The sun was setting over the camp as Lucius watched Patrick walk over to the line of men working on the defensive wall, interrupting their work in order to pull Nicolai aside. The rotund young man immediately assumed he had done something wrong and thus began apologizing profusely, the look on his face turning from fear to dread when he noticed Lucius observing him from the distance.
Lucius chuckled quietly to himself as he watched Patrick waving his arms back and forth rapidly as he attempted to convince Nicolai that he had not come to punish him further. Leaving Nicolai in Patrick’s capable hands, Lucius headed back toward the farmhouse. The sun had almost set by now, signaling that the world would soon be embraced by darkness. Ever since the humans had lost access to electricity, people had steadily reverted to the natural habit of sleeping and waking with the rise and fall of the sun. Until Patrick’s new light-giving inscriptions became widespread, they would most likely continue living this way.
Stepping inside the dim farmhouse, Lucius made his way to the room allocated to Nana and Maryanne, which now also housed Sarah and David. The housing situation within the small community was growing increasingly strained, and the first priority after the defenses were completed would be building additional shelters. Lucius wasn’t sure what they would be capable of constructing without power tools and modern equipment, probably nothing fancy, but he had a feeling that whoever took charge of the construction would eventually unlock some talents related to building structures. That would make it possible to create much more impressive infrastructure in the future.
As Lucius approached the room, he heard Sarah speaking. It was clear she wasn’t having a conversation—it sounded more like she was narrating. Peeking around the corner, Lucius saw Maryanne tucked snugly into the medium-sized bed while Sarah sat beside her, holding open the storybook that the child treasured so dearly.
He couldn’t help but smile as he noticed the expression on Maryanne’s face. He watched the young girl pull up and snuggle into her thick blankets as she gazed up at her mother, eagerly listening to each word of the story. Feeling satisfied that Maryanne was back with her family where she belonged. Lucius slipped away silently to avoid disturbing the child’s first storytime after reuniting with her parents.
As Lucius walked down the hallway away from Maryanne’s room, Tiber noticed him and stepped out from one of the nearby bedrooms to speak with him.
"Lucius! Are you willing to do me a favor? I’d ask someone else, but you’re the only one with a storage ring around here. If you are willing, move these supplies into your ring and take them to Jack—I’m sure he’ll be eager to receive them right away. I’m completely exhausted, I’d rather not make another trip across the property and back."
After listening to Tiber’s request, Lucius held out his hand without saying a word. Tiber furrowed his brows in brief confusion before shaking his head with a quiet sigh.
"Right, the rings. Sorry, I wasn’t kidding about being overtired."
Tiber pulled three storage rings off his left hand and handed them to Lucius.
"I had to use three [Magical] Grade rings to hold all the items, but I’m sure that impressive-looking thing on your hand has more than enough space to store everything. Am I correct?"
Lucius wore a slight smirk as he slid the rings onto his hand without responding. He briefly glanced through their contents before attempting something he had never tried before. He imagined pulling the contents of the lower-quality rings directly into his own ring without first moving them into the real world.
Through effort, you have raised Dimensional Manipulation to level 3.
Lucius watched as row after row of steel ingots appeared in his storage ring, along with an entire pallet of lumber and several stacks of leather pelts—the leather pelts were the only items that had clearly been created recently, everything else was manufactured before the apocalypse. When all the materials had been transferred, the pile of goods in Lucius' ring massively dwarfed his own small collection of items. Whisper looked on with interest, taking flight and circling the large pile of supplies to inspect it.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Tiber accepted the rings back from Lucius, raising an eyebrow as he realized they had already been emptied.
"Interesting. I didn’t know it was possible to move items between storage rings like that."
Tiber attempted to do the same with some of his own personal supplies after returning the rings to his hand. While he eventually succeeded, he could only move one item at a time—and very slowly at that. He was left puzzled as to how Lucius had managed to transfer such a massive stack of materials so quickly. He would have asked, but he could barely keep his eyes open, and Lucius was already making his way down the hallway. Tiber shook the thoughts from his head and returned to his bedroom, shutting the door to finally get some sleep.
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Lucius stepped back into the sweltering workshop for the second time that day. This time, Jack was back at the workbench, with Mina standing close beside him, her big doe eyes intensely observing his every move. Jack appeared to be crafting a second blacksmith's hammer—this one slightly smaller than the version he had made for himself.
Lucius waited patiently to the side until Jack reached a point in the creation process where taking a break wouldn’t be detrimental. Setting down the item he was working on, Jack looked up at Lucius.
"Couldn't stay away, huh?" Jack wiped his dirty hands off on the front of his leather apron as he spoke, "I heard Tiber and his boys arrived. It’s too bad about Roland—I really liked that guy."
Lucius nodded and gestured toward his storage ring.
"I’ve got the supplies Tiber promised you. Show me where to put them."
A wide smile spread across Jack’s face at the news, quickly turning into a wry grin as he narrowed his eyes at Lucius.
"You mean you’re bringing me a gift again? Didn’t I just tell you earlier today that I’m not into you like that?"
Lucius raised an eyebrow as Jack repeated the same joke for the second time in one day.
"Don’t make me dump all these fancy materials into the pond. You can spend the next day fishing them out in the cold wind while you think about the consequences of making lame jokes."
Jack chuckled and raised his hands in mock surrender.
"Okay, you win. Put them over there—separate everything into its own area if you can, please." Jack gestured toward the storage section as he spoke.
Lucius followed the instructions, watching Jack's expression shift slowly into one of pure ecstasy as the neat stacks of materials filled his storage room. Jack couldn’t help himself—he rushed over to the items and picked up a steel ingot, running his fingers across the smooth reflective surface of the metal, the carbon and grease from his hands rubbing off on the previously clean metal.
"Steel? I was expecting iron..."
Lucius shot Jack a questioning glance as he heard the murmured comment.
"Is that a problem?"
Jack looked over with an offended glare, as if Lucius had just made an off-color remark about his wife.
"A problem? Only if you think it’s a problem that the quality of items I can make just got much higher! This is the best problem I’ve had in a long time!"
Lucius nodded, relieved to know there wouldn’t be any issue with the weapons.
"Get Mina equipped with her own tools as fast as you can so you two can get started. The sooner we can supply Tiber’s battalion with quality weapons, the better off we’ll be."
Jack gave Lucius a thumbs-up, the shiny steel ingot in his hand making a pleasant clank as he placed it back onto the stack before returning to the workbench.
When Lucius stepped out of the workshop, the sun had already set, and the chirping of insects had become much louder as darkness blanketed the human community. The only light he could see came from the fire burning at the center of the circle of tents Tiber’s men had set up. Lucius rubbed his chin as he gazed up at the night sky, speaking softly to himself and Whisper.
"Well, I just woke up a few hours ago, and I’m not the least bit tired. What do you say we take a trip to Magar’s cave and thank him for defending us from Baba Yaga’s sneak attack?"
Lucius glanced into his storage space as he was speaking, he watched Whisper shake his head with his miniature brows heavily furrowed in response.
"I don’t care about that. I want you to practice using my powers. You can’t keep putting it off. You’re much weaker than you should be because you’ve neglected this."
Lucius waved his hand dismissively.
"Fine, fine. We can do that too. Magar first, then training. Deal?"
A puff of purple smoke appeared on Lucius’ shoulder as Whisper emerged from the dimensional space of the ring to enjoy the cool night air beside Lucius. He did his best to mimic Jack by forming an awkward thumbs-up with the tiny fingers at the ends of his wings, smiling proudly as he did so.