She had better not be the norm for gods.

I had returned back to the tavern after that little misadventure in hopes of getting a bit more rest. Expending all that mana and dealing with that goddess had left me a bit exhausted. I requested the next day off from Ava, and she granted it after I told her the whole story regarding the goddess. It was during that day off and the subsequent days that I decided to devote more time to understanding magic, this time with a much lighter hand. Safety first, magic doesn’t fuck around.

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I had once again made my way back to the crater that was my site of experimentation, intent on learning something potentially useful, and not just a dangerous way to make a bomb and expend most of my mana doing so.

The sun was just beginning to rise when I began testing spell combinations. I reaffirmed to myself that I would avoid causing any explosions like before if I could help it.

I started with something nice and simple: Ignite oxygen.

It hadn’t had the effect that I had expected, but it didn’t take me long to figure out why. Oxygen isn’t flammable on its own, so I would need to use something as a catalyst for such a reaction. Hydrogen was weirdly plentiful, so I suppose it could make for something useful in a pinch, but it seemed a bit dangerous to try that again so soon, so I opted for a different spell.

Using a very small amount of mana in my hand, I spoke. “Generate electricity.”

This produced a small tingling or buzzing feeling in my hand, which confirmed that I could generate electricity with mana. There also seemed to be more arcing of mana, which seemed to not be exclusive to outright discharges.

Now if only I could figure out just how much mana is required to generate a particular amount of energy. That would give me numbers to work with, and numbers are my friend here I think.

I could infer that mana must have had a small amount of mass when I did the rock-bomb thing the day prior. I decided to try expelling mana from my body without casting. After all, if I could put mana into a rock, then surely I could expel it out of me and into nothing.

I held my hand out in front of me and focused on my insides. Finding my lungs and therein my mana, I pulled it into my hand, and tried to force it out.

It didn’t take long before I could feel it begin to drain from me, leaving that distinct inward feeling of pressure when I cast anything at all. It wasn’t nearly as intense as when I went through depressurization, but I could definitely notice it more than normal here.

It was when I tried to check if anything had actually left me that I had been quite stumped. There was nothing in the air. I had entertained the idea that even if it were particles — which it had to be if it had mass, I think — then it would have probably been invisible anyway unless it worked like atoms and could bond into larger molecules visible to the eye. I then had an idea, a potentially stupid idea, but an idea nonetheless. Hear me out. Detect mana spell.

In my mind, the idea had some merit. I might even learn something depending on how the spell represented the information.

It might not tell me at all if I don’t tell it to, but that’s what I’m curious about. Will it even say anything if I don’t specify the means of representation? Only one way to find out!

“Detect mana.”

…

It started with just one. One singular ticking sound that sounded like it came from nowhere, and yet everywhere at once.

Then it became two ticks. Then three. Then four. Then five, six, seven — until the ticking gained such a high frequency that it came out as a single, low tone. Before it had reached that point, I’d had an epiphany.

This sounds like a geiger counter! Does that mean anything? Is mana actually radiation?? But if it is then why does it seem to have mass? It could just be how the spell chose to represent whatever data it is that it got, and if that’s the case then I need a way to observe it…

This line of thought had unfortunately been getting me nowhere. I couldn’t even begin to imagine how I would detect something like that with the tools I had now. As such, I instead chose to explore a different avenue of magic.

What if I ask a question?

Like normal, I pulled mana into my outstretched hand and spoke. “Condense water vapor?”

Water droplets appeared orbiting my hand just like they had before.

No change then. Alright, let’s try something else.

“What is mana?” I said as I channeled mana into my hand.

…

…

Nothing. I could feel the mana being expended, but nothing happened. Are open ended questions not allowed? Hmm.

I channeled my mana once more. “Yes or no — is water wet?”

…

…

…

Nothing again? I guess not even magic has the answer to that question!

…I should probably find a better spell than penetrate. It takes more mana than I’d like.

My thoughts exactly, past me!

I had come to the realization that I would benefit from a more efficient attack spell. Something to defend myself with that wouldn’t leave me briefly stunned or defenseless. I had a few ideas, but not many of them held much water. I had briefly considered jokingly saying something like “die”, but I didn’t want to risk something like that misfiring. I also had a strong feeling that something like that simply wouldn’t work how I would want it to, and I was in no rush to test it.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

I had considered a few options, though I had found myself drawn to one in particular. I had picked up a small rock, looking at the tree that I had so callously attacked the morning prior.

There shouldn’t be much energy required to bring a small rock to deadly speeds. Let’s start simple.

I took a pose not dissimilar to that of a baseball pitcher, and channeled mana into the hand holding the rock. As I threw it with force, I yelled- “Accelerate!”

I heard a loud crack! And when I examined the tree, I found a small rock embedded about an inch into the trunk. It had fractured and shattered into a number of smaller pieces where it had embedded, but it had still done its job.

It might not pierce an armored target, but it’ll definitely do some damage to a soft target, maybe even kill. Not to mention that hardly took any mana compared to before! Penetrate takes way more mana than this!

Alright, first give it more mana, then make it more specific. I think I can make something out of this! I am getting to that damn school and no one is stopping me!

I tried the spell again, giving it what felt like twice as much mana as before.

Ka-crack!

This time it had pierced nearly four inches, creating a small crater where it had impacted. It was much louder too. The first one had definitely been subsonic.

Alright, let’s refine this thing!

I don’t know what mechanism it was using to accelerate it though… maybe it just increased the kinetic energy? Can it just do that? Hm, I don’t see why not if it could just rip things apart with penetration… what if I increase the speed itself? I know that kinetic energy quadruples when speed doubles, so if I use that logic, then I should be able to get it up to quite a lot of speed.

I hope that school has a way to measure mana…

I readied another rock to be thrown, winding my arm back. I took a deep breath, and spoke. “Multiply velocity by four!”

…

The rock hit the ground about three meters away.

What gives?

…

Oh wait. It must be multiplying it while I’m throwing it, which gave it a hell of a lot less extra speed. Alright let’s try that again.

“Multiply velocity by four after I throw this rock!” I said, stepping forward as I threw the rock.

I immediately regretted this as my entire body was thrown forward. I went into a roll when I hit the ground, rolling until I hit the tree.

“OH so NOW it misinterprets??” I yelled to no one in particular. I stumbled when I got up off the ground, breathing heavily before dusting myself off. I couldn’t tell if it had been the spell that had given me the sudden exhaustion, or if being tossed into a tree had done it. Nevertheless, I tried again, this time specifying just which object’s speed was being increased.

“Multiply this rock’s velocity by four after I throw it!”

…

Why are my ears ringing? And is my nose bleeding again? And why didn’t I throw the rock? And why am I laying on the ground with my face in the dirt and my ass in the air? And why am I losing consciousness??

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For the fifth time since arriving in this world, I accidentally woke up in a bed that I did not enter. Though all things considered, I had a pretty good idea of where I was. Maybe it was the fact that I had seen this exact room before. Or maybe it was the fact that Ava had just cleared her throat from next to me.

“Hi Ava.” I greeted.

“Do you wanna explain what you were doing this time, Max? Or do I need to make you work the rest of your time here.” she threatened.

“Hm. Gun?” I said with uncertainty.

She sighed, putting a hand to her face. “And just what in the hells is a gun, Max?”

“Uhm… a weapon?”

This had not been the answer she was looking for, apparently. “Max, why were you making weapons?” she said, menacingly.

I had considered running away, but something told me that she would be faster, and that I would not like what happened next.

You know what? Fuck it. Double down.

“Self-defense.”

She actually seemed to calm down upon hearing this. “Alright… I can understand that, but what exactly is it that you’re afraid of? Another god? Because if that’s the case then you should give up.”

“I mean, I would be lying if I said that I hadn’t thought of that, but I’m more worried about more animals like lupien and whatever that duhen argen is. If I miss with a spell, I don’t want to be stunned or weakened by it.” I reasoned.

“Well it seems to me like you got just that when I came looking for you. Did the dirt taste good?” she teased.

“Eh, I’ve had worse.” I shot back.

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After that incident, I decided that it would be safest to just use the low powered version of the spell. I ended up spending the rest of the week working with Ava and learning more about that world. Apparently there were a lot of gods, and when I say a lot, I mean that they had enough gods for Hinduism to take them to court over copyright infringement.

On my second to last day in the town, I checked in on Kalenz’ shop. He had been hard at work apparently, and was ready to present a product. He had seemed quite proud, so I allowed him the song and dance of it all.

“Lad, you are going to be elated when you see what I’ve made. Come with me into the shop.” he demanded. He nearly shoved me along, so I could only imagine how excited he must have been. He led me into the same room where he had originally strung up the hide that I had so poorly preserved. In the place of the rack he had used was a simple coat hanger.

I approached the object to take a look, only to realize something. He hadn’t made a cloak. He had made a jacket! It even had a hood! It was almost like a trenchcoat, with the bottom end of the coat extending down to my ankles. I felt the inside of the coat, and it had been cool to the touch, like when metal saps the heat from you when you touch it. But the inside also felt like leather.

“Kalenz, what is this inner material made from?” I inquired.

“That, lad, is the hide of a kvanlos! It’s a rare kind of duhen argen that prefers to bring snowstorms instead of sandstorms, though the hide I have is quite old. Normally their hide is used to freeze foods to preserve them, but this one’s been worn down by age, so it isn’t nearly as valuable. Even so, it makes for a great coat liner!”

There’s that duhen argen being mentioned again… is it actually one? Or is it just a relative? I would bet my money on the latter. Snowstorms sound like a pretty drastic change. Do all of them have some level of control over the weather, or is it just a misconception?

I took his hand and shook it, taking him by surprise. “Thank you so much for this, Kalenz. I won’t forget what you’ve done for me today.”

“Well don’t thank me yet, I still owe you a set of brands!” he reminded me.

Before I could respond, he rushed to another room. I heard some things being thrown around before he returned, a sack in hand. He gestured me over to a table, and dumped the contents of the sack. A series of metal clangs resonated in the air when roughly fifty of the things clattered onto the table.

“Lad, if you pass mana through one of these and press it into an item, it will be branded. Channel mana into the new brand, and it will cast a spell. That spear you’ve got there, you could put a penetration rune on the blade, and some runes for a force shield on the other end where it’s flat. You’ve got quite a few runes here, but truth be told, I don’t know what they all do. You might want to find out for yourself, or ask someone who knows more. Though I can say with certainty what runes are for the penetration and shield spells.” he said as he separated them from the rest.

He continued while putting the runes back into the sack. “A word of warning, these brands are very volatile when saturated, so take great care when branding with them. This is why we prefer spellsilver. It’s not only safer, but it’s easier to channel mana into it as well. Do be careful, I would hate to see someone like you lose your life to this.”

Hear that Stabby? Time for an upgrade.