I admit that my motivation for becoming friends with Connor was quite selfish and I was more than willing to leave him behind if necessary to save myself and my friends. But I didn't expect that in just 2 weeks we would all become so fond of him, I even thought that he had put some kind of enchantment on us to the point that the four of us went to the Cali temple for a check, obviously not giving any results.
It was only his charisma and natural honesty that won us over, if he wanted to change profession to a merchant it is quite possible that he would become guild leader in a record temple.
We arrived at the center of the village very quickly as usual.
—And what do you intend to do now besides rest? — Connor asked us.
—Max and I are going to take the fish to our parents, my father always says that the fresher the fish is delivered, the better he can tell the best time to prepare it. Mac said.
—I'm going home with Cali, I need to inform my father about our trip to the Ordeal and deliver this to him.
I said feeling the stone we found when we went near the goblin village. A souvenir that I'm sure he will like.
—Ah, that what you wanted, but are you sure that this stone will really be useful for making an expansion artifact? — Connor asked, not trusting at all that the stone we mined could be used to make something so complicated.
His doubt isn't without reason, the Ordeal only appeared a little over 4 months ago, in the meantime many unbelievable things were discovered there, one of them was a stone.
From what the wizards my father works for said, this stone can be used as an Aether conduit to create expansion items, an artifact that is both complicated and simple to make, as well as to obtain.
It itself is surprisingly easy to do, just needing to use specific runes and undifferentiated Aether, without adding any attributes, like Cali's punches or Connor's Aether arrows.
The problem would be with the materials and the limitation specifications, in theory it would be possible to create an expansion artifact with infinite capacity but obtaining the materials to do so would be essentially impossible, requiring at least the crushed bones of the entire skeleton of an Ambund-Kshad (N/A: the animal that traumatized Kaio), considered the most sneaky, perverse and wicked creatures that exist.
On the other hand, creating expansion artifacts with space limitations, limited uses, or that need to be constantly supplied with the user's Aether are much easier things to do, to the point that even commoners can buy them if they save enough money. or get one more somehow.
An example of how this type of artifact can be easily accessed is on both Max's wrist and Connor's finger, both are artifacts with expansion enchantment but made of materials and with different limitations.
Connor's ring is the cheapest version available, made from Wolgahák bone (A/N: the wolf with "tentacles" that Kaio saw), runic inscriptions to maintain the enchantment and supply it with a portion of the user's Aether constantly, with a white and semi-transparent stone in the middle, where the Aether is deposited and maintains a space of 0.40 m³.
While Max's bracelet was also made primarily of Wolgahák, with the runes made of glowing iron, copper and 3 of the semi-transparent white stones, which holds a space of 1.2 m³ with an additional time slowdown of 1 to 2, 5, meaning that while in space out here 1 minute passes, inside the bracelet only 24 seconds pass. Needless to say, the bracelet was a gift from my father to their father.
In addition to the difference in space and even the slowdown in time, there is also a weight limitation with Connor's ring only being able to hold up to 16 kilos, while Max's ring could hold up to 35 kilos. A ring like Connor's can be found in up to 5 units with merchants affiliated with the guild and at least 1 unit with common peddlers to get an idea of how easy they are to make, being sold for 20 silver coins, and Max's bracelet for 10 small gold coins.
Obviously I also have a 10 m³ expansion ring with a limit of 100 kilos with a 1:5 time decrease, but that's another story.
The point is, even if it were made only of bone (as long as it was from a creature with the ability to absorb, conduct, or even produce Aether) it would be possible to create expansion artifacts (and almost any other type of artifact), as long as it had the right inscriptions and the Aether conduit. And this is the big problem with artifacts, conduits must be precious gems created in places that are rich in Aether, which should be easy to see is not something common.
That's why I went to the Ordeal with the others, to see if it was true that the gems taken from there could be used to create artifacts, after all, even the bones of creatures with a low Aether level like the Wolgahák that can be hunted by ordinary people (as long as they were well prepared and caught the creatures by surprise) they could be used to create an artifact that would sell for 20 silver coins, imagine if during the hunt for Wolgahák the hunter could also make a small detour and get the gems in the same way place?
The costs of hiring staff, hunting animals and exploring places to obtain gems would decrease considerably, if you consider that the cost of the wizard's commission could also be reduced to create the artifacts, then it would not be so difficult to believe that the total cost of operation could be reduced by up to 40% at least.
This being low-level expansion artifacts that could still be given additional limitations to make it a little cheaper, but thus guarantee a constant demand for both renewal of runes and new purchases when the artifact becomes unusable.
After all, the more you use something and no matter how much care you take with it, including constant maintenance, it is inevitable that at some point it will no longer work, this is the logic of low-cost expansion artifacts, which is what I am encouraging my father to invest.
Of course this still depends on IF we can strike a deal with the order of mages, The Void Watchers, but IF we can then we can have a monopoly on both low and high level expansion artifacts, if that's not enough to open a new guild and compete with those idiotic buffoons who do nothing but get fatter in the capital, what else could be done. And the profits we will make.... Hhahahabhahah.
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POV 3 Person
—Ah there she goes again to her wicked machinations. — Mac said, looking half worried, half scared at the youngest of the group.
A feeling that even though he had only lived with them for 2 weeks, Connor already knew it was constant.
—Isn't this the 3 or 4 time she's done this this week? — he asked, genuinely not knowing.
—5 actually, but we can't do much. — Max said looking with a little pity at Cali who was going to stay with Anna.
—Well, let's go here, good luck, macho woman!!! — Mac said waving to Cali, already 10 people away. Literally no one noticed when he had done it.
Cali could only look angrily at her friend's mocking smile and suppress as much as possible the desire she had to jump and break every bone in his body, even though he was in a public place.
Instead she just started walking with Anna still lost in thought to the house that her family had bought and renovated (mostly), but when she turned around Connor saw that she herself was also a little lost in thought, wasn't it? It takes a genius to know what she was thinking about.
Connor in turn could only watch as the two walked away from the three of them, look at Mac who continued to smile like an idiot and silently pray that whatever Cali was planning for him wouldn't end up going too far.