Invent ~ 30!

The last of the flames guttered out, leaving behind a scarred and pitted metal floor. Joe looked around hollowly as he inspected the damage, regrew his foot, three fingers, and his left arm; finally getting a notice as the structure itself stopped taking damage.

A.S.P.E.C.T. durability: 113,333/150,000.

“How in the abyss did that deal over sixteen thousand damage to the structure? I had barely even started!” Joe slammed his hand on the only undamaged portion of the floor: where he was sitting. His Exquisite Shell had been wrecked. Aspect damage—being True Damage—went right through shields. Even so, it had saved him from the superheated air and molten metal that tried to sizzle his skin. Right now, he was waiting for his mana to regenerate so that he could reactivate the lifesaving skill once more.

“Even more, that was using Trash aspects? No wonder the system told me that it ‘recommended’ doing them in order. I can't even imagine the level of damage that could have happened if I would have started with something like Rare aspects.”

The framework that he had put in place, the ghostly mana scaffolding, had vanished when he had pulled his attention away in order to save his skin. Reluctantly, he reactivated the dais and watched as lines were traced over nearly the entire available space inside of the nonagon. “Right, there is no way that I could possibly do all of this tracing by hand… especially once it goes up the walls? There's nowhere to stand. I can't exactly move the building around so that I’m able to do the work that needs to be done. Think, think.”

An answer to his concerns, more of an idea perhaps, filtered across his conscious mind. “If controlling a Field Array is directly correlated to my Mana Manipulation, what's to say that I can't directly use that skill to fill in this area?”

He had been getting quite a bit of practice using his mind much more directly when it came to handling objects—thanks to his Ritual Orbs—and even if it was absolute fractions of milligrams; energy did have mass. Taking a firm stance that he knew he would be able to maintain for a good chunk of time, Joe pushed the tip of his Inscriber into a mana line on the wall, and tried to get a feel for how aspects flowed out of first his storage device, and then through the tool itself.

Slowly, ever so slowly, he moved the inscriber along the line and began to get a feel for how his power and the essence of what was once an item interacted.

Skill increase: Magical Synesthesia (Beginner I).

Skill increase: Essence Cycle (Beginner VI).

Even though he was seeing no progress in controlling it, Joe knew that he was moving in the correct direction once more. Over the next few hours, and maintaining his concentration only on the walls within arm's reach, he began to get a solid feel for how to control the flow of energy directly. The moment of truth came: as far as he could tell, he was not going to get any better without actually practicing it. Taking a deep breath and double, triple, quadruple checking his Exquisite Shell—then preparing to jump out of the nonagon if needed—he began forcing the Trash aspects along the lines using only his mind and his Inscriber as a catalyst.

The only thing that stopped him from detonating the entire place with his first attempt was the fact that the lines that needed to be drawn were perfectly straight. Dark gray aspects blasted along the Intervening space, collecting and slightly pooling at the end of the line as he pulled back how much mental force he was using. He stared at the flickering, nearly destabilized energy, and reached up with his off hand to wipe away the cooling sweat that even his Neutrality Aura hadn't immediately gotten rid of. “Oookay, got it, this requires a very light touch.”

Near destruction was a great motivator for rapid improvement, and there was even a hidden benefit to the pooled aspects: instead of drawing additional energy directly from his storage device, he was able to direct the excess from the pooled forces and have it flow along the lines near it. This allowed him to keep the lines consistent, both in thickness, depth, and placement along the walls. Getting a better feel for how to make this work, Joe slowly began feeding additional aspects into the array.

The design he followed with his eyes slowly had energy added to it, all with Joe staying in one space. So single-minded was his Focus, he did not even realize when he had completed the project. If it were not for an intense flare of gray light that broke his concentration, he would have been attempting to add too much power to the system once more; and he did not want to experience the devastation that would be wrought by the array breaking down at this juncture.

Joe blinked his eyes to clear away the after images that had burned into his retinas, then looked over the design that he had been working on for… he wasn't exactly sure how long. “It turned into metal?”

He ran his fingers along the intricate, frankly impressive filigree that spanned the entirety of the walls and floor. The Reductionist found that he had been incorrect in his initial assumption; this was not metal. At least, not a type of metal that he had ever seen before. It moved around as if he were playing with a vein on the back of his hand; staying in place, attached to the wall and floor, but seemed closer to mesh tubing than malleable metal.

Array layer complete: Trash.

Class quest complete: Novice Reductionist. Reward: 1,000 Damaged aspects you can claim at any time, in any storage device that will accept them.

Class quest gained: Novice Reductionist II. Create a Damaged rank permanent array. Reward: 2,500 Common aspects. Array created: 0/1.

Congratulations! Your A.S.P.E.C.T. will now be able to convert materials into trash aspects if they are placed within the open area and the array is supplied with energy. Before you begin to worry, there are several methods that you can use to power the array.

1. Active Conversion.
   1. You are able to directly supply mana from your mana pool to convert items into aspects.
2. Directed Conversion.
   1. Using a mana battery or mana collection methodology is an effective way to empower the permanent array. Access points for indirect mana supplies are built into the exterior of the building.
3. Aspect Convection Direct Conversion.
   1. After initial powering of the array with mana, the array can be directed to use gathered aspects to fuel the reduction of items without needing further energetic input. Each rank uses aspects at a differing rate. Gathered aspects that do not have an empty storage device will automatically be used as an ACDC power supply if this option is selected.

“Well, that's easy enough; burn anything below Rare to fuel the conversion process.” Joe muttered to himself as he debated on whether or not he wanted to set up the next layers of this array immediately.

His Constitution told him that he could keep going. His Strength informed him that he would have no issue remaining standing in this position for days if needed. But, his Wisdom suggested that he should probably take a break.

“Forget that!” Joe chuckled to himself as he dove into the ‘Damaged’ aspect layer. “The vote is two for continuing to work, one for pausing. Working has it!”

A new layer of ‘scaffolding’ appeared, but this time the lines were not along the wall and floor, or… a better way to put it would be that the lines were not directly touching the walls and floor anymore. It appeared that this layer would only connect to the first in a few areas, giving Joe the slightly uncomfortable feeling that he was weaving a massive spider web. “I don't suppose the original Reductionists were spiders, were they?”

With his ever so slightly more impressive Inscriber, Joe began filling out this new layer with potent aspects. A frown touched his face as soon as he began, and realized that even with how minimal of a difference between the two rankings logically, the fact of the matter was that Damaged aspects were much more mentally ‘heavy’. While Joe wasn't sure if it was that he was already tired, or if they were truly this dense in comparison, the strain on his mind caused him no small amount of struggle in the beginning.

After the initial input, as he got used to the ‘weight’, the momentum of the energy’s movement made it far easier to progress. It did make him slightly concerned for when he would be trying to work with higher rank aspects, but that was a problem for future Joe. Right now, he was working on grinding these skills and making them more effective so that he would be able to meet the goals he had waiting for him when he got to the next challenges. As he got to an extra tricky portion, he grunted, “Classic skill grinding, gotta love it.”

He was pleased that there was no day or night cycle down here, otherwise he would have likely given into mental fatigue before completing the second layer. Over the next few hours of feverish creation, Joe managed to complete the dark gray portion of the array in one fell swoop.

Array layer complete: Damaged.

Class quest complete: Novice Reductionist II. Reward: 2,500 Common aspects you can claim at any time, in any storage device that will accept them.

Class quest gained: Novice Reductionist III. Create a Common rank permanent array. Reward: 500 Uncommon aspects. Array created: 0/1.

“It still considers the next layer as a Novice quest? This set of class quests might be… *yawn*… a lot more intense than my other ones. At least the reward is about half of what I need to make the next layer every time I succeed.” As soon as he was done reading and thinking over the notification, he leaned against the viney, oddly organic layer he had just created and closed his eyes.

“Just a tiny nap… then I'll get the Common section done and do a test run.”