Damian descended the stony stairs of the ancient site, his steps deliberate as he made his way down. Toph was finally back on his feet, thanks to the potion of stamina and healing Damian had given him. He was good as new. Though not without tackling Damian in a flurry for a while before finally settling down.
Unwilling to rush back to the academy the same way they had come, Damian opted to take a wooden ferry to the front of the island. The serene sea, though accompanied by a biting cold wind, provided a refreshing change of scenery. Even Toph seemed to enjoy the short trip, bundled snugly in Damian's arms beneath his cloak.
'Is fear of heights common in elephants?' Damian wondered idly, his thoughts drifting.
The diary he'd been poring over weighed heavily on his mind. Its contents were troubling, but given how long ago the events had taken place—and the fact that the supposed Demon King had been defeated—he assumed everything had turned out "okayish." He had yet to read it in its entirety, but the pages he had skimmed were full of melancholy and unease.
The diary's owner clearly hadn't wanted to join the Hero's party, complaining about it multiple times. Yet their feelings toward the group seemed contradictory—tinged with envy, resentment, and perhaps admiration. Was it jealousy? A yearning to belong? Or simply the musings of someone from a sheltered upbringing? It was hard to say. Whatever the mix of emotions, it was all tangled together in an uncomfortable knot.
Then there was the question of secrecy. Why hide the diary in such a complex way? Damian had checked the enormous five-layered, ever-changing runic circle before leaving the site, and it was still intact. The blackened, erased lines on the pages were another mystery. The person themselves would not do that to their personal diary, meaning there was someone else who had got their hands on the thing. After hiding whatever it was that they were trying to hide, they put it back as it is.
But how? Activating the runic array without completing it—and leaving it unchanged—should have been impossible. The original mana signature was still there. The mana used in these blackened line spells—it had to be a spell of some sort—felt different. If the spell was active, it means the caster was still alive somewhere.
"Wheee!" Toph's jubilant trumpeting broke Damian's chain of thought.
"Ah," he muttered, realizing they had reached the stony shore. He paid the ferryman and stepped off onto the wooden deck, Toph perched happily in his arms. They navigated the bustling streets of Edgehaven, weaving through the crowd as Damian made his way back to the academy. Toph let out another excited trumpet, his keen nose catching the scent of steak cooking at a roadside eatery. Unable to resist, Damian stopped to grab a bite for both of them.
The evening light bathed the city in a warm crimson glow, painting a scene far more enchanting than the starkness of night or the glaring brightness of day.
No point musing over forgotten pasts, Damian thought as he finished his meal. He had too much to do. His true journey as a runesmith awaited, and while he'd made plenty of plans, he hadn't committed any to paper. He hesitated to document everything, wary of the possibility that the elves might search his belongings when he wasn't in his room. He didn't want people to know what his limits were. A little display of strength and innovation was fine, but no one should know everything.
Back at the academy, Damian decided to retire to his room instead of visiting the newly acquired runic forge. Tomorrow would be the start of his work. Today, he had done enough. Before returning, he had painstakingly copied the five-layered, ever-changing runic circle. Though his eyes had watered from the effort, It kept changing so an accurate copy was impossible to make, he had managed to capture the sections that stayed constant. Activating it, however, was another matter entirely—he still had no idea how the purple element worked. Or if it was an element at all.. That was another anamoly he had gotten nowhere close to.
Toph and Damian had eaten their fill, so they skipped dinner. After a relaxing bath and some work on his runic circle combination papers, Damian fell asleep next to a curled-up Toph.
A simple end to their weird day.
He did get up way earlier though, as they had fallen asleep much earlier too. Toph was still curled up though, but then again he was always sleeping. Using the extra time, After freshening up, he headed straight to his new lab. It wasn't bigger than the 20 x 20 meter room, most of which was taken up by the runic forge. Damian had seen the type before—It could be powered with both mana stones and a Pathfinder's mana.
He began by clearing out the items he wouldn't need, storing them in a low-quality spatial storage tool. To organize his workspace, he conjured wooden storage units and adorned the walls and ceiling with greenery and wood for an aesthetic touch. He couldn't sense any hidden spells or enchantments, but he liked to go the extra mile.
Next, Damian turned his attention to the lab's door. Using some of his own steel, he reinforced the wooden door with a thick inner layer of iron. This required creating an entire steel door frame, but it was a worthwhile test for the forge. Inside hinges and a peephole completed the design.
To weld the steel, Damian used his high-intensity concentrated fire rune—a makeshift substitute for an oxy-acetylene flame. Though it consumed a significant amount of mana, it achieved the necessary temperatures. It wasn't perfect, but it was the best he had.
With the door assembled, only the runic imbuement remained. The best time for it according to the books, and his own experience, was when the metal was bright hot white, it was much easier for mana threads to pass through and also to reach the deepest part. However, since the door was an amalgamation of parts, he decided to save that step for later.