Closed [Lab 13-J]An Ichored Staff: Part I

[Clyde Sullins]

44 Summer 514 The first step as always was preparations. First things first Clyde laid out all he needed to do his work before him. First was the staff, of a kind he'd yet to work with. He'd asked for a staff for making a magic staff, and he'd gotten a staff of gnarled juniper wood. Or at least that had been how it was labeled. He'd learned later it was a Sahovan native plant, and so perhaps was a magically made plant that worked well for such tasks. Ironic seeing as how his own staff was of vian wood, a naturally occurring plant on Mura, that was especially good for making magic staffs. The odd reflection in this staff, of a magically made tree that was not natural, compared to the carefully preened and cared for trees that were on Mura, whose limbs could only be acquired when they came off naturally such as in a storm, was not lost on him. Next was the ingredients, the vast amount of low level reagents and items whose djed would be sunk into the staff, to affect its change. He also had a single glass vial with a stopper, that had a white substance inside. Nuit ichor, from a world mage named Lenore. Along with that was the tools of the trade, a pedestal set off and raised from the ground of the lab, along with a trove of hammers. He also had some insulated clamps and a length of d-wire which would be used in the next step, that of making the staff into a True Magic Staff. But that would be for later, when his assistance came. For now this was his work, and he'd be working for these two days to make the first step, that of the single step of enhancement to the items durability. Before he could begin he set out about his Glyphing, warding the area about the pedestal from djed both external and internal. At this point he had done his common Magecrafting wards so many times their was little to it, he barely even had to think as he painted out the glyphs in inscribing paint. A set of innermost warding which constituted a two faced barricade. On the inner side of it was his well used swirly whirly bits of pathways, which led the excess djed form the reaction out and into their maze, each set of swirls ending with a focus. This was then set upon the other side, which was a solid barrier to keep anything out that could pass by. After that was a solo barrier layer, constituting words turned on their side. He then ended it with a thick external layer of barrier wards, which would keep out any external djed, in particular djed from other experiments, or which often saturated the very air on Sahova. Unlike the inner side this outer one was about keeping djed out, and so it had a curved sweeping pattern which repeated, and would lead the djed around and back out at first. if this was overwhelmed then behind that was a second smaller layer, and behind that a solid layer of barrier, along with an occasional focus to slowly leech in djed that struck the layer next to it. This was sandwiched by another barrier, and then capped off by a final barrier layer that was three rows thick and melded seamlessly with the single layer of barrier. All in all it was a comprehensive set of warding purpose built and designed for use in Magecrafting. Nothing short of another djed storm was getting through these wards, and, Clyde joked to himself, even that might not do it. But with a confident stride he picked up the staff to be enchanted, and placed it upon the pedestal. With that his preparatory work was done. Willing his djed to flow down his arm and into Cha, ever present in his hand. Once she was ready they would extend out his Auristical sense, willing his mind to clear and focusing only on himself and Cha, part of a whole, willing his djed to roil and move and flow into place.

[Clyde Sullins]

Within the warding Glyphs, Clyde extended his senses through Cha at the staff lying on the pedestal, a charged hammer in his free hand. Cha was a powerful conduit, and made the process easier. Or perhaps it was simply his mind which made him find it easier, perhaps without Cha it was just as hard or easy. Either way he felt out with his auristical sight, mental fingers brushing against the wooden length laying on the pedestal. Almost right away he sensed some smaller bits of information. The feel of the wood as if he brushed his fingers against it. Not as soft or smooth as his own debarked staff of vian wood, which was naturally softer to the touch. But neither was it hard, despite its firmness. He examined its appearance, looking for imperfections or damage, but found none. Slowly his acquisition of the staffs aura grew, and became more clear and refined. He smelled it, tasted it, and sensed it, feeling out deeper. Within it seemed solid and normal, no major issues, no real imperfections, a standard mundane staff made of wood of the branch of a tree. There was a smoothed bit at both ends, at one where the branch had broken from the tree, and at the other where a small little twiggy bit had been snapped off and shaped down. It had been worked to an extent, enough so it functioned well as a staff and could support the weight of a person leaning on it easily enough. It was no master craft as his own staff was, but it was passable. First was a step in durability, to make the staff harder, more durable, more able to take punishment and to handle the magical forces that would rush through it once it was done. With a swing of his hammer he gave it a soft strike, a tap, infusing the djed while focusing on strength and sternness and solidity. The second strike was of a similar bent, clearing his mind and imbuing it with the sole will to withstand and bear the force against it. While a single step of durability enhancement was nothing to sneeze at, neither was it strong. But it was much better than a simple staff with no structural enhancement to its durability. Returning the spent hammer Clyde picked up another, heading back to the pedestal and over the wards. Turning it slightly, Clyde tapped at another spot on the staff, infusing in the djed that would strengthen and alter the staff in its innate nature. His next smaller tap was at an angle, infusing and flowing into the previously opened pathway, forcing in djed and widening it. Clyde could feel the thrum of the magic upon the air, the tingling running up Cha and through his arm into him. Blow by blow he worked on the enchantment, slowly deepening it and focusing his mind purely on breathing, and on enchanting the staff, of making it sturdier and stronger and steadfast.

[Clyde Sullins]

It was a couple charged hammers further in before he had a better grip of the staff. At first glance he had noticed the physical properties of it, but now as he linked and examined it longer more details began to come clear. He could see quite clearly the pathways opening up inside of it, spreading and widening, along with the new ones forming. Each time his hammer struck there was a surge of djed, a tingle up Cha and into his arm like a ghost of fingertips brushing across his flesh. Ready for another blow, he positioned himself, focusing on stern and immutable thoughts, that of unmoving stone and steel that would not bend, and of men of a hardy nature, and willed his thoughts to impart this intent into the item. Canting his next hammer he struck the staff from the side with a tap, and felt the brush of djed as it exited the hammer and flowed into the staff. Before his eyes their was a blaze of liquid color, as it flowed into the staff, feeding into it and rewriting its story. The world and its rules said this was this staff, this was how strong it was, this was what it could do. Line by line, bit by bit, he was rewriting this story, changing the staff at a fundamental nature, so that its truth was made anew. Pondering this for a moment, Clyde wondered if there was not a natural affinity between chaon and Magecrafting. After all, what other magic allowed one to make a item's innate nature be a lie, and to alter them at ones whim. None. With a small grin forming, Clyde pictured the staffs old story, of weak mundane wood, and willed it to be rewritten, making it a bit stronger, a bit more sturdy, a bit more like the unbending and unflinching stone of this isle. By itself the one action was little, but repeated and done over time, it was much more. “Now little staff, what story will you tell when I am done? What grand adventures will you live through and be a part of? And what powerful djeds will flow through you as a conduit for a mighty mages spellcraft?” Returning for a new hammer, Clyde felt the dimming as he lost connection momentarily to the staff, the wards blocking him. But as he passed back the connection was gained, and he continued from where he had left off on the staff. With another hammer blow he struck, filling the item with djeds, strengthening its structure, filling its djed pathways, and making it anew. What lie would its existence be, compared to the story it told on the day of its creation?

[Clyde Sullins]

45 Summer 514 The beginning of the next day of work, and Clyde know took out the vial of ichor he had gained from Lenore. Taking out a bowl, along with a small bit of the mineral powder used during the Magic Staff step, he dropped the pinch of the powder into it. Then uncorking the vial, he slowly poured out the nuit ichor, the white ooze slowly dripping and glopping out, till finally gravity won and its flowed forth, dropping an inch or two into the waiting bowl. Using a wooden mixer he stirred it up, mixing a tiny bit of the powder into the mass of ichor. Once it was well mixed, and the powder had vanished into the nuit goop, he brought the bowl over to the pedestal, along with a hammer held in the crook of his arm held against his side. Passing over the wards, Clyde reopened his Aura sense, feeling back out for the staff, willing the djed to flow through him, through the extension of him that was Cha, and out to the waiting staff on the pedestal. In the meantime, Clyde prepared the item for the next step. First Clyde poured a bit of the ooze over the staff, along its length. Slowly turning and positioning it, keeping it in contact with the pedestal, he spread about the ichor, coating its entire surface, rubbing it in like ointment until a fine film covered the staff. This took another two applications of dollops of ichor. Using another small bit of the ichor, Clyde dribbled it across the head of the charged hammer he held. Then like with the staff, he rubbed it into the head of the hammer. Focusing on the intent, Clyde willed the staff to become an enemy to the race who the material belonged to, to become a weapon against it and its kind. To be against nuit. With one strike he expended the djed into the staff, upon the task of charging the essence of the ichor into it. With the second strike he willed it to recall that essence, and to hate and destroy it, to rot it through, to be its bane. As he did he felt djed rumble up his arm and down his spine. He also noticed that at some point the ichor had vanished, and was no longer coating the staff. Now instead it was mixed into the essence of the staff, put their as a marker and a reminder and a note, upon which the staff would work its effect. The effect of destroying those who were kin to it, to the ichor. Prepping the staff for another round, Clyde returned with the spent hammer, and grabbed a new one. Back on the pedestal Clyde could feel a slight tinge upon the aura, a off whitish note. His own influence upon the items aura was a silvery mark, similar to his own res. This however was a white taint, mixed in with the others yet flowed throughout. It marked the fiber of the staff, deep in its essence, and was the essence of hate against the nuit, of arming itself against them.

[Clyde Sullins]

Back at the pedestal, Clyde took the last of the ichor, and ran it across the top of the new hammer. Similar to before he rubbed it in, though with a slightly thicker coating. Taking in a deep breath, he cleared his mind, and worked his way through the intent he wished to instil into the staff. First was that of the staff striking a nuit, of its flesh rotting on impact upon the strike area and around it. Next was of a flurry of strikes, of each impact knocking the nuit back, and further rotting him from the inside out. Next was a blast of flame from the staff, which crisped it and wilted it to dust, the form crumbling to dust and leaving behind a scorched shadow of ash. Willing this intent into the staff, Clyde stride struck with the hammer, a gentle blow against its surface, yet a hardy one full of intent, one with a deeper resonance internally than the sound of wood on metal of the actual blow. Within Clyde could feel a tumult, as the whitish essence he had sealed within before quavered and grew, taking on a blackish tint. Where before he had taught the staff to know of the nuit, to recognize and react to its blood, its ichor, now he taught it to react violently, to rot and destroy when it felt that essence. With these simple yet effective steps, the staff was more, and was armed by the blood against the blood. When it was done it would be a weapon against the nuit, its bane, and a nasty bit of Magecrafting for those who met it. Heading back for another hammer, Clyde readied himself, adding the next blow at a cant opposite to those of the ichor's blows. This was to solidify it, to go onward, to bury it within while continuing on, continuing to strengthen the staff beyond its mundane wood said it should. Clyde furthered his work of making the staff a lie, of making it break the rules of its existence. Now he continued on with the lie of its structure, that said it was X strong. With another hammer blow near the tip of the staff Clyde vehemently told the world this was not a truth, that this fact was not the one that mattered. Quietly Clyde told the world a lie, told the staff it did not follow the rules, and willed it to obey, and for the world to respect this lie as a truth. For a lie committed to and treated as truth, became a truth, even if a distorted and twisted one. Slowly Clyde rewrote this wooden staff, and retold its story. “What is a tree but a elder sapling. What is a branch but a arm of a tree. Let this staff be that arm, let it hold the strength of the whole, and stand against the winds that blow against it.”

[Clyde Sullins]

Done with the process of altering the essence of the staff, at least in respect to making it a bane to nuits, Clyde focused back on the task of increasing its durability, of altering its physical structure to be able to withstand more. This would be important, considering the potent djeds that would run through it as a Magic Staff. With Cha in one hand, and a freshly charged hammer in the other, one of middling size, Clyde assessed the new staff and its aura. He could feel the pathways, feel where they were low and where they were swollen. He could feel where paths widened, and where they were ready to be widened. He could see where with a bit of force he could expand the staff in new and deeper ways. All flowed within his sight, a melding of the auristical sight he sensed through Cha, and his own Magecrafters training and skill knowing and sensing the staff's needs. Canting and turning about the pedestal 60 degrees, he approached from a new angle and struck twice in succession, discharging djed into the staff with a brush of fingers across Cha's face, the tingle of djed along his arm and down his spine. As he headed back for the next hammer, Clyde wondered if perhaps he could work faster without Cha in his hand. But the idea felt... Wrong... It was like casting aside his own arm, not bringing it to the process, to the enchantment. He would no more cut off his own arm and disown it, than he would do such a enchantment without Cha by his side. Cha was a comfort, a part of him, and a able partner. With the next hammer her struck, turned an additional 60 degrees, another small grin on his face. While Cha might take up a hand, it more than made up for this in his own expanded capacity. In his Auristical sense radiating out from it and sensing out at the staff on the pedestal. He grinned further as he felt the next shockwave of resonance sweeping through him. Along Cha and into his fingers, then up his arms and through his body. He could physically feel the sensation as the hammer fed into the staff, and it swelled to its banks. Clyde could feel the process, the sensation taking place as the first step was completed, as the materials were exhausted on the first step, and the durability increase was done. Now all that was left was the Staff Step, aided by Anna, and it would be completed. OOC: Enchantment to be concluded in Part II

[Ink]

Let me see what you have done with your ink. Clyde Sullins Skills Auristics 3 Magecrafting 4 Lores Magecrafting: A Staff That Lies Magecrafting: Against Blood Between Black and White If there are any concerns or problems with my grading please feel free to toss me a PM. I am more than happy to explain my reasons or reevaluate them if you feel I've been unfair. Also please remember to edit your grade request as graded or delete it if possible. Thank you, Ink