After Greta left and I finished taking in my current space, Myrda turned to me. The earlier tension had not vanished, but it had settled into something quieter, heavier, the kind that sat in the chest rather than crackled in the air.

  “All right, Enchanter Azolo,” she said at last. “Tell me what this thing is that you want my help with. The thing that isn’t illegal, but might hurt you.”

  I opened my mouth to answer, then closed it again. The words were there, ready, but this was one of those moments where speaking too fast would cheapen what followed. “Hold on for one moment,” I said instead.

  I knelt beside my chest and opened it, taking more care than strictly necessary. I retrieved the carving knife made of reverend iron, its edge dull and unassuming to the eye, then the first vial of mana I had retrieved in this life, the one that held only three drops. I knew exactly how unimpressive it looked. I also knew how limited it was in most situations.

  This was where my plans began in earnest. Those three drops were the foundation of everything that would follow, because they were where I had started.

  What I had believed was treasure had turned out to be little more than trash. That did not matter. This was what I had chosen, and I was going to use it.

  I straightened and met Myrda’s eyes. “I’m going to draw a magical circuit for you to follow,” I said. “You’re going to carve it into my finger, my forefinger, and my thumb. Then you’re going to carve one more directly beneath my left eye.” I raised my hand to demonstrate, then pointed to the exact spot under my eye to remove any doubt about what I meant.

  She stared at me, aghast. “You want me to cut you?”

  “It’s not really cutting,” I said calmly. I kept my voice level on purpose. Panic helped no one. “You’ve heard of the runic tattoo discipline of enchanting, haven’t you?”

  “Yes,” she said slowly, clearly choosing her words with care. “And I’m not sure I’m comfortable with this.”

  “I’m not doing anything illegal,” I said. “Even Greta has said that markings like these are generally considered acceptable. People don’t like them, but they’re allowed.”

  “The one beneath my eye allows me to see mana flow. Seeing octarine is required for true enchanting to be done properly.”

  I paused, then continued more quietly. “Even if it’s only in one eye, it will help me immensely. I don’t like the color, but I need to see mana if I’m going to do this properly.”

  I held up my hand again, spreading my fingers slightly. “The circuits on my fingers are barely more than a prick. They’ll let me hold mana directly in my fingertips and guide it with far more precision instead of relying entirely on reverend iron. The iron will still be useful, and this knife will be as well. One day, I’ll enchant it properly. Maybe not this one. I might need to reforge it first, but that’s beside the point.”

  I looked at her steadily, not backing down. “These are things I need to have done. And if you’re serious about becoming an enchanter yourself, they’re things you would eventually want as well.”

  Myrda was quiet for a long moment. The forge sounds in the distance seemed louder in the silence she left behind. “Is there any way this could go wrong?” she asked.

  “Other than you driving the knife straight through my eyeball?” I said lightly. “Given your strength, you could probably put a paper cup through someone’s head without damaging the cup.”

  She considered that with uncomfortable sincerity. “That’s… probably true. I might actually be able to do that.”

  “Reverend iron doesn’t cut unless mana is involved,” I said. “As long as your hands are steady, there’s nothing to worry about. And at your rank, your precision is far beyond what a normal person should have. Even a mostly competent ordinary person could manage this.”

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  She did not answer immediately. Instead, she studied my face, her eyes flicking briefly to the spot beneath my eye, then to my hand, then back again.

  “This is going to make you look like a criminal,” she said finally.

  “Yes,” I said. “It probably will.”

  She frowned. “Are you sure you want to go down that path?”

  “Yes,” I said without hesitation. “This has always been the path I was always going to walk.”

  I exhaled slowly. “Greta knows I chose it too. She told me I wasn’t allowed to do this myself or to others. She didn’t say I couldn’t ask someone to do it to me.”

  Myrda stared at me for a heartbeat, then snorted despite herself. “That’s a really, really dumb way to get around that.”

  “I know,” I said. “She’s going to be pissed when she sees it.”

  “Oh, absolutely,” Myrda said dryly.

  “I figured it would be better to ask for forgiveness than permission,” I continued. “Especially when we both knew I was going to do this anyway. Sometimes children need to be reckless.”

  Her brow furrowed. “But your not really a child in this case.”

  “I am not,” I said. “But this is my life. And I’m going to do reckless things with it. I’m going to take responsibility for what this means, even if she worries about me. Rightfully so.”

  Myrda watched me for another long moment, then let out a slow breath, the tension finally leaving her shoulders. “All right,” she said. “As long as you’re sure.”

  “I am,” I replied.

  She nodded once. “Okay. I’ll help you with this,” she said. “I can tell there’s no stopping you.”

  “Thank goodness,” I said, unable to keep the relief out of my voice. “I was not looking forward to doing this myself in front of a mirror.”

  She shook her head slowly. “I can’t even imagine.”

  Her gaze dropped to the vial in my hand, lingering there longer than before. “Is there a reason that vial of mana looks almost empty?”

  “It’s a long story,” I said. “Maybe I’ll tell you while we work. Ancient knowledge is ancient for a reason. If you ever reincarnate, be prepared for more than a few shocks.”

  I moved over to a mostly clear drafting table and pulled a sheet of parchment toward me, along with an ink bottle and a quill. I sat down, settled my breathing, and felt something shift.

  I drew.

  For the first time in this life, I was working on an enchantment.

  It was one I never would have created in my past life. First, because I had never needed it. Second, because it would have been counterproductive to replicate something I could already do naturally. Even if it might have helped others one day, creating it back then would have been inefficient, even foolish.

  This was different.

  This was not going to be the standard mana grip paired with a merchant’s eye. I had been thinking about this design for as long as I could think in this life, turning it over again and again, considering how I could take something crude and rigid and turn it into something that could grow alongside me.

  I wanted to do things with this body that others could barely imagine. One day, if I lived long enough, I would probably be covered from head to toe in runic tattoos. And these three marks, these first three, would be the beginning of that journey. They would be the ones that enabled all the rest.

  That meant the foundation had to be special.

  I began with a Felian rune as the base for the grip. On its own, the rune served a simple purpose: it left mana on the surface of whatever it touched, allowing the user to hold that mana instead of letting it dissipate. In many ways, it was almost a complete circuit by itself.

  Almost.

  What I wanted was not just retention, but control. I wanted my grip to be able to adjust the width, depth, and shape of the mana I held directly. To accomplish that, I terminated the Felian base within a senio circle, a three-and-a-half twist loop that curved back through the center, anchoring itself to the original rune.

  Then I broke the line.

  The break allowed leakage, deliberately so. That leakage would serve as a link point for future enchantments, a place where I could expand the circuit later instead of tearing it apart and starting over. To compensate, I capped the break with a value cut, closing it in a way that allowed the circuit to feed back into itself while still holding mana properly.

  The cost would be higher. The circuit would draw more mana than a simpler design, especially at this stage. That was acceptable.

  What it bought me was adaptability.

  I repeated the process for the second design, the one that would be carved into my thumb. Together, the two circuits would give me a grip that could be tuned with exacting precision while I worked enchantment lines by hand, without a tool. Reverend iron would still be superior when I needed absolute precision, when I could funnel perfectly measured flows through it, but this would free me from relying solely on crude blades and knives.

  Both circuits were designed to draw mana directly from the atmosphere. They would perform best in higher concentrations, but even in the lowest zones they would function at a base level. That, too, was intentional.

  There would be times when I did not need perfect control or deep precision. There would also be times when I absolutely would.

  This design gave me both.