[Greyson – 10 years]

  Orange circles skip rope with a blue square containing a fuchsia triangle. As it does that, a silver trapezoid swims through a sea of red pentagons. A yellow square strolls through the orange circles bench-pressing green seven-pointed stars. Purple straight lines inch along my view as indigo rectangles rise in the background.

  I continue watching until a disturbance enters my perception. Something off. Something wrong. But this can't be all. There must be more. The disturbance happens again and I shake myself. Right. I need to stop or I'll be out of it the rest of the day.

  Sitting up, I find Cal watching me closely, concern clear on his face and deep within his mind.

  "You took longer to come out than usual," he says. "Everything okay?"

  "Yeah," I sigh as I drain the tub. "I just got into perceiving the universe and its secrets. If I'm interpreting things correctly, another Ice Age was going to happen, this one completely global. Set for next week. But then it disappeared just as quickly, so I suppose you're safe."

  "Me?" He asks. "Don't you mean 'we're'?"

  "No," I answer. "I'd be fine in an Ice Age, but you wouldn't be able to withstand the cold without outside help."

  "Thanks for saving me if there's an Ice Age."

  "You're welcome."

  "So you would protect me if there's an Ice Age?"

  "You, Travis, Dad, and Papa," I answer. "Though Grandfather Adrian would also probably step in since we're his descendants and we haven't made him dislike us. Which is good, because I probably wouldn't be able to always keep you warm during the frigid temperatures. Especially not if you left the safety zone I'd create."

  Cal snorts.

  "I need to ask Dad something," I make sure the last of the bubbles go down the drain. "I discovered another fragment of a magic I'm trying to figure out which there currently exists none of on this planet. That is, unless our great-grandfather has it. He likely does. And I would like to work on it while it's fresh in my brain."

  "Greyson," Cal grabs my arm before I get to the bathroom door. "You need to rinse off the bubbles, dry off, and get dressed before leaving the bathroom."

  "Oh, right."

  Five minutes later, I'm peeking at Dad over the counter separating the kitchen from the living room. He's currently in the kitchen, preparing breakfast while Papa helps. I'm also fairly certain he's making me wait on purpose.

  If I interrupt him, he'll find a way to delay me asking what I want to ask, so I'll just stare at him instead. His mood is a little bit goofy right now and I don't like dealing with that. It's rude and disrespectful to goof around when someone's trying to be serious and get permission for stuff.

  "Dad," Cal snorts as he comes out, having just woken Travis. "Greyson wants to know if he can go to his workshop to work on figuring out a spell. He wants to do it while it's fresh in his mind. Apparently, it's a big one."

  "If I can manage to finish it," I say. "It'll completely revolutionize storage abilities. Rather than merely creating an expanded space, it'll create a dimensional pocket to store items in. If it enters the mainstream, we would become able to store items with something like a marble rather than needing a bag."

  "That sounds like it would be pretty expensive," Papa says before Dad can say anything. "Not something which would enter the mainstream."

  "Mainstream for old mage families," I say. "And even lesser ones that still do well for themselves. May I please go to my secret base so that I can work on trying to finish it? This is the second time I've gotten a fragment of the spell from meditating on the universe."

  "You've gotten pieces of spells during that?" Cal asks. "I… still don't fully understand everything I saw."

  "Normal for a novice," I state. "And yes. The first time I received a fragment of this particular magic was the session after you interrupted one early. Or was it during the one you interrupted early? It doesn't matter. What matters is that the new fragment is fresh in my mind. And it's not a spell so much as just magic itself. That already makes it difficult to understand, and translating it into a spell or enchantment makes it even more difficult."

  "You can go," Papa tells me."Make sure to eat breakfast in the next couple of hours, too."

  "Will do!" I hop a little. "I've already got food packed into my bag and more at the base! I'll eat there! See you tomorrow!"

  I hurry and get ready, then head to the workshop and add to my database what I learned from my meditation on the universe. The first thing I add is the part about the spatial pockets, then I add in the rest of the stuff that needs recording.

  After that, I begin working on trying to put the two fragments together and figuring out more of the magic from what's there. The fragments by themselves aren't large and piecing them together is difficult. Even when I try filling in the missing parts when adapting them into a spell, I struggle. The same goes for if I try to enchant it into something.

  This is frustrating. It appears I lack sufficient knowledge of dimensional magics to create a pocket dimension. I really hope that more meditation baths will give me enough.

  It's a little past lunchtime when I determine that I've made all of the progress I'll be able to make for today. Even though I have more information now than I did when I woke this morning, I'm fairly certain I've made basically zero progress.

  Wonderful. Perhaps making a robot will give me a breakthrough. If not, I'll return to work on the mega-computer until the next time I receive a fragment from the meditation baths.

  [Luke – 13 years] → starts after Greyson's/still during Chapter 89

  "Hey, Mom! Hey, Trey!" I greet them as I enter the guest lounge at home.

  The guest lounge is used when we have guests over we're just talking with. My parents are friends with Trey, so I'm not surprised to see him here. Since they're in this room with clean drinks and no papers, they're probably just talking casually and not related to work or somethign.

  "Hey, Luke," Mom says as I walk over to her, Dad entering the room as I do. "How'd the trip go."

  "Great!" I give her a hug. "Spent most of it fishing, hiking, or swimming. Managed to push Dad into a creek when he wasn't paying attention, too."

  I'm grinning as I say that, and Dad gives me a light whack on the back of the head.

  "I was paying attention," he says. "Or did you not notice me attempting to resist you shoving me in?"

  "Close enough!" I grin at him, then look at Mom. "We got a few pictures of some of our catches. I managed to catch some of the biggest fish I've ever caught before!"

  "That's good," Mom gives me a light kiss on the cheek. "You smell like camp, why don't you go take a shower?"

  "Will do!"

  "Without lightning-charging your body," she says.

  "Will do!"

  Trey chuckles a little and greets me, then I head up to my room. When I return to the lounge, Gabe's joined the other adults, and I plop down beside Mom. Dad's not back yet, but I start telling them about the trip anyway.

  "There's been some news," Mom says when Dad finally joins us, taking a seat on the other side of her.

  "Mooom!" I complain. "I was telling you about the bear that wanted to eat our food!"

  "You can finish after," Mom ruffles my hair. "It relates to you, too."

  "Me?" I ask. "If it's about my generator, I already know the announcement's next week."

  It's ready to put out on the market, so the reveal of my generator with its new magitech will be next week. Enough of them have been produced to send to stores, too, so we can actually release it next week.

  "Not that," she says. "Adrian King himself made an announcement, and you know how rare that is."

  Adrian King made an announcement directly? He mostly makes them through the Lumaria Group, even though everyone knows it's him. If he actually did it himself, then telling Mom, Gabe, and Trey about the camping trip can wait.

  Though I hope the discussion on it is fast. I want to get back to my story.

  "That sounds pretty important," Dad says.

  "It is," Trey responds. "He announced that over the next year, the Lumaria Group will be adding magic training centers to every elementary, middle, and high school which doesn't already have one, as well as providing magic instructors for each one. It's also been declared as a mandatory course for all of Kenzibri."

  While the official language of both Canada and the US is Zebzrialan, the common term for the collective two countries is "Kenzibri", from the name of the other original race for North America. While it isn't always used when referring to both, it's used fairly often – including when both countries pass the same law.

  "Adrian already announced," Dad says. "The places people can go to learn how to manipulate their mana and input it into a device to make magic crystals. Now he's made it mandatory in North America for all youth to learn magic?"

  "Yeah," I frown. "I wasn't even going to take the magic class at school since I'm already pretty gifted with it. But now it's mandatory?"

  Those classes are mainly for people who've never used magic before or are from families without. They provide a way to learn magic. My parents have been teaching me magic since before I was old enough for preschool, so they really have nothing to offer me.

  "They're also funding expanding the magic training centers," Trey informs us. "For where a school has one but won't be able to host all of their students even split into classes. It seems that Adrian King now wants everyone in North America to know magic."

  "Has Xander said anything about why?" I frown. "He seems to talk with his great-grandfather a lot more than most people who talk with him do."

  Unusually a lot. It's as if Adrian King is willing to just drop whatever he's doing to talk with Xander. Based on what he said to me during our private discussion at the cliff, I wouldn't be surprised if it's because of how powerful Xander's soul is.

  A soul so powerful that it broke the soul filter his great-grandfather had placed. Someone like that definitely warrants keeping an eye on. Interacting with Xander a lot is probably his way of monitoring him more closely.

  "He hasn't," Trey tells me. "I haven't brought it up with him and Xander… tends to not bring things up that don't interest him. Or which he doesn't think is important. Since it was in the news, he's likely assumed I already know. He may also not know about it since I know he doesn't watch the news."

  Xander doesn't watch the news? That's the best way to keep up with what's going on in the world.

  "I'll ask!" I pull out my phone. "His great-grandfather probably mentioned it to him."

  "Might not get a response," Trey tells me. "Since the lessons are over, he may have deleted your number."

  Oh… right. My good mood's just sunk about a thousand miles at the reminder that Xander doesn't like me. Also that I lost my first friend because he has an issue with his emotions and was taking it out on me.

  My life is really messed up right now.

  "You can still try," Trey tells me. "That said, he's out in Autumn Hills, hanging out with Carter. It's the kid's birthday and he invited Xander to the party, so Xander might not be checking his phone for awhile."

  And he even gets invited to birthday parties of kids he just met less than a month ago. How is the Autistic kid better at being social than I am?

  "By the way," Mom wraps an arm around me and pulls me over. "Tyler's back in town and can come over in a couple of hours. His dad gave permission for him to spend the night as well."

  Tyler!

  "Really?" I ask.

  "Really," she smiles. "Though I know you don't really like hanging out with him too much, so-"

  "Of course I do!" I tell her. "Lemme text him real quick!"

  "Hold on," Dad chuckles. "Why don't you wait until after we finish? Otherwise, you'll just keep texting him and forget to talk about the trip."

  "The trip! Right!"

  "Before that," Mom says. "Back to the other topic. The Lumaria Group already finished some of the training centers. Dragon Falls School District got them built this week, and Lakeview's are coming next week. They're attempting to get fifty school districts their centers built before school starts back up."

  "That's pretty neat," I say. "Though… how will it work for people like me? I mean, I'm literally the strongest kid at school and have a lot of magical training and inheritance. There are quite a few others come from old families and have been trained by their parents, too."

  "That's being factored in as well," Trey tells me. "The courses won't require you to have a certain level of power or be able to cast a lot of spells. Instead, it'll focus on helping students develop their skills. While the parents of mage kids already help with that, the course will focus on broadening one's skills if they're already good enough at the basics."

  "It'll be possible to test out of it as well," Mom says. "But that requires having a certain level of casting skill. You're pretty good at magic, so it's possible you'll be able to test out. It's also possible you might not have the level of skill required and can learn something from it."

  "That said," Dad says. "Weren't you planning on doing the 'ultimate' course?"

  That's not the real name for it, just what the kids call it. As long as I maintain high grades – at least a 95% or higher in all subjects – then I can apply for it when I start high school next year. It will let me take both my freshman and my sophomore classes at the same time.

  Since that's actually physically impossible since there's no such thing as an actual avatar spell, it's partially self-guided. I'll be assigned two classes per period, and can pick which one to actually attend each day.

  That way, I can attend the class I need help understanding the material in. I'll still receive the classwork and homework for each and will still need to turn it in. I won't, however, actually have to attend every single class.

  As long as I stay at an 80% or higher in each class, I'll be allowed to remain in the program. If I pass all of my classes freshman year, then for sophomore year, I can take all of my junior and senior classes with the same policies.

  Which will allow me to graduate high school as a sophomore, earning my high school diploma then rather than two years after.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  Since I've maintained perfect scores all through school so far and find the subjects rather easy, I'll likely be one of the few students at the high school to actually complete the program. If testing out of the magic class is possible, I'll try to do that.

  "Some families are already petitioning regarding the requirements," Mom says. "Due to them teaching their children magic and the goal of the course seeming to be to have all youth learn it. They want children from proper mage families to have an easier time testing out or to be outright exempted. Whether or not it happens all depends on Adrian King's real motivations for the course.

  I really want to know what caused him to do this. He doesn't normally make such a large change so openly. A lot of times, they're more gradual.

  So there's a hurry for some reason, but I don't think anyone knows the reason. Unless Xander knows, it's doubtful I'll have a chance for learning.

  Which means I shouldn't think about it too much.

  "Now that that's been discussed," Mom says. "Tell us more about the trip, Luke."

  "Back to the bear that tried to eat our food…"

  The next two hours won't be pass any faster, but I wish they would. It's been almost a week since I've hung out with anyone except my dad and I want to hang out with Tyler. I really want to tell him about the trip, then hear about his hunts this past week. He and his dad were planning on trying to take on some magic wolves that are tricky to fight, and I'm hoping for good news about that.

  [Sig – 13 years] → starts during Luke's PoV

  "No streaming," Aunt Rachel tells me when I tell her I might play a game rather than take a nap. "Camping is… exhausting. I didn't feel it until we were on the way back."

  "Yeah," I tell her. "We all get tired after we come back from camping and need a nap for the day. I might take a little bit of a nap before dinner, but I haven't talked with my gaming friends in over a week. I wanna hear the updates!"

  "Alright," she says. "No streaming. And take a shower first, you smell like smoke from the fire."

  "So do you," I snicker. "Enjoy your nap!"

  After my shower, I boot up my computer and log into the MMO. The moment I'm on, I find that both Sara and Jack are on, both on their alts rather than their OP mains. I don't blame them, I'm on my alt as well right now. There was an update while I was gone that means I should grind some stuff for my main, but I'm just playing casual right now.

  I'm too tired to play serious. Doing more casual things in the game is better until after my nap.

  "Hey, guys," I join the voice chat.

  "Hey, Sig!" Sara says.

  "'Sup?" Jack asks.

  "Bit tired from the trip," I answer. "What about you? Anything new for you guys?"

  "We've got some stuff for your main," Sara tells me. "We finished the grind for our things from the update on Tuesday, so got you a few things when we had time."

  "Thanks!" I say. "I'll get them sometime next week, I'm just being a sleepy casual right now."

  "You sound it," Jack says, his accent a little bit thicker as he does. He tries to speak more city when he's playing, but I know he's at least slightly-country. "By the way, your friend was in the news."

  "My friend?"

  "The Xander one," he says. "Joined Carter on a huntin' trip, and the group caught a couple of rare ones. Was covered by the local news."

  Xander went on a hunting trip? I'm super jealous of him. I've always wanted to go hunting with Tate and Carter when I visited on the week-long trips a few years ago but was never allowed. Well, they also never went hunting when I was there. To shoot a buck even once… I wish I could do that.

  "That's neat," I say. "Wait! The local news? How'd you hear about it?"

  "It's gone through a few huntin' communities," he chuckles. "And I go huntin', too. Heard about it that way. Man, that boy's truly amazing. Did you know that he sees through illusions?"

  "That was mentioned?" I ask. "Yeah. He's got something called 'perspicacity'. The magical form of it. It lets him 'see what's real rather than what's fake', according to what I looked up online. It came up on the news?"

  "They caught a shimmerwave elk," he says. "And it was using light magic to make itself invisible. Xander saw right through that, and was even able to share the ability with others temporarily. He froze the creek they were by as well so it couldn't draw on that. Combined, that limited the elk to ramming and water jets, and the other boys kept it from being able to run, so it couldn't ram anyone. It's been over forty years since anyone 'round there caught one of those, and it was a group of six boys this time. Definitely headline news for the area, even if it's not good enough to go global."

  "That sounds frickin' amazing," I say. "Man… I wish I could go hunting with them. I'm too low in magic to join them, though, and I don't know how to use a gun. But I'd like to be able to hunt my own food sometimes. Not all the time, just maybe sometimes. Dunno if I'd actually want to do it more than once… but I'd like to try. Doubt Aunt Rachel would give me permission, though, even if I had a way to go hunting."

  "Doesn't hurt to ask," he says. "And speakin' of huntin', Sara and I were gettin' ready to do some for these chars. Wanna join us?"

  "Your accent's coming in a bit strong there," Sara chuckles.

  "Y'all ain't heard nothin' yet!" Jack puts his accent on extra-strong when he says that, probably even exaggerating it a bit.

  Sara and I burst into laughter at that, and he joins us in laughing. Once we calm down, they let me know where to go to join them. As we grind out materials and run a short Dungeon, we joke around with each other and Jack occasionally puts on his accent a bit more heavily just for fun.

  I only manage to last an hour before I need to sign off for a nap, but it's a pretty fun hour. I'll definitely be back on after dinner.

  "Hey, guys," I say. "It was fun hanging out again, but I'm exhausted from the camping trip and need a nap. Thought I'd manage to stay up longer, but… guess not."

  "No worries," Sara says. "It was fun hanging out again."

  "Enjoy your nap!" Jack says.

  "See you guys next time!" I say, then log out, turn off my monitor, and crash onto my bed.

  Sleep comes quickly and wonderfully.

  [Xander – 12 years]

  "Why didn't fire work?" I ask. "It's a giant plant monster!"

  Carter and I are playing the game he wanted to, and he's letting me handle the first boss we've come to after starting, which is about forty percent of the way into the game. At least, according to Carter.

  The boss is a wyvern made out of stone and plants, and there's an elemental weakness system in the game. Most – not all – enemies have a weakness to one or more of the game's different elements.

  The game's a lot more confusing than I expected it to be, and I already expected it to really confuse me. I'm not sure if asking my dad for permission to play it was a good idea. If I were only watching Carter play, I'd probably still be confused, but I wouldn't be frustrated at the stuff making me confused.

  We're sitting beside each other on the floor of his room, our backs against the frame of his bed with pillows and blankets acting as cushions. I'm in jeans, a green long-sleeved shirt, and socks, while Carter's in black shorts and a green sleeveless.

  "Maybe because it's more like armor than actually part of its body?" Carter asks. "It's mostly made of stone. They probably didn't want to give it too many weaknesses."

  That can't be it, since the joints look like they're made of vines.

  "Look at the joints," I say as I try water magic, which only heals it. "Well, that's fucking stupid. It's not weak to fire, but water heals it? They're definitely factoring in the plants!"

  "That's weird, yeah," Carter says. "Stone's weak to air, try air magics."

  "Yeah, I'm trying that now," I give the command to my character. "That did extra damage. Fucking stupid. Okay."

  "Make sure to switch the knight from plain attacks to magic ones."

  "Right."

  The knight isn't a mage, but he can imbue his weapon with different effects, as long as we've bought or found the related spell. We found the basic one for air on the way to the boss, which means that the game developers probably wanted us to use it for the battle.

  Carter probably figured that out immediately, but also probably wanted to let me try things first. I should've realized that on my own. I'm so fucking dumb.

  "Don't forget the rogue," Carter reminds me.

  We don't have air magics for the rogue, but we do have poison attacks, so I tell him to use one. My main character – who's a mage – and the knight autoattack with their elemental attacks. The game allows us to set them to do that with a skill or spell until they run out of MP, then they switch to their normal attack. For the rogue, I only want to try poisoning once and after it sticks, he returns to his normal attacks.

  The archer doesn't have any special attacks, so I set him to shooting with his bow, while the healer focuses on support buffs and healing. Thankfully, we can also give the characters a customized set of commands that they follow in battle, allowing them to prioritize certain actions over others.

  If we've unlocked the related command, that is.

  This let us set up the healer to focus on healing if the characters drop below 70% of their maximum HP and using his curative magics if someone is afflicted by something. The boss can poison and blind our characters, so that's really useful.

  Though we don't actually have the spells for the status ailment cures, so we have the healer set to use items for those.

  Once the boss is down to half of its health, the stone on its body cracks, then breaks and falls off. When it does, it reveals a body made of… vines and bark.

  "That's even stupider!" I exclaim.

  "Ooooh!" Carter says. "Try fire magic! It's probably susceptible to it now!"

  The fact that it's weak to fire magic now is even stupider. It's also lost its weakness to air magics, which makes even less sense. Why would it just lose a weakness?

  "This didn't make any sense," I pause the cutscene that begins when the battle ends. "There was plant stuff all over it, there was plant stuff for the joints. Why wasn't it weak until after it lost the stone?"

  "Probably to help change some of the fight mechanics after the halfway point," Carter tells me. "Some games do that so that boss fights ain't the same thing over and over for the entire thing. It switched up some of its attacks, too."

  I'm still certain that's just dumbness.

  "Yeah…"

  "Let's watch the cutscene."

  We watch the cutscene, which tells us where to go next, then I call up the menu.

  "I still think that boss fight was stupid."

  "A lot of the boss fights are like that," he snorts. "Game devs like making them with different phases so it's not just a big fight of you doing the exact same thing every time."

  "Then you can fight them, because that's stupid."

  "Maybe," he shrugs. "I like it. By the way, that boss was based on a real monster."

  "A real one?" I look at him.

  "Yeah," he nods. "It's in the mountains to the southwest, 'bout six hundred or so miles down. He flies about a hundred miles out in each direction, which is why no one lives out that way. Well, I think we wouldn't be there anyway since I think the border's before then. But I know that hunters don't go into his territory, just in case."

  "An actual wyvern made out of stone and plants?"

  "Yup!" He uses telekinesis to pull his phone to him, then pulls up an image of the real wyvern and shows it to me. "Look! He's about eighty feet from his shoulders to his tail and towers over even the tallest of men."

  Unlike dragons, wyverns are confirmed to exist. They don't fully look like dragons, though. Rather than four legs, they have a pair of legs at their rump, and claws at the ends of their wings. Wyverns also lack scales while dragons supposedly have them.

  The reasons no one's killed that particular wyvern is partially because we don't need to expand into his territory.

  But also because he's extremely powerful. Estimates put him at having around three million or so units of mana at full, making him one of the twenty most powerful wyverns in the world. He's known to use a toxic breath, acidic spit, summon a storm of thorns, spikes of stone, and can unleash a sonic roar that bursts unprotected eardrums.

  Grandpa Adrian could probably smite him entirely on his own, but he mostly wants society to develop on its own, without his help. He takes actions to keep things from getting out of control and makes sure things are good. From time to time, he even releases some of his own knowledge as "new inventions" or "improvements" via his companies.

  Well, there's more to it than that, but what all of that means is that he won't take on the wyvern unless it becomes an actual problem. The wyvern hasn't gone near any settlements, so the only people at risk of being killed by him are hunters who stray into his territory.

  I bet he would burn really well. According to the info article we're looking at, it's known that he has more plant parts underneath his stone, but it doesn't say how they know this. That makes that information unreliable, so I won't trust it.

  "Yeah, I'm not sure where they got that information, either," Carter says. "But see? They based the boss on him."

  "He'd probably burn pretty easily."

  "Not exactly on him," he snorts. "Just a decent bit. They took liberties when designing him."

  "Liberties?"

  "Without strict adherence to the facts," he tells me. "Means they changed some stuff or made up stuff to take the place of what they didn't know."

  "Oh."

  "Let's take a break from the game," he says. "I saw a save crystal before you menu'd. We can talk for a bit before getting back to it. That should help with frustration."

  A break from the game would be nice. I close the menu and save the game, then we pause it.

  "So," he says. "Got anyone you like?"

  We're apparently going to just talk about the game.

  "I like all five of them," I tell him. "They haven't done anything mean so far."

  "No," he snorts. "Real life. Like, like-like."

  "Like-like?"

  "Yeah," he nods. "Like, someone you wanna date? I know you ain't gotta date someone, I'm just curious if there is someone. I'm older than you and am in no rush, so you definitely don't have to be. But that doesn't mean there ain't someone who's caught your attention."

  This is a weird topic. Does it have to do with him liking me? The feelings are barely strong enough for me to pick up on with my empathy. It's weird that he does since we barely know each other, but I guess he learns about people and gets to know them easier than I do. I struggle with getting to know people.

  "Yeah," I answer. "I like Sig, but he likes a couple of other people, and he's known them longer. So it'd be wrong for me to ask him out."

  "Why would it be wrong?"

  "Because he knows them better than me," I answer. "And they both like him back, too. We've been bowling at the same place at around the same time for over a year and a half, but we only started hanging out this summer."

  "You've gotta have more confidence, man," he says. "When it comes to magic and magitech, you're just like 'yeah, that's what's what'. But it sounds like you're not as confident elsewhere. It doesn't matter how long someone's known someone, just ask 'em out if they're available and you like 'em."

  He gives me a look and I can feel something that I think is realization.

  "Oh, right," he says. "You're only about to turn thirteen. Keep forgetting you ain't my age. I guess being nervous and shy about that is normal. Well, like I said – don't try to push yourself or rush. You've got years. But when you're ready… don't worry about who's known who longer. Alright?"

  "Maybe…"

  "Is there anyone else you like?" He asks.

  Is there anyone else I want to date? Someone I'd like to text a lot and sit next to when eating lunch and invite to hang out when I'm doing stuff? That's a hard question. But also maybe an easy one.

  "Um…" I try hard to think of someone. "No. Oh… is this about you liking me? I don't like you like that. I just like you like a friend."

  "You know I like you?"

  "Yeah," I nod. "Your face looks nice, but I don't know you very well, so I'm not able to feel that way yet. If you're even someone I would feel that way about if I did. It's possible I'd just want to be friends even after we get to know each other. But. Um. I do like hanging out with you. You're a really nice guy. I-I hope that doesn't upset you."

  "Nope!" He grins at me. "I know how to be just friends! I wasn't plannin' on askin' you out, either. We live too far away for that. And speaking of being friends, how did you like today? You seemed uncomfortable at times."

  "A lot of times," I nod. "Thanks for inviting me to the party and stuff. And the hunting and tractor stuff. I liked going on the hunt this morning, but it was waaaaay too early."

  "Yeah," Carter chuckles. "The location we went to was a couple of hours away; had to go that far to get to a good spot in absolute wilderness. At least, one that wouldn't take forever to get to. Meant we had to wake super early, though. So you liked the hunt?"

  "Yeah," I nod. "Especially since I managed to get pocket hare hides from it. I've wanted some ever since watching a documentary that talked about them."

  "You said they're useful for enchanting, right?"

  "Spatial enchantments, yeah," I nod. "I want to try making a small pouch with a massive inside. It didn't work that well with normal materials; there seems to be a limit even I have to obey when it comes to expanding the size of something. At least, before it gets unstable."

  "That's why you use a backpack and not something like a satchel?" He asks. "Because you can make a bigger space in it?"

  "Yeah," I nod. "But the pouch thing is just something I want to try. And if it works, then I'll make a spatial pocket."

  "A spatial pocket?" He asks. "Like, a separate pocket dimension that's tied into something? That doesn't exist yet."

  "Greyson has part of the information for one in his database," I tell him. "I figured out the rest on my own after seeing it when I was reviewing his information on expanded space. It kind of works, but it doesn't anchor very well on normal stuff."

  "But it might on an item that's already full of spatial magics," he says. "Like pocket hare hide."

  "Yeah."

  "What happens if the enchantment fails after it's been set?"

  "The pocket dimension collapses," I answer. "But everything inside of it gets shot out of it. I… might've gotten hit with some marbles when I did that. Even if the pain quickly faded 'cause of my regeneration, it… hurt. I'm not sure how to make it just deposit things, but at least everything comes out."

  Which means it's not lost if the pocket dimension collapses. I did make sure to use cotton balls inside of the rest of the ones I experimented with. Feeling pain when they collapse isn't something I'm interested in.

  "Does it destroy the item it was anchored to?" Carter asks.

  "No," I shake my head. "And I can even enchant it again, but I have to be careful with that. Enchanting an item too much makes it unhappy, and that messes with the enchantments. The residual magics conflict with the new magics, and that makes disasters. Purging the residue is annoying, so it's easier to just start with something new."

  It's why it's easier to put enchantments on something with the same type of magic already inherent to it than on something different. Fire magics placed on something with inherent water magic properties would just cause the magics to coflict.

  "So you have to purge it?" He asks. "Does that mean you can't enchant something again after it has too much?"

  "Residue fades over time," I tell him. "So it's eventually possible to. It takes longer to fade from living things than nonliving for some reason. Haven't figured out why yet, but it means that objects can be reenchanted in days or weeks rather than years."

  "Huh," he says. "Well, if the expanded space works out, can you let me know? And the spatial pockets, too?"

  He seems interested in my enchantments, but I don't feel like it's for bad reasons.

  "I'll try to remember that," I tell him. "You're interested in enchanting?"

  "Nah," he says. "But I'm sure you've noticed that we use a lot of items with expanded space. The saddlebags, coolers, a backpack… a lot more than that. Some of it's old, some of it's new. It all belongs to the ranch and family, though. I don't have one of my own. I can afford one, sort of. The earnings from today's hunt actually gives me enough for a decent-sized expansion."

  "You want to buy one from me?" I ask.

  "Yup!" He says. "If you're up for it… and you manage to do it. I think it'd be neat to have a small pouch with a big space, or even a space pocket. But you'd have to be able to make it to know how much it'll cost."

  Is this a business card situation?

  "I'll have to ask my great-grandpa if that's allowed," I tell him. "If it is, then I don't see an issue making it. I like making enchantments."

  "Cool," he grins. "Want to get back to the game? If you want to, you can play until we find the nomads."

  Finding some nomads in some plains is the next thing we're supposed to do, according to the cutscene. That just leads me to being more confused before we even continue.

  "Okay," I say. "Though… how will we find them? Plains are huge, aren't they?"

  "They won't be in the game," he tells me. "You'll probably be able to find them within half an hour just by exploring the plains."

  I'm not so good at this game that I'm confident I can find it that fast, even if he probably can.

  "If it takes longer than that, can you take the controls?"

  "Sure!"

  "Okay," I unpause the game. "Wait. How do I leave this area?"