Chương 49: Collaboration

It took a long talking to convince Eran to accept the gift. The secret had been getting Mum to speak to Eran's mother and explain how hard I'd worked on it. My intention had been so clear that even the Spell named it Eran's Shield. Once his Ma agreed, Eran no longer hesitated to take the shield. Unfortunately, I hadn't anticipated the wild idea he would come up with the very next day.

"So let me get this straight," I said, releasing a slow, deliberate breath.

"You want me to use the shield to punch Kinetic Force at you?" Eran nodded eagerly.

"I haven't made any progress in Arcane Resistance all this time," he explained, "but when I tried that force attack using the shield, I got one point almost immediately."

"You actually used the Kinetic Punch on yourself?" My voice rose despite myself.

"Are you insane?"

"It was an accident," he said, cheeks flushing.

"Are you alright?" I examined him carefully. There didn't seem to be anything visibly wrong, but then again, it could hurt his head, considering how wild and reckless his idea was simply to train Arcane Resistance.

"It only threw me off a few metres," he said defensively.

"And the shield flew out of my hands, which probably offset most of the impact."

"And you still think it's a good idea?" Eran said nothing. I considered taking the shield from him and disabling the runes controlling the Kinetic Force until he grew more responsible with it. Mum had only asked me once to avoid training Pain Tolerance and all those self-harming ways I was yet to receive, and I'd listened. True, my training schedule was already packed with shaping skills and artificing. There was hardly enough time or energy left to torture myself and still manage everything else.

But Eran wasn't me. While Augmenters advanced quickly early on, the Ways they had access to were limited. Worse yet, Eran's internal weave was a chaotic mess, hindering him from effectively utilizing his gift. Despite all his grueling training with it, his internal weave showed little to no improvement, leaving nasty purple and angry red patches. Honestly, if I'd been in his shoes, I wasn't sure I would've acted any differently. Still, I felt like it was my fault by enabling such dangerous training methods.

Eran had barely seen four winters. If he was older, it might have been another matter entirely.

"You know I need a stronger body to utilize my gift," Eran said quietly.

"This is the only way for me." My lips tightened as I stared at him.

"Do your parents approve of this training method you devised for yourself?" His eyes widened in panic.

"No! Don't tell them!" he pleaded.

"Only the Oracle knows what they'd do to me if they found out."

"Do they know about your other training?" Eran looked down, muttering, "You don't understand—no one does. I need this."

"I…" I paused, considering.

"You're right, but what you're asking for is a bit extreme." Eran looked at me as if I'd betrayed him. He was my best friend, perhaps that made him believe I would help him even with something this reckless. But I couldn't, in good conscience, encourage him to such a practice. It might help him advance in Arcane Resistance, but the cost to his body could be too steep. Ultimately, the few points he would receive a few months quicker simply didn't warrant the risk.

"However," I said, making up my mind, "that doesn't mean I can't help in other ways."

"Other ways?" I nodded, taking the shield from his grasp.

"You see, the Kinetic Force from this shield is nearly equal to an early Noble-class Shaper's strength. Of course, a mere Uncommon-rank Fabricator can't replicate the efficiency of a skilled Shaper, but even so, it's still too powerful for an inexperienced Augmenter. It's like using a hammer to kill a fly." Eran tilted his head thoughtfully, finally considering my point.

"What you need is something tailored to your needs." His brow furrowed slightly.

"You're going to build me another artifact with less power?"

"Even better," I grinned.

"I'll be the one throwing arcane attacks at you." Mostly because I didn't trust Eran to understand his limits, let alone to use artifacts responsibly. Besides, even at full strength, I could produce only about a quarter of the kinetic force the shield could generate. True, I could direct it better, make it more threatening, but all that would be under my control.

"Are you sure?" Eran asked, suddenly concerned.

"Don't you have other training?" I waved away his worries.

"I can easily make time after the morning session, and probably in the evening too," I reassured him.

"I need to train my shaping skills anyway. Having a moving target would hurt no one." Eran needed no further convincing.

"So, should we begin now, or…?"

"Now is perfect," Eran said immediately. Without another word, I channeled my shaping skill into Kinetic Force and directed it at Eran. During practice, I'd rarely used it against him, as my main focus had always been refining my sword forms. But now, considering it carefully, I realized there was no harm in finding a balance between swordplay and shaping skills. I was sure Father would approve, not to mention I had to utilize my shaping skills while fighting Priam.

Even with sixteen threads, my kinetic force was barely strong enough to lift me a few finger-widths into the air briefly. Whereas all it managed to do here was hinder Eran's movements. Still, I only used kinetic force, having no intention of setting my friend on fire. Nevertheless, it wasn't without rewards. [Congratulations! Way of Weight Distribution IV (100/100) is complete.] [+4 Unallocated Points.] [Way of Weight Distribution V (100/250) is now accessible.] [Congratulations! Way of Essence Weaving V (250/250) is complete.] [+8 Unallocated Points.] [Way of Essence Weaving VI (250/500) is now accessible.] With that, making progress in Essence Weaving became somewhat more difficult. I realized I likely needed intermediate-level weaving to progress faster. The only problem was that it was practically impossible to weave threads of essence into anything beyond elementary forms within Common Class. It needed at least sixty-four threads to even try.

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. In the coming day, I found that alternating between two types of weaves—Kinetic Force and Empower—for an hour still counted towards 1 point of progress in the way. Although syncing the two weaves didn't empower the shaping enough, which wasn't achievable by simply weaving all sixteen threads into Kinetic Force alone. Empower was efficient only at momentarily spiking power, drawing in more essence.

But then again, that was its primary use, along with temporarily enhancing the quality of objects. A couple of days passed, and a dozen infantry legionaries appeared in town, soon followed by a small bunch of guildsmen, somewhat disrupting the quiet flow of life in the valley. Still, it reassured the townsfolk about their safety. Since neither the guild house nor the sentry outpost had enough room to host the soldiers, they had to camp at the Institute, relieving us of classes for the week.

Other than that, I had no other convenience, but that already enabled me to pour more of my hours into studying aritfacing and other new Ways. I finally picked up hammer and blacksmithing, though I wasn't expecting to complete them any time soon. Then, it was finally time to craft my gift for Aunt Emi. Mum had used my conditions well to stop me from rushing into it over the last few days. I used all that time to come up with a foolproof design I was satisfied with.

Although Mum hadn't helped outright, she had nudged me too many times—almost guiding me so thoroughly that I thought the design had more of her hand touch in it than mine, even though I did most of the work. It was more of a collaborative project than something solely my own anymore. But just because she might have had a hand in the design didn't mean I would change it just to spite her. I could only blame myself for not having the expansive expertise required for the job.

Mum might have known all the answers from the very beginning, but she never gave them to me. She only pushed me to find them on my own.

"After all the work is done, it looks so easy, doesn't it?" I muttered, looking at the design spread across the different parchment papers on the table.

"You'd think so," Mum smiled, raising the intensity of the fluorescent light constructs. It had taken twenty-seven iterations for me to finally settle on one design. But of course, those twenty-seven tries weren't for nothing. I had grown considerably since my very first attempt. It was like looking back at my younger self and realising how much of a dumb fool he had been. The simple design I had started with had been lost completely after going through a couple of dozen minute changes by each attempt.

The final iteration contained four kinds of runes, stacked within the small design of a crystal paperweight. Honestly, squeezing that many complex rune formations into such a small paperweight had been the main challenge. But now that that problem was solved, I had to tackle the actualisation of the design. I had to utilise crafting papers once again, since I couldn't for the life of me believe I would be capable of flawlessly drawing such complex runes in one go.

The first runes involved were a pair of Amplification runes, which would amplify the effect of the elder tree leaf's essence. While they had their fair share of difficulties due to the limited space, the real menace was the peculiar Transformation runes. Mum had to nudge me hard here—practically giving me other designs to work through on my own. Magically speaking, these runes transformed the elder tree essence into an effect.

Now, in theory, any normal elementary Transformation rune could have done the job, but that would have severely limited its potential. The last part of the design was an essence weave, knotted with faux essence threads. It was something too mysterious and practically impossible for anyone below Prestigious Class. I had no choice but to leave that part to Mum, since I couldn't afford to wait years to craft the gift. At the rate my aunts were going, they would likely shower me with dozens of gifts by then.

Honestly, the weave itself wasn't the difficult part, it was the creation of the faux threads. Mum refused to show me how it was done, saying it would only derail my studies. Either way, with that left in her hands, I finally faced the final ordeal. Funny thing was, most folk wouldn't even consider it an ordeal at all. Although the essence within the elder tree leaf was rich, it wasn't sustainable for long-term use like an essence core. The best it could do was act as a charm—pretty much disposable after one use.

But I didn't want that. I had to make sure the leaf wouldn't completely cease to exist after the charm was used. I had no more elder leaves to experiment with, but we found that normal leaves were good enough for testing as well. It turned out we couldn't save the elder leaf completely once the charm was triggered, but we could ensure that not all of its essence burned away in one go. This left behind a burned copy of the leaf—not completely charred, but a deeper crimson than its original state.

For the material, we decided on refined dusk opal. Regrettably, my elementary refinement wasn't enough to refine it. Another task I had to outsource to Mum. She had already refined it into transparent glass to showcase the full form of the crimson leaf. On that note, dusk opal was a considerably expensive material—perhaps almost as expensive as the leaf itself. However, the far more expensive and rare element was the dream essence.

Since we were creating a mind-empowering charm, dream essence was the top-tier material for it. Mum had to use her secret channels, and even then, it took her two whole weeks to obtain some. She didn't tell me how much it cost, saying she would cut it from my tab. I didn't trust her wholly on that, but that was a problem for later.

"Shall we begin now?" she asked, holding the leaf and the opal midair with telekinesis. After a little discussion, we came to a tacit understanding of how to divide the tasks between us. It had already become a collaborative project, so I didn't mind leaving the impossible tasks to her anymore, though I would take over when it came to lacing the runes and connecting essence veins into it.

Mum would handle the heavy task of keeping the leaf from withering, as well as ensuring the infusion of dream essence into the crystal. As I watched in anticipation, she melted the crystal into an almost liquid form before infusing the dream essence into it.

"Hmm, I never told you about my Gift," Mum said, as thin threads of silver essence wove through the liquid material, integrating together to create something greater.

"What you see here is almost impossible for most artisans. Some Master Artisans even find it difficult." I tilted my head.

"Does your Gift let you do that?" Mum nodded.

"It's called Construct, though for the better part of my life, I had it as Essence Melding." She crooked a smile at that.

"As the name suggests, it lets me combine different things together to create a superior material. It also helps with Refinement and Reinforcement. What I can do in a day is practically a month's work for other artisans."

"What about Construct?" I asked, my curiosity peaking.

"Does it enable you to construct things better?"

"Obviously," Mum said, the process of melding almost coming to an end.

"Though it's a bit more complicated than that. It's like there's a bug in my head, always prickling at my mind unless I'm fully convinced about the project, which makes me an unhealthy partner in collaboration."

"Nonsense," I said.

"All this would have been impossible without you." Mum smiled brighter." Construct also helps greatly with design and finding flaws in my creations, which saves a lot of time, but its main function goes far deeper than Melding. Essentially, I can break materials and construct them to my design." I was about to ask how she had managed to upgrade her Gift, but I stopped myself upon realising we were ready for the actual crafting.

With the material prepared, Mum wove her essence threads into a protective layer around the leaf.

After that, she encased the leaf in a perfect oval shape with the melted dream opal. Keeping it aloft with her telekinesis, she turned to me.

"Now it's your turn." Mum quickly cleared the space for me as I stepped in. I placed the rune paper on the underside of the melted opal and slowly used Aetherbound Quillpen to carve into the crystal. Light flickered in silver and green throughout the process, and it wasn't simply something I was seeing. It was a natural phenomenon, quite common when dealing with higher materials. Thankfully, my attributes and Fractal Sight enabled me to work through the obstruction of light rather peacefully.

Compared to my snail pace, Mum integrated the faux weave in mere minutes, leaving the rest of the task to me. I became even slower when I got to connecting the runes to the leaf, giving extra care to every single essence vein. There were sixty-four of them. Here, Fractal Sight proved useful as well, allowing me to see if there were any deficits in the form as I quickly began correcting them. By the time I finished, I was drenched in sweat, my clothes cold and soaking, and an hour had passed.

I waited with bated breath, my eyes glued to the new creation, radiating heat and bright light across its surface. That usually didn't happen with common-grade or even uncommon-grade fabrications. Before the glow could dim completely, the Spell's voice echoed in my ears. [Congratulations! You have crafted an Elite-grade Fabricator. Although you have received outside help, there is no denying that your skill at Artificing has reached above Novice rank.] [Congratulations! You have met the requirements for a Noble Honour.] [Honour Obtained: Novice Artisan (Noble).]"Mum, isn't the Novice Artisan Honour only supposed to come once I complete a hundred creations?" She tore her eyes away from the shimmering paperweight and blinked at me.

"Quickly," she practically shouted, "sit down and channel Essence Unification. There is significant gravitas in a noble honour—it might allow you to form another Aether root." But it hadn't even been a full month since the last time I advanced. I wanted to voice that out, but as she said it, I also felt a quiet pull of essence through my two essence roots. Moreover, from the look of it, it felt like I could pull even more if I simply put my mind to it.

So, without hesitation, I sat cross-legged and channelled my essence into the familiar path of Unification.