by Andrew Rowe
Gauntlets, on the other hand? Those could hold a fair bit of mana, and I could easily afford a pair. I was worried that a traditional gauntlet would impede my ability to manipulate anything with my hands, though, so I settled on a demi-gauntlet that I’d wear with a leather glove underneath.
“So, whatcha doing?”
I’d made the mistake of asking Sera to watch me work on this enchantment, since it was technically Carnelian-level and I wasn’t precisely allowed to be trying it yet. There was only a tiny chance I’d detonate the gauntlet in the process, and I was pretty sure my shield would save me. Probably.
I sat on the floor, laying the gauntlet down flat on my “enchanting tile”, a square of wood that I used to center whatever I was working on. I laid down my enchanting book on the left side of the tile and my measuring implements on the right.
The exact size of a rune wasn’t important. You could make a tiny rune on the side of a jewel if you knew how. The proportions and angles of lines on each symbol were supposedly relevant to the function, though, so I’d have to measure those. I didn’t know how exact I needed to be, but I was going to take my time on this one.
Before I started, I used four clamps to attach the demi-gauntlet to the wooden board. It moved a little if I lifted the wood, but it was pretty steady once I put it down.
“I’m making a gauntlet that will serve as an emergency weapon. I don’t know what I’m calling it yet. Blasting gauntlet, maybe? Power glove?”
Sera snorted. “Power glove sounds pretty bad.”
“I’ll think of something better. Anyway, I’m going to try to give it two different functions: raw mana projection and kinetic energy projection. In theory, I’ll be able to use one at a time or both at once. This is going to make the enchanting process a bit complicated.”
“Okay.” She sat down across from me. “And I’m here to...?”
“Go get help if I explode?”
“Oh, got it. Can I laugh at you first?”
“Heh. You’ve never asked for permission before.”
“Right you are. Okay, let the fireworks begin.”
I rolled my eyes. It comforted me to have Sera around in case this went badly, even if she’d never let me forget about it. Bringing a Mender would have probably been more logical, but I didn’t know any of them very well yet. In retrospect, maybe “healing” should have been on my list of things to consider for enchantments, but I was committed by that point.
“All right, first thing I’m doing is setting up capacity runes for each type of mana. These prevent the gauntlet from containing more than a certain amount of mana of that type.”
I opened up a container of paint and dipped my brush in it. I’d write the runes out in paint first, verify the dimensions, and then etch into the metal using my other tools if the rune had been drawn correctly. More experienced Enchanters could jump straight to etching, but I was working with runes I’d only practiced on paper — the risk was too great.
I drew three capacity runes: one for gray mana; one for transference; and one for mind. I checked them, wiped the mind one, and redid it twice more before I was satisfied.
“What’s the third one for?”
I pointed at the mind one. “This one is going to connect to a rune that detects when I want the gauntlet to activate. If it was like a cane, it’d just activate whenever I was in contact with an activation rune. Which would be all the time, since I’m going to be wearing it.”
“It senses your thoughts? Isn’t that really advanced?”
I shook my head. “No, it’s not sensing my thoughts exactly... it just waits for me to send a bit of mental mana into the rune, then it activates the other rune functions.”
“Oh, that makes sense.”
I flashed her a quick smile, then refocused. “Going to have to be quiet for a second for this part, I need to concentrate while I engrave.”
I adjusted my clamps to make sure the gauntlet was going to stay where it was and picked up the engraving rod. It was one of the simplest Enchanter implements, and the first one I’d learned to use. It looked like an ink pen with a tiny gemstone on the tip and a few runes written on the side. I pressed the activation rune, which caused the tip of the rod to vibrate rapidly. When I pressed against the metal, the vibrating tip cut into the surface of the gauntlet.
Slowly, I traced the painted runes. It only took a few minutes, but I was sweating by the time I turned the engraver off.
“Okay, first step done.”
I set the engraver down and used a pair of wet and dry cloths to wipe off the remaining paint. After that, I reviewed the runes. The lengths and angles looked fine, as far as I could tell.
“Not bad. So, you can enchant it now?”
I chuckled. “That’s three runes out of twelve. Next, I put in the recharging runes. They’ll let it draw on ambient mana to refill each mana type up to the capacity over time. Then, I put in the function runes, the ones that actually make the item do anything. After that, it’s the activation runes, which tell it when to do it.”
Sera frowned. “Don’t you only need one activation rune? The mind one?”
I blinked. “I mean... I was going to make the mind rune activate the other two activation runes... but maybe I could skip that step?”
I paused for a minute, frowning as I considered. “I don’t actually know if one activation rune can trigger three functions or not. I could try—
“Wait,” I interrupted my own train of thought. “I’m doing this all wrong. I need two different mind runes either way, or I’m going to always activate the gray and the transference runes at the same time.”
Sera leaned forward, looking at the gauntlet. “Yeah, but I still don’t see why you’d need other activation runes. You’re only activating it one way, yeah? Can’t you connect one mind rune to each function rune?”
“I’m not sure. That’s never how they show it in the introductory book...but to be fair, I skipped the intermediate ones and most of this comes from a more advanced book.”
She side-eyed me. “Maybe you’re thinking too much about what the book says and not enough about what makes sense.”
“I could look it up, I suppose.” I shook my head. “But I’d never get back to it on time for the tests if I stop now. I’ll finish this one the way I was planning to, but that is an interesting idea. It’d save me time and materials if it works. I’ll look it up later.”
She grinned at me. “Maybe for when you make me one.”
I found myself smiling back. “Sure,” I said. That was the first indication she’d given me that she was interested in one of my items. It was kind of nice. I liked feeling like I could do something useful. “As soon as you can afford one.”
“Charging your family? You cut deep, Corin. Here I am, risking my life — my very existence — to help make sure you finish your first item properly...”
“It’s not my first item, it’s my first high risk item. But your point is taken, Sera. I’ll make you something.”
She made a gesture of victory and I grinned as I resumed my work.
***
“All right, time to test this thing out.”
Fortunately, there was a whole section of buildings dedicated to enchanting, and a number of “gray chambers” set aside for testing new equipment. I hadn’t bothered to use one before, since my previous enchantments were so simplistic, but this probably warranted a degree of caution. Even if the gauntlet worked correctly, it was going to fire a blast of mana that was more powerful than any weapon I’d used before. Firing off bursts of energy in random places wasn’t exactly wise.
I signed the paperwork to use one of the chambers, and Sera and I stepped inside. We were assured that the chambers were monitored and that Menders would be close by if anything went wrong.
We stepped inside the assigned room.
It was small, about the same size as a single dorm room. The walls were gray stone. I didn’t recognize the type of stone... maybe that was the source
of the name of the rooms? I activated my attunement, noting that the stone had a soft glow, but I didn’t see any runes on the inside of the room. If it had them, they’d done the smart thing and put them outside of the chamber. Otherwise, I’d have to guess the stone had inherent magical properties. Possibly both.
I turned the attunement back off. I was starting to get headaches more often, and I suspected the bright lights I was picking up with the attunement active were a part of that.
“So, these walls are designed to handle magical blasts?” Sera tapped a finger against the stone. “Seems like they’d be a good place for any of us to practice, really.”
I made a broad gesture with my hand. “Yeah, but there aren’t enough of them for all the students to use them. I imagine they’re expensive to make. The dueling grounds serve a similar function, but allow for larger groups to practice at a lower cost.”
“So, why not just test enchantments in one of the dueling fields?”
My laugh was sharp. “Because an instructor can probably repair the damage from a careless Elementalist. If an Enchanter makes a big enough mistake? You could probably wipe out a small town.”
Sera paused her inspection of the room and turned to me with a quizzical look. “How’s that possible? Wouldn’t the detonation be based on how much mana you put in it?”
“Normally, yeah. But remember what I said about capacity runes? Now, imagine I got that wrong. This gauntlet could probably hold about ten times the mana I’m putting into it before it explodes. Now, that’s nowhere near a town-level explosion. Maybe a building, at best.” I lifted my chin to scratch my neck, just to do something with my hand.
“But let’s say,” I continued, “you’ve got some fancy climber who wants a full suit of enchanted armor. It has to be good, so it’s made of a material that can absorb several times more mana than usual... khyonite or something. Now, someone makes a mistake on the capacity rune on that. Let’s say it’s twenty times the material of my gauntlet and the material can hold ten times more per area. So, two hundred times more mana. Two hundred times bigger explosion. That’d be a small town, I’d say.”
“That’s... kind of horrifying, actually.” Sera folded her arms. “So, these rooms let you run tests to make sure each rune is working right?”
“Actually, from what I understand, they’re more about containing the explosion if I did something horribly wrong.”
“Oh.” She paused and glanced from side-to-side. “I’m going to go stand outside now.”
I laughed again. “I’ll see you in a minute.”
She had a good point about checking each individual rune’s function, but I didn’t have a good way of doing that. A Diviner could, maybe... and that meant that I could potentially build a tool to do it myself, given time.
In the meantime, I could only test the whole, and that meant activating it.
I waited for Sera to get outside, then took a deep breath and sent a flicker of mana into the activation rune.
Then the world went white.
“...rin... Corin! Can you hear me? Wake up!”
Sera was standing over me. When did she get back in the room?
Why was I lying down? I didn’t remember lying down.
Someone else was next to her. I frowned. It was another student, but I didn’t recognize her. She was tall, with dark yellow skin like Jin’s. She knelt down next to me, waving a hand over my head. A soft white glow enveloped my face, forcing my eyes shut. The soothing chill that came with the glow helped numb the pain in the back of my head... which I hadn’t realized was hurting until the chill came along.
Oh, I’m being healed, I realized. Which means I’m injured.
“I think I’m okay,” I mumbled.
“Don’t move,” the Mender instructed. “Don’t talk. Don’t do anything.”
I complied. It was several minutes before she even let me talk.
“You’re lucky — your shield sigil absorbed the majority of the blast itself. The explosion carried you into the wall, though, and you hit your head. The sigil looks to have softened that, too. I don’t see any fractures, or any internal bleeding. You’re very lucky. The next time you want to test an enchantment with an attack spell, you should have a more experienced Enchanter look it over first.”
That was true. I probably should have considered that.
“Mm.” And after a few moments, I managed, “Thank you.”
The Mender looked to Sera. “He shouldn’t have any permanent damage. Can you accompany him back to his room? I need to go check on the other rooms.”
Sera nodded with an expression of deadly seriousness. “Of course.”
The Mender left us alone.
“Uh, yeah, so that didn’t go as planned.” I tried to smile. My face felt... weird.
“I’m resisting the urge to smack you right now.”
“Your willpower is, as always, admirable.”
Sera sighed, rolling her eyes. “Ugh. At least you didn’t break your snark.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. My snark is indestructible. It’s the core of my being, and quite possibly the universe as a whole.”
“Arrogance, also intact. You think you can stand?”
I frowned, looking over the side of the bed. Everything was wobbly. Sera was especially wobbly. Why were we sailing? “No. I’m pretty sure that I’m a ‘no’ on that.”
“Fine.” Sera sat down next to me. “Never do that again.”
I couldn’t manage a nod; my neck was still feeling too stiff. “Right.”
Sera waited with me for as long as I needed. As it turned out, that was the rest of the night.
***
It was two days before I was largely functional again. Sera kept a close eye on me the whole time, even coming by to bring me food when I was recovering in bed the day after the incident.
Much like a retainer might have, if I had any.
As it was, I was just grateful to have anyone to help me. I owed her one.
The explosion’s cause was fairly obvious. I’d somehow activated both the gray mana and the transference mana at the same time, and they’d mixed. As Lord Teft had told us, like deflects like, opposites nullify...and other mixes tended to explode. This was apparently one of the explodey kinds.
I didn’t see how I’d managed to activate both, though. I had fixed the obvious problem beforehand, thanks to Sera’s comment. I had two separate activation runes that led to each type of mana.
So, I took it to Professor Vellum, the most likely person to be able to diagnose the problem.
Her office was littered with... everything. Books. Unlabeled potion bottles. Children’s toys. Weapons. At least one very mean looking house cat. More potion bottles.
I barely managed to step over the mess at the entrance when I moved to hand her the gauntlet.
“You tried to use this? Goddess, child. You’re lucky to be alive at all. The rest of us might be less lucky for it, if you intend to keep being so reckless.”
I frowned. “I have two separate runes. How did the mana get mixed?”
“Oh, dear child. Do you know how sensitive those activation runes you made are? Take a look here.” She picked up something from the table — a wooden stick — and handed it to me. “What’s different about these runes and the ones you used?”
I glanced them over. “They’re, uh, completely different ones.”
“Yes, of course. But what’s systemically different?”
Interestingly, much like my gauntlet, the stick had multiple activation runes, one on either end of the wood. Each connected via a line to another set of runes.
I was still looking when she spoke again.
“The circles, boy. The circles. Have you never seen a magic item before?”
Oh.
The runes on the stick were circled.
Just like they were on my dueling cane, and my etching rod, and my engraving rod.
“...My books didn’t say anything about circles.”
&n
bsp; “Of course not. Because you aren’t reading books about using multi-function enchantments or even basic attack enchantments, both of which are for second year students. Students that understand the fundamentals of how not to kill themselves. Goddess, child, what did you think the circles on your dueling cane were for?”
I winced. I’d skimmed through some of the second-year texts, but I hadn’t read them cover-to-cover. “I guess... I assumed they were cosmetic? They make the runes look more like buttons.”
“Like buttons.” Vellum let out a deep sigh. “Goddess, this generation. Please, let it be the last that I’m blessed with teaching.” She gestured to the stick. “Hand that back to me.”
I gave her the stick, and she handed the gauntlet back to me in exchange. “The circles are far from cosmetic. They’re boundaries. They prevent excess mana from escaping, and they also help to prevent the runes from being accidentally activated by ambient mana, or through other effects. They make it so the rune only activates when you put something inside the circle itself to feed it mana.”
“...Meaning that without them, my gauntlet could have triggered any number of different ways. If I walked into a mana-rich area that had the right type of mana in the air, or the gauntlet was hit by a spell...”
“Precisely. You’re lucky to have your head on your shoulders right now. You’re doubly lucky to have that hand. I’m not sure how you managed to keep it.”
“I was wearing a shield sigil.”
“Ah. At least you did something right, in that case.” She sighed. “Let me see the glove again.”
I handed it back to her. She frowned, shaking her head.
“What gave you the idea for this contraption?”
I folded my arms. I really wasn’t enjoying being interrogated, but I didn’t exactly have any choice about answering. “It seems like there’s always something attacking me, and I’m never properly prepared. In the tower, in dueling class... Even in my bedroom.”
Professor Vellum snorted. “I heard about that. I don’t approve of Orden’s antics, but she is funny, at least. That’s better than I can say for most of our staff.”