That was a sobering thought. I made my way home, and then drifted off while thinking about rune designs.
The next Magic Theory class was pretty basic stuff, and the Physical Combat class was mostly focused on stretches and footwork. We all had mandatory physical training three times a week on top of the combat class. Even if this wasn’t as strict as a true military academy, we were expected to be in reasonable enough shape to survive military training after we left.
Introductory Runes proved less exciting than I’d hoped. The teacher just summarized what I’d already read in the beginning of the book. It was with a feeling of dejection that I headed into The Art of Artifice afterward.
“Your runes class is useless.”
I blinked at that, focusing on the teacher. She was a short, thick, older woman with the same olive skin coloring most of the students had and dark, graying hair. She could have been anyone’s grandmother.
She leaned heavily on the lectern, sounding exasperated. “If you’re here, that means you’ve decided to commit to some actual enchanting. Not the kind of useless garbage they’re teaching in the standard curriculum. Good for you for taking the initiative. This will be your hardest class. If you’re not interested in being a real Enchanter, leave now. I won’t give you a second chance.”
There were only a few dozen of us in the class. No one left.
“Not leaving? Good. You’re probably just afraid to be the first one to walk out, but that’s good. Fear can be useful. But not as useful as studying.”
She tapped a finger on the table. “Write this down. Elements of Enchanting, volumes one through six. Volatile Runes, by Fairway. Constructing Ritual Matrices, by Conway. And,” she sighed, “Monster Hunting for Amateur Adventurers, by Hawthorne. A book I am loathe to require, but one that sadly proves more accurate than any of the more ‘scholarly’ tomes on the subject.”
“You will read — nay, study —” she actually said nay? I aspired to that level of pretension, “the contents of each and every one of these books before the end of the year, starting with the Elements of Enchanting series. If you’re wondering why there’s a book on monster hunting, you’re already behind, but I’ll be merciful for this last time. Monsters are the single most important source of enchanting materials. If you want to be an Enchanter, you’re going to need to learn about how to find and harvest monster cores, even if you don’t actually do the hunting yourself.”
One of the students stood, indicating she had had a question. The teacher ignored her.
“I’m Professor Vellum. That’s a type of parchment, for those of you who aren’t quite literate yet. Remember that.” She shot an annoyed look at the student who was standing. The student withered beneath her gaze and sat down.
“Now, I’m sure your runes teacher taught you a few things about scratching pretty shapes into things. What she didn’t teach you, I’ll wager, is that those basic enchantments just trap enough mana in an item for a single use. A single use! Whoever would want to make a magical item that can only be used once? It’s horrifically inefficient. And yet, that’s the only thing you would ever learn in the standard curriculum.” She spat out the last two words like they tasted of venom.
“I’m going to teach you children how to work real magic. If you survive this class, you will forge objects of power that will last beyond your lifetimes.” She shot a withering look at a student whose eyes were shining. “No, they won’t be objects of myth and legend — don’t let your dreams get too far ahead of you.” The student deflated, and there were a few snickers.
“Now, who would like to see a bit of magic happen?”
I went home that night with a feeling I hadn’t experienced in what felt like years.
Excitement, mingled with hope.
Professor Vellum was as elitist as Teft in her own way. She’d already punished a few students who hadn’t been paying sufficient attention. But she was going to teach me how to apply my attunement in ways that were useful, and for that I was deeply grateful.
The downside?
It turned out permanent enchantments were expensive.
I ruminated over the details of the lesson.
“Monster cores — those are the glimmering little bits you find when you kill a monster, if you haven’t managed to do something that basic yet — are the purest sources of mana you’re going to come by, aside from disenchanting an existing item. If you want a permanent item, you’re going to need at least three types.”
Vellum held up a finger. “The first is the only one your other teacher is going to tell you about. You’ll need a core for the basic enchantment itself, obviously. Fire core for a fire rune, that sort of thing. Alternatively, you can get someone with the appropriate attunement to power the rune for you if they’re strong enough, and know how to put the exact spell into the rune. I never do this, because people are terrible.”
She held up a second finger. “Second, and one of the first hints of secret knowledge you’ll learn here. You need a second rune and a second core to make the item recharge itself. There are a few varieties of these that tell the item to draw power from different sources to recharge itself. The most common ones draw mana from the wielder.”
Vellum lifted her gaze to the ceiling. “Obviously, these are terrible, and you should never use them. They are, predictably, also the most common.” She looked back at us, expression sharp. “People are terrible, and also stupid.”
She held up a third finger. “The third rune is the most important. It tells the item to stop gathering mana when it’s full. If you forget this rune, or make a mistake on it, your item will eventually explode.” There was a pause as she let this sink in. “As you might expect, since people are both terrible and stupid, many of my students make mistakes on this third rune.”
Vellum took a breath, then let it out. “Typically, these mistakes only result in lost fingers, but there have been a few students who have been more seriously injured. This is unfortunate, because checking if a rune is working properly requires a trivial amount of effort. Simply bring the item to the Divinatory, and they can cast a basic spell to check the rune. Of my students, more than half fail to take this basic precaution, because people are terrible, stupid, and also lazy.”
She folded her arms, leaning against the table. “I mention this lesson every year, and every year, I am disappointed. Nevertheless, in my weakness, I retain some hope that this class will be the one class to finally demonstrate a degree of basic competence. I look forward to being disappointed once again.”
Straightening, she lifted her hands, pressing her palms together beneath her chin. “Now, let’s talk about the types of cores you’ll need…”
I took extensive notes throughout her entire lesson. Oddly, I think her vitriolic sense of humor helped me to focus.
Unfortunately, the cores she was talking about for making permanent items? They’d cost about ten times more coin than I had on hand, just to make a single basic magical item.
We’d get some materials from the academy as a part of the class if I lasted that long. Not a lot, but enough to meet the basic requirements. Barely.
I wasn’t satisfied with that.
I wanted to get to making permanent items as quickly as possible, and that meant either finding a source of income or a direct source for cores.