20 How Did You Do That! (Edited)
Several hours had passed since Val, Ben, and Tia began their experimentation with Ben's transmutation ability.
One of the main features Ben discovered through their continued experiments was the Inventory Spaces had no limit to the number of things it could store.
For example, they decided to store all the things from the storeroom into the Inventory Space due to the countless items and materials placed within the cramp room.
At first, they thought they would have to move them one at a time to his inventory.
However, Ben's control had slowly improved from the continuous use of his Inventory Spaces and eventually he could store whatever he wanted with a slight wave of his hand.
To show his proficiency, he unsummoned everything and returned it to the room on several occasions before placing it back in the Inventory Space.
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"Eh…?" Ben was surprised to learn that everything within his Inventory Space was also categories, including the materials and items originally kept within the chests or wooden crates.
All of the Iron Ingots, Silver, Bronze, various types of wood and much more were neatly stored in the Inventory Spaces, making Ben thankful for the Systems automatic management operation, otherwise he would have driven himself made trying to sort everything manually.
Not before long, Ben also noticed some disparity between the costs to transmute the materials to a higher grade.
If he wanted to transmute iron, then depending on the grade of the materials used for the function, such as three Low-High grade ingots, they would form one Medium-High grade Iron Ingot.
However, when they tried the same thing with wood for example, Ben needed the materials to fit certain perimeters.
The blocks of wood needed to be shaped roughly the same and be of the same variety before the Transmutation Function would accept the materials as ready for merging.
Stone seemed fairly easy though, as the Inventory Space would categories them by weight most of the time, with its shape possible to be formed after the Transmutation process.
When they tried transmuting crafted items, the System appeared to be fine with the request however the System alerted him his System Level was too low to perform the current requests of the Host.
He was not surprised that the System was lacking in Level, but rather his attention was drawn in by the System being able to turn crafted items into greater forms than their original through the Transmutation Function.
In the few hours they had conducted their little experiment, Ben's thoughts about his System being 'broken' all of the time had changed.
The fact it could accomplish Magic or what his Master called 'Space Magic' to be specific, was crazy even if there appeared to be some big differences in the function of the Inventory Space and Space Magic fundamentals.
From what little information he could scrounge by annoying Val, he learnt that there were different types of Magic Elementals, and as such, Space happened to be one of many.
Space Magic though, as well as several other types, were only learnt by the most promising talents in Empire academies, mostly done in the hopes to convince the students to join their respective Empires.
Usually, if a person didn't have affinity with a certain element and they wanted to still be able to use it, they had a few different options available to them.
One was buying artifacts or items made with magic imbedded into the objects during the forging process, which would then need to be synced with the user's soul.
Eventually the body of the user would adapt to gain some affinity with the element and help ease the users time controlling the crafted object.
Another option was to use expensive Elemental Crystals which contained raw energy of specific elements.
Difficult to obtain in the first place, those that were found typically ended up in the hands of nobles, so most people never heard how they were utilised, but Val had long known how they dealt with the crystals.
One needed to forge an item using a combination of liquid metal and Magic Stones to create an ink that could draw certain tracks or lines on the items.
Those lines would be used by the Elemental Crystals to funnel the power into the user to use while also managing the input levels of raw energy entering the body of the user.
The Elemental Crystals were essentially fuel cells that could empower the User by several levels and also recharge as long as there was Magic Energy in the atmosphere but if there wasn't, they could recharge through the user of the items when they would replenish their own Internal Energy.
If they had affinity with the element of the Elemental Crystal, then only a tiny amount of energy would be siphoned off and absorbed by the crystal when the user would recover their own Internal Energy.
It seemed annoyed to most people, but nobody would really buy Elemental Crystal Items unless it related to their body elemental affinity.
Those who would use objects made from Elemental Crystals that they didn't have an affinity with would need to draw in more Internal Energy than others if they wanted to refill the power of the crystals.
The problem people faced now was the lack of people buying such goods or even being able to produce them since nobles had effectively reduced the talent pool to achieve Master Craftsmen that could do the job.
Commoners and peasants would be drawn in and taken by nobles' families if they had talent but the true problem those talents faced was being supplied resources and time to develop their skills natural and not through hard strenuous labour.
Eventually most nobles moved away from Magic because of the costly process to raise worthy and loyal talent capable of crafting with the precious materials.
Most moved onto a different style to achieve their strength and grow their bodies beyond mortal capacity.
However, that'd yet to be discussed among the Master and student pair, even though Ben had a rough idea what it was.
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"Many people did not bother imbuing Elemental Magic into items and weapons as a majority of the worlds people could use Magic freely.
It was pointless to buy a sword made with Fire Magic imbued into the object only for it to take your own Energy to fuel itself, typically far more than using a normal weapon and then endowing it with their elements magic.
The other option would be buying specific Element Magic imbued objects with Spells carved into its functions.
Being able to quickly shoot out a Water Ball or Wind Slash without needing to chant the spell was a great way to survive in big battles or long runs in dungeons for example.
I personally found using Magic Stones would drastically reduce the Energy cost of spells, and even regulate itself to not drain the user of their Internal Energy completely or of the Magic Stones.
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Space Magic was especially popular for its ease to transport for merchants back before the Human Race started their campaign for complete dominance.
They loved being able to store their goods safely in a Storage area made from Space Magic, keep the materials nice and fresh.
At first the Space Magic skill was known among most people and wasn't as large demanded, but with time it eventually became one of the most precious traits for types of work.
Blacksmiths weren't far behind in considered among the people, as they were skilled enough to craft the items required to be imbued with specific Element Magic, especially that of space imbued items.
It was far more than normal, eventually make it extremely hard for Smiths to actually process all of the requests.
Both from adventurers and merchants all looking for that extra edge.
As time passed, less and less people could eventually create the product, especially after Humankind started their race war.
Eventually it led to Space Magic items costing more than nations at one point, leaving only those wealthy and powerful enough to possibly buy the items.
Only those who considered themselves just below the filthy wealthy were able to fight for any scraps that made their way to them."
Val explained to his student during their experimentations of Bens ability.
He ignored Bens questions about Magics application and use in the real world, back before nobles controlled everything about it.
Beyond its supportive nature in battles, Magic seemed designed for warfare, which ultimately led to it being gone from the 'free' world and only left to certain influential nobles could in the world.
The fact of the matter, Space Magic was extremely powerful and had a wide range of applications according to Val.
Ben even started thinking about its application in battle, falling down the same path as history had, but the System stopped his train of thought.
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[System would like to inform Host that the Inventory Spaces isn't designed for combat]
[The purpose of the Inventory Space is to store items for the Host within a safe, controlled space, where the Host can call for their items without having to strain themselves with the weight or burden of having to carry the items]
[Materials for crafting, cooking, wearing and others can be stored within the Inventory Space, holding them in time as to stop them from damaging themselves or cooling in the instances of food]
[Additionally, it will organise and catalogue everything stored within its spaces, including by Grade if requested by Host]
[It also works beside the Transmutation Function, vastly increase the options available with Inventory Spaces]
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Immediately his train of thought went back to using the inventory for battle, having decided on a certain method to try his theory, he quickly rushed Tia outside with a bow and arrow.
"Shoot at me…" he urged Tia, who felt worried about her friend, especially now that he asked her to shoot him.
She tried her best to resist Ben's pleas, but he kept pestering her until she caved in and accepted his request.
Without waiting a moment longer, she drew the bowstring towards herself as she readied her aim.
The moment she released the arrow, it whistled through the air towards Ben's chest.
Both Tia and Ben were completely focused on the fast arrow, for Tia she hoped she hadn't just killed her first and only friend, while Ben was thinking about the possible application in battle if that arrow successfully disappeared into his Inventory Space as he expected.
As it got closer and closer to Ben, Tia instinctively raised her hands to her face, dropping her bow on the ground, as she didn't want to see the blood and pain if the arrow hit her friend in the end.
Suddenly, before she shut her eyes completely and covered them with her hands, the arrow disappeared.
The arrow vanished into thin air, just like all the items and equipment that they had been playing around with inside the storeroom.
The speed arrow also happened to become a victim of Bens ability.
Joy filled her young heart as she rushed over to Bens side, onto to leap into his arms with some aggression in her actions.
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"HOW DID YOU DO THAT!" she screamed energetically into Ben's face, her beautiful smile seemed as if it couldn't contain all the excitement from seeing something new and indescribable.
Even though she had seen Ben's ability earlier to vanish items into thin air, to see something moving and then disappear was an entirely different story.
Before she knew it, Ben had summoned the arrow again, moving his palm over towards a wall, and letting the arrow go from the control of the Inventory Space.
The velocity of the arrow hadn't slowed down from its original speeds, in fact, it kind of increased, with the speed of the arrow increased to a point that it locked itself halfway into the wall, easily 17 centimetres.
Tia was shocked silly, just by the fact that the arrow was so far deep into the wall.
She suddenly felt that she must have had a boost in her natural awesomeness to give her some superhuman strength or hidden abilities for her to become so increasingly powerful.
Suddenly, she embraced Ben with tears streaking down her beautiful face, thanking him for displaying her true raw awesomeness.
Ben could only wonder at times what went through Tias mind.
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"I-if if you hadn't made the arrow disappear, then… then it could have killed you!" she cried as she wiped her face on Bens clothes, even demanding Ben to promise her not to do such things again.
"I-If you got hurt… *Hiccup* what would have become… of my awesomeness…"
Ben couldn't help but try to explain how the increase in power of the arrow and its strength to pierce the wall as deep as it did, had nothing to do with her.
Instead, she ignored everything Ben said and focused on hold Ben in her arms so she could pull of Bens puffy cute cheeks.
Shortly after, once Tia had left Ben alone, he originally planned to use his new ability to start crafting the weapons for the Withering Roses, but he decided to rush on home first.
He forgot to notice how many hours had passed, as the bright silvery moon was illuminating the city.
As he rushed home, Ben knew his mother would be patiently waiting for him by the door of the manor.
No matter how late out Ben stayed, his mother always waited for him by the front door of the manor until he came.
The servants of the manor had made a nice cosy space for Liz to rest and relax in while she'd wait for Ben to arrive home.
Lately, he had spent more and more time at the workshop, which meant she would stay awake waiting for him till late at night.
He noticed she seemed more anxious and quieter lately, but when he asked if anything was wrong, his mother would smile back just saying that it was nothing or she was not feeling well.
Ben had seen lately that the manor had reduced the number of servants, yet the house was as clean and maintained as before.
He knew that his mother and Agatha would have undertaken most of the work with some help from the Withering Roses party members, however for the servants to disappear like this and to take up the jobs yourself, seemed quite peculiar to Ben.
Furthermore, if it was about money, Ben felt he was able to now earn enough to provide some support to everyone.
However, he still felt there was something 'fishy'.
He wasn't wrong…
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