Her blue flames made the outside of the ice palace melt where her breath hit. Waves of heat came off the ice palace that was colder than the coldest part of the north and south poles.
After a few minutes, Denur and the other Dragons left, taking to the skies.
Malsour watched as the ice palace quickly worked to repair the damage that had happened to it.
The only way to destroy the ice palace was from the inside, or by constantly hitting from outside with strong destruction spells. The power that was needed was incredible. Few creatures other than the Dragons could be able to do it. Even they would need to do it for several weeks before they cracked the palace open.
Malsour took to the sky, headed to meet back up with the rest of his family.
The vault soul gem and amulets had been a success. It looked as if they had a way to crack the ice palace without being dangerously close to Mana fatigue.
***
The room was silent except for the atmospheric exchanger that constantly moved air through the Deq’ual system station.
Chairwoman Wong, Engineer Edwards, and Commander Sato were the only occupants.
Edwards held his tongue even though it looked as if he were ready to burst, his eyes darting between Sato and Wong.
Wong sat parallel to her desk, looking at the wall as her left forefinger rested on the desk and tapped it lightly.
Sato was expressionless as he watched Wong.
Wong finally moved after ten minutes. She looked as though she had aged a year, but her expression was firm. “Sato, by the power invested in me, I give you permission to continue with your ship and weapon advancement programs,” Wong said. It seemed to have taken an effort of will to get those words out.
“People are going to think that we’re idiots; that we should just hide out for the rest of our lives here. Now we can confirm that the Jukal Empire is still functioning and very much active and that they have genetically altered and imprisoned a planet of humans for their own sadistic entertainment. I want you to work to increase our abilities so that we are able to create a fighting force that can rescue the people on Emerilia and fight the Jukal. I am going to remove the restrictions on birth rates as well as the amount of people within the military. I ask that you continue to talk to the other Human stations and see if we can send people to check on their situation. If at all possible, I want to scout them. Get as much information as you can get from our contacts in Emerilia,” Wong said.
“Understood, Chairwoman Wong.” Sato nodded.
Even Edwards kept his mouth shut, feeling the weight of the decisions made in this room.
Chapter 11: A Craftsman’s Power
Dave finished the very last rune on the metal sheet. He lined it up with the other paper-thin sheets. There were four sheets but they were large and covered in tiny and exact runes. He had needed to use his conjuring art to remove the metal so exactly. Even then, it had been hard to get everything exactly right.
He rubbed his eyes. He had been working on it for a couple of days between his different classes, conferences, and signing various items that Suzy brought to his attention.
He looked around. He was in one of the workshops within the Mirror of Communication school. There were a number of people looking over at him, quickly turning back to their work. This was a magical coding lab. People from all over Emerilia had tried their hand at magical coding in here. With every week, more people were in Dave’s classes.
Dave heard someone yell out in excitement in the distance. The lab was the size of a football field.
He quickly opened his quest interface.
Quest: Skill Creator Level 10
Personally teach 3,200 people your Skill (3,051/3,200). Or help your students reach the level of Apprentice (149/200). Or help your students reach the level of Journeyman (0/1).
Rewards: Unlock Level 11 Quest
Increase to stats
Active Skill: Teacher
Level: Journeyman Level 7
Effect: You can teach people skills that you have prior knowledge of, up to your level of ability. Your students are 10% more likely to understand what you’re teaching them. Teaching on subjects you have a higher knowledge on will yield higher results. Teaching skills you have mastered or created give higher chance for students understanding your lessons.
Dave smiled. It seemed that they had just made it into the Apprentice level.
He looked to his own coded work. It wasn’t even a centimeter thick, with runes covering it in what seemed to be a haphazard mess. There were hundreds of thousands of runes on those simple sheets.
He opened up his interface, changing the settings of the area he was in slightly so that he could record much more information than others could. With his Bleeder Class, he found that he was able to see more options within Jukal technology, as it now recognized him as a Jukal and therefore allowed him more access.
He closed the interface and started to feed the rune sheets with a vault soul gem. It took a considerable amount of power.
He looked around, making sure no one was too close to see his work in front of him. Happy with it, he activated the magical coding within the sheets. It seemed to move a foot to the right before it fell down, smoking as the sheets melted.
Dave grinned to himself.
A new notification flashed in his face.
Active Skill: Teleportation
Level: Master Level 3
Effect: Able to create a device to teleport across distances.
Dave did a little dance, silently doing the cha-cha slide in front of his worktable.
“Who is that weirdo?” someone in the Novice phase asked their lab partner.
“Shh, keep your voice down. That’s Dave Grahslagg. You know, the guy who made magical coding,” the other hissed back.
“What? But why’s he dancing?”
“He always gets a little excited when he gets a breakthrough or when someone else figures something out,” the second lab partner said, shaking his head.
“So, he just had a breakthrough? What was he working on? I didn’t even see anything happen!” The first looked over to Dave, trying to see what he was working on.
“I don’t know, but with him, if it’s something he’s just figured out, we’ll probably see Emerilia change again. It’s said that he and Steve made those onos—you know, those teleport pads that just go to Terra?”
“How can someone have so many accolades already?” the first complained.
“By working at it and not complaining about what others have been able to do,” the second said angrily, not looking up from the runes he was working on.
“Oh, sorry,” the first said sheepishly, looking to his own metal sheet he was coding before he glanced up at Dave again. He swore that the metal sheet in front of him was just a mass of melted metal.
Maybe it was so warm from heat discharge after using the soul gem power that it came apart?
Dave didn’t pay any attention to the mutterings of the students as he deleted what he was working on and then exited the Mirror of Communication.
After leaving the Mirror of Communication, he found his physical body trapped with Deia’s leg over his; her head rested on his chest and her hands were wrapped around his arm.
She let out soft breaths, drooling on him.
Dave snorted at the sight.
“Demigod and she’s slobbering on me,” he whispered to himself, kissing her forehead.
She moved, tightening her grip on him before she relaxed, a pleased expression on her face before it once again flowed into sleepiness.
Dave’s free hand moved to Deia’s stomach. Even if he might have figured out how to create his own magically coded teleporter, it was by no means his greatest achievement.
“I’m looking forward to seeing what you can do,” he whispered, focused on Deia’s stomach.
***
“How is this possible?” Quino asked Kol. All of the Dwarven Master Smiths working in Terra were in the conference
room of Terra’s smithy.
The noises of work could be heard in the background. All of the DCA soldiers had been issued and fitted with armor. Now the smithies under the Grahslagg Corporation were working on their own projects and there were a number of them. People from all over Emerilia were coming to them with rare weapons to be repaired or forged. They were a household name, with their smithies being synonymous with quality.
“Dave has his mine manager class at a really high level. Also, we got lucky,” Kol said. It was clear that he was keeping something to himself.
The other smiths were interested, but they trusted him.
“But, so much Mithril. Hell, the amount of ebony you have here! That’s more output than most Dwarven mountains over five years!” Jesal said.
“Well then, we best put it to good use, like repairing the Stone Raiders’ weapons. If you wish to buy materials to work on your own projects, you are allowed, but there is a limit to the number that you can purchase. Everyone will be allowed the same amount,” Kol said. “You can pay for it with time from repairing or making items, or you can pay for it with other precious materials or soul gems. From now on, all Grahslagg smithies will only be accepting these two items in payment.”
A stir went through the smiths.
“Why not copper, silver, and gold?” Quino asked.
“Copper isn’t that useful for us right now, and we’ve got tons of it. Silver is useful for magical coding. Gold is used to make things pretty. Here, we want weapons first, appearance second. Soul gems we can use to buy and sell items with the Aleph, Devil’s Crater people, and Terra. Also, they power this place and we can use them to power the magical coding in weapons,” Kol answered.
“What about wages?” Jesal asked.
“We’re going to be switching that over to soul gems, simply put. They’re becoming the new money for Stone Raiders and their allies. With Terra trading in them, nearly everything in two of our three locations, people are using the gems to buy and sell items,” Kol said.
“Okay, we agree—now, what about these projects that Dave has given to us? Can we do those as we want?” Sola asked.
“Okay, so for those, there is a bounty. He has a bunch of projects but he can’t work on all of them. If you can find a solution to his problems, then there is a list of rewards that you will gain in resources,” Kol said.
The Master Smiths leaned in with interest. Money, fame—all of it was second to their own smithing. Finding solutions to Dave’s problems would stretch their minds and they could get items to make their own projects!
Grins broke out on the rough, scarred, and bearded faces of the Dwarven Master Smiths taking up the challenge.
***
“Dave!” Malsour yelled as he entered the lab.
“What?” Dave yelled back, not looking away from his work as a bag of holding evaporated in his hands. Burns seemed to form on the material in the shape of runes and Magical Circuits before the bag was burned up.
“I need thirty amulets and fifteen vault soul gems!” Malsour said.
“Huh?” Dave looked at Malsour, his eyebrows coming together in a frown.
“My family needs them to break open the ice palace in Opheir and get at Akatol,” Malsour explained.
“I’ve got three soul gem factories going—two in Terra, one in the seeder—but you know I’m using those soul gems for our extra projects,” Dave said.
“I just want fifteen just in case, but if I can get the amulets and a few coded vault soul gems, it would be good,” Malsour said.
“That I can do. Check in the material storage locker—take the charged ones. Also, I’m going to need you to increase the draw from the fusion plant. I want to really test it out. For that, I need to send the power somewhere,” Dave said.
“I thought we agreed to not play with the bomb in the back of the room?” Malsour yelled as he moved to the materials room. It was a simple room with chests that looked to be more pieces of art than having any actual function. Newer ones were simple metal gray.
Dave had a special order to get a number of the spatial chests. He needed them for moving materials with his factories, smithies, and his various projects, as well as just storing them in place.
Malsour called up what he wanted out of the organized chests. Once they appeared in mid-air above them, Malsour put them into his ring.
“Hey! I needed to step up the Mana well production! For that, I needed some irradiated materials that I can get really easy by using the big bomb, as you call it!” Dave yelled so that he could be heard in the storage room.
“How many you trying to do in a week?” Malsour yelled back as he closed the chest. He moved to another and checked his inventory.
“Well, right now we’re at a Mana well every five days. I think I can get one every two days. I’m working on an assembly line to combine the Mana well, soul gem matrix, and the onos. However, I think I might give it over to the Aleph; they’ll be able to do it better.” Dave trailed off, the last a thought to himself.
“Sounds like a good idea, spread the work around a bit. Dave, where’s the damn amulets?”
“Third from the far right, box all blue and gold weirdness,” Dave yelled back.
“Thanks!” Malsour opened it up and found the amulets. He grabbed them and walked back out into the lab.
Dave was floating in mid-air in his spinning chair. Around him, there were various spatial items and things of holding.
Malsour stopped and looked at Dave. He used his arcane sight without any conscious thought.
Dave was manipulating the gravity of the room to move the various items. They moved in elliptical orbits around him, though there were some places where there weren’t items. But Malsour’s gut told him that there was something.
“How is the work with the armor going?” Malsour asked, cancelling his arcane sight.
Dave turned in the air, a thoughtful look on his face. “With the enchantments and magical coding that I can do on the armor, they’re going to be some of the scariest things I’ve ever made. I’m thinking of making them for Lox and Gurren, though I’m still working on these damned items of holding. It won’t work if I have the armor filled with coding plates and find they can’t fit in it.”
“Why don’t you ask Bob about it? He might have an idea or two,” Malsour said.
“Good idea.” Dave opened his interface.
Malsour smiled. When Dave was working on a project, he had a one-track mind.
“Oh, and I’m going to bring Steve in on all of this. He might act like a goof, well, all the time, but he’s smart as hell when it comes to coding and figuring things out,” Dave said.
“I saw some of the coding on the onos; getting his help would be good.” Malsour turned to leave, but stopped. “Wait, you said you know what you’re going to be coding in the armor already? What about the power consumption? The layering armor and the interlinking coding plates? That should have taken months?”
“Well, I have a very willing workforce. I might have overstepped by saying it was done, but I offered a contest to the Dwarven Master Smiths working in my smithies. Each of them is working on a part, competing with one another to make their best work. As a reward, I’ll give them some resources that are hard for them to get.” Dave had a devilish grin on his face.
Other than Dave, the Dwarven Master Smiths had been working with magical coding for the longest time.
They’d also been making weapons and other items with Magical Circuits for years. They were probably only second to Dave, only due to Dave coming up with crazy ideas and breaking down so many Magical Circuits that he was a moving repository of runes from dozens of different languages.
Malsour let out a breath. Dave had boldly declared that he would make the suits of armor as true Weapons of Power, using his smithing art and imparting a piece of his soul onto each of them. He would be greatly increasing their power and also giving them something that could test and check the user and their intents.
&nb
sp; If Dave had made it by himself, it would have been a great achievement, a true Weapon of Power. But now, he was getting nearly a dozen Master Smiths to create the various components. Where Dave might make a general coding to make the item function, each of the Dwarven Master Smiths would pour their heart, soul, and creative talents into their work, making each piece of coding, layer of armor, and power consumption runes the strongest they could be.
Chapter 12: A New Challenge
Deia stepped through the teleport pad’s event horizon, leaving Terra and entering Devil’s Crater.
“Deia!” Anna said with a wide smile, hugging Deia, careful to not squeeze her too hard.
“So, I heard that you need a weapons trainer?” Deia smiled.
“Getting a little cabin crazy?” Anna laughed as she led Deia away.
“A bit; not being able to go on dungeon raids or check out new ruins and locations is a bit wearing. Dave’s been trying to distract me with coding. I find it interesting and he’s got a lot of interesting projects, but I really just want to work on my fighting skills. Seeing as I can’t,” Deia patted her stomach, “I guess I’ll teach some people how to do it.”
“Well, we’ve set up something of a fight between some of the aerial and ground troops of the DCA: try and humble them a bit, see how to improve them and get some good ole fashioned rivalry between them!” Anna grinned.
“I haven’t been able to get to the Dwarven tournaments. You and Alkao should come with Dave and I for some of the later ones,” Deia said.
“Okay.” Anna sighed in resignation.
They chatted and walked through Unity. It didn’t take them long to leave the growing city behind and head out toward the training area where the training fight was supposed to take place.
Deia floated into the air, her feet glowing with fire. “Sorry, ankles get a bit swollen with walking and it’s much easier to do this.”
“It’s fine with me.” Anna easily stepped into the air beside her.
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