Ikki arrived at eight the following morning, perfectly punctual as usual. When he saw me, his eyebrow raised, and he gave a short, crisp nod.

“Excellent. You have finally progressed to a point where I can begin teaching you in earnest. First and foremost, do you know why I have yet to give you a temporal based harvesting spell, minor haste spell, or many other spells?”

“I assumed that it was for the same reason Orykson hadn’t planned for me to learn many spells,” I admitted. “Rapid advancement. But given the way you’re asking, it’s not that, is it?”

“Correct,” Ikki said, inclining his head. “The nature of time-based haste or slow spells is complex and easy to mess up. Localizing haste spells to just your legs, for example, can be done at first gate, but it is unwise, as it would interfere with the standard third gate haste spell.”

“What about Lesser Image Recall?” I asked. “The lesser in the name implies that there’s a greater version.”

“There is, and you will learn it eventually,” Ikki said with a nod. “But unlike haste, they serve highly different functions.”

“I see,” I said. “And harvesting? Do they just not exist?”

Ikki’s lip twitched in what I thought might be the barest hint of a smile.

“Astute… They do not, at least not at such low gate. Even at higher gates, they are of extremely limited use. Thus, I ask you… What is an astute time mage to do, to ensure they can access and store mana?”

I waved my hand and opened a portal to Dusk’s plane. She whipped her head around to stare at me, then gave me a disgruntled chirp and shoved the cookie that she’d been eating behind her back. I shook my head and laughed, but pointed to the Emperor’s Tree.

“Something like that?” I asked. “You establish an external source of temporal mana that you can draw upon? I’d assume it isn’t a plant, since I use life magic blended with time magic to actually draw from it or feed it.”

“Indeed,” Ikki said. He held his hand out, and a sword appeared in it.

The sword was on the longer side – I thought. I wasn’t a sword expert, but it looked long to me – with a single, slightly curved edge. It didn’t look like it was made of metal, exactly, but I wouldn’t contest that it wasn’t a metal either. It was some sort of off-white color, with a worn leather… grasp? Handle? I wasn’t sure what to call the place where someone held a sword.

Set at the very bottom of the sword was a stone that was a translucent, milky white. It hummed to my mana senses, filled with immense temporal mana.

The metal had a rippling folded pattern in it, and magic seemed to flow through it strangely, like an enchanted item, but… Complex. Yet at the same time, it felt highly natural.

“This is my domain weapon. Forged through years of resources, and then improved via a commission with the Craftsman.”

Ikki said the name as if I should know who that was. I wracked my brain for history lessons, but nothing came up.

“It is also the place where I store my temporal basin,” Ikki continued, tapping the stone at the bottom.

“Who’s the Craftsman?” I asked. “I do want to hear about the… basin, but I’ve never heard of him.”

“A wandering occultist with a legacy that allows him to work with any type, mix, or variation of mana as if it was his own, at least for the purposes of enchanting,” Ikki said with a wave, as if it was no matter. “The annoying thing is that his commissions are entirely based around first come, first serve. He’ll work for a prince or a pauper, so long as they get to him first. And since he wanders around, and is hard to track…”

Ikki shook his head and rolled his eyes, then ran a hand through his hair.

That was interesting… he sounded like the perfect person to craft a growth item, sine Orykson wouldn’t be providing one. Of course, finding him would be the hard part. If he was able to exasperate someone like Ikki, there was little chance I’d stumble across him.

“Back to the basin…” Ikki said. “The final spell I will teach you for your time mana is Temporal Basin. It was pointless until you had ingrained Capture Moment and unlocked the relevant features. And to be honest, I was worried you were not taking temporal magic seriously.”

“It isn’t that,” I said, wincing and shaking my head. “I didn’t intend to. Orykson put deadlines on life and death magic, and there wasn’t much to do with spatial, so it just… Sorta fell by the wayside. It wasn’t on purpose.”

Ikki studied me for a moment, and then shrugged.

“As you say.”

He flicked his fingers, and a smooth orb of crystal appeared in his hands, about the size of a lemon, which he passed over to me.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

“This is a common quartz stone,” he said. “Crystal is excellent for holding temporal energy, and quartz is a powerful and cost-effective place to begin. Cast the Capture Moment spell on it.”

I did as he said. With the spell’s mana cost sharply reduced by ingraining it, I was easily able to fill the stone in moments.

“Now, up until this point in time, you have only used the most basic application of the spell. Can you feel the other layers within the spell, however?”

At my nod, Ikki continued. I thought of them more like multiple taps than I did layers, but I assumed they were what he meant.

“One of them should give you a sense of permanency. Activate that function.”

I felt around the spell until I found the tap that gave me a similar sense, and then poured mana in.

It was an absolute glutton for mana, and I wound up having to convert my second gate life mana into first gate temporal mana, just to be able to finish the spell. When it did finally finish, though, I felt around with it in my mana senses.

There seemed to be a core of power within the Capture Moment spell, one that hadn’t been there before, providing the spell with a constant trickle of power. It wasn’t entirely unlike the ingrained effect of a harvesting spell, in fact, and it reminded me of what Orykson had said about Dusk, back when she was just a key.

“Go refill your mana,” Ikki told me.

I opened the portal to Dusk’s plane and drained the Emperor’s Sapling, refilling me instantly, then stepped back out again.

“Now you have captured it at this instant in time,” Ikki said. “Fully, as well, and not respective to space, like the most basic forms of this spell. Your Lesser Image Recall spell will now appear where the stone was roughly half of a second ago. Test it.”

I powered Lesser Image Recall, and nothing happened at first. Then, I moved the quartz.

Sure enough, flickering images appeared in the air behind it, leaving a trail of after images.

“You will, when you have the time and mana, want to create permanency version copies of the bone shards you use, as well as layering several inside of yourself. I personally recommend doing one for each of your limbs, and then another for your body as a whole.”

“Will that provide me with mana, from these… Cores?” I asked

“No, the core’s power is entirely diverted to maintaining the spell’s permanently active state. However, it will allow you to call illusory afterimages of your strikes and body.”

Ikki punched at my face, and I threw my hands up to block, but he stopped before hitting me. His fist lingered in the air for a moment, and then I felt him gently bonk me on the head from behind.

“Like so. However, this is only one step in creating a temporal basin. Feel into your crystal with your mana.”

I did as he said, and felt that I was still connected to the permanent spell, though tenuously. I could feed power into it to update the moment it captured, if nothing else.

“Add mana into it, and then search. One of the other layers should give you the sense of a deeper connection. You will need to empower that function.”

I searched inside the spell until I found the tap he was talking about. It felt less like a normal tap to run mana through, though, and more like a hose, attached to a tap.

I slid mana through it, and felt the tenuous connection solidify slowly but surely, like turning up the water on the tap. There was… something. Some sort of threshold ahead, one that once I pushed, I wouldn’t be able to stop.

“Break through,” Ikki instructed.

I poured more power in, and felt the metaphorical pressure rise to a bursting point, then…

Stillness. The drain on my mana stopped completely,

“You have established a firm link to this particular moment, allowing it to automatically update. This is not something I recommend doing often – it puts a strain on your spirit, and decreases your temporal mana’s regeneration. In most situations, a permanent core will be plenty.”

“If this decreases my mana regeneration, how exactly is it going to fix the lack of a harvesting spell for time mana?” I asked.

“Patience.”

He sketched a spell out in the air. Its structure was interesting, reminding me of both a harvesting spell, and the enhancing spell I knew.

“This is Temporal Basin. Cast it on the gemstone.”

I followed his motions, then sent my temporal mana into the quartz. The crystal slowly began to turn a pastel yellow, like tulips, as it drank in my mana. It felt almost like throwing mana into a pit, burning it pointlessly.

“Yellow?” Ikki asked. “I always thought of temporal mana as white.”

“It was yellow when I opened my gate,” I said defensively, snapped out of the void of the basin. “Space was blue, time was yellow, death was purple, and life is green.”

Ikki blinked, then shrugged.

“Well, it’s simply a matter of perception. Regardless… Now, cast the Temporal Basin spell again. Rather than storing, however, try to pull mana out.”

I did as he said, reaching into the abyss, and…

I drew out a tiny spark of mana. Just the smallest amount, far less than what I’d put into it. It slid into my spirit and restored my temporal mana, just the tiniest bit.

But even I could feel my mana regeneration in my temporal gate slowing down to a crawl, as the gemstone took away most of my regeneration.

“This is your temporal basin,” Ikki said, tapping the stone. “Should you find a more valuable stone of roughly this size and purity, you should destroy the link to this and re-establish your basin with the new stone.”

“What does it do, though?”

“It collects temporal mana and stores it inside the crystal. It does this passively at all times, by draining from your recovery. While that is certainly an annoyance when you are low on mana, it is a blessing all other times, as your mana may be full, but it will constantly store just a touch more. You may also fill it with your own mana directly. As I am sure you noted, it is an inefficient process, however, given the time to build up, you can carry a great deal of power around with you at all times. Furthermore, the efficiency increases slowly, but surely. Each time you expand the spark of power within it, it becomes ever so slightly easier to fill it to that size again.”

I rolled the crystal between my palms, thinking.

“And what does imbuing the spell to add or remove power from it do?”

“It will decrease the burden on your personal mana regeneration. It will not return your regeneration to the level it would be without it, but it will mitigate the damage, so to speak. Oh, and one more thing… It being incorporated into the ritual for the construction for a domain weapon or staff will increase its potency further.”

“Really?” I asked. I really needed to get around to assembling my staff.

“Indeed. Now, let us spar.”

I nodded, then stored the crystal inside of Dusk’s plane and dropped into a sparring stance. Ed joined us then, and we spent a while fighting Ikki two on one until ten rolled around, and Ikki vanished.