80. Artifice (VII) (Patreon)

A/N: Slight delay to this chap bc it turns out I had 2 more midterms (yesterday + today) that I just found out existed! … Im not an exemplary student, as you might guess

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He flipped open the Compendium of Artificing - Tier 1. It was a very long volume, sorted by popularity. On the first page were qi-powered clocks, lanterns, small-scale machinery… he kept flipping. Soon he arrived at the page he was searching for. He pointed.

Kal leaned in. Dorian saw his bushy brows shoot up. Dorian saw him bark a laugh.

“Did you stop to think why that thing is at the back of the book?” hissed Kal. He jabbed at it. The image read: Wizard’s Stick. Dorian knew it as a staff. The description was simple—it was an instrument which stored a qi-technique; it took the user’s qi and spat out the technique. A very powerful tool, in theory. It made all sorts of hard-to-learn or incompatible techniques easy for the masses. 

But it had one key defect—something which meant that in all likelihood, there wasn’t a single working Wizard’s Stick in the Azcan Oasis. All the instructions to forge it were lost.

“It’s not real!”snapped Kal. Strangling Dorian seemed to have sated some of his rage, which left him merely very mad instead of murderous. “The Wizard’s Stick is a myth, made up by the same ancient idiots who thought swallowing Roc-dung cures male-pattern baldness! The only reason it’s still kept in the tome is the Guild council—that posse of gormless fossils—has a raging hard-on for ‘tradition!’ A stick that shoots Techniques? It’s the stupidest thing I ever heard!”

Kal looked on the verge of tearing his hair out. “Is this why you picked it?” hissed Kal. “‘Cause making a stick is easy? It has to act as a Wizard’s Stick too, fool! Without the spells, it’s a shitty back-scratcher!”

Nodding, Dorian swept over to the stick and picked it up. He channeled in qi.

It was like the entire stick had become one long bright-yellow bonfire; a bellow of warmth and light gushed out of it. It shined so bright it could’ve been a lighthouse beacon.

That shut Kal up. He stooped over the stick, peering at it closely. A few slow seconds ticked by. “…Huh.”

He snatched it out of Dorian’s hands, tested its weight in his palms, and fed in his own qi in. There was an instant assault of light, an eye-searching flash, a rush of fierce flame. He let it burn out.  “Well,” he said at last, looking bemused. “Shit.”

“The history tomes mentioned the Wizard Stick’s discovery. I figured it’d be fun to recreate the lost steps,” Dorian’s eyes twinkled.

“… Huh,” said Kal again. His great jaw worked slowly. A fat frown sagged on his face. He took a deep breath. He injected a thread of qi and watched the Stick light up again. He seemed to be having trouble wrapping his head around it.

He stared at Dorian. “So,” he said slowly. “So. You found a forgotten artifact, hashed out its blueprints, and slapped up a working prototype of this—this Wizard’s stick. In under an hour.”

“Yea. What do you think?”

“That’s…” Kal’s face twitched as he mumbled. “Fuck. That is pretty good. Fuck!”

Dorian perked up. “Does this mean I pass?”

“No!” yelped Kal. He swallowed. “Absolutely not.”

Dorian cocked his head. “Why not?”

A pregnant pause. “Hum,” said Kal. “Good question. One moment.”

One big hand scratched his big tangle of a beard as he thought. The moment stretched on to half a minute, then a minute. “Aha!” crowed Kal, lighting up. “Yes. I’ve got a reason.”

Dorian could see his composure slowly rising back up, like a heavyweight fighter crawling back to his feet after he’d been floored by a hard punch.

“I’ll admit it. It’s…not a bad effort,” said Kal. That phrase seemed stuck in his throat. It looked like it killed a small part of him to voice it.

“In the end, though, you’ve still made a shitty lamp.” He was picking up steam again, but he still looked off-balance. “It’s clever, boy. I’ll give you that. But the Alchemists the Guild admits make clocks, or carved daggers, or plate-mail. That sort of shit. Complex shit. You made a stick. A shiny stick, I’ll grant you. But if that’s all you got, the Guild’s not the place for you.”

The big man swallowed, looking reluctant. “It’s… a fine effort for a savage. But I can’t pass you.” He folded his arms. “That’s that.”

“…Oh,” said Dorian, affecting a sad look.

Fine effort for a savage? Please. Dorian wagered that if he didn’t look quite so dark and smell quite so bad he would’ve been admitted on the spot.

“Look, boy,” said Kal, grimacing. The man put a hand on Dorian’s shoulder. “The Guild may not be for you, but you’ve got something. Something special. A real spark. Not many kids have an eye for blueprints. Work hard at it, and one day—who knows? Maybe you can start up one of them solo-shops in the Outskirts.” Kal shrugged. “As it is—it ain’t a good fit. Half the Guild would riot if I let you in. Just how it is.”

Weird, he’s gone soft on me. I guess I’ve earned some respect.

Kal looked resigned, even a smidge upset as he stood. “I’ll walk you out,” he muttered. “Least I can do.”

But Dorian didn’t move. He simply smiled. “But…I’m not done.”

He cleared his throat gently. “Maybe now is a good time to mention that it’s not just any shiny stick.”

Dorian walked back over to the work-bench and thumbed one of the three disks he’d made. It looked like a finely-wrought ornamental bronze coin.

“The default spell this Wizard’s Stick holds is [Glow],” said Dorian. “It’s true—at its base form, that’s its only function. Except… I noticed Wizard Sticks had a curious trait,” said Dorian. “Each Stick held only one spell. To swap spells, you needed a totally different design with its own qi-channels and qi-aspects! It’s horribly wasteful to make a new stick for every spell, don’t you think?”

He tapped the side of the stick. Kal’s eyes darted to a little indent.

“Boy,” breathed the big man, stiffening. He almost looked nervous. “What did you do?” His voice had dropped to the soft register he’d used before he strangled Dorian. Dorian hunched his shoulders over his neck a little, just in case.

“I made a few small fixes,” He thumbed the disk in his hand. “Each Stick needed a new design ‘cause the qi-channels and aspects are carved into the Stick itself, right? But what if the qi-flows of each spell was stored outside the Stick? In, say, a disc?” The disk slid into the indent and was secured with a click. The ridges of the disk pulsed with icy blue light, snaking a stark sigil across its surface.

Dorian poured in his qi, and the air chilled to freezing. A burst of cold light shot out of the tip of the Stick, crackling against the ceiling and bursting into a blanket of glittering white, a a blizzard in miniature. Sleet slashed at the walls.

“SHIT!” Kal leapt back, ducking under a tuft of white. “Fuck! What the hells was that?!”

“It’s a spell!” laughed Dorian. “This one’s called [Snowshot]. It’s basic—the Yalta learn it as children.” Dorian waved the tip of the Stick around. Frost drizzled off the ends.

“You made that white stuff shoot outta your stick?!” Kal eyed it, incredulous.

Dorian winced. “Well, I wouldn’t put it quite like that—but yes.”

“How?!”

Dorian plucked out the disc and held it up. Glimmering on its surface were little carved runes, hot to the touch; latent qi swirled across the grooves like water on a riverbed.

“Shit,” murmured Kal again. Dorian got the sense it was the word the man defaulted to when he didn’t know what else to say. He rubbed his eyes.

“You inscribed it?” He said, snatching the disc from Dorian’s palm. He squinted at it, holding it up to the light. “Fuck me,” he murmured, befuddled.

While Kal soaked that latest little nugget, Dorian was happily plugging in a third disc.

“Let’s see what this one does!”

Storm-clouds of qi blustered angrily above them; a peal of qi-lightning cracked across the roof of the room, sizzling the air.

Dorian set down the stick and gave a little bow. “Now I’m done,” he said, smiling. “So? What do you think? Not your average back-scratcher, eh?”

Kal had plunked down onto a seat, cradling his face in his palms. Kal’s face was scrunched up in hard focus. His hands wrestled with the hairs on his head. He was muttering madly to himself all the while.

If he was a sensible man, he’d be leaping straight for the conclusions Dorian laid out for him. Dorian hummed as he waited.

“How?” croaked Kal, his head still hunched down.

“Qi-channels, sir,” said Dorian, shrugging. “I was an Alchemist’s apprentice—I got a good idea of how qi went up and down the body. So I carved the Stick’s insides to mimic the basics of human qi-channels and lined it with qi-conductive bronze.”

“No,” said Kal. “How’d you think to do that?”

“Um. Dunno. How’d no one else think to do it?” Dorian brightened. “Oh! I bet it’s ‘cause they picked the wrong metals. The book says copper and silver are best for conduction, but only bronze is stable enough to hold the spells together. Says so in the book.”

“No,” said Kal. His head shot up. Dorian saw fervent red veins against the whites of his eyes. “How’d you think to do that?"

“Oh!” Dorian pretended to think. Now’s a good time to drop a hint. “I always had a good eye for puzzles—maps, constellations, all sorta stuff about fitting things together…”

Kal froze. “Not to boast, sir, but I also have a real good memory,” mused Dorian, scratching his chin. “Once I see something once, I never forget it. I usually get a lotta things most of the way right after I see it once, too.”

Then, nonchalantly, “I was reading up on this Jani Zhang lady—she founded the guild, yea? It said she was born with a few tricks too—Perfect Intuition and Perfect Copy…and I thought ‘huh. Sounds an awful lot like what I got. Nice!’”

History: a great source of convenient alibis. Dorian knew those tomes would come in handy.

Kal was speechless; groaning, he started kneading his temple. Dorian kept on rolling.

“Oh! Inscription’s a Tier 2 technique, isn’t it? I hope it’s alright I for a Tier-1 test…”

“…”

“Hey—here’s a weird thought. If the requirement for a Tier 1 test is to craft a Tier 1 artifact… is the requirement for the Tier-2 test to craft a Tier 2 artifact?”

“…”

“Isn’t inscription what makes a Tier 2 artifact?”

“…”

“Does that mean this counts for the Tier-2 exam too?”

“Stop yapping and let me think!” said Kal, taking a ragged breath. “Give me that.” He grabbed the Stick from Dorian’s hands and brought it close enough to his face he could’ve licked it. Gingerly he turned it about, scrutinizing its sides and the disc-slot.

When he lifted his shaggy head back up, his eyes were bloodshot.

“This,” he breathed. “Do you know what you’ve done?”

Lovely. He’s come to the right conclusions. Let’s lay them bare.

“I think so,” said Dorian, nodding. “If a citizen needs fast transport, they no longer need years learning a secret qigong technique—they can buy a Stick. They don’t need wood- or kelp-burning for cooking-fires; the right disc will do. Most folk specialize in one branch of qi—but this brings a the world of qi Techniques to their fingers. As spells.”

He paused. “But armies…that’s where things get real fun! With the right Inscriptions the Stick can make perfect fireballs—far better than the common Vigor-soldier can do. It can switch spells in an instant—it can target a Vordor with lightning, or a Wyrm with earth. Its casting can’t be interrupted like a warrior’s focus can, either. Am I right?”   

Kal’s face was slack. He looked like he’d been struck on the back of the head by a meteor.

“I think I could make them take Spirit stones as fuel, too—for even stronger spells, with no need to draw your own qi at all! Can you imagine—blasts that consume a whole Spirit Stone? It’d be strong enough to down a Profound Beast! But… that’s Tier 4 stuff, I think. I couldn’t figure a way to get it done in the hour.”

Dorian looked to the Martial Elder with hope. “If I got a workshop here, though—I think I could make it work. And more.” He scratched his chin. “I wonder what I could do in a week, or a month…”

What he didn’t say aloud—I wonder how much I’ll make selling the crap out of this thing. Establishing a monopoly and squeezing the state and the people? It’ll be obscene! Oh, I can hardly wait…

Kal had turned to wide-eyed stone. He wasn’t moving. Dorian couldn’t tell if the man was breathing. “Shit,” he croaked as he drew another shuddering breath. “SHIT!”

Then Dorian got a hair-raising suspicion. He tensed a little. Wait. Have I pushed him too far? Have I crossed into the realm of ‘suspicious’—or even worse, demon-possessed? Dorian had been burned or drowned or stoned his fair share of times for being too much of a smart-ass with his talents.

Kal seemed a forthright, blunt fellow. He had a soft side, too. He’d even been warming to Dorian, hadn’t he? If Dorian read him right, he wasn’t the lynch-mob sort…

Still, he kept his eyes Kal’s hands and tucked his chin in. Just in case.

Then he gave Kal his most charming smile. “So, Martial Elder. Do I pass?”