We both empty our packs onto the floor, taking stock of the recently looted items. Most of it is scrap metal, probably forty pounds of it, that Daniel separates into a few different piles after touching them for a second. I assume he uses his skill to identify them in some way, but maybe he just knows what they are. Most piles are full of metals I recognize: rusty iron and steel nails and door hinges, copper and brass doorknobs, and a few sets of silverware. The last pile just had two things in it, a black dragon and a silver knight, both about three inches tall, and despite being left abandoned in the city for years, they have no damage on them. If I remember right, he got them from the biggest building we looted.
“What are those made of?” I ask.
“I don’t know, but I think it’s some kind of alloy with mana inside it. I can feel it with my skill. The metal reacts differently.”
I pick up the knight and send a small pulse of mana inside it, the same as I do when using the communication amulet. My mana easily pushes inside, almost as easily as the crystals, but not quite. I quickly reabsorb the mana, noticing that some leaked out and dissipated, and some stayed behind, getting absorbed into the metal. I pick up a silver spoon to test, trying to push the same amount of mana into it and reabsorbing it again. The results are as expected. Magic silver is much more efficient at moving and holding mana.
“It’s definitely way more mana conductive,” I say as I move on to the rest of the loot.
Three small clear crystals and a small glass horse are the only other items worth anything that we found. The horse turns out to be made of just regular glass, which disappoints me a little, but what can you do? The crystals, on the other hand, are pretty nice. All of them are identical, smooth marbles about as big as my thumbnail, and when I send my mana into them, they are completely empty of any spellwork. They drink up my mana greedily and store it just as well as the one I got from the shaman, even though they are slightly smaller.
After a little while, I take out some jerky, and Daniel joins me, both of us eating our bland meals while talking about our plans. He wants to reinforce the door and hatch, which seem like good ideas, especially since that door is pretty thin in some spots. I plan on studying the enchanting crystal I have. I’ve barely cracked the surface of what Rayke put on there, and I'm excited to learn more. After we finish our meal, Daniel takes most of the metal downstairs, leaving only the silverware and magic metals.
My next few hours are spent studying the basics of enchanting from a small crystal in my palm. It’s the weirdest method of learning I’ve ever used, but Rayke was able to put a ton of info on this relatively small crystal. I guess modern data storage is pretty insane now, too, so I shouldn't be too surprised. I learn how to properly carve mana channels and nodes, a few different methods depending on their purpose and the material you’re working with, which apparently matters greatly, as it is emphasized several times. There are even practice sections built in, where he started the path and I have to clear more and more out the further I go. It works well, as both my [Mana Shaping] and [Mana Sense] skills level up during my practice.
Before I realize it, hours pass, and I am woken from my study session by Daniel, who has brought our sleeping rolls to the top floor.
“We should get some sleep. It’s getting late, and I want to get back out into the city tomorrow.” He says.
I didn’t even realize he had finished with the doors. I was too invested in the enchanting crystal. The hatch at the top of the stairs looks far more solid, and my spatial senses tell me it’s much thicker. The door down below looks much the same, with an extra bar added to stop it from being opened. You can hardly even tell that just a few hours ago all he had to work with was old metal.
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“The doors look good. Thanks for securing them.” I say as I crawl into my sleeping bag, getting ready to sleep until Daniel wakes me, probably.
He waves his hand dismissively, like it was no big deal. “I leveled up my skill from it and learned a good deal about how different metals interact with each other under the influence of my skill, so it was worth it. Any luck with enchanting?”
A small smile creeps onto my face. “Yeah, it doesn’t seem too complicated. Well, the basics, that is. Rayke is a good teacher, and with a few more days of practice I should be able to finish the crystal and start on my first item. The three crystals are blank, so I can do whatever with them.”
Daniel crawls into his sleeping bag after checking the outside of the tower through the magic screens. I drain the mana from the light stone we were using to light up the room, letting only the soft glow of the screens light the room.
“Any ideas for your first item? Can you use that magic metal?”
“Yes to both, and you were right. The metals are just many alloys of base metals. They are used in most magic items, one way or another. If you can, I’ll need you to turn them into wires.”
“I can do that. Does your crystal tell you how it’s made?”
“Sadly, no. We have to find that out somewhere else. But I don’t need that much. What we already have is plenty.”
“So, are you going to keep me in suspense forever? What are you going to make?”
“Be patient. I need to learn more before I know it’s possible, but I’m pretty sure I can do it.”
We talk for a while longer, about our skills and the best places to look for loot in the city, before sleep comes for me. Like the last few nights, my rest is relatively peaceful and uninterrupted. Which is surprising based on my current circumstances, but I'm not complaining. Maybe I'm getting used to Helot.
As predicted, Daniel wakes me up in the morning, just after sunrise, based on the screens. We eat our breakfast, change our clothes, and get ready for our second day in the city. We head into the city the same way, using the passages inside the massive city walls to get back to the city gate. I want more crystals, as I’m pretty sure I will break a few of them attempting to make my first item, so I suggest we head deeper into the city to start, near where we left off yesterday. My partner agrees, and my mana is nearing its limit, so I expand my spatial senses to fifty feet and lead us through the maze of alleyways and side streets toward our destination.
After about forty minutes, I stop. I’m totally lost, but the buildings here are bigger and taller than the ones closer to the wall, so it seems like a good place to loot. I can see the buildings here have more stuff inside them, but I keep my attention on the rooftops and alleyways where undead might appear from. I point at the door to a three-story building, made of the same gray stone as everything else here, and look at Daniel. He shrugs and works his lockpicking magic, opening the door in a few seconds.
We loot the place but only find disappointment. Anything of value is gone, just like every other building. I think people must have fled when the ruler was killed. It definitely hasn’t been looted. We haven’t found any forced-open doors or anything, but with magic, who knows? We loot a few more buildings, only finding one more crystal before we decide to head deeper. I lead us deeper into the city, probably nearly a mile at this point, before we stop again. I push my spatial senses through the building in front of us just to make sure what I’m seeing is right.
On the basement floor of the house right in front of us, six undead are standing around. They aren’t moving, or sleeping, or doing anything. They just stand there, eyes open, swaying slightly. I alert Daniel, and he has me check the nearby buildings as well. They are empty. Only one building has any lingering undead.
“Want to just clear them out?” He asks with a casual tone.
“Sure, same as yesterday?”
He nods, and we repeat the same tactics as the day before. Daniel baits them up the stairs and kills them while I create a small portal to stab them from behind, killing them before they get any real opportunity to fight back. After we congratulate ourselves on a job well done, we loot the place of anything that’s worth it. We find a few more crystals, and the fixture that attaches them to the ceiling is magic metal, so we take that as well. After we rip out what I determine are the magic lights, we head back into the city to gather more loot.
Six houses and an hour later, we find another building with undead standing around. I tell Daniel to check the surrounding buildings and give the all clear, and we move in to kill them. It goes just as easily as the last time, with the undead being mindless and all that. As Daniel gives me a high five for a job well done, I send my spatial senses back outside the building and realize I fucked up.
The building is surrounded by undead, dozens of them. How did they get there so fast? Why are they acting so tame? They always just rush forward, but now they just silently gather outside, blocking the only door out. My heart begins beating faster. We’ve been tricked—the small groups spaced out, how easy they were to kill, how noticeable they were. Something has been watching us. Testing us. And my spatial senses extend just far enough to see it.
A big-ass bear is standing behind a group of armor-plated undead in an alley just one building over.
Fuck me. The bear is a necromancer.