Bookbound Bunny

B2 - Chapter 72 - Instructions

Lily continued drawing her glyph, and since it was just a simple light orb, she finished it rather quickly. From the right angle, it looked great, but as soon as you deviated even a little, it looked like a mess! Before even trying to activate it, she already wanted to die of embarrassment.

[Not bad.]

"Not bad!? I drew better glyphs over a year ago!" Lily cried out.

Despite Lily's turmoil, Arakil chuckled as if expecting this outcome.

[It's quite the step up to go from two-dimensional glyphs to three. I'm not joking when I say you should be proud of this first attempt, I've seen far worse!]

Despite Arakil's comforting words, Lily still felt awful. She stared at the glyph in disappointment.

"How do I activate it?" Lily asked, before sighing. "Assuming it even works..."

[You simply point the wand at the glyph and pulse your Mana. It might help if you imagine shooting an arrow.]

Lily was surprised it was that easy to activate, but despite her excitement, she still frowned. After all, Arakil hadn't even hinted whether the glyph would work.

Sighing again for what felt like the umpteenth time, Lily pointed the wand at the crest in the center of the glyph.

I hope this works.

While picturing an arrow, Lily pulsed her Mana. A small bullet of pearlescent light pierced through the air and struck the glyph as if it were a wall. The bullet splattered like an egg and, in less than a second, bled into the floating glyph. The glyph flashed and vanished, and in its place was a floating sphere of light.

"It actually worked!?" Lily was surprised.

[Of course it did! Not only is the size far larger than a regular glyph, meaning it has much more Mana available than you usually contain in a page. Furthermore, the deficiencies in relation to depth aren't nearly as strict as the first two dimensions.]

Lily's jaw nearly hit the floor as she gaped in astonishment. She had no excuse for Arakil's first point, and she felt foolish for not realizing that sooner. The second, however, was starting—since when did glyphs allow mistakes?

"Surely that doesn't mean that it's irrelevant?" Lily asked, still feeling bewildered.

[Of course it matters! If you perfect a glyph in all three dimensions, the efficiency is astronomical! While you might not lose much, the gains are considerable, and I fully expect you to master it.]

Feeling relieved, Lily nodded happily at that despite knowing what a hill that would be to climb. The reason was simple: she wanted to be rewarded for her perfectionism!

"It sounds like it will be a lot of work, but I don't mind, no matter how long it takes!"

[Mm. Good. Now let's see what learning functions this particular wand has.]

Lily once again was doing a fish impression with her mouth after Arakil so casually dropped another bombshell. "It has more!?"

[It should. As I mentioned before, these were teaching aids and should have some further functions to help raise apprentices.]

"How do we find out?" Lily asked excitedly.

[First, place the wand in the book margin and shut it tightly. You might even need to stand on it to ensure it's closed tight enough. This should accomplish two things: firstly, I should be able to provide an analysis, and secondly, I can drain any ownership markings left in the wand.]

"Ownership markings?" Lily repeated curiously.

[I'm unsure about this wand in particular, but these usually need to be registered to their owner to receive their full benefits. After all, you wouldn't want an enemy to use your own wand against you.]

After accepting that explanation, Lily followed Arakil's instructions, although quite nervously. After receiving such an exciting prize, she was terrified that the book would snap the wand; after all, she knew full well that nothing could even damage the former.

It was a lengthy process, but thanks to their link, Arakil could keep her informed. It turns out that not only was the wand previously registered, but the lock was quite complex, and in his limited capacity, it took him a while to drain the Mana.

Once he finished removing the binding, he spent a short moment analyzing it. After that, he confidently declared it ready for Lily to register, and all she needed to do was channel a large amount of Mana into it for five minutes straight, which she easily did.

[Now that it's bound to you, you simply need to summon forth the instructions.]

Lily stared at the wand, which felt exactly the same as before to her. "How do I do that?"

[Fortunately, I gleaned that during my analysis. Listen closely...]

Arakil explained the process, and Lily was quite surprised, as she had never guessed something like this. Lily had to activate the wand like an ordinary magical device and draw something resembling a quadrilateral.

After that was done, she would shoot pulses at the corners of the shape before sending a final burst at the center. Throughout the process, Lily really thought Arakil was playing a prank on her, but when she completed the final step, she couldn't believe what happened.

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Lily had drawn a large rectangle for her quadrilateral, and suddenly it became filled with text and illustrations as if it were a page in a book. But that wasn't the really shocking thing, as the illustrations were moving!

"This..."

[Oh! Quite impressive, it seems there's been some considerable advances in my absence.]

Each illustration featured a hand holding a wand, which would perform various flourishes and gestures before coming to a still position. After a few seconds of stillness, it would repeat the process. Not only that, there was accompanying text next to each one, presumably a description or further instruction. Unfortunately for Lily, it was in a language she'd never seen before!

"What does it even say?" she asked, not able to make heads or tails of the bizarre text that made the saintess' writing look reasonable.

[It's written in Myrlune, which is one of the ancient fey languages. Honestly, I'm just as surprised as you to see it, as I thought they were extinct... And yet somehow this wand is using their text, and is more advanced than the ones I knew of.]

"So it's both from the past and future?" Lily asked, feeling a headache brewing.

[Well, as I mentioned, perhaps they didn't truly go extinct? The other possibility is someone borrowed Myrlune for this project, as there is potential hidden power in seemingly dead magical languages.]

Lily could only shrug; she had no idea or input and could only turn to Arakil for help in this regard.

"Can you read it?"

[While my Myrlune is a bit rusty, the text is relatively simple, so there is no issue. Regardless of that, you simply need to copy the gestures before resuming "drawing mode". However, I'd request you don't do that and instead allow me to permit you access to certain features.]

"I don't mind, but can I get the reason why?"

[Of course. Now, I don't want to spoil the surprise, as I'd like you to have some of these later, but the gist of it is that, in my opinion, many of these features are a bit too helpful. I worry that if you use them before learning the basics, they will become a crutch and impair your development.]

Lily nodded. "That makes sense. Okay, can you tell me which ones I can use?"

[Certainly.]

Arakil then pointed out two particular gestures from the bunch. The first one was something like a figure eight, and it helped stabilize the depth when drawing with the wand.

Lily was actually surprised Arakil allowed her to have access to this, as in her opinion, this sounded exactly like a crutch. She quickly voiced her concern, which was met with chuckles in response.

[The guidance isn't perfect, and considering your honest concern, I believe you are mature enough to know when to use it. The reason I want you to use it is that there is a flow to the Mana when drawing that can help keep the depth stable. Just like you needed to learn the correct pressure when using a pen, I want you to recognize this flow.]

Lily gleefully accepted the explanation, which put her fears to rest. She also personally swore not to abuse it and to use it only as a teaching tool or in emergencies.

The second gesture was a simple yet deliberate flick and flourish, which appeared easy to replicate. When Arakil explained the purpose, Lily immediately understood why this function was so easy to replicate—it could reproduce a saved glyph!

"This sounds too good to be true," Lily commented.

[Then I look forward to your future reactions. As with the previous one, this one is also ripe for abuse, but I trust you will use it responsibly. I want you to have an emergency glyph stored, but at the same time, you need to study the process.]

"Are you saying I'll be able to produce glyphs instantly by myself?" Lily gasped.

[Of course, but you'll need to graduate beyond the wand to actually do that.]

Lily was visibly bouncing with excitement as this was some of the best news she'd ever heard. While she was dreadfully curious about the other gestures, she managed to restrain herself and follow Arakil's guidance.

To get rid of the floating instruction manual, Arakil told Lily to blast out another pulse of Mana at the center, which caused the "page" to unravel before her eyes.

[You can do something similar with floating glyphs if you wish to discard them; think of it as an eraser.]

"Does that mean I can fix small mistakes to redo it?" Lily asked.

[If you control your Mana to a small enough degree, yes. You could remove or change a sigil, for example.]

Lily's mind raced as some ideas quickly came to mind. When Arakil had mentioned saving glyphs, one errant thought was saving a partially completed glyph, and she could rapidly fill in the blanks. This would give her some on-the-fly customization she might not have otherwise had.

But when Arakil mentioned that she had an emergency glyph, she quickly discarded that idea, as if it were incomplete; she wouldn't be able to use it instantly. Now, though, she could erase the parts and replace them, still saving time while not wasting a contingency.

Some other thoughts and ideas seemed to spring up, and she quickly threw them out to Arakil, who seemed delighted at her imagination. The biggest one was Lily asking about having multiple floating glyphs ready, and the answer was yes!

Lily could leave a glyph up and activate it only when she wanted by shooting it with her wand. Unless someone or something disrupted the Mana, like those anti-magic bees, they would last a considerable amount of time.

When Lily's deluge of questions finally ran dry, she immediately jumped into practicing with the wand. The first thing she tried was the stabilizing function, and she drew another quick light orb glyph. The result was like night and day, as she quickly produced a flat glyph.

Wow, this really feels like cheating.

After that success, Arakil informed her how to save a glyph in the wand. After drawing it, she needed to perform the gesture, but rather than pulse her Mana, she needed to stab the glyph with the wand. Lily drew up another light orb and, after doing the flourish, stabbed it.

As the wand made contact with the glyph, it was like a whirlpool as the floating glyph began to get sucked straight into the wand. The experience was a sight to see, and when the job was done, Lily found herself staring at the stick in her hand with wide eyes.

Now that it was saved, Lily just needed to perform the gesture and pulse her Mana. She quickly did just that, and right at the final flourish, the wand spat out the glyph exactly as she had drawn it.

Lily was about to activate it when another errant thought crossed her mind. Instead of activating the glyph, Lily performed the gesture again, and another glyph popped out!

"That worked!?" Lily cried out in surprise.

[Oh? Did you think it was expendable?]

Lily silently nodded, her eyes still wide in shock. Arakil chuckled in response.

[If that were the case, I wouldn't have been worried about it negatively influencing your development. No, the glyph design is saved until you replace it.]

Lily was absolutely flabbergasted, and suddenly her impression of this unassuming magical black stick improved exponentially. Now she truly understood why Arakil was so excited about this and why he had told her to abandon the bag.

I'd pick this over a storage bag any day! This is perfect!

With her excitement at an all-time peak, Lily practiced late into the night until her room was absolutely packed with floating light orbs. Lily regretted not putting time limits on them, as these large glyphs seemed to have ample fuel to keep them running.

"Arakil, is there a way to get rid of them?" Lily asked.

[Yes... I'll tell you if you promise to go to bed straight after.]

Lily opened her mouth to protest before suddenly realizing how late it was. A momentary panic set in, and she quickly acquiesced; she was just glad tomorrow was the weekend, or she would have been in a real pickle!