14 Chapter 14 (2/2)
Looking at his status afterwards, Wilfred could see he had gained a new skill.
”There, now try destroying one of these.”
Grabbing the Colt Wilfred felt a small tinge of regret. He didn't want to destroy it. He could always recreate it he supposed. Sighing, he held the gun and activated his spell.
”[Deconstruction]!”
Swiftly, the revolver began dissipating into small blue flakes, lifting in the air and settling on Wilfred. As the process ended, Wilfred felt a large rush of energy from deep within him.
”Woah, what is this?! I feel like...supercharged. Like electricity is running through me. It's not painful but I think I could lift a mountain.”
Primus simply nodded.
”Yes. When you deconstruct a pure magical item, such as a summoned sword, you get a portion of the mana spent creating it back. The amount of mana needed to destroy something you did not create will outweigh any recovery from destroying it.”
Wilfred's eyes shot open wide, realizing the implications of this.
”Wait, so if I had 20 of these, I could destroy them and use them like... mana batteries?”
Primus looked at Wilfred perplexed.
”What? Can you make sense, what is a battery?”
Opening his status window and looking at his own stats, Wilfred smiled.
”Just a.n.a.lyze me, you'll see.”
Wilfred Lamarche [Lv. 7]
Health: 60/60
Mana: 7034/6068
Str: 7
Con: 10
Agi: 8
Dex: 6
Int: 52
Wil: 45
Wis: 54
Lck:???
Skills & Spells: [a.n.a.lyze], [Wind Aura], [Construct Artifact], [Barrier], [Wind Blade], [Deconstruction]
”This means the cost to create one of your weapons is very high. There is actually something similar to this that we mages use sometimes. It's a rather rare crystal named Zoisapite, only available in the Elven territory. By breaking it, there's a release of energy that the user can absorb to increase his mana beyond what he normally can. It's very expensive though.”
”So why hasn't anyone done this before? It's essentially free to do; just use up mana one day to use it on a later day. Would be a ma.s.sive advantage in combat.”
”That is true but abilities that create something from using only mana are quite rare and most only last a few hours. I would argue that you're likely one of the only mages in the world capable of doing something like this. Also, not to belittle your experience but at higher levels, fights are decided different than what first years do at the academy. It's not simply a battle of who has more mana.”
”Hmmm, so it could be very profitable if I sold this then? What if...let's try this. [Construct Artifact]!”
So far, Wilfred had only attempted to make guns since that was what worked. When he tried to do swords or medieval weapons like those Lucius described to him from book, it had always failed. This time, he focused on what a battery was and how it worked. Granted, it was a long time since science cla.s.s but he remembered that chemical reactions, such as acid in car batteries, was what produced electrons and generated current.
Blue light s.h.i.+mmered away from Wilfred's hand and condensed into a black rectangular shape.
Wilfred held it close, turning it around and examining his creation.
”I wonder if it worked. Could you inspect it for me please? I really need to learn that inspect skill one day.”
[Artifact Item]
Lithium Ion Battery, Lv22
Mana Stored: 1450/1450
Effect: Can store and retrieve mana from this device by channeling magic either from or to the device.
”Oh, very nice. So this is a battery? Such a strange concept. I do wonder sometimes how you know of these things Wilfred, it is peculiar. Nonetheless, I am interested in this. I would pay you for it. How does 18 gold pieces sound?”
Trying to remember how currency worked in this world, Wilfred did a few calculations and his heart froze for a moment. If 50 Copper pieces made a Silver one and 100 Silver ones made a Gold piece then… this was an astronomical amount! It was like winning the lottery. His family made due with about 30 copper pieces a day for food, this was the equivalent to 90,000 copper pieces! Wilfred accepted in a heartbeat, he could always make another now that he knew how to do it.
”There is one condition Wilfred. I ask that you do not sell any of your creations to anyone else. At least until you've grown older and get a better sense to judge people's character. It would be rather...bad for you if those of unscrupulous morals found out about what you can do. This money should last you until you graduate fourth year, which I do not doubt you will.”
”Hmmm, consider it a deal sir. Thank you. And you'll look into the matter of the theft?”
Primus nodded and went to his desk to write a missive about the incident and increase security.
Wilfred left the Headmaster's office and headed for the cafeteria. This was where most students tended to eat and study but they did not refer to it as a cafeteria, that concept was Wilfred's only. Wilfred prefered the calm of the library for studying however. Lucy and Lucius were supposed to be waiting there for him in order to go to the graduation ceremony later that evening.
Wilfred didn't like those huge social gatherings, he prefered a smaller amount of company. Always greeting people, getting stuck in awkward conversations and having to fake being interested in whatever subject the other person spoke about. The only good thing was the food. Parties always had the best food. Wilfred was pretty curious about this world's delicacies and exotic dishes. As barely more than commoners, they always had the same meals. Thankfully this world still had meat and potatoes, some of the new vegetables were alright too.
”Hey, there you are.”
A voice woke Wilfred up from his thoughts and he turned around to see Lucy with Lucius tagging along.
”So, how did everything go?” Lucy asked.
He sighed.
”Well, Primus will look into it but they're likely long gone by now.”
”Well that's a shame. I remembered something else though, there's another weird faction. They're more like a religious cult but they're interested in specific things. One of them came by my father's estate some time ago with a list. They don't usually cause any trouble and aren't doing anything illegal as far as the King knows so they let them be. I didn't get to see the list but they call themselves 'The Society of Video Games'.”
Lucius scrounged his eyebrows and a lightbulb went off in his head.
”Hey! You talked to me about 'video games' the other night. What are they and how did you know about them?”
Wilfred stood beneath the questioning gaze of Lucius and Lucy, unsure how to respond to this.
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