Vellum lifted her gaze to the ceiling. “Obviously, these are terrible, and you should never use them. They are, predictably, also the most common.” She looked back at us, expression sharp. “People are terrible, and also stupid.”
She held up a third finger. “The third rune is the most important. It tells the item to stop gathering mana when it’s full. If you forget this rune, or make a mistake on it, your item will eventually explode.” There was a pause as she let this sink in. “As you might expect, since people are both terrible and stupid, many of my students make mistakes on this third rune.”
Vellum took a breath, then let it out. “Typically, these mistakes only result in lost fingers, but there have been a few students who have been more seriously injured. This is unfortunate, because checking if a rune is working properly requires a trivial amount of effort. Simply bring the item to the Divinatory, and they can cast a basic spell to check the rune. Of my students, more than half fail to take this basic precaution, because people are terrible, stupid, and also lazy.”
She folded her arms, leaning against the table. “I mention this lesson every year, and every year, I am disappointed. Nevertheless, in my weakness, I retain some hope that this class will be the one class to finally demonstrate a degree of basic competence. I look forward to being disappointed once again.”
Straightening, she lifted her hands, pressing her palms together beneath her chin. “Now, let’s talk about the types of cores you’ll need...”
I took extensive notes throughout her entire lesson. Oddly, I think her vitriolic sense of humor helped me to focus.
Unfortunately, the cores she was talking about for making permanent items? They’d cost about ten times more coin than I had on hand, just to make a single basic magical item.
We’d get some materials from the academy as a part of the class if I lasted that long. Not a lot, but enough to meet the basic requirements. Barely.
I wasn’t satisfied with that.
I wanted to get to making permanent items as quickly as possible, and that meant either finding a source of income or a direct source for cores.
I was contemplating that, getting ready to sleep, when I heard a creaking sound come from my doorway.
It took less than another second before the board that was nailed over the door split in half and my door flew wide open.
A tall, hooded figure dressed in all black was standing in my doorway. A wickedly curved knife was in their right hand.
My first thought was, “Why is there an assassin in my doorway?”
Quickly followed by, “Ohreshassassinquicklyduelingcane.”
I’d been warned to be prepared for threats, so I had my dueling cane within reach. I reached. I knocked it on the floor.
Welp, life over.
I’d like to say it’s been fun.
The figure took a second to look around the room before advancing. That bought me a precious moment to reach down and grab the fallen cane, flip it around, and fire two shots into the intruder’s chest.
No effect at all. The mana dispersed across the surface of the intruder’s tunic, shimmering as it spread. It wasn’t an effect I’d seen before, not a traditional barrier. A dueling tunic would have taken damage from the blast. This thing was more resilient.
The intruder lunged.
I rolled out of the bed, firing another blast — but not at the intruder.
This one hit the ceiling, pounding a hole through layers of wood into the room above. It wouldn’t have enough force to hurt anyone up there... I hoped... but it was sure to get their attention.
If anyone was up there.
My “evasive roll” turned out to be more of a “wrap myself in a bedsheet and fall on the floor” roll. It still served the purpose of getting me out of the way of the daggers for a second, but ultimately I was in a worse position afterward. In the second that it took to disentangle myself from the sheet, the intruder was above me, bringing a dagger down toward my shoulder.
The dagger glanced off a barrier, generated by the shield sigil pinned to my nightshirt.
Yeah, I slept with that on.
I punched the assassin in the face.
The intruder recoiled from the blow, giving me enough time to kick at their legs, but my angle was bad and the impact was minimal.
Another dagger strike came down, but this time I rolled right. The dagger splintered the floor, and I pushed myself to a crouch.
A kick hit me in the face.
The barrier soaked some of it, but I still fell backward, hitting my head against the nearest wall. That hurt, and my vision swam.
I ducked the next kick, which smashed a chunk out of the wall above where my head had been. Blearily, I noted that ordinary kicks shouldn’t have that amount of force.
I switched tactics, running my hand along the other rune on the hilt of my cane. A short blade popped out of the hilt, and when the next kick came in, I lashed at the offending leg. I missed, but the attacker retreated a step.
I stood up.
The intruder ducked, taking a lower stance, reversing their grip on the knife. It wasn’t a stance I was familiar with. To be fair, though, there weren’t any knife fighting stances I was familiar with. I’d never learned to knife fight.
Apparently, they had.
My odds were bad.
I yelled for help.
The intruder glanced toward the door, hissed, and then lunged forward, making a sweeping cut toward my face. I blocked it with my own blade, kicking afterward, but meeting only air.
The intruder stepped back, reaching into a pouch.
I flicked the other rune, feeling a sharp sensation of pain as mana surged through my hand, igniting the dueling cane’s blade.
The intruder threw something from the pouch — a potion — right at me.
I caught it with my off-hand and threw it back.
I could see their eyes widen even with their cowl in place. I smirked.
My smirk was short-lived.
The intruder vanished from where they had been standing, appearing right in front of me.
The potion hit the of my room near the door, but didn’t break like I’d expected.
Then there was a knife at my throat.
“Don’t move.”
The voice wasn’t coming from the intruder.