Not only do I mistrust the Roots, the expedition from the Magistrate will be coming in a few months. So I should be ready for any attack I might get.

The reason I know it is coming is easy. Clarke knew Mink rather well and the knowledge about a strange new mana well is extremely valuable. So valuable in fact, Mink will not let the opportunity go to anyone else but her caste.

For a Country of Magicians who want knowledge above anything else, they are extremely tight lipped about it. The idea of ‘freedom of Information’ would break their minds. Learning how to read and write is not common and rather a skill you have to pay quite a hefty sum for.

I digress again, right now there is only one thing I have to do and this is building up my defense and offense. ...or are those two things? Whatever…

First of rebuilding my Gate. As my Pitfall was already seen I revise it into a kind of moat with a secondary wall for better protection. The first Gate gets further into the tunnel and the moat extended into 6 Meters with a retractable drawbridge. The second Wall is build into a half circle and the top gets a walkway with towers for a new project of mine, explaination later.

First Gate becomes a grate. Rock Pillars reinforced with iron lattice will be enough. Sadly the iron is still rather weak, but it would be enough for now. I need more Information and fast.

The next is the second gate. As those Bombs are rather problematic I just hope my second gate can hold with Iron as reinforcement. Wood was too weak, so I use this. The ropes I have to use to pull it are really thick. I mean arm width and they still groan. By creating wedges to fall into place after it is lifted it takes a bit of weight from it. With this it should be stable for now.

The drawbridge was a rather problematic part. Creating it on the towns side makes it rather nice and easy, but when someone is on it, It can not be retracted. So I started to create a device to just drop it, when it is detrimental. That was the problematic part, as I do not want to lose the bridge too early or not being able to. Self destruct buttons are tricky.

The final product was a runic circle where I just drop a core inside from a Monster. Instantly it heats the shaft holding the bridge. The shaft melts and lets the bridge fall. Horrible inefficient, but whatever. I find better ways later.

Now to the towers. They have dart throwers! I tried different kinds, but rock darts are the most efficient. Metal is better, but more expensive so sharpened rock it is. The dart throwers throw multiple darts directly into the opening of the tunnel. Their power is rather okay. Not really scary but the reloading part is the nice thing. In a Spiral, there are multiple darts and when a dart touches the copper plate it activates the runic circle behind it and fills the dart with kinetic power. Mana reloads the circle while the spiral slowly rotates to let the next one fall into place. There should be a better way, but right now it does the trick.

The last resort is the liquid metal thrower. Yes it sounds overkill, but we are in a Fantasy world, so I try my best to survive. It is a trap door below the street. By starting a runic circle it heats the metal above it to melting. Opening the trap door a kinetic circle starts throwing the liquid right into the tunnel. That is the theory, practice will show how effective it will be. My tests had shown it thrown up to 30 Meters, so it should paint the walls of the tunnel entrance with a new metallic look.

…

Rebuilding the whole Mansion was a bit tedious, but worth it. It was way too close to the entrance to be secure. For the place the Mansion was prior, I build a barracks. Filled with traps for now. A sealed room with heavy door looks like an armory or treasure room. The treasure? Unfiltered Miasma under heavy pressure. Kitchen was filled with knifes and other kitchen utensils and the trap is kinetic circles with different directions. Knife Pinball from hell!

A few pitfalls are also made with rocks falling right on top of it, If someone can hold on the edge, they will not be able to be happy. In the commander room I put some papers in common language on the wooden table. Also some in my original alphabet to take them for a ride. It has to only hold them up until the high pressure breaks the seal of the ceiling trap and sprays the harvested acid from my snake bodies over them. The Plug is made from scales of my mutated dragon snake, as they are close to completely resistant to their own acid. As I need something that can break before the rock by pressure I use that. Small pipelines bored inside the ceiling just sprays it like a sprinkler System.

This should make them think it is all on how I can defend myself. Now to my magnum opus.

On the marketplace I put the prior pedestal for the Portal. Creating out of glass a female statue stands on top holding a clear crystal ball like her precious treasure. This crystal is specially made and took me days to get it how I wanted it to be. Finding the best silica and filtering it over and over I finally was able to create clear crystal glass. The thin sphere is filled with the strangest Miasma. Miasma, that rejects other Miasma. It even glows in the dark and sparkles in the sun. Strange stuff, as it has a kind of holiness to it. Might be some kind of Miasma from prayers, or it has been created by cleansing other miasma while the Mana took its intent over. Who knows, not me.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

So, what do I need it for? Simple, I create around the statue a big amplification circle. This Circle amplifies the miasma inside the sphere. Now, I do not have to always put pressure over this place to keep it clear. The reasoning is the last trap. Breaking the sphere stops the bubble. In mere seconds the Miasma of the crater will take over the Village, and what happens then is the Miasma of the crater taking the place of the crystal ball. The amplifier is multiplicative with high reach. So multiplicative Miasma will blast out to eradicate anything and everything, before after a few seconds the amplifying runes burn out under the extreme miasmic blast. A miasma bomb!

The rest of the time I ward every channel with blockades to keep miasma out of the tunnel system. Funny how I try to keep it OUT of the sewers than in. Well it blocks both ways for now. The system itself has a charged rune which holds for a few minutes but reduces the power of the ward significantly. Rune circles are strange and work in convoluted ways.

At the same time I just hold the Miasma off everything I want secured. Maybe I should try to see what the multiplication of the Miasma would do, but I just hope for the best. It is the last resort and should not be used, unless I want to wipe everything out.

…

Clarke is now named Ava. He will be my Avatar for now as he does not hear those pesky plants babble incoherent stuff like Red does. The change in Name is not without reasoning, as I changed much, much more on his Body than on Red. His Facial structure is now different and does not resemble his original look at all. Scar tissue got removed with skin grafts and precise removal of the tissue in question. I even removed the ability to grow a beard, so he stays smooth in every situation.

And that are just the outer changes. Bone reinforcements are made by increasing the density. For this I needed to crush the bones and form new ones to be inserted inside the body. Making changes like that needs time for the spirit to readjust, so right now he rests on the makeshift bedding and make him occasionally rehabilitation training. Muscle mass will be another issue, but right now I am a bit apprehensive to change too much as Red had some reactions too.

His magical talent is sadly non existent. Only a few people seem to get the ability to use magic and others do not benefit from it. Magic can be used on them, or work through them and even triggered by them, but using is a whole different thing. Forcing Magic into people is written to create a strange illness, but except for the name ‘Mana Burn’, and sudden scaring of the skin, nothing is known in particular. Whatever the other effects are, the common people were not told, just that it is treated like a curse and stigmatized.

Back to his not existing magic. By looking at Reds and Avas spirit I can see some differences. While Red his Mana is flowing the one of Ava is stagnant. It is the difference between made out of liquid and made out of solid. I will not touch this stuff unless I have more bodies, as I have still not found a way to stop the unraveling.

To circumvent the Magic I start creating magical weapons. My first attempt was a staff with the core of an electrical mouse. Lightning staff, and it worked like a stun baton with a bit more power. Throwing lightning… I do not have the right runes for that. I am happy enough to reverse engineer the kinetic rune from the inert field of the Bomb.

For the next experiment I create a glove out of mouse leather and insert copper lines inside. The runic circle and the core are hidden behind a second layer of leather. With this, it should be able to throw shocking handshakes, punches and slaps. Even a conductive sword should work… and Reds hand exploded. Back to the drawing board.

…

Runes have to be precise. They do not like to be scrunched or warped. The next is runic circles can not be bent when loaded or they go haywire. Luckily I got the Information with body parts I can rebuild. For this the glove became a gauntlet. The runic part is inside the guard while it gets loaded into the hand via harvested nerve strings of the mice. The copper Idea was nice, but a failure too. Dislodging the gauntlet from cooked flesh with molten copper inside was the third way Red lost his arm. The second time I do not want to mention, but hey, at least I know magnetic currents exist and are usable.

The new prototype is usable and can charge the modified sword he had with him with the electricity. As the gauntlets runic circles are now amplifying with the bigger surface it packs a real punch. Even Red has still his arm after using it multiple time without pause. It seems stable.

Now kind of Magic is possible. As Ava can inject Mana it is a great addition to his repertoire. Strangely, he had no Idea this was possible to inject Mana and I could do it as Red knows how to meld Mana into Magic.

I can understand no magical people can do no magic, but activating runic circles and other artifacts should be possible for everyone. Does this knowledge not exist or is it suppressed? Who knows, not me.

While rehabilitating I test out all the skills I could learn about wielding a short sword. The balancing is a bit off at first, but I start to adapt to Ava. He is shorter and heavier than Red and has more muscles as he is scout or rather mercenary. They get called, get an objective and get paid afterwards. Sometimes an apprentice Mage hires him or herself to the mercenary group or starts their own group.

Using the gauntlet for the first time with Ava, it did pretty well. The copper core made the sword a great conductor and makes heavy sparks by hitting something. It should be deadly enough to kill a Wolf on touch, so humans or elves should also not fare really well.

…

The perception inhibition cloak is my next improvement. First I thought the hard shoulder plates were for protection, but they are for the stability of the Runes. There must be a better way to create circles, as not all materials are non bendable.

To make it better I put a core of a rat in a new plate right in the back part. Ejecting Mana from the back will activate the runic circles and add to the perception inhibition, another camouflage effect the darker the area is. In bright light it does nothing, but between trees or at night it should be close to invisibility.

The test of the prototype is ready and Red will be the subject again. Using the cloak I walk through the Village. As many things ignore me already I wander around and try to see how I look in my light perception. Nothing is there where I stand, so it seems a success without a lost body part. Deactivating the cloak makes Red visible again and goes back to Ava. Using it on Ava does the same and while holding it stable I look through the eyes of Red to see still nothing. So it works better than anticipated. This should give me the ability to get out without being seen by Roots. Even if they do not let me out of here, like they promised, I have an exit for my Avatars.