Ray

“So, you have been meeting another Fae all this time?” Ma asked, making the thing seem terribly contrite. Ma had been very curious to know all about Norman.

“Yeah…” Ray replied.

“Well, it's certainly possible that this guy woke up from the System. The blue screens were certainly attention-grabbing. And I would seek out the only other person of species if I was stranded in a place with little to no memory.

Though I do find its statements interesting. The lifespan of the Fae is said to be long, though no one knows how long exactly.” Ma said, bending down to look at the cat that was calmly eating cookies.

Ma lightly petted him, but received no response. “I don’t suppose you could get it to talk to me?’ Ma asked.

Ray put his hand on Norman, but all he got was the sound of eating. “I don’t think he’s interested in talking right now.”

“Well, he certainly is a foodie.” Ma noted, “On to other matters. The lab thing. I know its a done thing now, but are you sure, Ray? I know you wanted to be a Mage, but you’re basically giving up any chance of becoming one now.”

“I don’t see it that way Ma. The College is already coming for Marcus and the rest, how much longer before the nobles come for us? No, we have to stick together.” Ray said.

“Well, it's certainly good for business. Just about everyone wants to buy things here now. After all, we’re supporting the locals.” Ma said, getting up and going out, so calm that it unsettled Ray. Did Ma see it coming? Ma had moved to the Commoner’s district right after the System came, and had met with the rebels, did she see these things coming?

Ray could see why they happened now. The Empire kept a monopoly on power. The System destroyed that. Now the Empire was trying to get it back, but the people weren’t happy about it anymore. The event was bound to happen the second the System conquered the planet. But what if Ma had seen it coming? Ray had benefited from it in the end.

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Ray sat in his lab, looking at his ingredients. To describe the last few days as hectic would be an understatement. Ray had been running from one corner of the Commoner’s district to another, setting up labs. As it turned out, things were much harder when you didn’t have days to set labs up, or had to deal with people that could not do anything.

A significant amount of commoners lived in rented homes, homes who’s noble owners would rather die than allow them to convert attics into labs. Marcus thought he had a solution, some old warehouse his Mother had left him. Ray hadn’t even known that Marcus’ Mother had died. Not to mention that Ma had started to give out responsibilities. Ray couldn’t say that hiring more cooks was wrong, in fact, it seemed like a good decision.

Now if only he hadn’t noticed her leaving the house at night. At this point, he would be shocked if she wasn’t doing something on the side. But he wasn’t going to confront her about it until he had some idea what was going on.

But enough of that, Ray had a potion to make. After yesterday’s failures, Ray had decided that he needed to learn more about the potion. Asking Norman the cat had been hopeless, he could barely think of anything but food. Though he would drop the occasional surprising fact, Norman just didn’t remember enough.

Ma had been very accepting of Norman, she just spent an hour everyday trying to talk to him. Norman had yet to reply to her attempts to do so. Ray was sure it had something to do with the knowledge Norman likely had.

But Ray did manage to come up with a plan. The reason the potency was lost was because of the reaction between Quartenmar and Norisset. So the question rose, how did you limit that reaction?

The answer was simple, by instituting a block. But actually doing it was much harder, one could not simply make a wall in the middle of the potion, and adding materials would be foolhardy at best.

What Ray could do, however, is add in glitter pellets. The very solid, very unreactive glitter pellets. So Ray began. The ingredients were added, the potion stirred, and the synthesizing began.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Ray added pellets of glitter to the space between the two solutions, blocking them from crossing over. The pellets weren’t the best blockers, he found. The disc-like shape still had holes in it that allowed some through, but Ray could reduce that with some good old mana control. The pellets just made it much easier to do so.

In the end, Ray dismissed the pellets into neutral mana, and added Huastenfor, causing the final reaction. As usual, the beaker exploded into light as the potion entered the final step. Ray covered his eyes, waiting for the light to calm down. And it did, a pearly white potion appeared before Ray’s eyes, making him smile.

Ray picked up the beaker and poured the solution into a flask, ready to bring it down to sell. What should he price the solution at? The usual price for the milky white solutions was a mana coin for each mana they gave, and this potion would give five hundred points of neutral mana.

Hmm, should he sell it? Ray didn’t have five hundred points of neutral mana to begin with. Perhaps he should keep it.

“Ray! Look who's here!” Ma’s voice called out, making Ray look towards her. Ray saw her standing next to Anita who was gradually disappearing. A few seconds later, she disappeared, this time without even the shimmer.

But Anita wasn't the only one who'd gotten better. Ray had learned a new thing too. Ray conjured brown glitter and spread it about, letting the area be filled with dust. Ma retreated out, coughing at the dust as Ray looked on sheepishly. Norman on the other hand had decided that dust looked interesting enough to check out, and was walking through the dust cloud curiously.

Ray waited patiently for Anita to be revealed, the dust would make her cough and want to go out, and as she moved, it would show him her position. And it did. An irritated Anita appeared among the dust cloud and stepped out, coughing as she did so.

“At least I know that you can’t see the shimmer anymore.” she said between coughs.

Did you really use the dust to draw that girl out?’ Norman’s voice said into his mind.

‘Yes, why else would I do it?” Ray asked

‘Are you telling me that you couldn’t see through such a simple illusion?’ Norman asked

‘No?’ Ray had no idea where this was going.

‘Are you telling me you’re blind?’ Norman’s voice shouted in his head, making Ray fall to his clutching it as a headache emerged. The voice hit him like a hundred people screaming into his ears. The pain was massive, a sharp piercing thing that made it hard for him to even think.

“Norman…” Ray said through the pain, but Norman was not done.

‘What house are you from? Did you tell me? I can't remember. Tell em now. I need to beat some sense into their heads. A Fae that cannot see? What are you, Human?’ Norman ranted in Ray’s already hurting head.

“I can see just fine, Norman. What are you talking about?’ Ray said as flashes of pain went through his head.

“Ray, are you talking to your cat?” Anita asked. Ray silently swore as he realized that he’d spoken out loud.

“I can explain…” Ray began but was interrupted by Norman.

What are you doing chatting up that girl? Was she always there? No, wait what was I trying to say?’Normal said.

“Just shut up Norman!” Ray shouted as his head began hurting again.

“Is he like Mama’s familiar? The one I’m not supposed to know about.” Anita asked, her black eyes sparkling.

Ray caught on to the chance, familiars were tamed beasts that had been banned by the Empire after a few too many went berserk.

“Yes, just like that. Norman just isn’t well behaved.” Ray said.

What do you mean well-behaved? I am probably older than your grandmother you know! Wait, how old is she? Tell me how old is your grandmother? I wanna know if I am older than her.’ Norman continued. Ray felt like hitting him across his face.

“Hmm, bad cat. Why are you hurting Ray?” Anita asked, Void appearing before her finger as she pointed it at Norman.

‘Tell this girl that she can’t use that little toy of hers against a proper soldier. A proper Fae can control their energy well enough. And I’m not hurting you, am I? What kind of Fae gets hurt from talking?’ Norman said.

“Yes, Norman, you’re hurting me! Can you just stop talking for a few minutes!” Ray shouted, but immediately felt something dangerous move towards him.

“Ray, familiars don’t talk.” Anita stated as she pointed her now Void-laden finger at him.