The chemical formula for silica was one silicon atom plus two oxygen atoms. A typical silicon atom had fourteen protons, neutrons, and electrons. And a typical aluminum atom, which we wanted a lot of, had thirteen protons and electrons, with fourteen neutrons.
Our alchemical transmutation thus had a fairly simple waste product. Removing one proton and one electron from a silicon atom to make aluminum would also leave us with a hydrogen atom we didn't want, which could be mixed with some of the oxygen atoms we also didn't want to produce water and oxygen gas, with maybe some ozone in there.
I'd asked about the prospect of a wasteless transmutation, and Volex informed me that such was a lot more complicated to arrange, and required a great deal more safety equipment for the conversion of protons into neutrons- because aluminum needed more neutrons than protons, whereas the inputs were very evenly split on the proton/neutron ratio- and also, a cloud of steam was a very cool effect for an alchemical transmutation to have, and at that point I said I was sorry for being ungrateful and thanked her for using her rare expertise to turn common sand into pure aluminum, and kissed her for good measure.
Instead, I watched Rachel spar with the swordsage on the sand, because apparently some unstable ground was good for Rachel's training.
According to Rachel, the swordsage's methodology was straightforward and reasonable on paper, and simply involved a lot of work in the implementation. There were a few sets of motions and basic techniques, and for any given blade, some of these sets would be reasonable and work, and others would not. The sets were designed such that a few simple guidelines would tell you what would work and what wouldn't, but every sword was different, some of them were weird and didn't obey the guidelines, and Rachel still had to practice all of these motions and techniques with different kinds of blades, and then she had to spar with her master to learn how to actually use the goddamn things.
You might be thinking to yourself, 'that sounds fucking complicated,' and it is! That is why the swordsage is an eighty year old woman who had been learning the blade ever since she was old enough to hold one. In a temple, a place dedicated to education and learning, with great educational infrastructure.
So, naturally, Rachel and I cheated. I crafted for her a ring of intricately braided and wound platinum wire, and then I filled that sumbitch with every bit of magic I could fit in it and more, all aimed at one singular boost:
Plus twenty to Learning, but only when there's been a sword in her hand in the past minute, and only for sword-based skills.
"You're learning fast, girl," the swordsage said, breathing heavily. She was very spry for her age, and probably had a few more decades in her yet. But physical enhancement and biosculpting, at the skill levels practiced by the Grand Temple, could only sustain her for so long. Eventually, her telomeres would completely give out, and she'd die of cancer or organ failure. "Keep this up, and you might surpass even me. Oh, what I wouldn't give to see that..."
Rachel didn't say anything, because talking in a fight was a sign that you were so far above your opponent that you didn't need to give them your all, and the swordsage was quite happy to punish Rachel for such presumptuousness. The rules were different for little old ladies, though.
Today, the swords were a bit odd; Rachel's blade was very evocative of a shotel, a forward-curving sickle-sword for getting around shields and perforating your opponent's sides. Thrusts were impractical, draw-cuts were too, and swings would function like stabs. It was a weird change of pace for someone used to more straight swords, which I kinda assumed she was. The swordsage, meanwhile, used a khopesh- a short, funky-looking axe-sword that had only really been a practical weapon in the bronze age, and which had been obsolete once the days of iron and steel weapons began, which was more than a thousand years ago.
Apparently, something like the khopesh- still made of bronze- saw ceremonial use these days in some far-off southern port that Definitely Wasn't Egypt.
The swordsage seemed very used to her khopesh, using its many nooks, crannies, and bends expertly to deflect, trap, and block Rachel's shotel at the tip. This must have been intensely frustrating for Rachel, to judge by how nothing she tried was getting through, and also by the look on her face, which was plainly frustrated.
"You're mean," Rachel said, after disengaging and leaping back.
"Tell me what you've learned, girlie," the swordsage said.
"This would be a much better weapon if you were a soldier with a sword, a shield, and no armor," Rachel said. "And you were not a swordsage. Perhaps also if you wielded a straight sword, so that you couldn't catch the tip of my sword so easily... but in this matchup, with your skill, this weapon is too limited, and too specialized."
"Good analysis," the swordsage said, nodding. "Yes, that sword is a bit of a gimmick weapon. Very good at what it does, but terrible at anything else. Now. What can you tell me about my sword?"
"It's short, which reduces the range," Rachel said. "It's an axe-sword, made for powerful slashes, but unable to give point, and only sharp along the top half; if I didn't know you'd chop my fingers off for it, I might've tried grabbing the bottom half and kicking you in the face."
"Hah! I was waiting for you to try that, I'll admit. What do you think, then? Good weapon or not?"
"I think that, for what it's good at, there are other swords that do it better, without making the same compromises in functionality," Rachel said. "I've never seen these swords in the hands of knights, in person or in artwork. I imagine it's because they're old and no longer in popular use."
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"Indeed, indeed. Well. Keep doing your exercises and learning your main blade inside and out," the swordsage said, nodding and putting her khopesh away.
"Being a swordsage involves more analysis than I'd imagined," Kara said, standing beside me. She'd helped Volex set up the transmutation kiln out of vitrified sand, and had decided that Volex's complete lack of Teaching skill made watching the spar the more interesting option.
"That's why we're swordsages, girl," the swordsage said, taking Rachel's shotel and putting it away. "We don't just learn how to fight well, we learn what fighting well means, and try to develop new ways of doing it. The Knights come to us for instruction, too, and we teach them a specialized variant of our forms, based on the weapons they use and the enemies they're likely to face in battle, but they can only come to us for instruction because we've spent all that time studying and experimenting and refining this craft. You're twenty seven, and about to become a full Sage of Mechanics. But it takes forty five years of dedication to become a full Sage of the Sword, because of just how much is involved in fighting, and how a swordsage has to be a master at all of it."
"Hot damn," I said. "...Wait, a swordsage is a better swordfighter than a Kotor Knight?"
"Ehhh," the swordsage said. "We teach them a distilled version of our forms, not a simplified or dumbed-down or incomplete version. A knight who's fought in wars and been training all in their downtime sure won't be a pushover. I'd say they've got the edge over a swordsage their age... mostly. If the swordsage has a high Learning skill, like Rachel here, then they've got the edge, since most knights don't pursue scholarly skills too strongly."
"I see, I see," I said, tucking away in my mind the fact that Rachel was, with a little help, becoming a proper monster with a sword.
"Metal's ready!" Volex called out.
"Is that what you're doing out here?" the swordsage asked. "I thought you were just goofing off."
"Nope, we're doing alchemy to make a metal called aluminum," I said. "I'd offer you some, but you probably wouldn't want any. It's lighter, softer, and weaker than iron, and generally doesn't make for good weapons of any sort."
"Can it hold an edge?" the swordsage asked. "Does it rust?"
"No to both," I said. "I don't know swords too well, but wouldn't it be easier to just enchant a steel sword to be lighter and rustproof, instead of enchanting an aluminum sword to be stronger and harder?"
"Mmm, point," the swordsage said. "Still, if you've got some spare..."
The glassy quartz dome cracked open like an egg, before shattering back down into clean, white, granulated sand, unleashing a huge geyser of steam straight upwards, and leaving us with a big ol' pile of aluminum the size of a house.
"We just might," I said.
---
We'd made more than triple what Kara had calculated we'd need for my design, with the understanding that anything we didn't use for the vehicle and its spare parts would be gifted to the Grand Temple for further analysis and study. Sure, I was a wellspring of technologies that these people had no concept of, but my time with Kara was more than enough to remind me- if I hadn't known in the first place- that I was not the only smart person around, and other people could in fact have their own clever ideas.
So, in the meantime, Kara and I worked for a week to build, test, and tweak our prototype, and then another week for me to figure out how to use the goddamn thing- over the Bay of Kotor, because a water landing was far more survivable for me than crashing on the ground thanks to water magic having its own advantages over earth magic- before finally, at the end of my second month in the Grand Temple, and my third month in this world, we were ready to embark on our quest.
"Void preserve me," Rachel said, buckling herself into a passenger seat.
"This is weird," Volex said, climbing into another passenger seat- she was not a dragon, currently, as making chairs that would properly accommodate her was tricky enough when you set aside the need for bracing against acceleration, and nearly impossible when you didn't. "All those dials, and levers..."
"Don't worry about them too hard," I said, strapping myself into the pilot's seat. "Alright, pre-flight checklist. Wind status."
"Sea breeze coming in southeast from the Bay of Kotor," Kara said. "Twelve knots."
"Deploying wind-calming charm," I said, pushing one of the toggle-switches. "Local reading?"
"No wind," Kara said. "Sensors still detect twelve knots blowing northwest outside our bubble."
"Good. Beginning engine startup." I pushed another toggle-switch, this one under a protective coverplate to prevent being accidentally bashed at the wrong time.
"All readings nominal. The High Priestess is waving green flags; we are clear for liftoff."
"Beginning liftoff," I said, easing forward on the throttle. "We are gaining altitude."
Now, yes, I could have made just a basic bitch airplane. That would have been achievable. It would've been inconvenient, because there are no airstrips anywhere, but with parachutes and my void space, we could've just jumped out over our target and stashed the plane in my pocket. I could've also made a helicopter, if I was so fucking worried about actually landing the thing properly.
But I am an insane woman who does things the hard way for no reason. So when I needed a flying machine to compensate for the fact that my pet dragongirl wasn't big enough to carry myself and my other two girlfriends to our destination, I went all fucking in, and built us a V-22 Osprey-inspired tiltrotor Vertical Take Off and Landing aircraft. Because, again, I am insane.
We went straight up for a good while, ensuring we were very safely above any tall buildings in Kotor- the buildings weren't really skyscrapers, admittedly, but it was still important to maintain absolutely zero risk of crashing our big, bulky, awkward, and fragile metal wrecking ball into anything at all- before, at long last, I tilted the propellers forwards, and we began to properly fly.
"Which way to your elf?" I asked.
"East," Volex said. "Due east."
"Let's fucking go, baby," I said, gunning the throttle.