Chapter 20: Chapter 17 – The Arm

Two weeks have passed since I began my lessons with Karine. After just a scant few days, they had turned from a combination of literacy and magic lessons to just magic ones. Sure, the magic lessons do entail magical theory, spell books and the like, which do require a good bit of reading, but that was a given. And hey, my vocabulary has grown thanks to all the reading Karine’s putting me through!

Being able to read is truly a blessing. Sure, most of the literature I’ve read has been either related to magic one way or another, but I’ve managed to pick up my favorite past time again: trashy books. Romance and war novels seem to be particularly in vogue right now. Just that most of it is, shall we say, boring, and not really to my tastes.

A pity.

Avilia has gotten more accustomed to the “adventuring guild,” which in turn has gotten more accustomed to having someone do jobs for it. The jobs she’s doing are slowly getting a bit more demanding. A bit more adventure-y, as it were.

It was nothing dangerous, thankfully. Her most involved job so far has been about exterminating some giant rats in a villager’s basement. Which is to say, apparently villagers have started to come to the guild with chores, too. I was surprised when she told me about that. Don’t they have exterminators or something?

Every day she would either come early and watch me study magic or just in time for my lessons to end. It had become an important part of my daily routine. Knowing that she’d come, knowing that we’d walk around the village before retiring to the inn, talking about our days and all that.

After the first six days at the inn, we switched to a different room, just as we had planned. We switched from the room with the single bed to one with a two-person bed. I guess it’s somewhere between a queen and a king-sized bed, but I digress. I kind of expected she’d want separate beds, but no. Avilia looked adorable coming up with all kinds of excuses for why she didn’t want to sleep alone, the embarrassment shining brightly through her face the entire time.

I let her leave it at that. I’m just happy she feels comfortable sleeping in the same bed with me.

I’m so glad I met her.

And that brings us to today.

I’m standing, for the first time ever, in Karine’s workshop. It’s a bit cramped, the walls lined with staves that look increasingly complex and ambitious. There’s just one table with a couple of chairs next to it. Or a “workbench,” I guess. Regardless, there are magic crystals of different shapes and sizes on it, and some sort of enchanted-looking tools.

I absentmindedly place my coat and my cloak on the back of the chair that looks like it’s for an observer rather than the person working on the table.

“Okay,” Karine says with immeasurable excitement in her eyes, “Give me your left arm.”

What? Oh. Oh! Today’s the day? Already!?

“Um, are you sure? It’s been only two…”

“Yes, I am absolutely certain that I can do what I promised. Now, give me your left arm!”

I nod. I feel a bit apprehensive, but I do what she asks.

Left arm… Entering maintenance mode.

The skin retracts, exposing the metal underneath. The systems in it shut down, leaving the arm completely limp. The arm comes off its socket with an audible ‘pop’ as I pull on it with my right hand, making sure I don’t tear the sleeves of my blouse.

I give the arm to Karine. Anxiety washes over me. If the arm doesn’t work anymore…

“Just don’t break it.”

“I won’t, you’ll see!”

She carefully places the arm on the workbench and sits down. She turns to look at me.

“Please do sit,” she says, pointing at the chair next to her.

“Ah. Right. Of course.”

I take my seat. I guess she wants me to watch her work? Not entirely sure why, but I’m sure it’ll be interesting.

She smiles at me and turns back towards the arm. Cautiously, she moves it around on the workbench.

“I’m looking for locations to embed magic crystals into, and how to best connect the crystals to each other without impacting whatever drives the arm.”

Makes sense.

She picks up one of the tools she had on the workbench and points it at me.

“This tool is used to mark where the circuits should go. It’s functionally a bit like a magical pen, I guess? But for staff making. Some crafters skip this phase, but you really shouldn’t. Sure, it’s faster, but this is where you can see if there are any mistakes in your plans and fix them before they become a problem.”

“Right.”

Karine turns back to the arm.

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She starts to slowly draw lines in the metal, lines that glow with an eerie, pale blue light. Sometimes she lingers at certain locations, making circles, probably denoting the locations she intends to place magic crystals in.

After half an hour, she has circuits drawn all over the arm.  But she doesn’t seem happy with the results, erasing and redrawing sections here and there.

Just as I think she might be done, she finds more places to redraw.

She keeps going back and forth, erasing some of the lines she already drew, drawing new ones in slightly different locations.

I wonder how long this’ll take? I mean, sure, it’s better she takes her time since I can’t afford my arms to be broken since there won’t be any replacements, but still. I’m no crafter. I’ve no frame of reference!

She never did give me an estimate. Now, I can see why skipping this part of the process could lead to issues, but it doesn’t mean it’s particularly interesting to see. I just hope that doing it on my right arm will be faster, what with her having already done it once at that point.

She exhales deeply as lowers her tool to the workbench.

“I think this is as good as it’s going to get!”

She picks up another tool, again pointing it at me like the earlier one. It doesn’t look that different compared to the first one, but surely it must be different somehow.

“And with this tool, I do the actual carving. When I use this there’s no going back. The circuits I carve will be final. That’s why the earlier step is crucial. If you don’t do it, you’re asking for trouble.”

I nod. I’d be lying if I didn’t feel anxious, but this could be the first step in solving my battery issues. It has to be done.

She turns back to the arm.

A red light emanates from the tool as she expertly traces the blue pathways she had drawn. As she reaches the first circle she drew, she picks up one of the magic crystals with her free hand and places it on the circle. The light from the tool turns green, and she uses the tool on the crystal.

Dammit.

I’m blinded for a second. Pretty sure if I had my original eyes, though, that would’ve been a lot worse.

I’m not entirely sure what she did, but the next thing I see is that the magic crystal is now inserted into the metal, as if it had always been there. Oh, and she’s wearing some sort of protective goggles. I wonder when she put them on. I must’ve been concentrating too much on what she was doing to my arm to notice!

She continues carving through the lines, fusing magic crystals of varying sizes into the arm. If there’s a pattern, I can’t see it. But I’m not a staff maker, and this isn’t very scientific. It looks more like an artform.

She sighs in obvious relief as she fuses the final, extremely small magic crystal close to the tip of the pinky finger. For some reason she added one to each finger. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s to make casting as natural as possible.

She takes off the goggles, placing them on the workbench.

“I think that’s it.”

She carefully picks up the arm and places it in front of me.

My anxiety has been replaced by excitement. What if this actually works?

I hastily open my blouse with my right hand and pop the arm back in its socket.

Maintenance mode… off.

So far so good.

The limp arm starts up normally, and the artificial skin begins to cover the metal again. I can’t see any part in the skin that’d have unsightly protrusions or anything.

“Alright! Looks like everything’s working.”

“That’s good, but we don’t know if the arm’s magic circuits are working,” Karine says, placing a rune stone in front of me, “Could you touch this?”

I touch it, and…

It lights up. Magic particles are, undoubtably, moving through it.

Karine smiles, obviously happy with the results of her work. “But this is only half of the job. Now, give me your right arm.”

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