Cat With a Raygun

By the time Joe returned with food, another waterskin, blankets, a tent, and a small Arcane Heater he had made as a prototype before, Otto had already fallen asleep against a boulder.

Joe woke him up with a gentle shake of the shoulder. Otto was startled before he took in his surroundings and realized who had woken him up.

“You're back!” Otto shouted in surprise. “You've done nothing to deserve the thought, but I was afraid you'd abandoned me.”

Joe shook his head, “No, but the journey back to my town is going to take a lot longer than I originally planned and I'll need frequent breaks to recover my mana.”

“So I was right, you are a Mage.”

“Yes, but unlike that gnome girl you encountered, I became one naturally and with no coercion.” Joe avoided mentioning that Otto had smuggled the girl because he didn't want to poke at his guilt while he was still so emotionally raw from telling his story.

“I still have a good amount of mana left now and we have several hours left in the day, so let's get started. You may want to close your eyes, we're going to be changing scenery a lot in a short time period. I can do 8 boosted jumps right now. We're looking at over 100 in total to get back to Rust's Edge.”

“Rust's Edge? I thought that town was dead.”

“Not quite, no,” Joe replied before asking, “Are you ready for our first trip?”

Otto nodded and closed his eyes. “So, do I have to grab onto you or--”

Otto felt things shift under his feet and an odd silence in the area that stretched out for several seconds.

“Open your eyes.”

Otto saw they were in an entirely different environment. Other than the shifting under his feet he didn't feel like he had moved anywhere.

“How far did we just travel?” Otto asked in wonder.

Joe looked to be in though for a moment. “Slightly more than 217 kilometers.”

Otto then remarked, “We're still on the road. Can the spell only move you along roads?”

“Nothing like that. Instead it can take me to any place I've been before. I ran the roads to get here, so the roads are where I can return to. The distance is set by my Intelligence and the spell's level. When it got to level 10 it gained a variation that can go 100 times as far, but I can't take anyone else with me when I do that.”

Realization dawned on Otto's face. “So when you went to get supplies you went all the way back to Rust's Edge?”

Joe nodded, then moved to the side of the road to find a spot to sit and wait for his mana to refill. Otto hobbled over to a tree and was able to get down to rest against it.

“Are you still having problems with your leg? I had hoped my healing would have fixed it.”

“I actually broke my leg jumping out of the window where the girl and I were kept. It was a clean break, thanks to my Toughness, but it hasn't healed yet, and I couldn't stop to let it heal when I wanted to get as far away from those men as possible.”

“We have a druid in Rust's Edge who also has this healing spell, but I don't know what level hers is at. No matter, I don't want you to suffer too much while we travel, give me a little bit.”

Joe got up and looked for a sturdy branch. He had not actually had a reason to cast Straighten Wood yet, so was actually happy when he found a strong branch that had a bend in it. He also spied a section of a really thick branch that had fallen some time ago from the main tree it was from. He cast Harvest to turn it into a chair and brought both the chair and walking stick back to Otto.

Joe sat back down again near Otto and got into the lotus position. He rolled up the sleeve on his left arm, took out his longknife and started making shallow slices along his exposed arm.

“What are you doing!?!” Otto shouted.

“I'm multitasking. I've been neglecting my Regeneration skill since I have a healing spell, but it would benefit me to practice with it.”

“There's no Regeneration skill,” Otto asserted.

Joe stood back up and summoned his physical Guidebook to show Otto a single line displaying the Regeneration skill which was still at level 7.

“It's not easy to unlock as it relied on another skill which itself relied on a Mage ability to unlock.”

The blood in the fur on Joe's arm was starting to be reabsorbed back into his body. The Regeneration skill acted a lot like regular healing magic, just at a slower pace.

Since he had two of his resource pools being trained, he might as well train the last one as well. Joe took out his waterskin and opened the cap on the end. He cast Move Water and pulled the water out of it into the air.

“I thought you were trying to refill your mana. Why waste it like that?” Otto asked curiously.

“This isn't a mana-based spell. This one relies completely on stamina, so it won't affect our schedule.”

“But I thought all Mage spells used mana.”

“That has been my experience so far, yes,” Joe concurred.

“So is that from your profession?”

“No, my profession is Arcane Gadgeteer, meaning I make things, devices, that run on manachlorian power without being completely enchanted items.”

“So where did you get that water spell from?” Otto wanted to know.

“I learned it from a Farmer. She uses it for irrigation.”

“You can't learn spells like that. They have to come from your Guidebook.”

“You also said Regeneration wasn't a skill.”

“Well, okay, I guess I walked into that,” Otto admitted.

By the time Joe was ready for the next leg of their journey he had gotten his Move Water spell to level 3, but none of the skills he was using had leveled up, nor did he expect them to for a while.

Otto indicated that he was ready and closed his eyes again while they traveled another 271 kilometers closed to Rust's Edge since he could cast Backtrack 10 times from full.

“Okay, one more resting period and then the last hop for the day,” Joe said as he offered some food to the merchant.

Joe noticed Otto holding himself like he was cold and felt the temperature getting lower. He lit a fire in the base of the Arcane Heater and set the temperature to 24 degrees. The heater was placed on the ground near Otto's chair while Joe sat on the ground on the other side of the heater.

Otto noticed the leaves and other brush on the ground and asked, “Aren't you worried about it catching fire?”

“Not in the slightest. I designed that myself. It's currently set that it can't exceed 24 degrees, which isn't hot enough to catch anything on fire. The fire inside is a little hotter, so if you open the fuel chamber you could start something, but as it is, no.”

“Do you mind if I check it out?” Otto asked.

Joe gestured with an open palm towards the heater so Otto leaned over and gingerly touched the metal casing on it. Seeing that it wasn't too hot to handle he picked it up to look at it closer.

Otto chuckled slightly at the novelty of it and remarked, “This is pretty useful. Have you thought about marketing these?”

“I'd love to, but they'd be prohibitively expensive for most people,” Joe said with a resigned sigh.

Otto looked confused for a moment then activated an ability of his and checked the results in his Guidebook right before his eyes opened extremely wide.

“Why does my Appraisal skill say it's worth 15,000 gold?”

“I'd guess because it doesn't value my time or expertise. That price is almost exclusively due to the key component in it.”

“And what's that?”

“Magisteel wiring.”

“Of course it is,” Otto replied sardonically. “At this point I'm in no position to question anything about you, it seems. Why wouldn't the mage who can create magic items out of bodies, travel thousands of kilometers in a day, discover new skills no one has heard about, and learn spells from other classes also have access to magisteel along with a pioneering understanding of how to use it?”

“What makes you think my methods are pioneering?” Joe asked with a smile.

“Because that's how my Inspect describes the design of this heater,” Otto replied matter-of-factly.

“Well, I guess that means it's indisputable,” Joe laughed while rolling up his sleeve again to get back to training while he meditates.