Carving their own magical items promised to be a fun and entertaining experience, Robert thought as he dumped yet another small sheet of crystal in the trash bin. He then swept the crystal shavings away, clearing his workspace. He already used one-fourth of his slab and was nowhere near finishing the first set of runes.
Engraving the runes was a painstaking process. Each rune needed to be carved without flaws; a single twitch of the hand was enough to put all the previous work to ruin. The strokes, the depth, and even the thickness needed to be close to perfect. Even the grip on the carving tools had to be with the perfect tension. Grab it too loose and it will slip, grab it too hard and the runes will become jagged and stiff. Especially the curved parts. In a way, it resembled sword fighting. Wielding the chisel was similar to wielding a sword with grace and precision.
Across from him on the workbench, Amanda wasn't having it any easier. The initial enthusiasm was quickly dying out. Robert hated wasting real-world time and was looking for an easier way to get the runes on the crystal.
"Hey, have you tried manipulating your crystal with your Earth magic?" Robert asked.
Amanda stared at him like he was an alien visitor from twenty passages down the interspace. She showed him the gloves. "We need to wear these to stop unwilling essence transfer, what makes you think that a willing one would be any better? The moment I put Earth essence in this crystal, it might explode."
Robert stretched. He went to his slab and used a small hand saw to cut another piece of crystal to work on. He had to sand the surfaces, then wash the dust with water and polish the faces. He took the small crystal plate to a grindstone and sat next to it. Pumping on a pedal, he accelerated the flywheel and smoothed the surfaces. Using a leather band running next to the grindstone, he polished the piece until he could see through it. Cutting, sanding, and polishing took five minutes.
Now all he had to do was to not screw up in the first ten seconds of engraving. Again. He took the chisel and carved each rune with care. The crystal, despite its name, felt more like a hard plastic than glass or gemstone. It didn't crack under pressure.
Instead, he screwed up after three minutes. His nose itched and he pressed the chisel too hard, gouging the crystal and carving a deep V where a curve should go. He lifted the crystal and checked how deep he went. Shaking his head, he flung the plate into the trash can. If the mistake hadn't dug that deep, he could grind the top layer and try again.
Modern industrial crystal circuits were almost paper-thin and tiny. The crystal plate Robert threw in the trash could've been used to make more than a few dozen wristwatches.
He stood up and picked up his copy of the centennial manual. "I think I'll take a break. Gonna sit down and read this for a while."
Amanda finished carving the rune she was working on. She set her tools aside. "Want me to come with– Oh. You are going to use your talent."
"Yes. Oh. I got an idea." Robert said as he went back to the tool locker. He took the second-worst set out and placed them in his storage ring.
"What is it?" Amanda asked when he returned to the workbench.
"I'm going to fetch a block of wood, and practice carving runes on it in the liminal void."
She scrunched her eyebrows, then smiled faintly and poked the tip of her tongue at him. "Cheater!"
Robert chuckled and shrugged. He organized his workspace and thought about moving his slab back to the containment rack. He decided he didn't need to as he would be back really soon.
"Good luck with your chisel," Robert said with a grin. He turned around and went outside in search of wood.
He didn't take a single block of wood. He took a whole firewood stack with him. Robert took out his inflatable mattress and laid down to read. He went through the book three times before he felt confident enough to butcher the firewood. When he tried carving runes on the wood, he found his first obstacle: the wood grain. It had veins and knots and wasn't homogeneous. And it was firewood, not very suitable for carving.
Robert checked all the wood he took with him to see which pieces had the smoothest and most homogeneous pieces. He set those apart and then worked on the bad pieces first. He followed the instructions in the book and carved slowly, focusing on how each different type of chisel affected the wood. He had two months to practice and only so many pieces of wood. The priorities were inverted with the resource scarcity. He could afford to take his time.
He cycled between reading, engraving, expanding his mental palace, and playing the guitar. When his time was up, he collected his best pieces so far and left the rest littering the liminal void. Reappearing in the workshop, he sighed and placed his engravings on the table, one by one.
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"Already back? How long was your stay this time?" Amanda asked. "Oh, let me see what you did." She went around and took the blocks of engraved wood one by one, ending with the two she believed to be the best, one in each hand. In these pieces, Robert gave up on following the circuit diagrams and just scribbled runes everywhere, letting his subconscious run wild. "You're such a cheater! I'm confiscating these!"
He laughed and waved a hand. "You can have them."
Amanda blew a raspberry at him. "I'm not asking for your permission!" She slithered back to her seat and butchered the crystal plate she was working on, chiseling nonsense on them. Angry, she showed the waste of Ether to Robert. "Look at what you made me do!"
Robert found her tantrum cute. He equated her to an angry kitten pretending to be a tiger next to a big dog.
Without addressing her tantrum, he took his slab out of the rack, thinking it was a waste to put it there since he was gone just for a few minutes. He cut a flat piece, sanded, polished, and returned to his spot, to use the set of good tools he left there. He botched another one because he got used to working with wood. But after a few more tries, he managed to imprint a full circuit on the crystal. This one only made the plate glow softly when powered with essence.
Robert set it aside and cut another plate. After he successfully engraved the second exercise circuit - creating a heating plate that only went to the temperature of a hot coffee - he decided to help Amanda.
"What do you want?" She complained as he approached with a chair.
"To help you?"
"Why did you answer with a question? Do you mean to ask if I need help? Because I do. You should help me." Amanda sniffled.
Robert ignored her antics and leaned closer. "What do you need help with?"
*
*
At the end of the day, Noah returned to check on their work. Robert made five light crystals and ten heating ones, while Amanda managed to craft two of each on their own, plus some she did with Robert's help. They also had used up half of their crystal slab. Noah checked each crystal plate, bringing them close to the blue eye painted on his white mask.
"Very good. You surpassed my expectations. Though I believe someone blew the time limit," Noah stared at Robert.
"Hey, subjective time doesn't count," Robert protested.
Noah laughed. "No, I guess it doesn't. Let's retire for the night and tomorrow we can continue our studies.
Robert took the other books about enchanting into his ring and went to his assigned apartment. They had the whole city for themselves so they each got their pick. It was free real estate.
He opened the window to the balcony and sat on a chair. Cotton and Coal floated near him and went inside to explore the apartment. Robert stared at the eternally sunlit world. He slowly sipped one drink and touched a crystal near the balcony doors. It was time to start the artificial night. These fancy apartments had an illusion enchantment that simulated dusk and night. As the spell covered the balcony, Robert saw a red sun dipping toward the horizon. He took another drink from his ring and toasted it to an imaginary friend. The illusion was pretty effective. Robert could feel his body give in and become tired. He even yawned. Still, he watched the sunset and the stars that appeared overhead.
He called his bonded puffblooms. "Go to the nearest islands and try to bring some wisps with you," he ordered. The island was pretty dry, Ether-wise. He watched them float away and vanish behind the illusion of the night sky. Robert sighed. The puffbloom islands were a dying realm. Unless someone stayed here and bred thousands of puffblooms to release into the wild, the Ether flows would choke and stop.
The realm was immense. Explorers had surveyed an area the size of old Asia and had no idea how big it was. Perhaps they had a big community of puffblooms living elsewhere, they just avoided this section that was colonized by humans because they learned to not come near.
Robert focused on his link. He noticed that Cotton and Coal were about to fly over the edge of the island but they avoided the glider platforms. He held onto that impression and it formed into an idea. Maybe the way the puffblooms learned how to avoid the explored islands was by avoiding the ones with markers and glider platforms. This turned this region into an Ether desert, which dissuaded the puffblooms from coming here even more.
In any case, it wasn't his problem. The tame puffblooms would leave the bond's link range soon. Robert went to bed and brought it with him to the liminal void. He slept there, as usual, and worked on his projects the whole night.
*
*
When his timepiece chimed it was already "morning", Robert prepared himself for a new day and departed his apartment. The four storage rings in his hands were almost full as he took a lot of furniture and decorations he found interesting or useful with him.
They gathered at the old abandoned workshop. The slabs of condensed, crystallized slime cores glowed softly, waiting to be used. Noah seemed to be in a good mood, judging by the pep in his step. Amanda was still sleepy.
"Today, I'm going to make Amanda an item. You can observe or go train with the rune engravings," Noah said.
Amanda's interest piqued, her drowsiness evaporating. She approached Noah with a big smile."What are you making, Noah?"
It was the question the showman teacher was waiting for. Noah spread his hands in a welcoming gesture. "Glad you asked, Amanda. Would you mind giving me a pint of your blood? No? Great! I'm making you a cursed item!"
Cursed items weren't that bad. They were called cursed because they often originated from negative feelings, most often, grudges. They had strong powers related to their negative feelings and also detrimental traits, also related to these feelings. They weren't entirely safe to use but safe-ish enough to make people accept the risk of wielding them.
Like all things, curses weak and strong existed. The trick was to only use cursed items that were weak enough to not overpower the user. And this was where all the problems lied. Because people, in their lust for power, often overestimated their own strengths and underestimated others, especially if it was something they believed would further their agenda.
In this particular case, it was most likely safe. Noah wouldn't hurt Amanda, at least not intentionally. By using her blood, according to what Robert read on item crafting, the cursed item would attune to Amanda's essence and become more helpful to her.
But what intrigued Robert was why a cursed item. He guessed he'd find out soon.