Chương 116: Onóra

Cardivar was once a city in the Fifth Ring. It wasn't there anymore, but that was neither here nor there. It was known as the last mercantile hub before the unreachable wasteland of the Sixth Ring, situated on a wide river that could be used to carry goods all the way down to the Fourth Ring. Whereas a city like Shirren eventually got itself together enough to plan orderly streets and infrastructure, Cardivar was lawless in every possible way it could be.

The Fifth Ring was the highest Ring to have a native population. Children couldn't survive being born into higher Rings - people can only advance there if they've built up their fórsa through Ascendancy. The only people who lived so close to the edge are those who are striving to become an Ascendant - or those trying to make money off of them. Eoin was in the latter category. He had a small gem shop hidden in a back alley in one of the seedier parts of the city, which suited him just fine.

In years past he'd had fancy showrooms or extravagant workshops in the richest parts of town, but he found that sort of profile came with expectations and responsibilities he didn't care to fulfil. Glad-handing customers, cozying up to the rich détentes of the city, pretending to fawn over this and that rising star who was clearly headed for success in the Sixth Ring! He left that to his more visible partner these days.

Eoin was happy to be the silent stakeholder that provided the rarest and most powerful gem machinery, and he was willing to lose fifty percent to keep it that way. After all, the baubles that provided the majority of their revenue barely took him an afternoon to craft. The real value was in the free time this earned him to research and develop new things. Which was why he was astonished to find a young Banshee girl standing in the middle of his shop when he entered it that morning.

Instantly he gathered Mist for needles, but left them unformed.

"Can I help you, ma'am?" The girl looked at him with an eager flush to her paper-white cheeks.

"You're Eoin Daithi." Eoin sighed. It had been years since this had happened. Though his early years were a fog to him even at this time, he could remember a period when he had basked in the glory that brilliance had afforded him. He was the most renowned gemcrafter in the Tír, and his years of staying incognito had not dimmed his fame. In fact, it made obtaining an Eoin Daithi original something of a quest for young, rich collectors.

"I don't know what sort of trinket you're looking for, but you won't find it here. There are dozens of shops in this tangle of a city where you can buy whatever it is you're looking for. You have my leave to tell people you bought it from me. Now if you will excuse me?" Her bright, shining eyes never left his.

"I don't need to buy anything. Whatever I can make is better anyway."

"Oh. You're that kind," Eoin said, exasperated.

"Let's just get it out of the way. Yes, yes, your gem work is superb! Genius level, even! Why, your parents didn't waste their money on your rigidly formal education one bit! Might I say, these are the best gems I have ever seen! And at your age, too! Great, now if that's all you needed, I will welcome you to leave my shop once more."

"I'm not here for that," she said calmly.

"You're supposed to be the best gem maker around. I've learned a lot by tracing your steps through the Tír. And now that I'm here, I want to know if there's anything else to learn from you. Or, if I've surpassed you already." Eoin couldn't hide a grin.

"Ha! Well, that's a new one. But I can tell you now, that while it's a certainty that there is more I could teach you, there is nothing I am willing to teach." The girl's eyes twinkled and a dozen mist needles launched from behind her back towards his face. Eoin was certainly startled - not at the attack; he always kept one invisible lens deployed when talking to people, which he used to help read their intentions. He could see her fórsa shifting easily.

He was surprised at the type of attack - as far as he was aware, Mist Needles was a technique he invented. Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. He didn't have to move a muscle as the same number of needles appeared, easily intercepting hers - plus one more, which he sent to hover right in front of her left eye.

"Intriguing," Eoin said.

"But slow." A hint of anger touched her face now - she had really thought it would be that easy?

"You saw that coming."

"Easily." A water knife launched from behind him, aimed at his back - easily deflected with more needles. Eoin sighed.

"Now you're getting more predictable than before. I do want to ask where you picked up that needle attack. I thought it was an Eoin Daithi special." The girl glowered at him now.

"Like I said, I studied you, everywhere you went. It wasn't hard to figure out the type of attack you used. Since I am also a Mist Adept, it was one I could adapt for myself."

"Except you're using too much power for them," Eoin said.

"The strength in the needle shape is its efficiency. It takes so little fórsa to create them and to move them. When you leave too much power in them, the amateur thinks they are making a more powerful attack. The educated individual realizes she's only making a slower one." She clearly seethed at the "amateur" description.

"Fine. I should have expected you to be better at that. It is, as you pointed out, your technique. But you cannot possibly exceed me at actual gemcrafting." Eoin smiled. He was actually enjoying this conversation for once. It was like studying an interesting insect or fauna. He supposed he could indulge longer - the new facet configuration idea he had been dying to work on this morning could wait.

"Fine. Your tenacity has earned you an evaluation. Please, show me your best gem." The girl produced a small object from inside her cloak.

"This is a gem for removing contaminants in water. I sold many of these in the Second Ring as I was just starting out. It's the one I have iterated on the longest." Eoin raised one eyebrow.

"You're a born Second?" She gave a triumphant grin.

"I'm here now."

"Impressive on its own," Eoin admitted. He summoned three lenses and took the gem from the girl. She was not wrong. It was a masterpiece. He could see the refined facet shapes for isolating Water fórsa - that was a common pattern for these sorts of gems - but what was actually brilliant was the catalyzing agent she used for purging contaminants. Most of these sorts of gems used an infusion of fórsa-enriched charcoal to capture anything that wasn't water, but that gave these tools a short usage life.

You had to replace them in only six or seven uses. What this girl had done was to create centrifugal spin inside the gem matrix. Contaminants were flung to the outside of the structure while the water-isolated facets held the purified liquid in the center. Wait though… there was a better way to do it. This way, the centrifugal force had to be continued as the water moved through the gem - it meant that you could only purify in batches - siphoning out the water, then leeching out the contaminants.

Time-consuming and prone to error. Before he realized it he was building his own version of this design, tweaking as thoughts came to him, reshaping the whole fórsa flow. The trick was to keep the spin going in a separate matrix chamber, but siphon the water down to one in which it could be stilled. But how to remove the contaminants in a flow such that water could be continually purified? Perhaps the answer was also in the spin - it would move in pulses?

He fashioned a structure that would act as a spout for contaminant delivery before he realized a far better way to do it. Just like everything else, the contaminants were fórsa - he could use them. He scrapped the spout and built a structure so complex that it required six layers of lenses to see and manipulate. This would burn the contaminants as fuel. All you had to do now was to prime the fórsa chain with a little fórsa of your own and this would operate continually as long as it was fed contaminated water.

The girl had handed him a gem for cleaning a cup of water. He had turned it into a filter that could serve as the infrastructure for a whole village's water system. Oh, wait, the girl. Eoin looked up - it was night now… how long had it been since he had so thoroughly lost track of time? He looked around and saw her standing exactly where he had last seen her, watching him deconstruct her work. He expected her to be impressed, to beg for his instruction, as they all did when they saw what he was truly capable of.

All he saw on her face was fury.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"It was a masterfully innovative design. I shouldn't have…" The intensity of her envy was palpable. He could almost fill the sting or her hate, seasoned with unavoidable admiration. One of the skills Eoin prided himself on most was in seeing the value in raw materials. What gems could be put to what purpose, what catalysts might bring the best effects, when other gemcrafters might turn up their nose at materials long thought useless. He recognized when there was value to something he could use.

"You want to be able to do this?" he asked bluntly. The girl glared at him, then nodded.

"Then be here early in the morning tomorrow. Your name?" The word came out spat like a curse.

"Onóra."