An Enchanting Experience

          (4E-193 13th of Sun's Dawn)

     Galeron was bent over the enchanting table positioned within the Chironasium practicing his inscriptions, when his little sister came running into the room screaming his name.

     "GALERON! GALERON! GALERON! LOOK I DID IT!" She screamed, while running enthusiastically into the room with a bright smile on her face, her crimson eyes shining and razor sharp canines peeking through her lips. 

     Galeron looked up from his inscribing and witnessed his little sister come to an abrupt halt beside him and placed her hand palm upwards in front of her.

     Scrunching her eyebrows, she seemed to be focused intently on the space just above her palm. A second later, a small orange flame flickered within her hand. Looking expectantly at her brother, she eagerly awaited his praise.

     Galeron bent over with a serious expression on his face and examined the flame. "Hmmm...not bad and your ward seems quite stable as well. Excellent work, Lyrah! Now you just need to work on modifying the flame so that it's heat doesn't affect you. Now run along and get back to your practice. I'm working on my enchanting and I need to concentrate."

     Lyrah, who's smile had gotten even larger when Galeron praised her, immediately began pouting when she realized she was being dismissed. "Aww, do I have to? I could practice in here. I promise to be quiet."

     "Hahaha! A quiet five year old! Don't make me laugh! I need peace and quiet and I have no confidence in your ability to not make noise nor any patience for when you fail to do so. Now leave me alone, before you make me angry!" Galeron scolded her.

     Lyrah lowered her head and slowly walked out of the Chironasium, regretting not being able to spend time with her brother.

     Galeron, however, wasn't at all concerned with his sister's situation. He wouldn't have bothered paying any attention to her at all, if he wasn't trying to keep up appearances. He didn't want the coven to start suspecting his loyalties, because of him demonstrating isolationist tendencies.

     He had long ago come to terms with what he was and understood the implications of what kind of future he would have, if he stayed in the Coven or if he attempted to enter normal society. He was an abomination just like his Hagraven parents and so he would never be accepted by normal society but he would also never accept living his life as the breeding stock of these filthy creatures.

     Galeron had only one viable path ahead of him and that was a solitary path aimed at exploring the limits of personal power. While he may have only ever role-played the dark and dominating anti-hero or villain in his past life, he was having relatively few problems adjusting to this new lifestyle.

     In his past life he was relatively social and normal but his nine plus months of isolation, gestation, and meditation seemed to have evened his emotional state out quite a bit. This experience left him with a very stoic state of mind and a near perfect control over his emotions.

     He knew what he would have to do, if things didn't work out just right, and he wasn't about to go and make that more difficult by developing some senseless attachments to Lyrah or Telthoth, his newborn baby brother.

     Having successfully shooed away Lyrah, who he would at best only use as a tool should she prove to be useful, he once again focused on the Daedric runes before him.

     He had already memorized all of these runes along with several other types of runes but this particular bit of enchanting was still giving Galeron some trouble. 

     Normally enchanting was a very straightforward translation of your intent into Daedric or some other type of runes and then inscribing those runes on the target, with an understanding that the more complex an inscription was the less powerful the enchantment would be. The difficulty, of course, being in the task of finding the most simplistic arrangement of runes to achieve the most complex or sophisticated result. The inscription he was currently working on, however, was actually a runic Fire Trap and it was causing him a great deal of confusion. 

     It wasn't that he couldn't use or apply the runes properly, it was simply a matter of understanding. If he inscribed the runes of the Fire Trap in the manner described by the techniques he had been taught, everything worked out fine. The only problem being that when he attempted to change those runes that made up the outer ring of the trap it still worked no matter what they were. 

     While the Fire Trap spell wasn't necessarily an enchantment in the typical sense, he suspected that the issues he had with understanding this spell's mechanisms would lead to a deepening of his understanding of runes and enchanting in general.

     Now some might look at this and think, "Well what's the problem exactly? It works doesn't it? If it works, then what are you bitching about?" 

     This line of thinking, however, simply couldn't satisfy Galeron, since all of his experience with magic in this world had taught him one thing. 'Magic is heavily influenced by understanding, intent, and precision.'

     What was even more perplexing to him, was that the runes in the outer ring could even be completely removed and the trap would still activate. The only thing that jived with the way Galeron understood magic was that if you formed the trap correctly, with 'FIRESONG' written with Daedric runes in the outer ring, it's power would increase by about twenty five percent. 

     So, despite the complete removal of any runes from the outer ring leading to a still functional trap, the decrease in power when anything other than 'FIRESONG' was placed there seemed to confirm that the outer ring wasn't at all useless. It seemed to have some function but what that function was and how it interacted with the central or primary rune was still unclear to Galeron.

     As if the situation wasn't confusing enough, the traps, no matter which ones they were or how they were configured, never actually retained the level of potency that his normal spell castings possessed.

     Having asked Morila about this, she had simply stated that this was normal and that rune traps weren't intended for destruction but distraction. This, of course, was akin to blasphemy in Galeron's ears and he quickly decided that Morila's judgment couldn't be trusted.

     'Hmmm…perhaps the answer lies elsewhere? If I know that the outer ring serves a purpose but that purpose seems to be quite subdued and perhaps even flawed, then maybe the geometry of the ring's interior is not properly calibrated to allow for anything other than this particular alteration? Yes, that sounds like a much more promising avenue of investigation. 

     'I'll, of course, have a shit ton of work ahead of me. Trying to analyze the geometric patterns of all the known runic spells and trying to suss out their meaning is going to take up most of my free time for a long time to come. I suppose there's no use complaining about it. Alright, Galeron, let's do this!' He thought to himself, as he resumed his analysis.

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           (4E-193 25th of Last Seed)

     Galeron had once again emptied his mind and then sent his consciousness into his magicka core, thus activating his Mage Eye. This time, however, he wasn't attempting to assess the magicka outside of or even inside his body.

     He had spent quite a bit of time attempting to look for some meaning in the geometric patterns of the runic spells. While doing so, he got the notion that perhaps meditating on the forms of the runes themselves might lead to some deeper understanding of them.

     After taking up this meditation, he discovered that the rune, when meditating on it, would appear inside his mind and the rune's meaning would seem to radiate out into his consciousness. After this discovery, he decided that, since he already had a sufficient understanding of the rune's meaning, he would shift the focus of his meditations onto the meaning of the rune.

     After undergoing this new meditation for a short time, he was slowly making progress towards a fuller understanding of the patterns, parameters, and characteristics of that particular rune's geometric structure. As his familiarity with these things continued to grow, he could gradually begin to see the outline of the respective rune within his consciousness. He was certain that, if he continued this practice, the rune would eventually take on its full and complete form, within his mind. 

     Not too long after this suspicion arose, a rather intriguing idea came to him. 'What if I were to practice this method within my magicka core? Not actually integrating my magicka but simply activating my mage eye, for the purpose of perhaps gaining even more insight.'

     It was this goal that he had set for himself and was attempting to accomplish, at that moment.

     As the usual scene of magicka in his surroundings filled his magical vision, Galeron focused inwardly on his magicka core, until his entire magical sight was completely white.

     Having eliminated everything except his own magicka from his perception, he once again focused on the fire rune's meaning. He allowed it to flow into and around his mind unhindered, until the form of the rune's outline could be seen taking place in his mind. This time, however, the process was much faster and, if he focused on the smallest of its details he could actually see the rune becoming more substantial. 

     Having confirmed the nature and benefits of this new meditation technique, he sat down and focused solely on the meaning of the Daedric fire rune. Only a few hours after starting his meditation, the finalized rune could be seen floating serenely within his magicka core.

     This rune radiated a familiarity that the previous rune hadn't possessed. The first time he meditated on the fire rune, which was really just the Daedric Rune for 'F' or 'Hefhed,' it simply appeared within his mind and began emanating its meaning throughout his consciousness. Images of a variety of colored flames of varying intensities, a variety of materials being turned into smoke or melted, and an insatiable hunger that seeked to devour all in complete disregard for its own existence. All of these things, alongside the scientific knowledge most of which Galeron was already aware of, were sent forth in gentle waves across his consciousness but the rune was still very distinct and clearly didn't belong within the space which he had brought it.

     The completed rune that had formed itself inside of his magicka core, aided by his consciousness, was now clearly a part of his magicka core. Galeron could even sense that his new rune had actually increased his overall magicka capacity by a marginal amount. 

     'If my estimations are correct and I were to assimilate the entire Daedric alphabet, I might very well be able to double my current magicka limit.' Galeron thought happily as his wicked grin was quickly replaced by a more serious expression. 'That can wait for now, though. I need to solve this problem with the outer ring of the runic trap, first.'

     Before deciding to meditate on the runes and their meanings, Galeron had thoroughly analyzed the geometric patterns within all of the known runic traps and had finally arrived at a new understanding of the significance of each pattern.

     Having constructed a new pattern to insert into his runic diagrams, he once again returned to his inscriptions.

     Wielding his magika, he poured it into the leather shield in front of him. After guiding it into the standard patterns of a fire rune trap, he then began adding his modifications to the established patterns.

     With the final touches having been laid, Galeron held the shield before him and inspected his work. All of the inscriptions were set properly into the shield and now only needed a soul, in order to draw in magicka to power them.

     After casting a ward over himself, Galeron took out a Lesser Soul Gem and placed it in direct contact with the inscriptions. The soul was drawn into the inscriptions and slowly the soul began to draw magicka into the inscriptions causing them to shine with a magical orange radiance.

     This only lasted for a second, however, before the inscription destabilized and released an unstable imitation of the intended enchantment. 

     This failure didn't bother Galeron much, as he hadn't expected to succeed on his first try. Maneuvering his magicka through the inscriptions he went through each pattern breaking it apart and cleansing the shield of any residual magicka. 

      This was a method of removing enchantments that he had discovered, by applying his mage eye. Such a thing normally wouldn't be possible since a failed enchantment would no longer be visible once it had been activated.

     'Alright! One failure down! I know I'm  on the right path. I just need to keep on trekking.' Galeron thought, as he took what he learned from his recent experiment and resumed his analysis of the runic patterns. 

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            (4E-194 28th of First Seed)

     Leaning over the enchanting table, Galeron was completely engrossed in this particular inscription. He was putting the finishing touches on his latest version of the Fire Trap runic inscription.

     His efforts to reengineer the geometric patterns of the inscription, were becoming more and more stable. He was certain that this attempt would succeed.

     During these past few months, Galeron had gone through countless Petty Soul Gems trying to perfect this new inscription.

     'Alright, now that I've finally finished the inscription, it's time for the moment of truth.'

     Reaching into the stash of already filled Petty Soul Gems next to the enchanting table, he pulled one out and coaxed the soul into the inscription. 

     After coming into contact with the inscription, the slight sheen of the soul Gem slowly faded as the gem was tossed aside by Galeron. 

     As the soul adjusted to its new inscription habitat, the magicka within the surrounding environment was gradually pulled into the inscription causing it to glow. The reddish orange glow began at the inscription's center and steadily spread throughout the rest.

     One thing Galeron had noticed after the Daedric rune for 'F' had manifested inside his magicka core was that all of his inscriptions using that rune were now almost on par with his normal destruction magic. He wasn't entirely sure why this was the case considering that 'F' was only the first letter in the word fire. For whatever reason, despite operating as a normal phonetic character, it also seemed to be the symbol for fire for some reason. This was similar to the way in which the Daedric rune for Oblivion was also the Daedric rune for 'O.'

     He, of course, wasn't about to worry about these things, at the moment. His perfected runic modification was being completed before his eyes and so he remained focused on the process. 

     Galeron, having already conjured a protective ward just in case, grinned as he watched over the inscription finishing its stabilization. 

      After monitoring the inscription for a few seconds and having a look at it with his Mage's Eye, he finally concluded that this modification was a success.

     'Ha! And now I can see whether this new modification can accept alternative runic inscriptions.' He thought gleefully, as he reached for his magicka and began to destroy the enchantments placed in the leather shield before him. 

     Having placed and removed several enchantments on the same shield over these past few months, the shield itself had begun to lose a lot of its structural integrity. The repeated insertion and manipulation of magicka and souls seemed to have some type of deleterious effect on inanimate objects. Whether the same was true for the living was something he would have to investigate at a later time.

     Needless to say, this had forced him to go through quite a number of shields as well.

     As Galeron was attempting to remove the enchantments, the long suffering shield finally fell to pieces in his hands. Sighing  with dissatisfaction, he tossed the remains aside and grabbed another one. However annoyed he might be at the weakness of the shields, he also felt it was fitting that this new inscription be performed on a fresh subject.

     After placing the shield on the enchanting table, he once again inscribed his modified fire trap diagram onto the shield. This time, however, he also added additional runes to the outer ring. Inside the outer ring, he perfectly spaced the Daedric rune inscriptions spelling out the word 'FLAMEFONT.'

     With this new Daedric text placed properly into the outer ring of the rune trap, he conjured another ward and activated the trap.

     Right before his eyes, the new geometric patterns and the new text he had devised resulted in an entirely new fully functional runic trap spell. The inscriptions shined brilliantly for a split second, before issuing forth a spout of reddish orange flames whose intensity was only slightly inferior to his normal destruction magic.

     Unlike a usual fire trap, this flame didn't dissipate suddenly after a short lived appearance. The small torch sized fountain of flames continued to burn strong and bright.

     Galeron wasn't sure how long this enchantment would hold but it hardly mattered at this point. He knew that there was a finite amount of time that a soul could remain inside anything other than a body or a soul Gem before exhausting itself and dissipating into wherever that particular soul was bound. This bit of trivia was, of course, irrelevant at the moment.

     Thirteen months of hard work and tireless experimentation had finally paid off and he couldn't be happier about it. Not only had he learned quite a bit about runes and enchanting, he also had countless ideas on where to go from that point on.

     It would be a lie to say that he had focused solely on enchanting experiments in the past year but it wouldn't be too far off the mark either. Although his mind was racing with the possibilities that his new breakthrough had uncovered, he also understood that refocusing his efforts on his personal strength was imperative.

     These disgusting Hagravens would start trying to breed him and his sisters, before too long. Of course, being Hagravens, their sense of what was acceptable and unacceptable was far outside the expected norms. Galeron suspected that they would start trying to breed him and his sibling as soon as Lyrah hit puberty. He needed to redouble his efforts in his magicka training to ensure that he would be ready for his eventual escape.

     The Coven only maintained their reverent attitude toward him because he maintained his facade of being sympathetic to their plight. He knew full well that the moment he dropped that facade he would never spend another day as a free man in this new world. His father's situation was a testament to that fact. 

     Not being entirely sure how many years he had left before the Coven started their breeding, he was doubly motivated to focus once again on his magicka training. Having gained many benefits from his research in the enchanting field, he resumed his normal training, only with far more vigor and intensity. Until he was satisfied with his power level or until he was forced out of Darklight Tower, it was going to be all work and no play from here on out.