Eli POV
_______________________________
The next two days passed in a haze of blood, bodies, and ruined wood buildings. After the raid, the local government put out a request for volunteers to help clean up the carnage. I was on the fence about helping considering the aid I had already rendered but Salamede stopped by and asked if I would join her in the effort. Besides her request, there was way too much attention on this side of town now for me to be taking in all the mana like I usually did.
Over the course of the repairs, we came across a lot of corpses. Most were in positions showing the ways they had been burned, stabbed, and tortured to death. When we had stumbled upon some children who had been visiting the town Salamede broke down in tears, I had a few to give them as well but I figured I needed to be the strong one so I just stood still and let her cry on my shoulder.
After a long two days, we finished helping with the cleanup. Now that all the bodies were accounted for, the whole town was attending a funeral procession around early morning for the deceased as the remains were carted off to a large wood pyre across the bridge. Everyone around wept openly for their lost friends and loved ones.
But I didn't. I was familiar with several of the tavern workers and food cart vendors that had died but I still kept it all in despite my sadness for the poor souls lost here. Which was odd considering how I wept for Lilly, despite having spent even less time with her. Maybe that druid's mind magic had some residual effects or maybe it was because I genuinely believed the world had lost a wonderful person.
I remembered quite clearly how devastated I was even days after I lost her. Was the magic really that strong? How could a purely artificial emotion produce such strong attachment? Or was it just the first interaction that involved her mind magic and the rest was all me? Did the fact that it was artificial at some point make the sorrow and pain I felt any less real? I just huffed under my veil at these questions that presented themselves without my consent.
It was too early in the morning for this philosophical bullshit.
I felt something lean on my shoulder. Turning around I saw the soft fur and bike handle horns of Salamede's head as she leaned on me. A coil of pain wrapped around my heart as we stood among the crowd of the grieving.
Of the people I knew, Salamede was suffering the most these past few days. Her movements looked like that of a scared animal. She constantly looked over her shoulder, clutched at her dress in nervousness, and probably wasn't sleeping if the bags formed under her eyes were anything to go by.
After the funeral procession, Salamede bid me goodbye. Shortly after Ryan came to visit me in my warehouse. He looked quite refreshed. He still wore the typical white and blue striped student robes and white undershirt, but his happy green eyes, lush black hair and general manner told of a man loving life and life was returning the feeling.
"Hey man, how's it been?" He asked jovially as we shook hands.
"Tiring, very tiring. Much worse than the time you've been having if the talk of the peasants is anything to go by." I responded with a light-hearted prod.
He looked defensive but he apparently picked up on the mirth in my eyes and gave a nod as he relaxed.
"That's actually close to what I wanted to talk about. There's a big ceremony planned to commemorate my bravery and achievements two days from now. It's practically been the only thing dad has talked about since the raid." Ryan grew apprehensive at that last bit.
"Congratulations, I'm sure th-"
"Eli" Ryan interrupted me. "We both know that the fight was over before I got there."
A long silence crept up for several seconds as we both measured each other.
"So what are we talking about exactly?" I asked carefully.
"An amicable exchange, hopefully. You've been honest in our dealings so far and I hope we can make an agreement we can both uphold," Ryan said. He gave a light cough and stood straight
"The military and mage associations don't really take crafters, as I'm sure you know." Ryan continued.
"All too well," I said between clenched teeth.
"Yes, well. The government has already released the official story about how I won the battle all by myself but there are a fair number of people who know the truth. Even so, I now have a path to several very promising careers with my showing in the raid. What boon would you be willing to take in exchange for continued silence about the battle at the docks?" Ryan said, abandoning any sophistry or gilded words.
I stood silent for a few seconds.
After getting back home on the day of the raid, I came around to admitting that Ryan getting all the credit was ultimately for the best. God knows all the attention from the trials made things difficult enough. So when the official story went out I didn't bother contesting it. This was the sensible, reasonable path to take.
It was very.... logical.
But now it looks like I may get a little something from my efforts.
The obvious thing to ask for was to get more resources or connections in the mage community. But my internal mana generation meant that getting mana resources from him would be extremely wasteful, comparatively anyway. As for the mage community... their indifference towards me was becoming a very mutually feeling and I wasn't sure just how involved I wanted to get with them if it meant wasting years on the bottom ring being ignored.
"A favor. At some point after some amount of time, I'm going to need your help, some resources or something else entirely. Whatever it is I want, I assure you it will be within reason." I finally said after some deliberation.
Ryan was, of course, hesitant to make such an open-ended promise. His face broadcasted the internal conversation going through his head but eventually, the siren call of potential gains from the fight at the docks won out. He stuck out his hand and we both shook on it. He then gave a nod and left.
I turned around and went to get back to work on my invention downstairs. A sound by the door told me it was opening,
"I think a favor is quite-"
"That fucker!" A spirit connection reverberated those words into me. I instantly recognized the voice in it.
By the time I had turned around Salamede's white stripe running up her snout was a few inches from my face. Her eyes may have been white marbles, but her bared teeth, the furious expression in her face and clenched hands spoke of her anger well enough.
"Is that true? You saved the town?" She demanded.
"Well, I don't think the town was in danger of being completely destroyed, it probably would-"
"Eli!" She stomped her foot at this and put her hands to the hips of her green dress.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
"Yeah, I did. But we came to an arrangement so it worked out fine." I said defensively.
"A favor? Some promise of help at some point? What on earth could he give you that would make up for your rightful recognition?" She demanded with her hands on her hips.
"He'll give me more than nothing, which is what I would have gotten. He knows that and I know that, so he at least let me have something as opposed to the byline of lip service recognition that results in nothing but hardship." I said far more calmly than I thought I would have been capable of.
"What?" She said hesitantly, the anger in her face being replaced by confusion.
"Salamede, I have enough attention on me as is. Being the crafter who won in the trials has already made enough problems for me. It might be worth it if I got anything for all the trouble but being a crafter in the magical world is like being handicapped without any of the sympathy to go with it. None of the associations wanted a crafter dragging them down." I replied with a steady tone.
"Your not just a crafter, Eli. If you showed people what you can do they would have no choice but to reconsider." She shot back.
"I can't. I don't have any idea where the people who might be looking for me are." I said as I tried to hold back my exasperation at having to repeat myself.
"You're a quad element caster. Who cares how badly they're looking for you? Once you get into the government they can't touch you. " Salamede retorted.
"Can the government protect me from the elves?"I responded coldly.
Her ears drew back as her eyes went wide.
"You're wanted by the elves? " She whispered through the connection, almost like she was afraid their sharp ears would hear her through the connection no matter its' lack of sound.
"Yes, maybe. They're connected to them. Or maybe they are them. Or it could have just been one rogue elf. I don't know but some proportion of elves are involved in some way." I said, giving the sum total of my intelligence on the situation.
Salamede just stood there trying to process my words. The elves had reflexes, magical power, and raw strength that far surpassed humans and keltons. This was such a fact of life that most people regarded going against them as a form of suicide. Why they hadn't simply conquered the 'lesser' races, their title for non-elves, was a mystery as was almost everything else about them.
"Eli, you don't need to be a quad caster to do some good in the world," She said after a moment of consideration.
"Why are you so hung up on me going out into the world.? What difference does it make to you?" I demanded as I tried not to lose patience with her.
"Because they deserve to know mages like you exist. People deserve to know that there is a mage out there who cares. Who looks at peasants and keltons and doesn't see walking talking cattle. Who will take time out of their day to help them when they're laying in the dirt and filth with nothing to offer them." She took my right hand and squeezed it appreciatively.
"I want people to see you as the good person I know you are and not just the oddity who spends all day in a book or in a basement." She finished.
"Salamede, I need to be careful. I have many considerations that you do not understand." I said firmly, trying to ignore the warmth in my chest from her praise.
"I don't presume to know all about what you are and what you're going through. But if you're willing to take risks, it's not like the locals have nothing to offer" Salamede countered.
"Oh, and what is it that they can offer, exactly?" I asked hesitantly.
"Well land, for one. It's extremely hard to buy but the local government has a bad need for some services that you could provide and that would grease the wheel for getting your own home that you could do with as you please. Another is that you're still a mage, even as a crafter, so you won't have as many people challenging you." She said.
"That's all well and good but the mages-" I started but then I considered a different angle.
What exactly did I need the mage community for? I already had access to the magical libraries in the classroom building.
We didn't have magic back home and all the stuff I needed involved a lot of technical knowledge. The mages were far more wealthy and connected but since spirit magic meant everyone was functionally literate that learning barrier didn't exist for technology. Until I find out more about the people who brought me to this world, I am going to continue to hide as a crafter which means it's going to be far harder getting any help from the magic community.
But the peasants didn't understand those differences very well. I could probably gather a group among them that was far more loyal and less likely to be infiltrated by the necromancers than I could find amongst the mages. It would take a while but being some kind of local legend might give me the pool of reliable people I needed. There were a lot of downsides, but the time and danger invested might pay off more in the long run.
"I'll think about it, but I will make no promises," I finally responded.
She gave a big smile and with a light bow turned to go out the door.
However, I still felt like teasing her a bit as I re-established the spirit connection.
"Oh one more thing, do you make it a habit of staying near my house to eavesdrop on my conversations?" I asked with mock indignation.
"I was coming over to check if your house needed another cleaning and saw Ryan going in to meet you." She said without a hint of shame.
"And?" I prodded.
"And what? It was a scion meeting a quad caster. Of course, I eavesdropped." She said matter-of-factly.
"Pff, goodbye." I waved her on as she smugly waved back while she closed the door.
Well, if I wanted to finish my work in the time frame that I had promised I had a lot of work ahead of me. After getting a quick lunch from one of the local street food vendors, I headed back into the underground workshop. It took a few more hours getting the metal frame, wooden pieces, and balance right on my new invention.
But finally, it all came together.
Around the fans of the pole was a large wheel with panels of wood in between the iron spokes. On the sides of this wheel were 8 leather bags whose openings were sewn into the inside of the wheel as well as teeth like that of a gear behind the bags. This was perhaps the hardest part making this device as I had ripped several bags and destroyed their enchantments before I had gotten the procedure down.
The whole thing was held up by two hefty stone stands and a thick metal pole in the middle with a counterweight block of stone on the end allowing it to spin while not putting any strain on the magnet holding pole. What made this really special was that these leather bags were bags of holding.
Each of these I had made to hold a 5x5 foot space in their barely foot long size, which was now half-filled with river water. I had attached a metal casing around them to thread rope through, while not letting any water out through a watertight seal, connecting to the metal squares that acted as their lids allowing me to open or close them all in a few swift back and forth motions.
I took a deep breath.
"All right here goes nothing," I said to myself.
I pulled on the string to get the bags caps into the open position.
Opened, the bags on top or tilted down released their contents. At the spout of each bag was a slanted piece of magically maintained stone so that those coming up wouldn't have their water push against the wheels counter-clockwise motion. This water deluge on the fans caused the pole to spin. The magnets pole had a large gear around it that spun another gear attached to it. This gear was skewered in the air by a stone shaft on a stone column that allowed it to spin while connected to another gear through the long metal shaft near the water wheels end that was also held up by a stone pedestal on that opposite end. It was this gear that spun the water wheel.
This spin allowed the empty bags on the bottom to take in the water from the bags above as they were surrounded in a wood case with sharp edges to make sure all the water flowed into the slight dip of the bag's entrance. Then the empty top bags came down and were in turn filled as the water poured down over the fans. And since the water lost its weight when it went into the bags, the usual counterbalance of their payload was nullified.
Standing there, all I could think to do was just stare for a while. The wheel spun on and on while the sparks from the magnets came in a constant stream. Eventually, I realized that I was waiting for something.
An explosion? The twisting of the fabric of the universe as space and time collapsed in on itself? God coming down from heaven to swat me on the head before smiting such nonsense? I don't know what exactly it was that I was waiting for, but 'it' never showed up.
I decided to just sit down for a while, taking in the motion and the partially blocked sound of sloshing water. Eventually, my mind started going over all of the possibilities of such a device and the improvements I could make to it. If I could get four bags and put them in a box I could have small turbines generate electricity while slowly moving a metal rod in a circular motion. It would have to be in the middle to close the bag when it turns as well as open another to keep the cycle going.
Another possibility was to set up a hydraulic press to help me with my metal manipulation problems. If I could just get the copper and iron bars into the general shape I needed them to be it would save me a ton of mana allowing me to move my other projects ahead far faster.
I went over to the small sack that held my stash of mana crystals. That used to hold my mana crystals. I had been so excited putting my idea into reality I hadn't realized that I had used up all of my reserves. So whatever I decided to do will have to wait for me to replenish the spent mana crystals. But it was getting late and I was fighting to keep my eyes open as I went over all of the possibilities. For the sake of safety, I put a wooden block in the gears besides the magnet poles end to stop the movement.
After getting a late dinner mere minutes before sundown, I went back home to sleep. While my excitement over what lay beneath my house kept me up for a while, sleep came to me in time.