I examined the item Vyrania had just given me.

While it looked similar to a card, it was actually an arcana. Instead of a grid-like structure of lines like on Contract, this had three distinct groups of curving, looping strokes of varying widths that tricked the eyes, looking like they were moving, though they were stationary. A fourth shape was formed by the empty space the other three strokes left. It was strange to look at, as though my mind was putting in an image that wasn’t there, like that image of a vase that outlines two faces.

You do not possess the powerpack.

You are able to purchase it for 22 low-potential fragments.

You currently have no fragments and insufficient convertible currency.

Due to your [Merchant] profession, you have a line of credit.

Would you like to use your line of credit to purchase powerpack?

“I have to buy another powerpack to inspect it? I already got one for cards.”

“That’s an arcana,” Koren said. “Looks similar, but it’s a different thing. You’ll need to pay again.”

“Man, they really nickel and dime you.”

I grudgingly gave my assent. A day in this new world and I was already going into debt. Just like the old world.

Arcana

Affinity: Alteration

Aspect: Flame

Attributes: Piercing, Accretive

Empty Circuits: 0

“This came from an… ice worg? I mean I get piercing I guess, but flame?”

“Arcana can be created from many things,” Vyrania said, “including fear.”

“Especially in the towers,” Koren added. “Things in here are more directed than they might otherwise be.”

“Why?” I asked.

“More entertaining that way.”

“Oh right, to the aliens watching our every move.”

“Precisely.”

“I thought it went well with the whole flaming staff thing you have going on,” Vyrania told me. “Plus, it’s hard to go wrong with flame-aspect. Unless you don’t want it.”

“No, I do. I mean, unless you need the money or you want to use it yourselves.”

She waved this off. “It doesn’t have the right aspect for either of us.”

“Flame? You have to pick only one? That sucks.”

“It’s not that you have to,” she said. “In general it’s best to focus your deck to one aspect along with one or two affinities. Your mana tends to bend toward what it’s used most often for, and trying to use multiple splits your effectiveness.”

“How do I find out Contract’s aspect?”

“Ask a Fragment Master? You’ve already integrated it so I’m not sure it’s even possible.” She shrugged. “Usually you can guess what it would have been, though that’s a weird one. Flame’s an easy one to grasp, so combining it with whatever you already have shouldn’t be too much of a strain, especially with how good you are with mana.”

“Are aspects what you’d expect? Fire, ice, and so on?”

“They can be pretty much anything. It’s simply how the mana put into the card manifests. So anything you can think of can be an aspect.”

“Stupidity?”

“That’s the first thing you think of?”

“Fifth. The first ones I thought of were fire, ice, air, and water.”

“Well, I’ve never seen anything with the stupidity aspect. They might exist though.”

“Probably as an attribute,” Koren mused.

“So arcana are different from complete cards because I can affect what it becomes?”

“Not directly for that one, since there aren’t any empty circuits. Indirectly though, yes. It will adapt to you when you integrate it. What card it becomes is dependent on the other cards you have and the tenor of your mana.”

“And random chance,” Koren added.

“That too. Usually it’s fairly unpredictable what precisely it will become. Or it requires so much information and is based upon such numerous factors that it may as well be.”

“I would say a computer could figure it out,” I said, “but the system seems smarter and faster than any computer we have. So the order I use arcana affects what abilities I get?”

“To a degree,” Vyrania answered. “The more you’ve leveled up your cards, the more integrated their circuits become within you, the more it influences the arcana you use after it.”

“That’s not always a good thing,” Koren said. “You might end up with a bunch of abilities that are all too similar. Just integrating an arcana is enough to flavor the abilities that come next to a minor degree. If you pick arcana with the right attributes, that’s all you need.”

“Do they all have two attributes?”

“No,” he answered. “You’ll occasionally find ones without any, and some even without an aspect. Though it’s probably best to sell those. They’re quite valuable to people who think they can control what they become by choosing the right sigils.”

“Like rich people,” Vyrania said.

“Or Fragment Masters. Some Alchemists too. Usually there’ll be two or three attribute circuits. I’ve seen some with as many as five.”

“So the more slots, the more powerful? Like, putting five sigils of flame would be better than one?”

“It might make it more specific,” Vyrania said, “but not necessarily more powerful. While sigils always give the same aspect if there isn’t one, which attribute they grant varies. I know flame can give the burning attribute, but also sometimes proliferous, for example.”

“I saw someone try something like that,” Koren said. “Ice-aspect arcana with five empty circuits, used ice sigils for each. Gave the chilling, freezing, frosted, frigid, and hullabaloo attributes.”

“There’s really a hullaballoo attribute?” Vyrania asked.

Koren nodded. “Saw it myself. The fellow wasn’t shy about sharing. Was from one of those flaunty civs.”

“What card did that give?” I asked.

“No idea. He exploded before he could tell anyone.”

I looked down at the arcana in my hand. “Yeah… maybe I should wait.”

“Absolutely not.” He motioned at it. “Come on. If you’re going to use it, you can at least have the courtesy to stop keeping us in suspense and use it.”

“Is it permanent?”

“The effect?” he asked.

“The card. Can I… remove it?”

“Sure. But it will be destroyed in the process.”

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“You can sometimes salvage fragments,” Vyrania put in.

Koren nodded. “At Copper it’s quite simple. It becomes nearly impossible once you reach Iron, though still doable with some effort, and if you’re willing to risk exploding.”

“What’s with exploding here?”

“Their circuit becomes intrinsic to you. Thus removing them naturally causes explosions.”

“That doesn’t seem like it follows. Other than possibly exploding, is there any downside to using it?”

“Only if you decide against using flame-aspect,” Vyrania said. “You’ll have to undo the changes it makes to your own circuit.”

“My own circuit? What is that?”

“It’s what determines everything about you. Your appearance, your abilities… everything.”

“Wait, do you mean my DNA?”

“I don’t think so?”

“That sounds like a question.”

“The interpreter only goes so far. I don’t really understand the concepts it’s trying to convey.”

“Where is my circuit stored? My DNA is in every cell of my body, is circuit the same?”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure anyone does, really. Maybe the systems, but they aren’t telling us.”

“So using a card alters my DNA, or circuit, or whatever. That doesn’t seem like a good idea.”

“You’ve already done it many times,” Koren assured me. “With your Contract card, taking a hobby. Just training and using your mana changed it a little.”

“And so if I ever want to change cards, I’ll have to rewrite my DNA?”

Vyrania frowned. “I think your DNA is likely inside your circuit. It’s some biological thing which determines appearance, according to the interpreter, so perhaps that is what gets changed when you use an ability to alter your appearance. Or it’s simply ignored. But whatever the case, your mana’s weak enough now that it’s not a large issue. Eventually you’ll reach the Iron stricture and need to focus your efforts because you won’t be able to remove anything after that. That’s when you’ll want to pick one aspect, maybe two in your case unless you can find out what aspect Contract was.”

“I think he could manage three with his mana,” Koren said. “Maybe more. Nylasys managed it all right.”

“Myths are not a firm foundation upon which to build one’s deck.”

“It might be better to focus his effort on using multiple affinities,” Koren allowed.

“That would be easier,” she agreed. “Even I can manage three of those.”

I groaned. “I hate having to choose. I always cheat my way to every ability when I play video games.”

“It’s a long way off for you. You have time to find what works best. Normally I’d suggest focusing on arcana with your affinity, but it’s going to be hard to get subjugation affinity arcana. And since we don’t know what aspect the card you already have is…” She shrugged. “Depending on how things go in here, flame might be a good choice. Easy to grasp, but not so simple that it’s limiting. Plenty of destructive capability, and with the right attributes, good utility as well.”

“I concur,” Koren said. “Your hobby abilities seem at least partly flame-based, which is likely a reflection of your circuit, and it’s likely we’ll find more flame-aspect arcana here in the tower.”

I stared at the arcana. “It’s hard to decide. I want to use everything. Like a spellcasting warrior tank that’s super-fast and sexy.”

“Sexy?” Vyrania asked.

I shrugged. “Shoot for the stars, hit the clouds.”

“Well, you have at least one of those things covered already.”

I nodded, then frowned. “Wait, which one?”

“For now,” she continued, “my suggestion would be to take as many as you can get, regardless of their affinity or aspect. Trying out as many as you can will help you settle on your deck. As I said, your mana is weak right now. As it gets stronger, it becomes more obdurate. At this point, it would maybe take you an extra few days to adjust if you decide to use a different aspect. You’re lucky in that you have the rare opportunity to actually do that since you’re in a tower at Copper. Most have to settle for whatever they can get. Just make sure you decide by the time your cards start hitting level nine.”

“What happens then?” I asked.

“You can start getting Synergies.”

“I don’t think he’s rich enough to worry about optimizing Synergies,” Koren said. “Right now he simply needs abilities. Synergies won’t matter if he doesn’t live to use them.”

“Fair point,” Vyrania conceded.

“What exactly are Synergies?” I asked.

“A sort of super-circuit between multiple cards,” she answered. “It gives you a new ability that is greater than the sum of its parts.”

“Now please use that,” Koren begged.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Is there a best aspect?”

He groaned. “Opinions vary.”

“What’s yours?”

“That it’s not the abilities you have, but how you use them. Even those who have trade-focused cards can be formidable foes. Imagine someone who can summon a delicious cake. Seems harmless, yes?”

“Not to your waistline, but go on.”

“Well, imagine he fights someone like you, assuming you keep with the flame-aspect. You summon a great ball of flame and hurl it at him. But if his skill is great enough, he can summon that delicious cake and use the energy in your attack to bake it to perfection.”

“You have cake-aspect cards?” I asked.

“Of course. We’re not barbarians.”

“Is there a limit to how many cards I can have?”

“At your rank,” Vyrania said, “you can have as many as you can manage the mana draw for, but you can’t have more than nine if you want to progress past the Iron stricture.”

“Let me guess, otherwise I’ll explode.”

She frowned. “How’d you know that?”

“Wild guess,” I muttered.

“You could also go insane and become a horror,” Koren added.

“That’s just a myth.”

“So until then I can have as many as I want?”

“It depends on how much mana you have,” she said.

“Is there a way to find out?”

She glanced at Koren.

“This might tickle,” he said with a smirk.

It did much more than that. A stinging erupted through every inch of my body, inside and out.

Thankfully it was brief.

Koren’s eyebrows shot up.

“What is it?” I asked, shaking out my numb, tingling hands.

He glanced at Vyrania.

“Don’t even try to tell me it’s not important,” I said.

He shook his head. “No, it’s not that.” His usual levity was gone. “Your mana is… I didn’t notice before, I hadn’t examined it that closely. I thought I was feeling the influence of the mana inside your Contract card, or your affinity.”

“But?” I prompted, after he didn’t go on.

“But it’s not that. It’s your mana itself. It feels like an affinity.”

“That’s not possible,” Vyrania said quickly.

“I don’t get it. What does that mean?”

He shook his head. “Mana can have tinges of things—emotions, active cards, abilities, etcetera—but it doesn’t have an affinity. It can’t. It’s the basic stuff of…” He waved his hands about, indicating everything.

“My stats or whatever now say I have an affinity.” I brought up a copy to show them.

“Yes, you do. Your mana isn’t supposed to.”

“But mine does?”

“No. That’s not— That can’t be possible. It just feels like it for some reason.”

“What does that mean?” I asked again.

“I don’t know.” He stared at me. Then he smiled. “But hey,” he said cheerily, “good news is you’ve got a decent amount of mana for your rank. A very decent amount. It will depend on the cards you use, but two will be no problem for you.”

“I’m still worried about the tainted mana thing.”

He waved this off. “It’s probably nothing. Now please, for my sanity, would you please finally use that arcana.”

“So just to be clear, there’s no chance I’ll explode if I use it.”

“You could explode right now just standing there,” Koren said cheerfully.

“That doesn’t seem likely.”

“Exactly.”

“I’ve never heard of anyone exploding from integrating an arcana,” Vyrania assured me.

“Koren just told us about a guy who did.”

She opened her mouth to respond, then closed it. “Huh.”

“If the Hero of Valinslen proves anything,” Koren said cheerfully, “anything is possible.” He saw the look Vyrania was giving him, and added, “But you probably won’t explode.”

“Oh, you’re giving me tons of confidence.”

“That’s me, a confidence man.”

“Isn’t that like a scam artist?

“I couldn’t possibly know what you’re talking about. I am a martial artist above all else.”

“You don’t even have that as a hobby,” Vyrania scoffed.

“I am a free man and will have whatever hobbies I please.”

Vyrania was about to counter this, but stopped, a smile teasing her lips. “I guess we’re both free now.” She looked at me. “Thanks to you.”

“Uh, sure,” I said, even more uncomfortable with the gratitude now that it was coming from the both of them.

“Group hug!” Koren shouted, grabbing both Vyrania and me and practically slamming us together. “We make a great team!” he said emotionally.

“This is becoming a habit,” I muttered, mostly to myself.

‌

∎ ∎ ∎

“Oh, that didn’t get any better the second time,” I groaned.

“It never really does,” Koren said.

While it wasn’t any better, it did feel different to absorbing a regular card.

You have integrated [Arcana].

A murky reddish light bloomed out from within me, my body taken over by a sensation of intense, dry heat. It moved through me before finally venting out with the scent of a barbeque during a forest fire and my temperature returned to normal.

[Arcana] has become [Smoldering Caress].

“Whoa, I know fire-fu.”

“You know a fireman?” Vyrania asked.

“I know how to use the card. Torath mentioned arcana doing that. I still don’t have much clue about Contract’s limitations, but I understand this one intuitively. Also, that was way more extravagant than what happened with Contract.”

“Integrating it creates the ability, completes the circuit,” Vyrania said. “A complete card is exactly what it sounds like. You still integrate it, but there’s nothing for you to add to it. With arcana, you’re creating the ability when you integrate it, which gives you a more intimate knowledge of it.”

While its name sounded romantic, it wouldn’t fit most people’s definition:

Smoldering Caress

Level 1, alteration affinity

With the merest of contact, ignite a spark that has a small chance to set ablaze anything you touch.

Converts a portion of physical force into fire. Scales with attack strength. Effect accumulates with subsequent attacks made within a short period.

“Fitting name,” I muttered. “I feel like I was just caressed by a barbeque. Short incantation. Just three words.”

“That’s a good thing,” Koren said. “You can use it more quickly.”

“I didn’t notice you guys using any incantations when fighting the giants.”

“We did,” Koren said.

“I don’t need one for Conjunction of Blood anymore,” Vyrania explained, “a simple motion is enough to evoke the circuit. The others I can subvocalize. You’ll be able to as well eventually, once the circuit is more established.”

I focused on the feeling of the new card, my mana flowing into it, charging it up. “Wow, this one’s charging much faster than Contract.”

“You’re Copper now,” Vyrania said. “Your mana’s better, and you’re better at controlling it.”

“It’s already almost charged,” I said with surprise. I focused, trying to force my mana into it to see if I could charge it faster. It worked, though felt… hot somehow. Like it was a bad idea to do that too often.

“Uh,” Koren said, “I wouldn’t do that again.”

“You could see that?”

He nodded.

“Let me guess, I’ll explode?”

“Not at your rank. It just might damage the circuit.”

“Noted.” I looked around for something to punch and settled on a nearby tree. “Fester and burn,” I chanted, then punched the tree as hard as I could.

Not much happened, though I could feel some of the physical impact being stolen away and converted.

“Hm. I think I need to build up attacks. Feels like it accumulates the more attacks I make. I’m not strong enough yet for a single hit to do much. Though I also feel like it would work better on living things. Or, sentient, I guess.”

“It’s an arcana,” Vyrania said, “so you should trust your instincts.”

“It really does charge fast. Even without forcing mana into it, it’s almost ready again. Maybe another minute.”

Koren nodded. “Makes sense. It’s not particularly powerful, so wouldn’t take a lot of mana.”

“I don’t know,” Vyrania countered, “igniting a fire inside something seems like it will be quite useful around here.”

“Well then,” Koren said brightly, “let’s go find another undead ice golem to test it out on.”