Jeb looked at his Mana and saw that it still hadn’t refilled. Learning Glyphs would take Mana, so he decided to work on learning to read music instead. The first pages of the book were spent explaining the value of learning to read music, which Jeb skipped. After all, he already knew why he wanted to learn.
Once he got a few more pages in, though, he saw the pages filled with arcane strokes, like in the Lute Method Book. Jeb learned that he’d missed a lot of meaning behind the symbols when he’d learned the folk song. He hadn’t done anything strictly wrong, but only because the piece was designed for a beginner on the lute.
Jeb got lost in the text. He kept turning between the notation book and the Lute Method Book as he learned what new symbols meant. When he remembered to check his Mana, he saw that it was totally full again.
Jeb started plucking the lute part again. The cycling note in his head and pattern on his lute quickly synced up. As he kept playing it, he noticed that they weren’t totally in sync though.
His rhythm wasn’t perfect, so some notes came slightly too early or slightly too late. That seemed like something he should fix before he tried adding in Mana again. After playing the loop what must have been dozens of times, Jeb realized that he had slipped into Meditation. It seemed to help his playing, so he tried to maintain the state while he added in Mana.
This time, Jeb saw what happened when he began feeding Mana into the Song. Just like how he saw points and flowing light when he learned a Glyph, he saw three wheels spinning, each releasing a thread that wove together. The Mana and lute wove around the base note, merging into a single shape.
Of course, Jeb still hadn’t figured out the speed for his Mana. Watching it like this, he could tell that it was moving too slowly. He kept speeding up the wrapping speed until it was in time with his playing.
Even then, though, something felt off. Speeding up the Mana, the weaving thread seemed to grow less and less stable. Then, just as Jeb was about to give up, the Mana seemed to lock perfectly into place. It was moving three times as quickly as the base note, and it felt somehow right.
The thread was clearly missing something, which confused Jeb for a moment. Then he remembered that he still needed to sing and add Mana through his voice, which made sense.
Jeb’s Mana was still pouring out faster than he thought it should. As he watched the thread grow, he realized that there was something wrong with his lute playing. He couldn’t quite tell what it was, but it seemed less smooth than the other two strands.
Jeb listened to his playing. Adding Mana to the Song had locked his rhythm in perfectly. As he kept listening, he realized that the strings weren’t perfectly in tune.
Jeb turned the tuning peg ever so slightly, hoping to see what it did to the pitch. He apparently overshot, and the string went from too sharp to too flat. He just touched the peg, which thankfully brought the string into pitch.
He went through the rest of the strings, bringing them all into pitch. As each one got to their correct pitch, Jeb’s Mana drained slower and slower. By the time he had the last one in tune, his Mana was almost entirely emptied, but he had plenty of time to unravel the Song.
Jeb felt like he had learned musical notation well enough to try learning the vocal part of the Song, so he decided to start learning it while he waited for his Mana to refill. As he started singing it slowly, he realized that he was missing the absolute pitch to start on. A quick glance at the book showed him where the starting note should be on the lute, and so Jeb started to sing.
He was singing it much slower than he remembered the Bard singing, but he also knew that he needed to learn the music first. Unlike with Lute Playing, Singing wasn’t helping him learn new pieces at speed yet. Still, Jeb was learning the piece quickly, aided by the metronome.
When his throat felt dry, Jeb used Least Create Water to fill the glass he kept by his bedside. As it filled, he remembered that he was trying to refill his Mana, not just learn to sing the Song. I feel like the hard part is going to be combining the Song, he justified. The lute and Mana combination is working fine right now.
That excuse rang hollow to him, so he stopped singing and just focused on Meditation, refilling his Mana. Once it had refilled, he retuned his lute again and tried singing the Song.
Now that he wasn’t as focused on making sure that every note he played was right, Jeb heard the Song even as he watched it spin. The many notes he was plucking seemed to be causing a growing resonance with the drone in his head. He still couldn’t tell what the Mana was doing, but the longer that he watched the pattern, the more that Jeb realized that he was holding too much control over it, at least if his Mana Manipulation Skill wasn’t misleading him.
He tried to let go of control, hoping that he wouldn’t suddenly face Mana Backlash. To his surprise, his Mana use nearly stopped. The note and his lute playing seemed to be guiding the Mana more effectively than he had been.
He tried singing, but his Mana immediately started to empty out. Jeb stopped the flow of Mana but kept playing the lute, trying to remember what the tempo was for the Song. As his voice grew tired, his singing and playing felt like they were resonating with each other.
There had been some notes in the lute part that felt strange as he’d practiced them. Now that he was singing along, though, they made sense. The two parts were in perfect counterpoint to each other.
Jeb looked at his Mana, saw that it was still mostly full, and tried feeding Mana into the lute again. As he did, the interplay between his voice and lute seemed to fade away. Rather than two parts working in harmony, Jeb saw how they were really a single line that he could never do on either instrument alone.
Circling around the other three strands, Jeb saw the wheel that represented his voice. It was spinning twice as fast as his lute’s wheel, which felt right to him somehow. His Mana was draining faster now than it had been before he sang, which confused Jeb for a moment.
As he watched, though, Jeb realized two things. First, his singing was not perfect, and the slight imperfections were affecting the thread of the Song. Second, his Skills were screaming at him that, just like Second Tier Glyphs had secondary pathways for Mana to flow, this Song also had another channel the Mana needed to flow through.
Jeb’s Mana was low enough that he didn’t feel comfortable trying to add the Mana to his vocal line yet. Instead, he tied off the Song, feeling the resonance die out of the room. Everything felt muted after that.
Looking out his window, Jeb saw that it was nearly dark. He rushed down the stairs, hoping that he hadn’t missed dinner yet. Thankfully, his family was just sitting down.
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“Welcome back, Aunt Bess!” Jeb waved to his aunt. She’d just come back from the market, where she went monthly to sell cheeses and cows, along with whatever the rest of the family was trying to get rid of that month.
“Good to see you, Jeb,” she replied, before continuing into what was clearly a story she’d begun before Jeb had come down.
“The Merchants were all totally sure that we would be having another tax increase this year,” she said, “and most of them think Farmers will be hit harder. Apparently one of the wars isn’t going as well as the Empire had hoped, or the enemies burnt their farms behind them, or something like that.”
Jeb listened in horror. What could drive someone to destroy their farm? Even if he wasn’t a Farmer, he still felt the connection to the land from working on it in his childhood. Every piece of the land connected him to his family.
The family muttered at the likelihood of an increase to the tax.
“There’s no point in bemoaning something we can’t control and don’t know for certain,” his grandfather said, trying to calm his family down. “And even if we get a higher tax this year, the harvest looks like it’ll be good, and we managed a second harvest last fall. Still, if any of you see other Farmers, make sure to let them know we’re always here if they need a hand in the fields.”
No one really needed the reminder, but Jeb was still certain that they’d pass the word. Farmers in the region always helped each other. Whoever’s farm was being helped generally had a barrel of something to share with everyone when the work was finished, and it was one of the main ways that everyone kept in touch. For something like a barn raising, two or three dozen people might come from surrounding farms, which made every barn raising a bit of an affair.
Truthfully, Jeb was surprised that there hadn’t been any barn raisings since he’d gotten his Class. Then again, they had replaced a lot of them the year before. Jeb realized he’d missed the end of the conversation while he had been considering that.
Jeb went back to his room after dinner to try putting the Song together. His lute had drifted ever so slightly out of tune, so he carefully adjusted each peg. He started playing and singing, waiting until they felt completely in sync with each other and the note in his mind. Once they had, he slowly fed Mana into the lute, watching the wheels spin.
When they’d stabilized, he tried adding Mana into his voice. Once more, he felt like he’d need to find the speed before the Song stabilized. With as quickly as his Mana was draining, though, he wasn’t going to figure it out that night.
Jeb closed off the flow of Mana and looked outside. It was well past dark. Apparently he’d needed a while to get his voice and lute in sync.
Jeb’s Status Sheet at End of Chapter:
Jeb Human Age: 16 Class: Least Mud Initiate Level: 1 Experience: 2725/100
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Total Statistic Load: 200 Physical Load: 114 Strength: 26 Dexterity: 19 Endurance: 28 Vitality: 37 Presence: 4
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Mental Load: 86 Intelligence: 25 Willpower: 20 Magic Affinity: 25 Mana Depth: 3 Charisma: 13
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Mana: 570
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Glyph Attunement: 18 Least Conjure Water Tier 1 Spell Least Shape Earth Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Earth Tier 1 Spell Least Create Earth Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Earth Tier 1 Spell Least Shape Earth - Efficient Tier 3 Spell Least Move Air Tier 1 Spell Least Create Fire Tier 1 Spell Least Create Mud Tier 2 Spell Least Shape Water Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Water Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Water Tier 1 Spell Least Create Air Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Air Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Air Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Fire Tier 1 Spell Least Move Fire Tier 1 Spell
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Skills: Least Mud Magic Meditation Mana Manipulation Spell Glyphing Improved Glyph Groking Gift of Gab Running Identify Soil Savvy Animal Handling Fertilizing Lifting Athletics Lute Playing Singing Musician Pollination
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Achievements: Focused Meditator Student of Magic
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Quests: Major: Slay the Dragon of the West (Progressive)