BT - Book 1 - Chapter 54 (Patreon)

Micah made a note of the sun’s position, scratching the data hastily into the Folio.  Whispering under his breath, he flipped to a page detailing his observations from a previous timeline on the current astrological conditions.

The stag snorted.  Most of the grey had left its fur when Micah enchanted Trevor’s greaves and bracers, but there were still some hints.  Stiffness in its gait, a slight discoloration around its eyes, nothing definitive but enough that Micah knew it had at least a couple years left to give him.

“Don’t worry about it too much,” he spoke to the animal, not looking up from the Folio.  “I’m almost done setting up the final ritual.  Just hold still a little longer and I’ll clear up all those nagging aches from old age.”

The deer cocked its head at him before chuffing out a breath.  It lowered its head and began eating grass, every inch of its body displaying forced disinterest.

“Yeah, yeah,” Micah chuckled as he placed the ritual’s reagents carefully into the quartz circle surrounding the stag.  “Give me the cold shoulder.  I’m used to it by now.”

The stag raised its head, a tuft of grass in its mouth while it contemplated MIcah.  It watched on, wholly unafraid while he placed the mask over his head.  At his level, Micah could probably cure the ailments brought on by inhaling the mixture of crushed obsidian and mercury that he needed to paint the runes around the outside of the ritual circle.  

Micah could feel its eyes on him as he worked in silence, the sun beating down on him as sweat dampened his hair.  He sighed, it was hard enough to see what his hands were doing through the smokey glass of the mask’s eye holes, but the heavy waterproof cloth didn’t breathe at all.  

That was the downside to enchanting.  The detail and nuance required by the runes forced the enchanter to either paint them on using a liquid or inscribe them into a stone floor with a chisel.  Of course, if he were truly desperate, Micah could always try to draw them in the forest soil with a finger or stick.  Unfortunately, it was hard to ensure that the corners and curves of any rune drawn in soil were crisp.  For anything behind a beginner’s enchantment, the tendency of soil to flake off or cave in would doom any but the luckiest enchantment.

Even as his enchanting skill improved, Micah still preferred ritual magic.  Admittedly, there were plenty of similarities, but by and large ritual magic castings focused more on external factors such as the state of the cosmos and the environment in which the ritual was to be enacted.  It was still hard work, but most of that hard work was performed in a cool and dark library.  Possibly sitting on a couch.

Enchanting involved precision work.  Rather than days researching the ritual, Micah spent painful hours cramped and hunched over, straining his eyes to make sure curves and angles of his runes were drawn correctly.  He’d spent the tail end of the last timeline perfecting the art, but it still tried his patience each and every time.

Standing up, Micah stepped back from the circle and pulled off the heavy mask, sucking in deep breaths of the rich and earthy air.  The deer cocked its head before returning to its meal of grass.

“I’m sorry to keep you waiting,” Micah chuckled, grabbing his spear and placing it into the center of the circle next to the dismissive animal.  “I know that my activities are intruding on the big day of eating and napping you had planned, but I’ll let you get to it shortly.”

He stepped back and nodded at the circle in satisfaction.  The runes needed to hold the enchantment had long since been carved on his spear.  All that remained was for him to enact the enchanting ritual itself.

The nonsense words flowed past his lips as Micah’s hands curved into the seals called for by the casting.  Mentally, he grasped onto the temporal energy dwelling inside the stag and pulled, creating a gossamer thread of power that tied the ritual circle, the deer, and the weapon together.

The deer twitched slightly, flicking its ears in discomfort as the ritual’s magic began to pull the years from it.  Micah bit his lower lip, flicking his wrists like a conductor directing an orchestra as he channeled the temporal energy into the spear.  Vertigo washed over Micah as a full point of attunement was ripped from his body to fuel the ritual.

Even with the aid of the temporal energy, the cost of the enchantment was incredibly steep.  Micah didn’t see the point in half measures. He already had skills necessary to craft a high end enchanted weapon.  There really wasn’t a point in delaying the casting.  With the stag on hand, he had everything he needed to create a tool that would serve him well throughout the entire Durgh incursion.

One rune after another lit up along the weapon’s haft.  Static electricity ran up and down Micah’s arms as he reached out, grasping the thread of energy with his mind.  WIth his other hand, Micah drew runes in the air.  They glowed briefly, mirroring the carvings on the spear as they flared with occult energy.

The symphony of mana and colors rose to a crescendo.  Micah reached out with both hands grasping onto the almost completed spell form.  Alien words spilled off of his tongue as he forced it into the spear.  

Light flared, illuminating the clearing as the spear erupted into a rainbow of luminescence. One by one, the reagents melted, their essence pouring into the ritual and tempering the enchantment.

Micah’s voice swelled, his hands gesticulating wildly as he teased and coaxed the temporal energy and free attunement into their proper shape. He squinted his eyes against the blinding aura spilling off of the stag and spear, struggling to keep the mana in its proper place for only a couple seconds longer.

Then the enchantment finished.  The light flickered out, leaving Micah stunned and blinking.  His spear almost seemed to writhe with energy as the potential from the enchantments coursed up and down its length.

Micah staggered forward and picked up the spear, his eyes heavy.  His arms felt heavy, their movements dull as he inspected the weapon.  It was like he’d just run for hours and hours, an exhaustion of the soul rather than the body.

The deer snorted.  

“Feels good doesn’t it,” Micah responded with a lethargic smile.  “I told you that the ritual would only help out.”  

It approached him, shoving its muzzle into Micah’s neck.  For a brief moment he felt the cold damp nose against his skin before it was replaced by the sandpaper roughness of the deer's tongue against his cheek.

“You’re welcome,” Micah patted it on the side of its head, shifting his hand slightly to avoid its antlers.  “The rituals should be done now.  If I use anymore on you, you’ll end up as a faun again, and I speak from experience when I say that reliving your awkward childhood sounds better in theory than it is in reality.”

It stepped away from Micah, cocking its head at him quizzically.

“Nothing so drastic,” Micah replied, holding the spear up so that he could inspect its delicate runework.  “I knew where to find you because I’m a time traveler.  We’ve met before.  Over the course of a couple lonely years you became the closest thing I had to a friend.  We fought side by side until you evolved.  There hasn’t been much that’s gone completely right in my life, but you feature prominently amongst most of those memories.”

The deer bopped Micah on the cheek with its nose, drawing his attention away from his new weapon.  It flicked its ears at him, as if to emphasize an unspoken question.

“I can’t tell you what you’ll evolve into,” Micah winked at the stag.  “That’d be cheating.  You’ll just have to kill a bunch of monsters with me to find out.”

The deer grunted, dissatisfied with his answer.  One hoof scraped the grass, revealing the dirt underneath.

“Give me just a second to familiarize myself with the enchantments,” Micah chuckled.  “There are still more than a couple hours of daylight and I plan on going after a couple of monster lairs if you’re up for it.”

The stag stepped back, tilting its head toward Micah.  It’s nostrils flared as its deep brown eyes stared at him impatiently.

“Trevor’s busy on his big date,” Micah thrust into the air twice with the spear, trying to get a feel for its new balance and resilience.  “It’ll be just you and me today.  Plenty of time for us to get the hang of fighting side by side once again.”

The stag wandered off to eat some grass, its brown eyes never really leaving Micah.  He didn’t mind.  They had plenty of dungeons to clear before it’d evolve into Telivern again, and in the meantime, it would be just like the early days of the last loop.  Constant practice while the deer watched on, punctuated with occasional bouts of violence as the two of them earned the experience they’d need to level up.

A brief smile flickered across Micah’s face as he settled into a guard position with the spear.  The only difference would be Trevor.  Now that his brother actually had a class and a little bit of experience with how dangerous adventuring could be, hopefully his impatience and rebelliousness were things of the past.

Micah wasn’t entirely sure how Trevor’s irrepressible energy and good cheer would change the dynamic, but throwing another human into the mix could only help.  He couldn’t help but reflect on some of his more rash decisions, such as opening the portal to Elsewhere or throwing himself directly at the Durgh with barely any knowledge of the situation and wince.

Maybe, eschewing all human contact before rekindling a romantic relationship wasn’t the best plan.  Micah chuckled slightly.  He clearly hadn’t been thinking coherently at the time, and Jo’s abrupt departure had hit him harder than the thought.  Even if Trevor didn’t add a whole lot to their team’s combat potential, his brother could help keep him rational and grounded enough to avoid another round of self inflicted mistakes.

He thrust with the spear, admiring its solidity.  Even with a wooden haft, it barely bent as he swung the weapon in a blindingly quick upward arc.  Gritting his teeth, Micah spun in a circle and slammed the spear’s side against a tree with all of his might.

The white and green reinforcement and sharpening runes ignited, crawling up and down the weapons side as the blunt pole of the spear removed a fist deep divot from the tree.  He stepped back, nodding as he inspected the weapon for any nicks or blemishes.  

The runes faded back into the wood, dormant once more.  He’d only inscribed three enchantments on the spear, but the resilience and sharpness runes took up almost a third of the weapons haft, strengthening the wood until it was twice as strong as ordinary steel.  As for the head?  It would never need sharpening.  So long as he periodically fed it a trickle of mana, the magic would retain a razor’s edge no matter how Micah abused the weapon.

He set his feet in a guard position once more, closing his eyes and gathering his energy.  Almost ten percent of his mana flowed into the spear as Micah tensed his muscles, waiting for the perfect moment.  

A butterfly flapped by, born on a warm breeze.  Micah exploded into motion.

The spear lashed out as the magic took hold, a rainbow of potential vectors surrounding the insect as time itself seemed to slow down.  Micah shifted the spear upward and slightly to the left, aligning the weapon’s point with its quarry.

The mana ran out and the moment ended.  The pre-images of the butterfly disappeared as the world returned to its normal speed with jarring suddenness.  The spear point flashed, piercing both wings of the butterfly in mid stroke. 

The insect struggled slightly as the spear warmed noticeably in Micah’s hands from using the powerful enchantment.  He infused a small amount of mana into the spear and activated its last enchantment.  The head buzzed as the energy from a sonic bolt spell wreathed it for a fraction of a second.

The butterfly simply disintegrated as the vibrations from the spear sheared it apart.

He turned back toward where the stag watched on with disinterest, a broad smile on his face.  The spear only had three enchantments, one from each of his affinities, but that was all it needed.  His wood magic strengthened the weapon and kept in it good repair.  His air magic added sonic damage to his blows, allowing him to either bypass the armor of an opponent or unleash the sonic bolt as a secondary attack within an enemy’s flesh.  Finally, the time magic was his crowning achievement.  It was mana intensive, but for almost half a second the enchantment combined the effects of haste and foresight.

It had taken him weeks to come up with the theory and designs behind the enchantments, but Micah was more than excited for their potential.  The time enchantment would allow him to strike an enemy’s weak points, slipping the spearhead under scales or through cracks in armor with supernatural precision.  Then, the air enchantment would multiply the weapon’s damage.

Now, it was only a matter of practice to perfect using the two abilities in concert.  

“Come on,” he nodded his head toward the disinterested deer.  “I know where a clutch of bog horrors are hiding out.  Let’s see if we can get you evolved.”

After all, what better way to get that practice than experience in the field?