When Jeb’s eyes cleared, he looked at the Enchantments he had made. The entire detector seemed ready, and they were no longer glowing from ambient Magic in the air. Looking over at Declan, he saw that his lab partner had not finished making Mana reducers yet.
“Do you need a hand?” Jeb asked.
Declan nodded, clearly focused on making his latest Enchantment. Jeb picked up a piece of gold foil and began etching the reducing Enchantment. In the time it took him to form a single set of runes, Declan had gone through three. It made Jeb wonder how he had finished his portion of the laboratory work before Declan had.
After crafting a few more, Declan nodded. “That should be the right number,” he said. The two carefully aligned the output of each sheet of gold foil into the input of the remaining ones. Thankfully, they would not need to power the reducing Enchantments, because their function was siphoning off Magic.
Jeb started feeding Mana into the multiplying Enchantment again and nodded to Declan. “Whenever you’re ready.”
Declan nodded back and obviously started pushing his own Mana into the first Enchantment. As his Magic traveled down the Enchantments, each one lit up in turn, glowing less and less bright as they went further down. When it reached the final reducing Enchantment, both of them immediately turned to watch the output of the multiplying Enchantment. It spat out a bright green beam of light.
“Congratulations,” Candidate Therese said as she walked over. “The two of you are the first to finish today. You are welcome to try to modify any parts of your setup. If you would rather, you can also just clean up and leave.”
Declan looked at Jeb. “Is there anything you would add to the system?”
Jeb shrugged. “I don’t quite understand why you used a series of reducers instead of a single reducer with mirror Enchantments, and it could be nice to connect the Magic blocker to the input of the multiplier so I wouldn’t have to power it myself. Neither of those is incredibly important though. We are graded entirely on whether or not we managed to isolate a single thaum, which my calculations say that we did.”
Declan’s brow furrowed. “Would you mind if I took a look at them? It’s not that I don’t trust you, I’m just a little curious how you know that we isolated a single thaum without more measurements.”
Jeb handed over his laboratory notebook. He had transferred all the calculations he’d needed over, since a part of their grade was based on explaining how they were able to determine that the system ran with a single thaum. Declan worked through the same calculations in his own notebook, making a note that he had taken them from Jeb’s. After rederiving the same answer, he nodded.
“Since thaums are discrete, there wouldn’t really be a way to see anything more than one thaum and less than two, which would glow blue in this setup. Of course, that does presume that you managed to make the detector to this exact size.” As the words came out of Declan’s mouth, he realized what he said and waved his arms as he quickly continued, “I didn’t mean it like that! I fully believe that you made it correctly, it’s just-”
Jeb nodded. “No, that’s a great point. We need to be able to record how we know that we made it correctly. I made three size reducers,” he gestured to the used Enchantments, “and drew the starting Enchantment at scale.”
Declan looked at the three versions of the Enchantment that weren’t in the detector and nodded. “I didn’t see that in your laboratory notebook.”
Jeb grimaced. “I forgot to keep a running log while I worked.”
Candidate Therese still hadn’t walked away, and she shrugged. “As long as you accurately report what went into the final system, at the very least, there will not be a penalty in this course. Keeping track of your attempts is valuable, of course, but it also makes my life grading you harder. When you embark on independent research, it is important to start by writing what you plan to happen and how you plan to make it occur, if only so your memory is not tainted by the reality of what you saw.”
Jeb nodded and wrote down what he had built into the system, making a note of why he had added each new piece. He spoke as he did, and Declan copied it over.
“Sorry,” Declan said when Jeb had finished, “what were you saying about how you would have used mirrors instead for the single thaum isolation?” Candidate Therese leaned in closer as well.
Jeb cocked his head, confused by the question. “On the third page of potential Enchanting Schematics, there was a mirror Enchantment, which just sends Magic back at allegedly perfect efficiency. There was also a second reducing Enchantment which took in a wider set of inputs. If you had set the system up like this,” he flipped to the page in his notebook where he’d sketched his plan for the design, “then we only would have needed three Enchantments, rather than,” Jeb quickly counted the reducers, “fifty three.”
Declan looked through Jeb’s notes. “But then we would have needed to align the mirrors perfectly. How would you trace the invisible beam of Magic?”
Jeb shrugged. “The angles aren’t that hard to work out, and there are a few options for verification. There’s this Enchantment,” he flipped open the handbook, “which makes trails of directional Magic glow. Or this one, which is just a beam of light that we could have tracked with the Magic. Of course, that would mean that we would have to align the two together, which could have been a little difficult, but-” Jeb cut off when he saw the expressions on Declan and Therese’s faces.
“Did I say something wrong?”
“No!” Therese practically shouted, before taking a deep breath and continuing. “I am just a little surprised that you thought about the laboratory session this much. Most students are happiest to just take the simplest route.”
Jeb frowned. “So am I? It’s much simpler to only have to deal with three or four Enchantments than to deal with more than fifty.”
“I think you and I define simple differently,” Declan said, pointing to the difference in the source schematics the two had made. Jeb’s was covered in calculations, while Declan’s just had a single piece of annotation “do this fifty three times”.
“Well,” Jeb said in the silence, “do you want to try making the mirror version?”
Declan shrugged. “I don’t see why not.”
Candidate Therese’s eyes lit up. “Let me know if it ends up working.”
The two lab partners nodded and began working on the new version of the Enchantment. When the bell tolled, both shot up, startled by the sudden sound.
“So,” Candidate Therese said, walking over to them. Jeb looked around, realizing that they were the last ones in the room. “What did you learn?” she prompted them.
Jeb shrugged, “aligning with the mirror Enchantments was a little more difficult than I had expected.”
“Is there a reason that you didn’t use this Enchantment?” she asked, pointing to a focusing Enchantment that would have let them set the initial angle Magic went through.
“I didn’t think we would need it,” Jeb replied honestly.
“How much time do you think using it would have saved you?”
Declan chimed in. “Given that we’ve spent the last hours completely unable to fix the angle and location the first beam of Magic hits our reducer? A lot.”
“Sorry,” Jeb said, “I forgot that it was in there.”
“It’s no problem!” Declan replied, “this was really good for practicing my Magical dexterity. I hadn’t considered how hard it was to keep my Mana flowing out in a perfectly continuous beam.”
Candidate Therese nodded. “Do you two believe that the mirrors are aligned properly right now?” They both nodded, and she flicked her fingers.
A mote of Magic shot through their system, leaving an afterglow on the tracing Enchantment. When it lit the detector, it glowed a bright green for a moment. While Jeb and Declan gaped at how easily she had just solved their issues, she smiled.
“Well, congratulations.” Jeb stopped her as she started to walk away.
“Wait, how did you modulate how many thaums of Magic you put out?”
She shrugged. “It’s one of the skills you will need to learn for a lot of higher order Enchanting. Now, I need to go to my own research, and I am sure that the two of you need to eat.”
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She ran her hand down the air in front of her and stepped through the doorway that appeared. Declan didn’t seem to see anything strange in that, so Jeb refrained from commenting.
“So,” Jeb said, “do you want to go get dinner?” Declan nodded, and the two made their way to the cafeteria. After dinner, Jeb opened the door, hoping to work on another of his Skills again. It took him to a smithing foundry, where he spent a few hours collecting his thoughts as he worked on a piece of iron.
When he had finished reshaping the piece back into an ingot, Jeb realized that he had a Quest Notification he had ignored while working in the laboratory. Opening his Status, Jeb saw that he actually had five.
Congratulations! You have completed the Minor Quest Learn to Enchant Second Tier “Learn a New Single Piece Enchantment” You have learned a reducing Enchantment. Rewards: 1 Magic Affinity, 1 Intelligence, 48 EXP, Learn to Enchant Third Tier Quest “Learn a New Double Enchantment”
Congratulations! You have completed the Minor Quest Learn to Enchant Second Tier “Learn a New Single Piece Enchantment” You have learned a multiplying Enchantment. Rewards: 1 Magic Affinity, 1 Intelligence, 48 EXP
Congratulations! You have completed the Minor Quest Learn to Enchant Second Tier “Learn a New Single Piece Enchantment” You have learned a mirror Enchantment. Rewards: 1 Magic Affinity, 1 Intelligence, 48 EXP
Congratulations! You have completed the Minor Quest Learn to Enchant Second Tier “Learn a New Single Piece Enchantment” You have learned a Magic detecting Enchantment. Rewards: 1 Magic Affinity, 1 Intelligence, 48 EXP
Congratulations! You have completed the Minor Quest Learn to Enchant Second Tier “Learn a New Single Piece Enchantment” You have learned a blocking Enchantment. Rewards: 1 Magic Affinity, 1 Intelligence, 48 EXP
The sudden rush of new Statistics hit Jeb, and he blinked slightly. After working off his nervous energy in the forge, his mental exhaustion was enough to make him ready for sleep. As he made his way back to his room, Jeb looked at his schedule. He had Introductory Piano for the entire day. “I wonder how they’re going to block my Skills,” Jeb said to himself as he drifted off to sleep.
Jeb’s Status Sheet at End of Chapter:
Jeb Humdrum Human Age: 16 Class: Wizard Level: 3 Experience: 1015/204
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Total Statistic Load: 623 ->633 Physical Load: 228 Strength: 52 Dexterity: 53 Endurance: 54 Vitality: 55 Presence: 14
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Mental Load: 395 ->405 Intelligence: 78 ->83 Willpower: 85 Magic Affinity: 84 ->89 Mana Depth: 74 Charisma: 74
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Mana: 1755
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Glyph Attunement: 31 Least Shape Earth (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Earth (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Earth (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Earth (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Shape Earth - Efficient (Modified) Tier 3 Spell Lesser Shape Earth (Modified) Tier 3 Spell Least Shape Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Shape Water - Efficient (Modified) Tier 3 Spell Lesser Shape Water (Modified) Tier 3 Spell Least Hold Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Conjure Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Conjure Water - Efficient (Modified) Tier 3 Spell Least Destroy Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Move Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Move Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Mud (Modified) Tier 2 Spell Attune Earth Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Attune Water Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Attune Water Mana - Efficient (Modified) Tier 2 Spell Attune Air Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Attune Fire Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Attune Sand Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Least Create Sand (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Attune Sand Mana - Efficient (Modified) Tier 2 Spell
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Bard Songs Known: 1 Lute Enforcement
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Skills: Meditation Spell Glyphing Gift of Gab Identify Soil Savvy Animal Handling Fertilizing Lute Playing Singing Musician Pollination Brewing Distilling Smithing Wood Identification Woodworking Soil Improvement Glassblowing Magic
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Achievements: Focused Meditator Student of Magic Glyph Specializer
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Quests: Major: Slay the Dragon of the West (Progressive)