Chapter 62: Runes pt. 2
by**Ding! General Skill Available! Would you like to learn: Rune Mastery – Ykkardian (Rare)?**
Kaius stared at the system notification that hung in his vision, feeling exceedingly pleased with himself. Getting offered the skill on his first attempt was evidence that all of those evenings spent in mind bending study of runes had been worth it. That his father’s exacting methods and intolerance of mistakes had worked.
Mastery skills were interesting. They might boost competency, but you had to display some baseline capability before a Skill would be offered to you by the system. It was an especially high bar for the runic arts. Your inscription didn’t have to be perfect, but it did have to work. It took months of practice for that to even start to become a possibility. Even for him, with a grandmaster as his father, it had taken a lot of sweat and tears to get to this point.
“Kaius. Why the hells did that paper explode.” Porkchop asked him, still lying on the floor after the shock of Kaius’s rune’s spontaneous detonation had startled him from his seat.
Kaius refocused on his friend, scratching his head awkwardly. “Err. The paper couldn’t handle the throughput of the rune?” He offered.
“So you knew this would happen?” Porkchop accused.
“Well. Yes. But-”
Porkchop snorted, interrupting him. “Usually you tell people before something blows up right next to where they are sleeping.”
“Sorry, I-”
“Will it happen again?” Porkchop cut him off again.
“I mean-”
“Will. You. Keep. Blowing. Up. Paper.” Every word flowed across the link slowly, Porkchop making his annoyance clear.
“Yes.” Kaius said, feeling a little silly that he had forgotten to warn his friend about the slightly volatile effects of scribing active runes onto mundane materials.
“I swear to all of your two-legged gods that if you manage to blow up this house as well I will eat your boots.” Porkchop pushed himself to his feet, walking out of the study. “I’m going to nap on the bed. Come find me when you’re done blowing stuff up.”
“Sorry!” Kaius called after him, feeling a little bad. The feeling passed quickly, his excitement for his new skill returning in full force as he turned his attention back to his notification.
Kaius accepted his new Ykkardian mastery, and pulled up the description of the skill.
Rune Mastery – Ykkardian:
Level 1
Rare
Understanding relies on signs and symbols. These relations have weight. Once distilled into their purest form, power is all that remains.
This skill improves the users ability to create Ykkardian formations, and increases the stability of the formations themselves.
Each level slightly increases speed and accuracy when inscribing Ykkardian runes.
Each level slightly increases stability of Ykkardian runes.
Each level slightly increases memory and learning capacity of Ykkardian runes.
Kaius focused on the middle effect of the skill, increasing formation stability. It was runic stability that had led to his earlier sheet immolating, and was what had caused the destructive detonation that had ruined their last home.
It was an interesting trait of runes, many things could affect stability. Mana density, having too much of a single aspect, use of poor materials, mistakes in an inscription itself – all could have the effect of disastrously destabilising a formation. Even if an unstable formation didn’t collapse with as much excitement as his previous experiences, it would still invariably fail at some point.
Perfect stability was basically a myth. There were too many variables to control for, and all formations eventually failed because of them. Still, skills that boosted that aspect were invaluable. He doubted that it was enough to stop the paper from burning, not at his level, but it might be enough to make it less…Explosive.
Kaius quickly moved to test it, redipping his pen and pulling another sheet from his stack. He kept to the same rune. Drawing out Strength a second time would make it far easier to tell how much the skill impacted the formation’s inevitable failure. Different runes failed differently. He had no doubt that if he used sigils for Decay or Consumption that the paper would have been far more likely to crumble into dust rather than ignite.
The tip of his quill glided over the page in a single stroke, broken only to collect more ink from his well. He was faster and smoother than he had been only a few minutes before. His latest Skill tweaked his movements, giving him the confidence to draw with haste. The curves and slashes of the sigil seemed to leap out to him, no time being wasted on remembering the exact angle of a line, nor if the stroke that crossed its centre was two and a quarter fingerlengths, or two and an eighth.
Neither did he feel like his Skill was writing for him. It was all him, just better.
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