Benjamin focused on the sleeping man for quite some time. The man turned onto his back and after a moment, started snoring lightly. Any attempt Benjamin made to communicate with him failed. There had been a brief glow surrounding him. The suitable ruler function didn’t seem to do much other than just highlight the man. Benjamin selected yes on the dialog box for what felt like the millionth time. Once again the box vanished and a glow surrounded the man on the bed, but when Benjamin focused on the man, the glow vanished.

Benjamin yelled out of frustration. Just like what happened the last hundred times a fresh dialog box popped into view.

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Benjamin selected no, instantly dismissing the box. He went through options and started looking for some kind of hint to what he could do. Most everything he found had to do with the layout of the windows and buttons. There were many options that were obscured, however Benjamin did find a few that seemed helpful. He turned on both the ability to view active quests, display target information, and also a window for population. Benjamin pushed the population number to the size of his vision. It was zero. Benjamin would have been surprised if it were one.

He had been surprised that there was an option for active quests. He wasn't quite sure if it was for quests he received, or if it meant he could give out quests. The option to display target information seemed useful as well. He decided to try that out. It took him a while to understand how to target at first, but he found it was much like clicking on something while using a computer. He selected a chair first.

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Benjamin was happy, he finally made some progress! He selected the sleeping man.

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The window didn’t really display any ground breaking information. He knew nothing about the man, so he figured the target information just displayed information that he knew personally. Benjamin decided to try giving the sleeping man a quest. After a few minutes of mental effort he received a window.

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Benjamin grew frustrated again. He selected the sandbox. A new window popped up.

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Benjamin decided to pass the time targeting everything he could in the small cottage. That killed a few hours. There hadn’t been anything remarkable except for the bracelet the man had been wearing. Once Benjamin targeted it, it displayed the information.

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The stone in the bracelet couldn’t have been much bigger than an acorn. He found himself captivated by it. At first it appeared to have just been a sphere, but the closer he moved his perspective, he found himself looking at smaller and smaller flat surfaces. It was an apeirogon. Each flat surface was perfectly flat, and held at an impossible angle. At first glance the iron band that had been constructed to hold the city heart appeared to have been fastened like any other piece of jewelry. On closer inspection, however, Benjamin could see the band and the apeirogon never touched. The heart itself rotated freely as it cycled through all its colors. This object was fascinating.

Does staring at what essentially is my own brain in utter fascination and awe reek of vanity? Benjamin thought to himself.

Time flew by as he watched the heart spin in different directions. Benjamin had tried to change the colors that cycled through the heart, but had no success. It was a magnificent thing, really. The simplicity of the iron band, bound by a thin leather strap had off set the beautiful shape inside. He inched his perspective closer to the apeirogon. It really had looked like a sphere from afar. In the back of his mind he wondered if he would be able to see the structure on the atomic level, and how long it would take him to zoom into it.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Benjamin’s concentration was shattered in an instant. The city heart flew far from his sight. The loss of the intense focus on the heart had dizzied him. He hadn’t felt anything quite like it. It was almost as if his mind was split into two. He pulled himself back and paused a moment. The man had sat up straight in bed, his arms outstretched. Benjamin sent him a quest.

————

Gram woke well rested. His small cottage had at first felt too small, but over the years he had grown to love the thing. He sat up and stretched his arms toward the ceiling. The sun had just started to come out from over the horizon.

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Gram glanced around the cottage. There hadn’t been anything new that he brought in. He lowered his arms and caught a glimpse of his bracelet. The gem inside had a faint blue glow. Gram shot out of bed and quickly dressed. As he tried to leave the cottage the bracelet on his wrist got caught in the middle of the air right at the threshold, causing Gram to fall on his back, he hastily went back inside. The bracelet came off in a matter of seconds, and then he stashed in underneath the cold coals of his fireplace. He rushed to his grandmother’s house.

Gram had been raised by his grandmother. He hadn’t had any memories of his own parents. They had died when he was young, and his grandmother never talked about it. She always answered with a, ‘I’ll tell you when you’re older.’ He eventually stopped asking. She had tried to teach him the basics of magic from an early age, but found that he had neither the aptitude nor the temperament. She had sent him to tutor with family friends, in an effort to train up his martial skills. He had shown promise, but there was a physical limit, unlike magic.

“Nan!” he shouted, upon reaching her door. He opened it without hesitation.

She sat at her table holding a cup of tea with both of her hands. The tea was still steaming, filling the air with a floral scent. An empty plate sat before her, cleared of her breakfast. Her silver hair had been tied into a bun on the back of her head. Something about being a mage had helped her age without a wrinkle. The only clue of her age had just been her hair alone. She wore her robes. They were just made of a black rough-cut cloth. She slowly looked away from her tea. Her eyes had been cloudy for a moment, but as her gaze turned to Gram, their color returned, revealing a dark brown. They matched Gram’s exactly. She looked Gram over and noticed his wrist was bare.

“What’s going on Gram?” she answered with an even tone.

Gram frantically pointed toward his cottage, “The bracelet! Something’s happened to it!”

Kylie waved her hand slightly to the corner of her room, and a staff jumped into her open hand. She patted her hip, and nodded with satisfaction upon finding what she was looking for there. She left her house, closing the door behind her. Gram had been urging her on back to his cottage, but Kylie took her time. Every second step was accompanied by the thunk of her staff. The staff itself wouldn’t have made noise on its own, but she had it enchanted to do so. Kylie had always liked the theater.

The door to Gram’s cottage had still been opened from his haste. Kylie pushed ahead of Gram when they arrived. If someone had stolen it, there would still be a trail. The heart still had a charge, despite its fracture. It had been leaking mana for generations and still had enough left in it to last many more. She looked around the room, unable to see any stray wisps of mana floating around. She planted her staff in the middle of the room where it continued to stand unaided. Under her breath she mumbled an incantation to illuminate any smaller traces of mana she couldn’t detect herself. She couldn’t find it.

“Where did they take it?” she muttered to herself.

“They didn’t take it,” Gram said.

He dug into the fireplace’s dead coals and produced the bracelet. Kylie was stunned. She started to lose her footing, and backed up to the table to steady herself. It had never been that alive before! She reached out a hand to touch it, but Gram misunderstood and just handed it to her. Kylie dangled the city heart in front of her face marveling at the large amount of colors it cycled through.

“What exactly happened, Gram?” she asked as she watched the heart.

Gram shared his morning’s story with his grandmother. Kylie broke into laughter.

“Just the luck of things, you’re the least magically inclined, but also the luckiest!”

“What do you mean luckiest?” Gram asked.

“You’ll be getting your first class without being unlocked!” she said with a chuckle.

“I don’t see how this is funny,” Gram stated.

“If only you knew how hard our family worked at keeping you away from being unlocked.”

Kylie waved her hand dismissively.

“Alright let’s go into your cellar,” Kylie said as she placed the bracelet back into Gram’s hand.

He followed her wordlessly to the cellar. The cured meats and other long storage foods sat on their prospective shelves. They were lined neatly in rows. Between the shelves there had been a rune carved into the floor. It was work that Kylie had done personally. She pointed at the rune.

“Ok just put the bracelet on that, and your quest will be done.”

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Benjamin watched the pair come back into the cottage. He didn’t understand what the older woman had meant by ‘unlocking.’ He decided to ignore it. He’ll be able to find out later. He was happy that he managed to grab Gram’s name from their conversation. He’d have to figure out the woman’s name later. The pair went into the cellar. Gram had taken back ownership of the bracelet. Benjamin still felt odd about the city heart spinning in the middle of the iron ring. It was strange to consider that it was him. He was still quite attached to his human body. Having it replaced by something roughly the size of a small stack of pennies had been a bit unnerving. Gram tossed the bracelet underhanded toward the rune in the middle of the floor. Benjamin did not like the casual way they were handling his physical form. The bracelet soared to the rune and was caught mid air. Benjamin had a message pop.

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The bracelet spun wildly in mid air, the leather whipping about. It slowly dissolved into nothingness. The iron ring had started to dissolve as well, though it was at a much slower pace. Both Gram and the old woman stepped back as they witnessed the city heart spinning in the air. Benjamin had expected to feel something as the core was repaired.

The woman looked down at the rune. Could she see something he couldn’t? Benjamin swung his perspective around to get a good look at it. The rune started to glow red. The old woman pushed Gram into the wall ladder they used to get in. He had the wind knocked out of him. She appeared at his side a moment later. The staff that had been upstairs standing by itself crashed through the cellar’s trap door. The moment it reached the woman's hands a shimmer appeared in the air.

Benjamin started to feel something. The city heart’s colors had stopped shifting and the crystalline structure turned transparent. There was a physical jolt to the ground, followed by a vibration. A lance of energy exploded out through the rune on the floor. The food in the cellar had been vaporized instantly along with their shelves. The walls had been made into glass. There hadn’t been any further damage. The woman and Gram stood shakily. The woman pushed him off gently and sat down on the ground.

The woman looked exhausted. She pointed to the core and Gram’s jaw fell. It grew to the size of a large beach ball. Gram spoke excitedly to the woman. She just shrugged and replied. Not being able to hear these two was frustrating.