Myst and the Magic Shop Part 13 (Patreon)

"Give me something," Myst muttered as he set Arion's crown in the middle of the star carved into his enchanting altar and glanced over the item's details that appeared on the altar's floating display. He was a bit annoyed but not particularly surprised when he noticed the grayed out option for disenchanting the crown. "So much for the easy way," he muttered as he read the description floating above the crown, 'Always active: Nearly indestructible, Well of Power (Order aligned). Wearing the crown: Boosts the user's magic and draws magic from the Well of Power to empower the wearer and their future bloodline. Curse: Wearing the crown acts as a channel for the Lords of Order.'

"Where's a volcano when you need it?" he complained as he grabbed one of the fortify enchanting potions off the captain's shelf.

"Let me guess, you found something cursed?" Lena asked from the open doorway as he drank the potion.

Myst checked the disenchant button, not surprised that it was still grayed out despite his artificially high enchanting skill. "Technically, wearing it opens you up to judgment by some extra dimensional entities that don't generally see things the same way humanity does."

"Basically useless or overly selective?" Lena asked as she walked into the room.

"It's probably a toss up," Myst replied, not sure how the Lords of Order would react to someone like Mera putting the crown on rather than a power hungry clone. "There's a small chance that the Queen of Atlantis could use it without getting blasted out of existence but Mera is supposed to be a decent enough person that I'm not really interested in taking chances, especially when I might be able to learn something."

"Arion's crown?" Lena asked, thinking about Alura's stories of possible lost artifacts that he might be able to recover and were powerful enough to risk the wrath of the Atlantean people.

"You're remarkably well informed," Myst replied as he stuck the crown in his satchel and carefully set the cracked magical gem from his collection on the altar. "I'm surprised it still works considering the damage."

"Alura's spent a decent amount of time with Hephestus, he likes to lecture about artifacts. It survived ten thousand years, they made things to last…" Lena trailed off as the jade stone turned to dust on the altar. "Was it supposed to do that?" she asked in concern, not sure if he'd disenchanted it or if it had fallen apart due to age.

"Gasp, it spontaneously fell apart," Myst offered dryly.

Lena shook her head. "I'll take that as a yes. Did you at least learn something?"

"Hopefully." Myst checked his collection of available enchants. "If anyone asks, it self-destructs from the change in pressure."

"It probably absorbed some magic when you were studying it and fell apart when it tried to activate, you'll have to be more careful," Lena suggested, rolling her eyes.

"Makes sense," Myst agreed, deciding to use her excuse if anyone asked. "I figured out an enchant that gives a stone or crystal the ability to store an impressive amount of magic and create a force field."

"Do you think you could use it for vehicle shields?" Lena asked thoughtfully.

"No idea," Myst admitted as he grabbed one of the gems from his satchel along with a soul gem. "I'll have a better idea once I've enchanted a couple gems and run some tests." He enchanted the gem so he'd have something to experiment with. "Huh, it stores more than the original, probably because of the damage the original had."

"How often would you have to charge the stone?" Lena asked, thinking about her collection of mad scientists and how it could serve as extra safety gear.

Myst examined the gem on the altar. "If you didn't use it to block anything and it wasn't sitting at the bottom of the ocean, you're looking at centuries or maybe even thousands of years. You'd probably survive a couple of dozen hits with an RPG before you'd have to recharge it."

"Or a punch by a kryptonian?" Lena asked.

"I wouldn't want to punch something made out of magic but yeah, we could probably drain it fairly quickly," Myst agreed as he grabbed an ornate necklace from his collection he'd picked up in Atlantis and set it on the altar. He glanced over the details then carefully set it to the side when he saw that it was basically the same enchant as the stone. "Same thing, I wouldn't learn anything."

Lena nodded. "At least you'll have something to give Aquaman."

"That's the idea," Myst replied as he grabbed an ornate gold helmet from his collection and set it on the altar. "That's useful, it provides food, water and air." He set the helmet next to the necklace and grabbed a bracelet.

"You're not breaking it?" Lena asked, a bit surprised that he didn't want to learn how to copy it.

"As much as I'd love to learn the enchant, I'd rather let Mera study it," Myst replied as he set the bracelet on the altar. "I can always grab similar items from D&D and break them."

"That let you survive without food, water and air?" Lena asked.

"Not in a nice convenience package but close enough," Myst agreed as he examined the simple gold bracelet. "At least the craftsmanship isn't particularly impressive," he mused as he disenchanted the bracelet to pick up the enchantment.

"What did you get?" Lena asked, wishing he'd left the bracelet on the altar a bit longer so she could read over everything.

Myst checked the resulting enchantment and sighed in relief when he realized that he'd picked up the full ability and not a weaker version. "The enchantment allows the use of a magic based version of electrokinesis and using it increases your natural affinity for electricity and magic over time which means that you can use it to train your magic and electrokinesis."

"How much voltage are we looking at?" Lena asked thoughtfully, wondering if they could use it to cut the power requirements for the lab or to make large scale electric aircraft viable.

"No clue," Myst admitted. "The altar isn't set up with modern measurements in mind."

"Does it provide any protection from electricity?" Lena asked, figuring that would have been mentioned.

"Not in the slightest which makes it dangerous for Atlanteans to play with," Myst replied as he grabbed a cracked and worn looking bow from his collection and set it on the altar. He frowned slightly when he noticed the disenchant button was flashing gray randomly, like it was right on the edge of being able to be studied or like the durability enchantment that kept it from being destroyed was failing. "The bow lets you summon it from a pocket dimension and create magical arrows."

"Are you going to break it?" Lena asked, fairly sure using it would cause it to snap given the damage the bow had suffered from sitting at the bottom of the sea for so long.

"If I can," Myst replied as he scanned the inside of the bow with his X-ray vision, wanting to make sure nothing was buried in the partially decayed wood. He picked up the camera that Clark had loaned him and took a couple of pictures from different angles. "It's basically useless as anything other than a conversation piece and we have a couple of archers in the League that could benefit from the enchantment."

"If you can?" Alura asked as she walked into the room.

Myst gestured towards the disenchanting button that was flickering. "I'm guessing the durability enchant is messing with my ability to disenchant it."

"Can't you just hit the button when it's not grayed out?" Alura asked as she glanced over the display, fairly sure Oliver and Athena would love a bow that they could summon when they needed it.

"That's the idea," Myst replied. He tapped the disenchant icon when it wasn't grayed out and got an error message the first time when it changed on him. He tried again after another flicker and grinned when the bow turned into dust and vanished. "Good call," he told her as he checked the new enchant. "Can you see the display?"

"The enchant increases the durability, range and power of the bow and lets you summon it from a pocket dimension and conjure arrows that last an hour," Alura replied, summarizing the information on the display.

"Good to know the display isn't just in my head," Myst replied as he reached for the next artifact. "Did you find out anything useful about the ship?"

"The hull is an interesting titanium alloy that should have some industrial uses if we can replicate it and it's been coated with a heat resistant resin that makes up for the paper thin shields to a certain extent. The star drive is probably the most significant find, it pulls in energy from another dimension and it allows you to travel across the galaxy in weeks by creating a physics bending bubble around the ship."

"I was half expecting bullshitium for the hull," Myst admitted as he disenchanted a mangled gold bracelet that stored mana.

"An alloy we can use and mass produce is more useful. The ship is an eclectic collection of technology, the Fortress' AI identified technology from at least a dozen different species," Lena replied with a pleased smile. "It should push forward our understanding in several scientific fields by at least a couple of decades."

"Did you figure out what the glass tubes are for?" Myst asked as he grabbed the next artifact and set it on the altar.

"Lights," Alura replied with a giggle. "One of the alien species uses empathic and electrokinetic rodent-like creatures to generate light by charging the glass-like material with electricity."

"Huh," Myst muttered as he moved the mana storing necklace to the box of stuff he was going to give Aquaman, not seeing a point in breaking it as it was simply another mana battery. "Let me guess, the colors change based on the hamsters’ mood?"

"Nope, the crew's mood, they are empathic after all," Lena explained. "It's supposed to help keep the crew calm."

"That probably has more to do with the biology of the one species being affected by light than it does the particular shade of the light or the space hamsters’ presence," Alura offered, having read the Fortress' entry on the aliens that had created the lighting system once the robot had identified that particular species. "I talked the AI into fabricating several replacement maneuvering thrusters, the bots should have everything installed in a couple of hours."

"You're the best," Myst assured her.

"Yes, yes I am, and it’s nice to have someone else realize that," Alura teased with a smirk.

Lena buried a giggle in her hand as she pretended to cough.

"Do you have any objection to sending the scrap and damaged thruster to Kara's lab?" Clark asked from the doorway.

"Go for it, I'm a magic user, not a mad scientist, which means it's basically useless to me," Myst admitted.

"I just wanted to make sure," Clark replied.

"Let me guess, it's already halfway to Kara's lab?" Myst asked with amusement.

Clark shook his head. "Of course not."

"Kara wants to collect it herself and take another look at the ship," Lena replied, the amusement clear in her tone.

"That sounds safer than trying to send it by truck," Myst said, thinking about the mess involved in some of the cartoons where people hijacked trucks carrying advanced weapons that they shouldn't have known about or been able to find.

Clark turned to look at the wall when he heard the sand get compressed outside and used his X-ray vision to check. "Kara's here. Nice timing, I need to get back to the Watchtower for a meeting, Batman wants to discuss adding a new member to the youth team."

"Can you give the artifacts I recovered to Aquaman?" Myst asked as he handed the cardboard box filled with magical items to Clark. "They're all magical and I recovered them from the ruins of the original Atlantis. I figure he'll probably want them so he can give them to Mera to study before they stick them in a museum."

"He'll probably have some questions for you about where you found them," Clark pointed out as he looked over the contents of the box.

"Probably, but that’s why I filmed it," Myst agreed as he handed Clark the kryptonian camera he'd borrowed. "I'm going to want a copy of the recording, it was a neat trip."

"I'll make a copy," Clark assured him.

"Thanks. Let me check something while you're here," Myst said as he reached up and grabbed Beowulf's sword off the shelf. He focused on the sword and cast his polymorph any object spell on the sheath, trying for something that didn’t look like a mummified hand grasping the hilt with the sword sheathed in its disembodied arm. He scowled as the magic managed to partially change the skin into something that looked slightly more like a traditional sheath but not the hand or the shape. 'Okay, let's try something else.' He focused on changing the hand rather than removing it altogether and used the spell again, changing the hand to a bronze hand and the creepy flesh to leather.

"See if you can draw it, the command word is, 'abannan afol Beowulf."

Clark handed Alura the box and grasped the sword. "Abannan afol Beowulf," he said, making sure to enunciate each word clearly. He carefully pulled the broadsword from the sheath once the bronze hand released the blade. "Not my usual choice but I can see using it against Darkseid or Grundy."

"Or against robots," Myst suggested, thinking about Amazo.

Clark carefully slid the sword back in its sheath. "Where do you want me to put it?"

"Somewhere safe, it's useless to me," Myst replied as Kara walked up to the doorway.

"I know a safe place to keep it," Clark said.

"Under your sofa?" Kara asked with amusement.

Clark turned and smiled at Kara. "I doubt anyone would look."

"Considering the dust bunnies, probably not," Kara agreed.

"Do you want one of the treasure chests, it would probably make flying back easier," Myst offered.

"That would be great," Clark agreed.

"Who are they thinking about inviting to the team?" Alura asked, hoping she could figure it out before Robin.

Clark considered the question while Myst grabbed an empty chest and moved it closer. "A pyrokinetic."

"Please tell me they aren't a pyromaniac," Alura begged.

"Okay, I won't," Clark replied as he stuck the sword in the treasure chest. “I’ll go deliver these, see you all for dinner.”

Lena waved and Alura gave him a hug, before he left while Myst scratched his chin thoughtfully.

“What are you plotting now?” Lena asked, looking at him suspiciously.

“What makes you think I’m plotting anything?” he asked, trying to sound innocent and flubbing it so badly that Alura burst out laughing. He rolled his eyes. “If you must know-”

“I must, I must!” Alura interrupted with a grin, quoting Gene Wilder.

Must chuckled. “I’m wondering where I can get a hold of a necromancer.”

The two just stared at him.

“What?” he asked.

“Necromancers are usually things we try and put down, not call up for tea,” Alura said.

“Oh, well I was going to get one to resurrect the hamsters,” he explained. “Dungeon and Dragon necromancers are a lot more sane than the ones around here.”

“Can’t we just clone them?” Alura asked.

Myst blinked. “Can we clone the alien hamsters?”

“It’s certainly something we’d try before using dark magic to resurrect them from whatever little hamster heaven they’ve wandered off to,” Lena said dryly.

Myst shrugged, not having considered what kind of heaven existed for hamsters before now but guessing exercise wheels figured heavily into it. “Fine, I’ll keep an eye out for necromantic artifacts or books and the like while you see if you can use your unholy science to create alien hamster abominations for me.”

“That’s all I ask,” Lena said with a smile, thinking he was far easier to deal with than many of the scientists they employed.

0o0o0

"Okay, that should give me the Hellride greater power," Myst muttered as he saved his game in front of the standing stone. "Now I just need to get the spell crafting altar so I can start putting everything together and unlock a spell for fortifying skills."

He pulled up his character's map and fast traveled to the Frost Craig wizard's tower which the official mod had given him. "Pay to win," he said cheerfully as the loading screen appeared on his handheld. He frowned slightly as the scent of iron and soot filled the air and he heard the ringing of a hammer on an anvil. "Huh…" he trailed off as a mountain of a man with a black beard appeared with a gust of forge's heat in the middle of the room.

Hephaestus studied the young man in front of him. "I felt some of my apprentice's work being destroyed, figured I'd see if it was a slight against me or if you had an actual purpose."

"I was picking up patterns so I could reproduce things, one cracked gem, one broken bow and a mangled bracelet, my apologies if I caused offense," Myst offered, instantly knowing who it was as the world around him gained an immeasurable amount of solidity to bear the presence of the god, all but engraving his name and nature on the viewer's soul.

Hephaestus raised an eyebrow. "You managed to reverse engineer three magical items in less than five minutes?"

Myst pointed towards the enchanting altar in the corner of the room. "I had help."

"How…" Hephaestus trailed off as he turned his attention to the magical artifact and brought his godly aura to bear, the table falling within his domain, its secrets were laid bare to his eyes. “Interesting…”

“The majority of the items I found I had delivered to the current king of Atlantis so they can study them or put them in a museum or whatever they choose, I was in no way trying to offend you,” he quickly assured him.

"Orin, good man, not much of a story teller though he does try," Hephaestus said thoughtfully. "Where did you get the altar, it doesn't appear to be from this reality."

"I picked it up in a pocket dimension that my power created, it makes learning enchants a lot easier," Myst replied.

"Do you have any more of these?" Hephaestus asked.

"I have an extra and I can get more, do you want one?" Myst asked, hoping he didn't want them destroyed.

"I'd love to take one apart and study it," Hephaestus replied. "Tell you what, I'll give you the knowledge of the one thing you can’t learn from your altar, as indestructible items can’t be broken down to learn their secrets, I’ll gift you with the knowledge of how to include exceptional durability in your enchantments for the altar."

"That would be fantastic, thank you," Myst replied, more than happy with trading an altar for notes on how to make things exceptionally durable.

"What have you already made?" Hephaestus asked, curious what else the young mortal had made, as sensing him actually required a portion of his attention.

Myst pulled the gem out of his pocket and tossed it to him. "I made that based on the copy of the broken gem."

Hephaestus examined the copy of his old apprentice's work, fairly sure the unusual twist in magic was why it worked better than the previous version. 'I'll have to suggest that, not sure I want to have my apprentices playing with soul magic, but I’m sure I can figure out a work around.'

Myst started pulling out other examples of his craft as the man looked interested. "I learned a couple of enchantments to absorb fire, cold, and lightning from robes which makes dealing with certain monsters easier. I picked up an enchantment that reflects magic and I'll be picking up more when I go back."

"It's certainly a different style," Hephaestus agreed. "What about your gem?"

"I picked it up in another world, Sigil," Myst explained.

"Ah, I've never been for obvious reasons, but I've heard there are places there that produce wonders," Hephaestus told him.

"I'm looking forward to picking up some magic items that offer defenses against various status effects, magical conditions," he offered.

"I'm aware of the term," Hephaestus replied with amusement, having played a number of crafting based games over the last couple of years before giving up because they never did it right, though he had to admit to a lingering affection for Minecraft.

Myst pulled out the ring that let him absorb fire and lightning then pulled out the healing staff that healed people by hitting them. "You might like the staff, it's entertaining if nothing else."

Hephaestus examined the staff and started laughing as he realized that he could have some fun with that particular enchantment. "What else do you have?"

Myst focused and conjured his Final Fantasy handheld and loaded Final Fantasy IV. "Take a look?" he offered.

"Don't mind if I do," Hephaestus replied and accepted the unfamiliar game.

"I'll get some more examples this weekend, I have to play the games to get better stuff," Myst explained as he went back to playing Oblivion, wanting to get the tower set up so he could walk in and use the spell altar.

"Interesting," Hephaestus replied as he tried and failed to figure out how to copy the game systems, making him smile as it had been a while since he’d run across anything that provided a challenge to his skills, before getting distracted by the game and the magical artifacts it was filled with. “Needs a better plotline,” he muttered, snapping the fingers on his left hand and summoning coffee and donuts for the two of them.

“I’ll show you some of the other games in the series, they have much better storylines,” Myst replied absently as he became absorbed in his own game, grabbing a cup of coffee without thinking about it as the two played video games from another dimension in the abandoned alien ship beneath the sands of Death Valley.