gotten round about your enchanting, making a name for yourself; be careful out there. I haven’t a clue how you can enchant for such a cheap price. Might grab some ma self.” In a slightly thicker than normal accident

“That was quick” slightly short of breath from surprise

“I think it was slow, such a good price is rare. Anyway, I added extra security to your room; felt you might want privacy if you don’t mind adding a little more on top”

“Sounds good, add 3 more days on to; ‘leaving the money on the counter have a good evening”

“You too darling,” she says waving

That was interesting, well back to my room. Immediately using my Telepad I head home. Let us start witchery.

Finding my massive collection of unused seeds, I select the ones I need. Wolf's bane, mandrake, belladonna, and water artichoke. Planting a small garden within one of the rooms of my castle for magical crops. I also take the time to plant my new vegetables. Dinner will be far more interesting now. Glowstone makes indoor farms completely viable; love it.

Taking one of each seed I make anointing paste, manually rubbing it onto a cauldron; the mental slowly starts to warp and hum with a strange buzz. After a while, it now looks like the witch’s cauldron I am used to. It's strange how easy it is to craft small things now like muscles, perseverance pays off.

I also take my now scarily large quantity of iron, making a ‘witches’ oven and ‘fume funnels’.

I find a nice space outside; the rain has cleared by this point. Placing Nether rack with fire under the cauldron. Furnace nearby as well with a chest. I create a hopper with a positively massive quantity of clay jars. Since you use so many of them; filling the oven with coal I start to burn spruce, oak, and birch. Letting it run with a while; producing a sizable amount of each of the basic fumes. The most basic crafting ingredients after all.

I started with oak so I would have exhaled of the horned one; allowing me to make mutandis while my oven works. Filling my cauldron with the combination of exhaling of the horned one, egg, and… oops forgot the mandrake root. Heading to my indoor garden I break the mandrake root. “Scream” ‘clutching my ears’ swinging my sword wildly as I grasp my head in pain. Luckily, I got a strike in killing the mandrake. I forgot you harvest them at night, oops.

Taking the risk, I break 2 more, thankfully saved from the pain as the mandrakes didn’t wake. Taking the mandrake roots to the cauldron I produce 4 mutandis; repeated 2 more times making 12. I use this mutandis on random grass blocks; mesmerized as the greenery shifts and coil, eventually turning into a new plant. I got lucky getting all 3 magical saplings; sadly, I only got 1 other plant, glimmer weed. I need more mutandis, later. Not in the mood for more pain.

I use my liquid time to quickly grow massive amounts of magical saplings. Quickly burning a stack of each of them I have all the fumes. When I do something, I do it big so I don’t have to mess around because I am lacking what I need. My favorite part of this mod is circle magic and the magical wand. Although I appreciate the extreme utility of the potions that are possible.

I looked at the recipe for each of the books. All require squid ink, lovely. So, with a sigh, I head into the ocean, night vision potions in my belly I look for a squid. It took a while but I eventually spotted a squid, sadly it's gargantuan, screw that. I continue to search for finding a variety of ocean life. I did find a type of squid. But knowing what the cute little buggers are made me steer clear. Every time you kill one a Kraken has a chance of appearing.

I did manage to find squids just before nightfall, decimating all but 2 of them for a lot of ink. I also used my scraper to get skin samples from the squids before they were killed for ink. Flying home, I craft all the books. Neatly placing them on a desk inside my home. I harvest the mandrakes, blessed by the evening light. Saving my ears in the process.

And with that, I go to bed. The evenings are actually kind of lonely now I have people I can socialize with. No true friends though, a shame. I should make some sourdough soon, the starter is nice and healthy. I only ever think of making it when it's too late at night – annoying.