Sam didn’t actually go to sleep but stayed up and spent several hours building an “enchantment app” in his onboard. He designed it to function in a way that would take “plain text” and turn it into “enchantment code” or take “enchantment code” and turn it into “plain text.”

He then created another function that would allow him to interact with his materials and enchantment database. “Kelly, with this app I would simply do a search for all the ‘enchantment codes’ that I need for a particular enchantment I want to build, and then I can splice them together like the building blocks.”

“Next, with the encryption system I built into my app, the final ‘enchantment code or runes’ will be encrypted to a far more complex encryption than the codes I’ve been stripping off the enchanted rings and other items.” Sam didn’t want anyone decrypting and stealing his enchantments!

His app was still a little rough, but he planned to refine it as he learned more about enchantments in general. Sam looked at the enchantments he already uploaded into his app and thought, “Now, all I need to do is start gathering more enchantments and stripping the codes out of them. I could create unique code from scratch, but for complex enchantments that might take days or weeks depending upon the result needed, and I would need to fully understand the method or raw spell for obtaining the results.”

Sam then prepared a couple of simple charms to take to the Arc guild to possibly impress them or just to sell. Jen had told him the Arc guild was powerful, but also very wealthy from the sale of goods collected by their adventurers and merchants… “bla, bla, bla, so he had to make some charms and try to impress them,” Sam thought.

The only metal Sam had handy was some of the slag metal from their electronic equipment. Sam used a knife to scratch and carve different enchantment runes and symbols into the metal, and then he tried charging the runes, but the metal simply cracked apart destroying the enchantments.

Sam took another look at the armor enchantment before finally realizing the importance of the location of the strengthening enchantment. “Of course, the enchantment doesn’t make the user stronger, but the metal stronger!” Sam then carved the enchantments into the slag metal again, but this time he placed the strengthening enchantment first. Then he made sure to charge the strengthening enchantment building block with his mana before charging the other runes.

“Yes, the enchantments held up! Now let’s find out how well they worked.”

His firestarter enchantment worked fine. The gravity enchantment worked perfectly, except the difference in weight on a five-pound piece of metal was only lightened a half pound at best. Additionally, the “space ring” enchantment he placed on the metal, was limited by the storage capacity. If he made the storage capacity too big, it would disintegrate the metal into dust. As he experimented with decreasing the size of the capacity, he found he could use the storage space, but after a few uses, the metal and enchantments would disintegrate. Finally, through much trial and error, he discovered the exact capacity size that would not erode the integrity of the enchantment or the metal. “Damnit, I guess someone could use it as a small coin purse?”

Sam sighed with frustration while breathing hard at one of the gnats that had snuck its way into the room and was flying around his face. “That’s it!” exclaimed Sam as he reached for the enchanted ‘space ring’ he just made.

Sam modified his enchantment slightly and created a metal charm that could store up to four hours’ worth of a light breeze, and then release it slowly at the wearer’s will. He estimated the breeze charm would burn out after 2 full charges. The wearer could use the charm in intervals, but he figured it was limited to maybe a maximum of 8 hours total for each charge.

The charm would be perfect for someone standing in line, a farmer overheating in the field, etc...

The other simple charms Sam made were hot and cold “store and release” charms. These charms would heat up food or cool down a drink, but would also burn out with about 8 hours continuous use. What made these charms possible in the low-mana environment of the First Deck was they didn’t create the wind, hot, or cold, they just stored and released it.

He placed the breeze charms outside his window to catch the nightly breezes until it filled up, the same with the cold charm. He placed the hot charm near the fireplace.

Of course, he wasn’t going to tell anyone they were store and release charms. Sam wanted them to believe the enchanted charms actually created the wind, heat, and cold.

Last, Sam made a few Minor Mend enchanted charms with the slag metal, but these were good for one use only. Unfortunately, this type of charm burned out immediately because it directed much more mana all at once. Unlike his other charms, the Minor Mend charms actually used the mana to create magic healing. The few minor mend charms he made required him to spend another hour or so to charge them up with mana.

The only additional step Sam had taken before constructing the charms was to encrypt the ‘code’ on all the charms with his newly developed enchantment app.

Sam finally went to sleep as dawn was just rising the next day. Only an hour later, Sam winced as he heard Jen calling him from the other room, “Let’s go, get up! You’ve already sat around for three days playing with your runes.”

Sam groaned as he rolled out of his bed, cleaned up, gathered his charms, and as he headed towards the door replied, “What are you talking about, I’ve been waiting on you!”

His comment earned him an evil eye from Jen, but she was just happy he was finally heading out the door.

Jen brought Sam up to speed as they walked through town. Messaging each other through their onboards was almost second nature to them now.

“While you were ‘away’ in your little trance working on enchantments for the last few days, I set up a safehouse.”

“Nice, you are learning, my little paranoid acolyte!”

Jen rolled her eyes, “Whatever, I’ve hidden a ring stocked with food, money, and weapons in the house. I’m sending you my map to its location now.”

Sam looked confused, and said, “How can you do that?”

“Oh yea, I purchased a cheap map technique scroll for each of us. Tonight, you need to use yours, so you can open my map in your onboard.”

“That’ll make getting around a lot easier. How do you use a technique scroll?

“It’s pretty neat, you don’t even read the scroll, you just place it to your forehead and will the scroll to activate. Then it’s just in your brain. It’s easier than uploading a flash drive onto a computer.”

“That’s awesome! Does the map technique show us each other’s real time location too?”

Jen shook her head, “They have that type of map technique, but the ones we have won’t do that.”

“Too much money were they?”

“Exactly. They were a fortune! I can’t wait to get one though!”

“Stop!” Jen said raising her arm in front of Sam, just as a gambler, apparently holding a stolen tool bag, ran past them and into an alley with a cobbler screaming and running after him.

Jen then tapped her temple with her index finger, “I’ve significantly raised my psych, multi focus, and overclock ability. I can’t get my skills any higher without us doing some creative training. Right now, while we are ‘talking,’ I’m also scanning all nearby coms messages, and I’m scanning for any emotional triggers from anyone within about 50 feet.”

Sam gave Jen a surprised look and said, “Nice! How long can you keep the multi-focus going for?”

“Depends on the number of people nearby or how far out I’m trying to scan, but I can keep this passive type scanning going for 3 to 4 hours before I need a break. If I am doing active scanning, searching for specific coms signals, or trying to read all the emotions people are feeling, then only about 45 minutes to an hour.”

Sam whistled and replied, “Your power is a game-changer for our security and safety. I really appreciate you taking care of everything while I worked on my enchantment development.”

Jen perked up at his compliment and bragged, “I can also easily see all of your stats, levels, and titles.”

Sam raised his eyebrow at Jen, and then joked, “I didn’t know you were so good at undressing me with your eyes; I’m feeling a little violated!”

Jen snapped back with laughter, “With what I can see, you should be feeling SHAME, not violated!”

Sam tried his best comeback, “Yeah, Shame for being friends with a pervert who likes to check out people’s stats.”

Jen just shook her head sadly and said, “Old man, you need to learn that a crappy retort like that is way worse than just keeping your mouth shut!”

Sam grumbled a weak reply, “Whatever! I’m just still tired.”

Jen just laughed at him, rubbing in his failed quip. She was cheering for herself inside, because she felt like she rarely got the better of him in their picking on each other.

A few minutes later, Sam didn’t need any psych ability to read Jen’s emotions as she had become unusually silent. He suspected she was about to bring up something she was uncomfortable about.

Jen straightened up a little and tried to give her words a more mature tone and said, “I met Tamako for dinner the other night down at the inn’s restaurant.”

Sam sighed inwardly with relief; he was glad she met someone. He wanted her to be happy, and he knew Kelly would want her to be happy. However, he couldn’t deny that he was a little sad that he might end up travelling the Decks alone, if not because of Tamako, someone Jen would eventually meet.

Sam pushed his selfishness way down deep and replied with a laugh, “So how crazy is she? We’ve talked about the hot to crazy scale. She is so high up on the hot scale, she must be some serious crazy for cocoa puffs!”

Jen smiled and said, “You’re right, she is pretty damn hot, but so far she has hidden her crazy side, even from my psych ability. Also, she has offered to give me some combat training. Do you think I should take her up on her offer?”

Sam gave Jen a serious look, paused, then said as sarcastically as possible, “Let me think about this, if I was single, and some hot chick offers to give me some combat training. Would I take her up on her offer? That’s such a tough question!”

Jen started blushing just slightly. Sam gave her a side hug and continued to walk down the street, “Jen, if you like her, hell yeah you should train with her, or make the time to do whatever else makes you happy. If you don’t, I will kick your ass and so will Kelly!”