For the next couple of weeks I try to set some of my goals in motion with varying degrees of success. My information gathering has been going well if not a little slow. I’ve found out a couple facts on magic, mage’s, and the general treatment of them in this place.

For one, magic doesn’t seem to be that big of a deal around these parts, with Vegter saying that anyone could do magic if they studied for it. Even saying that he knew a couple spells himself. Also when asked on how magic is performed and what toll it takes, Vegter explained that magic is used by channelling a certain energy (I’m gonna call it mana for ease of use) from a well of sorts in the center of your being into various roots and pathways across your body before thinking of various effect runes and launching it out into the world to take whatever effect the runes were for.

He also said that mana, while replenishable, takes a long time to be recovered into your well. From this knowledge I now know various things about my own magic, like the fact that I don’t use mana from my well and instead channel the ambient mana and elements.

Also since I take mana from around me there are upsides and downside’s, like the fact that I’m limited to the elements around me, but since I take my mana from the elements around me, it means that one, I don’t run out of mana, ever, and two, I can cast my magic significantly faster than most other mages because I don’t need to specify what element my mana needs to take the form of. This also means that I have significantly less access to inert un-elemental mana than most other mages, but that doesn’t seem to be too important since most of what normal mana does can be mimicked by elemental mana.

On other fronts, I’ve finally found some time to experiment in the end of the day, when I’m supposed to be sleeping. I’ve found that since my ork body is extremely strong and quick to adapt that within a week I could pump the bellows way easier than I could before, meaning that I don’t collapse onto my bed every night. From the experiments I’ve held for the last couple of nights I have added a new goal, and that is to try to gain access to new runes since as of now I haven’t really discovered anything new from my experimentation.

As of now my life has fallen into a nice rhythm, wake up, eat breakfast with Vegter and Clara, pump the bellows in the forge, have break , talk to Caden, pump the bellows some more, get home, eat dinner, then practice some magic before going to sleep. Today though, seems a little different.

Me and Vegter go through our morning routine, picking up Caden on our way to the smithy. When we get there though Vegter says to me “we’re going to be doing something different today boy. I’ve noticed that you’ve gotten a bit stronger now, with your arms looking like arms instead of the un-manly pile of twigs they were a couple weeks ago. That means that you can do more things now instead of just helping me pump the bellows”. I start to panic slightly at this. “so instead of just helping me with the bellows you’re going to start grinding these stones to dust” Vegter says motioning to something that looks like Crys except a bit more jagged. “along with that you’re also going to be responsible for cleaning out the forge once we’re done” Vegter says. I start to panic some more. “Now you look a little nervous, so I just want to tell you that all of this will be explained when the time of day comes, and that all of this will be fine so don’t worry about it” Vegter adds. For whatever reason I don’t really feel all that assured. The look of pity that Caden sends me doesn’t really assure me either.

Like every other day me and Vegter are smithing in the forge, while Caden is outside manning the shop. Unlike every other day though when it’s time for lunch, Vegter starts explaining how the rest of the day is going to go for me. “For an hour or two after lunch you’re still going to be pumping the bellows, but after that you’re going to start working on making some Pulveris” Vegter says. “Now off the look on your face I’m going to assume you don’t know what Pulveris is. Pulveris is just the powder of some specialised Crys that is applied on various items written in various runes to give them some magical qualities” Vegter explains.

“now what I need for you to do is to pound away at this specialised Crys until it starts crumbling to bits. After that all you have to do is to put the bits in that big ol’ stone cup and pound some more” Vegter says. “What about cleaning up the shop. Oh, and what differentiates normal Crys from this Pulveris stuff” I ask.

“I’ll explain your tasks for cleaning the shop later. And the difference between normal Crys and the stuff we use to make Pulveris, which we call Petram by the way, is that Petram is a lot bigger, is found in the ground, and is treated differently so that it can have the desired effects” Vegter responds.

And like that we continue to eat quietly, me pondering how I’m going to survive now, and Vegter and Caden just really, really hungry. After break, true to his word Vegter asks me to pump the bellows for an hour, before sending me off to another corner of the forge, showing me what it is I am expected to do. Vegter takes a big chunk of Petram, grabs a giant looking hammer and starts bashing into the thing before it violently cracks into a bunch of little pieces. He then grabs the pieces and shoves them into what looks like a giant mortar, before grabbing a huge looking stone pestle and thumping away at the cracked Petram until there’s nothing but a fine dust of the stuff. Vegter then puts the stuff into a little a bag, telling me that that’s it, and that there’s really nothing to it. Of course after all of that I find myself with a jaw dropping to the floor.

Thankfully, my fast-learning ability helped me memorize all the steps the first time Vegter showed them to me. The only problem though, was the fact that even though I understood what I was supposed to do the entire process was long, tedious, and extremely difficult, usually taking me twenty to thirty minutes per chunk of Petram and making me feel extremely winded and tired after I’m done.

Vegter didn’t even break a sweat when he did it, and on top of that he did it in five to ten minutes tops. So for all of the rest of the day I hammer away at one piece of Petram after another, building up a nice pile of pouches by the end of the day. By this time I could feel every fiber in my being begging me to end the suffering, particularly in my core, back, and arms. Who knew that hammering away at stuff all day would be so painful.

As Vegter signalled that it was the end of the day, I was so absorbed by the pain in my body, and my previous task that I completely forgot about cleaning up shop.

“Wait a second boy, you’re not done yet. Did you forget that you still have to clean up this place” Vegter says grabbing me by the scruff of the neck. “I’ll explain what you have to do bit by bit here, okay. So for one scrub down the entire room, then start scrubbing any and all metal tools you find. Then, clean out the forge, shuck all the ash into the pit that’s right next to it. After that, I want you to scrape off any rust you find in any and all tools. And then, you have to start cleaning up the anvil, checking if there’s anything at all that could compromise the making of anything in here. At the very end, go take this broom and brush away all the dust and ash and soot you find.” Vegter recites all the steps taken to clean up shop. Of course after hearing all of that my jaw drops to the floor for the second time today. Blearily I start doing all my assigned tasks, from scrubbing everything in the room, to cleaning out the forge, to cleaning off any rust, to scrubbing up the anvil, to brushing up the room. It takes me an hour or so to finish all the things I’m supposed to do and by the end of it, not only do my arms and core hurt, but everything else does too. At this time I feel dead tired, so the walk all the way to Caden’s house, then from there to our house feels almost like a herculean task to me. I nearly just drop dead on the side of the road, having to use all my will power just to move forward. When we get home Clara starts asking me why I look like a dead-walker. Vegter answers that he added to the amount of things I had to do today, and that it might take a while for me to adjust to the new schedule. A while, more like never. My body starts screaming at me, telling me to eat something or I’ll actually drop and never get up ever again. When we get to the dinner table I start ravaging all the food there, not just asking for seconds, or thirds, but fourths. When I’m done Vegter and Clara both have gigantic smiles on their faces. When I ask to be excused they both just nod. When I get to bed all thoughts of any magical experimentation are gone, except for one saying that I probably won’t be able to experiment until my body learns to handle all the new tasks given to me.

The next day I feel a great amount of dread at the prospect of repeating the previous day, but I tell myself that there is no progress without pain. When we get to Caden’s house and get Caden he is a lot chattier today than all the previous days. “Trust me man it gets better” He says. “yeah man that’s what I’m hoping for” I say. “it’s just that it gets worse before it gets better” he mutters under his breath. That day I started off pumping the bellows as always, before break came around and I had to start the more unfamiliar tasks for the day. Crushing the Petram to get Pulveris was a little bit easier today than it was the day before. Although by the end of the it my arms still felt as sore as if they were pulled off of me, used to render an entire village of people comatose, then violently reattached. The part of the day that I had been dreading arrived cleaning up. Usually a pretty harmless task. Not so in Vegter’s forge though, not at all, for I have the wonderous job of scrubbing everything in here. After that I have to pay special attention to specific tools, getting the rust off, re-scrubbing them, making sure they’re spick-and-spam. Then I have to broom everything. And so my weeks went on like this, until something changed