78 - Thaumshot and Mamon Couplers [Cherno]

“Oh, right. I wanted to ask you to show me how that belt of yours works - unless it’s a church secret,” she asked after taking a sip of ekarone juice.

Casus was more than happy to do so, rising from his seat.

“Wait here.”

He brought back the Silberblut Coupler and two other belts - the Dregsteamer from the Old Street Butchershop, and a brass-plated, slightly ornate belt with a depression on the right-hand side and a grey, cracked crystal in the center. The brass belt came with a ring set with a red gem, designed to fit into the depression.

“The fundamental structure of any Mamon Coupler is usually the same. You have the Coupler Body, which is the main body of the device, determining the most basic characteristics of the armor. Normally these are belts, but it is not uncommon to see Coupler Bodies styled as gauntlets or as part of large weapons such as greatswords. Anything smaller is uncommon, but not unheard of either.”

He gestured to the brass belt’s grey crystal.

“The Core is the heart of the system, it determines the fundamental properties of the armor, such as the armor scaffold and its base performance metrics. You often see a Voidkey used as the Core nowadays.”

With tangible respect for the item, he slipped the ring onto his middle finger.

“The Catalyst serves to resonate with the Core and determine the armor’s outward characteristics. It can simply adjust what the armor specializes in, or it can completely change how it functions and multiply the wearer’s combat ability many times over. They are commonly made from Soulbeasts and impart their characteristics onto the user, but inorganic artifact catalysts, such as this ring, are not uncommon either.”

Pressing the ring into its slot, Casus turned it forward ninety degrees. The belt’s crystal briefly came to life with a red glow, then died. Casus solemnly took off the ring and set it down.

“You are most likely to see insect-based catalysts, half because they have good performance metrics even if extracted from a weak soulbeast, and half due to the Great Plague of fifty-one seventy-two, sixty-seven years ago. Dregsteamers are an exception, both in that they lack distinct Cores and that they use consumable Catalysts.”

“It’s an interesting system, I’ll admit. Is it a new technology, or an old one?”

“Very old. Mamon Couplers are an offshoot of fleshgrafting conceived of by one of the direct disciples of Zavesh. Many Couplers still require the would-be user to undergo a grafting operation to permit their usage - the more traditional, the more drastic the operation. My Silberblut Coupler is one of the original twelve, hence…”

Casus raised his arm.

“Dregsteamers are unique in that they require no such operation. It is also the reason they inflict a disproportionate amount of strain on the user given their performance.”

“The brass coupler’s core is busted, right?”

“So it is. The Stonesoul Coupler once belonged to a fallen friend.”

Later that same day, she visited Garvesh and bought from him Thaumshot for an extortionate price… Though still a better price than she would’ve gotten at any street-side supplier. She had checked. It was no worse an ammo price than regular bullets during an ammo shortage. Krahe bought a few full-sized Thaumshot bullets, as well as a few different sizes of subcaliber Thaumshot to test casting it in metal. Despite the significant price of this base material, it seemed most of the cost when it came to true Thaumshot bullets, such as Red Reapers, came from the materials needed to empower the ammunition.

The pawnbroker had also sourced a few of the missing parts she still needed to reload her own ammunition, such as gunpowder, two-hundred bullets worth of a special ballistic alloy, and a basic crucible. Lead was a good option, but unsurprisingly, Zastreon’s materials science was well past the point of it being ideal. Homogenous, cast bullets made of this so-called “Mescalt” would take on properties akin to HEAT shells. The price was, of course, premium, but she wanted premium performance… And of the six street-facing firearm vendors she’d inquired with, only two even acknowledged that they knew what Mescalt was. Of those two, one assumed Krahe was a government agent trying to bust him for smuggling the stuff, and the other asked thrice what Garvesh had charged her.

Krahe spent some time in the library trying to confirm her hypothesis on how she might be able to anchor a Thaumaturgy to a chunk of Thaumstone. She found records of archers doing that very thing with Thaumstone arrowheads, including some mention of using blood as a priming agent, but that was all. It was good enough. By testing with a tiny, inert construct and simply throwing the bullet, she found that using her own blood a 4mm diameter piece of Thaumstone was the minimum so long as she slathered the bullet in her own blood. To her relief it worked even if the blood was dry.

With this experimental ammunition in hand, she ordered a larger quantity of this shot, able to afford it due to the fact smaller pieces of Thaumstone were far cheaper by volume.

There was just the problem of testing it, and Krahe didn’t feel like visiting a public shooting range - assuming such a facility could even be found in Audunpoint. Her own investigation showed that there were such places, even ones which would let her rent out various firearms and even higher-order voidkeys. The local Zaveshian temples were often connected to gymnasiums and training grounds, which were largely free to access. The problem was, of course, the total absence of privacy. She brought it up with Casus, who only confirmed her findings.

“You could access an agency’s training grounds, but you would meet with the same issues. Only ranking agency members can hope to get privacy, and even then it would be a matter of pulling strings. I could do such a thing, if you so wish - secure access to a private training ground. For the two of us, that is - as you are not a member of either church.”

“I expected you to suggest that I should join the church to access a private firing range.”

“I would do no such thing. Joining or not joining is your decision to make, and the church will not suddenly consider what you have done any lesser if a few weeks or months have passed.”

“If there are no strings attached, I have no reason to reject your offer,” Krahe shrugged.