"Alright, sounds good. Is there anything else you need?"

Zachariah says "No, although I feel like I should be the one asking you that. Is there anything at all that you need?"

"No. Oh, wait. Actually, I need wood, preferably magical wood."

Zachariah says "No problem. How much do you need?"

"Probably three or four trees worth. I will need the same amount again in a few days, a week at most."

Zachariah says "Alright, not a problem. I will send it over with the weapons. Anything else?"

"No, not right now anyway. Thank you for your help."

Zachariah says "Please don't thank me. I am going to make a fortune off of this deal. If anything I should be on my knees thanking you!"

"Please don't. That would be embarrassing."

Zachariah says "I won't as long as you stop thanking me."

"Deal."

Zachariah says "Would you like to join me for lunch?"

"Thanks, but no. I have other things to work on until the weapons arrive. Besides, Lin is much better company."

Zachariah says "Well, I can't argue that."

After that, I say my goodbyes and head back to the association's library. I find Lin in her usual spot and once again the table is covered in stacks of books. Instead of joining her right away, I go talk to the librarians to find a few books, then I join Lin.

Lin says "What are those for?"

"Researching enchantments to finish the castle. Once you put all these books in your library, if you can't access it easily, I will suffer."

Lin says "That is probably true." and smiles at me.

I return her smile and then start reading the first of the books that I chose. It is about spacial enchantments like those for bags of holding and other things. I am hoping to find some inspiration about how to make the castle into its own self contained micro-world.

I think that the first thing I am going to do is rebuild the spacial spell and try to perfect it. Then, using that as the foundation, I will try and push it to the next level. If I can do that, it should get me pretty close to my goal since I already figured out some other parts of it.

I already figured out how to keep air available and sunlight in the castle. Enough plants will keep the air clean so I don't need to worry about that. The only problem remaining is how to be able to enter into the castle while it is shrunken.

Stolen novel; please report.

I finish reading all of the books and then take a break to have lunch with Lin. After lunch I start working on the new spacial spell, rebuilding it from scratch. With what I learned from the books and my previous experience using the spell, I make good progress.

However, just as I am getting close to finishing the spell I am struck by inspiration. Unfortunately, what I figure out causes me to scrap the spell and start over from scratch. On the other hand, I now have a much better idea of what I need to do for the castle.

Creating the spell again goes much faster and it is also much more effective. If converted into an enchantment for a bag it would hold at least three times as much now. That's because rather than expanding the space inside it, the new spell folds it.

Once the space inside is folded, there is much more room to be expanded. This is actually completely counter to what I remember of the properties of space. Once again I underestimated magic's ability to cheat and break the laws of physics.

That led me to the solution for the castle, at least I think it might work. It will require tearing space, which I am rather nervous about doing, but it should work. By tearing space, I should be able to create an area outside of space, a pocket dimension basically.

At least that is how it worked in D&D and I am hoping it will work the same. Or at least similar enough that I can make it work because if it doesn't I have no other ideas. I will just have to wait and see how it goes after I finish creating this spell.

Even though tearing space should be a completely different type of magic, it actually isn't. So I will still be using this new spell as the foundation for the pocket dimension spell. Although that name isn't very accurate, I am not creating a new dimension.

The problem is that I have no other names for an area outside of normal space. In fact, I don't fully understand how it will work, if it even works. Luckily, magic doesn't need me to understand to be able to accomplish something.

If I had to fully understand everything, I wouldn't even be able to cast a fireball. I may understand fire, but the forces involved in a fireball are more than just fire. Luckily, I don't have to understand any of that, all I need to know is how the spell works.

Creating a spell, on the other hand, does require a bit more knowledge, but I think I know enough. I won't know for sure until I am actually working on the spell. When I finish the first spell and double check it, I hand it to Lin for her to check over it.

Lin says "There are problems here, here, and here."

"I know, but I couldn't figure out how to fix them without creating many more problems. Any ideas?"

Lin says "I'm not sure. I don't fully understand the concepts you are using. Can you explain it to me?"

"I can try."

I spend the next hour trying to explain the folding of space to Lin, but it doesn't go well. The concepts are completely new to her and I don't fully understand them myself. Surprisingly, she doesn't get frustrated with me even when I can't find the words to explain it properly.

Luckily, even if she doesn't understand it, her questions help me figure out how to fix the spell. She also helps me with an error in the structure of the spell that I didn't notice. If she hadn't caught that, it would have ruined the chances of the next spell working.

Once I make the corrections, with Lin's help, the spell is done and pretty close to perfect. It is definitely stable enough to serve as the foundation for the next spell. However, before I can start on the next spell, a servant approaches to tell me that a delivery has arrived.

Lin says "Were you expecting a delivery?"

"Yes. It should be the weapons for me to enchant, as well as the wood you wanted."

Lin says "Oh, good. I am almost out."

"I figured you would be. Shall we?"

Lin says "Alright. I could use a break anyway."