Cat With a Raygun

It only took Joe 2 days to make 6 of the new version of SACT. He made them with color coded leather wrappings and each one had colored glass beads around a dial where you could set which SACT you were trying to connect with. After some testing Joe discovered that his HUD would let him know if his SACT was beeping when it was in one of his Extra Storage spaces, which was awfully convenient.

Joe kept up his farming and reading training in the mornings in his field and greenhouse, and in the libraries of Trenos, respectively. He gained 2 levels of Reading and one more in Agriculture. Despite all of his research on elementals, he wasn't able to find anything on the essences he had Harvested from the magma lion. Joe thought about asking the Mages in Trenos, but he didn't want to go back there until he had an idea on how to help them improve their Sense Manachlorian skill without exposing the secret of the mana diamond.

Joe kept up weapons training with the previous residents of Rust's Edge, still without his armor. Joe kept using training weapons, but he allowed his sparring partners to use non-magical regular weapons. While he was fighting he kept brainstorming what to do for Ferelda and Thoomin, able to split his concentration quite easily.

He could work out patterns for his spells quite easily. He could make ones for his skills, although he had to mostly intuit those. Joe wondered if he could make patterns for his abilities. If he could, he could create a way for Ferelda and Thoomin to train their Sense Manachlorian ability by exposing them to the greater energy flow seen at rank 2. Since it was a passive ability it was rather difficult to work out as he couldn't even use Test Pattern to see if it was right.

While in deep thought about the problem, Ziko, who had decided to try the sparring himself for the first time, connected with Joe's chest with the claw weapon he was using. It still couldn't get very deep due to Joe's toughness, but Ziko immediately began to apologize profusely.

“I'm sorry, Joe. I thought you would block it like you blocked my other hits,” Ziko got out.

Joe just laughed in reply, “Not to worry. It's my fault for thinking too much about inventing. But this isn't even a bother to me. It gives our other Mage Kerras a chance to practice one of his spells.”

Joe said it wasn't a bother, but it did sting and even gave him one more level of Pain Tolerance. Joe was just glad Ziko wasn't using one of the new Dino Claw weapons he Harvested from the recent oculasauruses Kerras and Melanie had killed. Those were much sharper being enhanced by magic and would cut through even Joe's Toughness and Defense.

Kerras's Healing Touch wouldn't close Joe's wounds completely but another minute did the trick with his active Regeneration. Joe had a hard time convincing Ziko to resume sparring, but after some time Ziko resumed his training. Joe didn't split his focus this time, as he had an idea to work on finally.

It took another couple of days to perfect what he hoped was the pattern for a rank 2 Sense Manachlorians. Joe made a steel ring and gave his new rank of Miniaturization a workout by engraving the pattern on the inside of the band, then filling it with his empowered copper.

Joe wanted to test the ring out, so he gave it to Ferric and asked him to power it with his stamina.

“Sure, Joe,” Ferric readily agreed. Anything to keep the town's closely-guarded secret better. “I think I'm feeling something. Wow, there's really energy all around us, isn't there? I can't see it, but I definitely feel it. There's a lot more around you than around me.”

“Good, I think that's the right Rank, then. Rank 3 lets you actually see the energy flow, but Rank 1 barely lets you feel it, it would take more time to feel the difference in the flow around you and me. The description when I used Read Aura on it said it would be Rank 2, but it's always good to double check.”

“Hey, uh, Joe? I want to try something while I have this,” Ferric said, acting a little bit like he was ashamed of an idea he had.

“Sure, Ferric. Do you need me to do anything?” Joe asked.

“No, just stay here at The Rusty Cup. I'll be back before too long.”

After about fifteen minutes Ferric indeed returned with a great big grin on his green face. He wasn't even wearing the ring anymore, he was holding it in his hand out to Joe.

“Can I ask what happened?” Joe inquired.

“I'll tell you in a moment, but here, take the ring back.”

Joe did as Ferric instructed and then he saw Ferric manifest one of his CGS windows in the air. Ferric motioned for Joe to move around so he could read it and then Joe saw a line manifest.

Abilities:

Sense Manachlorians 1

Joe deduced where Ferric had gone, then. “So you went into the cavern and used your current access to the ability to gain a level?”

“Exactly. This has even more implications than your ability to learn spells, Joe. Skills are limited, but there's no known reports of abilities being so limited. If I master this ability like you have I should be able to show you the patterns for my abilities, right?”

“In theory, yeah,” Joe responded slowly, still thinking about what this means. Joe handed the ring back to Ferric. “I guess you're going to need this, then, and I'll make two more of them instead of just one more?”

Realization dawned on Ferric, “Oh, right, since I already got my free rank up for this ability I'll need to train it the same way you're trying to get those mages to train their abilities.”

- - - - -

One day later Joe was knocking on the door to the Mages' office in the palace in Trenos. He didn't bother going through the palace gates or even the town's gates, he just Backtracked directly to the hall outside their room. The door opened and Thoomin peered out into the hallway, looking around Joe and both ways down the hall.

“Hello, Joe. Good to see you, but why did you ditch your escort?”

“Escort? Why would I need an escort is there some danger here?”

“What? No, nothing like that. But after your last visit we instructed the town and palace guard to keep an eye out for you to be your bodyguards whenever you're visiting. You represent a fundamental shift in the power we can provide for our kingdom, we want to protect that.”

“Oh, sorry. I came directly to this hall,” Joe apologized.”

“Yes, but why didn't any guards try to stop you?”

“When I say I came directly to this hall, I meant it. Remember how I just disappeared last time I was here? I can teleport to any place I've been before, within a certain distance. Since I'd been in this hall before, I came right back here to avoid the wait and bureaucracy.”

Ferelda came to the door and told both men to come in and stop talking about Mage matters in the hall. Once the door was closed and Joe was seated Ferelda spoke again, “I'm sorry about that, Joe. Our positions here are solely based on our class, but without any combat abilities, we don't have the ability to really be effective if anything happened. We don't want that to become common knowledge for either our friends or our enemies. Now, is that teleportation a spell, is it something we can learn once you figure out how to get us started on that?”

Joe nodded, “Yes, and yes. And on that note, I have something for you two.” Joe pulled out the two new rings he had made after Ferric kept the original prototype. “I hope I got the sizes close enough. They aren't magically enchanted so they don't resize.”

Ferelda and Thoomin took their respective rings and found fingers they fit on. They both looked confused, though, and Thoomin voiced the thought they both had. “These aren't magical at all.”

“Not according to traditional magic, no, but traditional magic won't accomplish what we want to do,” Joe said as he reached for each of their hands and reoriented the rings to an etched eye was at the top of their fingers.

“Now, directly under that eye where the ring makes contact with your flesh is a small plate of copper. Channel some mana into that.”

“What ever do you mean?” asked Ferelda.

“By the hearth,” exclaimed Thoomin in a gnome expression, who obviously figured out how to do it. “Just use your sense of touch to find the plate and imagine you're moving mana from yourself into it, Ferelda.”

Ferelda followed her coworker's advice and her expression also changed with a gasp.

Joe grinned and said, “Good, it appears they're working for you both. Since the ability is normally passive, the mana cost is extremely low to keep the rings going. With practice you should be able to keep them active constantly and immediately replenish the spent mana with your normal Mana Channeling or even just your base rate from your Intelligence.

“Now, I don't know how long it will take you to get to Rank 2 on your own, or even know for sure it will let you, but I have strong reason to believe it will.”

“This is wonderful, Joe. I'm still not sure how it works, but I hope this ability will help me to understand it better as I rank it up,” Ferelda said. “Now, is there anything we can do you for you while you're here?”

“Actually, yes. Remember last time I was here I said I'd had a run in with an elemental? Well, I got something from it that I'm not sure what it's for, but it seems like it should be for something useful.”

Joe pulled one of the fire essence jars from his Extra Storage and set it down for the two Mages to examine.

After a few minutes Ferelda got up and went to a bookshelf near her desk. After a minute she grabbed a book off the shelf and brought it to Joe.

“Here. This book is about elementals and mentions these essences and theorized possible uses for them in crafting. No one knows how to reliably extract them from a dead elemental, though.”

“Can I borrow this book?” Joe asked. Ferelda nodded in reply.

Meanwhile Thoomin had been staring at Joe's foot. “Joe, that replacement foot you got is really great quality. It looks so real. Can I ask where you got it?”

“Oh, it's my real foot. I grew a new one.”

Before Thoomin and Ferelda could even get the first words of their questions out of their mouths Joe used Backtrack to return home to Rust's Edge.