Chapter 17 – A Fire-Magic Tool
Quiet, ordinary days went by for a good while after that. I practiced magic and trained on every one of them, and I think I have got considerably stronger. My mana capacity has climbed a long way too. I don’t intend to get comfortable about it, though; I mean to keep pushing. I have never fought a monster or a knight, so I have no idea how strong I actually need to be. Well. It’s hard to see how being stronger could hurt.
I was living days like that, and the first real signs of winter were coming in, when Marie caught a cold. There are no thermometers in this world so I can’t be sure, but from the feel of her forehead the fever was high. Her breathing was rough and it clearly hurt.
The fever came on last night, and by this morning it hadn’t gone down at all. If anything it felt higher. I was badly rattled. Medicine in this world is a long way behind, and even an ordinary cold might turn into something that kills her. And if it wasn’t an ordinary cold but something worse, it might not be curable at all. We had been giving her medicine bought from the apothecary and it wasn’t doing anything I could see.
“Marie, are you all right?”
“…Big Brother. I’m all right.”
She answered with no strength in her voice and her face pulled tight. She ate nothing last night and nothing this morning either. What do I do. Is there anything I can do. And I know nothing about medicine… Ah, everything I learned in Japan is useless here! Somebody should have told the version of me back there to stop messing about and study something. Shouting it at him now doesn’t put it in my head.
What I can do… Wait. Healing magic! I have only ever used it on injuries, but I have wondered whether it might work on illness. I decided to test it on myself first and went through to the living room.
Right. When you cast Heal you picture the healing clearly and pour mana into the injured place. Except that with an illness I don’t know where to pour it.
Which means what, pour it through the whole body? I covered myself in healing-attribute mana to see. And suddenly I could feel the state of my own body as clearly as if I were holding it in my hands. There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with me, but if I do this to Marie, wouldn’t I be able to find what is wrong? And then heal that with healing magic. That might actually work!
Now that I had a way to help Marie I hurried up to the bedroom. She seemed to be asleep, though not comfortably. I stood beside her and covered her in healing-attribute mana, and I could feel it: in her nose, in her throat, somewhere down the windpipe, things that were doing her harm. Viruses, presumably. So I poured mana into those harmful things the way I would cast Heal, and they thinned away and thinned away until there was nothing left of them at all.
I stopped the flow of mana and looked at her. The strain had gone out of her face and the fever seemed to have broken. Healing magic is extraordinary. The mana cost is brutal, but it can cure sickness! My capacity has grown a long way, and that took very nearly all of it, which means this is probably beyond anyone else alive.
I looked down at Marie’s quiet sleeping face and thought, with everything in me, that I was glad to have this strange ability.
She slept about three hours after that, and the Marie who woke up was the usual one, full of energy from end to end.
“Morning! I’m better!”
She came down the stairs announcing it, at speed.
“Marie, are you feeling all right now?”
“Nothing hurts any more?”
“Uh-huh!”
“Come here a moment.”
Mom said it and put a hand on Marie’s forehead.
“No fever now. Oh, thank goodness. Are you hungry?”
“I’m starviiing!”
“There now. Lunch is just coming.”
“Really?! Yaaay!”
Watching all that, I felt the relief come up so hard my eyes went hot. Marie must have spotted it, because she came straight over.
“Big Brother, what’s wrong? Are you sad?”
“No. I got something in my eye. Thank you for worrying about me.”
“Does it still hurt?”
“It’s fine now. Shall we go and eat?”
“Uh-huh!”
Walking through to the living room with her, I was already thinking about how to keep Marie from catching cold again. She caught this one because the season turned and it got cold… Winter here doesn’t go as deep as a Japanese midwinter, but cold is cold. The nights and the early mornings especially. And apparently it snows occasionally.
Wealthy houses may have fireplaces. Commoner houses have nothing of the kind: you put on every layer you own and take your warmth from the kitchen. At night you pile on cloth and everyone sleeps in a heap to get through it. It would be strange if a person didn’t catch cold.
I was told a fire-magic tool is impossible because it melts the magic iron. But is there really no way to make one? I want a stove badly enough that it hurts. Magic practice and training have eaten my time and I haven’t been to Marcel’s in a while. Perhaps it’s time I went.
So a few days later, today, I am on my way to Marcel’s house. I may not be able to buy a magic tool myself, but nothing starts until the thing exists.
I can do a passable stove with fire magic and wind magic on my own, but it eats mana, and keeping it going takes concentration and wears me out.
“Marcel, it’s been a long time!”
I opened his door and called into the house. A voice came back from the depths of it telling me to come in, so I went straight through to the workshop.
“Good afternoon, Marcel.”
“Been a while, Leon.”
“I’m sorry I haven’t been able to come.”
“No matter. So what brings you today?”
“I came because I want to work out a fire-magic tool. Winter’s coming, and it’s cold enough that I want one badly.”
At which Marcel turned to me with a slightly rueful look on his face.
“Everyone says exactly that when winter comes on, and starts researching fire-magic tools. But a fire-magic tool won’t work, Leon. The magic iron can’t take the heat.”
“So I’ve heard. Which is why I’d like to put some proper thought into it. I might come up with something.”
I sat down, set a magic stone and a piece of magic iron in front of me, and started thinking about what would make a fire-magic tool work. A magic tool works by fitting the magic stone into the magic iron, which makes the magic built into the stone manifest. And it manifests from the stone. Water comes out of the stone in a tap. The stone glows in a light orb. Wind comes off the stone in a blower. With fire magic, fire comes out of the stone, and the magic iron can’t survive it. That’s the failure.
How do I get around that… Wrap the magic iron near the stone in some kind of insulation? Except what would insulation even be in this world? Hmm. Earth or stone are all I can think of. And if I packed earth around the magic stone, how would I hold it there? Earth is also, frankly, dirty. Magic tools are things nobles use, so it would never be accepted. Which leaves stone, and working stone is far too much trouble, and stone is heavy.
So insulation is out… Or rather, more than that: the magic stone has to be in contact with the magic iron, so however much insulation you pack around it, the heat comes straight through at the point where they touch. No. Insulation is dead.
Some other approach, then. What is there? It would be simple if the fire manifested somewhere away from the magic iron.
Hmm…? Hold on. The ice maker I built. Didn’t that make wind magic manifest away from the stone? It did! So couldn’t fire do exactly the same thing?!
How did I never notice? I had it fixed in my head that magic from a magic stone comes directly off the stone. When I built the ice maker my whole attention was on getting ice out of it and I never saw what I was doing. I want to try it right now!
“Marcel! Magic from a magic stone manifests directly from the stone, doesn’t it?”
“Obviously it does. It’s a magic stone.”
“But when I built the ice maker, I had wind magic manifest away from the stone.”
“You did use wind magic. Wasn’t it blowing out of the stone?”
“No! It came from the middle of the box and from the outside of it. Away from the stone.”
“Surely not… Can that be done? And yet, now that you say it. How has nobody noticed…”
“It’s a fixed idea. The things you’ve assumed are the things you can’t see. So, may I try it with fire?”
“Aye. Go on.”
I started by reshaping the magic iron. I wanted a stove, and if I made the body of the stove out of magic iron the body might melt, so I made the magic iron a single thin plate with a socket for a stone in the middle. Then I set into the stone a small Fireball, to manifest about thirty centimeters above the plate.
I fitted the stone into the iron, and a Fireball appeared, properly, thirty centimeters up in the air. Success! I had been thinking that if the magic iron melted anyway I could put stone or something in between, but heat goes upward, so it seems to be fine as it is.
“Marcel, it works! Now if we put an ordinary iron grille or something round the outside, it’s finished!”
“What?! It genuinely works… Leon. To have the thing we all gave up on made in front of me, and made this easily… Well. It’s you. I shall have to accept that…”
What is that supposed to mean?! I’m not that far outside the normal! Marcel had started off astonished and was working his way steadily toward exasperated.
“I’m not that far outside the normal! But this is going to make life much easier.”
“That it is… though it may be better not to file this one with the royal palace.”
“Why not?”
“The ice maker drew a good deal of attention as it was. Add a fire-magic tool on top of it and it will draw far more still, and somebody will certainly go digging. Likely enough somebody will get as far as you. You would rather not stand out, would you?”
“That’s true… but would it really attract that much attention?”
“Of course it would! In the several decades since anyone started making magic tools, only four have ever reached the market. Four. Register several inside a single year and of course you will stand out!”
Ah… Put that way, perhaps not registering is wiser. Except, hold on. In the ice maker I already made wind manifest away from the stone, didn’t I?
“Marcel, in the ice maker I already made wind manifest away from the stone. Isn’t it only a matter of time before somebody notices that?”
“Ngh… Aye, that’s so. The ice maker I built for the registration has already been handed over, so somebody noticing is only a matter of time.”
“Then wouldn’t it be better to register the fire-magic tool as well, before somebody else gets there first?”
Marcel sat with that for a while and then gave me a reluctant nod. He had worked it out, I think: once anyone realizes magic can manifest away from the stone, it comes to the same thing anyway.
“Very well. We register this time. But this is the last! From here on, once you have a position of your own, you file them yourself.”
“Yes, I will! And, um, could I keep one of these for myself? It occurred to me that I can’t buy magic tools because I’m not a noble, but you can, can’t you?”
I had taken Marcel at his word when he said he couldn’t sell me anything, because every magic tool goes to the royal magic tool workshop. But there are magic tools in Marcel’s own workshop.
Which made me think that even if I couldn’t buy from Marcel’s workshop, one could presumably be bought at the royal workshop or at a magic tool shop. A commoner couldn’t buy it. A noble could.
“Well. Aye, that’s so. I can’t sell you anything out of my workshop, true enough. But there’s nothing to stop me selling you something I bought at a magic tool shop. That way there’s no difficulty.”
“I knew it! Then could you buy me just the stove?”
“Aye, that’ll do.”
Yes! I’m getting a stove! Marie won’t catch cold, and none of us will be shivering under a pile of heavy cloth!
After that I made the magic-tool parts of a cooking range and a water heater as well, and drew rough plans for the parts that would be ordinary iron. If we were going to register anyway, I thought, I might as well build every fire-magic tool I could think of. Marcel will take the tools and the plans to a workshop he favors, and they will finish them there. Then he will take the finished articles to the royal palace to register. He promised to secure my stove for me too.
“Once all of this is registered I’ll put the money into your account while I’m about it. I’ll take the cost of the magic tool out of it.”
“Yes! Thank you very much! Ah, that reminds me. When I looked at my account the other day there was more in it than the figure you gave me. Why was that?”
“That was a payment for having found a new use for water magic. That’s the difference.”
“They pay for that too? Thank you for passing it all on!”
“I wasn’t the one who discovered it. It’s yours by right.”
He could perfectly well have kept quiet and taken it, and instead he handed it over. Marcel really is a good man. I must have been grinning at him like an idiot, because he apparently found it embarrassing and abruptly started throwing me out.
“Leon, isn’t it about time? You had best be getting home.”
He was flapping a hand at me, go on, off with you.
“Yes, yes. I’ll head home, then.”
I said it with a wry smile of my own, left Marcel’s house, and started walking slowly back toward ours.
A few days after that I went to Marcel’s house and found the stove, the cooking range and the water heater all finished.
“They’re done already!”
“Aye, and registered. There was a nasty moment when they doubted I was really the one developing them, and then an instruction came down from above and it went through at once. Leon. Do you have connections in the upper reaches of the royal palace?”
Marcel fixed me with a long, suspicious stare. I don’t have an acquaintance in the royal palace, and in any case the only nobles I know are the Townsends.
Ah. Although, wasn’t Lord Richard working at the royal palace? Well, I don’t really understand it, and if it got registered, what’s the harm.
“I’m not really sure, but perhaps House Townsend? Anyway, it got registered, so surely that’s all right.”
“Wait! You have connections not only with Lord Frederick but with the whole of House Townsend?!”
“Hm? Didn’t I tell you? I was invited to the mansion the other day.”
“Invited to the mansion?! That is…”
Marcel muttered away under his breath after that. Something about how, as abnormal as I am, of course they would take an interest. Something about whether I was useful material to the Townsend camp. Eventually he seemed to make his peace with it.
“Never mind. Where you’re concerned, the less deeply I think, the better. In any case it’s registered, so I’ve put fourteen platinum coins and five gold into your account, with the price of the stove taken out.”
Something about that does not sit right with me, but arguing that I am not abnormal would carry no weight coming from me, so I let it go.
“Thank you. I’ll check it later.”
“Do that. And how do you mean to get the stove home? Shall I lend you my handcart?”
“I’d be very grateful if you would! I’ll bring it back tomorrow.”
So I borrowed Marcel’s handcart, loaded the stove onto it, threw a cloth over the top and went home.
“I’m home! Dad, could you give me a hand?”
“Welcome back. What’s the matter, Leon?”
“This is heavy. Could you help me carry it inside?”
“Of course, but what is it?”
“It’s a magic tool. This one we can actually use at home.”
The words magic tool stopped him where he stood. As far as he knows, magic tools are things nobles have. I would like a great many more of them in this house, but the cooking range can’t be installed without rebuilding the kitchen, so that’s out. Nobody will do the installation work for a commoner’s house.
Flush toilets and running water are out too, because in the central district they work off a sewer system and we have none. The bath is the same, and on top of that there’s nowhere to put a tub.
Marcel’s workshop has magic tools installed, but the state apparently ran a sewer line to it by special exception. I am extremely envious.
I did once think I could make a purification tool by setting Purification into a magic stone, and when I asked Marcel it turned out not to be feasible. Purification eats a great deal of mana, and putting it into a magic tool doesn’t make it cheaper. Cleaning a toilet once would drain a fully charged magic stone and want it charged twice more on top. That’s no use to anyone.
So magic tools in my house are more or less impossible across the board. A stove, though, works anywhere you put it and needs no building work, which means it works in my house! And Mom and Dad can charge it. I would love to fill the place with magic tools and make it convenient, but that is asking for too much. Being able to use a stove at all is plenty to be grateful for. Though I would still rather like to be a noble. It looks more convenient.
I had got that far in my head when Dad finally came out of his astonishment.
“A-a magic tool, that’s the thing nobles use, isn’t it? Why do you have one, Leon?”
He asked it quietly. So it is better if people don’t know we have a magic tool. It could be stolen, too. We’ll use it in the living room and the bedroom.
“I’m friendly with Marcel, so I was able to get hold of one. Marcel makes magic tools, remember?”
That seemed to satisfy him. Between the nobles I know and everything else, he is gradually getting used to it. Mom and Dad both have a way of deciding not to think too hard about me.
“Well then, let’s get it inside quickly.”
“Yeah!”
Dad and I decided to put it in the bedroom for now. Mom was astonished by the magic tool as well, and seemed to settle once Dad told her Leon had brought it home. I am not sure whether to be pleased that this now settles matters. Well, never mind. Marie didn’t seem to have much idea what a magic tool was, but she was delighted about it being warm.
That night, in the bedroom, I taught Mom and Dad how to use it, and the image to hold while charging it.
“The image when you put the mana in is a small Fireball, made about thirty centimeters above the magic stone.”
They’re both fire attribute, so I expected them to manage it right away. But their mana capacity is low, and nothing came.
“Leon, Mom and Dad haven’t much mana, you know? Neither of them can make a Fireball at all.”
Ah… That does make it harder. But if I taught them the idea of oxygen and drilled the imagery, mightn’t they get there? That image cut my own mana cost enormously.
So I explained oxygen to Mom and Dad and had them practice sharpening the image as far as they could. I was nervous at first, expecting to be asked how on earth I knew such a thing, and when I said I had read it in a book at the noble’s mansion they accepted it instantly. That excuse is convenient. I expect I’ll be using it again.
“Does that make some sort of sense?”
“A little of it, I think. Though what does Mom do with it, sweetheart?”
“I can’t believe any of that is going to let Dad make a Fireball.”
“Let’s just try it! It’s dangerous in here, so let’s go out to the courtyard.”
So the three of us went out to the courtyard. Marie had worn herself out and fallen asleep while we were talking.
“Right, make a Fireball with that image. A little way off your palm, and picture it small.”
They both tried it, gingerly, and they both produced a small Fireball. Amazing! The image really is what matters. If this method spread, the strength of magic in this world would rise a long way. It might make our enemies stronger too, though, so I need to be careful with it.
“Leon, you’re amazing! Mom really can do it!”
“Thank you, Leon. It’ll be useful about the house, and it’s a way of defending ourselves.”
“I’m so glad it worked! I think you can charge the magic tool now, so come back and try!”
We went back to the bedroom and both of them put mana into it, and both managed without any trouble.
“Now we can sleep warm whenever we like.”
“Oh, that is a joy. Mom used to wake in the night all winter, it got so cold.”
“And it should stop us catching colds.”
I was glad they were both so pleased.
“But this is better kept from the people around us. The magic tool, and that way of using magic as well.”
Mom said it with her face gone rather serious.
“The magic especially. That could change a great deal. Leon, you mustn’t teach that to people lightly.”
They’re right, of course. If I spread it, it will be when I can admit to every attribute.
“I know. Will you two keep it secret as well?”
“As if Mom and Dad would ever say a word that put you in danger.”
“That’s right.”
“Mom, Dad. Thank you.”
I think the two of them have noticed by now that I am not the Leon I was. And they say nothing, and go on loving me exactly the same. It makes me happier than I can say. I’ll be careful not to put my family in danger. And I’ll build the strength to protect them. That was what I decided.
We ended the conversation there, turned the stove on and went to bed. The room was warm and the bedding was warm and I dropped straight into a deep sleep. Stoves really are the best…