Daily Life with Three Systems: Chapter 28

I step into the guild with a pep in my step. 

My eyes sweep the guild hall. 

No Makarov. Huh. 

I walk over to the bar. "Hey, Enno. Where's Makarov?" 

"Oh, he's in his office." She gestures towards the back of the guild hall. 

"Makarov... not drinking? Hell must have frozen over." I snort as I turn and walk away. "Thanks, Enno." 

I make my way to the door and knock on it briefly. 

"Come in!" 

The door swings open as I step inside, Makarov is at his desk looking perturbed. 

His eyes slowly rise to meet my own. "Ah. Andy my boy. It's been a while. Need something?" 

"Ah... well, I wanted to show you the things I've made so far and ask for a little advice but... you look worried, Master. What's wrong?" 

"Bah, it's nothing my boy, the man waves off." 

"If it has you annoyed it isn't nothing." I scoff as I step forwards and take a seat in one of the chairs across from him. "What can I do to help, Master? I've got divination so realistically I could just snap my fingers and be all 'show me the location of the solution to this problem'." 

"You can do that?" Makarov blinks. 

"No." I shake my head. "But I COULD say for instance, help you track down something that you know would solve whatever issue you have is." 

"It's a... few things, my boy." The man sighs. "Firstly, I just got word that my son... created a guild... seemingly only to spite me called Raven Tail." 

"Oh." I mutter. "Want me to... track him down and beat him up?"  

"No... no..." He waves off. "Don't bother yourself with it. He was an S-Class before I kicked him out of the guild a quite strong one, at that. I wouldn't want to send you off to fight him for such a petty reason like a name. He hasn't done anything that would warrant such a response yet. The magic council is quite harsh on guild conflicts." 

"Alright." I shrug. "Want me to tell you where the guild is?" 

"It's truly not worth the effort." Makarov shakes his head. "I'd rather forget about him... such a disappointment, that boy. I do not know where I went wrong." 

"Then what else are you having problems with, Master?" I ponder aloud. 

"Well... it's just..." His finger taps on the desk. "Jose is being..." 

"A total prick?" I suggest. 

"A right bastard, yes." Makarov nods. 

"What did he do this time?" I sigh. 

"He seems to have sought out every manufacturer that Fairy Tail uses to produce its merchandise and has signed exclusivity contracts with them... I didn't notice until I began to ask around to get some winter clothing being made." 

"Master. You do realize I am a CLOTH mage, right?" I huff. "Observe." 

With a wave of my hand a tin mannequin appears in the room. 

"So... winter-wear, right?" I ponder aloud as I stand. 

"Thread make!" 

Wool begins to weave around the mannequin within moments I've made a basic white and blue festive sweater. 

"Rias forced me to read up on a bunch of clothing, fashion, and style books and believe it or not I get A LOT of practice making clothes." 

"Everything you've seen me wear, or the girls wear was made by me." I point to my chest proudly.  

The man now has a calculating look on his face. "How many can you make? And what exactly can you make?" 

With a flourish, fuzzy gloves cover the tin man's hands, a beanie appearing atop its head. A scarf wraps around its neck. 

An iron belt buckle with a fairy tail symbol on it appears in-hand. 

"Regretfully I can't make leather, and this belt buckle's iron instead of steel so it's slightly less durable. As for how many I can make? It kind of depends on the complexity of what I need to make. The Fairy Tail symbol is a little complex so to make one like this..." 

A large fairy tail emblem begins to stitch itself to the front of the sweater.  

It doesn't take that long, about as long as the sweater itself. 

"About thirty seconds?" I mutter. "How many are you looking for?" 

"About a thousand." The man mutters. 

"A Thousand?" I ponder. "I could have that done in... about a week maybe?" 

"A week?!" The man shouts. 

"I am veeeery efficient master." I smile proudly. 

"But." I raise a finger. "I want paid like this is a job on the job board, because, well, that's kind of what it is." 

"Oh, of course. I wouldn't allow you to work for nothing Andrew." The man shakes his head. "I'll give you... how does forty percent of what I plan to sell them sound? This way the guild can still make a small profit if some don't sell by summer and we can offer them half-off." 

"That's fine by me, master... oh, and you should be aware. Since these are made from maker magic, the threads are actually quite a bit tougher than your average sweater. 

I allow the tin-man to fade and catch the clothing. Offering them to Makarov who seems to examine them. 

"So what should I do about sizes? What sort of designs do you plan on using. Just what are you looking for with Fairy Tail's winter line of clothing?" 

"We can talk about that in a minute... you came here for some advice and to show me something, right?" The man places the clothes to the side turning his attention to me. 

"Oh! Right!" I blink. 

"Tell me what you think of these. Be brutally honest." With a dull flash I summon the six bolt rings. "These are elemental bolt rings. These have two modes, the first fires numerous bolts of magic of a set strength as long as you put magical energy into it. Say for instance a c-class mage could dump a fairly large portion into it and create three but you and I could put maybe a percent or less in and we'd get dozens. The second mode gathers all that energy into a single bolt. They also home in on whatever you are targeting via Light Ecriture." 

"You want me to be brutally honest, lad, right?" 

"I do. If you have any ideas on how I could improve I'll take them." I nod. 

"Well... To be honest I can't see much wrong with these." His eyes take on an appreciative gleam. "It's a little amateurish in some places, but you haven't been learning for long. Refinement and skill will come with more time. Beyond that I'm... intrigued how you got these runes into the metal." 

"I used Light Ecriture to soften gemstones, at which point I used it kind of like clay to stuff in all the runes I carved beforehand." 

"I see." The man mutters. "I can't say I know much about making magic items, but I have been in a few magic shops in my time. These would be some quite high-priced magic rings. Anywhere from five hundred thousand to a few million jewel. They're really not bad for a first attempt after a few months." 

He slips one on and with a dull glow a single light bolt appears. 

He holds out his other hand and stops it dead in its tracks. 

"It has great mana-efficiency... I'd put it in the upper range, I estimated." He nods after a few moment. "I'm impressed." 

I scratch the back of my head with a small smile. 

"So. What's it you need help with? Something to do with crafting?" He places the ring back on the table and dismisses the light bolt with a wave of his hand. "Like I said, I've got no experience in artificy but I'll help if I can." 

"it's more help with a spell." I rotate my wrist. "I'm try to make use of this... concept I've heard of before." 

"Basically, there are five elements that I want to use." I conjure a few tiny magic circles in the air. "The basic Idea to this is that I've got Fire, Water, Wood, Earth, and Metal." 

"I see." The man mutters. "How do you seek to combine these elements?" 

"Wood feeds fire. Fire becomes earth. Earth has metal. Metal purifies water, and water nourishes wood." I cycle through the five magic circles. "I'm just having issues getting it to, well, work that way." 

The old man rubs his mustache in thought. "Yes... you've got the building blocks of a spell here you're just having trouble getting it to do what you want. Have you given thought onto what you want this spell to do?" 

I simply shrug. "The general idea I had was to-" 

I drag my finger along the outside. "Start here, at the element strong to whatever magic I wanted. Then go all the way around until I get to the targeted element, then take that element, draw it inwards and... I don't know? Fire a massive laser or something similar?" 

"it'd also allow for defense against these magics as well, as water quenches fire, water is obstructed by earth, earth is depleted by wood, metal cuts through wood, and fire makes metal more fragile." 

I draw a star around the five magic circles. 

"I... think I remember seeing a book on converting magics in the guild library." The man mutters. 

My eyes light up. "Oh! Alright, then. I'll take a look as soon as we finish talking about the clothing I need to make." 

[Split] 

Let's see here... 

"Wood-Firebolt." 

I layer two magic circles, a hum leaving my lips as a much larger gout of fire is shot from the frontmost magic circle. 

I can see magical power leeched from the backmost magic circle. 

It's... not quite what I would get had I simply doubled the strength of the firebolt. 

But... if I were to... loop it? 

There's no way in hell the spell would grow infinitely strong, but it should knock off quite a bit of the magical cost if I manage to loop it up. 

I think I've finally got a finalized design. 

"Hey, Andy." A voice behind me calls out causing me to turn.  

I glance over my shoulder. 

"Oh, hey Natsuki." I wave. "Need something?" 

"Master Makarov and the guild are starting to prepare for the harvest festival in a month... I was kind of wondering if... you'd like to come and help?" She touches her fingers together. 

"Hmmm."  hum leaves my lips. "I'd like to, Natsuki... but... well... I'm getting kind of close to this new spell. I can feel it." 

"Oh..." She whispers. 

"But. That doesn't mean that I won't do ANYTHING to help." I note. "I've got a celestial spirit that can do flower arrangements. Tell Master Makarov that and I'll let her have free range of my magical power to make some flowers and stuff... in fact-" 

"Open! Gate of the Rose! Rosa!" 

With a bright flash a small girl appears. A child. She wears a long white dress like she's waiting to throw flower petals around at a wedding. 

She blinks twice and looks around. "Hello! Do you need something of me, Master?" 

"Fairy Tail, my guild, is preparing for a festival. Can you go with Natsuki here and show Master Makarov a little of what you can do?" 

"Ooooooh!" The girl's eyes sparkle. "Okaaaaay!" 

She turns and skips off, causing Natsuki to blink and quickly follow after her. 

"Oh." I call over my shoulder. "And I WILL be going to the festival this year. I missed it last year and the year before, but this time I will be going... want to join me?" 

"O-Of course!" The pink haired girl grins. 

[Split] 

The air has a mild chill to it. 

The harvest festival. 

My hands slip into my hoodie pockets, a small smile on my lips as I walk through the fairgrounds, Natsuki at my side. 

We are both watching Koneko darting from food stand to food stand. 

A literal blackhole for food. 

Apparently, she's been saving some of the money from her jobs all year SOLELY for today. 

Good for her. 

She had saved up a hundred thousand jewel for today... and, well, by the end of today that money is going to be gone one way or another. 

How she can spend a thousand dollars on ONLY food, I genuinely have no idea. 

But, well, she can. 

My teeth harden and sharpen as I tap into the barest bits of my takeover and bite down on a candied apple. 

It's been a long time since I've had a candied apple personally.  

Its nostalgic. 

Natsuki is similar to Koneko in a way... in that the sense that she saved up money for today. 

But while Koneko's will solely be used to feed her gluttony, I have no doubts that Natsuki will grab anything that catches her fancy. Be it clothes, jewelry, or maybe even books. 

Honestly... I should probably not eat a second candied apple... I DO want to try some of the other foods. 

Fuck. 

I want a funnel cake. 

Actually. 

"Open: Gate of the Maiden!" With a flash Virgo appears. 

"Do you need something, master?" The woman asks. 

"I was just wondering if you'd like to join us here at the festival today." I gesture around. 

Her eyes light up. "Of course!" 

My eyes stray to the flowers on threads draped between buildings. 

"Actually... I should probably summon Rosa as well. She helped out here, after all." I mutter under my breath. 

[Split] 

So. A pink haired maid, a flower girl, a fox girl, a chronic shut-in, a chef, and a cat girl walk through a harvest festival. 

I had invited Vulpecula as well as Rosa. 

I would have asked if Lyra wanted to join us but today isn't one of my 'summon' days. 

If she wanted me to summon her for festivities, she should have said something when we made our contract. That's on her. 

We all watch large floats travel down the road, Rias is stood atop one in a vibrant red dress that is adorned with roses. It seems to be sort of a 'gothic' vampire-esque float with a tall tower in the back, where Valerie wears a vampire-like cloak and is surrounded by bats. 

They are seemingly distributing bouquets. 

Rias' eyes brighten upon seeing me, she promptly tosses one to me- which I catch effortlessly thanks to my Sharpshooter essence- then blows a kiss at me, an impish smile on her lips. 

I can feel Koneko's and Natsuki's stare on the side of my head. 

Vulpecula is staring at the flowers, though. There's a small pout on her lips, ears drooping slightly. 

I reach down and offer the bouquet to her with a gentle smile. "Here you go, Senko." 

"It's Vulpecula! Not Senko!" She pouts, but regardless she takes the flowers as I pat her head. 

Rosa just looks thrilled to be here. 

"It's... so pretty!" She gasps. 

She's right... a torrent of flower petals seems to drift from the floats; I can see my fellow wizards shooting flames and sparks up into the air as they pass by. 

This was... fun... I do have to admit that. 

[Split] 

We sit in the grass, just outside my home, gazing up at the night sky. Motes of light seem to rise from the city, like paper lanterns. 

Rosa and Senko had gotten quite tired after today's festivities so I had sent them home. 

Now it's just me, Natsuki, Koneko and Virgo. 

We watch a streak of light shoot towards the sky. 

BOOM 

Sparks bloom outwards like a flower, the night sky is tinted blue for a brief moment before they shift into another shape, leaving glowing streaks in the sky before eventually fading. 

"I have to say it..." I admit after a moment. "Magical fireworks are better than their mundane counterparts." 

"Yeah." Natsuki whispers. 

Pop-CRACKLE 

"Hey... uh... Andy..." Natsuki mutters under her breath. 

"Yeah?" 

"..." 

"..." 

"Is this the part where you-" 

She leans forwards, placing a quick kiss on my lips before quickly looking away. "I-I'm glad you came with us to the festival..." 

I watch Rias and Valerie slowly walking up from the town below, following the twisted and curved path to our house. 

"Yeah..." A smile slowly blooms on my face. "I... I am too..." 

"..." 

"Total cliché though. 'oh this is the part where I confess to senpai at the school festival but it's drowned out by the sound of the fireworks'." I smile brightly, closing my eyes and clasping my hands together. 

"H-HEY!" The girl pouts, her blush growing as I continue to tease her. 

[Split] 

I gaze over five glistening rings, my eyes have dark circles around them, hair messy, my shirt slightly stained. 

Well. 

I finished. 

In record time, too. 

I suppose that this time I ACTUALLY had an idea of what I wanted. Plus the practice from the bolt rings helped out as I was making these five new rings. 

one month to design a spell that draws on all of the elements to function- and to finish Makarov's order as I squeezed it in here and there- then three months to carve the rings, taking a break here and there to have fun at the Harvest festival. 

An ecriture wall is surrounding the clearing- mainly because I have no idea how destructive this will be. 

I slip on the five rings, a massive golem made of iron sprouting from the ground in front of me. 

Shooting this at a simple pillar of metal wouldn't sit right with me. 

"Let's start with... wood..." I whisper. 

I hold out a hand, five magic circles appearing in a pentagon shape. 

Wood to Fire to earth to metal to water to wood. 

You can visibly see the elemental magic being transferred between the five circles in a flaming, blooming, crumbling, metallic, and bubbling line. 

A green bead of energy forms in the center of the five magic circles. 

BWEEEEEE 

A green wave of energy shoots out at high speeds, crashing into the metal golem. 

It staggers back, metallic body deforming under the weight of the spell. Plantlife begins to coil around its torso and down its limbs. 

Eventually I cut power to the rings, gazing up at the golem. 

It's like I had taken a massive hammer to it. The chest has been punched inwards like I had sat a massive bowl on its chest and filled it full of some incomprehensibly dense material. 

Cracks cascade throughout the golem, but ironically it is held together by wood and vine. 

The golem slowly fixes itself as I let out a low hum. 

Wood is weak to metal, soooo let's see what happens if I use what metal is weak to? 

This time I use less energy, conjuring the five magic circles yet again. 

The shrill ringing of the beam echoes out as an orange beam shoots out. 

I watch the golem begin to droop, body becoming red, then white. 

Eventually after about ten seconds of exposure it begins to melt. 

By twelve, one arm thuds to one side, another to the other and the beam passes cleanly through where it had been before. 

That... 

Took very little magical energy. 

The way these five rings work is utterly fascinating. 

You input a little magic to get it to start then the energy grows as you cycle it. Said extra energy is added to the beam in the center of the five elemental circles. 

Now, that may sound like it produces infinite magic, but... that's not exactly the case... 

Ah... 

How to explain it... 

It's... 

Well... it's kind of based off my 'spirit bomb calling' spell where it drags in the nearby ethernano to supercharge itself. 

Yeah! A spirit bomb would be a good way to describe it. 

A kamehameha-like spirit bomb of elemental energy.  

The longer I let it run... charging like a spirit bomb... the stronger the eventual spell becomes. 

You can of course jump start it with your own magical energy, but theoretically you'd be able to shoot it with barely any magic at all. 

And you likely could create quite an impressive blast if you let it charge up for five... maybe ten minutes. 

Less depending on the saturation of ethernano. 

This is the first time I've ever held an object where I'm like 'yeah, this could have been a weapon to base an entire arc of an anime around' and that is... kind of humbling. 

Well, besides Virgo. 

But she only got like an episode. 

Now... 

For the moment of truth... 

Create the Five-Element Rings: {+180 Points} 

"Fuck yeah! That's what I'm talking about! That's what it's all about! Wooooo!" 

Rewards time! 

My eyes glint as I rub my hands together. 

I had eighty points originally- up from seventy eight from all my ofuda making, a prerequisite to make quite literally ANYTHING out of dragon bone with Fornax- so... 

Two hundred and sixty points. 

All of this effort. 

This trial and error. 

It has all been worth it! 

And I STILL have two months left to make stuff... 

Magic Item Creation: 
Well, you've learned quite a few things over the past three years. Perhaps it's time you put it to the test. Make a magic item! The stronger the better. Use that brain of yours to create an item to rival that of the artificers in this world! 

Objective:  
Create at least one magic Item: [x] 

Bonus Objective: 
Granted 'Bonus Points' depending on several factors such as the overall 'strength' of the magic item(s), the quantity, Scale, and the overall 'potential' for said magic item. Thus, creating something that functions like a celestial spirit, even one that is weaker than a copper spirit, would be worth a great amount of 'bonus points'. 

Rewards: (Pick one of 4) 
One Random 'Epic' 'Base Modification'. 
One 'Chat Connection Selection' of your choosing 
One random book on any magical 'Crafting' profession such as arcane blacksmithing or alchemy. 
One Random 'Crafting' 'Base Modification' 

Bonus Rewards: 
1 Point: 
100,000 Jewel 
1 Pound of any 'Non-Magical' material 

5 Points: 
One random book on magic (Weighted towards the 'Weaker' side of magics) 
One random 'average' magic item (About on par with a pair of x32 Gale Force reading glasses) 

10 Points: 
1 book on magic of your choice (That is below a certain threshold of power, such as 'Fire Magic' or 'Iron-Make' but not something like 'Fairy Law') 
5 random book on magic (Weighted towards the 'Weaker' side of magics) 
One Random magic item.  

25 Points: 
One random book on magic (Weighted towards the 'Medium' side of magics) 
One Random 'Base Modification' of 'Rare' tier or lower. 
Shop Upgrade (Farmer's Market) 
Chat Upgrade (Calls and Face-Time) 

50 Points: 
50 random books on magic (Weighted towards the 'Weaker' side of magics) 
1 Additional Reward from the basic list. 
10 Celestial Spirit Keys of any rarity (But heavily weighted to Copper) 
Up to 10 books of 'Magical Crafting' (In which a rarer, more obscure, and more powerful crafting profession would require more books to give you an extensive overlook of the magic, with each 'book' truly only granting a few dozen pages worth of knowledge. 
Chat connection selection 

100 Points: 
Sharpshooter's Essence. 
10 Random books on magic. (With the weakest possible being 'average' magics 
One Black celestial spirit key of your choice, even from among the broken ones. 
One Item from a connected world (Within Reason) 
One 'Chat Group Creation' Token. 

Time Limit: 2 months, 1 day, 3 hour, 1 minute, 59 seconds (The time left until the end of the year) 

Sooooo. 

What do I want? 

Well. Chat group. That's one. 

I watch the option get crossed out just like the sharpshooter's essence. One hundred and eighty left. 

As for the other one hundred point rewards... they don't really call to me. 

Sure the black keys are sort of interesting, but... 

I'll just find them on my own. 

Figure out a way to fix the broken ones... on my own... 

As for fifty... the fifty random books is kind of calling to me. 

The extra reward would be neat to get that 'epic' base modification'. The ten celestial spirit keys are... 

Gonna be real, probably the worst thing on the entire list even if it's theoretically possible to get like... a platinum spirit. 

Magical crafting would give me something mildly interesting and... I'm not exactly looking for a chat connection right now. I've got the better version. 

I'll talk with the others about it.