I moved to the workshop on the first floor and took several disks of ash wood out from my inventory. I focused for a moment and felt the euphoric sensation of mana pulsing inside of me. My right hand began to glow with a light blue aura and let off a high pitched whining sound.
[Mana Saw] activated and I gently caressed the side of the wooden disk. The wood itself seemed to shudder and recede from my touch. With the precision of a professional craftsman, I set about detailing the first rune. This was going to be my ‘pattern’, or the first copy that I based the others off of. Thus, this one needed to be absolutely perfect.
I was immensely careful as I shaped the rune into a rounded rhombus, ensuring not a single grain was out of place. I deactivated [Mana Saw] and activated [Mana Sanding] in order to clean up the edges.
It might be out of place, but, if it hasn’t become obvious by now, I only have access to crafting type spells for the most part. I do have a few combat oriented spells, but they’re few and far between and all of them can be used in some way to aide my crafts. There had never been much of a reason to learn fighting moves, after all, with my two bodyguard NPCs… Though if they ever turned against me perhaps I’d start practicing fireballs.
It took me about an hour’s time to shape and sand down the first rune. I hadn’t even begun to inscribe it, either. Still, I was oddly enjoying my time. I always considered crafting and enchanting to be an act of love. It was genuinely enjoyable. I know some men in the real world… Well, in my old world at least considering how ‘real’ this world felt, who enjoyed woodworking as a hobby. They’d make birdhouses or chairs in their spare time. They were my kindred spirits, in a way, as I found true pleasure in crafting Xternity items. I certainly wasn’t alone in that. It really was nice to only need a virtual reality headset to be able to pursue a hobby rather than an entire set of power tools and machines, too.
Once the shape was completely finished, I set it down on top of the next disk and traced the outline. I repeated this until each of the twelve wooden disks had the outlines on them. Those twelve weren’t going to be as well cut as the first, but they’d at least be roughly the same. The importance in repellant runes wasn’t in how well shaped they were but how similar each was to their corresponding partners. They worked much like a circuit in series, each passing on a voltage comprised of mana to the next after distorting it a bit. This worked to create an invisible fence of sorts around an area.
Using the outlines I cut out the rest of the disks into the proper shape for the repellant runes. I found myself humming the tune to of Piano Man. The workshop room smelled of wood shavings and chemicals. I found myself twirling to the tune as I stepped around, grabbing the tools I needed.
With each of the rune boards properly shaped, I needed to start etching in the actual enchantments. For this, even though I could use magic, I preferred to use ordinary carving tools. It made the lines cleaner, neater, and I could work just about as fast with them anyways.
http%3a%2f%2fi.imgur.com%2fxx5OnEw.jpg [http://i.imgur.com/xx5OnEw.jpg]
The tools, legendary in their own right, were well worn and fit into my hands perfectly. It felt like I was meeting with old forgotten friends for the first time. This sensation, this very real sensation, was astounding. It was the first time I’ve tried using them outside of the game world. If I ever manage to find a way home, I’d be sure to get myself a full set of engraving tools there too. There were just so many new and wonderful sensations that couldn’t be recreated in the virtual world.
I set about drawing the first rune’s pattern with careful consideration. I needed to ensure that the ‘Keys’ I typically used would still work. It would be terrible if I accidentally locked Tenia outside. Though, knowing her, she’d probably find a way through… Or maybe she’d just use a communication magic and tell me. She was technically programmed to be intelligent, after all.
Once the pattern had been drawn on the wood, I set to carving it out. With the practiced movements of a grandmaster, I set about curving sweeping arcs and long valleys. By using a small bore I was able to make layers of circuitry, much like a via on a printed circuit board. I changed my humming tune to Mr. Brightside as I worked, a goofy smile plastered on my face.
It took me several hours to draft and finish carving the enchantment circuits on the rune boards. Still, it was good work. Each one was nearly perfect. They’d easily last for at least three years like this without needing a recharge. Carefully I pulled out an enchanting potion to fill the circuits and set to pouring it in. The liquid flowed through the carved pathways like a virulent flood. I imagined small people running from the onrush of blue-gold liquid as it overtook their cities.
When the enchanting liquids settled, I charged mana through it and watched with awestruck eyes as they hardened. Steam began to pour outwards and it gave the room a citrus smell. It was the sign of a successful enchanting.
The final touches, several holes drilled in the tops for the hanging wire, were added and I carried the armful of wooden runes outside. I found Benson hard at work digging a hole. I looked at him oddly before shrugging my shoulders. I carefully laid the runes in proper spots around the newly expanded yard, making sure they were a proper distance from one another. Then, when I set the last one in place, I watched them all react and finish connecting. It looked like an invisible dome formed up over the entire clearing. Immediately a small army of birds and bugs started migrating from the dome towards the forest on its edges. It was a complete success.
I made my way back to Benson, who was still digging his hole.
“Benson, what are you doing?” I asked stifling a laugh. He looked so much like a goofy cat that it hurt.
“Ah, I used [Mana Sense] to find a source of water. Since you needed a source in the smithy. I figured I’d let you know after I actually hit water, though,” he replied, shaking a small pile of soft dirt from his elongated nose.
“Oh that’s perfect!” I replied, forgetting my laughter. I was in desperate need and I had been afraid we’d need to redirect one of the rivers on the mountainside. Such a project was, of course, within our power… But it’d be a pain in the butt; this made things much simpler!
Suddenly Benson stiffened up and sniffed the air. His hackles raised for a moment, but then the tension seemed to leave him all at once.
If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“Tenia’s back,” he said with a calm voice before climbing out of the pit.
“Good,” I replied. “I want to hear her report.”
Benson and I made our way back to the house. I forced him to use a water crystal to clean himself off first, but Tenia cast a spell that completely cleaned him in one go while walking over, saving us time.
We stepped inside and I sat down in the green colored chair. It was soft and comfortable. It was unfortunate that it didn’t recline, though… Perhaps I could make it recline. I started thinking of ways to modify it and improve it. I could even add magic circuits to make it a massage chair!
Tenia stepped into the kitchen and brewed up some tea. It was terribly fast, but then again when you are a mage who can boil water instantly making tea seems a bit trivial.
She walked in and passed out a mug to everyone before taking her own seat.
“So,” I said, “What is the town like? Do they speak English?”
“The town,” started Tenia, “has a population of about three thousand. They mainly speak english, but a few of the older residents speak a strange language I’ve never heard before.”
We were started off with rather good news immediately. This was an incredibly good thing. We weren’t going to be stuck trying to learn some foreign language from scratch without a translator. Just being able to speak with the people alone was huge. That meant we could learn about the world.
“I slipped into the town unnoticed and scanned the people. The average level of the populace was around 4. The strongest person in the town seemed to be their ‘Chief’ who was about level 16. He seemed to be highly regarded for his strength, among them.”
“So the average level is quite low…” I mused.
“It seems that way, mistress.”
“Still,” I said in a careful tone, “This might just be a small town out in the sticks. The forest around us has low leveled monsters from what Benson told me earlier, meaning we might just be in a weaker area. We should be careful in case foes closer to our level ever show up.”
“I agree, mistress,” said Benson in a calm tone. “Just because the warriors of a small town are weak doesn’t mean the whole world is weak.”
“Alright, so, continue your report.”
“Yes, mistress,” replied Tenia. “In town I found a few key establishments. There seems to be a Magic Studies Guild and an Adventurer Guild. These two guilds actually belong to the same overall organization but serve different purposes. There is also a town office which the locals unofficially dubbed the ‘Merchant’s Guild’. In the town office I was able to exchange our currency. Our ‘G’ coins are about 14 karat gold, it seems. This section of the world uses a currency system called ‘Marks’. There are Low Marks, Middle Marks, and High Marks. Low Marks have a small amount of gold in them, Middle Marks are roughly a quarter gold, and High Marks are made about half gold. It takes five Low Marks to make a Middle Mark and two Middle Marks to make a High Mark.”
I held up my hand to stop Tenia while I pulled out a piece of paper to write down this information. I was surely going to forget it soon.
Low Marks (LM)
Middle Marks (MM)
High Marks (HM)
5 LM = 1 MM
2 MM = 1 HM
“Our ‘G’ is worth about three High Marks per coin, it seems,” said Tenia breaking the silence.
1 ‘G’ = 3 HM
“That means we have about 90,000,000 HM,” I said doing the easy calculation in my head.
“Not quite,” interrupted Tenia, “they may be worth three, but we can only exchange for two and a Middle Mark.”
“Okay,” I replied doing some quick multiplication down on the paper, “That means our 30,000,000 ‘G’ will become 75,000,000 HM.”
I stopped for a moment to amend the note paper.
1 ‘G’ = 2.5 HM
“Now, Tenia, we know how much of their money we have… But how far will that take us? What’s the basic price of amenities?” I asked.
“I went around town and it seems most basic fruit sell for one Low Mark. Iron Swords usually cost about a Middle Mark. A meal at a fancy resturaunt was around a Middle Mark. Decorative swords looked to be going for about 3 High Marks, which is incidentally the same price as a basic healing potion or to receive healing from a White Mage at the Magician’s Guild.”
I paused to write down the relevant information. The first thing I needed to think about was getting my sense of values adjusted to this new world.
“Okay, judging by the price of a basic healing potion and healing magic, it seems such resources are rare in this world,” I said.
“Yes,” replied Tenia. “In this town there aren’t very many magicians or adventurers. It seems their township was built on an ancient monster’s nest, and the beast’s smell still lingers to this day repelling most of the forest’s monsters. Thus there’s not a large number of requests for such things. Farmers, Smiths, and Carpenters seem to be the most common professions.”
“Huh, so it’s a small farming village. They also value healing potions pretty highly. Oh, that reminds me. How did you blend into the town? What was your cover story? Surely our strange currency had to raise some eyebrows at the merchant’s guild.”
“Ah yes, I told the Merchant Guild staff members that accommodated me that I was working for a young Noble woman traveling far from home to sightsee in the country and that we recently ran out of local currency. They happily obliged so long as I was fine getting a slightly reduced rate. Oh, I also promised to return tomorrow to make a larger transaction, since you only gave me about 20 coins. They seemed very eager to do business.”
“That’s clever, Tenia,” I said while thinking. “Did you happen to find anything like a map of the area?”
“Ah, yes. I did,” replied the woman as she pulled a rolled up piece of parchment from her inventory. She quickly laid it out in front of me.
“It seems we’re currently in the Western Side of The Great Thrush Forest, a massive woods that cuts through the middle of this continent. Unfortunately, the man I bought the map off of didn’t have anything showing the Eastern half, but we’ve got a fairly good representation of the Western half of this world.”
http%3a%2f%2fi.imgur.com%2fS8U7Bg7.png [http://i.imgur.com/S8U7Bg7.png]