If there was anyone in Gale House, Ethan trusted it was Amelia. Although he counted Barry as a person he would share his secrets with, he knew the man wasn't interested in anything but his own work. Amelia's desire for academic knowledge was unquenchable. He explained everything he knew about how he could patch the system.

  "I still don't understand every part of it. Unfortunately, the anomaly I worked on was extremely basic. I have a feeling that if I want to fix issues with a full blown system, it's going to be a lot harder." Ethan ran his fingers through his hair when he felt that it was slightly greasy. He sent a pulse of mana to his Endurance Ring. A cloud of cleansing magic washed over him, cleaning him in an instant. "Understanding each element of the anomaly was the only way that I could change it. I had to assign the system sigils to each aspect. Then I was able to alter the control sigil. Maybe I could begin working on the X-13 system, but I really don't think I'm there quite yet."

  Amelia took a very long time to respond. The silence of the library meant that Ethan could hear his own heartbeat as he waited for her response. Eventually, she pursed her lips and leaned in.

  "And how can you get to a point where you can mess with our systems? Do you have a plan of attack? Are you going to wing it like I've seen you do before?"

  Ethan waved his hands through the air. "Too many questions. I don't have a plan right now. I think it's out of my range, and I need to increase my attributes before I can even approach it. I think the best way is for me to tackle lesser anomalies. I also want to fill my other rings with useful abilities."

  "I'm sitting across from something special, aren't I?" Amelia produced a dramatic sigh, but beneath the hard exterior, Ethan saw her crack a smile. He was hoping this would be the case. He had hoped her relentless desire to pursue academics would override her sensibilities for safety. "That sounds like as good a plan as any, but you need to be careful. The classes do get harder as they go on, and if you slack in any of them, you'll fall behind. You're almost out of the expulsion range, but both you and Barrow are still extremely low in the rankings.”

  Ethan cracked a sly smile. "I didn't expect you to be such a mother hen."

  "I'm normally not, but when somebody comes with so much talent, I always feel angry when they squander it. That's exactly what you're doing, Ethan. You're squandering it. You need to be more cautious."

  "If it makes you feel any better, I've got plans to track down a few anomalies here in Gale House. You're welcome to join me so you can see the process."

  Amelia straightened her back in an instant, cocking her head to one side. "Really? How long do you think it'll take?"

  "It shouldn't take longer than a few hours. That really just depends on the kind of anomaly we're dealing with. The list the Anomalous Materials Group gave me contains quite a few, almost benign ones." Ethan stretched lazily, groaning as he felt something pop in his back. “Each one gives me some money, so that’ll help with my debt.”

  “A debt you shouldn’t even carry. We should go to the headmaster,” Amelia growled, looking oddly like Barry when he got worked up.

  “I could go to Armel Batteux if I wanted.” Ethan waved a dismissive hand. He wasn’t about to get involved in politics. The best way to ruin his easy life here at the academy was by throwing his weight around. His plan wasn’t to throw it in the faces of people who could make his life hard, but to keep things easy going the way they already were.

  Amelia simply didn't have an answer for that. She nodded. "Okay, which one's first?"

  Ethan withdrew the sheet of paper he kept tucked in his robes. Perhaps he should invest in a bag, but he simply didn't have that much to carry. Instead, he looked over the list, finding the short descriptions Alex had left him and choosing one that wouldn't freak his companion out too much. "Down on the shoreline to the southwest, there's some kind of water issue. Alex wasn't terribly specific with his description, but he said there's a water anomaly they can't do anything about. If I had to guess, it's exactly like the gravity one I've already dealt with, which means I have experience, so you can stop worrying.”

  "What are we waiting for? Let's get going." Amelia shot up from her seat, completely forgetting whatever research she was supposed to be doing, along with the help she was meant to be giving Ethan for his support magic.

  He just smiled, standing and following her until they finally left the library. Along the way, he flipped through the spells he had learned, finding the Decrease Gravity spell and looking it over. He wanted to fill all of his Attribute Rings, and this one seemed like a great candidate for agility. It was one of those things where logic prevailed. He soon had a system sigil representing the pilfered spell. He slotted it into his agility ring without issue and inspected the resulting ability.

  [Weightless Agility]

  Agility Ring Ability

  Generated By:

  Decrease Gravity (X-13 Variant, Mana Font Rank -1)

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  Description:

  The effects of gravity have less impact on you, allowing you to jump higher and further.

  Effect:

  Applying mana to this ring allows you to jump higher and further depending on the amount of mana injected. As you are affected less by gravity, the impact of falling is also lessened.

  That ability was just plain cool, and Ethan simply couldn't help himself. "Hey, you want to see something cool?" he said, poking Amelia on the shoulder. She turned, cocking her head to the side and squinting. "Watch this."

  Without giving her a chance to object, Ethan shot a pulse of mana into his Agility Ring. He felt himself get lighter in an instant, and then he kicked off the ground, floating about eight feet into the air and waving his arms to maintain his orientation. Amelia shouted in surprise, placing both hands over her mouth as she gasped. A moment later, the scribe came down, landing softly. He didn't even feel pain in his knees from the impact. It was a welcome update from his life back on Earth.

  "Was that gravity magic?" Amelia's mouth was still agape as she stared at him.

  Ethan did a few more test hops, finding that the mana he had put into the ring was only good for a single jump. He didn't know whether it was expended while he was hovering in the air or if the system knew exactly how long to make him float. All he knew was that gravity magic was extremely cool.

  "That's right. From the Gravity Font I fixed. I adapted the negative side of the spell for my system and attached it to my Agility Ring. I can jump really high, not that I think that's very useful. I guess I could get up on those roofs over there.

  "Don't. Please. Just don't do anything weird," Amelia said with a sigh. "Let's get you to the coast before you float off into space."

  Ethan had a smile on his face the entire way to the coastline. His mind reeled as he thought of the different ways he could have tapped just about anything to fit into his Attribute Rings. But more than ever, he wanted to increase the power of those rings, which was not an easy feat to accomplish. They eventually passed through the harbor area, working their way south along a rocky coast until it opened up into a black sand beach. There were several people among the waves, picking through the sand in search of seashells or interesting rocks. Far in the distance, Ethan could feel the energy of water magic. He was familiar enough with it after the fiasco with a water crystal.

  "There it is," Ethan gestured, drawing Amelia's attention. She was doubled over, scooping a particularly interesting rock from the sand.

  She held the rock up for him to see, a stupid smile painted on her face. "Look, silver striations. It might be worth something."

  Ethan shook his head. "I thought you would be more interested in the weird water geyser shooting out of thin air over there."

  Amelia creamed her neck, squinting against the afternoon sun and nodding. "That is pretty weird. Alright, show me how you do your magic, scribe.”

  Even before Ethan drew close enough to get a good look at the geyser, he could feel familiar energies with his pen held in his hand. He could practically see the generation node with a control sigil attached to it. But he had turned over a new leaf. It was time for caution.

  "This would normally be the part where I just go in and try something out without thinking. But since you are here, I'm going to take a moment and think about it."

  “A wise choice.”

  Over the course of a half hour, Ethan checked, double-checked, and triple-checked that his assumption was correct. He took a steadying breath and reached out with his senses. As the geyser burbled, shooting water about five feet into the air, he felt the anomalous X-13 system within. He breathed a sigh of relief. He was very familiar with this system, so he initiated the emulation with his pen.

  [Anomalous X-13 System Variant Emulated]

  ERROR: You have emulated an anomalous system. This variant of the X-13 system is incomplete and mostly non-functional. Your interaction with this system will be limited more than normal. Please use your Celestial Pen to resolve enough errors to stabilize the anomaly.

  Gravity Magic Anomaly

  Difficult Rank: Effortless (Rank -3)

  Known Errors: INCOMPLETE

  System Alignment: X-13

  Anomaly Designation: Glitching Infinite Puddle

  Current Status: Unstable.

  "I just felt the mana change in your chest," Amelia said, shaking her head. "That's very weird."

  "I kind of cheated on this one. I identified the error before I even emulated the system. This one's at Rank -3, so that's not a surprise. It's apparently called a glitching infinite puddle. Maybe this is just supposed to be a tiny puddle and not a geyser, which means that there's a control flow issue. Same problem as with the gravity anomaly."

  "So how do you resolve it?" Amelia circled around the geyser, craning her neck in either direction to try to see what he was seeing. But he knew that without a pen like his, she wouldn't be able to see a thing.

  "I need to create a System Sigil for each part of the anomaly and then amend one of those sigils. That will be the control sigil attached to the production sigil. It should take me only a few minutes."

  "So now you're an expert now?”Amelia folded her arms and smiled. "Will I be able to see your work?"

  Ethan smiled as he dragged his pen through the air, drawing the first sigil for her to see. "Yep, and I'll point everything out as I'm working on it. This is the generation sigil. This tells it to create fresh water. And down here, attached to the bottom, is the control sigil. This is telling it how much water to create. I should note that I completely made up these symbols. I basically run it by the grand system, and it sends me its approval or declines the design of the sigil."

  "What about the excess mana?" "The gravity anomaly you dealt with had a lot of that."

  "Just look all around us." "There's enough water mana in the air here already. I don't think something as mundane as water energy is going to be as much of an issue as gravity. I hope so anyway. I can't afford to go further into debt by creating a tidal wave."

  "Please don't even joke around about that."

  “And here’s the control sigil… Yeah, that symbol means ‘a lot’ just like with the gravity thing. Let’s change that to ‘some’?” Ethan smiled to himself, erasing part of the control sigil and replacing it. The geyser calmed down, turning into nothing more than a slow dribble that pattered against the ground.

  A moment later, a coin appeared in his hand and a message in his vision.

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