Chapter 3

One Week Later...

I think that loneliness is starting to get to me. I can't wait for a trip back to town. I will visit my family and maybe that will help with the homesickness. The sooner I get my enchanting up to the journeyman level and start my business the faster I can get married and the more trips into town I can make.

I have made some progress over the last week. I now have the first five symbols in my enchanting language internalized and chosen a few new which are fire, heat, light, growth. I have an interesting idea for an enchanted item that would be a game-changer if it works. It is using the item as the mana source and using the source symbol, transform symbol, and the output symbol to make a rare item duplicator. It would be such a cheat if I can take a rock and turn it into a gold piece or even a mana crystal.

I'm past ready to try my first enchantment now. I get my rock because I have a plethora of those at my feet. I start filling my wand with mana and slowly engrave the water symbol on the

BOOOM!!!!

My face is covered in rock splinters and I can't hear anything but ringing in my ear. I guess that's why the Baron didn't want me in the village. Nothing to do but to do try again though. I start with less mana and after adjusting the level up until the wand will just barely make a mark in the rock. This time I complete the symbol. The rock requires me to add my mana to the stone in order for the enchantment to have a power source.

The rock begins to sweat. I add a little more mana then water starts to shoot out of the stone, and I got an ice-cold bath. Note to self don't add a lot of mana to an uncontrolled enchanted symbol. Throwing the stone into my water take to take advantage of the water shooting from the enchantment I get to work on doing more enchantments.

When it's time for me to start cooking supper I have been experimenting with different sources and the different enchantment symbols that I have available to me. I have had a few more close calls, but I did make a few enchantments that I will keep around. I have a rock that has the enchantments for water, force, and output. I'm glad I put this on a rock that is long and thin like a stick and the output is at one end. It shoots a powerful stream of water out the end. When I add a moderate amount of power it can cut a tree down with little effort. I think that this is an enchantment that I will keep for self-defense and try to think of upgrades for the future.

Supper is the last of my food. I really want to make a trip to town tomorrow, but I also want to try to enchant my item duplicator. That means I will have to try out fishing tomorrow and see what I can get for lunch. I want to get some sort of protection for my land built too. I have been lucky that most of the animals of the forest think that the bear a bear still lives here but I think with all the noise I made today that will soon change.

I seal up my cave and do my nightly meditation and then it's off to sleep.