The keys of the typewriter clicked as my fingers jumped from each circular button to the next, the words I conjured appearing on the page as the ink was pressed onto the parchment.
“Are you calling me a goon?”
Rakyat just blinked at the page as disappointment settled in on his features.
“If you're working for one of those stuck up inventors, then yeah I guess you are. So which one is it you have to fetch parts for, huh? I'm guessing that Orzgip guy who keeps asking for explosives so volatile I actually cannot have brought here safely, or maybe the one who ordered a crate of a hundred custom made platinum rune plates then told me that I had mishandled them. What a bunch of scaly ticks, I’m ashamed to even do business with them.”
No my friend, you are very off the mark in your assumptions.
“Nobody. I'm one of the inventors and I run my own laboratory.”
Rakyat scoffed, then put his hands on his hips as he talked to the empty air to his side.
“The day those lazy thieves let a kid be an inventor is the day I sprout wings and call myself a fairy.”
I crossed my arms and put on my most shit eating grin, because somebody was getting ready to be eating their own words. Rakyat's eyes jittered around as he scanned through some unseen information, his face finally twitching into a mixture of shock and intrigue.
“Oh. You aren't messing around, are you? It's disturbing that someone as young and inexperienced as you has access to her own lab, but considering that brain you've got there I'm actually not all that surprised. It's actually more alarming that the machine that the elders set up to assign jobs would pick you for such a position. Anyway, it's good to hear that Yabby's big niece is a part of that moronic carnival of self-important lizard shits. I'm not insulting you personally, but that place is a fucking nightmare and it's really impressive that you've managed to get that high position at such a young age. Guess being a reborn does more for you than I thought it would.”
His beady eyes looked at the note I had in my claws, and before I could either hand it to him or pocket it he had already snatched it so he could read it himself. Hey, you could have just asked!
“Ah, these are the other traders around the city. This isn't your penwork, so I'd say this has to be Vyn's. My advice: don't go to these others. First one on this list is a soul-breaking money fiend born from the deepest depths of the dark, and this other one is a sweet lady but can't read or keep good inventory. I will act as your in-between and get you anything you need.”
You're being awfully pushy today Rakyat, what's up with that? I asked him using the typewriter, which had now begun to feel a bit easier to operate after warming up. Rakyat flopped into a crossed leg sitting pose and answered me through a heavy sigh.
“I'm losing my mind from boredom. You want to know why I stayed up working on that machine? I've got nothing to do around here except dig through a bunch of crates for old junk and tell goons from the workshop to let their impatient masters know that I don't control the rate at which caravans travel. I was so excited to have some real tinkering to do that I went nose first and burned through it all like an idiot.”
He propped his elbows on his knees, then placed his chin atop his open palms.
“I talk bad about the workshop, but I secretly yearn for that life again. I was no inventor, but my gears were always the neatest, fastest, and smoothest running of the entire foundry back home. Every piece was a work of art driven by springs and cogs, some smaller than bugs, others as big as trees. Oh, uh, you probably don't know what those are. So they're these tall things that-”
I raised my hands to stop him, and fortunately he understood right away that describing plants wasn't what I wanted to hear about. He closed his mouth with his hands as though physically restraining his jaws from moving. We shared an awkward moment since he didn't seem to know how to resume talking and I was already in my own thoughts at the moment. A clockwork master craftsman with nothing but time and energy looking for something to rekindle the flame of passion. A thought came to mind, one that I hadn't considered due to a small bit of arrogance on my part.
What if I gave Rakyat a few of my more mechanical designs and gave him some commission work? I looked down at the typewriter and made a note of just how tiny the inner parts were, and I knew for certain that these parts were not the original components that were in that crate. I had mistakenly assumed that there wouldn't be anyone around that could handle some of the complex mechanisms I knew of, but the level of intricacy right before me was beyond even my skill. That and if anyone could make sense of my notes it would have to be someone as equally sporadic as myself, and Rakyat was in that perfect range of unhinged and stable.
I looked at the box I had brought in and settled the matter in my mind by posing this as a test. I withdrew a design for a basic four speed transmission and set it next to the sullen fuzzball. Just as quick as he had robbed me before, his little paws were on the schematic like lightning as his eyes went wide at the page. My dangers jumped around the keys in order to begin this test.
“One of my designs. I'm curious to see if you understand what it does.”
Not once did his eyes leave the page as the verbal jargon began to pour freely.
“This is some kind of power selecting box using a few different sizes of gears to change between fast speed and high strength. I don't know what this engine or clutch nonsense is, but they're obviously the thing that gives these shafts their rotation. Normally you would need to change out entire sections of gears on any kind of set for the same effect, but with this you could do all that without even stopping. But how do you change this connecting part here without tearing everything apart? There has to be some kind of brake or slowing system in order to disconnect from the active gear and change over to the new gear. You'd also need to keep this all inside of some kind of oil to keep it from getting hot. Oh wait, there's already a note here that says just that. Good, you’re smart enough to know that metal things get hot when they hit other metal things. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen anyone pay attention to proper gear spacing and depth, and I can already tell that this is just one part of a much bigger thing that is way more complex”
Congratulations, you passed my test with outstanding results! He continued to mutter as he read over more of my notes, all the while I was typing out an explanation of what I intended to do with the machines on some of my other schematics. Both of us were practically buzzing with excitement as I handed him a stack of schematics and the written explanation, both eager to finally have someone to talk precision engineering with. Depending on his price, Rakyat might be an excellent outsource for my materials and crafting needs, or perhaps even another pair of hands in the workshop if such a thing is allowed.
…
The chiming of a dozen clocks told me that the day was over for the furry kobold, and I had to leave his shop with a bit of disappointment. As expected, that mechanical mind of his was insanely good at discerning details and functions, and as I had anticipated he was starting for more. In the end I had settled on enlisting his assistance in making the inner working of a lathe and mill, with a promise of further assistance later on. His work asking price was a bit steep at seventy Draks for both machines, but given that he also threw in a stack of gray stone crucible cups and a thick glass mixing jar. I need to be careful in his shop or I might go completely broke. Yabtin walked me home with my new purchases to both guarantee my safety and collect my fee.
Mibata and Bahruk were already home waiting for me, though admittedly dad was chewing at his claws like a madman with worry while my brother somehow knew where I was despite me not telling him. He also somehow knew that I would be too tired to cook anything and had already gotten some mushroom and chicken skewers on his way home. Okay mister spy guy, we get that you're the well informed one so there's no need to show off. I ate my portion as well as an additional plate of pantry snacks to sate my ravenous hunger, then went into the hobby room to ensure that my new stuff didn't get broken. I'll decide whether or not the fragile stuff comes to work with me in the morning.
As per my request, Mibata had refrained from expending the excess mana and had gone about his day with an overcharged source. To our shared surprise it seemed that doing so had helped boost his mana capacity to match his own rate of growth in addition to the extra I'd given him. He asked me to continue sharing my magic with him, and even suggested that I scan our dad to see where he was on the scale. He agreed under the caveat that he get his own status sheet just the same as the one for Mibata.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
His phrasing got me thinking about how I was interpreting the information in my head. Up until now I was looking at it as some sort of diagnostics report for magic issues, but perhaps that isn't what the sensors were really meant to be seeing. What if I thought about them as character sheets from an rpg, with as much information available displayed in any term that applies? Amazingly this worked, and it showed up in my mind like this:
Bahruk
Kobold
Mana: 217/217
Physical scan incomplete, component missing.
Source condition: healthy
Elemental affinity: stone/ore/rock
Non-physical elemental resistances-
Fire: 27
Thunder: 23
Ice: 20
Magic: 20
Corrupt: 7
Explosion: 50
Sonic: 2
Light: 24
No magical effects detected.
Scanner tier too low, further data inconclusive.
Something about the way it was displayed tickled my brain, and I had to double check with Charles to check if he was influencing it in any way. He was doing half the work, and was basing the way it was shown in my mind off of the average of every video game and tabletop game I've played. Cool, looks like I have even more questions such as: why does thinking about it like a video game make it work better? Not even Charles who had a direct line to my subconscious mind had any idea of why, but if it works I'll take it.
I’m starting to get the feeling that my intent placed on runes might be what determines their optimal function, the scanner rune more so dependent on what I wanted than how it was actually shaped. Maybe the fact that it was an organic shaped rune meant that it had behaviors that were like a living thing, so my idea of a character sheet changed how it would interpret the data and display it for me. If that’s the case, then perhaps scanning something inorganic with the desire for an item description might be more viable than just trying and failing based on loose thoughts and feelings. I’ll give that a try on this unassuming piece of quartz I purchased a while back.
Item: quartz
Physical scan incomplete, component missing.
Mana conductivity: 65%
Mana enrichment: 0%
Rune compatibility: Sonic element
Scanner tier too low, further data inconclusive.
What the heck, why is it so easy to understand now that I’m pretending it’s a video game? This is weird, I’ve been playing the guessing game with all of this magic hullabaloo, and now it’s just going to tell me all of this just like that? Charles says that it’s because of my change in perspective, but I think that it’s because I’m hesitant to fall into too many tropes for my own sanity. Fine, if that’s what it takes to get a decent scan then I’ll accept it, but let’s do a self scan just to be sure.
Kayrux
Kobold (progressing)
Mana: (scan failed)
Physical scan incomplete, component missing.
Source condition: (scan failed)
Elemental affinity: none
Non-physical elemental resistances-
Fire: 15
Thunder: 49
Ice: 6
Magic: 1̸͙̈́0̴̮͛͠0̶̢̟̕
Corrupt: 5
Explosion: 17
Sonic: 16
Light: 3
Magical effects:(scan failed)
Source growth rate: (scan failed)
Mana capacity growth rate: (scan failed)
Magic resistance growth rate: (scan failed)
Scanner tier too low, further data inconclusive.
Just a buggy as I thought it would be, if not a bit more. This told me a lot of new information, such as damage types beyond what I could think of before and possible upgrades that could be made to the rune allowing me to scan physical properties. At the same time it made me incredibly worried about some things, primarily why my race had the word (progressing) next to it and why there was a corrupt damage type in that list. Maybe I can put the latest scan from Mibata through this interpretation and use it as a cross reference.
Mibata
Kobold (progressing)
Mana: 60/60
Physical scan incomplete, component missing.
Source condition: injured
Elemental affinity: transmutation-metal
Non-physical elemental resistances-
Fire: 16
Thunder: 8
Ice: 4
Magic: 11
Corrupt: 4
Explosion: 5
Sonic: 8
Light: 15
Magical effects: minor mana fatigue, moderate source scar
Source growth rate: 13% (hindered)
Mana capacity growth rate: 11% (hindered)
Magic resistance growth rate: 10% (hindered)
Scanner tier too low, further data inconclusive.
Okay, so it wasn’t just me that was in a weird not-fully-kobold state. Was it perhaps a sign that we weren’t fully matured yet, or perhaps it has something to do with our heritage? Only time would tell, but for now I could take some solace in the fact that the number of limbs and eyes I had remained the same. Regardless of his lower stats, I was glad that Mibata was gaining some magical power and resistance from my help. Maybe by next week I can help push him over into the triple digits of mana capacity.
Owch, scanning gives me one killer headache that makes my teeth feel wrong in my mouth. Charles says that it's because the runes are putting the information through my brain like some kind of filter, which is not what the brain is supposed to do with the info. He’s going to look into it while I take the night off from any more magical mischief.
…
The next day started with a big breakfast, a box loaded high with things for the lab, and Mibata being an extra set of hands for me on my way to the workshop. I had already put six mana into his source before we left, and watching his source on our elevator ride allowed me to watch the shape of his very soul writhe and twist as the colorless mana was scattered and folded into the silver waves surrounding his heart. It was mesmerizing to watch, though perhaps a bit uncomfortable for him to be stared at like a lab rat. Sorry Mibata, your mana is just a very pleasing color to look at, that's all.
Dad dropped us off but remained on the lift so he could drop the miners off on the bottom floor, meaning that it was just Mibata, Tim, and myself going into the workshop. My brother seemed quite intrigued by the constant motion of the working kobolds around him, his inquisitive eyes watching each passing laborer with eyes that told of curiosity and wonder. I know it’s a bit much if you’re not used to it brother, but to me it’s like a home away from home. I led him to my lab and sprung the lock so he could place my things on the work table for me.
He turned to leave, but I stopped him and held up my slate for him to hold onto and read.
“Thank you so much for carrying all of my stuff. I’m sorry if it's a bit loud in here, that’s just how it is. Take care of yourself on the job and don’t get hurt. I love you, be safe!"
A curt nod was his reply before he soldiered off while wearing his imperceptible smile. A brief check in with Dobo let me know that Vimna and her siblings were having a field trip to the town at the foot of the mountain, and my lab assistant would be back tomorrow. Looks like I’ll do something quiet today with the fence blocked off and Tim in my lap. I sat myself at my table with the book of enchanter’s knowledge and began to try deciphering it with a new way of thinking. As with runes, perhaps delving into the aether required one’s intent to be less complicated for there to be significant progress.
Today was going to be a long and boring day, something I had been needing for a while now.