Boundaries weren't always necessary for creating wards, but they often helped define the reach of the working. If Caen spun his bed on an axis, it would create a perfect circle, but that seemed to him like more of a hassle than just taking quick measurements.

  Since his cot was pushed against a corner, he had to go outside the tent to complete the circle. He retrieved a metal stake from his toolbox and used that to make a two-inch deep furrow in the grassy ground. It was a perfect circle.

  His roommate eyed him warily as he worked, but she said nothing.

  He prepared some tyyr powder, which was a specialized substance, orange in color, that mixed with water to form an ink used in magical scripting. Then he took out his canting tool, which was a pen-like instrument with a nozzle-beaked bowl at the end that allowed him to pour the tyyr ink into the circular furrow he'd made in the ground.

  As he did this, he engaged a basic Scripting visualization technique and, with some effort, moved his spirit in such a way as to guide his mana out of his body and into the circle. This didn't involve typical spirit patterns; it was closer to how he used his whorl-gem, in fact. He had to move his spirit in certain ways to affect how mana was expelled from his spirit.

  As an Attuner, Caen couldn't see or truly sense his mana, or any mana for that matter—unless it was in crystallised form. But he could sense what he was manipulating his spirit to do. It was an indirect thing, but he very carefully guided his mana along the curve of the script circle, using the ink from his canting tool to guide his infusion. With every instance of infusion, the ink glowed very softly, but in the dark of night, he could see it clearly enough.

  As with his whorl-gem, efficiency and precision were key here. Caen couldn't just flood the circle with mana. He had to direct it himself and ensure that no trace of his mana stained the inside of the circle. Otherwise, it might interfere with the script's functionality.

  Caen was working blind, figuratively speaking, which meant he had to move extremely slowly, trusting the glowing ink to verify his infusion.

  Once he had completely infused the script circle, a portion of the visualization in his mind lost its complexity. That was a good thing. It meant that he'd made the script circle correctly.

  He carefully patted down the grassy ground around the furrow, covering up the now glowing orange of the tyyr ink he'd put in there.

  Then came the real work.

  He made new divots in the internal perimeter of the script circle, each one for a grounding rune. He spaced them out equidistantly after taking careful measurements.

  His metal stake drew out the runes carefully and linked them along the circle in rough cursive. He took his canting tool once more, mixed another portion of tyyr ink, and began his infusion yet again. The runic cursive allowed him to work uninterrupted. Having to stop every few characters would have been a pain.

  A few more minutes spent on the runes had him sweating from effort, but he was soon finished. He immediately began attuning mana to replenish his reserves.

  Caen took a look at his handiwork, smiling. It was a simple alarm ward. Incredibly basic, but while active, it would alert him if anyone crossed its perimeter. Its only usefulness to Caen was that it provided a layer of precaution while he slept.

  The magical discipline of Scripting didn't innately have affinities. However, Scriptors were necessarily specialists in a discipline. Being abject as a Scriptor was still inconvenient because Scripting involved applying runic techniques and scriptwork in specific areas of magic. Even the ward he'd just made had elements that touched on Dream-guarding.

  He covered the runes with the soil he'd dug up. He didn't have to worry about closing up the incisions he'd made in the ground, since the tyyr ink would preserve the scriptwork.

  He dusted his hands, wiped them clean, and began putting away his equipment when he noticed that a few other people had entered the tent. One of them was a woman with a round face and traditional Vedul tattoos on the sides of her head, which was shorn. She'd picked a cot by the entrance.

  The other newcomer was a mousy-looking man with fluffy, rounded ears atop his head and slightly slit eyes that darted to and fro, as if expecting danger. His cot was opposite Caen's.

  Caen had a cold wash at the bath house and wiped down his armor as well. He'd carried his bag of holding and glaive with him for safety reasons.

  Back in his tent, he infused mana into the scripts of his alarm ward. Now that it had been constructed, precision didn't quite matter anymore. He felt a measure of accomplishment when it activated. A nigh imperceptible ring of something unidentifiable encompassed him. He knew—by the understanding many arcane constructs imparted to their wielders—that while he was within the script boundary, any breach of this perimeter would be brought to his awareness immediately.

  Caen sat cross-legged in bed and ran through his evening routine. He only spent two hours on it, though. He spent the whole while meditating on his soul structure, familiarizing himself further with his affinity clusters.

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  The noise within the tent had grown particularly unpleasant. The remaining cots had been taken, clothes and gear piled on several of them. Nine men sat on and around a bed by the entrance, chatting with the loudness of the drunk. A few with wet hair and towels around their necks. Most of them couldn't be members of this tent, as Caen, the wereperson, and four other women took up other cots.

  There was a single lamp of placid reshent hanging at the center of the tent, and a rope attached to the lamp's bottom for turning it off and on. With so many of the people in this tent awake, there was little chance of that being turned off soon. Not that it mattered anyway. His speculon could see just fine in the dark. It was a wonderful curse.

  Aunt Vensha had taught him to sleep with his primary weapon on the bed beside him. She often said that you never knew when you would need to defend yourself. Caen kept his armor on. His guns and Zeris's bag of holding went beneath his pillow, while his glaive was strapped to a cord that he'd latched to his wrist.

  Caen delved into his spirit to dull the sounds of reveling, though that did little to dim his speculon. To keep himself alert enough to wake up at a moment's notice, he decided that he wouldn't be visiting Uncle Vai tonight.

  Sleep found him in moments.

  * * *

  A jolt shot through Caen's mind, like static electricity amplified by several magnitudes.

  He woke up to the crisp and clear view of his speculon an instant before his physical eyes snapped open.

  Someone stood by Caen's side, reaching for his glaive.

  He grabbed them by the wrist and sat up, unsheathing a dagger strapped to his thigh.

  Several separate voices burst into shocked laughter. The man whose wrist Caen now held sputtered.

  “Hey, hey, take it easy,” the man said, body growing lax as he held very still. “Take it easy.” The man had brown hair packed into a lazy ponytail, and open concern now replaced the mischievous smile he'd been sporting a moment ago.

  “Come on, lad,” called one of the men sitting by the tent entrance. “We were just fooling around.”

  “Yeah, they dared me to do it. I would have returned your shit back, I swear. Hey.” He laughed sheepishly, beads of sweat on his forehead. “Come on. That's—that’s quite the grip you've got there.”

  He probably assumed that Caen was a Body-enhancer and must have been worried that Caen had strong enough passive augmentations to crush his wrist. Of course, Caen could do no such thing, but the man didn’t know that. Caen stared coldly at him, keeping a firm grip on the man's hand for a moment longer. Then he let go, grunting.

  “Oooh!” the men by the entrance echoed. They laughed as their companion returned to them, rubbing the back of his head.

  Sheathing his dagger, Caen checked to see that the time was barely three in the morning. He suppressed his irritation easily, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

  He'd used magic to solve a problem. Naturally, he'd erected this particular basic ward many times in the past, but this would be the first time that it had actually prevented something unpleasant from happening.

  Caen pondered going back to sleep, but the troublemakers in his tent were still laughing among themselves and playing a game of cards together. He strapped on the rest of his weapons, took the bag of holding, and left.

  He’d hoped to go into a copse of trees by the bathhouse to perform his morning rituals, but a sectioned-off lawn with benches around it caught his eye. Last night, people were sitting around, drinking and mingling. Now, however, a woman was practicing forms with her daggers. Wooden poles and bars had been erected into the ground. There were also several crude-looking, wooden free weights of varying sizes lying around. If their green color was any indication, these were clearly hewn from the awakened trees in the Plane. A wereperson with horns was pumping his arms while holding two comically large dumbbells in each hand.

  Caen sat on one of the benches there and ran through some spells and magical exercises. And rounded it all out with meditating on his soul structure.

  About an hour later, a few more people had begun to make their way towards this place. He Mimicked a Body-enhancer’s affinity and went about his boosted exercises, knowing that his body would curse him for this later. He would be targeting individual muscle groups from now on, instead of doing full-body workouts. He made sure to hold back much more than he had in recent times. Fighting while sore was not wise.

  He made a note to himself to come back here later in the day. Some people were engaging in a light spar, and if such things happened regularly, he'd be able to Mimic more affinities without needing to put his life on the line. He had the Plane for that.

  Caen headed over to the cafeteria. Even this early, there were several people seated in groups, eating and making conversation. He made his way to the back of the open-air structure, where an old woman sat on the only padded chair here. She eyed him suspiciously as he walked over.

  “You again,” she said dryly.

  “Me again. I’d like to start helping out now, if you don't mind.”

  Whenever Caen went with his father to observe the mass cooking stints on Ser-gwu Island, there was always magic being used. With dozens of people involved in culinary processes, not every single one of them used spells, but a sizable portion of them did.

  This kitchen was certainly far smaller in scale, but Caen strongly suspected that he might be able to find several active thread clusters here, which would allow him to practice Mimicking affinities while also getting extra food. With his new exercise regimen, food was very vital.

  “Did you sleep upside down and forget what I said, boy? One meal token every half day.”

  “I can do an hour and thirty minutes here daily,” he told her. “One hour in the mornings and thirty minutes at night.”

  “If you think this will get you free meals, you're very mistaken.”

  “I'm thinking of it as downtime from the Plane. I still expect to get paid of course. Every eight days, isn’t that right?”

  “Downtime? Don't you know how to make friends? Bah, suit yourself,” she said, huffing. “I’ll have you chopping onions all through anyway.”

  “Onions sound wonderful,” Caen said, putting on his goggles.

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