Chương 339: (332) 5.28. Here There Be Magic

The moment Shia's master vanished, Lumel turned to stare at Vin, her mouth gaping like a surprised fish.

"Did he just nonchalantly state that he was planning to hop over into another realm of existence, while bringing along a few hundred people along with him?!"

"Yeah, it certainly sounded like it," Vin chuckled.

"Why? Is that harder than it sounds?"

"Is that-" Lumel caught herself right as she began making a rather strange sound that was half-groan, half-laugh.

"That shouldn't even be possible! I could maybe, maybe see someone of a high enough level devising a way to slip between the layers of reality into a completely new realm if they were skillful enough, but holding the door open for others to follow? Hundreds of others? That's impossible!"

"That's my master for you," Shia said, still beaming at the empty space that had held the old elf mere moments ago.

"He's truly the greatest mage to have ever lived. In any world, in my opinion."

"If he can actually pull off what he said, he very well might be," Lumel muttered, shaking her head in disbelief.

"And you said he was a Druid, right? He's not even a Dimensional Mage?"

"Nope, he is very much a Druid," she smiled. Throwing up her hands, Lumel began grumbling to herself as she took the lead and began walking toward the Underside. Chuckling to himself, Vin fell in line behind her. He'd had a similar reaction the first time he'd met Shia's master, when the elf had popped into existence out of nowhere only to save him from a horde of insect monsters by casting magic from quite literally a world away. Getting to witness an actual magical genius at work was always a humbling experience.

The trip through the Underside was relatively silent as they all contemplated what they'd learned in the library and their surprise encounter with Shia's master. It wasn't long before they'd returned to Terra, easily dispatching the occasional beast monster that dared to lunge at them before making their way out of the forest dungeon.

"Welp, I'm off to go scare the hell out of some Slayer trainees who thought they were getting a longer break," Alka snorted, waving at them with both arms just because she could before taking off.

"I've got to relay some of what I read to Bill and Casper," Scule said, rubbing his hands eagerly.

"I picked up a few new adjustments we can make to some of our alchemy techniques that should show some promising results. Honestly, we really need to bring Bill over to the library one of these days. He'd probably be able to benefit from all that knowledge far more than anyone else."

"If it helps him create better potions, I'll happily escort him through the Underside and get him up there," Lumel said, before turning to glance back at the dungeon they'd just left.

"Though after being thoroughly embarrassed by that old Druid… I think I'm going to head right back from where we came and start studying that empty dungeon. If a Druid is capable of casting spatial magic I thought impossible, that just shows how much more studying I have to do."

"I wouldn't compare yourself too closely to Shia's master," Vin said gently, laying a hand on her shoulder.

"That weird, astral projection spell he's using to reach Shia and speak with her in the dungeons? I think he mentioned that was a tier 7 spell he threw together in a few months."" Months?!" Lumel gasped, looking even more irritated than before.

"But that shouldn't… gah!" As Lumel vanished in a flash of purple, Vin couldn't help but grow a tad concerned that his girlfriend may have just pitted herself against a rival that she had absolutely no hope of catching from what he'd seen. Shia must have had experience with this, however, as she gave him a reassuring grin.

"Don't worry, it's pretty common for mages who meet my master to throw themselves into their studies after interacting with him for the first time. Honestly, I was surprised you didn't."

"I think him saving my life may have helped with that," Vin shrugged.

"Anyway, I'm going to go take a crack at creating my first artifact. Might as well put the last few days of reading to good use. What are your plans?"

"I'll start by updating Erik on my master's current actions, then maybe hang around the Sacred Forest for a few days and check in on some old friends," she decided.

"Oh, if you're planning on creating an artifact… Scule, you should give him a couple of gemstones. Preferably tiny ones."

"What, you think I'm just carrying around a jewelry store in here?" the Rogue asked, holding his cape protectively as they stared at him.

"... How many gems are we talking?"

"Maybe like three or four to start?" Vin decided, now knowing from his research that a mistake would most likely result in the gemstone he was attempting to imbue shattering.

"And if it helps, you do realize I'll happily make you some artifacts once I get the hang of this, right?" Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"You should have started with that!" Scule huffed, pulling out a full dozen tiny gemstones of varying colors and dumping them all into Vin's outstretched hand.

"Just let me know if you need more!"

"Thanks…" Vin said, blinking in surprise.

"... Did you rob an entire jewelry store at some point?"

"I think you and I both know you don't actually want the answer to that question," Scule said, jumping into Reginald's saddle and directing the rat down to the ground.

"Catch you guys later!" Vin could only shake his head as the two of them darted off, and he tucked the gems into one of his many pockets. Realizing Shia was grinning at him, he rolled his eyes.

"What? It's not like me refusing to accept the gems would magically teleport them back to whoever Scule took them from."

"Hey, no need to justify yourself to me," she shrugged, hopping on to Blossom and waving as she took off toward the Sacred Forest.

"Good luck!"

"Thanks!" he called back. Once she was gone, he made his way back into town, nodding to the guards outside the main gate as usual and keeping his eyes peeled for Theodore as he made his way back to his apartment. The Spy must have been busy, as he wasn't accosted by any rodeo clowns or elderly woman asking for directions before he got home. Home… Vin couldn't help but smile as he stepped into his apartment, briefly taking it all in.

It had been many years since he'd really had anywhere to call home, and as much as he loved running around and exploring the wonders of Edregon, it was nice to have a place to come back to, even just for a little while. Lumel had helped them bring back a handful of actual furniture pieces and stuff for the kitchen, transforming their empty apartment into something that felt actually lived in. Throwing himself onto the couch, Vin pulled out the guard badges Abby had given him what felt like ages ago.

She was the first person who'd ever asked him to make an artifact, so it felt like as good a place to start as any. Holding up one of the silver badges, Vin looked between it and the tiny gem in his hand, blinking as he realized he had a problem. One quick trip down to the Crafter's Guild later, and he was back in his apartment, now the proud holder of three guard badges that each had a small gem inlaid in the back.

The gem itself would be pressed against the wearer's chest, so nobody but the badge holder themselves would even know it was there. Alright, that solves that problem. Now to actually turn these metal badges into magical artifacts… Leaning on his practice with Shia and the seeds, as well as everything he'd read up about over the past few days, Vin held one of the badges in hand as he slipped into Introspection. As expected, he couldn't actually sense the badge, seeing as it lacked any source of magic.

But that was okay. He knew he was holding it in his hands, which meant he knew roughly where to direct his mana in order to hit it. During their work on the magic plant, it had been Shia who prepared the seed to gain its own tiny mana pool. This time, it was all up to him. Imagining the location of the gemstone's rigid structure, Vin followed the directions he'd read about as he ever so gently pushed just the smallest sliver of his mana into it.

It was a good thing he started off so tiny, as he could practically feel the gemstone shaking under his forced injection of mana, and he stopped himself before the whole thing shattered. Good lord, I haven't even begun with the actual spellwork yet and I already almost messed up. Taking a deep breath, Vin slowed himself down even further, almost just pushing his mana in the general direction of the gemstone rather than injecting it straight inside.

It felt like it took ages, but ever so slowly, he felt his mana catch within the gemstone. Once enough had been stored inside that he was confident he could construct a tier 0 spell within, he nimbly reached out with his mana sense and tied it off. Now that the badge had its own artificial mana pool similar to his black void, he threw together the runic formation for Sense Life and attempted to insert it into the badge. And found it to be similar to trying to shove a delicate model through a brick wall.

"Because why would this be easy?" he grumbled within his void as he stepped back and tried to approach the problem from a different angle. He knew this step was the most difficult, but none of his reading had truly done the process justice. While inserting Protection from Fire into the magically prepared seeds, he'd had a twice-prestiged Druid coaching the seed into accepting his spell. He'd known doing this on his own was going to be more difficult, but he hadn't realized just how much more so.

I wonder if gemstones are one of the harder materials to try and imbue spells into… Magical beast leather sounds far more pliable and spell-friendly than a rock. Shame we don't have any herds of magic cows roaming around. Getting the gemstone to accept his runic formation was one of the hardest things he'd ever had to do.

Even with his passive and focus attribute allowing him to bend and stretch his runic formation around a bit to wiggle its way through the rigid outer structure of the prepared gem, it was a true testament to his current ability that he never once let the runes fall apart or turn into a backlash. Finally, after what he guessed had to be hours outside of Introspection, he finished.

Slipping the last piece of the runic formation within the gemstone, he let out a quiet shout of excitement before running around the spell to ensure it was all still in one piece. Satisfied, he released it after connecting it to the artificial mana pool he'd created, stepping back and grinning like a madman as the runes ignited.

The runic formation was so tightly squeezed into the gemstone that there wasn't any chance of it unraveling without his oversight, and as it desperately searched for mana to keep itself empowered, it would naturally begin pulling ambient mana from the air. His initial injection was like a jumpstart for the spell, but it needn't last.

After more than three months spent running around on Edregon, learning how to create brand-new spells, and even hitting his second prestige, Vin had finally done one of the first things he'd ever wanted to try doing after discovering magic. He had created his first artifact.