Bowen? Did…shouldn’t he be with his wife and son? What…what is going on here?

Well, whatever… he can do whatever he wants, but I’m not sure this is the best way to go about things. I like to think that I would be with my family during such a time. Or maybe this is just his way of taking a break?

…

“It’s not my problem,” I mumbled to myself as I stepped over the sleeping Bowen to head out the door.

I’ll have to return in a few hours when they are all alive again. I shouldn’t disturb them when they are sleeping. If I stayed up all night for seemingly no reason, I would be angry if somebody woke me up.

“Babajuie?” a groggy voice mumbled incoherently.

I heard him rustle briefly before Sylas suddenly flipped upright in his chair. Then, after his sleep-mumble nonsense, his sleepy brown eyes stared at me, glazed over with just a little bit of tears in them.

I stood there, figuring there was a fifty/fifty chance for him to either wake up or go back to sleep. And after he rubbed his eyes and let out a yawn, it appeared he would be doing the former.

“Kaladin? Is that you?” Sylas asked with another yawn.

“Yeah, it’s me.”

Sylas scratched his head with enough force that I could hear him scraping his scalp and hair with his nails. “What time is it?” he asked.

“A few hours before noon.”

“I see…” he mumbled as he looked out the window with unfocused eyes.

“Long night? Did you skip out on class?”

“Yeah, I think so,” he said with another yawn.

“So uh…why are you here exactly?” I asked curiously.

Sylas’s eyes went wide as saucers, and he snapped his neck toward me with an audible crack of his bones. “Kaladin?!”

“Sylas?” I questioned nervously.

Did he just break his neck? And was I even talking to Sylas? Did our conversation even register inside his brain?

“Kaladin!” Sylas exclaimed, bursting out of his chair and letting it tumble to the ground. Then, he took one great big step and grabbed me by the lapels of my school uniform. “Kaladin! I need you! Well, I need your eyes! Just give them to me!”

“Huh? Have you finally lost it?” I asked, knocking his hands away and taking a step back.

“Wait! Don’t you dare run! That’s not what I meant!” He said, rubbing his face with the palm of his hand. “I’m being serious. I really do need your help.”

“Then you can go about it in a more normal way,” I complained.

“That may be true…I’ll take it into consideration and blame it on my lack of sleep,” he muttered half-heartedly as he bent backward to stretch.

“So, what exactly do you need from me, Sylas? I wasn’t expecting to find you here amongst…these three,” I asked.

“Ah…it just sort of happened, don’t mind it. But I need you to look at something…now…where is it…damn….”

Sylas started to rummage around his mess of a desk until he picked up a glass cylinder. It was about the width of a forearm, and on either side was a gemstone, one blue, one red. In the glass cylinder looked to be a thin red wire connecting the two gems down the middle.

What is that? It seems… familiar in a way.

Sylas held the object up to my face. His excitement was palpable. “What do you see?”

“A sealed glass cylinder with some red wire and two gemstones capped at the end?” I answered.

“No! I don’t care about that kind of sight! Padraic was mumbling something about your Dragon eye being able to see souls! So I was wondering if you can see mana! Come on, check!” he asked, about ready to explode.

I shrugged, unsure what he wanted, but I fed mana to my eye through the usual channel, and what I saw was a whole lot of nothing. There was no mana in the cylinder or at the gemstones. Well, that’s not true…the red one has a bit of ambient mana surrounding it.

Huh…but it’s not a plant or living thing? Is that a dungeon core shard? No, it’s not bright enough to even be a weak one.

“I don’t see any mana within the tube,” I told him.

Sylas fell to his knees with a groan. “Gah! So damn close! I thought I was onto something!”

“Well, not all hope is lost. What is it you are—”

“Oh! That’s right. I need to explain this to you! Headmaster Taurus sort of gave me the information first. That’s when I just had a spur-of-the-moment idea and decided to run with it! Now where did I put those notes…” Sylas whispered to himself as he slid one book over and immediately grabbed a couple of sheets of white paper.

“Here you go! These are what the Dwarves discovered when experimenting with the green crystal that you found,” Sylas said with a self-satisfied nod.

I took the papers and sat down on a stool, and read through them. It was just research notes, so it was easier to read through. It seemed the Dwarves did all kinds of experiments on the stones.

They exposed the crystal to different types of magic. They even bathed them in the light of the sun and the moon. The experiments were all over the place, things based in actual science and the more magical. They did just about everything from smashing them to dust to dropping them in the World Forge.

One person…ate a corner of a crystal, and the other…snorted it? Are they insane?

They used them to try and scrape Mythril and failed. Made terrible weapons out of them. Added them to mixes and alloys. Apparently, where they focused the most was on the application for mountain farming, which also came to a failure. Their findings?

“Relatively useless…” I muttered the conclusion.

“Mhm. The Dwarves figured the gems would be no better than your average gemstones and should be used in jewelry since they polished nicely. But if you ask me, the Dwarves are either lying, or they were going about it the wrong way. I think they were being too stringent with their research. Dwarves can be innovative but also pigheaded at times. Especially with something brand new.” Sylas said with a nod.

Is it typical for them to snort and ingest unknown crystals of dubious origins?

“But there was one unique finding regarding red slime acid and the gems…” I said, looking up at Sylas.

He raised an eyebrow then the dots connected for him. He slid a drawer open and snatched a flat green piece from it. It looked like a green window pane that you couldn’t see through on one side…but according to the Dwarves…

“So, you really can see through the gems, almost like it’s clear glass?” I mused. “Does…oh, it does still work.”

I fed some mana into my fingertips, and the green crystal moved away, slowly receding away and over itself. It was interesting now that I could see through the glass like a one-way mirror. It almost…it…

Glass for a visor… that’s what it could be used for. The crystal’s hardness isn’t something to be impressed about, but it’s way more robust than glass. The only problem is the fact it moves away from mana which may lead to issues against spells. But then again, most helmets are susceptible to magic-based attacks to the head anyway, so what’s the point in worrying about that? Maybe we can strengthen the crystal via a particular process? Of course, if I were to wear a helmet, then that means I would have to cover my ears… mmm…maybe I should look up designs other Elves have come up with over the years.

“This might be worth investigating,” I muttered to myself.

“Yes, yes, I’m glad you think so,” Sylas said with a rapid succession of nods.

“So you haven’t explained what it is that you are doing?” I asked him.

“Yes! So let me walk you through it, okay? So, as you can see, there is your green crystal here, right? You find it in a dungeon, and it’s repulsed by magic, right?” Sylas asked me.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Yes…I understand that much. I’m more curious about the red crystal, though. There is a small amount of mana in it. It’s reminiscent of a very weak dungeon core. No, calling it a dungeon core shard would be wrong. It’s so minuscule it’s closer to a small plant that’s been trampled and is on the verge of death. Despite the fact that the crystal isn’t alive at all.”

Sylas nodded again, his smile growing. “Good…good…well, this red crystal here is actually the same crystals the Dwarves used in their underground farming techniques.”

I raised an eyebrow and looked up at Sylas. “The same crystals that only come from a dungeon in Krunbar, that are heavily monitored and restricted? How did you even get your hands on one?”

Sylas looked at me with a blank expression, his smile from earlier gone. “Does it matter how I got it? I needed it, so I found one. Nothing to concern yourself about. The process was mostly legal.”

Oh…he’s that kind of scientist. Maybe checking in on Sylas more often would be a good idea.

“I understand. Please continue,” I said, not wanting to touch on the specifics.

Sylas's smile returned. He did a complete one-eighty in a flash. It was sort of terrifying. It almost reminded me of his sister.

“So! Yes, these red crystals are attracted to mana, right? And I had the thought while looking at those two crystals that if one crystal was attracted to mana and one pushed away from it. Then maybe they could hold mana in between themselves?”

No way…is he?

“So I had Mister Squeaks over there make me Blood Iron wires. Although it took an entire day of convincing, he agreed. So I basically used Blood Iron because I thought its weird anti-mana properties might be helpful instead of using Mythril, and we connected the two gemstones via the wires and sealed the glass tube. I was hoping that it would store mana. But it appears it doesn’t work as intended,” Sylas said with a soft sigh.

“Sylas, can I ask why you thought of this? This is out of the realm of your practice, right? Isn’t your goal to create a world where the church and others don’t prey upon normal people with their light mages?” I asked him seriously.

Sylas met my gaze with a fierce determination that did not match his sleepy eyes. “Of course, that is my goal. But there are many ways to go about it. For one, I don’t want to rid the world of light mages. That would be the most imbecilic idea of the century. So one of the many ways to lessen the reliance on these mages and the monopoly of the church would be if more people were capable of using light magic. The question we do not know the answer to is: just how many people have the aptitude to use light magic? Sadly, even if thousands of people possessed the innate ability to utilize that specific magic school, the odds are they would not have enough mana to cast even a single spell. So…what if mana wasn’t a problem? What if they could take mana from a stored external source and use it then?”

“It would bridge the gap by leaps and bounds,” I told him.

“Exactly. Take even me, for example. At best, this device would have been able to let those without much mana to maybe one day use a healing spell. But at worst, someone like me who can use light magic but isn’t as gifted as some of my family members would be in a better position when healing someone. I’m a measly Intermediate mage at best. If someone were critically wounded via dozens of injuries, I would not be able to save them as I am now. But…if I had an external power source…I may just be able to eke out a better result,” Sylas said solemnly.

“What about dungeon core shards? Why not use those instead?” I questioned, already knowing the rough answer.

“Using dungeon core shards simply isn’t feasible for the average person. They are limited in their usage, while this one would be reusable for as long as the device was intact. And dungeon core shards are highly sought after for their various usages, which make them a competitive resource. Although my current device is expensive to build…I’m sure I can make it cheaper one day. If it worked, that is. Although the amount of crystals you found is an issue.”

“Sylas, how do you plan to feed this…bat—device, mana?” I asked.

“Oh, yes, I didn’t explain that part, right…maybe you can see something I can’t,” he said as he fumbled around with the tube.

Sylas went to the red side, and there was a small cap I hadn’t noticed before. It looked to be covered in leather, and he nudged it off with his finger revealing a sharp point made out of what I assumed to be Blood Iron.

“So I had Vampires on the brain thanks to uh…whatever his name was and got to thinking about some things. Why blood? Why do Vampires drink blood and not a waste product? Wouldn’t sweat or spit or even something less savory be better? I just don’t understand why it has to be blood when it could have been other things. And that’s when I wondered if blood has mana in it. Or maybe it’s a particular…mmm…life force that Vampires can tap into that other people can not,” he stayed, eyeing me suspiciously.

“I don’t know any more than you do. Sylvia has no idea why Vampires drink blood either,” I explained.

Sylas scrunched his mouth up and shrugged. “Either way, I figured that maybe feeding the red crystal with mana that was sourced from the blood from my finger would make it more efficient. Or, at the very least, just having a direct path to my body would be more beneficial for the device. Now, tell me what you—ouch…”

I chuckled as Sylas poked his finger on the needle and let out a slight whine of pain. I did as he asked and watched for any kind of reaction. And, sure enough, I saw something strange.

“The red crystal is absorbing the mana from your finger. I can’t be sure if it’s because of your blood or not. All I see is the source of mana flowing from the center of your chest and out to your finger, only to leave it and flow into the red crystal, which doesn’t appear to be changing all that much,” I told him.

Sylas’s shoulders slumped in defeat. He seemed rather sad about his invention’s supposed failure, but the truth was the man was a genius. He was mere steps away from creating a working mana battery, and he didn’t even know it. A battery that anyone could use.

The applications are a bit dangerous, considering a powerful mage could have another source of mana, and it could be used in war. But then again, it could also help thousands of people, just like Sylas wants. This is his invention, and he is my friend. I’ll help him for the time being as long as he stays on the right path.

“Sylas, I think you are missing a crucial part of this device,” I said quietly.

Sylas’s eyes perked up, and he looked at me with renewed interest. “Oh? And what would that be?”

“A dungeon core shard. Even a tiny splinter might be enough to store mana and allow someone to take from it,” I explained.

Sylas gave me a worried look, understandably, as dungeon core shards were not something that could be easily procured. However, there was also another glaring issue regarding the potential supply. I found the green crystals, the first of their kind as far as anyone in the world knew, in a dungeon that no longer existed.

Creating these mana batteries in mass may not be possible with the current supply. But if the idea was there, Sylas or someone else may just be able to replace the crystals one day with something else.

“Sylas, dungeon core shards after they have been used up. What happens to the now empty crystals?” I asked.

Sylas rubbed his chin in thought. “I…am not certain. I’ve never heard of anyone selling used dungeon core shards before. But I’m also not looking for them. So I wouldn’t know either way. Perhaps they would be used in jewelry or accessories as cosmetic additions?”

“That’s a good thing then. There’s a chance an entire untapped market of used dungeon core shards exists. The possibility that even a piece of a discarded and used shard could be valuable for you. Maybe even given new life from your device. Do you understand what I’m trying to tell you?” I asked him.

Sylas’s eyes went wide as they darted around. He looked to be figuring everything out, piecing everything together, the pieces I had left out for him. If I knew Sylas and I believed that I knew him well enough at that point, he would figure everything out on his own. And if he needed help again, he would come to me.

“Say, Sylas, would you like to be a researcher for the Dragonheart Foundation?” I asked him.

Sylas put a hand on my shoulder. “I can’t do that, sorry. I appreciate the offer, but I have plans for the future. But thank you, Kaladin. I think I’m starting to understand everything now,” he said in a low voice.

Then he sprinted away, out the door, and into the hallway.

“Well…that was something,” I muttered.

It’s a shame I couldn’t hire Sylas. He would be a valuable asset for the foundation and even give us another direct connection to a noble house. But I wouldn’t pester the man about it. He had a dream, an admirable one at that. I believed that wherever he went, he would make the world a better place. So I’ll just have to support him any way I can.

I looked over to the side of the room as the pile of black scales started to move. Squeaks slowly stood up, slipped on one of the scales, and crashed to the floor below him. He let out a grunt of pain and just lay there motionless for a few moments before finally pushing himself up.

“You look beyond tired. When was the last time you slept, Squeaks?” I asked him.

Squeaks had heavy bags under his eyes. And without any facial hair, it really made him seem like an old bald man.

“Don’t know, don’t remember,” he grumbled as he scratched his chest with a teary-eyed yawn. “Whatever amount I slept wasn’t enough, though.”

“I came to check on your progress. I figured you would have the designs edited up by now.”

Squeaks snorted. “Designs edited? Who do you think I am? Some amateur? I already understood what you wanted, but we are going to have to talk about some of it, Kal. I got good news and bad news for you. What do you want to hear first?”

“I suppose we should start with the bad news then,” I said. “And I didn’t mean to question your abilities…”

Squeaks waved my apology away, picked up one of the scales, and hoisted it to the table, letting it fall with a heavy thud. He pointed a thick finger at it and looked right at me. “This thing right here? I can’t do anything with it right now. I can’t even crack a piece off of it to start working. Don’t even bring up heating it, or I’ll shove you in a furnace. I tried everything under the mountains to get it to work, but I couldn’t manage a damn thing.”

“I see…so it is impossible with current technology? But what about all the other Dragon-related gea—”

Squeaks silenced me with his intent glare. “Were you listening to me, Kal? I said I couldn’t do anything with it right now. Not that it was impossible. I can use these scales; I just need the World Forge and my tools. I can forge anything, and I’ll show you how it’s done,” he said proudly as he puffed his chest out.

“So…how do you plan on accessing the World Forge and your old tools exactly?” I questioned.

“Isn’t it obvious? By going there and reclaiming my right as a Forgemaster. The inner sanctum of the World Forge only allows those who are worthy to enter it. Nobody can take that right away from me, not even myself,” Squeaks explained.

The inner sanctum? This is the first time I’m hearing of it. And it appears things are not going to be so easy. Krunbar isn’t exactly a hop, skip, and a jump from here. And we have an event to attend, and I can’t excuse myself from it.

“Okay, we can talk about this later. What about everything else?”

Squeaks grinned, showing his pearly white teeth.

“Let me show you.”