Chapter 47. Mad Scientist

You discovered a new Enchanting Pattern: Enchanting Wire.

I looked at the discovery. To create Enchanting Wire, all I had to do was take normal metal wire, heat it up until it glowed red, then sprinkling Magic Dust on it. However, the possibilities were exciting. If it were possible for enchanted material to act as both symbol and power source, then it was possible to bend enchanted wire into the shape of a glyph and have it power itself. I needed to test this out by making a light or a heating source or something simple.

“I hit 148 in Leatherworking,” I said. “I want to make my last set piece before I start enchanting.”

“I’m a kind and generous mentor,” Dread told me. “So I’m going to let you make and enchant your own gear first.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“But don’t you dare leave this building without doing my armor sets,” she said. Joking but not joking.

I copied down the next Tribal Leather piece into my pattern book from Dread’s.

Congratulations, you learned the pattern for Tribal Leather Shoulders.

Over the next hour, I prepared shoulders from some of my remaining Shark Skin.

Sharkskin Tribal Pauldrons

Item Class: Set Armor

Item Quality: Uncommon

Damage Reduction: 2%

+4 Constitution

+4 Dexterity

+4 Intelligence

+5% Shadow Resistance

Set Bonuses:

3 piece bonus: +5% critical strike chance with all skills

4 piece bonus: Each time you cast a spell that does not result in a critical strike, your critical strike chance goes up by 3% for 10 seconds. Getting a critical strike resets the bonus to zero.

Soulbound

“Dread!” I shouted. “Check out this four-piece bonus.”

“I already know about it,” she said. “What do you think this is my first set of Shark Skin?”

“Way to ruin the mood,” I said. “Three percent crit every time I don’t crit. That’s amazing. This build is coming together.”

I set up my enchanting station. Needle, enchanted thread, an awl for punching holes. I pulled the pattern for Critical Strike onto my new shoulders and began the detailed work of tracing, punching holes, then threading Enchanted Thread through the patterns to create crossed swords. This part of the process was slower than the leatherworking. My Expertise in Enchanting was only twenty-one, so I only worked 21% faster than I would in the real world. But with every piece - two shoulders, two bracers, two boots, a chest piece, a buckler, my helm, I got faster.

Your Expertise in Enchanting increased from 21 to 30.

Every individual piece granted me 1% to crit. Which was wild and possibly overpowered. The shoulders, boots, and bracers granted me 1% per side. All-in-all, I added 9% crit to my gear plus the 4-set bonus.

I looked at my advanced statistics. My crit was up to a whopping 19.8%. Very respectable.

Over the next couple of hours, I helped Dread. I enchanted eleven items for her, using up all of the Enchanted Thread.

Your expertise in Enchanting increased from 31 to 42.

“Dread,” I asked as she inspected my work, “do you have any wire?”

“What for?” she asked.

“I got an enchanting recipe for Enchanted Wire. I wanted to try something.”

“Sure,” she said. “I have some spools in the back. Grab a couple. And some wire cutters. Just don’t lose them.”

Janica and I returned to the University after the sun had set.

Gamers milled about, looking for groups or offering trades for gear or services. But most of them were talking about the article.

“DPS looking for group before they shut the dungeon down,” an archer said.

“How do you know this is where the data breach is coming from?” a warrior replied. “Could be anywhere in the game. Take your tin foil hat off.”

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“It’s obvious dude,” the archer said. “They said it happened forty-eight hours ago. Right when the World Alert came through.”

“I need a few minutes,” I said and headed to the target dummies in the corner. I preferred to practice in private, instead of in front of all of these randoms. But I didn’t see a way around it. I needed to practice with mana, and that could only happen in The University. And this was the only place with target dummies.

I opened my Spell Book to Rejuvenate. It remained at 66% memorized. I cast the spell on myself, thinking about the words Parvun Rejuvenis . I looked at the Spell Book. Nothing had changed. I frowned. That was supposed to work. I tried again, but said the words aloud.

“Do you know what the word means?” Janica asked.

“Yeah it—” I paused. I closed my Spell Book. I pictured in my head returning myself to a younger state of being. I made the hand motion.

The game flooded my head with information. In an instant, it was as if I had known how to cast the spell all along.

Somehow, the math was part of it. Like a calculation I did in my head because I had done it a thousand times before. Like hearing the beat of a song and knowing that the base pounded at one eighth of a note while the snare was at one sixteenth of a note without having to sit there and count the beats. The math was just part of it.

The three elements came together. Math, hand gesture, Latin meaning.

A Rejuvenate healing over time effect appeared on my interface.

Congratulations, you memorized all known versions of the Rejuvenate Spell.

“You did it!” Janica lifted a fist into the air. “Now I will only probably die. But it won’t be because you’re casting spells at a turtle’s pace.”

I did it. I could hardly believe it.

“Okay,” I said. “Time for Lightning.” In Latin, lightning came from the word Folgos. Which meant to lighten . It was a flash. I cast the spell, conjuring the meaning. A lightning bolt jolted down onto the target dummy.

Congratulations, you memorized all known versions of the Lightning Spell.

A ruckus erupted in the room. I turned and found dozens of gamers collected behind me.

“You’ve already got Lightning?” a warrior asked me. “Do you want to join our group? We don’t have a healer yet but—” he paused, looking at my Rejuvenate buff. “You’re a healer too? Please, we almost made it to level five. We’ve got big damage. We’ll pay you 200 Silver to get us to level five.”

“That’s one of the people who created the dungeon,” somebody said.

I started to get direct messages and group invitations.

“Sorry,” I said, pushing my way through the crowd toward the elevator. “No time right now.”

When the elevator doors opened, a portal covered the entrance. I walked through, happy to escape the chaos.

“Phew,” I said. “Vultures. All of them.”

“I don’t know,” Janica said. “Maybe we should get a full group. Might be safer that way.”

But that wasn’t an option. Fifty-thousand dollars awaited the person who could provide proof that an uninvited AI was taking data from the dungeon. I didn’t want to split that money. Sofia and I needed that. Besides, I didn’t know anything about those people. They were probably obnoxious, rich kids, playing with their parents' money. And they didn’t care about Henry.

I put my key into the slot and punched the elevator button.

“Too bad we didn’t have more time to practice,” I said, as the elevator descended. “I think I may have figured out some other spells.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We need to find a safe place for me to experiment. Maybe leave a single mob alive.”

“Okay,” Janica said. “We can do that.”

We stepped onto floor five, the safe floor. A group stood around, discussing their battle with Hettie, but we ignored them and headed to floor six. We walked through an instance portal.

The sixth floor had research lab vibes to it. It reminded me of a chemistry lab except that all of the scientists seemed to be brewing bright green concoctions and laughing, manically. The room was as large as a basketball gym with lab benches everywhere. Beakers and flasks lined the shelves. Burners sat below glass aparati that might be used for distilling or condensing chemicals. The three ghosts nearest me took turns looking through a microscope. They wore lab coats and had protective eyewear on their heads.

One of them threw their head back and cackled.

Mad Scientist

Level 14 Elite

HP 140/140

Stamina 200/200

Mana 160/160

“That was creepy,” I said. I checked my Loadout, making sure that Critical Restoration was activated. With my increase in critical strike chance, that passive was going to start to take off.

Job: Restorative Mystic

Passive 1: Spiritual Embodiment

Passive 2: Critical Restoration

Skill 1: Rejuvenate 2

Skill 2: Lightning Strike

Skill 3: Tempo

“We don’t have a lot of space here,” Janica said. “If we pull extra groups, we’ll need to run out of the instance.” She equipped her Ghostly Shield and a new one-handed sword. The weapon had a curve to it and was wide across the blade with a two-pronged hilt. The grip curved in the opposite direction. It reminded me of something from ancient Persia. Except that instead of steel, it was made of a dark gray metal. Almost black.

“Ooh,” I said. “New weapon?”

“I found a blacksmith,” she said. “Had just enough to craft this beauty.”

“Did you get access to sword and shield skills?” I asked.

“You’ll see,” she said, charging into the group of scientists.