Chapter 101 - First Spell

Note : Chapter 107 has been written and added to the queue !

Wew. Today was tiring, but fun. ARC Raiders in squad mode is a MASSIVE bloodbath.

With chapter 107, that's about two thirds of the way through book 3. Hot damn. I could probably finish the book before the end of the month, but I should probably start switching gears to The Fallen World.

And yes, I was tempted to call the chapter 'spellcasting 101', but it would have been redundant. Still, Sapphiria's first spell being on chapter 101 is poetic.

I hope you'll enjoy the chapter !

Chapter 101

Starborn Mountains, Mount Nebula

Crash Site

"Holy shit." Kalia looked at the cavern, stepping into it as she looked all around. Sapphiria was about to broadcast some collision alerts, but Cia was already on it, every bot rerouting to give them both plenty of space. "When you said crash site, I expected like...a ship's boat splintered on a rock and some kind of camp with Ramina's workshop. Not this."

"To be fair, it's not far off."

Kalia snorted, then looked over her shoulder.

"Wait, you're serious? Ahahahah!" She laughed. "Sapphi, love, this is a factory!"

"Not quite." Not yet. "But I suppose it is pretty impressive."

"It is! And it explains a lot." She walked over to one of the smelters, and looked it over. "What's that?"

"Smelter."

"Smel-What? How- where's the smoke?"

"There is none." Colonial smelters didn't make any. They used some of the same tech orbital smelters had, which for obvious reasons didn't want to have unpredictable vector changes by venting gases. "They burn clean. So to speak."

And made some nice bricks of impurities and undesirable materials she could then either feed to her advanced materials refinery to pull the valuable bits out, or just dump into the metaconcrete plant.

"That's...insane. And all of this-" She spread her arms, englobing the cavern. "-without magic?"

"Yep!"

"Crazy. Just...crazy." She nodded towards the pod. "I assume this is it? Given that it's at the end of a furrow in the ground and, uh..." She looked up at the giant pile of collapsed rocks behind the pod. "Is this...safe?"

"The cavern is structurally sound." Sapphiria paused. "Mostly."

"Gah! Don't tease me like that."

The AI smiled.

"Alright, alright. It is safe." She had her bots and drones reinforce it to prevent it all coming down on her head. But she might as well not have bothered. If the rest of the room hadn't collapsed when it was hit by what was, for all intents and purposes, orbital bombardment, she wasn't about to bring it down on her own lest she overloaded the pod's reactor or something.

"Oki." Kalia seemingly realized she was surrounded by bots rolling about, and gingerly got close to the pod, looking at its various opened hatches. "What's in those?"

"Bots...I mean golems racks, where they recharge. Minilab. Refinery. Fabricator. And my bedroom, so to speak." She said, pointing to each compartment in turn.

"I can guess what the refinery does, but by minilab you mean some kind of tiny laboratory?"

"Yes."

"And the fabricator...that's the same thing you put in the snowpiercer, right?"

"Just a better version, but yes." The field fabricator on the snowpiercer had a full queue as well, though what it could make was limited. Mostly, it was making or repairing various parts for the golems she had in the field, keeping them in shape. They were rugged enough that it was sufficient for now, but she'd have to start cycling some back home for full servicing soon enough. That, or make some maintenance pods.

She watched as Kalia knelt down to look into the compartment that had housed her android.

"Bedroom uh? That's...kind of cramped."

"Well, I had limited space."

"Good thing you're such a small package then. Except in the right places of course." The mage-magistrate winked meaningfully, and Sapphiria had the good grace to blush.

The AI coughed.

"Anyway. That's my home. Just a bunch of industry, machinery, and a whole lot of golems."

"Well, it definitely could use a glowup. But I understand why you wanted to keep us away." Kalia looked around. "Had I seen this, I'd have thought you were part of the vestige, and had just woken up."

"Yeah, everyone seems to assume I'm an old fossil. Do I look old?"

"No, but you act like you've seen some shit most of the time. Which you have." Kalia looked around. "So you said you had some kind of firing range?"

Sapphiria nodded. Unsurprisingly, practicing actual spells in secret required a place to do it without arousing suspicion, and to minimize collateral damage. Needless to say, Kalia's place wasn't it.

"I do. Follow me." She started walking, and looked over her shoulder as Kalia scurried over to catch up. "I thought you'd want to take it in a bit more."

"I would but..." She shivered. "It feels a bit oppressive. I mean it's almost completely unlit."

"Oh. Right." She didn't need lights. Neither did the bots, or anything else. The entire place had to look creepy as all hell outside of her armor's pool of lights. "I'll see about making some illumination."

She had some floodlights on the list from when they'd stopped the Bane from destroying Astralis. Flares would probably be a better idea overall, but she wasn't all that sanguine about firing incendiary devices into the skies. Plus, with the Hand showing that fire was a very relative problem for the Bane that could wield magic, she'd rather not rely on them to help the squishies see, only to realize at the last second that they could just snuff them out like candles.

Besides, big floodlights could be used outside of battles to help around the town.

"Thanks." She smiled. "But at least I know the answer to 'your place or mine'. I don't think I can fit in that bed of yours. Let alone the both of us."

The AI blushed.

"Yeah...I'll need to work on that."

"No need to hurry. I like having you over."

"Uh huh." Sapphiria grabbed Kalia's hand, and guided her around a few holes in the floor. "Careful there."

"What happened?"

"I was testing mines."

"Oh. So you were really...designing all the stuff you used?"

"Most of it is Federation issued schematics. But my stockpile of them is limited. So I've had to improvise a lot."

"That's...impressive where do you find the time?"

"I don't...I don't sleep, Kalia."

The mage-magistrate came to a halt.

"Like...ever?"

"I can dream. I did it when we, you know...but I don't sleep like you do. I physically can't."

"Oh. That's...practical?"

"Yeah. And I don't need the coffee a human like you need to pull it off!"

Kalia chuckled.

"I've pulled a few all nighters at the academy. Believe me, all you need to crushed tavira and a lot of late homework."

"Tavira?"

"The crystal plant? You don't have those?"

"Not that I know of." Sapphiria came to a halt. "And here we are."

Kalia looked around, her eyebrows rising.

"This place...has seen some shit."

"It has. Carbines, machineguns, maces, grenades, mines...even the autocannon, before I realized it wasn't a good idea."

"How so?"

"Too small. But it should be fine for spells, right?"

"To start off of, yes." Kalia moved the box from the crook of her arm to her hands. "Alright then. Ready to cast your first spell?"

"Nope." She smiled at Kalia's expression. "Yes, of course I am. Any spellform I should use?"

Spellforms was a fancy way of saying 'aberrations we observed and reproduced'. They weren't really spells. More of like...the fundamental blocks of one. Like, every wind spell came from a wind spellform, that itself came from a wind aberration, the purest, most fundamental expression of that type of magic. They were just refinements. Spells focused a spellform, enhanced certain aspects and drove for specific effects, to be manifested in certain ways.

The best analogy she could come up with was that spells were laser rifles, laser cannons, or even the battlelasers on warships, but the spellform was the laser emitter, the piece of tech that at the end of the day generated the photons.

"Try wind. If you don't care about noise, it's the safest."

"Alright." Kalia stepped up to her, and opened the box. "Pick up a crystal."

"Does the color matter?"

"Not really."

"Why are they different colors anyway?"

"I'm not sure. I think that's covered in advanced Magister courses, and I only did the basics."

"Refining crystals not appealing enough for you?"

"I was itching to be the long arm of the law. Also I wanted to throw lightning around for a living."

Sapphiria chuckled.

Well, she supposed she could relate. She had signed up for the navy in part because she got to use the big guns.

"Alrighty." She picked up a green crystal, her security programs instantly springing to life as they intercepted the incoming pings. They'd tested it before, and it worked through the armor, but it was more muted. Which explained why Kalia had insisted on her doing it with her bare hand at first, since it could be so hard to accomplish for squishies. "What now? Interface with it?"

"Yep. You don't have to for most spells. That's what the initial runes are for. But best to err on the side of caution for a beginner."

Sapphiria nodded, and pinged the crystal. Instantly, data began streaming in. Data she couldn't make heads or tails of, but she noted every single bit of it, as well as full scans of the crystal and its physical appearance.

With the few other crystals she'd handled, she was fairly sure she'd already narrowed down the datapoints linking to size and/or quantity of mana within. Though of course, that was mostly speculation.

"Alright. Now that it's done...show me what you can do."

Sapphiria raised her hand, and spoke. Kalia called it incanting. Apparently it wasn't strictly necessary, but it helped with keeping everything straight. Given the fact that the 'incantations' she'd been taught sounded musical, she had to guess it was a kind of mnemonic technique. Which made sense, when messing it up could kill you or those around you.

Her recall was flawless. Runes flashed into being above and around her. A short sequence.

She had a spike of data. Data the squishies' brains had no way of interpreting, but which she at least could recognize for what it was. Then...

A chunk of the crystal vanished. Exotic radiation bathed her.

And the universe obeyed.

A blast of wind scoured the chamber. It wasn't particularly powerful or focused. But it had no physical, mundane source.

Sapphiria realized she had a massive grin splitting her face. She'd done it! She'd just cast magic.

In one instant, she'd upended the Federation's understanding of physics, of what was and what wasn't possible, forever.

She looked at Kalia, who was smiling equally widely.

"You did it! Congratulations!" She looked like she was about to grab the AI and kiss her, before catching herself, coughing. "Alright. Put the crystal back." She did, and the mage-magistrate closed the box. "Excellent. Now kneel."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Kneel."

There was a thing people called 'command imperative', the way someone, through voice, body language and just sheer personal presence, could make others obey them.

AIs were no more immune to it than squishies, though at least she could analyze it.

Sapphiria knelt.

Kalia grabbed her head with one hand, and Sapphiria realized that her thumb had some kind of paint on it, before she smeared it on the android's forehead.

"Sapphiria, I hereby recognize that you have casted your first spell, and taken the first step on the path of arcana. I christen you magus. Aspirant you are no longer. From now on, until forevermore, you shall walk the paths of beyond the physical, of the mysteries of the arcane. You may rise."

Sapphiria stood up, still confused. Was this some kind of ceremony? She-

Her thinking was cut short as the squishie leaned down, and kissed her.

The AI closed her eyes, and leaned into it, parting her lips, allowing the mage-magistrate's probing tongue in.

It was both supremely long and thorough...and yet too short, Kalia smiling widely as they parted.

"Congratulations love. You're a mage." Somehow, the mage-magistrate's smile grew wider still. "Now, do that again, but with a different spellform this time. And I can start running you through some of the more basic ways to bend them to your purposes."

"What do you mean?"

"Love. We both know you're staggeringly smart and resourceful. Not to mention the inventor and builder of devices I can barely fathom. And I've seen them with my own eyes. Why waste time cramming your head with already made spells, when I can teach you how to make your own?"