Chương 28: Third Place

Enzo stood at the window of his third-floor bedroom, looking out over what had become their territory. A week ago, this had been a neighborhood. Now it was something closer to a settlement. From up here, he could see the beginnings of the palisade. Most of the lookout towers were still half-built, skeletal frames of redwood beams with platforms that didn't have railings yet, but two of them looked close to finished.

People moved between the trees and along the street, carrying lumber, hauling water, doing the small things that kept a community of a hundred people functioning across sixty-odd houses. A group of cyclists rode by, panniers and backpacks loaded with supplies. The runs into town were getting shorter. The Steel Soul Riders had been expanding their control over the region for days now, and had recently started demanding useful equipment or resources in trade for food.

When they weren't just demanding people join them, of course. The smart move was to pull back and avoid a confrontation nobody was ready for. Which meant each trip brought back less, and required people to travel farther each time. He turned from the window. His bedroom, once a tribute to youthful accomplishments, now looked like a madman's laboratory. Two workbenches lined the far wall, assembled from borrowed furniture and stocked with tools and materials he'd pulled from the jewelry stores in town.

On every other wall, he'd pinned spell form designs, notes on magical theory, and whatever insights his enchanting work produced. Cross-references linked one sheet to another with colored thread, and half of them had been rewritten at least once. Only Sumi and Kenzo seemed to understand. Val had taken to giving him pitying looks, and his mother kept bringing cookies and asking if he was getting enough sleep. Pops took one look at the room, grunted, and left.

Enzo picked up the two rings from the workbench and turned them over in his fingers. Val's original and a new one for Kenzo, built with a heavier band to match his hands. Figuring out what went wrong with Val's hadn't taken long. The enchantment could only handle mana throughput to a certain degree, and she'd overloaded it. The more involved question was whether the fault was in the silver or his design, and the answer was both.

Silver degraded through repetitive use, while the enchantment itself shattered the moment too much mana was pushed through it at once. The degradation was a long-term problem. The silver would last through hundreds of casts as long as the mana load stayed reasonable. He'd repaired Val's ring and built Kenzo's with the same limitation in mind, along with a mental note to explain it in terms they'd actually listen to.

What he'd learned from diagnosing the ring had confirmed something more important than the fix itself. There was nothing preventing him from building enchanted items for people without magic. The mana-gathering schema already pulled ambient mana into a storage medium without any input from the user. All he needed was a way to store it and a physical trigger to activate the enchantment. The practical challenge was fitting it together.

The mana storage gems were too large for a ring, and the Watch members needed their hands free for weapons. So he'd split the system into two pieces. The ring carried a modified barrier enchantment, adjusted to project a flat shield rather than the fist-wrapping version he'd given Val and Kenzo. A leather-bound bracelet on the same wrist held the mana-gathering enchantment and storage gem, connected to the ring by a braided silver chain.

Sliding the gem forward along the bracelet brought it into contact with the chain and activated the barrier. It wasn't elegant. The basic storage medium meant one or two casts before a couple hours of recharging. But it worked, and he'd delivered a handful of them to the Watch this morning. They had offered no complaints about the limitations. It also hadn't escaped his notice that the lookouts were becoming a real organization. They had uniforms, rosters, and had even started forming a hierarchy under Frank.

Something to watch out for. So far, Frank had been nothing but friendly and competent. But Enzo wouldn't take chances with his friends and family. He slipped both rings into his pocket and grabbed his cane from where it leaned against the workbench. Looking at his spellbook made him hesitate. He'd created two new spells earlier in the week. Pulse and Analyze. However, after codifying Pulse and casting it for the first time, the information returned by the spell overloaded his brain and knocked him out.

The only upside was that he'd been in his bedroom and nobody else knew about it. Which didn't make it any less embarrassing. Since then, Enzo had spent his spare time working on a skill adaptation to solve the issue. What they'd learned about adaptations and the Guide had given him an idea. An adaptation that intercepted any information returned by a spell, filtered it, then translated it via the Guide itself. He was certain that it was possible. The Guide itself stated it could be developed further.

And adaptations hooked directly into it. Apparently. Which meant that today, Enzo was going to become the first mage on Earth to create an adaptation. Or die trying. He tucked his spellbook under his arm and left the room, pulling the door closed behind him.

Val's voice rang out from the clearing ahead.

"It's annoying!"

"Why?" Sumi asked.

"Because Enzo decided we're doing this. He should be in charge of it."

"What should I be in charge of?" Enzo asked, stepping into the clearing, leaning on his cane. Val turned to him, arms crossed.

"The neighbors keep coming to me for answers about things."

"Like?"

"Every. Thing. They even asked my opinion about where to dig latrines!" She growled.

"What do I know about shit pits? You should be dealing with them." He shook his head.

"It's good that you're handling it. I'm busy with really important things." Val pointed at Kenzo.

"Then make him do it. He started it before we even arrived, anyway." Kenzo remained seated on an old stump, slowly chewing an apple.

"I'm busy too. Each day, I take your old man out hunting. And when I'm here, I'm training, trying to catch up to you guys." Enzo nodded.

"See? Kenzo and I are busy. Sumi is busy. You can do it, I believe in you." Val huffed.

"What about my training?"

"Do it out front. That way, when people need to talk to you, they can. Treat the interruptions like part of your training."

"Ugh." Sumi turned away, hiding a smile. Enzo turned to Kenzo.

"Who's with Pops today?" Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

"Murph." Kenzo grinned.

"She's been going out with us each day. That dog is smart, bro. And I swear she's getting bigger." He wasn't wrong. Murph had already outgrown the size of a border collie, now easily as large as a fully grown German Shepherd. And she had a real nose for Eaters. Which was a good thing, considering the number of animals in the region, even though there were definitely fewer Eaters than they'd expected. Sumi's hypothesis was that the Beasts, as they'd started calling them, must be actively hunting them.

Every sign pointed to them feeling the same instinctive repulsion toward the undead as mages did.

"Why do we even need to be here?" Val asked, jabbing a thumb in Kenzo's direction.

"We're not wizards. And I don't really feel like watching you blow up again." Enzo smiled. She'd never been very good at hiding her emotions from him. And she wasn't used to being worried.

"Because you have Mana Sense too. Even though what we do is fundamentally different, it's still mana. You might spot something that helps with your own adaptations." All of them had hit what they were calling 'The Wall.' Val had hit level ten in Mana Circulation, Sense, and Absorption. Sumi's was the same, though replacing Circulation with Control. And Kenzo, still a little behind, had reached the limit in Circulation and Absorption.

"He's right," Kenzo said with a lopsided grin.

"You need every advantage you can get. I started after you, but I'm gaining!" Val stuck her tongue out.

"Only because you probably paid my brother to assign me the shit job. Literally." Kenzo snorted. Enzo took a breath.

"Okay, I'm going to get started." The others nodded. Sumi pulled her pocket notebook out and flipped to a fresh page. Kenzo took another bite of the apple, then gave him a thumbs up. Enzo caught the flash of concern on his best friend's face, but he said nothing. Enzo took a seat on the grass, stretching out his bad leg and laying the cane down beside him.

He pulled his spellbook from under his arm, flipped to the page where he'd sketched what almost looked like a series of concentric rings from a two-dimensional perspective, but when viewed at an angle looked more like a telescopic lens beginning from a single point. Each circle was progressively larger, with a set of threads linking them all back to the beginning. The threads were the data highways, while the circles all carried varying concepts and intents aimed at translating whatever was fed into the spell form.

Broader processing first, filtering down further and further until data became information. The Guide, with any luck, would interpret the result and display it directly in his mind's eye. While also not killing him in the process. Enzo closed his eyes and activated Mana Sense without forming the hand sign. They'd all moved past needing the training wheels by now, though none of them had yet perfected it. Before he could reach for his mana reserve, a notice flashed into existence.

— Notification The Universal Training Guide has detected that you are attempting to construct your first Skill adaptation. Automatic assistance will be provided. Note: It is highly recommended that you memorize the sensation of the Universal Training Guide's personal endpoint exposure process. As Skill adaptations are often deconstructed and replaced, and automatic assistance is only provided one time, you will need to expose the endpoint yourself in the future.

Warning: Skill adaptations are supported as an advanced feature of the Universal Training Guide. Please review your Skill Adaptation Framework Guide Entry and consult a mentor or magical technician before attempting to construct your first adaptation. The Universal Training Guide will reject known self-harmful designs, but because of the conceptual binding principle, it cannot eliminate all risk. Exposing personal endpoints… — A thread of mana pulled itself outward through his forehead.

It wasn't painful, but unlike when he threaded mana himself, forcing it to appear anywhere within his spell range, this thread dragged as it passed through bone and skin. A shiver of discomfort ran down his spine. He felt, rather than saw, the thread split in half, with each separate piece winding around his head in opposite directions before spiraling around the other end and meeting, but not rejoining, right in front of where they'd exited.

The others were whispering across the clearing to each other, but Enzo forced them from his mind. Focused on his goal. And drew out the first thread of mana, shaping it into a large circle. With a practiced thought, he pinned the thread in place, then moved on to the second, repeating the process. Again and again, circle after circle, shaped by independent threads, until there were seven in total.

Then he formed the first of the five long threads, connecting the largest circle through decreasingly smaller circles all the way through, before ending at a point. As he pulled the ninth thread free from his reserves, he felt his concentration waver. Kenzo's teeth crunching into the apple. Sumi's pen scratching on the paper. A stick snapped underfoot as Val shifted in place. A memory of the spell form exploding in his face, the sudden burst of pain and loss of consciousness, sat at the edge of his awareness.

Each distraction tugged at him, competing for his already split attention. Enzo squeezed his eyes shut harder and gritted his teeth. Dragged a deep breath in through his nose and forced the next four threads into place. A bead of sweat ran down his forehead, over his eyebrow, and into the corner of his eye. It twitched. He remained still. Focused. But he'd run into a problem. The spell form's design hadn't accounted for two separate connections. Enzo reached up calmly and rubbed the sweat from his eye.

Then, for good measure, he slowly wiped the moisture from his forehead before the problem could return. There was no way of knowing if he could just draw one more thread and link the completed form to one endpoint, or if he needed to connect it to both. The Guide had made it sound singular, which made him lean toward needing to close the loop. It seemed like such a dumb thing to be stuck on after all of his efforts.

The Guide was clearly capable of providing answers, and yet the bastards who'd designed it had assumed people would have access to resources and knowledge that he didn't. That his friends didn't. That the entire population of mages on Earth, struggling as they were to survive, simply did not have. He wanted to snarl at the stupidity. But he was out of time. He could feel his control over the threads beginning to slip, bit by bit.

Enzo dragged one last, very short thread free of his reserves, layered the idea of it becoming a link between the Guide and the adaptation, then attached it. It connected to the base of the adaptation, then bridged the gap between both personal endpoints. He held his breath. And released the spell form. A second passed. Then another. His heart continued beating within his chest. His head did not explode. Then another notification appeared. — Notification Analyzing Skill adaptation… No threats to user detected.

Analyzing concepts… Deriving purpose… Connecting to the Universal Training Guide Library… Comparing design… Recording design… Connection closed. — Notification Congratulations. You have successfully constructed your first Skill adaptation and connected it to your personal Universal Training Guide endpoint. You are the first Mage within your society to create an adaptation for Mana Sense. You are the third Mage within your society to create any adaptation.

Do you wish to add your adaptation to the list, making your name, along with the purpose, concepts, and insights into your design available to other Mages within your society? — Skill Adaptation: Mana Sense - Mana Information Translation and Display Classification: Sensory Processing This adaptation extends the Mana Sense Skill by introducing a multi-layered translation framework between raw mana perception and conscious awareness.

Incoming mana signals are processed through a series of progressively refined filters, converting unstructured sensory data into categorized information. Processed information is routed to the Universal Training Guide for interpretation and display. Note: Successful interpretation is reliant on the Mage's knowledge. — Enzo thought about the question for a long while. Long enough that he heard Val getting restless, now that he was no longer visibly manipulating mana.

He didn't like that his own name would be revealed to other mages around the world. That came from a sense of self-preservation. With how things were developing, or devolving depending on your perspective, he could see a future where many of the mages they encountered were not friendly. Then again, he could also see a world where the Eater threat grew unchecked because of a lack of mages. Things had been quiet the past week, with only a few encounters reported. But he'd seen the piles of bodies on the way in.

They'd seen what clusters of corpses became at the hospital. He knew what happened as the Eaters grew stronger. And they were all in this situation only because one of them had grown large enough to snack on a star. That made the decision easy. He selected 'Yes.' — Notification Congratulations. You are the third Mage to share a Skill adaptation within your society.

'Mana Information Translation and Display' has been added to the list of adaptations available for Mana Sense. — Enzo opened his eyes with a frown. He really didn't like coming third.