A few days after we had returned to Adrenas, the moon was once again full, shining high up in the sky. To me, that meant my Ice-Magic was greatly strengthened, and I planned to remake my Frozen Butterfly Wings; I had learned a lot about the magic, and my abilities had grown since I’d originally made them. Hopefully, I would be able to create a better item than before.

I told Sigmir about it and she agreed to watch over me; if I wanted to do the creation right, I would be completely defenseless - easy pickings for anyone wanting to do me harm, like Kallik, who had looked as if he had bitten into a lemon, when he heard that Rai would join us as my disciple. Lenore had kept an eye on him, but I wanted her help with the crafting, the additional Astral Power she supplied should be useful.

So, once the moon had fully risen, I sat outside Adernas in the field, centering myself to do some heavy duty spellcasting. I had cleaned the area around me, laying down a sheet of ice, inscribed with runic circles and a frozen platform in the middle. That was my seat for the night. Unsure if it would help, I had shed my clothes, deciding to follow old, mythological practices and perform my magic skyclad, as they called it. I certainly felt in touch with the cold, as it was biting my flesh and seeping into me. Hopefully, it would help.

Closing my eyes, I felt the moonlight on my skin, almost a physical caress - not scorching like the sun, but gentle, like a cooling breeze on a hot day. For some reason, the cold sensation it gave me chased away the chill of the night. The crystal core in my chest started to stir, almost humming, in tune with the moonlight touching my skin, forming a connection between my body, the innermost part of my magic, concentrated in the core, and the moon in the sky. The Astral Power within me was roiling, surging, pressing at the confines I had imposed upon it with my will, like a river trying to overwhelm the dikes to flood the land.

But no, I had purpose during the night, so I forced the power into the paths I had prepared and planned, letting it flood into the runic circles surrounding me, before coming back to me purified and attuned to the runes I had prepared. There was only one rune that could be fueled with the power in that state, the Hard Ice-Rune. But that was all that I needed.

In front of me, seven Hard Ice-Runes formed, spun together by my will and fueled by the power I had gathered and was still gathering. Part of me was floating on the Astral currents, drawing in more power, while another part was keeping them in check.

The formation in front of me was emitting almost no light at all, every bit of power that got into it was used to fuel the magic I was weaving. I felt the Hard Ice crystals form, and stretched my Ice-Magic, trying to weave them together to create something stronger than the sum of its parts. Each crystal was slightly different in form, slightly different in size, making it hard to perfectly conjone them but as I focused, I felt something join to the crystals, a liquid version of them. The strange, silvery liquid felt surprisingly heavy; normally one expects liquids to have roughly the same density as water, but the feeling this liquid gave me was more akin to mercury.

But I was able to control it and it worked almost like a solder, bridging the small distances and differences between the microscopic crystals, binding them into a whole, far stronger than the sum of its parts.

The process stretched for hours, as I was channelling power through my body, the runic circle around me and into the formation that let the blades slowly coalesce within it. Finally, I had a feeling that I had done all I could, and finished the blades up, adding a few decorations, making sure that the balance was exactly as I wanted it to be, and so on.

Once I was done, my curiosity reared its head and I let the blades rest beside me on my seat, there was magic exploration to be done. I wanted to know just what the strange silvery liquid had been and, maybe more importantly, what I could do with it. Just from the heavy feeling it had given me and the amount of effort needed to create and handle it, I suspected that it had to be a higher-tiered material compared to the Hard Ice I was using, just like the Hard Ice was a step above normal Ice.

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Drawing upon the base-formation, I was moving power again. Lots of it. But I did not try to channel the power into a runic formation to cast another spell, I used Ice-Magic to draw it out and control it. And it worked. Sort of.

My mind struggled with holding a small amount of the silvery liquid in the air in front of me and I could feel the cold radiating away from it, strong enough to pierce the comfortable sensation given to me by the moonlight and bite my skin. And that was with the liquid at arm's length. I even saw small amounts of gas freeze in the air around it, creating a small amount of fog around it. Those two things made me shiver and wonder just how cold the liquid was.

Lacking any form of thermometer and certainly not about to check it with my hands, I pushed against it with my mind, heaving it towards the nearest tree.

It arced through the air, leaving a glittering trail behind, like a glittering trail of stars, following the moon through the sky, but the peaceful scene only lasted until the liquid impacted the tree. There was a loud crack and the tree started to topple over, broken.

That had… potential. But only if I learned to use it in a more efficient fashion. On a flight of fancy, I decided to call the liquid “Liquid Moonlight”, for the colour and simply because is sounded pretty.

Slowly easing back into full focused state, I started to perceive more than the small focus I had tunneled on before. Sigmir was still there, looking at me with a bit of confusion in her eyes, as if she wanted to ask why I had destroyed the tree, and I would explain, later. For now, I wanted to get dressed first and maybe into her warm embrace.

As soon as I was dressed and had my cloak wrapped around me, I inspected the new blades I had made for myself.

Lunar Butterfly-Wings Rarity Rare Base Damage 8 Damage Piercing Base Damage 15 Damage Slashing Strength Modifier Low Special Effect Imbued- Due to the process used for the creation of this weapon, it is strongly in tune with the Ice-Magic of the Traveller Morgana. 33% lower cost when wielded by her Ice-Magic. Special Effect Coordination- These Blades are a pair. If both are used at the same time, their damage increases. These Butterfly Blades, made out of Hardened Ice-Crystals, form a breathtaking Set of Crystal Blades, created to be used in concert. The crystals were bonded, strengthening the weapons, thus reducing their chance to break. The material used makes them hard, but they are still vulnerable to heat.

Looking the stats over, I was quite pleased with my work. They were basically the same as before, only better.

In addition, I saw that the intense magical crafting had yielded results.

Skill increased You increased your skill: Ice Rune-Mastery [61/100]

Skill increased You increased your skill: Ice Magic [69/100]

Skill increased You increased your skill: Astral Meditation [45/100]

Smiling, as I saw that I should be able to infer a new Ice-Rune, I seated myself again. I doubted that there would be a better chance to do so in the near future, so I lowered myself back into a trance.

There was almost no surprise when my mind latched onto the idea of the silvery liquid, trying to grasp its meaning while I swam in the parts of the Astral River that were Ice. I felt the rune, saw the rune but was unable to grasp the true meaning. I doubted that I had understood it fully, but would be able to partially use it. But the only name I knew it by, was Liquid Moonlight, the name I had come up with.

“Come, Sigmir, let’s go to bed. I’ll tell you what I learned in the morning.” I called to Sigmir, as exhaustion hit me. When I stumbled a little, she carried me off, to bed. I was asleep before we got to the house.