Adamant Blood

Mark made one stop in the morning before the training missions started.

"Hey, Julie!" Mark said, walking up to the counter of the Artificer's Guild, at Castle North. "I'm here about the order?"

Julie said, "I got the items in my office."

Mark followed Julie back to her office.

Julie Sacredcut was Mark's contact for all magical items, and she was good at getting him new things, as needed. Mark had called earlier to request invisibility options for adamantium, for objects, and for whatever she thought was a good idea. Mark needed to make Quark's handy body invisible, but still functional, and a magical item would do that a whole lot better than constantly reapplying invisibility spellworks himself.

In her office, with the door closed, Julie took out three boxes from a wall safe, saying, "Three options, all of them with minor issues, but they're all still good according to the specs Quark gave me. All of them should allow for uninterrupted Sigaldry work."

Of course Julie knew about Sigaldry. Everyone did, once you got past mage secrecy. Julie did not artifice with basic hand signs, though. Maybe she used Goobersmithing? Mark wasn't sure what Goobersmithing was, exactly, but it seemed like the thing that artificers did. Second Princess Walaria had made Goobersmithing part of Mark's curriculum, with regard to magical item creation, so yeah. Julie probably used Goobersmithing.

"Did you bring the body with you?" Julie asked,

"Nope," Mark said, as he moved some adamantium around to mimic the shape of the 4-handed orb that he had made for Quark. "The invisibilities I put onto it kept breaking, so I left it at home. This is about correct, though."

Quark invaded the floating mock-up, silver tendrils spilling out around malformed hands. He didn't say anything, though.

Julie nodded. "They should all still work. This first option is the most comprehensive option." She opened a box and inside lay a plain silver ring. "Ring of invisibility. Should work to make a body invisible to most things in the electromagnetic spectrum. Astral sights will still see the wearer, but the wearer will be indistinct. Put the ring onto a finger on Quark's body and then have Quark twist it clockwise to turn it on. It has to be him turning it on and off, too. That's how it works. But seeing as how he's your familiar, you can probably activate it or deactivate it just fine… And there's more I can say about that, with regard to familiars and this mostly being your Shaped metal and also solid mana… But. We're experimenting here. Might not work." She added, "And be careful. It's PL 75, but Quark's metal is PL 90."

Mark picked up the ring, and thought it kinda big. It would not fit Mark's own pinky finger, but Quark's fingers were baby-sized. So Mark enlarged one of Quark's fingers and put the ring onto the hand. Quark moved around some rapidly-shaped bones that didn't move nearly well enough, jerking a bit as he moved them. Julie winced. Mark fixed the bones a bit better and Quark moved smoother, and Quark twisted the ring clockwise.

Mark's entire body went invisible, including his adamantium, and all of Quark.

He could still see, though.

Mark chuckled. "Better invisibility than the one I cast."

"Looks like it doesn't work how you want it to work, though," Julie said, humming. She pulled down her artificer's lenses over her eyes and then looked at Mark, and at Quark's floating orb, saying, "Pretty good coverage, though."

"Can you see anything, Quark?" Mark asked.

"Negative, sir. I am completely blind. I have put out new sensors, but those are blind as well."

Julie hummed. "We have other options, but I was hoping that one would work. It's PL 75, too."

"I'll buy it anyway," Mark said. "How much is it?"

"2.5 million. Be careful taking it off. You might really damage it with the adamantium being too close."

Mark had a moment of disbelief at the cost, but then he made himself get over the price tag. He didn't like spending money, but he was getting better about it. Maybe Isoko or Eliot could use this? … Actually, could Sally use it? Mark wasn't sure. Sally was the strongest one among them, and so she could actually withstand getting accidentally injured by big things, as long as those things weren't too big, and she actually benefited from being injured, too.

A lot of enemies actually stopped targeting her when they realized they got hurt when they hurt her, but if she was invisible, then most enemies couldn't help but hurt her.

Mark said, "I'm taking it off, so hold still, Quark," Mark said, and Quark held still. With a bit of fumbling, and like trying to touch fingertips to fingertips in the dark with arms that were not exactly attached to his body, Mark got the ring off of Quark's finger. His body and adamantium reappeared like splashed color reapplied to reality. Kind of a weird effect, honestly. Mark held up the ring, asking, "I want one sized for Sally. If she uses it, then she uses it."

"Of course." Julie put forward the next box, the largest of the boxes, at over 30 centimeters cubed. "This one is a natural treasure, rather than a created object. It is the most expensive. It's an invisible diamond." She opened the top of the box and there was cloth inside, but it had been cut down through the middle in a sort of roundish-shape, revealing layers upon layers of fabric piled up to the halfway point in the box. "Invisible diamonds would be less expensive if they weren't so hard to find. This one has been heavily enchanted to contain and multiply the effect, and to guard the diamond itself from breaking. It's adamantium-grade, but please do not nestle it directly against adamantium, Mark."

Her voice took on a bit of a worry there at the end.

Mark had broken a few things that Julie had shown him over the months, including pretty much all of the self-repairing clothes and webweave that she had gotten for him. He paid for it all, of course, and eventually they had found stuff that he couldn't break that easily, but still… This little thing must be expensive if she was worried about the price.

Mark grinned as he reached into the box and felt a sharp-edged something sitting on top of cloth, and said, "Neat!"

There was obviously something solid laying on some cloth. It was attached by strings to the sides of the box to keep it in the middle, but Mark couldn't see it at all. His hand turned invisible when he got close to the object, too, so that made a great first impression.

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"Can I take it out of the box?"

"Of course!" Julie flicked her fingers over the sides of the box, releasing the strings that were attached to the object. "It's not fragile, but it's not strong, either. PL 35."

Mark winced. "Ouch. That's… kinda low."

"It'll go up with a connection to your astral body, of course, but it won't get higher than the 70's."

Mark nodded, and then he carved out a little divot on Quark's mockup-orb and placed the stone on the divot. Quark's tester body went invisible, but a few of his fingers were outside of the effect.

Mark stood impressed. "How much?"

"65 million."

Mark made an instinctive, instant, "Ugh gah hahahah."

He carefully picked the crystal off of Quark and put the crystal back into the box and left it there.

Julie said, "Yeah. It's expensive. That's 85% material cost, too. 10% parts and labor, and not all of it done in house. 5% markup. It's a reward of the settlement, so that price isn't coming from me."

Mark asked, "That's with my 25% off Obsidian Card, yeah?"

It had cost him a million points to get that lifetime discount card from the Artificer's Guild, but it was well worth the cost and it had paid for itself twice over. Julie got to use it, too, in some weird way that Mark wasn't even sure about, but which had to do with purchasing goods for his requests. Mark wasn't a Hero of Humanity yet, but that card was a good marker of someone who might, one day, become a Hero of Humanity, and the Artificer's Guild recognized that.

Isoko was several missions away from her own Obsidian Card, while Eliot had gotten his two months ago. Sally was steadily working on her own, but she was a lot further away than Isoko.

Julie said, "It'd be 85 million without the card, but no one is buying that stuff without a card to begin with. You're into the big leagues with your purchases, Mark."

"Huh… I guess so." Mark asked, "What can you even do with such a diamond? Why is it so expensive?"

"City-wide True Invisibility enchants, mostly."

… Shit. Did Mark need to buy that for Eliot? For their eventual flying castle?

Julie began stringing the crystal back into its secured location in the middle of the box, tying the strings through holes in the sides, saying, "The last option is cheap. Just one second here…" She took a moment to make sure the crystal was secure.

Mark looked at the space where the invisible diamond was in the box, and wondered if he should get it anyway… Maybe he should? "The diamond is permanent invisibility, yeah?"

"Yes, and very strong, too. Most people break them when they find them, though, and broken crystals lose most of their effects, so they're always going to be expensive." Julie asked, "Do you want it?"

"Thinking about it… What's the last option?"

Julie lifted the lid on the third box and therein lay a solid black glass potion. Mark recognized it. Julie explained, "Oil of invisibility. 10,000 goldleaf a pop. Lasts 2 hours. Wash it off to end the effect earlier. Discolors clothes and most other things. It shouldn't interfere with Quark making signs since it's designed to be spread on bare skin and hair, and Quark qualifies as that, but if you get it in your eyes, or if he makes a camera around it, then those things are invisible, too. Same problem as normal invisibility, with the eyes, and all. One of the most common uses is for mages putting it on their hands and making sigils and other magical effects out in the open, so it will absolutely work for your purposes."

Mark had no problem saying, "I'll take some potions, and the ring, and another ring sized for Sally."

"She'll need to sign the paperwork explaining the risks of invisibility magic, too, just so you're aware."

Mark nodded. "Yup yup…" And then he paused, looked at the invisible diamond's closed box, and asked, "How long has that been sitting in inventory?"

"Since the second week of the settlement being operational." Julie sighed a little as she looked at the box, too, her vector almost annoyed. "The person who found it in a cave in the dragonoid canyons was ecstatic, but then it never got sold. Only been a few months, though. The price is a very good price, but it requires a special kinda need for someone to pay that much. People check in on the object all the time, though. Aurora has it slated for emergency reserves for the settlement, but she hopes to never use it that way."

Mark kinda wanted the diamond. It was less than a kilo of adamantium. He could spare that. He had 120 kilos on his person right now. But he didn't want to deprive it from someone who actually needed it. "I don't want to buy it out from someone who is checking in on it all the time."

Julie said, "It's another 2 months before it can legally leave the settlement's coffers and go on the open market, and out there it will get snatched up rather instantly. That's where most people are coming from, to look at it. There are only a few people here that are looking at the diamond for actual purchase, and one of them is you. The others include the Empire and the Inquisitor's Hall. The Empire plans to buy it for strategic reserve, 1 day before it goes onto the open market, while the Inquisitors are going after it through Sir Galen Greene-Shield. They're going to buy it next month, when they finally get the money together for it."

Mark had a moment, then he said, "Okay, well… I guess I'm not buying it, then. They can have it for their needs, which are probably important?" Mark wasn't sure about that last part.

Julie chuckled. "You are far from the first person who made that exact same decision. So how many bottles of oil do you want?"

"Two, to start, and I want to transfer them to adamantium orbs. Can I do that?"

"You can wrap adamantium around the bottles, but the bottles are enchanted to prevent degradation. As soon as the oil is popped open the bottle goes invisible, too, and the same thing would happen to your adamantium, as well…"

It took a bit of doing, but Mark got what he needed.

And then he got going.