Jeb was confused, though unconcerned. After all, the Librarian wouldn’t do anything to harm him, so this must have just been a mistake. A few moments later, Jeb heard the Librarian start to speak.
“Jeb, is that you?” he asked, sounding confused.
“Hello! Where am I?” Jeb responded. It was starting to grow brighter again, and Jeb saw shelves of books all around him, stretching off beyond his vision in all directions.
“Hmm?” the Librarian suddenly noticed where the two of them were. With panicked eyes, he started muttering and waving his arms. In no time at all, Jeb was back in the Library, where he expected to be.
“What did you see in there?” the Librarian demanded, strangely aggressive.
“Bookcases?” Jeb asked, “Oh! Is that the Central Library?”
The tension bled out of the Librarian’s body. “Never change, Jeb,” he said, shaking his head. “Now then, before I ask what you came in here for, what are you doing with an enchanted staff and an Infused lute?”
“I carved the staff,” Jeb explained, “and this is the practice lute that I rented from the Library! That’s what I came here to ask about, actually.” Before the Librarian could derail the conversation, Jeb continued, “he told me that I should bind the lute to myself, which seemed like a good idea. But, then I went to learn how to Woodwork with my Aunt Sue, and she seemed to think that binding was a bad idea, or at least a neutral one. Can you give me any advice about whether or not I should bind my lute?” The words all came out in a bit of a rush, Jeb knew, but he needed to tell someone, and the Librarian was there.
“We’re going to circle the discussion back to the staff later,” he said, “but I can get you some materials on binding and what it means. Or, I can just discuss it with you. Which would you prefer?”
Jeb considered that. Any book he read would have the author’s bias, he knew. The Librarian would have biases of his own, sure, but he’d never steered Jeb wrong before. “Which do you think is a better idea?” he asked the Librarian.
“Let’s start with discussing it. What reasoning did the Bard and your aunt give for why you should or shouldn’t bind the lute?”
“The Bard didn’t give any reasons that I can remember. He just told me that it was the next thing that I should do.” Jeb thought a little longer. “Oh, I suppose that he implied it will make using Bardic Magic easier and safer, because the lute can take the Mana Backlash instead of myself. I don’t know if that’s true, though, because he didn’t explicitly say that binding it will make the lute take the Backlash instead.”
“Did your aunt give any explanation?” the Librarian prodded, seeing that Jeb was lost in thought.
“More of one, at least,” Jeb said somewhat sheepishly. “She said that by making it part of myself, it becomes far worse if someone takes the lute away from me or breaks it. I think she said that someone breaking the lute would break me.”
“So in short, you’re deciding between an unknown benefit and a known weakness?”
“I guess? It’s also really fun to Enforce my lute, especially now that I’ve learned how to use Elementally Attuned Mana to Enforce it.”
“Jeb, you are fantastic at offering conversational threads to derail even the most straightforward conversations,” the Librarian said in a strange tone. Jeb legitimately couldn’t tell if it was meant as a compliment or an insult.
As Jeb pondered what to make of the comment, the Librarian continued talking, “We’ll come back Enforcing your Lute with Elemental Mana at First Tier another time, but I can enumerate some of the benefits of binding the lute in the meantime. One major benefit is that, especially at lower Tiers, you’re limited to how many different lines you can sing at once.”
Jeb cocked his head. “What do you mean?”
“Can you sing harmony with yourself?”
“No,” Jeb replied, confused.
“Exactly. At higher Tiers, there are Skills that can develop to let you sing in harmony with yourself, but they’re often very limited. As I’m sure you’ve noticed while playing Lute Enforcement,” Jeb didn’t think to ask how the Librarian knew what Song Jeb was Singing, “you need multiple different pieces to Sing a Song. As you improve, you can substitute them for more strands of Mana, but having a bound lute means that notes you play on it are treated the same way as notes you sing. That lets you either use Mana only for the explicit effect you’re trying to cause with the Song or Sing Songs that have even more lines in them.”
“That seems like a fairly large benefit,” Jeb said, “so I should bind the lute then?”
“Have you decided to become a Bard?” the Librarian replied, seeming genuinely curious. “If so, then you should absolutely bind the lute as soon as you can. Your teacher is used to-” he stopped himself, “is probably only used to teaching Bards.” Jeb wanted to ask what that correction was for, but the Librarian kept speaking before he could interrupt.
“Since Bards only tend to use Magic through Songs, there are massive advantages to binding their main instrument. If you don’t plan to become a Bard, however, those benefits are less relevant. After all, if you continue down the path of a Mud Mage, you eventually won’t be able to use any Bard Songs at all.”
That was news to Jeb. “What?” he asked, confused. “I know that I can’t use the Skill for Bardic Magic because of my Class Skill, but why wouldn’t I be able to Sing Bardic Songs at all?”
“I’m sure you’ve noticed that Earth and Water Glyphs are far easier for you to use than Air and Fire Glyphs,” the Librarian said. Jeb nodded, so he continued, “that is because your Mana is slightly Attuned to Mud. If you remain a Mud Mage, your Mana will only continue to grow more Attuned. For most Mages, this effectively means that they cannot use Spells from other Elements, since that’s all that they would care about.”
“Is that why enchanted items are still useful?” Jeb asked. “I was wondering what the point was to putting Spell Glyphs into objects when I can cast the Glyph myself.”
“That is a reason,” the Librarian confirmed, “though not the only one. But, it’s also a diversion from the main point I was getting at. In addition to Attuning your Mana to Mud, going up the Tiers of Mage also attunes your Mana to work with Glyphs.”
That was news to Jeb. “Has that already happened? I was wondering why it was so much harder for me to learn Lute Enforcement than the Spell Glyphs.”
“That could be part of it,” the Librarian agreed, “though Lute Enforcement is also much harder of a Song than Least Conjure Water and Least Move Earth are as Glyphs.”
Jeb wanted to keep asking questions, but the Librarian told him that the Library was closing, so he turned to leave. As he did, it seemed like the Librarian was incredibly tense, though Jeb had no clue why that could be.
Before walking into the house, Jeb stopped by his beehive. It looked stronger than it had before he left, though he couldn’t quite say why. “I’m back!” he said, and a few bees came out for a moment to buzz by him.
His Mana had refilled again, so Jeb got ready to Enforce his lute again. It was only as he started playing that he realized the Librarian had never given him a specific answer for whether or not he should bind it. As he replayed the conversation, though, it did feel like binding the lute was useful to him if he planned to keep Singing. He did, and so Jeb decided to keep Enforcing the lute.
He played a chord, nominally checking if the lute was still in tune. In reality, Jeb knew it would be, though he wasn’t sure how he knew. Maybe he was already starting to bind it.
More of the hive came out to dance around Jeb as he Sang. Now that he had more practice with the Song, Jeb realized that having the bees dance around him seemed to make the Enforcement go more quickly. Or, at least, he was Enforcing faster now than he was on the road. There were potentially other reasons for that, but Jeb had a feeling it was the bees.
The next morning, Jeb made his way downstairs for breakfast.
“Welcome back Jeb!” his mother greeted him, “how was your time in Midville?”
“I honestly didn’t like it,” he replied, “it never got dark or quiet.”
“Did you unlock Woodcarving?” his grandfather asked.
“I did!” Jeb showed off his new staff. After a few appreciative murmurs, his grandfather redirected the conversation.
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“How is balancing your Statistics going?” he asked.
Jeb took a quick look at his Statistics. “Magic Affinity is much higher than the rest of my Mental Statistics, but they’re otherwise growing fairly quickly. I’m not sure if I know of any ways to raise my Willpower, though, which could be a problem.”
“You can always just distill barrels of something potable,” his uncle chimed in, “though we’d need to schedule a time for you to do that. I’m fairly busy in the next few months.”
“I have an idea for raising your Intelligence and giving you more opportunities to Scribe Glyphs,” his grandfather said.
Jeb cocked his head, intrigued.
“Pollination has a quest to breed new traits into plants,” his grandfather said, “and Managrass allegedly grows faster when it’s fed Mana. Even without feeding it Mana, it’s what most people use when they’re trying to train their Pollination Skill. It grows from seed to harvest in about three days, and it’s known for mutating quickly. It is also the primary component of Manaweave, which is supposed to be essential for Glyphing higher Tier Spells. We keep seeds for the rare years when the President decides that all Farmers will be taxed in Manaweave and our normal crops. Since you’re trying to figure out some Spell Glyph, having Manaweave is probably going to be helpful now, and almost certainly later.” Jeb was convinced. He wasn’t quite sure why Manaweave was needed for higher Tier Glyphs, but if his grandfather said it was, he was probably right. At worst, it might just be easier to scribe into, which would be nice as he started down the Scribing and Glyphing Quests. He pulled up the Pollinating Skill
Pollinating: General Skill. You have raised a colony of bees and know how different plants can change. Quest: Minor, Pollinate (Repeatable)
Pollinate Minor Quest First Tier Breed a Plant to have a new Trait What’s the point of having plants if they don’t look how you want? Minor Quest Second Tier Breed a new Variety of Plant Make your mark. Create something distinct from its parents. Minor Quest Third Tier (Unlocked due to Synergy with Mana Manipulation) Breed a Magical Plant to have a new Trait What’s the point of having Magical Plants if you can’t bend them to your will? Minor Quest Fourth Tier (Unlocked due to Synergy with Spell Glyphing) Create a New Magical Plant If you can make new Spells, why not new Plants?
“Is Managrass considered a Magical plant?” Jeb asked.
“Right, I had forgotten about your Synergy Quests,” his grandfather said. “Yes, it is considered a Magical plant, so you should get better rewards for growing it. Do you know what trait you’d like to shoot for?”
“I have no idea, do you have any recommendations?” the Skill gave Jeb some knowledge on traits, but not enough for him to be comfortable knowing what would be easier to breed from a plant he’d never heard of before, let alone seen.
“Color changes are generally pretty easy,” his aunt said, “and the Managrass we have generally sprouts in a few colors each crop. I’ll walk you through what to do, but that would be my recommendation.” The rest of the table nodded at that, so Jeb agreed.
Jeb’s Status Sheet at End of Chapter:
Jeb Human Age: 16 Class: Least Mud Initiate Level: 1 Experience: 4262/100
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Total Statistic Load: 282 Physical Load: 124 Strength: 28 Dexterity: 21 Endurance: 30 Vitality: 41 Presence: 4
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Mental Load: 158 Intelligence: 29 Willpower: 25 Magic Affinity: 51 Mana Depth: 25 Charisma: 28
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Mana: 585
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Glyph Attunement: 22 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 Least Conjure Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Shape Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Water (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Move Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Air (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Destroy Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Move Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Hold Fire (Modified) Tier 1 Spell Least Create Mud (Modified) Tier 2 Spell Attune Water Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Attune Earth Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Attune Air Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell Attune Fire Mana (Modified) Tier 0 Spell
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Bard Songs Known: 1 Lute Enforcement
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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 Brewing Distilling Bardic Magic Smithing Wood Identification Woodworking
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Achievements: Focused Meditator Student of Magic
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Quests: Major: Slay the Dragon of the West (Progressive)