25 Suns

--- Jon ---

“You know when you said you wanted to start off easy, I didn’t think this is what you had in mind.” He told his ma, taking a moment to plan his route before taking off in a sprint.

“What? It’s just a little obstacle run.” His ma pointed out, pulling herself over a ledge before jumping to her next platform.

“True, but I figured we’d start with a spar or something.” He elaborated, kicking off one wall to get the height necessary to grab the ledge of another one.

“Really?” His ma asked incredulously, actually stopping to look at him. “You want to spar here?”

“Well, not here.” He admitted, before gesturing to the ground four storeys below. “I was thinking more down there.”

His ma’s face twisted a bit in distaste. “In a back alley?”

“Figure less room to maneuver would be more of a challenge than the open space of the patio deck or forest clearings.” He explained. “Besides, living in the city we’re more likely to get into an alley knife fight than a rooftop race.”

“Never know with all the Deviant’s and Masks running around.” His ma argued with an amused look. “They make interesting faces whenever you manage to catch perp faster than them.”

“I’m sure they do.” He agreed, remembering Andre’s face when he’d outmaneuvered the Orkin Traveler. It admittedly wasn’t the same thing but he felt it still held to the principal of the matter.

(I wonder how he’d ‘ve reacted if I actually managed to beat him without any powers or magic?)

Scene Consequences

-Thanks to Ma’s help, gained 1XP to Mobility and Awareness.

--Currently: Mobility Lv. 6 (2/14) and Awareness Lv. 8 (7/18)

---

(It occurs to me that these cautionary tales might be a little sexist.) He frowned, part way through yet another book on relationships.

(I mean they all keep going on about how their female lead is nothing like other girls as if being a girl is a bad thing!) Which he was calling bull pucky on, since most of his friends were girls and they were all wonderful people that he was lucky to have in his life. (And now I’ve got this book where the lead is supposedly the first girl to do something in the thousand or so years this ‘guardian rite’ has been going on for?!)

“This book is basically telling every girl who reads it that only the ‘magical chosen one’ can amount to anything.” He realized in disgust.

He wasn’t so naive as to not realize there was a glass ceiling out there, but at the same time he also knew that if a woman was determined enough they could match and surpass any man that they tried to, and that it was only sexism like this keeping them down.

(Just look at my Ma, a decorated soldier with over a hundred completed ops and now one of the best cops in the city. And that’s not counting Miss Edna either, who’s recognized as one of the best potion makers and enchanters in the country and a pioneer in both fields!)

Shaking his head in disgust, he slammed shut the book subtly propagating negative stereotypes while pretending to empower those women by having a single one subvert those stereotypes by being ‘special’.

(And here I thought we were finally getting past this garbage.)

Scene Consequences

-Gained 1XP to Awareness

--Currently: Lv. 8 (8/18)

---

“Huh, was expecting you in, a couple of days ago.” Samantha Delacroix admitted when he stepped into her shop. “I’m guessing you found that thing you were after?”

“Yeah, I did.” He nodded before giving a chuckle as he realized, “Same day I was supposed to pick the compass up too.”

“That’s how life goes I guess.” Ms. Delacroix told him with a touch of amusement as she placed a box on the counter. “But still, you paid for it, so you might as well take it off my hands.”

“Right.” He agreed opening the box to find an old box compass, with eight-sides and a dark glass dome on top.

“So, how exactly does this thing work?”

“Well, first things first, when I ordered it I managed to get them to fit as many enchantments as I could into it. One of which was a user blood-bond seal.” Ms. Delacroix told him.

“A what now?” He blinked.

“Smear a drop of your blood around the circumference of the compass, and it’ll only work for you and those you willingly hand it to.” His fellow magic user explained. “To anyone else who tries to use this it’ll be a regular compass pointing south.”

“South?” He frowned.

“An extra f-you to anyone who uses it without permission.” Ms. Delacroix grinned. “Didn’t even have to pay for that feature.”

Shrugging, he bit into his thumb hard enough to draw blood, before smearing it around the compass’s edge.

“Wow, didn’t even hesitate there.” Ms. Delacroix chuckled, looking just a little unnerved.

“Well, I mean… you wouldn’t get very far if your products weren’t reliable.” He figured, not seeing any reason for the shopkeep to screw him over at this stage of things.

(After all, ‘if a proper salesman is going to screw you over it’s going to be when they overcharge you for their product.’) That was an interesting lesson with Miss Edna, especially since it was while he was helping her at her shop in Blackwell.

“Not what I meant, but…” Ms. Delacroix shook her head. “Either way, once the bond is set -which you’ll know because the blood has faded- then grip the compass while thinking about your surroundings.”

He waited a moment, during which his blood rapidly evaporated off the compass, before shifting his grip on it and doing as Ms. Delacroix told him.

A faint blue circle flashed into existence a few inches above the compass and nearly twice as wide around with a number of shapes and dots within.

“What’s this?” (Because it’s definitely not a compass. Honestly it looks more like,) “A map?”

“Yep, specifically one showing everything and everyone within a fifty meter radius of you.” Ms. Delacroix nodded looking proud of herself. “What’s more if any of those people mean you harm it’ll also flag them by turning their dots red.”

“Huh, that is useful.” He admitted, (even if it can’t tell the difference between floors this could’ve been really useful when I was raiding the Dealer warehouse.) He wouldn’t have even needed to spend time tracking down the warehouse map if he’d had this thing.

Still regardless of its usefulness he couldn’t help but frown. “What about the whole ‘pointing towards what I’m looking for’ thing?”

“Right, I told you that enchantment could be finicky, especially since I couldn’t get the distance I wanted on it. Which is why I got all of those extra features added, that way even if you can’t get the compass part to work it won’t be a waste of money.” Ms. Delacroix explained.

“But didn’t those features up the price a fair bit?” He asked, having a basic idea of how marketing works for enchanted goods after helping Miss Edna with her own shop.

“Yes…” The shopkeep grimaced.

(Well, there’s the salesman’s screw over.) He thought sardonically.

Ms. Delacroix looked a little uncomfortable under his dry gaze as he tried to emphasize the fact that he would catch her if she tried to screw him over again. “Okay, uh, how about I make it up to you with a sweet deal?”

“What kind of deal?” He asked, what little business savvy he’d picked up from his mentors rearing its head.

“First off, since you’ve proven your really serious about this whole magic thing, I’ll open up a little more of my inventory to you. Then I’ll offer you… these at a discount.” The shopkeep told him as she set a large box full of rings on the counter.

“Rings?” He asked curiously as he picked one up before looking at his fellow magic user as he realized, “Silver, for enchanting?”

He remembered Miss Edna prefered silver as a working metal due to it having both a better conductivity and reflectivity than copper and gold, while also being notably cheaper than the later.

“Anyone who says gold is better doesn’t know magic.” Ms. Delacroix agreed with a grin. “Normally you can’t fit much in a ring, but the silver ups it to a point of being fairly useful for holding an enchantment or two.”

“How much for them exactly?”

“Twenty-five dollars each.” The shopkeep answered, before more sternly adding, “Today only.”

(Hmm, they could be fun to experiment with…)

“And I’ll sweeten the deal a little more.” Ms. Delacroix told him, pulling out a pen and paper. “I know you practice script craft, but tell me have you picked up a ‘light’ related affinity?”

“Uh, yeah, I’ve got one.” He admitted, watching his fellow magic user write out a few bits of spell code that he could tell slotted into an enchantment circuit.

“Good, then you can make use of this.” Ms. Delacroix finished, before handing him the paper. “It’s a simple enchantment that requires a light affinity of some kind and a ring. I won’t tell you what it does exactly, just that it does something… useful.”

“Going to keep it vague?” He asked, reading the script over trying to figure out what exactly it does with little success at his current level beyond the few bits Ms. Delacroix had already given him.

“Have to keep you interested somehow.” The shopkeep smirked. “So, do you want the rings or not?”

"Fine, I'll try it out. Give me... Three rings for now I guess."

"Sure thing."

Scene Consequences

-Collected Witch’s Compass (Rank: B+)

--Compass will only work for Jon and those he willingly hands it to.

--Compass will point in the direction of Jon’s current goal.

---(Note: Requires Will Check and 1 Focus to use, with the check getting harder the closer it is and the less information we have. Roughly a 2km limit.)

--Compass provides a small map of the area within 50m.

--Map will mark those who currently mean Jon harm within its radius.

-Witches’ Wares has new merchandise available to Jon.

-New Enchantment: Ring + [Moonlight] = ????

---

Setting his new compass down on his counter, he decided that it was time he got to work on a project he’d begun weeks ago but had let fall to the wayside with everything going on with the Valentines.

He’d already found two ways of helping Pix with her magic problems, and if he was lucky the garden she’d been working on would provide a third, but he’d yet to exhaust all methods available to him. Which is why he was currently going through the notes Miss Edna had given him for Script Craft trying to piece together something that could help.

(Okay, so if I use this I should be able to apply a spell script to someone other than myself.) He figured, knowing that the few spell scripts he knew either applied to himself or an object he directed it towards.

Now normally, changing a script’s targeting code wouldn’t be too big of a deal, but as he was quick to find out a person’s spell system -the ones born with one anyway- had something of a passive resistance towards foriegn magic.

(Another advantage the Arcane have over practitioners…) He thought with a touch of bitterness, before shaking his head at that mean thought. (It’s just the luck of the draw, I can’t blame Ying, Pix, or Miss Edna for that.)

What that meant for him was that if he wanted to create a spell effect with his -(amulet’s)- magic, he had to find a way to get the spell effect to be accepted as harmless by Pix’s spell system, (but the question is how to do that?)

It took him a while and a fair amount of shifting through De Sade’s books on the Occult, but eventually he remembered the times Pix had healed Ying. A feat that should’ve been arguably more difficult than healing him given how as an Arcane-Incarnate her system’s resistance would theoretically be even stronger than a normal Arcane’s.

“Of course a healing effect would automatically be considered beneficial.” He realized bopping a hand off his thick skull. The idea had been eluding him due to both his lack of the affinity as well as the fact that he had no system and thus no resistance himself. “But just because I can’t use a healing affinity doesn’t mean Pix can’t…”

It’d admittedly be a little more difficult than having Pix merely supply her affinity to an enchantment like they’d done with the garden, but it was similar to something Miss Edna had had them work on when he was having trouble learning a self-repairing enchantment.

Theoretically as long as she applied her healing affinity to the script while he was making them, he could inffuse the concept of ‘mending’ into them. What’s more because Pix was assisting with the spell crafting her own system should be more accepting of it once it recognized her own magic.

“That still leaves the magic itself though.” He couldn’t help but grumble when he had all but a few variables for the spell script he was attempting to craft.

As much as he wished he couldn’t just use magic, since any magic he used would be slightly tainted by his own innate affinities. Meaning he’d have to learn how to use a distilled magic affinity of sorts. (I think that ‘Arcane Affinities’ book I got the other week had something on that.)

A yawn fought its way up his throat before he was forced to realize that the sun had long set, his clock read A.M. instead of P.M., and a little fairy was snoozing away sprawled out on one of his pillows.

“Well, at least I don’t have school tomorrow.” He sighed, his joints popping as he stood after spending so long hunched over his books.

“Yeah, Pix has the right idea.”

Scene Consequences

-New Script Recipe: MP Charge Script (Requires: (Base) Magic related affinity, and Healing related affinity.)

-For creating a new spell script affecting others’ spell systems gained 1XP to Script Craft and Occult.

--Currently: Script Craft Lv. 3 (5/8) and Occult Lv. 6 (1/14)