Chapter 53

The date had been set for his Synaptic Resonance practical retake: two weeks from now, on Tuesday. And Fabrisse had become increasingly confident he’d be able to fully recognize the basic synaptic thread in time.

[Basic Synaptic Thread Recognition: 40% Progress]

The fact that he could track his improvements tangibly did wonders for his confidence. If he could keep up this diligence for the next two weeks, he’d get there. 

Over the next two days, none of the weird things happened. He categorized rocks during the morning, went to theoretical lectures and practiced Synaptic Threading, went home before eight, then obsessively checked his attributes until he fell asleep even though nothing had changed. 

Tonight, he was also doing the same time wasting, obsessive staring thing. At least he was able to calculate his Health Point replenishing rate by staring at the screen after bumping his toe into a table and losing 3 HP. Every five minutes, he would gain 1 HP back. He’d also learned that the shape of the rocks mattered, at least for Stupenstones. The rough ones would give him a STR bonus, but he decided to not move them to the robe pockets for now. He didn’t feel he would need STR at this moment, as this specific attribute didn’t seem to have anything to do with spellcasting. However, he did make a mental note to only practice Stupenstone Fling with the smoother stones that didn’t grant him anything.

There was no Tommaso to bother him the last couple days. Apparently he had been recalled for a couple of days to meet with a disciplinary liaison from the Northern Engagement Corps—something about ‘reckless conduct unbecoming of a junior field affiliate’ and ‘a worrying comfort with improvised combustion.’

Tommaso had sent him a single message via communication glyph—one of the older single-use panels etched on cheap slate. It took thirty minutes to arrive and would probably dissolve by dusk.

It read, ‘being lectured by a guy whose last name is Protocol. literally Protocol. wish me luck, he allergic to jokes.’

Fabrisse had stared at it for a moment, then sighed and scratched his reply into the return strip, which the glyph would convert and pulse back once the ink dried: ‘try not to explode anything.’

He almost added especially your chances of survival, but ran out of space. Budget glyphs had character limits.

No new quest had popped up during that time. However, he did get a small boon for his hard work.

Earth Thaumaturgy Mastery + 1

His current Mastery Point accumulation was 4. He would need another 6 to upgrade another skill to Rank II, which, at this rate, would take another twelve days of hard work. However, it would still be a significant improvement compared to the astounding growth rate of zero over the past several years. 

“Why do you keep staring at nothing?” Greg asked. He was still sitting in front of his desk, writing some sort of report.

“Uh . . . Assistant Hajin told me to, uh, meditate. This clears my mind,” Fabrisse lied.

Greg replied, “This kind of training is why Earth Thaumaturgy is so ineffective.” Then he just resumed writing.

Fabrisse just kept staring.

As he stared at his glyph, something popped up at him.

When is the last step of the tutorial going to come? And when will I get to see my Emotional Attunement attribute?

Not like he had a lot of hope about his Emotional Attunement being anything usable, of course.

In theory, it seemed like one of the most important attributes. But now he’d learned many spells didn’t require you to invoke emotions at all, and theoretically he could go his entire life just flinging stones without ever having to channel emotions. 

Another screen pulsed into view.

[Tutorial: Final Phase – Phase 4: Concordance Synchronization]
✦ Objective: Achieve and maintain short-term resonance synchronization with another aetherically-active caster.
✦ Requirement: You must be within range of a caster currently channeling emotion-fueled spellwork.
✦ Instruction:
  — Detect another’s emotional frequency (eg. shame).
  — Channel your emotional resonance into a shared aether pool.
  — Sustain a synchronized pulse long enough to draw upon their emotional input.

✦ Warning: Emotional resonance is inherently unstable.
  — Synchronization will drain FP at an accelerated rate.
  — Mnemonic incantation time is halved during shared casting.
  — Emotional overload may cause backlash.

Rewards: Emotional Attunement (EMO) Unlocked

Skill to be Unlocked: [Harmonized Spellcasting (Rank I)]
✦ When harmonized with another spellcaster, you may draw on their emotional charge to supplement your own.

✦ The effectiveness of harmonization is boosted primarily by your EMO, secondarily by your SYN.

✦ Rank I Limitations:
   — Duration: 3 seconds max (if you’re the caster; if you’re the contributor, the duration depends on their harmonization capabilities)
   — Only applies to emotion-fueled spells
   — Massive FP cost; backlash possible on failure

System Note: One cannot fake resonance. To access this power, you must feel what is real.

Harmonization? That’s an intermediate-level technique! I can’t even manifest my own emotions, much less borrow from others! I don’t even have a skill for it yet, and there’s no way I’m understanding any of these instructions.

Fabrisse stared at the tutorial, then opened the casting schematic to check the aetheric reaction involved.

[Aetheric Reaction Requirements: Harmonized Spellcasting – Rank I]

→ Input 1: External Emotional Resonance – 25% (if you’re the caster) / 50% (if you’re the contributor)
  Foreign emotional frequency detected within 10m. Must be active and stable for at least 0.5s.
→ Input 2: Internal Emotional Resonance – 50% (if you’re the caster) / 25% (if you’re the contributor)
  Self-generated pulse must be attuned within ±5Hz of external frequency.
→ Input 3: Synchronization Factor – 25%
  Measures moment-to-moment alignment of emotional pulse, aetheric rhythm, and intent.

→ Output:

 • Shared aether pool (temporary, unstable)

 • Access to [Harmonized Spellcasting] 

 • Mnemonic incantation time reduced by 50%

 • FP cost multiplier ×2.5

 • On failure: Emotional backlash chance 40%

So it was a two-person spell.

You needed someone else’s emotional charge just to form the pool. Without that, you were just pushing emotion into a vacuum. No resonance, no pool. No pool, no harmonization.

He frowned.

He couldn’t learn this alone; no way. If he wanted to master this skill quickly, Lorvan would be the worst person to ask. His mentor would just force him to train Emotional Tuning for hours while insisting he would need to grasp the basics first before borrowing emotions from anyone else. Traditionally, for Harmonization to take effect, firstly, two spellcasters had to feel or conjure the same emotion at the same time.

Maybe I can ask Liene. I’m not sure if she’s learned that, but it’s not like I have any other option.

***

“I have no idea how to harmonize,” Liene replied. “Why don’t you ask Lorvan?” She rested her back on the wall of the pie shop as she watched Fabrisse munching on a slice of mulberry pie.

Fabrisse replied, “He’ll ask me to spend weeks honing my Emotional Tuning. That’s so boring.”

“Well then, maybe we should start with Emotional Tuning first. But you struggle at that too.” 

“You don’t have to rub salt into the wound . . .” 

She wasn’t wrong. A big part of why he failed so hard at hitting the demon with his Invocation of Grief during last week’s training was that his poor Synaptic Clarity didn’t allow him to align the emotional climax of his fake story with the release of the spell, but he wouldn’t have had to do that had he felt actual emotions to begin with. Many expressive students could still make do with poor control because they still had the needed emotions to cast spells, even if their handling of the spell was lacklustre.

This is the tutorial, glyph! Why are the conditions so hard? Who in their right mind makes an impossible tutorial?

[System Note: Control of one’s emotion is a basic spellcasting prerequisite.]

[Additional Note: If you lack both emotional access and control, please consider enrolling in a different field. Suggestions include Rune Copying, Ancient Bureaucratic Theory, or Decorative Divination.]

[Suggestion: You may initiate a Tutorial Path Recalibration.]

[Would you like to restart Tutorial Protocol with a more compatible discipline? Recommended paths:
– Procedural Glyph Rendering (Low-Emotion Track)
– Administrative Chantcraft (Audit-Focused)
– Bureaucratic Summoning (Form 12-C Required)]

Hey . . . that actually doesn’t sound that bad.

[Warning: This choice is permanent. You will become emotionally inert.]

He tapped the prompt away in horror.

Okay, maybe not.

[Confirmation needed: Are you paying attention?]

Yes?

[Reminder: This interface is referred to as the System, not “glyph.” Terminology adherence ensures proper documentation, accurate troubleshooting, and consistency across all interdepartmental communications. Continued misuse may result in flagged entries.]

Oh, okay. You could’ve told me sooner, System . . .

“I’m not sure anyone can teach Harmonization to you if you don’t have decent Emotional Tuning,” Liene continued. “Why don’t you attend your next Emotional Resonance workshop?”

“I’ve skipped too many of those to understand the methods now.”

Liene exhaled slowly. Fabrisse swore she was resisting the urge to throw the rest of her pie at him. “Then you need a tutor.”

“A what?”

“A tutor. You know, those terrifyingly competent people who get paid to fix your ignorance?”

Fabrisse stopped chewing. “Wait, that’s still allowed?” He thought they’d banned tutoring since a few years ago.

“Yes. We are in the Synod, Fabri. It’s basically half a school and half a talent bazaar.” She tapped her fork against the edge of her plate. “There’s a whole registry of magus-certified tutors—some of them are adjuncts, some are specialists on academic rotation. A few are even senior-year students who passed High Distinction and now make side coins helping lower tiers not explode. Also, they can gain credits that count toward their Mastery Ledger or apprenticeship bids.”

“So I can just . . . book one?”

“Through the Arcanum Registry, yes. If you can afford the fee or barter something useful. Some even offer first-time assessments for free.” She shrugged. “If you’re too scared to ask Lorvan, or if he doesn’t have time, this is literally your only option. Unless you want to keep failing grief spells until a ghost starts coaching you out of pity.”

Fabrisse groaned. “What if they laugh at me?”

“They won’t laugh at you.”

“How much does it cost?”

“I’m not sure. The last time Lorvan tried to get one for me, he forked out 85 copper coins per lesson. I was a first-year then.”

He looked at her, then peered inside his satchel. He only had stones. He then looked into his pocket, and saw one copper coin. One. That was to pay for the pie.

Liene studied him further, then reached over to fix a stray curl that had come loose near his temple. “Silly. What are you afraid of?”

“Huh?”

“If it gets you to study . . .” She grinned. “I’ll lend you money for a lesson. Cool?”