Book, Part 4

"Every Mage starts with a Drop-sized Chimh Well only an inch across. A Chimh Well, unlike one's Towers, grows with the Mage, and won't stay this size for long."

His well had grown?

That set Morne to thinking.

There was no Trade to be had after the trial, and he had yet to cast a Spell, so he could cross those off the list immediately. And though this book didn't have anything on "Chimh Techniques," he felt confident that it wasn't one of those either.

He recalled the Coltha's words when Morne had first arrived in that dimension.

"This is my personal dimension, mortal. Here, my will is reality."

Morne had assumed that it only worked within the bounds of the realm, but had the Coltha caused a permanent change within Morne in this world?

If so, that made the demon's time-freezing seem like a parlor trick.

Morne kept reading, eager to know more.

To understand the measurements of a Chimh Well, one first needed to know the ranks of a Mage.

The first rank was Novice. Next was Apprentice, then Practitioner, then Adept, then Master, then Grandmaster, and finally, Arch-Mage. Spells followed this same scheme, though they were called Grades instead of ranks.

To be considered a certain rank, one needed to be able to cast at least one Spell of the corresponding Grade. For example, a Novice Mage could cast at least one Novice-Grade Spell.

Practitioner, Adept, Master, and Grandmaster were further divided into five Tiers. The first Tier meant you could cast one Spell of the corresponding Grade, the second Tier meant you could cast two, and so on. A Tier Three Practitioner could cast three Practitioner-Grade Spells before they were out of Chimh.

A Chimh Well was measured in two ways. First, the width.

A Chimh Well's width determined how much Chimh it could hold at a time, as well as the amount of Chimh one could use at a time. This in turn determined the strength at which one could cast a Spell.

A width of one inch marked the well of a Novice, six inches marked an Apprentice, one foot for a Practitioner, six feet for an Adept, sixty for a Master, six hundred for a Grandmaster, and one mile for an Arch-Mage.

Next was the depth.

A Chimh Well's depth, like its width, determined how much Chimh it could hold at a time. It also increased the natural generation of this energy. A Chimh Well's depth tended to expand faster than its width, but it was the width that determined one's Mage rank.

The depths were Drop, Puddle, Pond, River, Lake, Sea, and Ocean, once again corresponding to the ranks of a Mage.

Each depth besides Drop was further separated into Small, Medium, and Large. A Small Puddle could cast a minimum of one Apprentice-Grade Spell before emptying. A Medium Puddle could cast at least three, and a Large Puddle could cast at least five.

Using this information, Morne closed his eyes once again, and determined that his Chimh Well had the depth of a Medium Puddle and a width of seven inches, or "Medium Puddle, seven inches" according to the Mages' naming convention.

In other words, once he learned an appropriate Spell, he'd officially be an Apprentice, and could cast around three Apprentice-Grade Spells before hitting empty.

Then there were Towers, and this is where Morne realized he had been screwed over.

There were six Schools of magic, and each one was represented by a Tower.

Towers were used as a focus for the Spellcasting of a specific School, and were just as important as Chimh Wells in casting Spells. With no focus, there wasn't a way to cast a Spell from that School.

In ascending order, the Height of a Tower went from Empty, Dust, Pebble, Stone, Boulder, Hill, Mountain, and Mountain Chain.

A Dust Tower was naught but rubble. A Pebble Tower had only one story, a Stone Tower had three, a Boulder Tower had five, a Hill had ten, a Mountain had twenty, and a Mountain Chain had fifty stories.

Each floor was unlocked in the same way one expanded their Chimh Well: casting Spells. Though Morne had a Tower with fifty stories, he'd have to work his way up from the bottom.

But just the fact that he had access to the first floor in the first place was enough to cement his rank of Apprentice as soon as he knew an Apprentice-Grade Spell.

Empty was unique in that there was no Tower, meaning it was impossible to cast a Spell from its School. And while there were ways to improve one's Tower, there was no way to do so for a Tower that didn't exist.

If the demon's words were to be believed, Morne had at least a Dust Tower for each School. Brej-N'Ha-Frikt had taken Morne's potential to be versatile in the future and had left a fully built Necromancy Tower in its place.

Tamping down his anger, Morne turned the page to the back of the book, looking at the collection of ten Spells.

In front of him were five Novice Spells, four Apprentice Spells, and one Practitioner Spell.

He disregarded the Apprentice and Practitioner Spells almost instantly, the latter because he couldn't cast it anyway and the former because they required the Practitioner Spell to make full use of.

After reading over the five Novice Spells, he was a bit disappointed at their lack of power, but after consideration realized that it made sense.

If Mages were powerful right off the bat, they'd be a much bigger problem, and city guards and soldiers wouldn't still march into combat with weapons at their hips.

He considered his options for a few minutes before deciding that his first Spell would be Splinter.

Like every Spell in this book, it was a Necromancy Spell.

Splinter expended a small portion of the caster's life force to shoot a splinter-sized bolt of dark energy out of their finger. It had a small amount of concussive force, and would inflict pain on the target equal to its namesake.

It was underwhelmingly weak, a standard for Novice-Grade Spells, but Morne thought that it was the perfect start.

It would hurt more or less depending on where it landed. Obviously, a splinter in one's finger wouldn't hurt nearly as much as in one's eye. And even if Morne's aim was terrible, it could be enough to confuse or distract someone.

After memorizing the diagram detailing the Spell's circulation method, Morne once again closed his eyes and felt for his Chimh Well.