After a few minutes of scanning, Jeb saw someone set a keg down and wipe their brow. They also started looking around, and the two made eye contact. Jeb quickly walked over, hoping to catch the Brewer before they moved away.

“Hi?” the Brewer said apprehensively.

“Hi!” Jeb replied, “I was wondering if you would be willing to talk to me about the way you do Druidic Brewing.”

“Why? Also, who are you?”

Jeb blushed slightly.

“Sorry, my name is Jeb. I am a visitor in the Druidic Enclave, and your Radius suggested that I find someone in here to ask how Druidic Brewing works.”

The man held out his hand.

“My name is Colton,” he replied when Jeb grasped his hand to shake, “if the Radius was here, that does explain why the ambient Mana was so disturbed.”

He looked Jeb up and down.

“Would you mind if I checked your claim that the Radius approved you learning?”

“No? How long will that take?”

Colton looked into the distance. Jeb briefly tasted bitter notes before Colton looked back.

“All right, she approved it, so let’s get started.”

He turned and started walking, so Jeb hurried to follow.

I wonder why everyone is always in a hurry here, Jeb thought as he broke into a slight jog.

Colton led him to a small side room, where Jeb saw barrels upon barrels of grains and herbs.

“I see that you do not have the Brewing Skill right now,” he commented, “what do you know about Brewing?”

“Um,” Jeb replied, grasping for a response, “I used to have the Brewing Skill.”

“What happened to it?” Colton asked, not giving Jeb a chance to explain his history with Brewing

“My Class Skill consumed it,” Jeb replied “As to my history with Brewing, though,” he continued, not wanting to get caught in specifics, “I am a member of the Brewing Guild in the Republic. I was trained on non-Magical Brewing, and ran an Alchemical Brewery at the Republican Academy for a number of years. Your own Radius commented that I seemed capable as a Brewer after she tasted my beers.”

Colton nodded.

“If that’s the case, then I’m sure that you’ll have no issue with Brewing something for me right now.”

“Um, sure,” Jeb replied. “Do you have supplies I can use?”

Colton looked meaningfully at the different barrels and crates in the room. Taking the hint, Jeb grabbed a few handfuls of barley, some hops, and an empty metal fermenter. He Conjured some water, extracted the malt and hop flavor, and then rapidly cooled it off with an Inverse Heat Glyph. When the wort was finished, he looked at Colton.

“Do you have any yeast?” he asked hopefully.

Colton did not respond at first, and Jeb was worried that he had done something wrong.

“What?” Jeb asked, worried that he had somehow failed the Brewer’s test.

“What did you just do?” Colton asked, continuing to stare at the fermenter now full of ready to be brewed beer.

“I made a wort?” Jeb asked. “Do you not start Brews with a wort?”

“No, we do,” Colton replied hesitantly, “but why was there so much Magic involved in your process? I didn’t see any knot work spiraling out, so you couldn’t have been using anything Druidic, and I didn’t see any other Schools of Magic in your Status.”

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“Oh,” Jeb replied, realizing that he would have to give more details about his Class and Class Skill, “I have learned the other Major Schools of Magic, and my Class Skill also consumed those. For this wort I just used Glyph Magic, because that’s the one I’m most comfortable freehanding with raw Mana. That might be because my first Class was a Glyph Magic Class, but my research did also suggest it could just generally be the best School for that kind of work.”

Jeb hummed slightly, “Then again, there is the whole issue of confirmation bias, and there’s every possibility that I only found those results because I went into the research expecting that answer.”

Realizing he had gone far too in depth with the answer, he stopped and looked at Colton. The Brewer was looking at Jeb with something new in his eyes. Jeb wasn’t entirely sure whether it was respect, fear, or some other, more complex emotion. Whatever it was, though, he pointed to a wall full of different drawers.

Each drawer was labeled with a line of Druidic text. Jeb quickly skimmed them, brain working to convert the terms into words that he was familiar with. It was more than a little fascinating watching the text reshape from a completely meaningful Druidic word into its counterpoint word in Republican. Jeb quickly found a quick-brewing ale yeast with relatively mild flavor notes and opened the drawer.

He turned back to Colton, unsure how to take some of the dried yeast without contaminating the rest of it. Colton pointed to a spoon that was sitting in a glowing box. Jeb nodded, picked it up, and carefully poured in a few grains. Having done so, he turned to Colton.

“It should take a few days to Brew if we do it normally,” Jeb said, “do you want to wait for that to happen, or would you rather I speed up the Brewing?”

“How would you speed it up?”

Jeb pulled out one of the Alchemicals he had made with Professor Quicksilver and handed it to Colton. The Brewer took it hesitantly, uncorking it and looking inside. He sniffed it and frowned.

“Why wouldn’t you just make the yeast move more quickly?” he asked, seeming genuinely lost.

Jeb looked at the Druid, waiting for him to come to the right conclusion.

Light finally dawned in the Druid’s eyes. “Oh! I had not considered that working directly with yeast would be emblematic of Druidic Brewing. Um, let me think about how we teach that.”

Colton walked away, and Jeb stood, unsure whether he was supposed to follow or wait for the Druid to come back. Before he could decide, Colton returned with a small picture book. Jeb opened it, feeling the thick pages and knowing at once that it was meant for children. Of course, the bright colors and title, “Brewing Can Be Fun!” had already led him to that conclusion.

“Let me know if there’s anything in here you don’t understand,” Colton said, moving to leave again.

Jeb looked up, a little surprised to see that the man appeared completely genuine.

“I will,” he confirmed, sitting down to read the book. After quickly flipping through it, Jeb nodded. Druidic Magic, as he was coming to learn, was often far more about intention than anything rote. Jeb was relieved to learn that the intricate knots he saw tracing out of the different Magical workings were a consequence of the working, rather than their cause.

He left the room and quickly found Colton again.

“When I was in the Circle of the Swarms, their Brewmaster said that Druidic Brewers breed the same strain of yeast to a single Druidic Brew, using it through many batches until it is fully Attuned to the Magic.”

Colton blinked slowly.

“That is such a terrible method. I cannot believe that their Brewmaster actually works that way.”

“Oh!” Jeb replied, “Sorry, he does not. He is Bound to his own yeast, but suggested that as the alternative.”

“That would be so wasteful. A different strain of yeast for each Magical effect would require an almost endless storage for them all.”

Jeb pointedly looked at the nearly endless wall of yeasts.

“That’s different!” Colton protested.

Jeb raised an eyebrow.

“We need all of those yeasts! They have different uses.”

“I guess I’ll trust you,” Jeb said, not actually interested in fighting that issue.

He looked down at the wort he had prepared.

“I suppose I should try Brewing it,” he mused aloud.

Jeb blinked, activating his Magical sight once again. To his relief, he had not added anything inherently Magical to the Brew. The residual Magics from his Conjuration, heating, and cooling were still fading, but Jeb grabbed them, stopping their dissolution. Reaching out, Jeb forced them into strands of Magic.

Relying on his Druidic Magic Skill, Jeb searched the wort for the small colony of yeast. The small bloom of life was thankfully thriving in the environment, but Jeb saw that in the few minutes he had left the fermenter uncovered, other small life had started to enter the future beer. Jeb snuffed out those lives, then carefully wrapped the yeast in a gentle but vivacious Magic.

The colony quickly ballooned, and Jeb saw knots start to arc out into the air. A part of him was bothered by the waste of Mana that the knots represented, and part of his mind started to work on how he could use the Magic more effectively. Before he could put too much effort into the thought, though, he felt a sudden new draw on his Mana reserves.

The yeast, having consumed all the sugar they could access in the wort, were relying on another source for their energy. He cut off the flow of Magic and watched them quickly crash out of the beer. The children’s book had not explained how to add bubbles into the beer, and Jeb didn’t feel like asking Colton any other questions. It only took the briefest pulse of Magic for him to make the beer as effervescent as he liked it.

Jeb reached for two mugs on the wall and drew each of them a small cup. Colton took it and they clicked their cups together before each taking a sip.

“Not my best work,” Jeb said, preempting any comments that Colton might make. He took advantage of the Brewer’s silence and explained what he could have done better.

“You are definitely skilled enough at Brewing to work for actual Magical Effects,” Colton said when he had finished. “Follow me, and I’ll show you where the reagents are stored.”