The goddess's words had inspired him greatly; he should not limit himself if he wanted to do what he wished. Aelion wanted a powerful weapon to counterbalance his weakness and his slow growth.
Weapons were the worst and best human invention ever created. Not only could they serve deterrent purposes, but also grant superiority and win a battle. Some would say that the body itself is a weapon; others would claim that it is useless to possess a weapon if one does not know how to use or handle it.
However, Aelion came from another world, and he had no intention of becoming a pugilist, nor of dedicating years of his life to trying to master a sword or understand martial paths. He had nothing against martial artists—he didn't even know anything about those from Accnesea—but in general, their evolution and strength were too deep, philosophical, and spiritual.
He did not want to follow that path at all, not even with weapons. Where he came from, it was well known that no matter how fast or strong one was, no one could dodge or parry a bullet with bare hands or their body.
And yes. Hadn't the goddess claimed that UGAEL could forge and create anything? She was going to create firearms for him—and not just any firearms—which was why he was here in this library, despite the uneasy feeling growing within him.
He would have liked there to be a librarian or someone managing this place; unfortunately, it was empty, but at least he seemed able to find what he sought without help. Strangely, the library had shifted into a place he recognized more, similar to the ones he used at the university.
As he browsed the shelves, he instinctively came across what he was searching for: titles such as Evolution of Weapons from the ### Century to Today, Weapon Design, Introduction to Technomechanics, Technomagic, Magical Engineering, and many other books on the subject.
His best discovery was the runic introduction. Volume 1 covered minor runes, volume 2 major ones, and volume 3 superior ones. Despite being unable to wield elemental weapons, the runic language would be a major asset for producing various effects.
Aelion imagined all the applications he could use them for, and for the first time since his arrival, he would go self-taught—and that had always worked for him.
---
After more than three hours of reading on the third floor, he managed to decide that he would build an arsenal of weapons composed of different ranges: short, medium, and long.
For the short-range weapon, he decided to take inspiration from the Colt Python with a cylinder rather than a Glock, a weapon too modern whose complexity he feared in a medieval world—and also a shotgun.
Regarding the medium-range one, Aelion opted for a lever-action rifle. He would have wanted an assault rifle, but for now, he couldn't afford too high of a hope and would start with this one.
As for the long-range weapon, it would obviously be a sniper rifle. For the model, he still had to choose among many others.
The books had helped a lot. But they were only tools for his inspiration, because ultimately, he wasn't just going to forge his weapons—he would adapt them to the reality of the magical world. Magical weapons he would redefine and model himself.
His next reading would focus on the metals and materials to be used. Aelion was used to this. On Earth, he had once been employed in a video game company after winning a modeling competition. His specialty matched what he was about to do.
Leaving the comfort of the chair behind his desk, he completely reorganized the desk layout to gain space and sat on the floor. With the help of a parchment and old-style pens, he began drawing all the planned models, detailing each piece, each element.
With these basic plans in hand, he pinned them all around the room to get an idea of what he had to do.
"I have no limits, huh?" he muttered to himself ironically.
The next step he tackled afterward was runic language and its mastery. The first volume introduced the world of runes. Indeed, runes were a form of magic carved or written—a mystical sub-system used by mages or artisans. Most mages could use minor runes; however, major and superior ones would reveal their secrets only to certain talents.
To truly understand runes, one needed to adopt a different approach and not consider them as spells in the literal sense: they represented fundamental principles of reality. Runes were the words of the world, and using them meant using the power of words, which defined a guiding—or not—principle of reality.
There were several ways to use a rune: the most widely used was that of artisans, who engraved runes on materials or any suitable medium thanks to a specialized tool. Mages, on the other hand, used various catalysts such as blood, chalk, or more specifically magical stones containing the script.
However, some mages were exceptions, drawing runes directly in the air with mana. The main reason this method was extremely complicated even for minor runes was due to the structure of the runes and the complexity between 2D and the multidimensional aspect of reality.
A rune was never alone; its form was an assembly of lines, circles, angles, and curves. Each geometric element could represent a variation of intention, such as a circle for continuity, cycles, stable energy; a triangle for direction. However, all of these were merely anchors to refine the rune's efficiency.
Each rune consisted of three essential elements: the sigil representing the word and the intention; and the intention carried by the user's mana to activate it.
The geometric forms mentioned earlier would only be used by those tracing runes directly in the air because a rune engraved on a physical support in a three-dimensional space was much simpler than representing a figure in a multi-dimensional space.
Runes were organized into three categories: minor, major, and superior. Minor runes produced weak and minimal effects such as a small light, heat for cooking, or a marking rune and some very weak utility effects. Major runes were much more aggressive and reflected real elements like fire, water, or explosions, with more impactful combined effects.
Superior runes, however, reflected primordial concepts such as creation, life, or death. No description of them could be found in these books. Aelion was somewhat relieved, because if it were that easy to find such knowledge, it would already be chaos.
Thanks to the volumes, he was able to practice tracing runes in the air by himself. He understood well that for many, it was complicated—but not for him. For someone who had spent hours and weeks on 3D modeling software, designing shapes in three-dimensional and beyond spaces wasn't a problem.
In less than two hours, he had acquired the basics for minor runes. Of course, at first it was complicated, and his strokes were not straight at all, sometimes causing unstable runes that tended to explode or decompose in the air. In the end, he managed to form one—the lighting rune.
When he injected his mana with his intention, a small light was born from the sigil, brightening the room even more.
[ You have received the skills Rune Mastery ]
Skill: Rune Mastery (Basic)
Type: Magic – Knowledge
Description:
Allows reading, understanding, and tracing basic runes.
The user can identify the function of a rune and write simple ones to activate minor effects.
Effects:
– Reading common runes
– Tracing simple runes
– Light sensitivity to mana flow within glyphs
The young man collapsed on the floor, exhausted, surrounded by all these books. Reading about so many different subjects at once was a mistake that put his brain under heavy strain.
"It's already been more than five hours he locked himself in there—what is he doing?" she said, worried, tapping her feet on the ground in frustration.
She didn't want to be invasive or clingy, because he had told her he would explain everything, but Seraphina didn't seem very comfortable.
Eventually, she went up quickly, stopped in front of the door, and froze, thinking about how to enter. Fortunately, Aelion sensed her thanks to his perception outside the room and allowed her to enter.
"It looks like you're continuing to train as planned. I know I told you to read, but now I feel like you're pushing a bit too hard," declared Seraphina, impressed by the state of the room and the diagrams and drawings she couldn't understand.
"Don't worry, I can tell you I stumbled upon a good surprise..." Aelion admitted, tracing the light rune he had mastered earlier under the vampire's astonished eyes.
"You're mastering runes? I didn't know you wanted to turn toward craftsmanship..." she added, disappointed.
"Uh, what?"