The Lone Wanderer

“Percy… are you sure you don’t want to go out for a walk or something?” Gabe suggested, pinching his nose. “You haven’t left my place even once since you got here…”

It had already been a couple of weeks since Percy arrived at the Vault. By now, his host’s peculiar odour permeated the humble room, the thick stench of sweat and spoilt eggs causing its owner to gag every few minutes.

“So much for hospitality…” Percy rolled his eyes. “You know my time here is limited, right? I need to make the most of it.”

The monkey hadn’t been too injured when he found it, his fused mana being more than potent enough to patch the Orange beast’s soul for a while. If he really wanted, he could probably remain here for several months. That said, he couldn’t accomplish too much in this body so, in the end, Percy had decided to not stretch his stay for too long.

Unable to start a challenge or do much else by himself, he relied on Gabe’s generosity to dip his toes into magiscript. The stingy jellyfish had initially been hesitant to buy him food or reading material, though he had come around after some pleading.

Fortunately, Percy had no interest in cleansing the monkey’s core. That meant he didn’t need much sizian meat to get by, thanks to his smaller frame. Gabe also saved some money on the magiscript books by lending him the ones he had already purchased for himself. Of course, he’d still needed to pay a few credits for a written version, as he personally had the material narrated to him due to his blindness.

‘Everything I’ve read so far doesn’t sound too different from what we have on Remior.’ Percy noted, diving back into his book.

At least, the translation device conveniently worked on the text too, making his life easier. Still, he put some effort into learning the Vault’s language, as he knew it would help him moving forward.

Strictly speaking, Percy hadn’t delved into magiscript proper just yet, as the field was too advanced for a beginner. Magiscript involved the combination of multiple runes into complex enchantments that could achieve a lot more than their individual components. What Percy was currently learning about was merely runecrafting – the formation of single runes, each of which could achieve a very specific, simple, effect. However, even this lesser branch was plenty useful for him. Plus, it was the foundation for everything else.

Evidently, the enchantments could be written in any language suitable for runecrafting. Though there were a few rules as to what constituted one. Certain enchantments worked better with specific symbols. For example, geometrical shapes with lots of angles could more easily convey the meaning of “sharpness”, while looping shapes correlated with “completeness” and “repetition”. A good runecrafting language was designed to capitalize on all these nuances. Furthermore, a user could more easily resonate with a language they were intimately familiar with, which made it a little harder for Percy to learn the Vault’s runes.

Finally, some languages were just better for magiscript, having been specifically designed for this purpose. For example, the Vault’s written word involved circular symbols with multiple segments, which could easily be overlapped atop one another, or chained in a sequence. This gave enchanters a lot more freedom when combining them. Apparently, Metatron had personally devised this language to facilitate the development of magiscript. By contrast, Remior’s runes were much cruder and nearly impossible to link together, as they hadn’t been designed with nearly as much foresight.

‘Asshole or not, there is no question the guy is a genius…’ Percy admitted.

Next, he drew some of his teal mana from his stash, focusing it on his index finger. He tried drawing a symbol on a piece of parchment, careful to make the lines as neat as he could, constantly visualizing the rune’s intended effect in his mind. Slowly but steadily, he seemed to be going well, as he made fewer mistakes than his previous attempts. The rune might even work this time!

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Sadly, it wasn’t meant to be. At some point, he noticed his reserves were about to run dry, forcing him to stop about halfway through. Staring at the incomplete rune, he couldn’t help but click his tongue in annoyance.

‘I just wish I had some more mana to practice with...’

Unfortunately, the monkey’s beast mana couldn’t leave its body, and Percy had a limited supply of his own teal mana. He hadn’t been able to practice nearly as much as he would have liked. For now, his main goal was to simply memorize a few symbols and their meaning, so that he could try them out with his main body once he returned home.

Many enchantments could be crafted with any affinity, as was the case for the one Percy was currently working on. Knowing his and Micky’s bandages weren’t going to survive for much longer, he figured it would be a good idea to master the ‘concealment’ rune, so that he could more easily protect his secrets in the future. Luckily, Gabe had shared that view – at least before Percy told him Metatron already knew about him – so information on this rune was something he had already purchased.

Still, there were plenty of enchantments that could only be crafted with specific mana types. The ones typically drawn on spatial amulets fell in that category. Suffice to say, Percy had spent quite some time convincing his friend to buy him a book on that one, to teach Nesha about.

“What about the materials?” Percy suddenly asked. “I’m guessing you can’t just draw the runes anywhere you want…”

Gabe shook his head.

“Technically, you can. But there are materials that are far better for most runes in general – and specific runes in particular. They resonate with some or all mana types, amplifying the effect of the enchantments.”

Percy thought back to the strange dark cube with the glittering stars his spatial amulet was made of. Clearly, that material was suitable to be paired with space mana, though he had no idea where to get more of it.

“So, in theory, I could draw the runes on the ground?” he asked again, catching the caveat in Gabe’s words.

“Yes.” the latter nodded. “They won’t be as effective if you draw them on plain dirt, but it can work depending on what you’re trying to do.”

Percy nodded. In any case, this was the best he could accomplish right now. Without any more mana to practice, and having pretty much memorized the runes, the only thing left was to wait until he returned home to test them out some more.

“Ok then. I suppose I’ll listen to you and go for a walk.” he chuckled. “To give you a chance to deodorize the place.”

“And how exactly am I meant to do that?” Gabe frowned.

“Can’t you get the cube to ventilate the room?” Percy shrugged.

“Yes. For a credit…” Gabe didn’t sound very happy.

“Well, just use your mana or something. Between fire and air, I’m sure you’ll work something out.” Percy said, heading towards the door.

“Do you want me to come with you? To give you a tour of the Vault?” Gabe asked.

But Percy shook his head.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll explore a little on my own. And… Gabe…”

“Hmmm?”

“I haven’t forgotten about my promise. I know it sounds impossible, but we’ll figure it out.”

Percy walked through the narrow corridors, vaguely remembering the way to the exit. Still, a few seconds later, multiple arrows lit up on the walls and ceiling, helping him along. As soon as he was outside, he took a deep breath, having also grown a little sick of the stale air in the room.

‘Not that it’s much cleaner out here…’ he smiled wryly.

Strolling around the futuristic city, he spotted many other buildings of various sizes – but not shapes, all of them being cubes for some weird architectural reason. He had no idea what their purpose was, but they were all decorated with countless interlocked runes of various colours, shimmering or pulsating in set rhythms. While Percy was still a novice in runecrafting, his recent studies only made him appreciate the sublime art even more.

Many people walked past him, flashing him curious glances. Though nobody stopped him or talked to him, despite his minute stature and lower grade making him an easy target. Evidently, the gods in charge of the Vault had taught their children better than to stick their noses in matters that didn’t concern them.

Eventually, he managed to reach the area with the challenge cubes – after asking a few passerbys for directions. Placing his hand on one of them, he tried to enter it as a guest, only to get rejected.

‘It was worth a try…’

The system had already warned him he wouldn’t be allowed to do this without permission, but Percy couldn’t help himself. He really hated imposing on Gabe, so he hoped to earn his own credits during his future visits. Sadly, it wasn’t meant to be.

“Hey, it’s you.” a familiar voice said. “Did you find your friend in the end?”

Percy turned to his right, only to see the pentapus creature “standing” some distance away, its purple tentacles and yellow eyes giving it a slightly intimidating appearance. Using Mana Sense, he spotted a Blue core thrumming in its… somewhere.

“I did! Thank you again for your help, Ronnie!” Percy smiled.

“Or would you prefer me to call you Metatron?”