Chapter 87

Chapter 87

Matt and Kelley were sitting around two pairs of gauntlets, one with a cold rune etched into the back of the hand, the other with a slowing rune.

They just sat there and stared at them together. Their half a day of testing had finally paid off.

The same mana aspect could be subtly different, which led to subtly different results. With some manipulation of the standard cold rune, they had created a rune that, when cold-based skills were cast through, created a slowing effect. The effect wasn't minor either, with a near thirty percent effect.

All from creating the rune with the cold aspected mana.

The second pair of gauntlets with a slowing rune were designed to slow anyone struck with them. With the slowing cold mana, it was nearly twice as effective as the base, though it was still limited to melee attacks.

Hit me again.

Matt did as instructed and lightly backhanded the Tier 10 enchanter.

The man dropped an apple with his off-hand and drove to catch it with his other hand. It was like he was moving through honey for about half a second, then the effect stopped, and his hand shot forward like a snake, catching the apple.

It would have lasted longer if the man's Tier wasn't so much higher than the rune.

Inspecting the apple, Kelley repeated himself for the sixth or seventh time. I cant believe we got it to work.

Matt looked at the floor covered in ice from their test with [Hail], the only cold skill between the pair, and the cold slow enchanted gauntlet. He repeated himself as well. Neither can I.

Kelley kicked his way through the ice, over to his workbench, and pulled out a bottle and two glasses.

Careful with this. It's Tier 10 liquor and will put you on your ass before you know it.

He poured them each a drink. Matts was noticeably smaller, more so a shot compared to Kelleys nearly full glass. The enchanter raised his drink and said, To learning something new.

To getting an edge on the competition. Matt knew what Kelley really cared about, and couldnt resist teasing the man. He would work for free if everything was provided for him. Selling his wares was just a means to buy more things and fund his projects.

They both downed their glasses. Matt nearly died as the potent alcohol kicked him so hard, his teeth hurt. He had to brace himself against the table while the fire burnt its way down.

Kelleys two fingers of liquor went down much easier than Matts, if his lack of reaction was to judge.

Shit, this changes everything. I mean, I knew using aspected mana can improve certain runes, every crafter worth a damn figures it out, but

He was about to curse the man out a little for not warning him more when he noticed the man staring at his glass with a thousand-yard stare.

Matts Tier 10 friend started rolling his glass around idly. Aspected mana comes from five places. Innate bloodlines, Talents, carefully cycling ambient mana, special techniques involving cycling essence and mana through materials, and finally, natural treasures. The main aspects are easy to find: air, water, ice, fire and so on. It's that secondary property that's hard to capture. It's more unique to how each person views their aspected mana. An abstract idea like slow doesnt exist outside of Talents as a full aspect of mana. These extra layers are essentially understanding made real. It's like a concept. No, a Concept...

There was a rippling in the air that Matt didn't dare disturb, and after what felt like a year, Fuck! It explains so much! Concepts do the same thing. They can change your mana to better reflect your understanding. Someone with an ice Concept could use it to aspect their neutral mana into ice aspected mana, but that would just be the main aspect, the same as if they used an ice natural treasure.

Kelley paused for a moment, grabbing one of the gauntlets. Unless their Concept isnt found in nature, but as long as the persons Concept is the same as the natural treasure, it's no different. The inverse applies as well. Unique aspects could appear from peoples' Concepts. They would need to use their ice Concept to introduce the slowing secondary property. It would let their mana reflect the abilities of ice as they understand them.

Kelley started to chew his lower lip as a faint strum rippled through the air.

If you understand the Concept well enough, you can add that secondary property. The right... The enchanter seemed to search for the word, Sub-aspect to the main mana aspect. You multiply the effects greatly. That must be one of Ascendent Crafters' guild secrets, it explains how their products always out perform with the same runes and materials. They must have huge libraries of aspected mana. I can do the same.

Kelley uttered, I make the rune. I can find the best aspect and sub-aspect for the rune. I can change

Matt felt the air and surroundings vibrate like a bell was struck. Matt's Concept and his cores of essence vibrated to a frequency that was not his own. But it still sounded discordant.

Kelley was rapidly thinking his way through forming his Concept, but there was something more happening. Matt had felt when his and others Concepts formed during the ascension, but he had never felt the essence responding like this before.

I can change the aspect. I can choose the rune. I decide its properties. I can change. I am the sculptor and the stone.

With each phrase that Kelley uttered, the vibrations were brought closer and closer to harmony. Matts Concept vibrated in what felt like sympathetic resonance, but before the sensation settled down, Kelley said, I am change.

It was like a bomb went off, as everything fell into place and a smooth harmony rang out in a melodic fanfare. Essence started to rush into the room as if there was a vacuum pumping it in. And now, Kelley was absorbing the ambient essence at an absurd rate. Like a starving man at a banquet, he kept pulling more and more in.

The pressure built until Matt felt like he was underwater from the sheer volume of essence that was being pulled in. As the quantity increased, a resonance started to expand out through the essence as more and more rushed inward, condensing within the enchanter.

Once the entire room was vibrating from the resonance between man and essence, there was a moment where the torrent stilled. His enchanter friend was no longer Tier 10, but Tier 11.

Kelley's first word was, Huh.

Matt kicked the man. Huh!? Is all you have to say for yourself!? That was an inspiration! You just had an inspiration! By every ascender.

He had no idea how to react, honestly. It wasnt just mind-boggling. It was beyond that. Inspirations were rare, and Matt had no idea how rare it was for a crafter to create their Concept at the same time.

Matt had no idea why it had taken so long. The movies he had seen depicted an inspiration as lasting only a minute at most, but this experience had lasted five already. The real oddity was that this planet was only Tier 6, while Kelley was Tier 10. The essence shouldn't be useful for the man, but he still felt the essence condensing as it neared the enchanter.

Or at least, that was the feeling he got from his spiritual sense. It would explain why the man was pulling in so much essence. Quality had to be created from quantity.

Kelley hardly rocked from Matts kick, and just started laughing until he had to wipe his eyes from the excitement.

I can't believe it either. Fuck! Its kinda hard to believe. I I don't know.

The newly-minted Tier 11 vibrated with excitement before he broke out into an awful dance.

I need to test everything!

Matt wholeheartedly agreed. He didn't ask about the man's revelation. From the little he knew about inspirations, which was solely based on a movie or two, asking was considered incredibly rude.

So he asked about the man's Concept instead. What about your Concept? What did you make? What do you think it can do?

Instead of answering, Kelley picked up a scrap of metal and looked at it. Matt felt out with his own Concept and felt nothing. After a few minutes, Kelley looked up and said, I have no idea. How did you tell?

Matt felt flabbergasted, but half shrugged. He had just flexed his Concept, and it had worked.

I don't know. It just worked for me when I interacted with it. I felt there were two things it could do, and it was pretty easy. If I had to guess, try something related to the image. I assume it's crafting related, so try that.

The Tier 11s stylus appeared in his hand, and he started carving into the metal bar in his hand. The rune was familiar to Matt, as they had just been working on it. After a minute, the outline of the slowing rune appeared, and Kelley started to imbue the rune with his own mana.

Matt was about to offer to do that when Kelley grunted out, Mana. Please.

Throwing his Concept onto the man, Matt watched as the enchanter imbued his rune and then inspected it with a grunt.

He waved off Matt, who was still refilling the man. I'm good now, you can stop.

Matt didn't and just asked, You figured something out. What was it?

Kelley looked happier than a kid on his birthday as he said, I got myself the ability to somewhat influence my own mana with different properties. Its almost like copying what I learned from the cold. But it seems that I need to know how the aspect and sub-aspect work.

He tapped Matt with the bar, then from Matts perspective, rapidly cleared the workbench up. By his AI count, the effect had lasted one and a quarter seconds, but it had felt more like fifteen.

Matt nodded to the man. It worked, but not as well as the slowing ice aspected mana.

Kelley nodded. It also burned a lot of my own mana to convert it to both the aspect and sub-aspect, while also eating a ton of my willpower. I have a headache like you wouldn't believe, but I think that if I practice this, the mana conversion will get a lot better. Something feels off right now, but I'm not sure.

So, what are you gonna do now?

Kelley looked at Matt like he was dumb. I'm going to keep testing! At the minimum, I'm going to copy your idea with normal converting mana stones. It will cost me an arm and a leg, but I'll need to at least test with them. I bet the large guilds have pre-made libraries already, but I don't. It will just take some time and searching.

Matt offered, Why not try and hire a few Tier 5 teams to run the rift I got this from? It was dropping dual typed mana stones until I got this.

Yeah, but I need to lead them, which makes it worse. Liz sounded incredibly tired.

Sam said something Matt didn't hear, and Liz responded in kind.

Matt wanted to go over and ask her what else was wrong and try to help, but it wasn't like she couldn't have told him. They hadn't seen that much of each other in the last week and a half, but things had been hectic with them playing catch up on training and Concept work.

They had all been busy with their own thing, but he was slipping as Lizs friend and boyfriend.

That night Matt asked Liz as they were settling into sleep, Everything okay?

Yeah, it's all fine. She murmured her answer while stifling a yawn.

Matt waited, but when he got nothing, he pressed, Even with the leader gig?

It's fine.

I heard you talking to Sam.

Liz groaned, Dammit. I thought we were quieter than that.

You mostly were, but when I was changing arms, I was able to hear.

Liz rolled into him as she said, I've barely seen you, and it feels like all I do is complain when I do see you. I don't want to burden you as well.

Matt poked her under the rib. I'm happy to help.

See, that's the thing. You like to fix things, but this isn't something that can be fixed. I just wanted to complain and bitch to someone new a little. It's shitty sometimes, but it's not all bad. Ive met some really nice and grateful people. It's just turds that taint the whole bowl sometimes.

Well, I wanted to let you know I'm here to help.

She patted his chest. You are helpful. Time spent with you is time I don't have to think about all the bullshit I need to work on the next day. Thankfully, we only have two days off left, and things are heating back up, so we'll have more time together.

He kissed the top of her head, and they lay there together.

Matt wasn't happy that Liz was dealing with everything on her own, but at least they werent having any problems as a couple.

How can I help?

As he drifted off to sleep, Matt kept thinking about the question.

***

Matt took a fist on his unarmored forearm, and felt [Mages Retreat] flare slightly in response as the skill moved more mana through the area that increased Durability. He concentrated on stretching that area out. Just slowly.

If he moved too fast, the skill would actually start pulling from the Strength boost it gave. But if he was slow, he could slowly stretch the skills structure out like taffy. Adding his manual manipulation while getting hit doubled the effectiveness of his training.

His normal meditation was better for feeling out the skill, but he knew [Mages Retreat] as well as he knew [Cracked Phantom Armor.]

Matts AI pinged him. It was nearly time.

Shutting down and retreating from the training aid, he sat down. With two hours of meditation, he moved [Mages Retreat] out of his core spirit and into his inner spirit, with [Endurance] and [Hail].

It was right at the edge, but he needed the free slot for [Fireball], which he was currently absorbing. When it reached his core spirit, he would quickly modify it to reduce the mana cost while it was still malleable.

He checked his AIs timer, and found that [Fireball] had another three hours before it reached his core spirit. Then, he could perform his modifications to the skill.

It was enough time for a little more testing. He had practiced for the last week with the cube he and Liz had used to train for modifying [Endurance], and the time was nearly upon him.

Still, it wouldn't hurt to test the modification once more. He had the time.

Matt connected his AI and sent his spiritual sense into the cube, and started to simulate the process.

In the last week, he had doubled down on his skill training. Normally, he spent an hour or so a day doing it in the morning or before bed. But with the abundance of free time, he had been focusing on pure meditation training, and adding in skills training while using them in sparring matches

He knew it was just another side effect of his Talent that he hadn't appreciated. Annie, Emily, and Conor all commented on how his refilling their mana regularly let them use their skills more, and actively expand their capabilities.

They were usually forced to only meditate on the skill, and try to eke out whatever increase they could get when fighting or sparring. Even then, they were normally only able to do that once a day, as it took them a day and a half to fully regenerate their mana naturally.

His keeping them topped off let them train much harder than normal.

It was still a weird thought for him, as some small part of himself still thought of his Talent as useless. Even though it gave him and people around him advantages he could never have dreamed of.

With a soft chime, he stopped his wandering thoughts and focused inward. [Fireball] was close to the edge of his core spirit.

The longer it took him to make the modifications, the longer the skill would have time to sink deeper into the spirit, and therefore increase the time it would take to move back into the inner spirit.

He wanted to be quick.

As the skill breached the dividing lines between the spirit layers, Matt started to shrink the entirety of the skill down as much as he could.

He condensed it along the x, y, and z-axes, along with shrinking the inner tubing that made up the skills structure.

The first bit was easy, but as the skill shrank down further and further, it was harder and harder to compress. Matt even felt some of his willpower going into the task. His task became increasingly more difficult as the skill continued to shrink.

As the skill stopped moving and its malleability diminished to normal, he inspected the skill. He hadn't been as fast as he wanted, but the results looked good.

The skill was nearly half the normal size.

And at a base cost of 10 mana, he was hoping to get the skill to a mana cost of about 6 when it was removed from his core spirit.

Still, his modification had worked perfectly.

Standing, he went back to the training aid and turned on [Cracked Phantom Armor] at the lowest draw possible. He filled a mana crystal up before refueling his mana pool. He only had 80 mana for a second, as the 1 MPS of his armor and AI slowly drained his mana pool. His regen was next to nothing if his current mana was over ten percent of his maximum.

Still, he sent mana into the new skill in his spirit, and with giddy excitement, watched as a fist-sized ball of flame appeared, then launched in the direction he was thinking of.

He missed the training aid, and the [Fireball] splashed harmlessly over the back wall.

Not caring in the slightest, Matt launched half a dozen follow-up [Fireball]s, and laughed his best evil laugh as the vents needed to pull the heat and smoke from the room.

After half an hour of testing his new skill, he checked his AI for the results.

In his core spirit, the skill cost 4.1 mana, more than the ideal 3 mana cost that would allow him to use the skill endlessly at Tier 8. Matt didn't think an item could reduce the skill enough. He had learned from Kelley that mana reduction items were hard to make, and worked off a percentage. Essentially, he'd need an amazing item to get him under the cost of his one percent max. A thirty percent reduction wasn't impossible, but it was rare.

At Tier 9, at one percent of his max mana, he would have 6 mana, which would make the skill perfect for his inner spirit. Skills in the core spirit were thirty percent cheaper and far easier to manipulate than the inner spirit, which was considered the baseline.

He decided to move the skill out of his core spirit until he was Tier 7, so he could continue to work on [Mages Retreat] some more. But he was going to commission Kelley for a Tier 8 mana reduction item. Matt winced for his bank account. Even with the Tier 15 mana stone from the sale of the growth item, it was going to be an expensive item. Tier 9 or 10 materials at least, to help the efficiency get to thirty percent.

It wasn't a huge problem, considering the value of the Tier 15 mana stone that he had. But Matt really hated spending money, and it felt incredibly expensive as a Tier 6. In the end, he refused to take advantage of a friend, and that won out.

Still, the skill worked perfectly, even if it was at a little less than half power after his modifications. He could make up for quality with quantity.

Deciding to let large decisions be a problem for tomorrow, he cleaned up and headed out. Tonight, he would celebrate with everyone for the success of his new fire spell.

Matt paused. He should get some ice cream for Aster. She was going to hate his new spell. But he loved it.