Spells.
Passive spells had long since proven their usefulness to him. The advantages they had given him while learning and in combat could never be downplayed. Now that he had reached A Rank and solidified his position inside it, he considered if he should purchase additional passive spells.
True Sight and Concealed Aura, even Instant Channeling were unquestionably useful. So of his other spells, like his resistances, were a bit less so. Still, even if they were not used every day, they assisted in his training. The extra drain on his mana had helped raise his body’s mana tolerance. Allowing him to slowly raise how many spells he could cast, how much mana he could use, before he faced mana exhaustion.
Now that he had the knowledge of grimoires he thought perhaps it would be possible to pass these spells on. Certain spells he was hesitant to share, such as Concealed Aura and Mana Absorption. Sure, they were useful, anyone would love to have them, but he did not want to risk them being used against him.
True Sight was one he would not mind sharing with those closest to him. After all, he had already admitted publicly to having a spell that could identify people’s affinities. If he never shared it with anyone then people would begin to question if his school was able to identify affinities and how it would get by without him.
There were a few obstacles in his way still. Such as, could a grimoire hold a passive spell? Would anyone with the passive imprinted in their grimoire be able to use the passive spells or would they be limited to true mages?
These were important questions. Ones he needed answers to and the only way he would be able to get those answers was for soone to make a grimoire and try to make use of these spells.
Having reviewed the basic plans provided by the Iblis, he had already devised a simple security feature to keep magic seals safe, but it was not sothing he could do for soone else. His plan would make grimoire that was linked to the mind of the mage who created it. Therefore, Damion could not simply build one, imprint the spells and let soone test it. However, he could build parts of one and let soone else finish the last steps. This was his current project. He had already acquired all the materials needed and since he needed a break from training, he decided to begin working on the pieces.
According to the schematics provided by Visneer, the grimoire was made up of five parts linked together and governed by a controller. Since these parts were separate, he could create them independently and later the end user could compile them into one artifact. The only part Damion felt he could not craft was the Link, the portion of the artifact that linked to the user’s mind to provide the magic seals for spell casting. This was a crucial part and was what allowed a grimoire to be useful. Without it, a grimoire would just be a fancy repository for magic seals. It was also the part that he planned to modify with his security feature to make sure it could only link the mage who created it.
First Damion began working on the Repository for the grimoire. This was where the various magic seals would be stored. According to the designs, the Repository was the heart of the artifact and what it was made out of would affect all the other parts. Many of the examples provided by Visneer were books or devices similar to tablets on Nerotath. However, the schematics showed they were not limited to that design. A grimoire could be a bracelet, a necklace, or other accessory.
The difficulty of course was, the smaller an artifact, the harder it was to create. Sothing the size of a book was easy; there was plenty of room for all the necessary enchantnts. A ring, on the other hand, required expert precision to make the enchantnts tiny and to make the artifact in layers. One incredibly thin piece of enchanted tal hosting enchantnts on top of another.
This was not an unknown technique to Damion; most magic rings were crafted in such ways. There simply was not enough surface area on them to hold useful enchantnts. But it also was not sothing he had actually done himself. The artifacts he had crafted were bulky and boxlike. Only thanks to the Magic System optimizing them were they made more compact, fixing the flaws he had left and granting him the reputation of a genius artificer.
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Of course, he could still do that with the grimoire. He just had to create a working one first. But the conundrum was, if he created a working one, he could not give it to soone else, since for it to be working it had to be linked to him.
‘System, if I create a grimoire from these schematics, if you optimize it with an artifact upgrade, will it be able to link with anyone?’
{Affirmative. The limitation to form the link during the crafting process is to prevent mass production of grimoires that can be used to spread dangerous spells.}
‘Is it possible for to not link with the grimoire and still complete it following these plans? Or will the link be reset on the upgrade if I form the link?’
{Analyzing…}
{Flaws in the creation will be corrected on purchase of an upgrade. Links will not be broken through the upgrade process, but it is not necessary for host to link with the artifact during the creation of the artifact.}
‘Excellent,’ Damion thought to himself as he resud work.
As long as he could complete the artifact, he could then gift it to Elicia and see if she is able to make use of a couple of his passive spells. Since he no longer needed to worry about the grimoire not functioning if he did not form the link he could build the artifact and let the Magic System fix its flaws.
Aside from the Repository and Link, there was the Protection Layer. Depending on the design of the artifact this could be as simple as a cover plate, to hide enchantnt glyphs or as complex as enchantnts on the final layer of the artifact that acted as active security. While the Iblis did not include a great many enchantnts for the Protection layer, since doing so would make it easier for future humans to pry into their own secrets, there were still a few. Among those security features available were enchantnts that could cause the Repository to self-destruct should it fall into the hands of soone else. Damion did not think he needed to go that far, but he was able to create an enchantnt to simply have the stored magic seals be wiped in the event of tampering. He felt this was enough of a security feature for now.
Next was the Battery. Magic artifacts needed mana to power them. Like most artifacts Damion had seen, the plans for the grimoire included a small mana gathering enchantnt to pull in the mana required to function as well as a small enchantnt that could hold a charge to keep the grimoire functioning for so ti in a mana starved environnt.
The Reader was the final individual piece. It functioned much like a simple cara, capturing a magic seal and storing it in the Repository for use. Unlike the scanning features of his auto-mapper or body scanner, the Reader had only a short range and was not designed for long distance surveillance.
Lastly was what tied everything altogether, the Brain. This part of the artifact that controlled all the other pieces, allowing the artifact to properly function. Without the Brain, the rest of the artifact was just half functional pieces. This was the part that tied everything in together.
Even with the detailed schematics and having prepared the materials beforehand, it took Damion three days to complete his artifact. Once he was done, since he could not test it without creating the link to himself, he imdiately had the Magic System begin an upgrade.
‘System, purchase Upgrade Non-System Artifact and upgrade the grimoire.’
{Affirmative.}
{Analyzing…}
{Cost to upgrade to C Rank 80 Credits.}
{Would you like to proceed?}
‘Yes.’
{Affirmative.}
A mont later Damion was looking at the grimoire that had changed from a boxy-looking necklace to an elegant necklace. His boxy design had been refined into a round pendant no more than six centiters in diater with a chain for wearing. True Sight inford him of the now C Rank grimoire was an unbonded artifact for storing spells and was quite satisfied that it showed a zero of ten spell slots used.
The schematics of the grimoires provided by the Iblis did not list a limit to the number of spells that could be stored, but there of course was one. The limit was based entirely on the quality of the Repository. If at C Rank it was limited to ten magic seals, he had a feeling that at B Rank or A Rank that limit was going to be high enough that it was inconsequential.
‘System, purchase Upgrade Non-System Artifact and upgrade the grimoire to A Rank.’
{Affirmative.}
{Analyzing…}
{Cost to upgrade to A Rank 750 Credits.}
{Would you like to proceed?}
‘Yes.’
{Affirmative.}
The resulting A Rank grimoire did not change much in appearance. The silvery mithril it had been made from had shifted to a composite of mithril and aurichalcum. The greenish hue of the rarer and stronger tal created a hypnotic effect on those who looked upon it. Where the biggest change was in the number of magic seals the grimoire could now hold. At B Rank it had jumped to twenty, but at A Rank it was now fifty. That was on par with how many spells he could have with the assistance of the Magic System.
Seeing how the effectiveness of the spell jumped so high, Damion decided against upgraded grimoires for anyone except those he absolutely trusted.
For now, Damion stored the artifact away and resud his training to raise his magic power. Once he left the labyrinth he would let Elicia link with it and then he could share a few of his passive spells to see if they could be used by mages with locked affinities.
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