“Robbery!” I laugh to myself.

  Stalking down the street with my selling license in hand, I can’t help but wonder why I’m so determined to grace this backwater market with my wares. If I had to source rare materials like most workers, I’d never turn a profit with the price they charged me.

  Annoyance and amusement churns within me, frothing my dense mana into an agitated, foamy state that’s primed for an explosion. Taking a deep breath, I let out the mild frustration before I scare off half the marketplace with my emotions leaking through my Domain. Chuckling at the mental image of everyone in a mile radius screaming and running about like stampeding cattle, I take a breath and let go of the complicated emotions.

  Still. The price of renting a stall is downright criminal. There’s no way that the vendors are making enough off their meager sales to be profitable at those prices. Plenty of customers wander through the marketplace, but I haven’t detected any snarls in the flows of significance that usually indicate a significant transfer of value, so something else must be up.

  Half a year ago, I wouldn’t have noticed anything other than mana through my [Arcane Domain]. That brings a surge of joy to me. Many months at the Orpheus practicing advanced mana imbuing and observing other crafters at work bore fruit: I’m able to track more than mana, and any give and take of value, emotion, or magical potency now lingers in my Domain.

  My awareness has expanded to incorporate all forms of energy, whether the underlying animating powers of the world, or the more ephemeral connections that blossom between people when emotions run deep. The more casual the interaction, the more tenuous the link that forms. It’s little wonder that nothing major shows up based on the quality of goods and services I’ve observed in this market.

  Unless the quoted price for a stall is incorrect, I realize with a groan. Like an idiot, I paid it without thinking, so incensed by the boss’s mistreatment of his customers and employees alike that I just wanted to get out of his presence. Maybe I’ve gotten used to the absurd prices at the Orpheus without noticing how far I’ve strayed from my original conception of normality. Ember would die of embarrassment on the spot if she saw how I didn’t barter the marketplace administrator down to a reasonable price.

  Pride spikes through me at that, replacing my earlier irritation. Huh. Maybe I’m just really good at earning money, I realize, strangely pleased to find that I no longer care about how much I paid. It’s just a pile of coins, in the end. Evidence I’ve moved up in the world. I’ve even got bodyguards in my retinue, I think with a chuckle.

  Right! That reminds me. I need to find a [Healer] for the injured guard.

  Quick as thought, my connection to the falcon overhead snaps into focus. I map out the market through its sharp eyes. In the north-west corner, the familiar sigil of the Menders shows up on the banners of a stone-and-mortar building that’s more ornate and well established than the temporary stalls surrounding it.

  Typical Mender grandiosity.

  Spreading out my Domain with a light touch, I locate the [Spear Commander]. He blazes like the sun compared with the flickering candles of less powerful individuals. He’s at a weapons stall, giving off a miasma of disapproval that’s thick enough to choke on in my Domain.

  I direct the falcon to fly down toward Nicanor, who notices it instantly, and circle the bird around him twice before alighting on the injured [Honorbound Bodyguard]’s shoulder.

  Well, his non-injured shoulder.

  Falcon tilts his head, gesturing the direction of the Mender facility. Watching through his eyes is disorienting, since the overlapping images from my real eyes, the falcon’s eyes, and the sensory overload of my Domain all vie for supremacy, but I figure it’s a good training exercise.

  Thankfully, my request to follow seems to come through after a time. The trio trails after the glass bird as it leads them toward the [Healer]. My guide work complete, I release the active sensory connection to the falcon and resume my search for the stall I’ve retained.

  Referencing my vendor’s license again to remind myself of the stall number they allotted me for the day, I chart my path based on the map they provided to find my location. I can make artifacts that would beggar that administrator anytime. Why worry what gnats like him think? That puts a smile back on my face.

  Actually following the map to the empty stall soon erases the smile, however. Navigation should be one of my strong points, given my Domain, but things aren’t adding up. Perhaps the boss is messing with me in petty revenge for scaring him. In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have been so heavy-handed with my Domain.

  The buzz of conversation softens around me, giving way to relative silence, and I glance around at the dwindling crowds in suspicion. Fewer people shift out of my way, nudged aside by the subtle pressure of my Domain. The goods for sale are simpler here, on the outskirts of the market, and I’ll have to hustle to gain customers.

  I examine the passersby more closely. Clothes are threadbare. Faces seem pinched. Did they send me on a fool’s errand? This isn’t where they should put a master of a craft. For what I paid, they ought to put me in a prime sales spot. Honestly, most places would pay me to set up shop in the middle of the market and draw in a crowd, not demand payment to shove me to the fringes.

  Come to think of it, I’ve passed nearly half a dozen empty stalls without a vendor selling anything. Something strange is definitely going on here.

  Ten minutes of confused switchbacks later, I arrive at my destination. It may be out of the way, but it’s spacious enough for a few tools. I unroll the closed awning and pin my temporary selling license to the side like they requested, then head to the low foothills behind the market and start gathering rocks to transmute into glass.

  Half an hour later, I have a respectable pile of stones almost as tall as I am, proof that I am far stronger and faster than I used to be. Nicanor’s training is clearly paying off.

  Satisfied, I clap the dust and dirt off my hands. The stage is almost set for my show. I’ll need a lot of glass to make a mock crucible and workbench, which will be necessary for the Linas to work with me.

  I want to make a tidy profit, but I’d rather not do all the work myself. Plus, I need to help them both improve their imbuing.

  Most people wouldn’t be able to make a studio built out of glass, but if I treat the glass for heat resistance and fold the concept of unbreakable into its conception, then I can mimic ceramic or metal just fine. Crucible, benches, even a marver should work well once I’m done. Magic can overcome almost any material deficiency, and it’s high time I develop as a [Mage].

  Imbuing one or two top-tier items will raise the prestige of my shop. Free-forming glass with nothing more than my willpower will set off enough rumors to keep people coming long after I’m ready to take a break.

  Perfect. Word of mouth will advertise better than anything else.

  Anyone who knows glass will realize how unusual my impromptu studio is when I get my crucible up to temperature in minutes, rather than days. That alone might draw some attention, but I’ve got far bigger plans.

  No one is nearby, according to my Domain. Mindful of the artifact Nicanor’s bodyguards have that can hide their presence from me, I glance through my falcon’s senses, confirming with the bird’s-eye-view that no one is lurking. No audience yet.

  Well. I can fix that.

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  Mana surges within me, boiling and bubbling as I rotate the energy faster and faster, purposely letting the excess leak. My Domain expands, washing over shoppers a few avenues away. Even those without mana sensitivities should feel a strange prickling sensation with the amount of power I’m venting.

  Before long, a few worried individuals show up. Most are confused, but one well-dressed man with a monocle—an oddity on the fringes of the market—is staring at me like I’ve grown a second head. He’s squinting at me, looking half intrigued and half terrified, which tells me he’s likely got a [Mage]-adjacent Class, or at least decent magical training.

  I meet his gaze, grin, and begin the spectacle. Brimming over with mana, I activate my new bundles of Skills, while also combining runic elements from several unrelated structures. It’s more difficult picking and choosing this way, but my legacy Skill from Scalpel helps. Only a few of the runic arrays from [Vitrification], [Sanctuary], my [Arcane Domain] are necessary for what I have in mind, though every Skill in my arsenal is working in concert for this performance.

  Tendrils of mana plunge into the ground—ten, twenty, fifty of the twisted braids of raw power—as I pour more and more of my immense Capacity into the working. Lifting dirt and rock through the power of my Domain isn’t what I usually use it for, but it’s good practice imposing my will on the world.

  Pushing even harder, I reshape the earth beneath the stall I rented, excavating it and transforming the compacted dirt, loam, gravel, tiny worms and insects, and chunks of rock into glass. Levitating this much mass through my Domain makes my legs tremble and my teeth grind together, but I pour more and more mana into the effort, hollowing out a basement over the next five minutes as an audience begins to grow around me.

  If I’m relegated to the outskirts of the market, then flashy advertising seems like the best retaliation. By the time I’m done, this will be the new epicenter of the market. The administrator won’t know what hit him.

  Once there’s a hole in the ground twice as deep as I am tall, I shift more rocks into place, [Vitrification] working as I go, and build steps leading down to the next level. Glass is shockingly sturdy in large amounts, especially the tempered version I’ve been experimenting with lately, so I have no fear the staircase won’t bear up under the weight of my entire team.

  The steps cool quickly thanks to the heat-related Skills I’m training together. Soon I’ll be able to descend into the second level. It will have to wait until I’m done with my demonstration, but I don’t need it yet anyway. Right now is about shock and awe—and advertising.

  I’ll store completed items downstairs, and maybe the team can sleep there, too, if no one can find any vacancies in the nearby inns. It won’t be as comfortable as a real bed, but at least it should be dry and relatively safe, which is a step up from sleeping on the hard ground like we’ve been forced to do on the road.

  I’m panting from the exertion by the end of the basement construction, but I press on, creating jacks and pincers, punties and paddles, mandrels and marvers—each tool of my trade reinforced by unbreakable as well as imbued with innovation now that I know how to double up on imbuements.

  “Glass! Any shape, any purpose!” I bellow at the crowd milling around after catching my breath. The amount of mana I’d just spent on the project would make most [Mages] weep, but I still have a little left, and I’m gathering more by the second.

  The man with the monocle steps up to the stall first. He regards me with the wariness usually reserved for a wild animal, but places both hands on the counter top and meets my eyes nonetheless.

  “Heard a rumor that masters of glass can make cooling circlets. A few are circulating in the Barrens, but I haven’t been able to get hold of any yet. If you’re not a master at your young age with that display, I’ll turn my badge back into the academy.”

  I shrug. “Sure. How many?”

  “F-four circlets?” he stammers.

  When I raise an eyebrow, he mops his forehead with a handkerchief. “Two is fine! One is enough, really, if it’s too much trouble. I’m fascinated by magical artifacts.”

  “Four it is! Relax, friend. I don’t bite,” I say with a chuckle, but he still looks squeamish, as though he’s expecting me to snap at any moment.

  Rude.

  He manages a smile that seems more genuine this time. His unease is still there, but it’s muted, like small ripples on a lake after the inciting breeze dies away. “My company leaves next week. Will that be sufficient time for an imbued artifact?”

  “I’ll have them ready for you soon. Let the next customer through; I’ll make sure you get what you need before dinner,” I promise.

  Surprise flickers through him, and the corners of his eyes crinkle up as a sinuous ribbon of suspicions bleeds through. The ugly sensation slithers through his emotional tableau like a water moccasin swimming across the current. When I pick up a melon-sized chunk of rock and transmute it into glass, grinning at him the entire time, he sighs and inclines his head, as though coming to terms with my flair for showmanship.

  [Greater Heat Manipulation] resonates with the runes in [Quick Cool], and acting on instinct I push the Skill structures closer together, shoving until the harmony borders on turning discordant. Releasing the pressure, I turn back to the circlet and try not to worry about how slow the progress has been in my pursuit of combining the Skills.

  Despite their opposite purposes, each Skill uses elements of heat control, which explains why they overlap so much. While [Greater Heat Manipulation] is my go-to for adding heat, and [Quick Cool] is ostensibly about removing heat, they use the same runic arrays, but simply inverted. Have I ever seen such a close match in the core structure of my Skills before?

  Hm. Gotta be a clue in there.

  The circlet continues to take shape, but my attention is elsewhere.

  Regardless of the additional meta-magic runes, the formation is almost identical between the two Skills. How have I never realized before that this is a priceless opportunity to explore the effects of the extra modifiers? The core design is the same, even though the effects differ. That points to the modifiers holding the secret to how time flows.

  Lost in my thoughts, I barely notice when the glowing glass reaches the perfect working temperature. Instinctively, I move on to the next steps, forming the elastic material into a circlet through sheer force of habit, and imbue it with the image of relaxing around a chilled, shaded pool to escape the harsh sun of high summer, then add unbreakable on a whim, managing to hold the indomitable image simultaneously to cool relaxation. I might as well give him something good while I'm in such a generous mood.

  Calling on the weight of my Domain to levitate the remaining pile of small rocks, I spin them in a slow circle around my head, transforming them before the watching eyes of the crowd. Melting down the glass until it's malleable takes no more than a spare thought. All of my focus is on observing the runes and the flow of mana through their fractal arrays. The ebb and flow of energy captivates me. Again I offer up an irresistible image of coolness on a hot summer day for the ambient mana to embrace. Immediately, the energy of the world rushes into the projection I've painted in the ether, infusing the structure with life.

  The entire time, my attention is locked on the process, searching for commonalities to my Skills. Swelling energy surrounds me, vibrating around my [Arcane Domain] as I push it further than ever, willing the mysteries of the world to reveal themselves to me. With a surge of power, the Skill advances, shifting in color slightly as the runes twist and deepen, taking on new dimensions.

  In an instant it hits me: the way mana enlivens the material is eerily reminiscent of [Glass Animation]. Before I can examine that glimmering nugget of potential truth any further, however, monocle-man gasps.

  Beaming from my sudden good fortune at ranking up my Skill, I watch in amusement as the man before me stammers and adjusts his eyepiece, which glimmers a ghostly blue-white with mana. The flow of power intensifies, and he peers at me more intently. His lips purse, but he seems more perplexed than annoyed.

  "Everything all right?"

  He shakes his head slowly after studying me for a moment. “What are you doing all the way out here? That much mana—you could name your price in the capital.”

  I can't resist a small smirk. “What makes you think I haven't?”

  While his brain seems to melt trying to process that information, if his strangled look is any indication, I activate my heat-related Skill bundle and accelerate the annealing process. This time, the two Skills ignite together at the same impulse of will, showing that they're closer than ever to merging. A little more practice, and I might merge my Skills into an evolved form sooner rather than later.

  As I watch through my improved Domain, a snarl of dense, midnight-black energy catches on a cluster of runes that I've never noticed before in [Quick Cool].

  On a hunch, I charge up the strange, convoluted runes with a concentrated surge of mana. The glass doesn't change temperature or look any different to the naked eye, but the annealing process definitely accelerates. The change is obvious to [Compositional Analysis], showing that the runes are definitely time-related.

  A crooked grin stretches across my face. So that's what temporal-magic looks like. I've watched Melina activate [In the Blink of an Eye] hundreds of times before, but I've never been able to follow the dizzying flow of magic. The mana ties itself in intricate knots that my Domain couldn't parse before. I can't wait to see what Melina's Skill looks like now that I've upgraded my [Arcane Domain]. Maybe we'll uncover the secrets of time together.

  I laugh softly at my own eagerness and put aside the grandiose ideas for now. Raising my voice, I call out to the crowd. “Who’s next? Let’s have some fun!”

  Customers surge forward, clamoring to put in their orders, and a satisfied smile spreads across my face. After all the training on the road and politicking in Gilead, a return to my roots is just what the [Healer] ordered. It’s good for me to work with my hands, shaping the world around me with a symphony of my mind, will, imagination, emotion, and artistry.

  The glass seems to sing in agreement.