The Combat Artificer 2

Chapter 2

Outside Brook Town
Evening.

Money spent: 800 Silver Drachmas. It included food and water. I pulled the cart that I bought for cheap; it was loaded with tools of all sorts. My camping gear was there too, there was no way that I was going to sleep in an expensive inn. I would build my own house and get used to my abilities. The road leading inside Brook town was well maintained, it was next to a big flowing river with shallow clear water; in it there were many fish and other creatures that I couldn’t identify.

As I followed the river, I walked a good five kilometers away from the town, until I found myself entering a forest. The forest was divided in two by a gushing river that separated into nearby streams. Small animals, familiar and fantastic ones, were drinking or traversing the waterways. The birds were all going to sleep as the sun was slowly setting.

*I needed to make camp, but where could I find a suitable place…* My feet stopped there until I found the ideal space. The trail that I’ve been walking stopped before a big blue pool in the forest; the water was clear and there were crystals glowing blue in the depths of the water. It was really beautiful…

I stopped there, and started taking the camping gear out of the cart; I was careful to make camp thirty meters away from the pool, I didn’t want to be too close in case it rained today. On the flat weedy ground, I started assembling the simple tent that I’d bought. I remember seeing the enchanted models. It reminded me of those magical shelters in the Harry Potter movies, but it cost one thousand Silver Drachmas, basically 1 Gold Drachmas.

Once the tent was up, I looked around for wood and built a campfire, just like when I learned to do it with my children. I took a shovel from my cart and dug a shallow fire pit, built a circle of stones around it and put the moss and dead wood gathered in the middle of it. As the night fell, I finished making camp and started cooking.

It was nothing fancy, mainly canned beef stew with some water. It was while I was eating that I started reading about magic. I had pulled the red book Magic for Dummies from my suitcase, and started to literally devour it.

The introduction on the first page read like this:

In all Magical practices, there are systems of skills and techniques, closer to what we call ‘science’ than the average image of magic and magicians. Magic as a whole requires a complex amount of calculation, theory and practice in order to make efficient use of the powers they have. As such, spells alone are not simply something a person can cast, but require knowledge of the subject, how the spell works and what the incantation is in order to shape the magic correctly.

Under that introductory paragraph, there was a chapter index.

• Western Magic
• Eastern Magic
• Rite
• Spells
• Decisive Pose
• Ward

I turned the thin page and started to read, it was rather simplified. I hate to think about how complicated some magic tomes could be.

Western Magic : This is the style of magic based around Europe's cultural sphere of influence. With the spread of European culture and Christianity during the Age of Discovery, western-style magic has also spread throughout the world, with magical academies and similar institutions in many countries.

Closely conforming to the classic image of magicians, a western mage uses mana as energy, and requires spells, incantations, and catalysts to activate magic. The two languages of incantation are Latin and Ancient Greek, with the former being more common and the latter being solely used for High Ancient high-level magic.

The Western school of mages emphasizes the mage as a part of a team; the mage casts spells, whilst the partner or allies provide support, protecting the magician. In this way, many of the spells have a focus on two main sections: support powers, such as magic barriers, healing, and precognition, and assault powers, designed to either fire too many attacks to dodge, or to make an extremely powerful attack to break through any magic barriers. Even in this grouping however, many of these spells are designed for sealing, capture, and disarming rather than for outright destruction of the enemy.

I nodded and turned the page after finishing this, there were more explanations about this system and it began with:

Mana: This is the energy required to use magic. This is not some sort of innate willpower or magical energy, but something taken from the energy in the atmosphere and subdued via willpower and techniques – in other words, it is an energy from outside the practitioner. This means that Mana itself has more or less an infinite source, but the practitioner cannot preserve any Mana if he exhausts his own willpower. In this state, the practitioner can be said to be out of Mana. While there are individual differences when it comes to Mana capacity, it is an innate talent or ‘gift’ difficult to develop through training.

One way to increase Mana capacity is to reinforce willpower, which governs Mana. It is believed that by mental growth, and training of the mind, the ability to hold Mana also increases. Another method is to improve the efficiency of the techniques used to convert the energy in the atmosphere to Mana. If the amount of willpower used can be reduced by this process, then Mana capacity can increase as a result.

The theory of Mana is based on the Chinese concept of onmyou or Yin and Yang. While the energy outside of the body would be Myou, the energy inside the body would be On. As On and Myou are the smallest units representing the state of all things in existence, they exist in the foundation of all phenomena. On is the female and maternal component, representing the power of the earth, and of darkness and shadows. On the other hand, Myou is the male and paternal component, representing the power of the heavens, of creation, of light and brightness, and of activity.

This strangely reminded me of Naruto’s Chakra energy; two components of chakra: physical energy and spiritual energy. And let me guess, magic users here also got meridians or mana channels? The next chapter proved that I was right…

Eastern Magic: This is the general term for the traditional sorcery utilized in the Asian world and practiced by Eastern mages, or Jujutsushi. Unlike the unified magic theory of western sorcerers, there is an extraordinarily rich amount of variations in spells and the contents of the magic used, based on the many magic styles and systems. In Japan, the main types of magic included in Eastern Jujutsu are Onmyoudou (陰陽道, “way of onmyou“), Shuugendou (修験道, “way of training and trials''), Mikkyou (密教, “esoteric Buddhism”), and Shintou (神道, “way of kami).

Unlike western magic, the energy source in Eastern magic is Ki. However, Ki, which uses an individual’s life-force as fuel, would not be enough for large-scale magic such as the summoning of Ryoumen-Sukuna-no-Kami, so Mana would also be used. Comparatively, spell incantations also tend to be short, and there are no activation keys. In addition, there are very few spells with specific magic names. It is unknown whether Eastern mages require a focus to activate magic, but based on known depictions, it is likely that they are not necessary.

Eastern Mage schools emphasize the mage as a lone operative, with many of the spells devised to disrupt and confuse rather than to play a role in direct combat. In addition, the Eastern mage's talismans are highly specific. An assault demon, for example, will last until it is either destroyed, or until no more enemies remain, and then dissipate. In much the same way, a defensive demon will only last until it defends the mage from an assault. Once there are no possible threats, they dissipate. Talisman monsters, such as the assault (zenki) and protective (goki) demons, are an exception; these talisman monsters last until their purpose is accomplished, or until they are destroyed. In the case that no orders are given to talismans, they will take whatever task they are first given, and attempt to complete that. Once that task is completed, they return to paper.

Fuck I knew it, this was going to be so fun! So to be a powerful mage, I needed to marry the two disciplines, Eastern and Western. There was no way I would only focus only on one, even Negi in the story eventually had to learn martial arts and Ki. Speaking of Ki, there was a passage speaking about it.

Ki: In and of itself, is a rare ability, unique to Mundus Vetus, the lack of magic, as well as the establishment of Eastern religion and martial art lead to the discovery of Ki, the ability to release magic power from inside of your body through training and physical exertion allowed for an easy transition into martial arts, where the two become intertwined. As well as martial arts, Ki found its way into the esoteric ways of buddhism through various sects, mainly Vajrayana Buddhism, whose bestowed powers onto their acolytes, which eventually spread through to Eastern Magic and Martial arts by endowing them with special abilities on the level of super-humans. All manner of Japanese and Chinese martial arts rely on the fundamental basis of exerting Ki to perform duties, much like the magic of western societies today.

The book showed pictures and fair enough… There was a meridian and acupoints map!

So me watching the Hyuga and their bogus explanation about their gentle fist bullshit actually made sense. This could help in medicine as well, something for later…

“Hmm.” From what I just read from those simplified explanations, Magic seemed to be deeply tied to Quantum Physics. Fuck, I’m lucky to have chosen the Skill Mastery and Archmage essences, they made me a genius and able to understand stuff easily. To be a powerful mage I needed to understand mathematics and the big sciences. Sure enough, I will do that. I guess I’m going to make Mrs Shea rich with all the money I will be bringing to her by buying all the books I need.

I took one of the training wands that I had bought in the magic shop in town. It cost me 99 copper Drachmas for the three I bought and thanks to my Crafter ability I had an idea on how I could build something better and more powerful, but for what I needed, it would suffice. I took one from my jeans’ pocket, it was barely 20 cm in length with a crescent moon as the head.

Spells are the words that enact the supernatural phenomena of magic. Not a keyword that ‘activates’ supernatural power, but in itself holding the power and “soul” of words. However, spells are not simply ‘words of power’; they are full rituals which must be sung in verse, containing the will of the caster. Spells are the circuits which allow the caster to shape ‘the power of words’ in a form he most desires…

I continued to read through the book and I chanted my first spell, by really wanting the magic to happen. “Practe bigi nar… Ardescat!”

A small flame coalesced over the training wand in my hand. A boyish smile stretched onto my face. "Ah fire, I'm so going to burn everything!"

I have magic and I would become the best mage ever! Then I coughed and retrieved my calm countenance. "Okay calm down. This is just an entry spell, it just means I can do magic."

This little magic flame made it sink in, that I had died before and that my previous life was done. I will be happy and live proudly and make a good living. Training, fighting, becoming rich and finding love again; this will require a lot of work.

A plan was already forming in my mind, but first I needed to read that entire book. Tomorrow, I will be entering hardware mode.

I would learn later that my comprehension speed and practical skill in magic were abnormal. I had no frame of reference for what passes as 'normal' on Mundus Magicus.

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

Day 1
Belmont camp
Morning

After a hearty breakfast, I bathed in the pool and swam for a bit, after checking the water of course. My tools were ready and I stood next to the fire pit while summoning material with my essence given abilities was as easy as breathing.

I conjured red bricks and started to build the furnace. I was making a primitive forge.

I stacked the bricks in a square shape; making sure to leave a gap between the front two bricks for the steel pipe I conjured to sit in. For my bricklaying, I use a simple overlapping pattern with two bricks on the front and back, one brick between them on the sides, then the opposite on the second layer and so forth. This helps lock the bricks on the corners, making a sturdier structure.

I constructed my air system with the metal pipe, and then conjured sand and packed it around your pipe inside the brick structure. I placed a grate on top of the brick structure and anchored it down with bricks. This will both hold the grate in place and create sort of a railing to keep my projects and fuel inside the forge.

Bringing the manual bellows that I bought in the hardware store yesterday, I connected it to the pipe. After this I conjured wood branches and charcoal, next I fired up the forge with magic by taking out my wand. “Practe bigi nar… Ardescat!”

The flame appeared and the forge lit up; I pumped a fist up in victory, then proceeded to extinguish the fire. I looked up into the sky, it was almost lunch already. When I was done in the afternoon, I got back to reading my books on my foldable recliner.

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

Day 2

I was feeling a bit lazy… I finished memorizing all the utility spells in my book. Yay for unlimited memory and perfect recall; I could brush my teeth with magic, purify myself with a spell, but I still preferred immersing myself in the pool.

It was a matter of using those spells all the time to develop my magic. The essence of Archmage would make me more powerful as time passed, but I still could do magic for hours in my state. Still, having to use that tiny training wand was emasculating… I looked at it in my hand and put it back in my jacket's pocket. Now that I have my forge, I was going to make a staff for my magic practice.

Standing up, I went to my cart and I took out my carving tools; from what I inferred, staves were made from super old trees. I raised my hands and decided to summon one. Maybe a thousand year old ash tree branch. I idly thought that it would be so awesome if I could summon something like a tree branch from yggdrasil…

Pop!

In my hand, a three meter thick long branch appeared; it shone with a rainbow aura wrapped around it. Despite myself, I could feel the tremendous magical energy coming from it. This was the first time that I perceived that an item was magic. I really conjured a branch from the motherfucking world tree!

“Huh? So that means that I can conjure fictional or legendary material!” I tried immediately to conjure Nth metal from DC.

What did I get for my presumption? A throbbing and painful headache that knocked me on my ass. Then I fainted because of the pain in my head. When I woke up, I knew exactly what I did wrong, the Crafter essence was limited by Lilith, I couldn't conjure material from another universe.

I sat up and massaged my head. "Damn that's a nasty backlash."

Looking at the fallen Yggdrasil branch near me, I took it, as well as my carving tool, and went to sit on my foldable recliner. I took my tape measure and with my hand-axe, cut the thick branch at 180 cm; I threw the remaining wood in the traveling cart, I was not going to conjure more of it, this was too precious.

I began carving the branch, I didn't want anything fancy for my staff, a practical design. If it looked too well crafted, people might want to steal it; that is what I should be doing, make it look like a classic wizard staff. I took a lunch break after whittling the wood with my chisel and mallet, the sun was high in the sky.

It was late in the afternoon when I finished carving and smoothing the wood surface with sandpaper. I held the tall staff in my hand and tested it by filling it with my mana and… I felt the wood soak in the magical energy. I felt a prick on my finger, and realized that the staff was now connected to me. “So this is how you soul bind stuff here.”

It didn’t look like a legendary staff, but an old one, this was enough for me. “Practe bigi nar… Ardescat!”

FWOOSH!! A bigger flame than usual was conjured from the beginner spell. It seemed that my staff was powerful and conducted mana even better than I thought. I basically made myself an endgame item at the start of my magical journey; it doesn’t mean that I shouldn't work harder though.

It was the next day that I discovered how atypical my new staff was…

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

Day 3

I discovered that my new staff allow me to open portals to places I already went to. It started when I took my staff in the morning and thought about going to town to get more canned food; with a tearing sound a glowing green aperture opened in the middle of my camp and I could see Brook town plaza. I let go of my staff, but when it hit the ground the portal shut down.

“Merde, what is this?”

I experimented with it again and discovered that I could open portals, it was handy. Moving on, what was I going to do today? Oh yeah, I already read the introduction to magic and utility spell books, why not learn how to fly? The sky was blue and cloudy, it was an excellent weather to learn how to fly with my staff

I walked toward the big pool and held my staff horizontally in my hands. “Volatio. Levitatio. Scopae Volent!”

Nothing happened… I decided to do it with more willpower this time. “Volatio. Levitatio. Scopae Volent!”

The staff raised in the air by itself. I positioned myself to sit on it and the staff took my weight. With mental commands, I ordered it to fly higher and it did. I began to hover over the pool, it was awesome to just fly like this. I left the pool to fly over the forest, the staff was a bit slow.

“Hmm why not use this, Maxima Acceleratio!” When I chanted this spell my staff thrummed as it took more mana from my inner core and it started flying at high speed.

From the air I could see Brook town coming to the horizon. Before entering the town proper, I braked my flight with a spell. “Rapide Subsistat.”

This was the spell for stopping a staff or broom in flight to do the equivalent of an  emergency brake. I made a U turn with my staff and returned to the forest. I quickly found my camp and slowly floated down. Okay, I can fly now, but now that I am living outdoors I forgot something crucial! I needed ways to cure myself if I ever fell sick or mend my wounds, I knew of two minor spells for this Cura and Refectio, but no they won’t be enough.

Can’t I make my own spells? It won't be easy but I will succeed. I knew that I wanted my own spells, because if I use those noted down then there's a sure chance that a counter exists somewhere. Magic is a matter of willpower and imagination, but in this dimension you need to give the spell a name to give it power, words have power. Magic can be established as long as words of a language of magic are put together according to its grammatical rules. The effects of unnamed spells are not strong, but they can be freely created based on intents.

I took inspiration from the healing spells from Dragon Quest. I loved that game, it was really better than Final Fantasy in my opinion. That’s why when I said the words, “Fullheal.” I felt my magic muster, filling me and every little problem like my fatigue, and some ache I had in my hands because of the crafting of my staff disappeared.

I have no way to know if it's effective beyond my little aches and pains being healed; and I wasn't about to hurt myself to know if it works. Huh, maybe I need to find an animal. *I will do that later…*

Now I needed some kind of forcefield, like from Star Trek., but in the series they used electromagnetic force to make one, what I wanted was a solid barrier of force that stopped kinetic impacts. It would allow me some kind of vector manipulation in that case, just like Accelerator from A Certain Magical Index to stop, deflect, or reflect an incoming assault.

Trying to recall what I’ve learned in physics class in my youth, I focused; I remembered that Forces can be described as a push or pull on an object. They can be due to phenomena such as gravity, magnetism, or anything that might cause a mass to accelerate. The original form of Newton's second law states that the net force acting upon an object is equal to the rate at which its momentum changes with time. If the mass of the object is constant, this law implies that the acceleration of an object is directly proportional to the net force acting on the object, is in the direction of the net force, and is inversely proportional to the mass of the object.

There were other concepts related to force which include: thrust, which increases the velocity of an object; drag, which decreases the velocity of an object; and torque, which produces changes in rotational speed of an object.

I needed to experiment to incorporate that in the forcefield I wanted to create… hmm, I needed to make a dummy. But I’m not in the mood to carve one, I will just conjure a material in the form of a mannequin. I used wood for this, the dummy appeared on its own pedestal.

"Force Barrier." I chanted as I imagined the effects of the spell.

A shimmering blue colored barrier appeared over and around the dummy, rippling with energy over its surface. I spent well over a minute circling the spell and touching its surface, when I touched it, my hand couldn’t go through it and the more force I applied the more my hand was repealed. This was great as a first forcefield, I would be okay at the start, but my intuition told me that this could be refined.

I needed to do more research about the esoteric effect of magic, not just the physical side of it. Okay, so far I have memorized utility spells and created a defensive one.

Offensive spells, I needed them and I knew exactly what I wanted. A variable lightning spell, it should go from taser to the mother of all lightning strikes as I pour more magic into the spell. But first, what is lightning? Lightning happens when the negative charges (electrons) in the bottom of the cloud are attracted to the positive charges (protons) in the ground. I’m sure that I can recreate the phenomenon with my own magic…

Now I need a name to give my offensive spell enough Oomph. After further deliberation, I decided to call it ‘Raiden’ like in the manga I read about that hero kid who was half Dragon Knight. Hmm, I was still powering the force barrier, let’s see how it stack up against an offensive spell. Raising my hand, channeled my mana from my core and I chanted, “Raiden.”

A huge bolt of blue lightning fired from my hand and struck the force barrier. The force barrier resisted and diverted the strike to the ground, and caused a little explosion. I stopped channeling mana and cut the spell. Then I chanted the spell again and shot another blast, this time in the form of a ball of lightning sent to orbit around the force barrier that erupted with random lightning strike.

“I can control the shape and effects of the spells. Hmm, what happens if I want to make a Genkidama like effect?” As I spoke, the already conjured ball of lightning was fed more mana and grew as large as a small car and I slammed it into the force barrier. This time I felt the force barrier break as the big plasma explosion engulfed the clearing I was in but just in time, I covered the rest of the camp in an even more powerful force barrier.

“I am atomic.” I laughed as the detonation took out half of the clearing and… expanded it by disintegrating the trees and creating a big crater. I noticed that the pool started to fill the crater slowly; this was my first landscape altering spell, I felt that I could alter the yield of the explosion though.

Conjuring another dummy, this time an iron one, I decided to continue to master the offensive spells I knew. Raiden was okay, now let's try the Sagita Magic Spell. Sagitta Magica is one of the most basic attack spells, but also very versatile. The caster can create a number of elemental magic missiles and fire them at the target. The properties of the ‘arrow’ changes based on the type of spirit being called upon, making this simple spell very versatile and useful in many situations. The number can vary from just one to at least one thousand and one arrows

I knew that my affinity with fire and lightning were the greatest, so I started to chant the spell by invoking spirits of fire. “Sagitta Magica, Series Ignis. Undesexaginta spiritus ignis, coeuntes. Sagitta Magica, Series Ignis.”

Forty nine glowing spheres of fire floated at my side, held in place and then launched at the iron dummy. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom.  Each arrow burned and ignited the dummy on impact and exploded. "Oooh explosions!"

In the end the dummy was turned into metal slag, which I decided would be recycled to make some new tools. I continued to train my magic control all day after seeing that I was progressing well.

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

Day 4

Today we’re going to learn about physical reinforcement spells… for that, I was wearing a simple shirt to see the effect of the spells on my body.

“Cantus Bellax” I chanted as I mustered my own mana, my staff in hand.

My muscles contracted as I felt a rush of power as the spell increased muscle tension in my body. I started running and noticed how fast I was going. Zipping around the trees, I realized that I was ten times faster than a normal human. I remembered that this spell provided a long-lasting anti-physical shield to make the caster tougher, a bit like Aura in RWBY.

I ran for another thirty minutes, the reinforcement spell having boosted my endurance as well; I circled around the camp and the extended pool of water. I stopped next to the pool and canceled the reinforcement spell, breathing hard. I needed to train to peak human fitness to get the most out of the Cantus Bellax spell, let’s go with the One Punch Man training regiment, I should be able to do it. I got the Blank essence, there should be no limit to my physical might.

I stood back up and started to run again.

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

When I finished running in the afternoon, I noticed that I didn’t have much in the way of clothes and my food stores were dwindling as the day passed. Doing magic and training my body demanded a lot of food and water. My finances weren't good either, so I decided to cheat…

Walking to my tent, I conjured four gold bars and two little rubies, and put them into the backpack I bought four days ago. I put on my pants and a white shirt with a toolbelt, then put my backpack on, leaving my long red hair tied in a ponytail.

I exited the tent and whistled, my Yggdrasil staff immediately came to my hand. It was at this moment that I realized that I needed a secondary focus, in case I was ever separated from my staff. I will make a ring focus later and eventually learn to use magic without one.

Opening a portal to the alley I first arrived in, I passed through the hole in space and found myself in Brook Town. "I need to find a bank and a jewelsmith."

Walking out of the alley, I noticed that the big clock tower in the plaza showed that it was three in the afternoon. I still had time to visit the bank, I walked out of the alley and found myself before the fountain full of water. I looked around, and everyone was going their way, I spied some kids playing; they all had animal ears and tails, they were fast little buggers as well.

I took care of avoiding any pickpocket, this made me aware that I needed to work on Ki. I needed a teacher in that Eastern discipline… I don’t think I will be able to go far by myself. I knew how to fight, I did MMA before with my sons, but I didn’t know how to access this mystical energy at all. I either needed to observe practitioners or get someone to teach me.

I easily found the bank, but it also acted as the merchant guild. Opening an account there was easy, though I had to read through a lot of paperwork. Just in case, I registered myself as a merchant, an alchemist to be exact; my plan was to offer medicine, transmute materials (for a fee) and dabble in genetic engineering for crops.

An alchemy exam to evaluate my level in this profession is still going to happen… two weeks from now at the merchant guild.

Taking out the magic card with all my money on it, I read my full name on its surface and the number of my bank account. The card was attuned to my soul, blood and Mana signature; it acted like a credit card just like in my previous world. At least I won’t have to tote so many Drachmas in my magic wallet.

Quickly crossing the plaza and zigzagging through the throng of people, I found myself two streets away from the merchant guild and before the jewelsmith.

I was looking at a shop with European architecture, the walls were stone white and carved artistically with a fresco depicting some story of someone fighting a dragon and stealing its hoard. The sign on the shop said that this is the Dragon’s Hoard jewelry shop; the vitrine showed choice pieces of jewelry to showcase the artisan’s talent. I nodded, these were beautiful but I felt that I could do better with my cheaty essence of the crafter.

I entered the shop and looked around, it was the same white walls with carved frescoes, the difference was that the people often had eyes made of gemstones and the armor the warrior killing the dragon wore was made of genuine metal covering him. “Interesting artwork.”

There were displays on pedestals in the shop; I activated my mage-sight and immediately saw that there were magical formations and enchantments on them and all around the shop.

Behind the counter with the most displays was an old man of short stature with a stocky body, he looked strong. He had white hair, thin glasses and a black and white three piece suit. “Good afternoon, dear customer.”

I waved at the man. “Good afternoon, can I compliment you on the beautiful decoration in this shop?” I said as I looked at the decorations around the shop.

The old man chuckled. “You’re not the only one to appreciate it, young man.”

Suddenly, I remembered why I was here and walked to the counter and said, “Oh yeah, I’ve come to sell some gold and gems that I’ve found in a ruin.”

The stocky old man looked at me from head to toe and said in a doubtful voice, “Oh, you’re an adventurer boyo?”

I scratched behind my head and said embarrassingly, “Um, no. I want to become one, but I don’t feel that I’m ready for that life yet. I’m still training.”

The shopkeeper nodded. “Show me the goods.”

And I did, the man’s eyes widened as I took the ingots and rubies out of my backpack. He went to fetch some special glasses and tools and began poking at the gold and gems. It took five minutes for him to appraise them. “Pure gold, four ingots. 15 carats in rubies, finely cut.”

“How much for all this?” I asked, I still didn't have a sense for the money of this world.

The old man raised his head from the counter and delicately placed his tool and appraiser glasses on it. “2 200 000 Drachmas. Enough money to be set for twenty years as you do nothing and enjoy retirement.”

This sum made me whistle. “Wow, that’s… a lot, sir.”

The old man shrugged. “Not really, young man, I earn 100's of millions each month.”

“Ah.” Well, at least I am going to have enough for clothes and food.

The old man interrupted my train of thoughts and asked me, "Do you have a card? I will buy the goods for this exact sum."

When I exited the store five minutes later, it was with my card full of money and a pep in my steps. Instead of buying clothes, I bought fabrics and some tools to make my own. Self sufficiency was the game after all. I bought a magic bag with the capacity of a warehouse for ten thousand Drachmas and some food from the market place in the plaza, enough for months in the wild.

As I thought about it, I missed the comfort of having my own home with running water and a toilet. Different plans came into my mind to secure some kind of mobile home… I will start small, a cabin shall suffice, I will start building it tomorrow.

I was so excited by my new found fortune that I didn’t see that I was being observed by a group of people who had bad designs on me.

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

Day 5

I was having a dream about a Bunny eared girl with silver hair and red eyes with a curvy body, wearing a naughty secretary outfit and telling me that I was the love of her life. The dream was so vivid that when she called my name and told me to wake up and prepare for a fight, I woke up.

When my eyes opened, I heard people speak outside my tent and riffle through my things. All the voices were mostly masculine, though there was only one feminine; I counted four different voices. My staff flew to my hand and I opened a portal that transferred just at the entrance of the clearing.

There were four beastmen, they all looked to be descended from rodents, rat and cat beastmen? They were taking my things from my travel cart, my food, my tools, one of them was trying to destroy my forge… I saw red and walked inside the camp and shouted, “Who the hell are you?! You come into my camp! And steal from me…”

The four people looked young, maybe fifteen to sixteen years old; maybe it was due to their short stature… They almost emptied my traveling cart of things, I also noticed that some of them were armed. The tallest of the boys before me had a shitty iron sword at his belt, the other had a bow and arrows into a quiver, the only girl had a dagger.

As I walked forward, I said in a menacing tone, "You're going to put down everything you took, and you're going to leave."

The youngest, the cat girl, held on to the taller rat boy’s hoodie after letting go of the bag with all the food in it. “Brothers! Let’s leave!”

The older boy snorted and took on a threatening stance as he looked at me; well I was in a short with only a staff. “Nah, look at him, he is a weak humie.”

The other boys followed suit, the unharmed one entered a fighting stance, the one with the bow nocked an arrow; while the one with the shitty sword started to shit talk. “Hey humie! If ya want ta make us leave, ya gotta use force ma boy!”

My mana flared inside my body and I saw the girl who was hiding behind the tall boy look at me with alarm, it seems that she’s sensitive to mana. “No! We mustn’t!”

I chuckled, as I chose violence that day. “Cantus Bellax”

"Dragonspit! A magi!" A blue aura of magic flared around my body just like a golden Ki shroud from a super saiyan. My eyes fell on each of the thieves as I walked toward them.

“Fuck, a magi!” The archer shot his arrow at me, I deflected it with the top of my staff.

At high speed, I moved behind him, twirled my staff and bonked him on the head. He dropped like a brick on the ground, letting go of his bow.

The rat swordsman lunged at me, sword high. "Aaaah!"

"Force Barrier." I said calmly as a blue bubble of force came alive around me.

The shitty iron sword’s blade collided by the forcefield and was deflected by the shield with a metallic sound. "The fuck?!"

A golden magic mandala drew itself when I raised my hand. “Raiden.”

ZAP!!

A bolt of electricity with an intensity of 70 000 volts flew toward the swordsman and struck him right in the abdomen. The rat boy with the sword fell on the ground, twitching every second. It was the third boy, the brawler who became problematic; when I dismissed my force barrier he lunged  at me, trying to make me stumble and take me in a grappling fight.

I sidestepped then grabbed his leg, raised it even more to destabilize his balance, then delivered a swift punch that might have given him a sexual reassignment.

Crack.

I let the boy go, then looked around me, the only one left was the little cat girl with short black hair. I wasn’t about to go hit her, but I saw the twitching boy on the ground, the leader. I walked toward him and raised my staff.

“Please, please you won! Don’t hurt them anymore!” The young girl cried out as she put herself between me and the boy with the sword who was still twitching on the ground.

“Sure. I’m going to make you leave.” I was thinking about opening a portal and giving them to the equivalent of the police in this world. I remember seeing a guard post in Brooke Town.

The girl must have guessed my intention as she began pleading. “Please we just wanted to take the food and…”

“Accio all my belongings.” I said, ignoring her.

Everything that had been stolen flew out of the rat men’s bags and came to float and orbit around me, then with a telekinetic cantrip, I placed everything back into the traveling cart in neat stacks. I turned my attention to the young girl who kept pleading for the boys.

“Fine, I will heal them.” I said as I looked at her.

She has tanned skin, black short hair and golden colored eyes; she wore a large t-shirt, shorts and ankle length sandal boots which seemed to have been handmade. She looked a bit dirty, like the other boys, I think she is thirteen to fifteen years old, but she clearly looked malnourished.

“Y-you will?” The cat girl opened her eyes wide.

I rolled my eyes. Sitting on a tree trunk from a tree I had fallen with my lightning spell, I asked, “Yeah I will, but first tell me, why did you try to rob me?”

Her answer was a simple ‘GROOWWWL!!’ from her belly, and everything was clear. Those kids were all street rats, literally and they must have seen me spending money yesterday. The rat boys must have tracked me by scent to the forest somehow.

“Ah, it-it’s been five days since we didn’t eat anything.” The young girl stuttered.

I clicked my tongue and stood up and placed myself before her. She was on her guard right away. “What’s your name?” I asked her.

She hesitated for thirty seconds before saying, “Sienna.”

I twirled my staff and I began shining with magic.“Sienna look at this.”

“Area Heal!!” And a field of magic filled the entire clearing as magical healing energy flared.

The three boys were perfect guinea pigs for my healing spells. In the end, I discovered that my healing spells were efficient, but that I needed to tailor the spell to the wound to not overheal and cause backlash on the patient. I gave Sienna some food for a week and five hundred Drachmas and sent her and her boys directly back to town through a large portal.

Sienna kept looking at me strangely even as I closed the portal, I shrugged. I don't understand girls, even after raising two of them. This incident highlighted a fatal weakness in my current setup, I didn't have any alarm, or security in my camp. I needed to change that

It's time to get back to hardware mode.

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

Day 6

The events of yesterday have lit a fire inside me that forced me now to think ahead about my immediate safety. And I have had enough of camping! I want my own house, I am not a vagrant. Looking at the blue sky and the clouds moving, I decided that I would start building my dream little cottage by using my crafter abilities.

My eyes settled on the trees around me, I had sufficient wood to make my dream house and who knows… maybe I could add a new girl in it to warm the bed. Welp, time to move the camp; I can’t trust that the rats won’t be back, I should move somewhere else. But not too far, I really liked it here. Then I saw that there was another clearing created by me with my Raiden spell.

For one hour, I gathered my things into the traveling cart, then moved five hundred meters away from the pool and stopped near the clearing next to the river. Before making camp, I needed to prepare the land for what I wanted to do.

I came up with my first Earth spell, but it is in fact some basic geomancy. Spirit Magic is a discipline that revolves around channeling, summoning or using the power of spirits to achieve the caster’s goals. A user of Spirit magic can summon spirits, use spiritual weapons, or channel a spirit into their body to gain physical enhancements or gain completely new abilities; example: channeling a fire spirit gives the user Fire Manipulation.

Personally, to my own comprehension, it was just pulling my awareness and spreading it around myself and connecting with an Earth Spirit. The Spirit responded quite quickly and the conversation… at least a spiritual one, occurred. I would give it mana and the Earth Spirit would help me in everything it could.The law of equivalent exchange was in effect; I have to give something to get something in exchange. It was similar to Alchemy, yes.

My theory is that everything in magic is connected, I hope that I will live long enough to decipher magic’s mysteries. My Earth spirit that I named Dino helped me empty the clearing by moving the tree and making the soil stable enough to build a foundation. He displaced the groundwater channel underground connected to the river as well.

Once the ground was well taken care of, next I ordered Dino to make a basement; with a big rumbling sound, the earth underneath my feet shook. A rectangular hole appeared where Dino had treated the soil; he even created stairs for me and that was great.

Before starting construction, I decided to make camp and this time I had to come up with some kind of magical barrier. I conjured a wooden stake and started carving sigils in it with the concept of a bounded field attributed to it. My crafting abilities have shown me that it was possible to make a topographic type of barrier that consists of knitting a network of magical energy and spreading it all over the clearing.

The boundary line will isolate the space I worked in from the outside. My safe haven was now ready, with it, no one could enter the place and try to steal my stuff; it worked with intent as well, if someone wishing me harm tried to enter, the alarm would alert me and the land itself would fight with the intruder.

I put my tent down and assembled it. While doing this, I mentally made schematics for the house that I wanted. I wanted something cozy and inviting, like that little house Aerith Gainsborough lived in, in the FF7 Remake. After making sure everything was ready, I started the work and conjured Iron wood. Several hundred red wooden planks appeared next to my position.

Iron wood comes from a tree whose wood grain is reinforced with iron and carbon from ground minerals, forming a type of carbon steel to reinforce it.

Iron oxides give the wood its characteristic reddish color and high density while the hardness and flexibility come from the steel filaments woven throughout the wood grain. I was going to use it for the floor system, walls, and roof system; the skeleton of the house needed to be sturdy, there was no way I would let any random monster or magical fight destroy my property.

This process was called the rough framing, the next step would be to do the plumbing, electrical and HVAC… but we were in a fucking magical world! I don’t have to do that shit beyond the plumbing and electrical. I had so much work to do…

~~~~~~ Combat Crafter ~~~~~~

Day 24
Evening

"I am done!" I said as I fell on my recliner, facing the three story white house with red tiles.

The house was connected to a workshop that I created for many activities such as Alchemy or Blacksmithing, the two main occupations that I intended to focus on. As I looked up, the sky was darkening and I subconsciously conjured two balls of light to enlighten my surroundings.

I shot the two balls at the magical lamp post that I created on each side of my house. The network of lamp posts that surrounded the house and the trail leading to the house then came alive. The magical energy to sustain the network was taken from the house whose roof acted like a mana converter, turning the sunlight into mana and storing the energy in soccer ball sized crystals that I placed in the basement. I wasn’t connected to any power line but the electricity that I do get for the house came from the perpetual motion machine in the basement using a elemental space crystal that I conjured; free and unlimited energy baby!

The internal plumbing was done, I had turned it into a closed system with the water tank behind the house conjuring the water inside for everyday use; the wastes in the small sewer system were taken care of with a purifying and banishing spell. I was proud of this small system. The house was climate controlled to the best of my ability, come winter or summer. I will always be comfortable inside, it wasn’t difficult to come up with a ward scheme to control the weather outside the house as well; it was just a weather shield protecting the house, under it was a force and magical barrier to protect against any incoming attack.

I had finished the entire house in ten days, but making all the furniture and tools for the workshop took eight more days. I had to go take a break in town as well to go buy books from Mrs Shea to continue my magical education while also working. Then I had to pass the exam for my Alchemy license that I have of course aced.

I could legitimately sell my medicine, potions and processed materials and give it to the merchant guild for processing. I intended to get a blacksmith license later as well, to sell any armor and weapons I intended to make.

So yeah I was happy! It took me eighteen days but I was done with building my home! I sighed and stood up from my recliner. Walking up to the steps leading to the entrance porch, my eyes fell on the red door with sidelites. I had carved some mystical animals on the lower ends of the door, an eastern dragon, a phoenix, a turtle and a tiger. The doors were part of the ward scheme protecting the house from intrusion.

Taking the door handle in hand, I entered my house. I felt that everything I did for the last two weeks was worth it. I have my own furnished home.

The foyer and the living room were connected; the kitchen was on my left side, I still needed to buy or make my own plates, bowls and cutlery. The chandelier was just yellow light crystal fed by mana, and turned on when the wards detected that evening started to fall. My eyes turned the small bookshelves and they were still empty, I needed to fill them with the books I bought.

The crystal TV that I bought was here, it looked just like one of those screens from the 80s; this was kinda strange to me. This made me wonder about the date at which period of this world I’d arrived. I would ask Mrs Shea later, she’s the only friend I have in this town. I passed through the foyer and went directly for the stairs leading upstairs. On the first floor were four rooms, two bedrooms, a store room and a bathroom; on the second floor was the study and bedroom I built there that gave access to the small garden with a balcony.

I have added a greenhouse as well on top of the workshop to take advantage of the release of carbon dioxide from the forge. Plants loved the stuff after all.

Ending up at the top of the stairs, I walked in the short corridor and entered the master bedroom. The walls were bare and gray colored because of the insulating plaster I coated on the iron wood. The wood paneling on the ground reflected slightly the light, despite that you can’t slide on the iron wood. I had a queen size four poster bed with red draperie, a big wardrobe and a nightstand; I didn’t add any more furniture yet.

The mattress was made of memory foam that had been easy to make; it is created by adding various compounds and additives to polyurethane. I walked to the bed, took out my boots and laid on it. It was really comfortable how my body felt on it. So much so that I started to think about what I needed to do next;  making an enchanted hammer to build my first weapons, like a sword and revolver… I didn’t intend to rely on magic all the time.

I saw where this led, sooner rather than later, I might have to fight against someone with overwhelming physical attributes or one of those fancy anti-magic users… It meant that I needed training as well! In Ki manipulation, formal magic practice, a dedicated martial art; not the hotpodge that is the MMA that I picked up from my sons.

Slowly, my eyes closed as the fatigue really started to hit me. I’ve been working too hard, but it was so worth it… I fell asleep.