PreCursive

  The week or so was almost nostalgie.

  Almost, being the keyword.

  The various leaders and backers of the Uprising would schedule multiple meetings and pnning sessions, that Sylvia and I were obliged to attend. You know, sinentors were two of the most important members.

  Which was a hing for Sylvia. She told me that Grey had rarely, if ever, asked her to attend importaings with him in the past.

  I guess lots of things ged in war.

  Iween the endless meetings, Honoka apparently approached Grey about taking Sylvia on as an official apprentice, in the same way that I was Grey’s. From what I heard ter, the older woman had been waffling and waiting to ask for this over the st few weeks. Acc to Sylvia, she had been unsure if she wao wait for the war to be over before making the request.

  Apparently, she had just gotten impatient and gone ahead with it.

  Grey had no issues with it. While I hadn’t been there at the time, an amused Sylvia had told me that her father had almost offhandedly agreed to the request, to the sternation of Honoka.

  So, it was official now. Sylvia wasn’t just the daughter of a figurehead of the Uprising. She was the apprentice of another, as well.

  Good for her.

  Even though Grey and Honoka had been dragging the two of us around to all of the meetings that they were required to attend, I’d been busy with something else iween all of them. I hadn’t actually seen much of Azarus or Renauld sihe parties after ‘winning’ the battle of Helstein. Azarus had apparently taken up some work with the smiths of the army and was busy ing out bdes by the dozen. While Renauld had been ‘volunteered’ by Honoka to officially join the Healing Corp of the Uprising. Renauld had assured me that he would personally be keeping an eye on Venix.

  Still, they were both doing something they loved, and didn’t have mupin about. Even if they were stantly busy.

  However, I had been crafting again.

  Now that we were expected to be in one pce for some time while the Uprising pheir moves, it was high time I got to work on some backlogged projects.

  Firstly, I o repce my colpsible spear. The ohat I had been forced to use for some time now was the inal prototype that I had structed after we’d escaped Addersfield. My improved one had been lost itle of Caer Drarrow. The hunk of junk that I was using now was getting a bit worn down and iual, no matter the repairs that I did on it. There were only so many times you could use a meism like the one I’d designed before it started to crap out on you, and I didn’t want to just repce parts anymore.

  No, it was time to create a good rept. Two of them, in fact.

  I think I was finally getting fortable with dual-wielding daggers, after the infrequent practice that I had gotten in with Azarus. There had been a breakthrough for me during one of our infrequeups for practice. I’d been asking him to help me for a while now to learn how to do it, and I’d finally practiced enough to learalent for Dual Wielding. As soon as I’d lear, it was like something had clicked in my brain, and using a dagger in each hand became more natural for me.

  Hell, an odd extension from that was that I was finding myself to be almost ambidextrous these days, whereas before I was strictly right-hahat had only grown, when I’d gottealent to level two.

  Anyway, all that to say I’d been w on making a new pair of extendable daggers. Drafting rogressing pretty well on them. I’d sourced some good materials from the smiths of the city of Helstein, and I think I knew what kind of entments I’d be aiming for. But for now, I was fog on refining the fiddly bits for the spears. Meaning all the little gears and meisms that I would have to paside the shell, in order for them to fun. I’d even optimized it to a degree.

  I think I would be able to finish stru on them in a few days, and theo work on the entments I’d been pnning.

  All this time crafting, though, had reminded me of something else. Something that I wao get Grey’s opinion on. He might be pretty busy right now, but he could still spare a bit of time now and then to assist his apprentice. A projeihat had ht failed on me, all the way back when we were sailing to Caer Drarrow.

  My prototype gun.

  I’d been surprised that I hadn’t lost it, on the drive all the way from Sancthaven, to Silvercrest, and finally to here.

  The two of us were in one of the alchemy aing bs that existed in the bowels of the Citadel of Helstein. The normal octs had been more than happy to lend its usage to the two of us. Or more accurately, to Grey.

  I doubt they’d given me any mind.

  Grey furrowed his brow, visibly puzzled. Repeating an experiment he’d already tried, he picked up a little firestarter from the bench, and first applied it to a small amount of bck powder that we had synthesized. It started sizzling almost immediately, eventually sparking into a small explosion.

  Then, he applied that same firestarter to the borehole of my prototype gun. It had been packed with the same powder, along with one of my small round bullets.

  Nothing happened.

  The powder didn’t ignite.

  Grey scratched his , baffled. “This is quite odd. Quite odd, indeed.”

  “See?! I told you so!” I said, throwing up my hands in vindication. “I knew something else had to be happening! The basicepts here aren’t even that plicated! Put explosive in tube, put ball on explosive, explode ball and BAM!” I cpped my hands together. With my new metal arm, it didn’t quite have the impact of flesh on flesh did. “New hole in target.”

  “Yes, yes,” Grey rolled his eyes, breaking out of his fusion. “You were correathan. There must be something else going on here. The meics of your bck powder are a simple chemical rea and not magical in nature. I think of no pusible reason as to why it’s not igniting within the ‘gun’.”

  I defted. “Oh. So you have no idea?”

  Grey shook his head. “Not many, no. And while this b is quite well provisioned,” He o the rge b we’d requisitioned, filled with magical equipment that I frankly had no clue about. “It doesn’t quite have the personalized tools I possess at the Academy to analyze the issue. However!” He held up a hand. “Even then, I’m not sure that this is worth pursuing any longer. It may well simply be the case that some facet of the ever-preseher of Vereden is preventing this…specific rea?” Even Grey sounded a little doubtful of his words.

  I sighed, but nodded anyway. “Yeah, I guess. I’ll just…shelve this one for now. Anyway, that wasn’t all that I wanted you to take a look at.”

  Grey raised an eyebrow at me. “Oh? Do tell.”

  Pig up a small sack that I had brought with me, I withdrew a small scroll that I had been scribbling in. I rolled it out oable in front of Grey. He leaned in to examihe lines of ruhat I had inked out painstakingly over the st few days. “Ah, I see,” He said, after a moment, before straightening up and nodding thoughtfully. “The entments for a new geion of your spear, yes?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, wao get your thoughts on this. See if it would all work, you know?”

  “Well,” Grey started delicately, scratg his . “Good thing you came to me first, because this entire array would fail. Spectacurly.”

  I winced. Ouch. It was just failure after failure today. “I see. What exactly is the problem, then?”

  “You’re trying to fit too many flig entments into this device,” Grey said bluntly. He pointed down to a particur runic sequence. “In particur, I have to say I’m a bit baffled by your inclusion of what seems to be a modified illumination ent. Whatever made you include that?”

  “Um,” I said awkwardly. I couldly say that I had been inspired by stories of a glowing blue short sword from bae, now could I? “I doly have a lighting Skill, and I still ’t cast Magic yet. And…I wanted an easily avaible source of light? I figured I could just turn my spear into a multitool.”

  “Ah, I see. That old trap,” Grey said knowingly. He shook his head. “Nathan, I ’t t how many times over the years I’ve seen enting students try and make a ‘multi-tool’, as you call it. The desire for a one-size-fits-all artifact of some kind is on, but mispced. Even if it looks like it might work on paper, some entments will simply reaegatively in practice. In particur, this light entment would flict with this…fire starting entment? And…” He paused for a moment, before shooting me an incredulous look. “Some form of lightning array?”

  I winced again.

  Grey shook his head with a smile. “No, I think you’ll have to start over. Perhaps you misuood me, when I said that the entments on yger were basic. I didn’t mean for you to add a rger variety. I wanted you to enhahe quality of the arrays on your work. That will serve you much better in bat. More esoteric arrays like those on my ons will e at a much ter date. These other entments would be better served being applied to specialized tools, instead. And besides,” Grey said, exasperated. “If you desired a light Skill, all you o do was ask, Nathan. I’d be more than happy to walk you through the process of pr one. Some other time, though. I’m afraid that our avaible time for experimentation is at an end. We have a meeting with Leopold about troop deployments soon.”

  I sighed, but nodded my acceptance. Pag everything away, including the failed gun prototype, I scooped it all up and followed Grey out the door.

  I felt a little embarrassed, now. I guess the K.I.S.S principle applied to entment, as well.

  Remember to keep it simple, stupid.

  ………………………………………………………………

  [ADD MENTION OF NEW LIGHT SKILL]

  Days after Grey had torn down my enting pns for my neons, I was finished. I held the finished product up to the light.

  This new dagger was looking pretty good, to my eyes. It was a bit less bulky, for one, due to the miniaturization of the meism I’d achieved. The bde was a bit longer, as well. Where before they’d been about hah, now I would say it was nearly the length of my forearm. I had kept the shape of the bde the same, however. I’d bee fond of my leaf-shaped spear bdes.

  It wasn’t quite as long as a short sword, however. Just a long dagger.

  You would think that with the enhanced miniaturization, I might be able to fit in a few more links of shell in order to extend the haft and ultimately the spear itself. I’d sidered that, but ultimately decided to shorten the spear form instead. If I was going to be dual-wielding these things, then it was much more feasible to be potentially using two short spears at once, instead of long ones. It wasn’t physically weaker, either, and not just due to the higher-quality hardening entment oal.

  No, it was due to the new material I’d chosen.

  This new metal was mildly magical in nature, and not just pin old steel like my old ons. It was called Oninite. A dark, nearly bck grey, it had a slight blue sheen to it that was most evident in the light. In fact, that was the effect that this metal had in the light. Instead of refleg light as most polished and sharpened metal did, Oninite absorbed it, and dispyed the slight blue sheen that was nearly uable in the dark.

  Perfect for the assassin build I was evolving into.

  Shaking off the slight pang that thought caused me, I flipped the bde in midair once before catg it. I the weight in my hand. This new version was a little heaver due to the Oninite, but it was just better overall. The reflective properties of the metal weren’t the only reason I’d chosen it, after all.

  No, due to its magiature, it had a higher enting load than pin steel did. I’d gone back to the drawing board aled on four separate enting arrays for it, all of which were higher quality than anything I’d made before. A sharpening array s that it split flesh without effort, a hardening array for durability, and two new ohe first eion array, born from my frustration at being uo pierce full pte. Even though I had Grinding Crimson Ssh now, I didn’t want to rely on that for armored oppos. The tip of the spear should have an enhanced ability to pierce straight through tough armor now.

  And the st?

  Well.

  What Grey didn’t know, he couldn’t criticize.

  I activated the st array, causing a brief burst of fire to jet out from the tip of the spear.

  , an easy firestarter was just too good to pass up.

  This was actually the sed of the daggers that I’d fihe other I’d gotten doerday, while I’d just fihis today. I’d e out here to one of the small training rooms that the Citadel had in order to put it through its paces, with some ons practice. I was intending to run through some forms that Azarus had taught me. Maybe shank a few training dummies at the same time.

  I drew my sed dagger from its pce resting on my right hip, befetting into a stance fag a practice dummy. As far as dual-bde work went, I’d bee fond of having the bde in my right hand upright, while the one in my left was in an underhand grip. I wao test how well that worked with two extendable daggers.

  Before I could even begin though, I heard the door of the training room open. I didn’t give it any mind, though. This room en to the public.

  However, I didn’t expect the voice I heard .

  “Oh, my apologies,” I heard a youthful, dignified voice say. Eyebrows raising, I re-sheathed my bdes.

  I khat voice.

  Turning around, I saw that I was correct.

  Sure enough, standing just ihe room with me rince Oskar, escorted by his asshole knight bodyguard.

  The Prince smiled at me. “You…you’re Headmaster Grey’s apprentice, yes? While I didn’t mean to interrupt your practice, I had been hoping to speak to you. Are you perhaps free now?”

  I felt my eyebrows raise.

  What could a Prince possibly want with me?