Turns out, Master Pilip owned a few books.
He had found them tucked away in the corner of the small supply closet, hidden within the utter disaster that was Pilip’s lab. But Pilip had told Levin to clean, so he didn’t think there was any issue with moving the books around and perhaps reading a page or two or all of it in the process.
Levin had been starting to feel like Master Pilip’s personal maid, but that find rejuvenated him. Especially since the books were on all runesmithing, exactly the type of general magic knowledge Levin was craving. Even better, Kirima had agreed to meet him at the library every day in the evening, so Levin’s collection had been rapidly growing.
He still wished he could put that knowledge into practice, but at least Master Pilip would be giving him magic of his own soon.
And there was a book about the Chaos magic Levin would be receiving – The Book of Reeds – but Master Pilip hadn’t let Levin touch it. He was burning with intense curiosity to know its secrets, but Master Pilip kept it under tight lock and key, especially after Levin asked to read it. Unsurprising, considering he had to get permission from Lord Hann himself to read it – that book must be one of the most precious treasures of Inuvik Academy.
At that moment, just as Levin was finishing putting one of the shelves back in order, Magus Pilip entered. His robes were wrinkled and dirtied, his goatee looked particularly unkempt today, and he had deep bags under his eyes.
“Good morning, Master Pilip,” Levin said, bowing at the waist.
Pilip didn’t react to him as he walked over to a chair at one of the tables in the lab, collapsing into it with a sigh. Levin hesitated, wondering if he should say something as he rose from his bow.
Instead, he just returned to his cleaning. Pilip’s eyes were closed, so Levin decided to focus on organizing one of the shelves. It was composed of a variety of different roots, leaves, stems, and other plant materials, each in their own glass jars. Levin was in the process of removing them all from the shelf so he could clean it, and he was setting the ingredients in rough groupings based on the classifications he had seen in Pilip’s runesmithing books.
He sat another few jars down, and then jumped as he noticed Master Pilip staring at him. Pilip glanced between Levin, the grouped ingredients, and a runesmithing book out on the table that Levin had found in the supply closet.
“You read the book?” he asked.
Levin blushed, but Pilip sounded more curious than angry. “Yes,” Levin said.
“Hmm… In that case, why don’t I teach you some runesmithing?” Pilip said.
“Really? Of course!” Levin exclaimed.
“I think it’ll be a good break for me…” he said, standing up and walking over to the pile of ingredients Levin had been sorting. “I just ruined half of my personal equipment with a Chaos failure. And I don’t like learning recipes with the larger equipment in here, so I’ll take some time to teach you.”
“Thank you, Master Pilip! Will we be starting with the analysis rune?” Of course Levin hadn’t been able to forget Pilip’s words on their Lethridge trip, that such a rune could let him try runesmithing.
“Yes,” he said, picking up two glass jars. Levin recognized both – one held a collection of blue leaves called Crystallized Pu’Erh Leaf, and the other held a root from a thousand-year-old yew tree.
“The recipe for this rune is very simple, because Force analysis is one of the most basic skills all mages possess. Let me demonstrate,” Pilip said, pulling out all the Pu’Erh leaves into his hand.
He looked at them for a second, and Levin couldn’t tell if anything was happening. But then, Pilip picked out three of the leaves, and slid the rest back into the jar.
“Grind these up,” Pilip said, passing them over to Levin and pointing him towards a mortar and pestle on the workstation.
Levin did as he was told, fumbling a bit with the tool before he found a rhythm. As he ground the leaves, Pilip continued his explanation.
“The tolerances in runesmithing are very small. You can not pick just any three leaves from that jar and expect them to work in the recipe. Each one has a slightly different quantity and quality of Source, and that will greatly affect the output. That is why Force-based analysis is necessary, to identify the precise attributes of each ingredient.”
Levin nodded, handing the powdered leaves over to Master Pilip, who nodded and set them aside. Then he opened up the second jar, taking out the entire ancient yew root. He grabbed a small knife and shaved a sliver of it off, then returned the root to the jar.
“This is a part of runesmithing I cannot help you with.” Pilip held up the tiny root sliver in his hand, and Levin watched as the edges of the material burned away.
“I am using my Force to burn away the excess, and continuing to analyze it as I do. This way, I can get the perfect amount to match the leaves. You will have to do this by hand, so advanced recipes will likely be impossible for you even with external aids.”
Levin nodded, not overly worried – Pilip had no idea how good Levin’s external aids were. Master Pilip took the ground leaves and sliver of root, combined them into a glass vial, then inserted it into a large furnace. He tossed some coal-like stones in, then lit the furnace and closed the door.
“The furnace is always the final step of runesmithing. Ordinarily, you would need to process the ingredients more than we just did” – Pilip gestured to the various glass instruments in his workstation – “but as I said, this is a very simple recipe.”
When the flames began to die down, Pilip pulled the vial from the furnace, revealing a silvery-blue liquid. He held it up to the light, examining it by sight and, presumably, with his Force. Then he nodded and picked up one of the hollow metal rods Levin had seen him use with Amaq.
“This is an engraving tool,” Pilip said, pouring the liquid inside. “Once the ink is complete, we use this to create runes. Now, give me your hand.”
Levin held out his hand, and Pilip pulled out a needle. Levin flinched a little as Pilip pierced his finger with the needle, but it was just a small prick. Pilip squeezed on the finger, and a few drops of blood escaped into the engraving tool.
“This is for the control rune. Through the blood you are linked to the rune, and will be able to manipulate it even from a distance. You should be able to do this even without a Source,” Pilip said.
Next, he cast his eyes downwards, scanning the floor. After Levin’s two weeks of effort, most of the floor had been cleared of knick-knacks and random assortments of runesmithing resources. However, this had only revealed what was beneath – miscellaneous small runes, each their own unique color.
“Sorry, Master Pilip. I wasn’t sure how to clean those up…” Levin said.
“No worries, no worries…” Pilip said absentmindedly, still looking around the floor.
Then, his eyes settled on a spot. He raised his right hand, folding his fingers into some kind of sign. Then he pointed his hand sign at one of the open corners of the room filled up with old runes, as Levin looked on curiously.
Atop the existing runes carved into the floor of Pilip’s lab, a new layering of runic lines suddenly appeared, glowing brightly a couple inches above the ground. In a matter of seconds, Pilip’s old runes faded away and the indentations in the ground filled in, leaving that corner of Pilip’s lab as clean as if a new layer of stone had been put down.
“What was that?” Levin asked in amazement.
“It’s part of the Force Distribution System,” Pilip said.
He then went down to his knees, stabbing the pen into the ground and beginning to carve a new rune in the space the old one had been. Seeing as Master Pilip didn’t plan to elaborate on his answer any further, Levin decided to push his luck.
“What is the Force Distribution System?”
“Lord Hann’s crowning achievement,” Pilip said without pausing his work. “It can absorb and release Force on command from anywhere on the mountain, including runes.
“Over a hundred years ago it allowed an army of acolytes to hold back a Smoke rank mage, by combining all of their Force onto Lord Panai. Back then, our three Lords Magi were only at the peak of the Wisp rank, but the Force Distribution System let them win a battle that should have been unwinnable. After that, they all had breakthroughs to Smoke rank and Inuvik Academy became the dominant power in Trurok.”
“I thought the Lightning Corp was Trurok's most powerful group?”
“That’s true now. But Silla and his Lightning Corp are new. Silla only advanced to Smoke rank about four decades ago, and it took him a couple decades more to seize a majority control of Trurok. So for most of the past century, our Academy has been dominant. And once Silla leaves, we will certainly reclaim that position.”
“Once Silla leaves?” Levin echoed questioningly. “What do you mean?”
“You recall how I said Trurok has low ambient energy?” Pilip asked, and Levin nodded. “That’s why. If Silla had been born anywhere else in the Northern Reaches, he would certainly have already reached the Cloud rank. And if he wants to continue progressing after his breakthrough to Cloud, he will need to leave. But crossing the Nalep Desert is impossible below the Cloud rank.”
“Didn’t Kirima tell me crossing the Nalep isn’t that hard?” Levin thought to himself.
“So Silla is stuck until he reaches Cloud. I hear he’s been quite twitchy about anyone coming near his base while he prepares for his breakthrough,” Pilip said as he made the finishing touches on the rune.
Levin was distracted from the conversation as he took in the full rune Pilip had engraved – he did a double-take, and had to engage his Y-Link on the second look.
“It’s the same rune Amaq used!” Levin exclaimed.
“Ah, very good. I see it was no fluke that you aced the rune section during the entrance exam,” Pilip said. “In that case, I have a test for you.”
Pilip handed the engraving tool, which was nearly empty, over to Levin.
“You’ve seen a control rune twice now, once on my hand during the entrance exam, and once on Amaq’s hand when we tested your Source. Can you recreate it without my help? The shape of a control rune is always the same, regardless of rune.”
A trivial task. Levin’s Y-Link had a record of everything he saw, heard, smelled, tasted and touched. All he had to do was pull up his memory, and he remembered the control runes in perfect detail – a diamond mark with a few circles inside.
Levin turned the engraving tool onto the back of his hand, and began to rub the tip along his skin. He didn’t need to apply any pressure to leave the mark in his skin, and it tickled a little as a glowing trail was left on his body. Soon, a small, silver-blue mark adorned the back of Levin's hand, a pure color that belied the blood of his that had been mixed in earlier.
“Very good.” Pilip nodded with a satisfied smile.
“How do I activate it?” Levin asked, feeling no different than he had before.
“Close your eyes and focus. Inside each person is a ‘sea of consciousness’ that contains all of one’s magic.”
Levin did as he was told, closing his eyes and taking a slow, deep breath, then tried to turn his mind inward. At first, there was simply darkness. His eyes were closed, after all. Then, a pinprick of light appeared in the distance, quickly burning brighter and brighter in Levin's mind's eye, transforming into a blinding silver glow.
A moment later, the glow took shape like a picture coming into focus, taking on the same diamond form as the mark on Levin's hand. Levin followed his instincts, reaching out and trying to interact with it. It felt like he laid an invisible hand on the surface of the rune in his mind.
And he felt a response. Levin’s eyes shot open, and he saw the rune Master Pilip had just engraved in the ground lighting up. The activated rune felt similar to the times Levin engages his Y-Link, a sensation like your mind expanding as it accesses external information.
Suddenly, he could feel the wind-element Source present in the air above the rune, the information about it flowing into his mind. And to his delight, his Y-Link could record the data.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“Very good!” Pilip exclaimed. Then he walked over to one of his shelves, plucking another jar of ingredients from the shelf.
“Now, let me show you how to interpret the information the rune provides…”
***
Pilip was a surprisingly energetic teacher, who clearly enjoyed seeing Levin make progress. And of course, Levin was more than willing to soak up information like a sponge. So it was late by the time Levin finally left Pilip’s lab, with the sun already sinking below the horizon.
As the dark set in, Levin saw something new for the first time in his two weeks at the Academy – night lights. He had yet to be out this late, and found that the dark was kept well at bay by snake-like threads of light that were popping into existence a dozen feet above Levin’s head.
They swayed back and forth slowly, as if pushed by the wind, projecting white light straight down onto the cobblestones below. Beyond, the stars were also beginning to appear as the light from the sun faded.
But Levin didn’t have time to stop and enjoy the sights. Normally, he would have loved to be kept late learning runesmithing, especially with a view like this afterward. But he had missed his usual afternoon schedule, for the first time since arriving at the Academy.
“I hope Kirima hasn’t been waiting for me…” Levin thought to himself as he hurried over to the library.
The large, twin doors to the library were usually kept open during the days, but they had already been shut for the night. Fortunately, there were still a few hours until the place locked up – the doors were only closed to keep the night chill at bay.
Levin pushed one open, squeezing through and lightly closing it shut behind him. There weren’t many still in the first floor’s reading area, not this late. Levin scanned the room, and quickly found a mess of blue hair spread out all over one of the tables and an open book.
Kirima was fast asleep. Levin walked over quietly, taking a seat next to the napping girl. A little drool ran from the corner of her mouth, and a few drops had already soaked into the pages of the book she was using as a pillow.
Levin smiled, suppressing a laugh. He put a hand on her shoulder, gently trying to rouse her.
“Hey, Kirima.”
“Wah! Oh! Levin!” Kirima woke up immediately, springing up and quickly wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
The few other visitors to the library shot glares in Kirima’s direction.
“Sorry. Sorry,” Kirima said quietly, bowing to the others before sitting back down next to Levin.
“I’m sorry too,” Levin said to Kirima. “I didn’t mean to be so late today. Master Pilip and I lost track of time.”
“That’s alright!” she said, speaking in hushed tones. “Was today the day?”
Levin shook his head. “Actually, Master Pilip said he’s been struggling with Chaos. So it will probably still be a while before I get my own magic. But instead, he taught me runesmithing today!”
“That’s amazing! So even without a Source, you can do it?”
“Yes, thanks to Master Pilip. Now, will you come with me? It’s a bit too late for the library,” Levin said.
“Of course! Where are we going?” Kirima asked.
“The campus store. I want to buy some equipment to practice runesmithing on my own,” Levin said.
“But runesmithing is expensive, you know. Oh! You have a lot of money, don’t you?” Kirima said.
“...That’s right,” Levin said.
He regretted letting her see into his coin purse when they first met, because there was no way he could share that his money came from the corpse of the Lightning Corp’s strongest warrior. At least she seemed to just accept it – maybe the amount of money Tulimak had wasn’t actually that impressive. If so, Levin would have to be a little careful how he spent it. But today’s purchase would be essential.
“I’m excited for you, Levin! Let’s go right now!” she exclaimed, quietly.
The two headed out, walking through the white glow of the nighttime campus. The buildings used by everyone, such as the Smoke Hall, the library, and the campus store, were all mostly clustered together in the center of campus around the massive statue of Panai, so Levin and Kirima didn’t have very far to go. Even so, Levin made haste, and Kirima lagged behind a little.
In the dark, the tower that Levin led them to looked the same as any other, with its curved stone walls and large glass windows on each floor. But the mystical lighting of Inuvik Academy clearly illuminated one clear difference – the sign reading Materials Pavilion sitting above the entrance.
Levin and Kirima walked in together. The first floor of the tower consisted of a single large room, filled with all sorts of items including tools, plants, pills, weapons, clothing, and many more items that Levin couldn't identify, all labeled with price tags. At the back of the room, a set of stairs circled up to the next floor.
An old man sat behind a counter to Levin’s right, near the entrance. Levin glanced at him, preparing to greet himself, but the old man’s head was down and he let out a small snore with each breath.
“Maybe I should have waited until tomorrow…” Levin said in a whisper to Kirima.
“They aren’t closed for the night, right?” she asked.
“No,” Levin said. According to his clock, they would be open for another hour or so.
He scanned the room, briefly engaging his Y-Link to check each item automatically for the objects of his search. One of them was here, and Levin made note of it.
“Let’s go upstairs,” Levin said, and Kirima nodded.
The two headed up, doing their best to step quietly up to the second floor. They poked their heads up, and found no one present. In terms of layout, this room was identical to the one below, minus one sleeping old man.
However, Levin didn’t need to use his Y-Link to tell this was the right floor. Unlike the miscellaneous assortment of common items below, this was clearly a floor selling runesmithing supplies. One half of the shelf-space was taken up by assorted bundled plants, minerals and preserved animal parts, many of which Levin recognized from Master Pilip’s runesmithing textbooks.
The other half was stocked full of the tools needed to convert those raw materials into ink and runes. Levin walked over, examining a group of boxes each containing all the runesmithing basics, intended for new acolytes.
Each one contained a mortar and pestle, a small furnace only about half a foot tall, a crucible for the furnace, a large, sharp engraving tool like the one Master Pilip used, a few glass beakers, a small alembic, a pair of tongs, an assortment of various plants, and a pile of coal-like rocks, each about the size of a fingernail with red, softly pulsing veins running along the surface – heatstones.
None of the tools appeared to be new, and many had noticeable wear and tear from prior use. Levin selected a set that appeared to be in the best condition, which still included a layer of dust and a few odd stains on the mortar. Equipped with his starting gear, he turned to head back down the stairs.
Kirima stood on the other side of the room, poking at a small membranous wing with her back to Levin.
“Is there anything you want?” Levin asked.
“Oh, it’s all so expensive… You’re lucky, Levin. Once you learn runesmithing you can make money by selling inks,” Kirima said.
“I could teach you,” Levin said. “You’ve done so much for me, it’s the least I could do.”
“Oh! Thank you, Levin! But I’d better not. With my talent, I can’t afford to take time away from my studies as a mage,” she said with a small smile.
“I really should do something for Kirima,” Levin thought to himself. “She helped me get into Inuvik City, she gave me a ride on her horse to the Academy, and most of all, she taught me to read and she’s given me a steady supply of books at the library. But I haven’t done anything for her in return.”
“Anything catch your eye here?” he asked.
“Not really,” Kirima said. “Besides, everything on this floor is for runesmithing.”
“It doesn’t have to be this floor. Come on, isn’t there anything you want?”
“Well… It would be great to get some water-element inks to help my meditation,” Kirima said after a moment.
“Ah, the kind used for strengthening your Source, right?”
“Yes, but those types of inks are the most expensive kind. And Inuvik Academy specializes in fire magic, so the other elements are even pricier,” Kirima said.
“Let me buy one for you,” Levin said. In that moment, he intended to get Kirima this gift even if it cost his entire coin pouch.
“No!” she hurriedly said. “It’s… I mean, thank you, Levin. But those inks really are expensive. And if you want to learn runesmithing, you’re going to need all that money for buying ingredients. Runesmithing is really expensive, you know…”
“Seriously, I insist. You’ve done so much for me.”
Kirima blushed, but shook her head. “It’s too much for a gift. I won’t accept it.”
“Then I’ll learn to brew them for you,” Levin said. “I need to start my practice somewhere, after all.”
“Okay!” Kirima said, giggling. “Then I better make sure you get more runesmithing books from the library!”
Levin smiled as the two headed back down the stairs. On the first floor, he walked over to one of the shelves, where a few glass vials of liquid were sitting, including the same silver-blue ink that Pilip had used for Levin’s analysis rune.
Levin grabbed all three vials of that ink – he intended to experiment a little with them. He dropped them into the box with his runesmithing equipment, and headed over towards the old man at the counter, who was still fast asleep. For a moment, the thought that Levin could just walk out without paying crossed his mind, but he immediately banished the idea.
Levin sat his purchases down on the counter, fishing Tulimak’s coin purse out of his robe. The price for the box and inks had been written above, and Levin poured out the correct amount into his hand, several blue coins and some gold change.
The gold coins made sense to Levin, seeing as gold had been quite valuable in his home dimension. But he couldn’t quite tell what the blue coins were made of, ones that mages referred to as “eth.” However, it was most certainly valuable – a single eth was worth around a hundred gold, and it was the main standard of currency amongst mages.
The amount of gold coins that a peasant could survive on for life was like pocket change to a mage. Even Levin’s box of basic equipment cost nearly a thousand gold, enough to purchase a respectable home in Inuvik City.
Fortunately, the stolen bag from Tulimak was more blue than yellow on the inside.
Placing the payment down on the counter, Levin picked up his newly purchased box and headed out, with Kirima in tow. Outside, they said their farewells for the night before splitting off back to their dorms.
Unbeknownst to Levin, the old man popped an eye open and watched them go.
***
Levin was a little surprised how nervous he felt as stepped back into his room in the servant’s quarters with the loot from his shopping trip. He was confident he was capable, but this would be an important litmus test – seeing if his Y-Link could process runes. And he was going to test it with the analysis rune.
After analyzing a few Sources and trying a few basic recipes with Master Pilip, Levin very much appreciated how important the analysis rune. As Master Pilip had said, the tolerances in runesmithing were miniscule – brewing inks required the touch of a mage. So Levin was very grateful for Master Pilip’s gift.
But it was incredibly inconvenient. First of all, it was far too limited. Anything he wanted to analyze had to be within the rune’s short range, and Levin had no way to move the rune without creating a new one.
So not only could he not analyze the furnace or glass tools while they were working, he wouldn’t be able to do any runesmithing at all outside of Master Pilip’s lab. Who knew when Levin might have to abandon Inuvik Academy and go into hiding like Mei – he needed to be able to brew inks anywhere.
Levin engaged his Y-Link. It was time to go to work.
Fundamentally, runes obeyed rules. And the rules said there were three things that contributed to the creation of a rune: The ingredients for the ink, the different steps and tools used in the brewing process, and finally the shape of the rune when engraved into a surface. Each of these followed a logical process, all contributing to the final effect of the rune.
Runesmiths understood these rules. They knew, roughly, what changes to one of the steps would have on the final product. Substituting fire-element ingredients for water-element would result in balls of flame becoming balls of water. And changing the physical shape of the lines for the rune might change that ball into a cube.
But while runesmiths understood these ideas in broad strokes, the exact details could be difficult. Runes were finicky things, and sometimes two similar ingredients could cause widely different effects in specific combinations. And finding the right shape, especially for new inks, could be like trying to build a circuit board without understanding electricity. Oftentimes, research into runes boiled down to brute-forcing as many combinations as possible to see all their effects, narrowing down the scope of testing from there.
But Levin was different. Not only did he have the full power of a quantum supercomputer at his fingertips, he had all the sensing equipment from Earth that Andrew had given him. He could not only see runesmithing happen at an atomic level, he had the resources to process that data.
And now, it was time to give his Y-Link its first runesmithing test run. Levin’s goal was simple – shrink the analysis rune. If he could get it to a size that would fit on his toolbelt, it would be a success, a huge upgrade to his measuring equipment. And since he already had the ink, he only needed to find the right shape.
As he began running simulations, Levin didn’t expect immediate results. This would be the first test set of a machine learning model, trained on the rules and examples he had read of in Pilip’s and the library’s books. It would take time and more data for his model to be refined, but eventually Levin hoped he would be able to create any rune at all from scratch.
For now, he set it to produce a rune that would give the same output as the analysis rune, but at only a few inches wide. It wasn’t actually that large a difference – the original rune could already be made less than one foot wide, just by scaling it down and using less ink. It would have less range, but that wouldn’t matter if it fit on his toolbelt.
Levin was soon producing new designs to test out, which he began to engrave on his hand. He tried to activate the rune directly, but was unable too – he had to engrave another control rune on his hand to get a response. The larger, main rune was visible in his sea of consciousness, but barely responded when Levin tried to interact with it.
But the benefit of using his hand was that he could keep what little furniture and floor space he had from being filled up with failed runes. After all, he expected a long string of failures – not only was his runesmithing model in its infancy, he was keeping the model’s criteria for success quite broad. Better to test a dozen false positives than let a false negative slip away in an ocean of computer-generated garbage.
And he was right, because all of his test runes fizzled out as the night dragged on. Fortunately, they left no marks behind in the skin, so he could reuse his palm over and over with different designs after burning the ink from the failed runes away. He didn’t even need to replace the control rune each time.
Levin entered a trance of testing runes over and over as sleep began to creep further and further into his body. A part of him recognized that he should let himself rest as the night began to turn into morning, but a larger part was repeating the same thing over and over – Just one more. Just one more. Just one more.
And then, as the light of dawn began to creep into the window of Levin’s room, he was jolted awake. Because suddenly, the rune on his hand was working.
Levin smiled from ear to ear. That had been much faster than he expected. But if the rules of runes were just simple geometry, then his Y-Link was going to have little trouble with them.