Copy Protection Void Part 24

'This would be a lot easier if I had a decent source of spell creation tokens, at least there isn't a timer counting down,' Mist mused as he looked at the various options and ways he could customize the spell he could create. 'Changing the color of the effect is cheap, changing the area increases or decreases the mana cost a decent amount, adding the ability to shape the spell on the fly increases the cost and making it selective increases it by an order of magnitude.'

He selected one of the area of effect options then selected a life draining effect from the rather long list of magical effects. He scaled the spell up to the point where it would be useful on a battlefield scale, curious about how much mana it would cost. 'A hundred thousand mana per tick, which is currently every six seconds? That's nearly useless.'

He played with the options a bit more, adding the ability to select what type of creatures were damaged and adding and subtracting various flaws to see if he could get the price down to something reasonable. 'Hmm, that would almost be worth it if I could kill a couple of million shadowspawn and if I didn't have better things to spend my token on.'

He went back to the menu and started skimming over the various options, wishing the interface had a search function as that would have made things a lot easier. "Ooh!" he blurted out when he saw an option to open a spell creation menu. He quickly selected the option and winced when he saw the mana cost of the spell. "Is that in scientific notation?"

Mist glanced at the grayed out test button on the corner of the screen next to the Create Spell button then tapped the Test button, causing a message to appear, "You need to have enough mana to actually cast the spell once to test it."

'So much for having an easy way to create spells,' Mist mused as he went back to looking through the spell effects, wishing the system had a search function as it would make it a lot easier to use. 'That probably costs extra.'

Mist smiled when he found a spell that would make a blade sharper the more mana you poured into it at the cost of durability. He pushed the test button in the corner and smiled when he realized he knew how to cast the spell. He walked over to the weapon rack filled with various bladed weapons that had appeared when he pushed the button and grabbed one of the swords. He cast his new spell and poured a decent amount of mana into the spell, causing the blade to glow before the glow faded. He studied the blade for a couple of seconds, not sure if it was his imagination or if the blade was a touch thinner. He walked over and hacked at the target dummy, causing a large gash in the wood and warping the blade.

'I should have tested it before I cast the spell,' Mist mused as he cast the spell again, pushing even more mana into the blade. He swung the blade at the target and winced when the blade shattered, leaving an impressive gash in the wood. 'Nice, but not exactly impressive enough to kill a god.'

He walked back over to the screen and went back to sorting through effects that he could add, feeling the knowledge of how to cast the spell vanish from his mind like a dream as soon as he went back to the main menu. 'So much for just testing a bunch of spells until I learn them.'

Mist felt sort of stupid that it took him five minutes of looking through the various spell effects before he realized that the system was probably adding random magical effects from the spells he'd learned to its list of magical effects. "Cavern creation, that goes with the monster creation effect. The summoning option is probably because of one of my summoning spells. Rip the flesh? That's probably from the spell…" he trailed off when he saw a spell effect that was suspiciously labeled.

"GUI?" Mist muttered as he quickly selected the spell effect, giving him a page filled with options for creating a user interface. "Graphical user interface? Is that because of my powers or am I reading too much into the process?" he asked as he added a button which brought up a list of effects that he could activate.

"This would be easier if it came with an instruction manual or an interactive system," Mist complained as he skimmed over the extremely long list, looking for ideas. 'Acquire?' He selected the acquire function then looked over his options. 'Mana, item, life, loot, stats… schematics?'

He selected the schematics options and frowned when another window opened with a list. 'It could be worse, it could be written in Scheme,' he complained, thinking about his less than pleasant experiences with the programming language in college.

'Huh, spell list? Database, okay, can I use this to create something that lets me share spells?' Mist mused as he started reading the brief descriptions on the options that selecting acquire gave him.

He played with the options for a couple of minutes then selected the option to acquire a schematic from his spell list. He hit the test button and cast his new spell, creating a basic blue interface window with a single button on it. 'Right, I should label everything.'

He pushed the button and blinked when his mind was filled with details of his spell to create bread, like he'd just spent twenty minutes having someone lecturing him while writing a bunch of symbols he only sort of understood on a whiteboard.

"Fuck," Mist complained as he rubbed his temples, starting to get a headache. 'Did it grab the first spell or was that random?'

Mist tapped the screen, causing the knowledge to fade from his mind along with his headache. "Okay, that could have been worse." He tapped the box just under the button on the interface and typed in a label when it gave him the option, 'Spell Script.'

He added another button and frowned when the mana cost jumped for the spell. 'I guess that's one way to prevent people from just making a spell that does everything.' He added another button and sighed when the mana cost jumped by more than double. He played with his options for a couple of minutes, selecting and swapping various functions and trying to get an idea how the pricing worked.

"Okay, I'd probably need a spreadsheet and a couple of days to figure out the exact formula but it looks like related functions cost less which means I can't just toss everything and the kitchen sink into my spell. If I can't make a spell that creates more spells, what about enchanting?" he mused, trying to organize his thoughts.

"I'd need a way to store schematics and a way to acquire them, I'd also need the method to actually imbue the items with magic which probably means I'll need a box or a way to select objects," Mist mused as he opened his gift menu and pulled out a notebook and a pen. "Okay, let's see what I can come up with."

0o0o0

"I feel like a script kiddie," Mist muttered as he stared at the notes he'd made while the details of his new spell were floating around in his head, feeling like he'd picked up old notes from college that didn't make sense but probably did at the time. He flipped through the notebook until he found a page that listed the functions he needed to grab if he wanted a spell that wasn't a complete waste of mana. "Okay, I don't need to understand the spell, I just have to put everything back together."

Mist spent a couple of minutes adjusting the script for the Scan function, ditching the overly clunky and mana expensive functions that would create a list of enchantments that he could recreate with the press of a button and a metric ton of mana in favor of a cheaper and potentially more useful spell that would break the schematic apart and store the building blocks that he'd have to assemble every time he wanted to copy something.

Mist pushed the test button then cast the spell, creating a blue holographic window to appear in front of him. 'I should probably give it a border and fix the overlapping panels,' he mused as he turned his attention toward the collection of magical items that appeared on the table that had appeared in the middle of the testing area. 'The spell creation option would probably be a lot cheaper without the testing center. It would also be a lot more dangerous.'

He focused on the rubber ball that was floating an inch above the table and hit the scan button, curious if the scanning function would actually work. He sighed in frustration when a short sword shimmered, drawing hit attention right before the spell activated and giving him the 'code' for a shimmering sword. 'I should probably add a second delay on that.'

He checked his list of code fragments that he could use to enchant an object. 'Dur0st87, Cut352st and shiNe20gs2? I'm going to need a key or a way to rename the strings of code,' he mused as he backed out of the scan function and used the 'debug' option that he'd cobbled together to check the basic enchanting function that he'd tossed together. 'Nothing, I'm going to have to check where I stored the code fragments.'

'Take breath and record the spell,' Mist told himself then took a breath and let it out, trying to calm down so he wouldn't rush things. He spent a couple of minutes and a few pages of his notebook recording the scan function that he'd created, wanting to make sure he could duplicate it and getting practice writing the code down without the extra understanding that came with his script spell.

He tapped the script button he'd coded, giving him knowledge of the last spell he'd cast which was his GUI spell. He focused on the scanning function and copied down a few more notes, places where he thought he could improve the spell, then turned his attention to the enchanting part of his spell and started making more notes after skipping a page and writing, 'Enchanting function starts here.'

He looked over his notes then canceled the testing phase and scowled as all of the knowledge he'd learned about the spell from the script function vanished from his mind, leaving him with bits and pieces and an idea where to start but not any of the details. He looked at his notes and started working his way through the spell, finding it a bit easier the more he worked on it.

He wasn't sure how long he spent testing and tweaking the code for the Scan and Enchanting functions and adjusting the basic interface window so it didn't look quite as basic but eventually he reached a point where he couldn't find any glaring issues that he could actually fix with the options he had.

'That's probably as good as I'm going to get without a decent amount of training,' Mist mused as he created another button for his spell. He glanced at the mana cost for the spell and sighed when he realized that he wasn't going to be able to test the spell's final form. 'I can always break the buttons if I have to test it,' he mused as he started looking through the functions that he could add to his GUI spell.

Mist had almost given up worrying about adding more functions to his spell when he found a function labeled Create Spell Crystals. 'Spell crystals that allow the user to cast an imbued spell and learn it if they cast the spell enough times? That sounds like materia,' he mused as he looked at the options. 'Create a random spell crystal? Anything and everything?' he mused as he selected the option to create spell crystals with random spells in them. "Huh, yeah, I'm not killing fifty million trollocs to unlock my spell and five times that if I actually want to use the function."

He swapped the random option for an option that would let him create spell crystals of spells that he knew, finding the price a lot more reasonable than the spell that let him conjure information out of thin air. "Okay, I'm probably going to want to be able to fracture the spells and combine the elements like with the enchanting fragments which means I'm going to need to debug it."

He flipped his notebook to a new page then selected the Scan function and started carefully copying the code so he could recreate it. He finished copying and double checking the code for both of his Scan and Enchanting buttons then deleted the scan function, dropping the cost enough that he could test it.

Mist pushed the test button and quickly cast his spell. He selected the option that let him create spell crystals and stared at the blank button and a black window with a list of the spells he knew and no descriptions. 'At least the prices don't change based on the quality of the spell,' he mused as he selected the bread conjuration spell and hit the button, making a note to add some descriptions and directions to the new window.

Mist held his hand out and pushed mana into his spell, creating a robin egg sized brown gem that his glasses identified as a Spell Crystal:(Conjure Bread). 'Spending mana while holding the gem allows the user to cast the imbued spell and learn the spell if they cast it fifty times. That seems pretty straightforward and it won't break when you use it, unlike the books.'

"On the other hand, that means we'll have to keep track of the crystals," he mused as he swapped back to the main menu. He hit the button to debug the spell, causing a bunch of information to get dropped in his head about his cobbled together spell and giving him a bit of a headache. "That's getting worse or maybe I'm just getting tired, I should probably fix that."

He skipped a page in his notebook then started writing notes on the spell crystal ability, wanting to get everything written down so he'd have a better idea of what he'd forget the next time he tested things.

0o0o0

Mist deleted the extra debug button that he'd dragged away from the rest of the buttons on his spell window then double checked that he hadn't caused any of the buttons to shift or do anything weird. 'Okay, now you're just wasting time.' He hit the Create button before he could change his mind, causing the testing room to vanish. He blinked a couple of times as he tried to get his eyes to adjust to the change in lighting. "How long was I gone?"

"Gone?" Egwene's clone asked, not sure what he was talking about. "You grabbed a coin and it vanished but you never left."

"What happened from your point of view?" Allora asked, wondering if she needed to get Nynaeve to check his head.

Mist covered his mouth with his arm and yawned, suddenly feeling like he'd just spent all day working on a project without a break. "I spent the last couple of hours in a testing room designing a new spell or at least I remember working on a new spell and I learned the spell, I just can't cast it yet."

Morgana looked up from the magic book that Bode was playing with and focused on Mist. "Why not?"

"I don't have enough mana," Mist replied as he closed the lid of the jewelry box and stuck it in one of the slots in his bracelet's storage.

"Is there a reason you didn't mention the other coin?" Berowyn asked, curious what he was hiding.

"Yeah, I didn't want people fighting over it," Mist replied as he headed for the tower the boss had walked out of, curious if there was more loot.

"Now I'm curious," Allora admitted.

"Same," Hilde agreed along with some of the other village channelers that had shown up to watch the show.

"I think that was the point," Bode complained when she realized that Mist was dragging things out.

"He's not going to tell us is he?" Fiona complained.

Mist stopped walking at the entrance to the tower and turned to look at Bode with a smile. "It's a token that upgrades a talent, I was planning on giving it to the person with the best talent that is willing and able to use the Dragon Crown," he explained then turned and stepped into the tower.

"Dragon Crown?" Nara asked Egwene.

"It's basically a ter'angreal that gives certain channelers a chance to permanently get copies of talents or boost their talents by having sex with another channeler," Egwene's clone explained when she realized that her twin was hesitating.

"That's going to cause a mess," Berowyn muttered as half the village girls blushed and the rest started giggling.

Nara turned to look at her girlfriend. "Loise?"

"As long as I'm there, we're good," Loise assured her, willing to cut Nara a lot of slack if it meant permanently increasing her talents as long as she got to take advantage of the crown.

"No telling the women's circle," Allora stated, wanting to avoid listening to yet another lecture about proper behavior.

"Or anyone that isn't a channeler," Alene added, giving some of the giggling girls a stern look.

Mist pulled his attention off the broken stairs and used a mage hand to open the chest next to the bedroll that probably needed to get burned. He smiled when he saw several magical rings and gems on top of a layer of gold coins. 'A ring of protection, a ring that lets you breathe underwater and a ring that lets you change your appearance while you're wearing it, not a bad haul.' He stuck the chest in one of his bracer's inventory slots then walked back out of the mostly empty tower.

"This is going to be embarrassing," Eldrene admitted.

"Would it help if I gave everyone ter'angreal masks that hide their identity?" Mist asked as he conjured a domino mask.

"Yes," Samara replied, having a pretty good idea of how the crown worked from one of her visions and knowing that a bit of ritual and plausible deniability would help make using the crown a positive experience. "We should probably search the cavern for treasure, stay in pairs."

"Can we keep it?" one of the girls asked hopefully.

"In theory," Mist agreed. "Everything you find needs to be brought back here so we can make sure it's not cursed and I reserve the right to buy or at least study any ter'angreal you find."

"I'll tell Nynaeve if you're stupid enough to try to walk off with anything," Allora warned them.

"We're not thieves," Fiona assured her mentor.

"Or stupid," Morgana added, more than happy to have the loot examined to make sure it wasn't dangerous. "Let's go," she told her twin then darted down one of the paths, wanting to be the first to get something neat.

Fiona smiled as she chased after her twin, knowing the rest of the girls would be right behind her.

Frank watched the group of villagers scatter then turned to look at Mist. "Speaking of curses, do you have anything that can turn me back into a man?"

"Catch," Mist replied as he conjured a sex swapping belt and tossed it to Frank.

"Thank you." Frank put the belt on over his loincloth then blinked when it honked at him, changed him back into a male and disintegrated. He sighed in relief when he glanced down at his equipment and realized that it wasn't old and rotting like he remembered.

Vivian glanced at Fox. "What do you think?"

Fox glanced between Frank and her twin. "I'm keeping the girls but I wouldn't mind chaining him to a bed for a bit."

"Works for me," Vivian agreed with a smile.

"Not my monkey, not my problem," Mist muttered under his breath as he conjured a bed so he could sit down and get off his feet.

"What are you thinking?" Egwene asked Mist.

"I was thinking about summoning a couple of strippers so Vanessa can grab some patterns," Mist admitted.

"It would be nice to have more options for the clothes I can conjure," Vanessa agreed. "And everyone likes naked girls."

"Not everyone," Berowyn replied.

"That reminds me, we should probably stamp everyone's ass to increase their healing talents and give everyone a loincloth before the show," Egwene's clone suggested.

Berowyn glanced between the two Egwenes then focused on the clone. "Explain."

Mist yawned and flopped down on the bed, deciding that he'd let the girls sort things out while he took a nap or at least closed his eyes and pretended to sleep so that he didn't have to explain everything to Egwene's family.

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