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“It is a fact of magic on Veird that everything follows the Elements.” Erick said, “This was how one is able to create a spell that generically counters ‘all Blood Magic’, or which destroys all of a specific Elemental magic, or, in extreme cases, destroys enough of the magic inside of a specific spell that you have countered the entirety of that spell.”

Jane watched her father speak, then she turned to the other Archmage in attendance.

Tenebrae scowled, then said, “There are so many holes in that theorem that I don’t know where to begin, so let’s start with the most obvious. [Force Boulder]. A spell composed of Force and Stone. Counter one half of the spell and you still have the stone hurtling toward your skull.”

Erick calmly said, “Generalized theories are never the whole story, but what you asked for—”

“Your daughter is already ruined enough with your crazy ideas. It’s a good thing I demanded this nonsense, otherwise you’d ruin her even more!”

The sun had risen an hour ago, but before that happened, Erick was awake and Palodia caught him in the courtyard. She asked him about what he liked to eat, and almost right after they started talking, Jane, Teressa, and Poi, who were awake as well, joined in the conversation. Palodia was happy to talk of food. She promised to serve some ‘pizza’ and ‘fries’ after they stopped moving and a Rocky went out for resupply, but breakfast would be ready in just another hour, after she got started on it. Did they have anything in particular they wanted, today? Jane wanted fried toast and sausage, and so, after explaining what she meant by ‘fried toast’, which was just french toast but that naming convention wouldn’t mean anything to anyone on Veird, Palodia went back to the kitchen, promising that Jane would get her request.

And now, they were at breakfast. Tenebrae joined them, of course, seeming to need to force himself to come out of his tower while complaining about ‘fried toast’ all the while. Tenebrae sat down at the table, of which everyone had a nice chair this time, while Palodia served them all in the same family-style dinner as yesterday.

Spicy sausages, fluffy eggs, crisp fried toast, and a hearty breakfast tea. It wasn’t the most lavish of meals. It was not a feast. But it was perfect, and that mattered more than anything else. Palodia was a Cook, with the Class Ability, Perfect Meal. It helped her to make everything just a little bit nicer, a little bit more rounded and healthy.

Breakfast looked to be great!

And then Tenebrae opened his mouth and spoke of how he wasn’t happy that Erick was stealing secrets out of the little words that he had let loose. The older archmage used harsher language than that, and there were threats regarding souls and minds and blood, but Erick let those threats wash over him, as he tried to play nice. He even suggested that they engaged in a [Strike]-for-[Strike], as Arbor Nosier had called it. A hint for a hint.

Tenebrae instantly latched on to that idea.

He declared that Erick was already down at least two [Strike]s, even if he hadn’t perfected his [Anti-Blood Charm], or made an [Appraisal] spell. And then he demanded Erick start divulging everything, from the beginning. What was the most basic bit of information Erick had on magic. How did he approach magic? That sort of thing.

Erick calmly reminded Tenebrae that he had only picked up tiny hints from Tenebrae, not full magical essays, but then he rushed forward, and started talking. Maybe, Tenebrae would be nicer after they talked for a while. That was the idea, anyway.

But then, Erick had barely gotten past answering Tenebrae’s first question, and Tenebrae was already complaining, and in a way Erick never expected! To declare that Erick was ruining Jane’s magical aptitude? What!

Erick was now personally offended.

“I have not ruined my daughter.” Erick huffed. “I have—!” He continued, more calmly, “My methods work.”

“They work because you have uncommonly deep delusions that they will work.” Tenebrae said, “You see the same sort of savant-like ability in the criminally insane who go around making the best [Force Trap]-derivative spells in a generation, where most people are barely capable of making [Stone Trap], or anything of that nature. You also see it in those who partake of mind altering substances in order to solidify a spell they’ve been workboarding for years. Anything to get them over that final hump. Anyone with enough intent can cause all sorts of strange phenomena.

“This is, in fact, one of the ways that mages usually end up killing themselves. They desire something so strong, like the casting of a spell which obliterates a target without care for the collateral damage, and thus the mana responds, accidentally killing them in the process. It is this ‘deep intent’ that will strip away the Script’s safeguards and cause blood and soul damage larger than normal.” He added, “It’s not your fault you have undertaken this flawed methodology. People are emotional creatures, and no mage becomes a mage without some sort of deep desire to change the world, and then believing that they are capable of achieving such a thing. But it is your fault if you continue on this path! I retract my previous question. I don’t want to listen to your delusions about magic. Where you claim to start your spells is not where one should start their spells.”

Erick sat in his chair, his fluffy eggs getting cold. He waited.

Tenebrae calmed. Then he said, “I appear to be even more [Strike]s to my favor. So. I will ask this: Tell me how [Cascade Imaging] works.”

Erick considered. Then he gave a non-answer, “Invisible light.”

Tenebrae considered this. He narrowed his eyes and gazed off into the distance. After a moment, he looked to Erick. “But it’s Particle Magic.”

“[Cascade Imaging] is indeed Particle Magic. I hope that satisfies, since it was about the level of the hint you gave me for [Analyze] and [Blood Dummy]. What’s your next question?”

Tenebrae almost frowned, but he did not. Instead, he resumed eating his breakfast. Erick resumed eating, too. It was slightly cold, but that was fine.

Tenebrae did not ask his question.

After breakfast, Tenebrae retreated into his tower.

And then Jane asked for help with her magic. She wanted her father to continue whatever it was he was saying, earlier. Erick had never actually spoken that way about his spellwork before.

Erick happily obliged, almost beside himself with quiet joy that his daughter wanted to learn from him again. He set up a chalkboard in the courtyard, since there was no space in the rooms for this sort of thing and the courtyard was mostly empty, except for the occasional pair of Rockys walking through from one part of the place to another.

He barely got through an introduction to the elements, as Syllea had once informed him, before the door to Tenebrae’s tower crashed open and the old archmage strode into the courtyard. Erick and Jane watched the man rush into their little talk, whereupon he conjured a chair for himself and sat down.

Erick paused in his explanation as he looked at him—

Tenebrae gestured forward, saying, “Get on with it! Let’s hear how wrong you have it all!”

Erick had not been counting on Tenebrae showing up, but he had a plan for that potential event. He said, “This will discharge all of my debt toward you, and then go even further, putting you in debt to me.”

“Nope. Because I’m going to correct you when you’re wrong.”

“Then at least the first half.”

“Again. No. Because I’m going to correct you when you’re wrong. You will owe me even more.” He said to Jane, “You shouldn’t even take part in this correction. You’re completely inexperienced and I have no doubt that your father’s words have damaged your ability to create magic of your own.” He said to Erick, “She hasn’t even made a good [Fireball] spell and you’re talking about countering elemental spells! This is bad teaching. There is the problem of Spatial Magic learning but even worse! There is a reason that we don’t allow the teaching of Spatial Magic in normal classes; all they end up creating is [Partial Teleport], and then they eventually, somehow, cast a basic [Teleport] wrong and kill themselves!”

Erick frowned. “… You can cast [Teleport] wrong? When you’re using the spell you buy from the Script?”

“Yes! My gods you didn’t know that either—” Tenebrae said, “[Teleport] puts you where you could have been. Some people can’t even cast that spell in the direction of the ocean because they’ve never swum that far out to sea and they could never see themselves doing that. Some people couldn’t use the spell to even go three towns over! Why do you think the Wayfarer’s Guild exists! In another example, for almost anyone, [Teleport] won’t let you [Teleport] over the Firemaw unless you demand such from the spell, which from your tone, I see that you demand weird things from [Teleport] all the time, don’t you!”

“I haven’t used [Teleport] in almost a month.” Erick added, “And I never felt or heard of what you’re talking about in all my [Teleport]s before then, so I can only assume you are lying to me or being purposefully obfuscating. That spell has never steered me wrong or put me anywhere I did not expect to be put.”

Jane added, “Me either. Never heard that or felt that.”

Tenebrae almost burst out at Erick, but then he turned and regarded Jane. His tone turned questioning, “Never? You never felt a ‘sticking’ odd sensation when you try to [Teleport] somewhere you’ve never been?”

Jane said, “Maybe at the beginning? I don’t actually recall. If I did, it must have been forgettable.”

Tenebrae focused on Jane. “Tell me: how often have you tried to [Teleport] into places you have never been?”

“A few times?” Jane said, “Mostly just in directions, like: ‘1000 kilometers in that direction, toward Spur’ or in other directions, toward a destination.”

Erick said, “Me too. Same thing.”

Tenebrae frowned. “Almost everyone experiences this ‘stuttering’ of [Teleport]. It is a common, well known phenomena. What was the first spell you experienced?”

Jane laughed, then said, “Uh! Melemizargo [Teleport]ing us to the surface? Yeah. A few kilometers above, actually.”

Erick regarded Tenebrae, unsure. “Are you talking about the problems of [Teleport 1]?”

Erick had had problems with wardlights back when his [Ward] was not max level.

Tenebrae kept frowning. “I am talking about the base spell, fully leveled; [Teleport X].” He asked, “Aside from [Teleport]ing for distance, do you ever try to [Teleport] where you have never been?”

“Never,” Erick said.

“Never,” Jane echoed, with a bit more force than her father.

Erick looked to his daughter. “Really? Never?”

Tenebrae leaned back, and watched Erick and Jane through narrowed eyes.

“I was caught up on the idea of ‘Teleporting Paladin’ when I came here, but that idea was based around many campaigns where my GM back in high school ruled hard for [Teleport].” Jane said, “I respect that spell. [Teleport] on Veird is positively beautiful compared to the [Teleport] I had been expecting. [Polymorph] is awesome, too!”

“But you’re so cavalier about [Polymorph]?” Erick asked.

“[Polymorph] is not scary either, Dad. I don’t understand your problem with that spell, either.”

Before Erick could speak of missing hearts or lungs, or skulls that crushed the brain in an experimental [Polymorph], or the fact that you didn’t have a brain as a slime (how the fuck does that work?!) or any of that, even if he knew there was no actual problem because Magic—

Tenebrae asked him, “You have a problem with [Polymorph]?”

“It’s just a bit terrifying, isn’t it?”

“No, it is not,” Tenebrae said.

And Erick had enough intelligence to shut up about his unfounded fears of [Polymorph]. Fear is the mind-killer, after all, and Jane did not need to take on Erick’s fears.

Tenebrae looked back to Jane, saying, “You do have experience with a lot of magic, don’t you, Jane. Even if it was imaginary. Maybe that is the answer, here. You believe that magic is solid, but in a way that is contrary to how it is. This produces a problem when you’re trying to make magics and all you can think of is how you would have thought of it back on Earth.” He looked to Erick. “You’re open to whatever.”

Erick connected a few dots there, too.

With accusation in his voice, Erick said, “I thought Jane’s report to the Headmaster was confidential.”

Jane suddenly sat straight. “What? That was confidential!”

“And I’m an archmage in league with other archmages, including the Headmaster. What of it?” Tenebrae barreled forward, “I think the real answer here as to why you’re so bad and Erick is… decent… is because you’re pulling at deeper magic, trying to emulate what you have seen your father do, while your father came to the magic quite naturally. Still doesn’t explain why you never experienced the common problems of [Teleport]— Oh! Wait! You’re planar. Ah.” He sighed, and smiled. “That’s it. That grand transition to Veird was likely the first magic you experienced. I got it, now. It’s a common thing in some parts of the world for parents to inundate their children with specific magics, in hopes that they can rise to greatness on those magics. It works, sometimes. I never put much stock in any of that, for all the good outcomes were anecdotal and all the bad outcomes were well documented. In your first moments of magic, you were inundated with Spatial Magic.”

Jane said, “I’ve never heard about any of that, though...”

Erick lost some of his anger, as he considered what had come before.

Tenebrae shrugged. “Blame your own lack of education. Or glance at the people you lived around for the last year.” He gestured to the house behind them, where Teressa was lounging inside, reading a book, then to the side, where Poi sat in a chair, reading his own book.

Poi raised his head to look at the old archmage.

Tenebrae continued, “A nomad adventurer who likely broke herself of the mental block that hampers [Teleport] long ago, and a Mind Mage, who likely had that thought drowned out of him when he came to Spur, where everyone in that city got there either through their own Spatial Magics, or through the Wayfarer’s Guild. It’s no wonder you never heard of this. If you had been born and raised on a nothing-farm in some nothing-part-of-the-world where you never moved outside of a ten square kilometer box your entire life, you would have had a lot of trouble with [Teleport]. But surely you had trouble with some spells. So what were they?”

Erick went with the flow, saying, “I had a lot of trouble with wardlights until I came to magic with an open, unafraid mind.” He gestured to the right, and cast a complicated structure of—

Tenebrae lifted his hand. “[Dispel]!”

The light sculpture that Erick had been trying to make, collapsed. White light broke into motes that drifted into the ambient manasphere like so much disappearing dust. Erick was almost too stunned to be mad, and then he was mad.

Tenebrae glowered. “It’s rude to cast magic in Polite Society without announcing it first.”

Erick clipped off his angry response, and said, “You’re right. It is.”

“And yes! You cannot be afraid of magic if you wish to be a mage!” Tenebrae laughed right at him. “It’s a wonder you got anywhere at all! Your methods are not applicable to everyone. Your magic is not foolproof. You are not the archmage you pretend to be! So! Continue with your basic lesson, Erick, and I will point out more problems and their roots.” Tenebrae smiled. “This is fun.”

“…” Erick gestured to his chalkboard. “So as I was saying, all magic is based on the Elements—”

“Wrong!” Tenebrae said, “Shaping is just as important as Elemental usage. For instance, Spatial Magic is not Elemental, at all! Many magics are not Elemental. [Teleport], [Mend], [Telekinesis], and more! If all you deal with is Elemental magic, then you are only learning half of the story—”

Erick interrupted, “Force is an Element. Spatial Magic is therefore based in Force.”

With a greater smile, Tenebrae said, “Force is the absence of Elemental power! Your conventions are not normal conventions, Erick! And I bet you can’t even shape— No. Wait…” He looked at Erick, and saw something there that made Erick worried. Tenebrae said, “Ha! Your problems are even more basic than that. You just never considered the shape, did you?” Tenebrae instantly recanted, “No. That’s wrong. You must have considered the shapes of your magic otherwise you would never have gotten anywhere. When you make a magic, how do you shape the magic?”

Erick found himself figuratively stripped bare.

First of all, Force was an Element, for sure. Erick had no idea what Tenebrae was smoking, but Force was definitely an Element. It was even in that book of Elements that Syllea recommended. And, also, Erick was adept at making magic. He had made Force Element spells before. Force was an Element!

But.

Shaping was important. Possibly even more important than the Elements that would occupy the shape of the desired magic.

Shape was so important, that Erick had never really considered the shapes of his magic, at all.

Of course you would need a canvas before you began painting. Of course you needed a turkey for Thanksgiving, or a car before you considered going on a road trip, or a house before you considered hosting a house party. These were just givens that Erick had never truly considered more than ‘oh yeah, this is what is necessary’. Therefore, the shapes of Erick’s magic was exactly what it needed to be.

But had Erick ever truly considered the shape before? Yes, and also no.

Erick answered, “I shape the magic in the most cost-effective way I can think of for any particular spell.”

“Boil a stew to burned residue!” Tenebrae laughed. He demanded, almost joyfully, “How do you actually shape your spells? Let us discuss [Ice Spike]. And no! Not you.” He looked to Jane. “You. You’ve heard from your father. You’ve had lessons before this, for sure. So! [Ice Spike]! Tell me where you would begin.”

Jane looked to Erick, and Erick gave a ‘whatever’ face.

Jane paused in thought, then said, “[Force Bolt] with Mana Altering for Ice, then infusing the idea with… Motionless thoughts of motion, touching and impacting the target.”

Tenebrae nodded, then said, “Basic start, muddling middle, basic ending. A failure of a spell. Perfectly normal. Not good enough for an aspiring mage.” He looked to Erick. “Now you.”

Jane sputtered.

Erick almost warned Tenebrae off from talking to his daughter like that, but that would lead to a deterioration of everything; ruin lay in that direction. He did glance at Jane, though. She glanced back at him, and calmed, putting her own professional facade back on. She handled herself just fine.

Erick turned to Tenebrae, and said, “Mana Altering for Ice and [Force Bolt], channeling the mana for both through my hands to hear them—”

“What is this nonse—!”

“You asked. Let me finish. Tear apart the whole thing, after I am done explaining. Please.”

Tenebrae scowled. “… Continue.”

“First, I decipher Elemental Ice, which is a variant element of Water, which is technically the sound for Water but slightly larger, since frozen water is larger than ice. There’re also connotations of deepness and spreading and the leeching of all heat in there, and some Particle ideas, but I need not go too far for those when it comes to [Ice Bolt], which is the kind of spell I would prefer to make; not [Ice Spike]. I like actually hitting my target, and—”

Tenebrae interrupted, “Not what I asked for, but sound reasoning and not everyone can aim properly, though you give up most chances to critical when you do this. That you have this failing is not the largest of your failings. I will allow it.”

“… And then I take the sounds of [Force Bolt] and join them with the sound of Ice, and create a cohesive whole, which I then shape into something that is sure to touch the target, and to bypass all defenses. In this way, I make an Ethereal, Inexorable [Ice Bolt], which is probably upgraded to [Glacial Bolt], or something. I haven’t actually tried that particular one yet.”

Tenebrae smiled, showing off white teeth. “You haven’t made this one? Lying now, are we?”

“Ah… Wait.” Erick just remembered, “I have made this one. But it was long ago, and…” He looked up his Status. “Ah. It’s called [Ice Spike]. I made it back when I was first starting. I would make a different one if I was doing this today. I must have barely tripped the line toward the naming conventions… Or something. I made [Glacial Crash] using this spell and then Mana Altering for fire, and that one does not have ‘unerring’. I could probably remake that one, too.”

“Let me see. Both spells.”

Erick… decided to show him.

--

Ice Spike, instant, long range, 22 MP

A bolt of pure ice unerringly strikes a target for 55 + WIL

--

Glacial Crash, instant, long range, 55 MP

A shard of pure ice strikes a target for 200 + 2x WIL

--

Erick watched as Tenebrae read. The man obviously wanted to tear Erick a new one, but his joyful sneer vanished, replaced by a small frown. And then Tenebrae’s smile returned.

Tenebrae said, “Over four times the original cost for what is surely a fraction of the damage of a four-times [Force Bolt], depending on your Willpower. And no ability to Slow the target; which is the purpose of Ice Altering. A failure of the spell. The second is even worse! The only impressive thing at all is that you have managed to combine the diametrically opposed Elements of Ice and Fire into this [Glacial Crash] while managing to retain the ‘pure’ designation. If I were you, I would rip these up and try again. They are a disgrace for any archmage, even if the archmage in question is you.”

“You’re right.” Erick deleted the spells immediately, saying, “I have erased them. I will be remaking [Ice Bolt] at my earliest convenience.”

Tenebrae narrowed his eyes. They flickered grey. He nodded. “And barely a shift…” He sat up. “At least you were aware enough of your own shortcomings so that you didn’t need to uproot a whole tree of spell failures.”

“Yup.” Erick said, “I only ever made the two, and that was way at the beginning. I have only been at this for a year. Please forgive me for my failures.”

“Not forgiven. Not yet. Maybe not ever.” Tenebrae said, “Especially when you talk of ‘musically combining spells’! Even the Songstresses of the Songli Highlands use some maths in their magic.”

Erick felt his heart sink. “Oh, gods. Math.”

Tenebrae laughed. “Yes! Maths! I have decided where we shall begin with your reeducation!”

… He was getting a reeducation?

Tenebrae declared, “We will work on proper spell matrices! Gridwork! This would enable a clarity of shaping and elemental designations much more than your ridiculous ‘hearing the magic’ ever could. Not everyone hears properly, and emotional magic is insanity waiting to happen. Your methods are deeply flawed, even if they have —somehow!— worked for you.” He stood and flicked his hand at Erick. “Get away from that chalkboard. I will speak of the true basic start to any spell creation! I will speak of gridwork, and you will learn.”

Erick… thought he might have heard of gridwork before, but he wasn’t quite sure. It might have been in some of those math classes at Oceanside. But! Whatever! This might as well be happening. Erick walked to the chair beside Jane and sat down.

Jane raised her hand, hoping to ask a question.

Tenebrae glowered, then warned, “If you dare to say some variation of ‘Doesn’t the Script do it all for me’, then I will end this talk now and you’re not getting dinner for a week.”

Jane kept her hand raised. She did not flinch under Tenebrae’s glower. She did, however, put on an even nicer, more congenial smile.

“… Ask your question.”

Jane asked, “Isn’t all math just a representation of the real world? Or do maths have some actual, intrinsic function upon magic? Does 2 plus 2 have a basis in this reality?”

Tenebrae paused, as though he had walked into an [Invisible Force Wall]. He asked, “What? Where would you ever get that idea? Mana is possibility, and maths have a direct effect upon the world through the act of sympathy, which is the oldest and best known way in which magic functions, as its most core. Mana is possibility. Magic is the shaping and condensation of possibility. Maths are how you turn Possibility into Reality. Maths are magic, and they’re also not. Maths are sympathy at its most core. Maths are representative, and also so much more than that. I could repeat it a few different ways, but you get the idea. I hope.” Tenebrae added, “But while 2 plus 2 does not have a basis in our reality, it does have a basis in our subjective, personal Reality, therefore it does have a use when considering the symbology we erect in order to enact sympathy with the mana in order to create magic. Do you understand? I cannot make it more basic than that.”

Jane nodded. “Sympathy. Right. Makes sense.”

“… Do you know of sympathy?” Tenebrae asked, almost dumbfounded.

Jane said, “Like-works-as-like.”

Tenebrae found his footing again, saying, “Okay. Yes. For a second there I thought I would need to talk to you as if you were a complete idio—” He rounded on Erick. “Did you know of sympathy, before now?”

“Yes.” Erick said, “I knew. Which is why I never bothered to learn the math. I got plenty of sympathy already. Just, not with the maths.”

Jane said, “I told him about that stuff years and years ago. It was part of Earth’s magic traditions.”

Tenebrae frowned; silent. Then he said, “I’ve read your reports to the Headmaster, but explain what you just said.”

Jane said, “If you have read all my reports to the Headmaster, you might have noticed that there’s so many parallels from Earth’s magic to the magic of Veird. There are even some parallels with animals like the unicorn and the ideas of elves and fae and angels and demons, too, but what I have seen on Veird is only partially similar to what has been imagined on Earth, and that is a whole different topic, somewhat. Not a fully different topic, because. Well...

“The similarities might have to do with all the magic that poured into this universe from the Sundering, that was not caught and kept by the Script. Maybe that unbound mana moved faster than light and instantly spread across the universe, catching upon the various worlds out there, and remained, somehow? There’s obviously some broken physics in there, which seems to go hand-in-hand with mana, or maybe something even stranger happened, but whatever the case, maybe some of that mana fell to Earth and we fell into a pocket of it, or something. Not too sure about that. But they do say that you cannot destroy mana, so while I suspect a lot of it fell into stars or black holes, a lot of it must have found planets like our Earth. This is what I mean when I talk about Earth’s magical traditions having parallels with Veird. But they’re, like, strange parallels.

“And then, there’s the idea that mana is also Melemizargo, therefore it is possible that Melemizargo is already on many different worlds, and he just doesn’t know it.” Jane asked Tenebrae, “He is the mana, isn’t he? That’s what I’ve heard.”

Erick and Tenebrae both listened to Jane, but while Tenebrae’s eyes turned distant and fearful, Erick was just proud.

His daughter had independently come to a lot of the same conclusions he had; Erick had just never expressed them, for those were terribly scary thoughts, as Tenebrae was currently demonstrating. Erick had hoped to never give those thoughts a voice, but there they were, suddenly, out in the open, and put out there by someone other than himself. He didn’t want his daughter out there on her own though, so—

Erick said, “I’ve heard that Melemizargo is the mana, too. I’m pretty sure that your ideas are exactly close to what might have happened, Jane, or at least I’ve had the same ones. I just… Didn’t want to voice those thoughts.”

Jane sat back in her chair, looking triumphant, as she playfully chided, “Can’t be scared of the magic, dad.”

Erick laughed. “I guess you’re right.”

Tenebrae startled. He declared, “This lesson is over.”

The older archmage rapidly walked away, visibly disturbed, and silent, back through the door at the base of his tower. The door to Tenebrae’s tower slowly closed shut, all on its own.

Erick and Jane, and Poi, watched that happen.

A moment passed.

Uh. So. That just happened.

“… Huh.” Jane said, “I did not expect that reaction from him.”

Erick stared at his daughter, and laughed, nervously. He calmed, but not really. “Giving a voice to the fearful thoughts is not always a good idea.”

“Eh.” Jane said, “Try not to worry about that stuff. Let’s just enjoy the adventure of it all.”

Erick smiled, and he just had to hug his daughter, so he leaned over and wrapped his arms around her. She laughed over his shoulder as she hugged him too, and patted him on the back.

“Love you.”

“Love you, too.” Erick released Jane and went back to the chalkboard, saying, “So! The Elements. I consider Force an Element, but I guess not everyone does. You’ve been reading that book Syllea suggested, right?”

Jane said, “Yeah. It’s in the room. It’s a bit juvenile, but it’s interesting.”

Erick nodded. “So! The Elements—”

Tenebrae’s door slammed open again. “Nope! We’re doing gridwork! Force is not an element!”

Erick sighed.

Then he stepped away from the chalkboard.

Tenebrae retook his position as professor.

A minute later, Erick and Jane watched as Tenebrae stepped away from the chalkboard, looking triumphant over his drawings, or rather, his gridwork he had placed upon the board. And it was a lot of gridwork, and each tiny space was filled with the Ancient Script symbols for various Elements; mostly Fire. He had even had to summon another chalkboard to write out all of his ‘gridwork’.

Ninety-nine, hundred-by-hundred grids, written out over three boards. There were 99 100x100grids because each of those 100x100 grids was a slice of a 3D magic construction, exploded out into exacting detail. When placed next to each other in the proper way, and if you had a hundred, then you wouldn’t have had an exact-center box, which was necessary in about half of magic, since a lot of magic needed a ‘central tenet’, where the Ancient Script symbol was that would hold the whole working together; if it needed such a thing.

Tenebrae explained the basic overview of it all as he cast the gridwork upon the board, but he did not explain everything. Mostly, he just told them what he was doing, but not the ‘why’ of it.

Erick had seen smaller grids like these in his short time in Oceanside, but he had never truly understood them, or even tried to understand them. But now…

This was complicated. And written small. Small enough to require most people to use [Ultrasight] to read the boxes from three meters away. Erick, almost uncomfortably, found he could read all of that just fine without any spells. Jane had had to squint, and then activate [Ultrasight].

The idea of all these grids was simple, though, once you understood that the grids corresponded to individual slices of a spell, taken at the moment of casting. Each box had a symbol that corresponded to An element, or a direction, or a shaping of the magic inside that box. Putting all of this sliced-gridwork together into a 3D lightward, and a mage could see what they would need to do to make the spell therein.

The problem with spell matrices, and why Erick had not seen many of them, was that even a 99 by hundred by hundred matrix could only describe the most basic of magics. No one used this methodology for anything over tier 3, except as a general guide, because gridwork failed at higher densities of spellwork.

But gridwork was great for learning basic magics.

“There! Now you know what you’re looking at.” Tenebrae asked, “So what is this spell? Jane.”

Jane’s eyes went wide. Erick frowned. Was the old archmage picking on Erick’s daughter? All Tenebrae had done was explain a bit about the gridwork in front of him; not what he was actually putting in that gridwork. Was he pouncing on Jane just because he could, just because she had no experience, at all, with this ‘gridwork’? He probably was.

But Jane was smart; she could handle this.

Jane guessed, “Fire… Something. An individual spell. So not… Wave… [Fireball]?”

Erick smiled. That was going to be his guess, too, except—

“Incorrect!” Tenebrae said, “Erick! Now you try!”

Erick frowned, complaining, “What you made has all the hallmarks of [Fireball] what with the majority of the gridwork looking like what I do to manually cast [Force Bomb]. That tiny bit of [Force Wave] you have in there is not a large enough part of the spell to make my daughter necessarily wrong.”

Tenebrae smiled wider. “So what would you name this spell?”

Erick guessed, “[Firewave] or [Fire Spreader]. The purpose seems to create a conflagration at the detonation point that spreads outward, putting all of the damage of the initial spell into the ‘over time’ part of the magic, with almost no damage in the initial effect. A common way to use Fire spells.”

“You have fallen into my trap!” Tenebrae gloated. “It’s [Extinguisher]!”

“What! There’s no Destruction mana anywhere in that—”

Tenebrae pointed at box 50, the center box, at the very center of the spell, and Erick fell silent. Tenebrae had left that central spot blank. Erick had assumed this was because he was not focusing on the explosion part of the spell… or… Actually. He didn’t know why the man had left it blank. The spell had lots of blank spots in its gridwork. None of them really meant anything, except for directions for the surrounding mana to flow, or transform, or…

Erick wasn’t too sure about gridwork, actually. It was one step removed from math and useless for higher level spellwork, so what was the point of learning it?

… To trick people who thought they knew everything? Seemed like a poor way to use a teaching tool.

Okay. Okay. Erick admitted, and only to himself, that he had no idea what was actually going on here.

Poi snorted a laugh to the side.

Tenebrae ignored Poi, and instructed, “A proper [Force Bomb] spell is a 100x100x100 grid. If you knew your gridwork, you would have known that. This one is 99x100x100 to enable this central square in box 50. This blank spot, and all the others, are for Destruction to occur. If you look upon the structure here, and here, you can see that the Fire mana is sucked into the blank spaces, and nothing comes out. In actual casting, this would create Destructive Fire that would nullify any fire in the area. This is how you properly create a Destruction-based spell, since you never use Destruction in itself. You always have the desired Element you wish destroyed to flow into Destruction, or, in some rare cases, for Destruction to overtake the targeted Element. The first instance is normal application, as we see here. The second instance is almost Propagation, and unless you limit the spell most severely, it will not work due to the Propagation Ban of the Script. Don’t use the Propagation-Destruction except in applications of war. This second type of spell usually has ‘Destruction’ in its name. [Fire Destruction], for example.” He said, “It is with gridwork like this, that you create a perfectly-made [Extinguisher] spell, which will be named whatever Rozeta feels like naming your spell, but if you have a name you’re working with, your spell will likely get that name, unless you run counter to the Naming Conventions of the Script, in which case Rozeta will name your spell without your input. Questions?”

Erick had a few, but—

Jane instantly asked, “So circling back to the idea that math is representation is sympathy is magic: If you were to create a [Ward] with this gridwork, what would happen? And if a spell was not created, then why not?”

Erick almost said that nothing would happen. Lightwards were not spells… Right?

Tenebrae’s eyebrows scrunched. He said, “Nothing would happen if you made this out of a lightward. You have to make it out of [Force Bomb], Mana Altering for Fire and Destruction, and [Force Wave].”

Jane asked, “Okay. But. How? How does this translate into all of those things you just said?”

“It just does?” Tenebrae frowned. “I’m not sure what the problem is, here.”

Jane clarified, “Where is the gridwork for [Force Bomb] in the spell [Force Bomb]? I never see grids when I cast.”

Tenebrae frowned, then pointed upward. Erick watched, as the air around the man flickered, twisting inward upon the tip of his finger. A grey dot launched from his digit to soar past the roofs of the castle and detonate with a spack upon the [Air Shield] of the estate, grey light briefly glittering in the explosion. Tenebrae said, “The gridwork is right there. In the manual casting. It’s not actually a part of the spellwork. Gridwork lets you understand how to Shape and Alter the mana while you are casting the spell.”

“Oh!” Jane said, “Manual casting! Okay. Yes. I get that.”

Erick nodded. “That makes sense.”

“… What did you two think I meant?”

“I thought you meant inside [Force Bomb]s blue box.” Jane shrugged. “Somehow… inside that box. I didn’t understand that. How is magic inside the blue box? That makes no sense.”

“I was confused a little, too.” Erick said, “They spoke a little about gridwork in one class I took at Oceanside; that it was somehow in those boxes. I didn’t understand it at all, and the professor never properly clarified. I didn’t even know about manual casting till Kiri looked it up and showed it was possible.”

“Ah. This problem.” Tenebrae said, “Oceanside trains warriors that work for the Headmaster, or other powerhouses around the world. All Arcanaeums are like this. They train warriors, even if they call themselves mages. And they were not wrong to simplify manual casting to the blue boxes. The same thing happens in the manasphere when you activate magic using the Script, but you cannot feel that shift unless you manually cast your magic, but many teachers are forbidden from explaining about the Remake Quests and about aura work. Students have to come to that on their own. Most do, eventually, unless they’re purposefully kept from those lessons when they are deemed a risk to themselves or others. That happens quite a bit, too.” Tenebrae said, “The blue box for [Force Bomb], is one slight step above the truth of manually shaping the mana; it is an automated process to use that box. Meanwhile, Mana Altering is one slight step above the truth of aura altering for the various Elements; it is an automated process to use that box, too. Understanding these deeper truths of Shaping and Altering, through the process of gridwork, will allow you to properly visualize and then work both [Force Bomb] and Fire Altering in the best possible way. Do you understand?”

Jane said, “Okay! That makes a lot of sense!”

Erick understood quite a bit more, now. Gridwork was like the difference between drawing using freeform, or using tools. He begrudgingly admitted, to himself, that this ‘gridwork’ held possibilities.

He liked his own song magic methods, though.

But Jane was rather analytical. Maybe she would do well with this method? She probably would.

Tenebrae asked, “Do either of you have experience at all with using your aura to cast magic?”

Jane said, “I can cast with [Greater Shadowalk], and some of the rest. I have never learned aura control.”

Tenebrae sighed. “Elemental Bodies are shortcuts to aura control, and you need to learn how to properly control your aura.” Tenebrae zeroed in on Jane. “You have [Prismatic Body]. You need to work on turning that into [Greater Prismatic Body], either through remaking it with every Greater Elemental Body, or through aura work and great aura control. I suggest you choose the path of aura control, since this will allow you to mimic much of the smaller aspects of [Greater Prismatic Body] while that particular spell is not active, as well as allow you to cast smaller magics outside of the Script Second. You will be able to cast [Fireball] or any other low-tier spell whenever you wish. This will also save you on mana costs, since you will not need to be constantly running an Elemental Body if you want to simply pick up a cup of tea from the other side of the table. Save your Script Seconds for when they are needed. Never waste them.”

Jane’s eyes went wide. “Casting outside of the Script Second, for everything?”

“No no no!” Tenebrae said, “Low-tier magics, only, that will have full mana costs. It’s not as good as using the Script to cast. Clarity does not work for manually cast magic. But for you, with all of your Elemental Body experience, there are fewer time constraints when you use proper aura control to cast your smaller spells.”

Erick was too busy thinking about the need for better aura control, himself, that he almost missed when Tenebrae rounded on him.

The glowering archmage turned to Erick. “And what of your aura control?”

“Ah…” Erick admitted, “Non-existent outside of [Greater Lightwalk].”

“… What!” Tenebrae exploded, “What travesty is this! And you made it to Archmage with—! How has this happened! What the f—!” He suddenly calmed as he closed his eyes and gripped the bridge of his nose between a thumb and forefinger. He opened his eyes, dropped his hands, and said, “You have given me a headache, Erick Flatt, because you are technically an archmage. You’ve even got a tier 9 spell. You are qualified. And yet, you astound me.” He stared at Erick. He asked, “Are you a Wizard?”

Erick’s response was calm; measured, even. He saw what was coming, and he answered as best he could. “What is a Wizard, exactly? I know they produce their own mana and have a core, but that’s about it. Why does the possession of a core mean that they’re able to overcome the Script?”

Jane seemed unable to help herself as she stared at her father, and then at Tenebrae, then frowned a little, and tried to turn her face unreadable. She mostly failed.

Tenebrae bargained, “I would not be nearly as hostile with you if you were a Wizard. We could work together to achieve something that should have been done a long time ago, for Wizards can truly cast magic outside of the Script. They can remove curses that gods themselves have placed upon lineages, or individuals. They can travel through time, with perfect accuracy, and without Phagar’s limitations. They can create new Elements.” Tenebrae seemed genuine, and sad, and desperate, all at the same time, while trying to appear as none of those. “I ask again. Are you a Wizard?”

“No.”

And it was the truth. Erick had none of the hallmarks anyone had ever said should be there. So what if other people called him a Wizard? That didn’t make it true.

Erick asked, “Should I bring a truthstone with me, too, when I deal with you and your possible ‘lessons’? You claim the Headmaster is purposefully hindering the magical growth of the people of this entire world, and that seems like something I would have been better served to hear while a truthstone was present.”

He didn’t know where it was, but there was no doubt in his mind that there was at least one of those truthstones somewhere around here.

Tenebrae scowled, but the heat was not there. He spoke the truth, “I would never use one of those against you.”

“Ah.” Erick understood. “Because you can just cast the base spells yourself. I should have guessed as much.”

“Exactly!” And then softer, “Exactly.” Tenebrae should have been triumphant; he had won a fight that he thought they were both fighting. But Erick was not fighting, and Tenebrae was not triumphant. He was just sad. “You should have guessed as much. Learn all the magic there is, yourself. Learn to cast as much of it as you can, outside of the Script Second; manually. Delve into the deepest Soul Magic. Explore Mind Magic, and don’t mind the Mind Mages; they get uppity, but you’re beyond them. Rip apart a million monsters to learn Blood Magic. Enchanting is a fine pastime, or a way to make some yellow on the side, but an archmage with need for trinkets is not a true archmage. Even those rings on your fingers… Well. I would have called them useless and a waste of time and even a detriment. But it appears you’ve made artifacts…” He tried again, “And you’re sure you’re not a Wizard?”

“As much as anyone can be sure.” Erick said, “I ask again: How is a Wizard able to overcome the Script?”

Tenebrae sighed, then said, “Okay. Now I’m done.”

And then he walked off. The door to his tower gently shut behind him.

Erick asked Jane, “Do you want to try out some of that ‘gridwork’?”

“Yes!” She said, excitedly. “Do you have any books on that?”

“Nope. We’ll both have to muddle through it together.”

Jane hummed, then looked toward the closed door to Tenebrae’s tower. “… I’ll ask him if he has any books at lunch, maybe.” She turned back, eyeing her father. ‘Are you a Wizard?’

‘Nope.’

Usually, Erick would have felt bad about lying to his daughter, but that was only ‘usually’. This was not a usual case.

‘Okay… Well. If you were… Which type would you want to be? I read all about them. If you picked ‘Time Wizard’ I would tease you relentlessly by calling you The Doctor.’

‘So you’d pick the Paradox Wizard?’

‘...They have a better name for them?’ Jane’s eyes went wide. ‘Paradox, you say! Oh! Okay! Paradox is a lot more varied than I thought! You could do—’

Erick cut in, before Jane got on a roll, sending, ‘I’m going to give you a bit of advice, and I urge you to consider it: Gifts of Time are useless in the face of absolute power. There’s also the Destruction Wizard, and the Creation Wizard. Together with the Paradox Wizard, you have the three archetypes. It’s my understanding that you can only pick one, and that you have to produce your own mana and take that mana and create a core, from which you then cast all your magics. I am almost a hundred percent sure that Wizards are like Shades in that regard. I’m not sure of the connection to Melemizargo and to monsters, but there is one there, for sure.’

Jane listened, then said, ‘I thought I had read about Wizards, but I guess not. That’s a lot more on the subject than I ever found. All I ever found were horror stories.’

‘What sort of horror stories? I never sought any of that out.’

‘Oh… There was that one Wizard Pirate a while ago that terrorized Archipelago Nergal. Hullbreaker was his name, I think. Made a lot of artifacts and stole from every ship he passed as well as created some still-hidden island that no one has been able to find. They say all of his stuff is still there. But I bet the Headmaster found it all. Every Wizard has some hidden caches around the world; that’s how the stories go, anyway. What sort of Wizard do you think Hullbreaker was?’

Erick thought, then said, ‘I don’t know of him. But… Creation— No. I’m not sure.’

‘Creation, eh?’ Jane started to silently think.

Erick changed the subject, speaking aloud, “So? Gridwork?”

Jane went with it, saying, “What does [Force Bolt] look like as a grid? And does it look like what I think it looks like? When I manually make a few hundred at a time with [Greater Shadowalk], I make it like— Well.” She held up her hands and sort of did a spiky, gathering motion. “That’s how it usually happens. Oh! You know what?” She stood, saying, “Let’s make some 3D lightwards for [Force Bolt], and then compare! I’m going to make mine over here.” She rushed into the blocky house and stepped behind a wall, saying, “No peeking!”

Teressa spoke from inside the house, “What are you doing now?”

“Gridwork!” Jane answered.

“Magic stuff. Got it.” Teressa promptly ignored Jane and went back to reading.

Meanwhile, in the courtyard, Erick held a hand up and cast a lightward that was representative of what he did with his [Greater Lightwalk] in order to manually cast a [Force Bolt]. It was a simple design, really. Just gathering mana then linking that mana toward the idea of touching a target in the distance—

Ah.

Erick ran into a problem. How to represent that ‘touching’ aspe— Oh. Put the Ancient Script designation for ‘target’ in the center of the ‘gridwork’. Obviously. But then…

Jane mumbled, “This is more difficult than I thought it would be.”

Teressa absently said, “Mm’hmm.”

Erick heard Teressa flip another page in her book.

Erick concentrated on his own working. He recast his gridwork several times before rapidly abandoning the ‘grids’ after only a few recasts. When he was happy, he dispersed his working, then recast it, attaching the working to the chair beside him. Jane seemed to still be working on hers. Erick waited.

After five minutes, he said, “Okay. Come on back. Let’s check.”

“One sec! It’s taking me…” Silence. “Ah. Blast it all. This is good enough.” Jane walked back into sight, carrying a cube of light that had been divided into smaller and smaller cubes, each with a speck of notation inside of each tiny cube. She held it up, then looked to Erick’s, attached to the chair. “What!”

Erick looked at his own representation of [Force Bolt]. It was fully clear, with no smaller, inner gridworks.

Jane said, “You didn’t even divide that tiny thing into grids!”

“I don’t understand the need for that.” Erick held up his perfectly fine representation, saying, “This is fine! It’s only a 5 mana spell. How complicated do you need to be?”

While Jane’s gridwork was a bunch of arrows and boxes filled with Ancient Script for gathering and targeting, Erick’s spell representation more resembled a bit of glasswork in the shape of a spiral galaxy. The center of his spell had the ‘target’ part of the spell, while four spiral arms contained all of the inexorable and ethereal parts of the spell which were prepared to crash into the center, whereupon the whole thing would then take off and impact the target. The ‘target’ itself was a variable that could change based on need.

Erick’s and Jane’s representations were different in another way, too. His lightward gridwork was a handspan across and a singular construction. Hers was half a meter across, and made of several overlapping lightwards; the ‘grid’ itself was a single lightward, possibly so that she could recast the central ‘work’ pieces as she refined her idea of [Force Bolt].

Erick gestured to the chair next to him, and the accompanying gridwork.

Jane handed him a stone with its attached lightward. She likely kept that stone in her pocket for just such a necessity such as setting a mobile [Ward], for there were no useless stones anywhere in this estate; the place might be boring, but it was immaculate. Erick should keep a useless rock in his pocket, too.

She said, “You should keep around something to attach mobile [Ward]s, dad.”

She handed him her rock. He gestured toward the chair.

They began reading each other’s gridwork.

- - - -

Tenebrae watched them from his position in the Lighthouse. He mumbled, “It’s like giving new toys to deprived children.”

He couldn’t help but smile.

- - - -

Lunch was a nice assortment of thin-sliced beef and vegetable wraps, sweet iced-tea, and then lunch was over, but Tenebrae had yet to dismiss them, for—

“You owe me several answers!” Tenebrae demanded, with a smile.

“… Of course.”

“Let us have a discussion of gridwork and you can go further into debt. To that end:” He turned to Jane, asking, “Do you have any questions about all the gridwork I saw you doing?”

Erick almost mumbled something, but Jane’s excitement was more important.

Jane still took a half-second to look toward her father, but Erick just nodded, and she turned back to Tenebrae and happily asked, “Can you somehow turn a grid into a working artifact? An enchantment, or something? How is gridwork connected to enchanting?”

Jane had come to Erick first with her question, but he had no real answers for her. Enchanting, as far as Erick had tried, did not seem to use the grid-system that Tenebrae had outlined.

Tenebrae said, “Enchanting a gridwork into a workable spell is to create what is known as a manacycler. This is difficult to do, mostly due to size and fidelity concerns. You see: A [Force Bolt] is barely larger than a human thumb. The manacycler for [Force Bolt] must be of the same size, or not too much larger. Attempting otherwise leads to gross inefficiency. While the gridwork can be of any size so it is easier to see and work with, magic itself works best at appropriate sizes.” He paused. He continued, “Manacyclers are not good items to focus on. There are so many issues with manacyclers. You can only make basic spells like this. Mostly Force spells. A few single Mana Alter spells, but only in extremely well-made manacyclers. Can you guess at some of the other problems?”

Erick had an instant answer. But Tenebrae had not asked him.

Jane smiled, excited. Her guesses about gridwork and enchantment had been correct, but both she and Erick had no idea what the resulting ‘enchantment’ would look like. She calmed herself, and asked, “I want to answer that, but first: What does a manacycler look like? I’ve never touched one. I didn’t even know they existed.”

“Ah. Yes. You didn’t know, did you?” Tenebrae lifted his hand toward the kitchen. A fork flew into his hand, becoming a small ball of silver metal along the way. He concentrated on the ball, his eyes flickering grey. The ball expanded, a fraction. A protrusion came out one end, while several slits appeared in the steel. It was a whistle, maybe? He set it in front of Jane. “A whistle of [Force Wall]. All one need do is blow mana into it and the spell structure will activate. This is a crude method, but it works. I could have made this cycler such that you could channel through your hands, but that is a whole different problem that I need not get into right now. Suffice it to say that mana released in the lungs and then blown out is physically stronger than mana channeled through the hand. So: a whistle. Go ahead. Try it. Blow away from the table, please.”

Jane picked up the whistle, poked at it a little, then turned to the side, pressed it to her lips, and blew. Dark blue mana shone out through the slits in the whistle and a barely-there shimmer of solid Force appeared in front of her; a circular shield two meters across. It was a shaped [Force Wall].

Jane held the whistle in her hands, her shadow flickering into the whistle, inspecting it. She frowned. She said, “Okay. I see inside, and… Yeah. That’s complex. That’s why you can only turn basic spells into manacyclers? It gets too complex otherwise?”

Tenebrae nodded. “And let’s not forget that this whistle is based on single-input spellwork; there’s only one hole to blow into. Higher tier work requires input from a thousand angles at once, which is something that you can naturally do with aura work, but not with simple mana expulsions. But! There are some good things to be said of manacyclers. In this application of gridwork I have made an item that cost me no rads to power, and which anyone can use. You can make endless numbers of these for very little cost. With enough use, the mana flowing through them will imprint the item in the manasphere in such a dense and purposeful manner that they can sometimes become minor artifacts in their own right, if only because they become near-unbreakable, what with all that exposure to Force, and all. But still, they are worthless. Can you guess why, now that you have seen one?”

Jane set the whistle on the table in front of her, asking, “You can use this as many times as you want?”

“Yes. As I have said. It is very rare for a mana cycler to break through proper use; they only get stronger.” Tenebrae added, “And you can even use it more than once per Script Second, if you blew really hard. It’s almost as good as a [Quick Wall], but without the ability to put your [Quick Wall]s exactly where you want them. If you stuttered your exhaled mana into that whistle, you might even be able to shape the resulting [Force Wall]s that come out of it.” He digressed, “But there is a problem.”

Jane frowned. She glanced at the air, likely checking her Status, then glanced to the whistle. Her eyes narrowed, then went wide. “Oh.”

“Ah!” Tenebrae said, “You see.”

Jane said, “It cost me 54 mana to make that one [Force Wall]. That’s 4 mana more than the base cost of [Force Wall]’s 50 mana cost. This whistle still costs mana to use. Clarity or Favored Spell or any spell cost reductions… They don’t matter.”

“Exactly. All manually cast spells are like this. They cost full mana to use. When manually casting a spell, it is only through personal skill that you can attain any of the efficiency of Clarity, or any other such ‘spell cost reductions’. ‘Spell cost reduction’ is primarily an aspect of the Script.” Tenebrae said, “That is why these whistles are nothing more than toys. Even if this whistle enables a person to bypass the Script Second, you would be better served with a bandolier of wands. Just tap-tap-tap the wands, and the resulting [Force Wall]s spring up as fast as [Quick Wall]s, and for much cheaper than you could with this little whistle. Oh, sure, there’s a set-up cost to those wands and a risk of theft negating all your hard work, but preparation and scenarios where that preparation will not get stolen from you are more common than not.” He added, “But still: gridwork is good to learn in the same way it is good to learn how to move your arms and legs while you run; all for the sake of efficiency and power. This is the true power of gridwork. Once a person puts their understanding of a basic spell into a grid, it is easy to pick apart, and for an expert to see where, exactly, their casting has gone wrong.”

Jane, with a small frown, asked, “But what if we’re unsure where to even start with gridwork? How does it all come together into higher tier spells? How high can you go with this?”

“That part is simple math. You can simply add the gridwork for various spells together, while following the rules for such additions, and thus find out how best to combine your starter spells in order to make a new one.” Tenebrae said, “You could theoretically go all the way to tier 7 or higher Force Spells with gridwork, but by then you’d be working with a million by million by million sized grid. Or larger! No one does that. Stopping at tier 3 and then learning other maths for the higher tiers is much easier.

“Or! You could try sympathy magic with Ancient Script, which is also a valid way to progress through the tiers. But, even if there is overlap with mana shaping, Rune Magic is rather hit-or-miss and has little bearing on gridwork and established methodology. If you have luck with Rune work, then you should pursue that methodology and become an enchanter, but usually only wrought are capable of good Rune work. I don’t care for it.”

Jane looked skeptical as she asked, “How do you make Rune Magic work? Is it useful for understanding the rest of it? I tried it… but nothing ever came of it.”

Tenebrae smirked, and it was a genuinely happy expression. For a moment, Erick thought the older archmage was actually enjoying his professor-like lecture. Maybe he truly was. But then he looked to Erick, and his expression soured.

“I feel I have talked enough.” Tenebrae asked Erick, “Why don’t you enlighten us what you know of Rune Magic? Succeeded much there, have you?”

Ah. Now they were back on the topic of Erick’s failures.

“I’ve tried Rune Magic for enchanting…” Erick said, “And what you do is create the rune inside the wrought-quality metal item, and then all the channels necessary to allow magic to spark into existence from the mana contained inside the metal and inside of the… Okay. First you have to have the words for your spell inscribed in Ancient Script inside the item, and then you have to fill in those words with rad dust, and then you solidify that rad dust and all the mana channels and all of that with the first casting of the spell contained in that dust. I can make a basic wand of [Force Bolt] using the Ancient Script, but it leaks mana and breaks after only ten to twenty uses.”

Tenebrae sighed in contentment. He almost said some truly unkind thing, Erick was sure, but then he smirked, and the words that came out of him were likely less harsh than they would have been, “Leave the Rune Magic for another day, for that is a field of expertise that is best learned well after the basics of gridwork, for good gridwork will help you with your runework. Even if Runework and gridwork are not the same, all magic has connections to all other magic, and the connections between Rune Magic and Enchanting and gridwork are deep.” Tenebrae said, “I have decided. You still have many questions to answer for me, Erick, but aside from that, we will have a little contest: The creation of a proper [Fireball], made through gridwork.”

Erick suddenly had a lot of reservations about whatever was going on right here and now. Jane looked skeptical, too.

Tenebrae continued, “I’ll have Rocky give you some proper materials on how to manually combine [Force Bomb] and Fire, and you will study them. We will have another discussion over dinner in several hours, where you and your daughter will show me how you would use gridwork to make a [Fireball], then you will make that [Fireball]. A friendly contest after dessert, let’s say.”

Jane’s skepticism vanished as her eyes glittered, but then she looked to her father.

Erick was already saying, “I’m not competing with my daughter—”

“You’re right! You’re an archmage. You will be competing with me, and my [Fireball] that I perfected seventy years ago!” Tenebrae looked to Jane. “Everyone else will be judged according to their own skill.” He looked to Teressa and Poi. “Would you two like to participate? I feel you two have been left out.”

Teressa said, “No, sir. I am not about [Fireball]s or any magic like that.”

“Thank you, but I must decline as well,” Poi said.

“… Unacceptable.” Tenebrae declared, “Erick. Make your people participate. I will count it against your reciprocal questions if they agree. By my count, I have racked up thirty seven questions, and you are deep in debt.”

Erick exclaimed, “How are you even counting to thirty— You know what? Okay.” He looked to Poi and Teressa. “You have the base spells, right? Just play along.”

“Yes yes! We are just playing!” Tenebrae said, smiling.

Teressa frowned. “… Okay.”

Poi said, “Acceptable. I agree. I already have [Fireball], so I will make [Frostball]. How many questions is Erick getting from this?”

“[Frostball] is fine.” Tenebrae said, “And let’s call it 15 fewer questions owed.”

Like he wasn’t just making up those numbers on the spot.

Poi nodded. Teressa briefly looked like someone had kicked sand in her dessert, but she agreed, too.

Jane, however, was bright-eyed and excited.

Erick said, “Okay then. It’s a contest.”

“Good!” Tenebrae nodded. “Now. Tell me: Why do neither of you two have [Fireball]? I can understand Poi and Teressa’s reluctance, but you’re an archmage, and Jane has experience with magic, and everyone tries to make [Fireball]!”

Erick frowned. “They do? It never occurred to me to make that spell. It always seemed so… Pedestrian.”

Tenebrae narrowed his eyes, then relaxed. “An unexpected answer, but understandable.” He looked to Jane.

Everyone looked to Jane, who looked like she had bit into a lemon.

Jane blurted out, “I tried! Okay? I tried.” She frowned, staring down at her empty plate. Then she raised her head, and said, “Every time, every [Fireball] was a 250 mana monstrosity with wildly differing numbers of anywhere between 10+2x Willpower, to 75+1/2x Willpower. The base [Force Bomb] spell is 50+2x Willpower damage. That Basic Spell was better than any Altered version I made. I have no idea what I was doing wrong.”

Teressa nodded in understanding, and so did Poi to a lesser extent.

Erick, however, felt like he was at the bottom of an abyss of terrible shame. He was an archmage, technically, so how had he not been able to help his daughter with her magic? This was somehow all his fault, for sure.

Tenebrae had a very different reaction. He exalted with brief laughter, then said, “There we go! That sounds like normal aspiring-mage problems! Finally!” He asked, “And you never had problems with [Teleport]?”

Jane went from rage at being laughed at, to sudden questioning. She ventured, “No? Never any problems with [Teleport].”

Tenebrae looked to Erick. “And all you ever had trouble with was [Ward]?”

“… And making Ophiel and [Prismatic Ward] and a lot of other things, but not as much trouble now, no,” Erick said.

Tenebrae relaxed with a sigh. “Okay. That sounds better. Much more normal. Particle Magic is a major outlier, but this sounds more normal.” Tenebrae said to everyone, “I never placed much faith in the ideas of exposing children to extreme mana experiences, but it seems we have an anecdotal case supporting that idea, right here. Maybe for you, Jane, this is what has caused all of your problems, for Spatial Magic is unlike almost all other magics. For Erick… I have no idea from where his success springs, aside from uncommonly well thought-out Intent, and sometimes that is enough.” He looked to Jane. “The only way anyone ever overcomes maligned magic issues similar to yours is through hard work and restructuring their entire approach to magic. We will begin some of that restructuring with a proper introduction to gridwork and [Fireball]. We will rebuild you from the ground up. You will learn. Teressa, you seem to have some of the same issues, so you will relearn, too.”

Teressa forced a smile, and pleasant words, “Thank you.”

Tenebrae said to everyone, “We will have a day or two more before we reach the Green Labyrinth, but we will likely have lots of time once we are there, while Erick sees what he needs to see regarding the Gates. These lessons need not end once we arrive, for I suspect we will be fighting off hordes upon hordes of monsters as we race for exits in the Vision, and then we will spend a great deal of time waiting for the Vision to calm down. That is what usually happens.”

A Rocky walked into the room, carrying a wide, thin book. Erick guessed it was barely over a hundred pages long. He set the book beside Tenebrae.

“Ah! Good.” Tenebrae set the book beside Jane. “Mage work for all of you. Only one book, but you can share as needed. It shouldn’t take a half hour to read this whole thing.” And then he spoke to Jane, directly, “Teressa, Poi, and your father have their own paths, so I don’t care if they fail, but if you’re not dedicated to this then I will stop teaching you the second I feel you are not worth my time.”

Jane, wide-eyed and seeming happy, gratefully took the book, saying, “Thank you, archmage. I can learn!”

“Good. See that you do.”

Erick wondered what would have happened if Kiri had been here. Would his apprentice have gone gaga over private lessons with another archmage? Maybe she would have, a little. Jane was certainly happy, and that was both worrying, and wonderful to see. Hopefully Tenebrae’s gridwork would help her more than Erick’s own methodology.

- - - -

After lunch, while Jane sat in a conjured chair in their rooms with the book in her hands, Erick read over her shoulder with an Ophiel. Jane read fast, for much of the book was rather easy to read; it was just a primer. Erick had his turn with the book next, but found that actually reading it himself was mostly unnecessary for he had mostly read it all through Ophiel. Intelligence was a boon that allowed near-perfect recall, and while that disturbed him a bit, he got over it. Teressa got the book next, and then Poi. Poi didn’t seem to need to refer to the book after the first read-through, but Jane and Teressa shared it between the two of them as they worked on their own grids.

Meanwhile, Erick sat in a chair in the courtyard, applying what he had read to lightward gridwork, but not for [Fireball]. He had already moved onto something else. Something more important.

He had never tried to recreate the Basic Particle Spells he had made so long ago, like [Call Lightning] or [Luminous Beam], but they were Basic Spells, and therefore able to be mapped to gridwork.

Theoretically.

Problems arose right away when the idea of gridwork just couldn’t account for the sky-spanning change that [Call Lightning] called forth. The most Erick could grid was the interaction of electrical charge and Force, the most basic Element of mana. (Force was totally an Element. Tenebrae was wrong.)

[Call Lightning] was only truly possible because water still had polarity, and through the power of magic nudging nature just a bit, a mage was able to take the moisture in Super Large Area of air and cause it to coalesce and then rub against each other, stripping electrons, moving them from one side of the cloud to the other, causing that cloud to become polarized. That same magic further allowed the mage to designate a point where a balancing of that gathered electrical charge could occur, causing a lightning bolt to connect most anything to most anything else.

So… The gridwork for such a spell was, at its most basic…

“Water molecules rubbing against one another?” Erick mumbled as he sat in the courtyard, shaping a lightward of gridwork that might have described [Call Lightning], or maybe only a very, very small part of it. “And then there’s a separation of— Oh. No.” Erick wiped away that lightward, and cast a different one. “It’s all about charge generation; yes. Which means…”

He cast for a while, imagining and reimagining [Call Lightning]. After an hour, he still wasn’t quite happy with his gridwork. [Call Lightning]’s existence was easy to understand, as a whole, but hard to put into a box, if only because the actual spell took place over an absolutely massive scale.

And there was something rather… maddening about magic being shoved inside a box, at all.

But gridwork was not about tackling the problem from the end result; Erick had read that, of course, but he had not internalized it until he had tried his own methods for a while. Gridwork was about the initial cast of the spell. What did that look like? What shape did that take?

That initial shaping was just a packet of Intent.

It was a thought that spread out, replicated X number of times.

… Which had interesting implications when one considered the Propagation Ban.

Oh.

Ah. Okay. So that’s how this works.

Erick dismissed the gridwork he had made, and started over, focusing on what was necessary for [Call Lightning]. Primarily, you had water drawn from the air. Then you had wind, or rather, the tumbling of water. So right there, you just had tumbling water out of air. That was easy to do. The next item was charge separation based on that tumbling, with electrons flowing downward through the space. From there, you had target designation.

A three part spell, with a fourth part, which was just ‘repeat this process as far as my 500 mana will go’. The electrons did not move to the bottom of each part of the spell, but instead moved through every single space without stopping at any individual border. In this way, one piece of the spell was replicated over a Super Large Area.

And that limit was only there because 500 mana seemed to be the limit of what a Basic Tier Spell was able to do. That limit had to be there because of the Propagation Ban.

Erick sat upright. He might have just discovered something that other archmages already knew. The Propagation Ban halted the unrestrained repeating of magic, but if your magic had a limit, then the Propagation Ban did not come into effect.

Maybe 500 mana was the ‘natural’, Script-imposed limit to ‘how far’ a Basic spell could go. Erick’s [Call Lightning], and many of his other Basic Spells, were simple replications of natural forces taken as far as they could go. That meant hitting that 500 mana Propagation Limit.

“Huh,” Erick muttered to himself.

Erick continued to refine his idea of [Call Lightning]; to take the mystical and put it into little boxes.

Before he knew it, it was dinner time.

- - - -

Tenebrae sat down at the table, smiling. Before anyone else could speak, he said, “Erick played around with spells that were not [Force Bomb] or Mana Altering to Fire. Jane practiced what I asked her to practice. Teressa and Poi had middling success. Unless you have a good reason, Erick, I will consider your goodwill spent, and I will no longer help you or your daughter with your magic. What say you, in your defense?”

Erick easily answered, “I was working on [Call Lightning]. I think I got it worked out, too. It’s basically Force magic, and it is only tier one, so maybe I could even make a whistle of [Call Lightning]. How cool would that be? And this is the gridwork for how I would do [Fireball].” He held up his hand and cast a grid into the air. “What do you think?”

Erick had only worked for a few minutes on his gridwork for [Fireball], but it was well-made, in his opinion.

[Fireball] was derived from [Force Bomb], which began with a packet of gathering intent in the center of a hundred-by-hundred-by-hundred grid. He could have gone with a 100x100x99 grid, but that type of grid felt unbalanced, for there was no ‘perfect center’ that he wished to gather around. The inner gathering of this gridwork was a small sphere-ish space that served as a separation and a condenser. When the mana for the spell went into the gathering, that separation protected it from randomly exploding until it touched a target, and that gathering membrane was actually broken. There were also some nods toward etherealness that would prevent the gathering from exploding on any random stuff that might get in the way, and other nods toward other effects that Erick wanted to achieve.

A second gathering was attached to the central gathering, on the caster’s side of the [Force Bomb]. This second gathering was shaped like a cone. This second gathering would produce the propulsion effect. The size and shape of the second gathering, and even the shape of the [Force Bomb]s main detonation packet, denoted how the spell would move through the air. Would it wobble, or would it fly true? Erick’s design would likely fly true, due to the stabilization fins and a few other items that he had put into the working, though he would likely have to experiment with some wind tunnels to get the whole thing rather perfect. He was not a rocket scientist. Yet.

This was good enough, for now.

To change the basic [Force Bomb] to [Fireball], all of the designations for Elemental Force had been switched over to Elemental Fire, though, again, there were nods to etherealness here, too.

Erick still wasn’t sure how to manually make Force become Fire, and the book Tenebrae had given them had not said how, but Aura Control was outside of his current skill set, and the Mana Altering Skill took care of that Elemental shift anyway.

Erick had manually cast [Force Bomb] before today. He knew how to flex his lightform in order to cast this spell. But before today, Erick’s manually-cast [Force Bomb] had been a one-off thing, just done in order to complete the Remake Quest, and get that point. But in being forced to put his own manually-cast [Force Bomb] down into a quantifiable imagery, he had identified many minor issues that surely led to a loss of power. From the shape of the charge, to the shape of the propulsion, to the size of the gathering, to the way it cut through the air and could be made to ignore crosswinds; there had been a lot of room for improvement.

He hadn’t actually made his ‘theoretical [Fireball]’ yet, but he was sure that this gridwork version would turn out well.

The question was: Would this [Gridwork Fireball] be as good as a [Sound it out Fireball]?

And would he be able to make both of those theoretical [Fireball]s, or would he have to destroy one in order to make the other? Would a bit of Mana Shaping allow for him to have multiple different [Fireball]s inside his Status, and overcome the Script’s limitations for combining spells? Erick would try that sort of experiment with a different spell. [Ice Ball], or something. He would leave [Fireball] for Tenebrae to ‘help’ him with.

Tenebrae’s eyes darted across Erick’s gridwork, his expression turning from ‘smug bully’ to ‘relaxed teacher’ in a matter of moments. He even managed a small smile. But then he realized he had smiled, and discarded that obvious show of emotion. He pretended reluctance, saying, “Passable.”

Erick nodded. “Thank you.”

Tenebrae turned to Jane. He waited.

She cast a grid into the air. It was a good grid! Looked fine to Erick. Jane looked ashamed, though.

Tenebrae said, “Good gridwork. We can work on visualization and actualization after we eat.” He looked to Teressa, and Poi, sitting on the other side of the table from Erick and Jane. “And?”

Teressa produced a passable grid that might have been better than Jane’s, but Erick would never voice that aloud. From what Erick had read, Teressa’s gridwork was pretty much a basic [Force Ball] but switched to Fire. Poi did the exact same thing, except for Elemental Ice.

Jane steeled herself, and did not slink into her chair, though Erick could tell she wanted to.

Tenebrae just smiled. “Good work, everyone.” And then he breathed in the smell of the dinner sitting before him, underneath [Heat Ward]s. “Good cooking, Palodia! Thank you!”

It was some sort of eel, wrapped like an ouroboros and stuffed with breading and sausage, sitting on a bed of rice. Everyone got one ‘eel donut’ except for Teressa. Teressa got three.

Palodia called out from the kitchen, “I don’t appreciate you putting my food under [Heat Ward]s!”

Tenebrae said, “Let us eat,” then he canceled the [Heat Ward]s over all the food, and dug in.

Teressa smiled as the subject turned away from magic, and followed the old archmage’s lead. Poi was right behind her. Neither of them had qualms about eels, and even Jane seemed interested in the food sitting before them. Erick, however, had been trying to avoid eating, once he saw what was for dinner.

It was… good.

Erick had the stuffing, the rice, and only some of the eel. And then he had the rest of the eel. It was quite good, actually. Dessert was more chocolate cake, and that was wonderful. Palodia really knew how to cook!

- - - -

To the west, the sun set over the darkened, endless Forest. To the east, the sky was already purple with night and stars. Below, the shadowed Forest flowed away as Tenebrae’s Castle flew north west, at a slightly slower speed than they had been flying at the start of their journey. They had to go slower, after all.

Four times today, Tenebrae’s Stone Men had needed to adjust course and speed when monsters had flown up from the Forest, trying to attack. Those four times, Rockys had took their places on the battlements and cast siege magics at a flying tangle of gore-ridden wyrms, then at a flying Forest Hydra the next time, then at some ghost-like things which no one knew of and which didn’t actually die (no notification boxes), and then, finally, to beat back another tangle of wyrms.

During the day, and for the most part, the Rockys remained on high alert on the battlements as the Castle flew, while Erick, Jane, Poi, and Teressa, had busied themselves with gridwork, down in the courtyard, and elsewhere.

Now, at sunset, Erick, Jane, Poi, Teressa, and Tenebrae, stood on the southern wall, overseeing the darkened Forest below, as it flowed away under the flying castle.

Teressa went first.

She pointed. She cast. A brilliant sparkle of grey magic flew out of her hand. It touched the [Air Shield] a good thirty meters away and detonated in a conflagration of grey-tinted fire that was quickly washed away by the tearing winds just beyond. She read the air, and startled. “Huh. It’s never been that good before.”

Tenebrae happily demanded, “Let us see!”

Teressa handed out her box for [Fireball].

--

Fireball, instant, long range, 75 MP

Launch a quick ball of fire that explodes on contact, damaging a medium area for 50 + 2x WIL and igniting everything touched, dealing WIL damage per second for 10 seconds.

--

Erick read, and smiled.

Tenebrae clapped. “A perfectly made [Fireball]! Very standard. Well made. Good job, Teressa. You need not destroy that one unless you wish to do so.”

“Uh. Thanks?” Teressa seemed to have a hard time processing what she had just done, but she put on a smile, and repeated, “Thank you.” She stepped away from the forward position, to stand back in line with everyone, as she mumbled, “It’s never been that easy.”

Tenebrae said, “Gridwork is a fantastic tool for sympathy and visualization. For those who have always had trouble with magic and who might not want to venture past tier 3, gridwork is one of the best tools in a person’s arsenal.” He turned to Poi. “Next.”

Poi already had [Fireball]; he had displayed as much to Erick just the other day. He stepped forward, pointed, and cast. A speck of sapphire-blue light arced forward and detonated against the [Air Shield], briefly flashing brilliant blue light, and then it was gone. Poi frowned just a little as he read the air, then he turned and handed out his new spell.

--

Frost Bomb, instant, long range, 83 MP

Launch a quick ball of ice that explodes on contact, damaging and chilling everything in a medium area for 65 + 2x WIL. Entities near the center are chilled more.

--

Poi silently retook his place.

Tenebrae said, “Decent. You could remake that one, if you wished. ‘Chill’ is not as good as ‘Slow’. ‘Chill’ is what one might experience if they were dunked into glacier water without preparation. ‘Slow’ is an Elemental Effect which lingers, which directly affects a person’s thoughts and actions. As a positive: you got the ‘Quick’ and a decently sized area. Ice tends to have smaller areas than other elements, but you have not experienced this problem.”

Poi said, “Thank you, Archmage.”

“That said.” Tenebrae asked, “What does your [Fireball] look like?”

Poi winced, then handed out a second spell box.

--

Fireball, instant, long range, 95 MP

Launch a quick ball of fire that explodes on contact, damaging a medium area for 50 + WIL and igniting everything touched, dealing WIL damage per second for 15 seconds.

--

Tenebrae announced, “Just shy of acceptable. You should remake that. The longer duration is commendable, but you might as well go for the whole conversion. 30 seconds of conflagration for 2 times Willpower, or, 20 seconds of 2 times Willpower and a large area; these are the numbers you should strive for.”

“Understood and appreciated, Archmage,” Poi said.

Tenebrae nodded. He looked to Jane. “You’re up.”

Jane breathed in, then out. She hardened her eyes and her expression, then stepped forward, lifted her arm, and cast. A dark sparkle of deep blue light shot forward to detonate against the [Air Shield]. Midnight-blue fires expanded then fell through the [Air Shield], to vanish.

She held her breath as she read the air. Erick held his breath, too.

Jane’s face broke into a wonderful smile. She laughed, and Erick’s heart flip-flopped to see her happy. She wiped away tears then bowed to Tenebrae, saying, “Thank you.” She stood and handed out blue boxes, then took her place back in the line, right beside Erick. She grabbed his hand to hold it; he squeezed back.

Erick was proud of her; he always had been. But he felt a new swell of emotion as he read her new spell.

--

Fireball, instant, long range, 66 MP

Launch a quick ball of fire that explodes on contact, damaging a medium area for 50 + 2x WIL and igniting everything touched, dealing WIL damage per second for 10 seconds.

--

“Well made, Jane,” Erick said.

Tenebrae nodded, then declared, “An excellent [Fireball]! I can see that you have taken the lessons of gridwork to heart. You have even managed to create something that is below the expected costs for such a working, showing that you are focused on efficiency, which is a different way to do well in the further tiers. Well done.” He turned to Erick. “Your turn.”

Erick let go of Jane’s hand. She patted him on the back as he stepped forward just two steps.

He pointed. He cast.

A lightning-fast speck of twisting, flaming white light flashed through the air, slipped through [Air Shield] thirty meters away, and kept on going. And going. And going. In a perfectly straight line, uncaring for the wind or anything else—

It exploded when it passed double ‘long range’; maybe 250 meters. From that distance, the explosion wasn’t very impressive. It looked somewhat like an expanding flower. But then the ‘petals’ of that expanding flower fell, like a falling firework, spreading out as they descended, giving the whole spell the look of a weeping willow tree. It was exactly what Erick was going for. He had even packed the gridwork for the spell with what he recalled of firework preparation, which was a rather odd thing to pop in to his mind when he was making his [Fireball], but it was appropriate, so he went with it. He wanted the end result to leave flaming fire everywhere on every surface, anyway. But maybe he needed more duration and less initial blast. From what he was seeing, most of the falling fire from this [Fireball] probably wouldn’t do anything at all since it was falling so slowly—

A blue box appeared.

Erick reconsidered his idea that this falling fire ‘wouldn’t do anything at all’. With a duration that long, some of those petals would surely reach the Forest below.

--

Fireball, instant, long range, 100 MP

Launch a super quick ethereal missile of fire that explodes on contact or at the end of its path, creating a large tumult of cloying fire. Deals WIL damage then ignites everything touched, dealing 3x WIL damage per second for 25 seconds.

--

He handed out the box.

Jane gave a quick laugh, while Teressa smirked, and Poi just nodded. Tenebrae snatched the spell, read it, then dismissed it. Erick waited. Everyone waited.

“I expected failure, but I got success. I would have been happy either way, but in this way…” Tenebrae declared, “I will gloat even more! Ha! My methods have a hundred percent success rate! Yours has a success rate of… What? One success, one half-success, and one failure; You, your apprentice, and your daughter. I have won this contest, and I can only hope you have seen the error of your ways. Do not teach your methods to other people. They are flawed.” He stared at Erick, almost imperiously, demanding, “What say you against proof of my competency and your inadequacy? What defense do you have against the truth of proper magic!”

Erick did not smile. That would set Tenebrae off, for sure. But he was happy and it was hard to keep his joy off of his face. He said, “Thank you, very, very much, for helping my daughter, and to do what I could not. My methods are flawed. They don’t work for everyone. But not everyone learns the same, and my methods work very well for me. If you don’t mind, I will be sharing this ‘gridwork’ with others, as I see fit, and I will credit you each time. My apprentice will especially enjoy this.”

Tenebrae stared down his nose at Erick. “It is only gridwork. This is… Acceptable.”

“Thank you again, Tenebrae.” Erick nodded, half-bowing, saying, “Archmage.”

Tenebrae seemed to accept the deference. A whisper of a smirk appeared on his face, and then vanished, as he said, “You should work that [Fireball] into a [Grand Fireball]. It is decent enough for such an upgrade. Your daughter’s [Fireball] is not there yet, but a few dozen more tries at efficiency and she will get there, too. With this method of gridwork, anyone can learn basic magic. It’s not hard, once you have the proper teaching.” He added, “And it’s not my invention. I will not take credit for this. Do not tell people that I created it.”

Erick couldn’t stop himself from smiling at that. He said, “Now, I just need to learn what it takes to make a [Grand Fireball]! I’m guessing it’s just a Mana Shaping for 500, and the replication of the original spell for that 500 more mana?”

“… Try it and find out. It’s only a tenday wait if you’re wrong.” Tenebrae turned, saying, “I will have questions for you on the morrow. You and I will have a private breakfast. Expect ten questions… Maybe a few more than that.”

“See you tomorrow,” Erick called to him.

Tenebrae disappeared down a trapdoor in the battlements that Erick had not noticed before it was there, and the archmage was gone from sight. The stone swung back into place and sealed with seamless magic, leaving the four of them mostly alone on the battlements, except for a few Rockys in their watchtowers to the left and the right.

Jane instantly hugged her dad, tight. He hugged her back. She laughed, then broke away.

Teressa chuckled. “[Fireball] has never been that easy.”

“Not for me either!” Jane practically shouted, “That was amazing! Kiri eat your heart out!”

Erick laughed, then playfully chided, “Ohhh! I’ll tell her about all of this soon enough.”

“I’m still gonna enjoy the moment.” Jane smiled, relaxing a bit, as she echoed Teressa’s words, “[Fireball] has never been easy. But that was easy!”

Teressa laughed again. “Easy!”

“Easy!” Jane shouted to the sky.

Poi cracked a smile. Erick did, too.

Jane started rushing down the stairs, into the courtyard, saying, “I brought a bottle of rum! Let’s open it!”

- - - -

Erick sat across from Tenebrae in a nice little room off of the side of a tower, where breakfast breads and teas awaited on a small cart to the side. A large arc of the stone walls to the left were enchanted to be as transparent as glass. The Forest whipped by, from left to right, as the sun rose on the right.

They were headed west, instead of north. They had switched directions in the middle of the night.

Tenebrae had called Erick here a little after sunrise. So far, all Erick had done was to greet the older archmage, and for Tenebrae to hum an unintelligible greeting. The older archmage had yet to say anything of substance. He just sat there in his chair, seeming at a loss for words, or planning something, or… something else. After moments of just sitting there, obviously thinking of how he wanted to start, Tenebrae decided to start in on breakfast. Erick wordlessly picked up his own tarrinol roll, which was almost like a cinnamon roll. Erick preferred cinnamon, but he had invented cinnamon himself and it had yet to make any real waves to go very far. Apogee, the former Wayfarer Guildmaster of Spur, seemed to like the cinnamon, but other than him? Nothing.

These tarrinol rolls had a rather thick sugar frosting, though, so they were pretty great.

Ophiels were already scattered around both Erick, and his people, and he saw nothing too untoward, but this silence was… worrying.

Erick tried to break the silence with, “I see we shifted course in the middle of the night. Trying to outrun the sun?”

Tenebrae’s knife and fork halted in the middle of cutting up his tarrinol roll.

Erick continued, “Or were we just avoiding the Blood Valleys?”

A moment of silence turned into a minute. Erick got through a roll. Tenebrae started on his second.

Erick tried, “Any other places we’re avoiding?”

“… There are a few places in the Forest that require avoidance, no matter how powerful one is, if only to protect those who have come along for the ride. The Blood Valleys are one such place.”

Erick was happy for the engagement, but he kept his voice even as he said, “I noticed the danger of the Blood Valleys when we culled those Reachers and Shrooms. Luckily, there were only a few of them in there. Took my apprentice four times to get in there and complete those hunts.”

“Hmm.”

Tenebrae ate a bite of his roll.

Erick had a bite of his own, and then took a sip of tea. He said, “Great tea and rolls. Palodia is a great cook.”

“She is one of the best.” Tenebrae said, “Hired her sixty years ago and though she’s come and gone a few times, she’s here, now.” His voice turned harder. “I would protect her with my life.”

Erick set down his fork. It seemed they were finally getting into the discussion that Tenebrae wanted to have.

Tenebrae set down his own fork, then said, “You should stop teaching your methods to others. Emotional magic is dangerous if only for the fact that it is rooted in force of personality, and not in actual magical theory. Your ideologies are what various accidental archmages the world over have been allowing into popular consciousness, and they are dangerous. Century after century, these ideas poison the well of true magic. Your guard, Teressa, is the most common reaction to that poisoning. An excellent mana sense, but she abandoned the idea of pursuing magic long ago, and opted to become a warrior. Your daughter is another. Popular magical ideas and your own ease of becoming an archmage have stunted her growth. I have proven that there is no one that is truly incapable of learning magic, and that your methods are dangerous. What say you against these accusations?”

Erick said, “I say that you’re somewhat right. I will stop teaching some of my ideas to others. But you’re also wrong because magic is possibility, and possibilities allow for my methods to work, as well. This gridwork is wonderful, but in the end, it is just another tool for visualization; to evoke a sympathy from the manasphere. Gridwork’s main boon is that it allows someone to put their spellwork into ink, so that the maker can see the problems they might have made for themselves, and also so that others may see that work and assist with problems that the caster cannot see themselves. My methods have none of that capability.” He added, “Yet.”

Tenebrae regarded Erick. “… Yet?”

Erick said, “Ask your questions, if you wish. We will probably go over some of what my ‘Yet’ means if you ask the right ones.”

“Very well. Then my first question is for you to elaborate what you mean by ‘Yet’.”

Erick chuckled. Then he said, “Sound exists in waves, like the surface of the ocean, where densities of particles correspond to peaks and troughs. Do you know of sound waves?”

“… Not like you do.”

“No one does. Just like no one knew of particles, not really.”

Tenebrae said, “You are too full of yourself. Alchemists have been working with the physical world for a millennium before you came along.”

“Even the alchemists and metallurgists just knew enough to get by in their jobs and to establish some rudimentary formulation and chemistry. None of them knew what they were doing aside from that it worked, or else they did know what they were doing, and they hid that knowledge from the world. None of them made magic or shared their notes with each other. Not like I did. I came along, and with a few small lectures, changed the world.” Erick said, “False modesty does neither of us favors.”

Tenebrae frowned, but he was emotionally on the edge of his seat. Erick could tell. He could tell a lot about the people around him, all the time, these days. Mostly, he edited the awful thoughts that occasionally bubbled up in his brain, like how Teressa was on the edge of leaving their little group, but she felt obligated to stay. Or how Jane resented him, and couldn’t bring herself to actually say or do anything that would give away those inner thoughts. Silverite was worried about needing to kill him, if he turned ‘evil’. The people of Candlepoint wondered if they were getting ready for war against the world, with Erick leading the way. Kiri blamed Erick for her current troubles and triumphs, and she, too, wanted him to go away, to leave her to her own devices and power, though she, too, would never have said those things. She was happy in Spur, though; Erick had checked.

Poi was the only one who wasn’t an open book, and that was nice, but Erick wondered how much of that was Poi, himself, or due to Poi’s magic allowing him to mentally edit himself. Such a thing was surely possible, right? Soul editing existed. Therefore mind editing must exist, too.

… Blood editing existed, as well. The practice wasn’t very popular in Spur, but in other parts of the world, people edited their bodies all the time. Or, at least, that’s what Erick heard. He wasn’t too sure where ‘other parts of the world’ existed.

But anyway.

And then there was Tenebrae, sitting right in front of him. Sometimes, he was as easy to read as the words on a page. Tenebrae was obviously suffering from some deep, untreated trauma, which likely had to do with a dead family. Erick guessed that they had all died long ago, each to horrible circumstances.

Normally, Erick shut off that cynical part of himself, that had recently grown so large with the introduction of Intelligence. But now, he let that part of himself out to play, to make sure that he wasn’t being played, himself.

From what he had seen, he was pretty sure that Tenebrae was a rather good man.

But still...

“Please do not pretend that I am not divulging huge ideas to you right now.” Erick said, “Elaborating on what I mean by ‘yet’ is massive. Do not do both of us a disservice and pretend otherwise.”

“… We shall see.”

“Fair enough.” Erick explained, “Sound is a wave. It is a density of energy that propagates through a medium. This world has tuning forks—” Erick grabbed an extra fork from the side, then lifted it up. With little effort, [Metalshape] turned the two-pronged utensil into a two-pronged musical tuner. “Like this one.”

Tenebrae said, “I have an entire set of those. You needn’t have ruined my silver.”

“It is hardly ruined. I’ll repair it when I’m done.” Erick tapped the tuning fork against the stone breakfast table. It vibrated with a rather normal sound. “I think I’ve tuned this one correctly to 440 waves per second, also known as 440 hertz. That is just a measurement, though; it doesn’t matter. What matters is that this little bit of metal will send out pressure waves in the air, at 440 waves per second. Longitudinal waves, to be precise. Those are compression waves; compression on particles, mind you. Transverse waves are the other type of waves.” Erick did not elaborate on those types. He did, however, cast a moving lightward into the air, showing a moving sinusoidal wave against a graph-paper-like background. “This is a representation of a soundwave, and unless my time in Oceanside was complete misdirection, then I know you have never seen this before.”

Tenebrae narrowed his eyes, and slowly nodded.

“Sound is characterized by a few things.” Erick pointed, as he continued, “In no particular order, you have:

“The speed of the sound, which is an intrinsic property of the material that the sound travels through. Sound travels faster through metal than through air, for example, because metal is denser than air; the particles are closer together, which is what makes a thing ‘dense’. Incidentally, the speed of sound in air is around 343 meters per second; though I have not taken that measurement on Veird, this is mostly what it was back home, at sea-level, and it seems to be the same here on Veird. On Veird, even way up in the sky, it might still be 343 meters per second. This is due to the Script mostly ‘evening out’ pressure throughout all of Veird.

“Anyway.

“The first characteristic of sound is frequency, which is the number of compression points in a given amount of time. High pitched voices have higher frequency. Low-pitched voices have lower frequency. There are points beyond high and low that are above or below a person’s ability to hear.

“Second, you have the intensity of sound, which is the power of that sound. This is the amplitude, or how tall the crests are. Louder sounds have higher intensity, and softer sounds have lower intensity.

“That’s all there really is to understanding how sound exists and functions. Except, I suppose, to understand that sound radiates out from where it was made in a spherical pattern, and with distance from the source, the intensity will naturally decrease as the sound expends its energy to move through its medium.

“As for why I imagine that my methods don’t work as well as yours, is that I don’t know how to let other people hear the magic as I hear the magic. Kiri barely hears what I hear. Jane even less so. I am almost a hundred percent sure that mana can vibrate with the soul, and hearing those sounds is not as simple as listening to the vibrations that channeled mana makes upon the air, which then vibrate a person’s ear drums.” Erick said, “But! I am sure that some machine, some day, will be able to understand mana and magic perfectly, and after hearing a spell, that machine will be able to copy what it hears, and thus be able to recast the spell that it heard by recreating those sounds, and eliciting a resonance with the magic that is already out there.”

Erick stopped talking. He had given away more than enough hints and truths.

He repaired the tuning fork back into a real fork. He dismissed the lightward that described wavelengths.

Tenebrae sat back in his chair, eyeing Erick, but also thinking, deeply.

Erick sipped his tea.

Tenebrae eventually said, “I was taught that sound was an aspect of Force. I was taught that Force was the base nature of reality, and that the physical detritus that composed this physical world was a necessity of the transition to this New Cosmology.” He said, “I understand, now, why you think that Force is an Element. To me, Force is just the real nature of reality which we can only experience as temporary and personal Reality. To me, you must Mana Alter Force in order to get Sound, which is what the soul hears through the physical medium of the various parts of the ear. To me, Sound is derived from Thunder which is right next to Lightning, which is an offshoot of Air and Light. It has nothing to do with ‘frequency’ or ‘particle density’… Can you prove what you say?”

“I can make a Particle Spell with the theory I just spouted; sure.” Erick said, “I already have, actually. Here.” He passed over the box for [Stillness].

--

Stillness X, instant, super long range, 250 mana.

Dampen all ambient physical damage in a super large area, turning that damage into light. Lasts 1 hour.

--

Erick said, “It used to say ‘Drop all <sound> to the level of a <speaking voice> in a super large area for 1 hour.’ But that was before Rozeta added Particle Magic to the Open Script.”

Tenebrae read, then postulated, “An application of the transformation of one element into another, or, in this case, the transformation of sound ‘intensity’ into Light. Perhaps?”

“Something like that.”

“… I see. I also see that these ‘waves’ are easily a form of maths. But you don’t like maths. What is going on there?”

“Uh.” Erick stumbled a bit, then said, “I mean… I guess. Yeah. They’re math. Not like your magic math, though. I don’t know how to translate those two systems into a working whole.”

“Hmm.”

After a moment, Tenebrae stood up, saying, “You have discharged your debt to me.”

Erick stood up, and nodded. “I hope you use this information well.”

“Perhaps. I won’t be sharing it with anyone, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“I admit, that was a small worry, but it is good to know that we can trust each other with secrets.”

“Hmm. Quite.” Tenebrae said, “I don’t need to see you make another spell. I have seen enough. Prepare yourself for entry into the Green Labyrinth. We will be there in a few hours.”

“We’re ready.” Erick said, “Thank you again for helping my daughter with her spellwork.”

Tenebrae paused, then said, “She seems like a capable young woman, but she needs to develop proper aura control if she is to fully utilize her Prismatic Class. I have no idea how to help you with yours, but I suggest the same to you. All proper mages need proper aura control.”

“I’ve been working on it, though I do admit that aura control has dropped rather low on my current list of necessary goals.”

Tenebrae nodded, then walked off, saying, “I remember when I was like that.”