Chapter 175: The Idea Woman

Nara had spent nearly two months in Kallid, and decided it was time to pay a visit to her mentors. What was the point of the ability to execute a cha-cha-dimension-slide if she didn’t use it to visit friends and family?

She was still working on the family part.

Innovation’s Retreat was surprisingly busy. All the members were there, and the ritual workshops were both in use. Chelsea’s ‘garage’ was open, displaying her various vehicular contraptions. Compared to her various vehicles—hovering skimmers, flying ships, medivac pods—Nara’s bike prototype was diminutive in the large hanger.

It had been 7 months since Nara had given her gifts to the members of Innovation’s Retreat. Some part of her mind had thought they’d already be done with her simple inventions, but Nara had no experience with the product development cycle of Erras. Was 7 months long or short for a gold ranker to work on a project?

(It wasn’t as if they were sorely dedicated to her projects either, Nara reasoned. Chelsea and Amara had their own research. She figured 7 months wasn’t long at all.)

Chelsea was wearing a simple shirt and shorts, completely clean and un-smudged, unfortunately disappointing Nara of her image of a mechanic. From what she now knew of adventurer’s clothing, they were probably ridiculously expensive and had anti-stain and anti-rip protections. Henri was with her, looking suitably more smudgy-y and unclean befitting that of a half-mad inventor. Figures he wouldn’t spend money on dirt-immune clothing. Nara should force some on him, as his sponsor. Something protective too, before he accidentally killed himself by launching a metal spike at point blank range at himself, or exploding a hole through his abdomen. If he hung around Amara, that was certainly a risk.

Nara had been getting letters from members of Innovation’s Retreat, along with periodic updates from the Invention Society. She’d been earning a small income from her boom sticks, but it didn’t compare to her adventurer earnings. (At bronze rank, adventurer teams started to use looting rituals to loot monsters as it had become cost-effective to do so, so she didn’t think her loot powers were cheating here, just more convenient.)

She could visit those of the Retreat whenever she wanted, but they weren’t always there. The letters meant they kept in touch, and she made less frequent trips to try to keep the ‘tension’ of the journey. It wouldn’t quite be the same if she always slept in her room at the Retreat.

She saw those progress updates reflected in one of the many models of bicycle scattered around Chelsea’s hangar. Chelsea had refined the frame; Nara and Henri’s version had been very improvised from the limited descriptive information Nara could provide. It had the same basic two triangle frame, which even Nara had managed to remember. Scattered around the workshop were basic frames made with different ratios to accommodate the different races, the leonid one was incredibly massive and the runic one considerably smaller.

The various artifact components—brakes, gear shift, and speed assist—were mana activated. The brakes were so economical that they only used the user’s mana as it was pressed: a mana cost so low it wouldn’t register on Nara’s interface. To call it a ‘brake’ was inaccurate in that there was no physical slowing component—Nara didn’t know the specifics, but the artifact leeched kinetic energy from the bike, slowing it. It was part of why the brake artifact functioned so cheaply.

Chelsea had written in her letters that this particular bit of artifice was from the Edelsterians. Since their world was mana barren, the conversion of other forms of energy into mana was one of their magic and technological specialties. The conversion ratio wasn’t efficient at all—the energy of physical reality and the energy of the astral, while related, weren’t the same. The brake artifact used quintessence of magic and balance, to perform the conversion. Neither quintessence was particularly expensive, and both lasted for a long time before needing replenishment. (It could be done with dimension quintessence or harmonic quintessence, but both were far more expensive options.)

The speed assist artifact was a new component. Much like an e-bike, it provided additional power and speed. It was the most expensive to operate component, but that was only relative to the cheapness of the rest of the bike. It would need swift and might quintessence, but as long as the user was determined to pedal, the usage of the artifact would be lessened.

Nara approached, chatting with the two as they discussed improvements and changes. The bicycle was nice, she loved it, but she could not help feeling mildly disappointed.

“Why is it you don’t have motorcycles…”

“…What?” Chelsea looked sideways at Nara, as if evaluating whether her off-hand comment deserved a glare.

“I mean, it’s just… I was never a motorcycle fan, mainly because they’re noisy, dangerous, and I was afraid of getting hurt. But now—” Nara gestured to herself “—I could wipeout against asphalt going sixty and just need a shower for the dirt from my hair.”

Chelsea was unimpressed with her babble. Her expression was tilting more towards glare. Nara had to salvage this!

“Okay, see. You agree that a bicycle is a pretty efficient form of transportation.”

“Yes,” Chelsea said, with a tone that wasn’t sure if she liked where this was going.

“And what does it excel at, besides efficiency?”

Chelsea wasn’t an amateur, and she had been working on the bicycle for over half a year, so she had an answer almost unwillingly at the tip of her tongue. “Personal transportation. Maneuverable at relatively high speeds with decent precision.” She raised an eyebrow like ‘is that the answer you wanted?’

“Yeah. So why doesn’t this have any vehicles in the shape of a bicycle but at the speed of a skimmer? Personal skimmers are all seated.”

“That’s true,” Henri said, perking up. “This is about that um, forward leaning position bicycle, isn’t it?”

“That’s not very clear.”

“You didn’t describe it very clearly. That’s not my fault.”

“Fine. It’s my fault. My point is, could we adapt a skimmer with some of the design philosophies of the bicycle? What’d we call that, still a skimmer? Personal skimmer? Cycler? Magi-cycle? It certainly wouldn’t be using personal locomotion to power the bike anymore.”

“And how is it powered in your world if not by personal locomotion?”

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“Well, we have something called internal combustion engines—” Nara paused. “You sly dog you, Henri! You were there for this! Knowledge gave us a talking to!”

“She gave you a talking to. I’m just the unhinged oddball inventor.”

“Right, well internal combustion is a forbidden topic. As far as I’ve seen, y’all haven’t figured it out yet, so I can’t really talk about it.”

“You’ll just dangle it in front of us instead as the most frustrating, untouchable bait.” Chelsea said. She was definitely glaring now.

“If you’re making a fish analogy that means you’re off the hook. That’s a good thing.”

Chelsea took a calming breath and counted to ten.

“…I see what you mean. I’ll think about it,” she said, teeth almost audibly crunching.

“Right, well I don’t need any credit for this one. It’s on me.”

“You don’t say.”

Nara left Chelsea along before she could decide she didn’t need an “idea woman”, and by didn’t need, meant “didn’t need alive.”

The next person to hassle was Amara, and she dragged Henri along, because he was equally involved in Project Ritual Stylus.

“I’m sorry to say I haven’t made much progress,” admitted Amara, although she sounded more intrigued than frustrated. Nara supposed with rank came the patience of an extended lifespan. Why rush through life’s mysteries when you have all the time in the world? “It just cannot reproduce what a ritual spell casting ability can do.”

It was disappointing, but not actually new ‘news’.

Nara held the stylus in her hand. It was sleek and polished wood, one known for its mana conductivity. It was a shame, really, that there’d be no wizards. She felt a pang of guilt that her gift to Amara had been fruitless.

“Why do you think it doesn’t work? Do you have any theories?”

“Well,” Amara said thoughtfully, “I suppose the ability acts itself as a conduit. The mana used to create ritual diagrams with an ability is different than mana used without the ability.”

“You think that the mana has been refined in some way to be able to draw ritual diagrams?”

Amara nodded. “Ritual magic uses a variety of materials to conduct and hold mana.”

“To form lines.”

“Exactly. Powered lesser monster cores are the cheapest material, but specific rituals, especially those of summoning abilities or familiars, can call for different conducting reagents.”

“So we need to refine the mana somehow.”

“Or provide a conducting reagent,” Henri added.

“Then isn’t that just the same as normal ritual spellcasting?”

The three sat in silence for a bit, pondering.

Nara had seen various ritual magic abilities. Amara’s was the most common one, and the medium seemed more or less to be light. She could draw glowing lines through the air, using a staff or any part of her body. A wand would work, but something like a hammer wouldn’t, because they usually weren’t made of particularly mana conductive material.

There wasn’t some super metal like orichalcum, which was the superior choice for all weapons and tools. A metal like that existing? How unrealistic.

Nara had seen someone with the ability to draw ritual diagrams with flames (which actually enhanced any fire and heat effect rituals cast with it), and another that used spider silk. Everyday ritual magic used neutral components—lesser monster cores, salt—and instead used quintessence and reagents of various types to produce a desired effect. Using powdered quintessence as the drawing medium could boost a ritual magic, but usually the concentration compared to the quintessence used as reagents was insignificant. If a ritual circle used 50 water quintessence, using powdered water quintessence for the ritual circle was an expensive material substitution for barely increased power, and ritual magic users liked keeping the ritual standardized. The ritual circle already needed to be adjusted depending on local conditions—introducing an additional variable to control for only increased complexity for little gain. It was a technique used to get boosts in extreme situations where it was needed, but rarely otherwise used.

Even if they could solve the issue of creating a viable ritual, they still hadn’t solved the problem of sourcing materials in battle. Ritual abilities automatically used materials from a dimension bag or inventory.

“Well…” Nara began, a thought beginning to form in her mind, “what if we do use a conducting reagent?”

“What do you mean?”

“What if the stylus acts as an extruder, and it floats conductive reagent in the air? Maybe…maybe we have this powered-mana slurry, and the stylus can draw it out. Or, or, those floating glow stones you made, those were cheap. Can we powder those and make a floating reagent?”

“…That could work,” Henri said after a pause. Nara could practically feel the thinking gears churning in his head. No, she could. He was vibrating on the couch.

“Which specifically?”

“All of it. None of it. It-it’s something. We’ll have to test reagents, and consider whether we want to use—”

“Whether we want to implement weightlessness within the wand or—”

“Have it an inherent property of the conducting agent.”

Oh god, they were finishing each other’s sentences.

“Erm, so, I thought that it could be a sort of refillable cartridge you attach to the stylus.”

“We’re not there yet.”

“I just wanted to contribute a little bit more because I know probably can’t soon.”

“Well,” Amara paused. “That’s fair.”

“I don’t know if I should be offended.”

Amara tried to smile consolingly, but Nara could see her simmering fervor. “You’ll get there. Artifice isn’t your focus; you’ve already done very well.”

Nara sat through the rest of the discussions, but she was playing second fiddle to a duo of masters. Amara pointed out that a lack of experience in a field leads to new insights—she had been fixated on using just mana to produce the ritual circle and solving the theory reason on what an essence ability provided that a wand did not. That was still a theory she’d like to solve, but all researchers had to acknowledge that there were compromises in the pursuit of invention.

Redell’s soul song research, conversely, would have had little progress for a very long time. It was research that had to be conducted with people, and there were stringent oversights and processes that the churches had to follow, even if the intentions were healing and therapy. He had managed to adapt the soul-song communion technique to create a lesser but more general version. Redell’s soul-song echo technique stimulated emotion with song (on a level songs did not already do). His echo helped with the release of emotion for those that may struggle or fear doing so, and to do so in safe, controlled environments. It also could stimulate joy, to call upon old memories of joy for those in a place they couldn’t remember it.

*****

Twilight was sweeping gentle lavender silks across the city of Kallid as Nara settled against a recliner, looking out at the city. In her hands was a mug of epil cider, a fruit similar to apple but with a cinnamon-cardamon flavor. The land had been released from the clutches of winter to the embrace of spring, but Nara wanted her cider anyway.

(She couldn’t help the low internal hum that told her this was the calm before the storm. It was, in a way, because of the apocalypse. But that wasn’t what Nara felt.)

Thanatos was draped across her legs, just as long and languid as she was. Sage and Chrome were doing…something. Bickering, perhaps. She glanced outside; Chrome was practicing his swords, so perhaps not.

“Hey. Looks like you got a minute,” Eufemia said, pausing a way away and pulling Nara from her dark-sweet molasses mood.

“Sure.”

Nara would invite Eufemia to sit, but she had already claimed a seat. It was only through their long acquaintance that Nara knew Eufemia was nervous. She didn’t fidget—Eufemia was above such readable displays of unconfident emotion, unless she was intentionally projecting it. The only way Nara knew was that she was nervous was because she was overly relaxed and overly controlled. Her movements were too smooth, with a calm slowness intended to project confidence when it was lacking. Sage appeared out of nowhere to hand Eufemia a mug of warm epil cider, then glided right back out of perception.

“I’ve been thinking about some things since this…potential end of the world talk.”

“You’ve been thinking? Didn’t know you could,” Nara said with a gentle tease.

Eufemia sent a glare, “Learnt that from Encio, did you?”

“I didn’t know it was worrying you so much.”

Eufemia’s finger circled the rim of her mug, casting her gaze to the amber hues of the cider. “I’ve realized that I may not have much more time to put off the meetings I’ve been avoiding.”

Nara waited for her to continue.

“I’m talking about my father.”

She’d guessed as much.

“You had offered to take a message to him. Does that offer still stand?”

“Of course. Is it alright if I discuss this with Sen and the others?”

“I wouldn’t make you go alone. Bring Encio along—he’ll finally be good for something.”