Chapter 30 — Budding Mage
The rain gave little care for Rína’s waterproof cloak. Falling every which way, it had easily bypassed her defenses to soak her to the skin. Under normal circumstances she would have been miserable, but this bit of discomfort would all be worth it soon enough.
“How much further do you think before we can see it?” Rína asked, sitting beside Yvette on the wagon’s driver bench.
Knowing the futility of resistance, Yvette had gone without a cloak, simply accepting from the outset that she would be sopping wet, “Another half kilometer, perhaps?”
Rína nodded, her wet hair sticking to the side of her face. She knew they were close just from the sound of oncoming thunder, but with every turn of the mountain pass, they were only met with another bend as the noise continued to rise. The eternal booms soon felt like the pulse of the world, a kind of reverberation that pervaded everything from the pebbles along the road, to the mountains their wagon was slipping between.
Rína could feel the thunder in her chest as the deafening noise seemed to reach a crescendo. The mountain pass made one final bend then opened wide, displaying a vista dominated by towering falls.
The Toirn Falls was the final waterfall of the Easruth River. The river itself was a far cry from what it was when Rína first laid eyes on it, nearer its source. Now, having absorbed all the waterways of the various offshoot river valleys, ‘mighty’ was the only word that really fit it. Gods only knew how many tons of water it carried every second, but whatever the amount, it all came plummeting hundreds of meters down the Toirn Falls.
She didn’t care that her eardrums were beginning to hurt, Rína just stared awestruck at the power nature could bring to bear. It all made her feel… She wasn’t sure. Minutes passed as she mulled it over, but she still couldn’t quite put it to words. There was just something about seeing what had been such a little river growing into something that could carve through mountains.
Unfortunately all things came to an end. At the waterfall’s base, the crashing water turned into an impenetrable cloud of mist. And with little warning, the wind shifted, blowing the cloud across the valley to smother the switchbacks the wagon was traveling down. Visibility immediately plummeted as the air around them held more water than actual air, and the Toirn Falls became nothing more than a disembodied roar.
«Was it worth the detour?» Yvette wrote upon Rína’s aura with her own.
«Oh, absolutely,» Rína wrote back, flashing her aunt an ear to ear grin.
Yvette replied with a smile of her own, «I’m glad you enjoyed it, but I believe it is time for us to head inside. I doubt that in weather like this, there will be many people around to comment on a driverless wagon.»
Rína drew a thumbs-up on her aunt’s aura, as well as giving something between a nod and a shiver in reply.
It was the late afternoon as the two women retreated inside, with Rína quickly taking a hot shower in the wagon’s closet of a bathroom. When she could finally call herself both warm and dry once more, she walked into the wagon’s kitchenette to find her aunt similarly dry, sitting at the small table with two fresh cups of tea.
“You really have to show me how you do that, one of these days,” Rína said, sitting down at the table and taking a sip of what tasted like chamomile.
Yvette quirked an eyebrow, writing: «You will have to be more specific, I’m afraid.»
“Getting so dry so fast. Do you just ramp up your body temperature, or absorb the water through your skin or something?”
«No, I simply use a towel. Well, that and variably hydrophobic hair.» Yvette chuckled as she continued to write, «I suppose the latter is doing most of the work.»
“Yeah, I’m definitely going to have to learn how to make those…” Rína shook her head as she took another sip, “Wait, why are you still writing?”
Indeed, between what distance they had put between themselves and the falls and—more importantly—the wagon’s sound insulation, the two women would have no problem having a spoken conversation.
«Because I believe we should use aura communication where possible, at least for the near future. Soon enough we will be in Westreach and the population density will make the chances of us being overheard only rise.»
Rína shrugged “Yeah, that makes sense, but for the entire time? Like, we’d just be sitting around in silence, passing aura notes?”
Yvette smirked, «Something like that. And you can also consider this another form of our usual aura and soul sight exercises: it is a good practice for good practice.»
Rína snorted at the wordplay, «Yeah, alright. So what have we got today?»
Yvette gave a wry smile, «Cantrips: the most basic type of spells, and every mage’s first cast.»
Rína’s eyes went wide, “So you’re saying it’ll be a good day?”
«I beg your pardon?» Yvette wrote in contrast to Rína’s verbal slip.
Rína shook her head, «2day = good?»
Yvette chuckled, «I should certainly hope so. Now if you have no objections, let us get straight into it.» Yvette wrote as Rína nodded expectantly, «As a refresher, spells originate from structures that a mage crystalizes on the surface of their soul. Structures designed such that when the mage passes their aether through them, the aether’s intent is changed into that of the desired spell. Now, if a mage discovers a novel implementation for a spell, how valuable would you guess that information would be to other mages?»
«I feel like you want me to say ‘very’, like they would go on and sell it, or lock it away, or something…» Rína wrote, taking advantage of the nonverbal lecture to sip tea as she wrote.
Yvette shrugged, «Guilty. Generally speaking, every living thing’s soul has a crystal lattice and intent of self that are utterly unique. Both of these factor into how one’s aether interacts with any spell structures said aether is moving through, and thus what effects—if any—the spell has. As such, finished spell structure designs that work for one mage are completely useless to everyone else—that is, with the exception of cantrips, which can be copied in full.»
«Ok… but I thought mages were taught magic at collegiums? Are they literally just taught cantrips and then they have to figure everything else out themselves? And what makes cantrips so special?»
«Cantrips are special for their simplicity. By definition, they are so incredibly simple that the differences between souls, while still significantly affecting the overall efficiency, do not prevent the spell from functioning.»
«So they’re basically one-size-fits-all spells?»
«Precisely. As for spells beyond cantrips, while the exact implementations of spells are worthless, the more abstracted designs are quite valuable. These would describe what manner of intents are interacting inside a spell structure, in what ways, in what sequence, in what magnitudes, etcetera. Armed with such an abstracted design, a mage can use their knowledge of their soul, their self, and the aether dynamics of the intents at play to create an implementation for their own use.»
Rína blinked hard as she tried to parse the information, «I… think I understand? But what do you mean by ‘aether dynamics’?»
«Well, liquid aether will behave differently based on the intent it contains. Aether dynamics is simply the mathematical study and modeling of such. It shares certain similarities with the mathematics of fluid dynamics, though of course where fluids in the physical are confined to three dimensions, aether dynamics starts at four dimensions and only goes up from there.»
Rína gave a nod, «Doesn’t sound too bad. I mean, I’m guessing it’s just a few flow rate formulas, or something, right?»
Though her aunt clearly tried to conceal it, Rína caught the older woman briefly giving her a look of abject pity, «You shall see for yourself in due time,» Yvette wrote, «but for now, would you like to learn a cantrip?»
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Rína didn’t miss the obvious evasion, but with such a carrot dangled in front of her, she was willing to ignore it for now.
«Hells yes, I would,» Rína wrote, adding a small doodle of herself shooting cartoon magic from her fingers.
Yvette chuckled at the drawing, «Well then, here you are:»
Swathes of Rína’s aura fizzled against Yvette’s, her aunt’s aura forming numerous diagrams. On reflex, Rína pulled her aura back ever so slightly, stopping the fizzling while still allowing her to see what was being displayed. Rína doing this for regular text and drawings was becoming second nature, but for what her aunt was showing her, it was difficult to just keep her aura still across so many complex surfaces.
She eventually settled her aura and was able to properly see a line of sixteen, three-dimensional schematics. At first glance, they reminded Rína of abstract pieces of art. Each seemed to be made primarily of several languid curves of crystal, all interlocking in what almost looked like some kind of flower bud.
That was not to say that they were identical. Indeed, though they all seemed to be of the same theme, each of the sixteen were slightly different to the ones on either side of them. It was almost as if adjacent schematics were connected somehow.
A moment later Rína realized that, yes, that was probably exactly what was going on: she wasn’t looking at a line of sixteen variations of a cantrip’s structure, she was looking at sixteen, three-dimensional cross-sections of a single four-dimensional structure. It made sense in hindsight—her soul was at a four dimensional depth in the Astral so any spell structures she built on it would necessarily have to have just as many dimensions.
«This is a simple kinematic cantrip, allowing one to apply force at a distance. Now seeing this for the first time, it may be intimidating,» Yvette’s words appeared alongside the schematic, «But it is just a few components and their connections.» More text appeared, labeling various parts of the cantrip, «The first of which is…»
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Though the river valley was not so kind as to have long sightlines, from where Rína sat, its contents at either end were clear. From upriver, the faintest of echoes from the Toirn Falls could still be heard, bouncing down along the valley walls. And in the other direction, just at the edge of sight, one could see what looked like a town sprouting up where yet another river and its valley merged into the Easruth.
The wagon would be reaching Westreach in another day or two, and given the increased population density, Rína assumed it would become that much harder to find opportunities to develop her soul—at least that is, without accidentally battering some passerby’s.
The problem was that she still couldn’t quite contain the burst of aura that came whenever she broke off a piece of her armlet’s enchantment. She had been working on exactly this, mostly by trying to take smaller, more frequent bites out of the aether crystal, but she still wasn’t quite to the point of being able to safely do so around non-mages. Thus, Yvette had taken the wagon off the road, away from any passersby, all so Rína could take her first step into proper spell craft.
It was the day after Yvette’s lecture on cantrips and Rína sat cross-legged on the wagon's large cushion, a morning breeze from an open window flitting through her hair. Before her were the only things she needed: a small chest of animal bones and her aunt supervising from across the room.
Rína allowed a small giggle to pass her lips.
«Hmm?» Yvette wrote.
«Oh, it’s just that I’m about to do magic while surrounded by bones.» Rína wrote, «If I were doing this at night under a full moon, maybe also in some dark forest, I’d be like a storybook witch.»
Her aunt smirked, «True, but you would still be missing the pointy hat.»
«Yeah,» Rína considered, «the cauldron too, but I guess we’ve already got the chem setup. Anyway…» She shook her head, putting the aesthetics out of her mind. Then Rína took a deep breath and began.
From her soul she let her aura flow outwards, wrapping and hardening around the chest of bones. With how small the arcanelles on the bones were, she wouldn’t have to wait long before they were attuned, but as she sat there, an idea occurred to her.
The organic enchantments on the bones were all supposed to be kinetic, strengthening the material by counteracting external forces. But of course that used up aether, and since Rína had to empty the arcanelles of liquid aether before she could attune them…
Rína took from the chest what looked to be a rib, maybe from a deer or sheep. Keeping it within her hardened aura, she used both hands to try and snap the bone in two. Her aunt had originally gotten the bones from a town butcher just a few days ago, so the one she had grabbed wasn’t anywhere near brittle enough for her to actually break, but that wasn’t what she was trying to do.
As she continued pressing, Rína spared a glance at Yvette, the older woman only giving her a knowing smile. Though ostensibly futile, Rína took this as a cue that she was on the right track and kept applying force to the rib for another minute. Then, tentatively, she sent a small tendril of her aura to brush up against the arcanelles situated right where a break might have occurred.
A grin spread across Rína’s face as all the small arcanelles in the middle of the bone lit up in her soul sight, fully attuned. She quickly repeated the process, testing out different ways to stress the different parts of the rib, and in less than a minute she had the entire bone attuned.
“One down, dozens to go…” Rína muttered as she put the rib back and looked at the remaining chest.
An hour passed as she gave a similar treatment to the rest of the bones.
The entire chest had remained wrapped in her hardened aura, and as she reached the bottom of it she assumed that at least a few of them would have been attuned. But no, once she started straining them, it took her just as long to attune the last few bones as it did for the first few.
It didn’t make any sense. It was as if some of the ambient aether was still getting through her hardened aura, keeping the arcanelles at least partially filled.
Rína shook her head. That was probably exactly what was happening. Given that she was at a lower elevation, with a higher ambient aether density, Rína guessed that she would have to compress her hardened aura a fair bit more if she wanted to attune something with just her aura alone.
Something to worry about later. For now, she took a few minutes to clear her head before diving into the actually difficult part. The thing that worried her the most about making the cantrip was its complexity. So far she had only been making threads, literally just straight-ish lines of aether crystal, whereas the cantrip had an actual design that had to be adhered to. Nevertheless, all Rína could do was try, and maybe fail, and then come back to bash her head against the wall.
Taking another deep breath, Rína focused on the spot on her soul she had chosen for the cantrip, and before she could psyche herself out, she focused her intent and made the starting cut.
She made an involuntary wince as she braced for the blinding pain, but thankfully none came. Instead, the inert crystal of her soul’s surface simply turned to dust and fell away into the Astral, while the more malleable crystal beneath remained untouched.
Sparing no time, Rína began taking metaphorical bites out of her armlet’s enchantment, the malleable crystal breaking apart into a flood of aura that took all of her focus to wrangle towards the future site of the cantrip. As the burst of aura arrived, Rína forced more intent upon it, crystalizing it against her soul.
It was a good start, but only that: a start. Rína quickly fell into a rhythm, her attention oscillating between her armlet’s enchantment and her soul as slowly but surely the foundation of the cantrip took form.
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Rína had lost her sense of time, though her sense of progress was still very much present. She had just finished building up through the first three cross sections when she brushed her aura up against her aunt’s. It was still in the shape of the cantrip’s schematic and she had been referencing it throughout the process, but now looking at the fourth layer, Rína couldn’t help but grimace.
Up until this point, the schematic had only called for her regular soul crystal to be shaped in a certain way, but now came the point where she had to integrate some of the kinetic aether from the bones’ arcanelles.
«Any last second tips about the kinetic stuff?» Rína quickly wrote out.
«Nothing I haven’t already said,» Yvette wrote, «Just keep the aether as far from the physical as you can, and leave the chest closed and latched, to be safe.»
Rína nodded as she pressed on. As expected, the new crystal she had laid down was slowly becoming inert, so she didn’t spare any time as she quickly bit into one of the small arcanelles rooted to the bones.
The chest jolted, kicking up a few centimeters off the ground as the bones could be heard crashing together.
“Shit,” Rína startled.
Despite her aunt’s warning, it was impossible to keep all of the kinetic aether away from the physical, after all the arcanelles were incredibly shallow, practically point blank on the physical already. So as the burst of aether came, some of it inevitably touched the physical. And as it did, it seemed to boil off, imparting its kinetic energy onto whatever happened to be around.
But the rest of it stayed in Rína’s aura, or more over, it was her aura. As she had attuned to the respective arcanelle, it shared her intent of self, so it flowed into her aura without resistance.
It was odd to say the least. This was the first time she had any aether in her aura that wasn’t purely of her self. And the kinetics, she could… ‘smell’ wasn’t the right word, but the new intent had a strange kind of feel to it, completely different from her intent of self.
It was light, too. Her regular aura had a weight to it, pulling it towards the Deep Astral. And while kinetic aether still had at least some weight to it, it wasn’t anywhere near as heavy, and was far more easy to move around in general. Because of this, Rína found herself casually pulling the kinetic aether out of the rest of her aura, and crystalizing onto the cantrip.
Returning her attention to the small arcanelle, Rína was about to take another bite when she realized that there wasn’t anything left for her. True, there was still some aether crystal, but with how small the arcanelle was in the first place, she must have gotten all of the interior, malleable crystal that could be turned to aura on her first bite. All that was left was a kind of inert shell that was still rooted to the bone.
It didn’t matter too much, each bone had a few dozen of the small arcanelles and the chest itself contained who knew how many bones in total.
So Rína focused on the next arcanelle and took a bite, the chest of bones rocking as she crystalized more aether onto the cantrip. And soon she fell back into a rhythm of breaking down and building up crystal—all until the various curves of crystal merged into a final summit, and she was done.