"That's manageable. The king will just put the castle lord under a strict contract to not misuse it and have someone watch over them in secret. What about the other layers?" Magnus asked.
"They worked as we thought they would, but we'll need a new spell for controlling the vitality layer. Manipulating life force with just the screen is tiring and difficult." Chronos said.
"We also have an idea we want to test out. We might be able to create an item for gathering and holding life force from the air. If a healer or priest carries it with them, they can transfer the extra life force to an injured person during an emergency." Old Tobias said.
"Oh, that will be helpful for the scouts. Alright Chronos I want two more of these devices for the other castles." Magnus said.
"No problem but if we don't get the black pearls only the Beklaedning clan members will be able to use them." Chronos replied.
"Don't worry about that. We've already received word that the black fangs are bringing a number of them."
"Good."
Chronos picked up another veyrite-concordite alloy bar and began shaping it into a pyramid. After his first experience making the pyramids he was able to easily finish the next two.
After rereading Old Tobias's book on material's, he had learned that concordite was used to channel spirit while veyrite was used to channel aura.
Neither of them were very durable materials and an alloy formed of both was incredibly weak, but they were both common materials that would channel aura and spirit respectively. When combined they would create an alloy that would channel both aura and spirit at the same time.
While he was working on the pyramids Magnus went over the notes that Old Tobias had written and added some of his own notes to it before leaving.
When Chronos was finished with his work he passed the pyramids to Old Tobias and left the plateau. Until the black pearls arrived there was nothing else for him to do here so he went back to the grove.
He made it back just in time for dinner.
"Chronos welcome back. Tonight we're having waste buffalo burgers with a side of beans." Lyla greeted him.
"Sounds good." He sat next to Gregory and gently nudged him. "Hey do you know how much Sariah thinks about you?"
"I can imagine." Gregory hinted.
"I hope so cause she is obsessed with you."
"That doesn't surprise me. I once found a hidden compartment in her room that had a homemade doll of me and a few of my older weapons in it."
"And you're not worried?" Chronos asked.
Gregory got a thoughtful look on his face then said, "I was at first, but I do love her, so I've come to accept her obsession. Besides I don't think she'll do anything illegal, she knows I'd be upset with her if she did."
"True, after all it's your job to handle the illegal parts of our journey. If you need any help don't hesitate to ask. I've always got your back." Chronos said as he patted his shoulder.
Gregory nodded as Sariah came in to join them.
Having such an obsessive woman in their group worried Chronos but he chose to trust Gregory to handle her.
Although maybe you had to be a bit crazy to know how to handle curses safely. It would explain why nearly all curse users seemed to have mental problems.
Compared to those that suffered from hallucinations or would suddenly act violent, being a bit obsessive was nothing.
After dinner Chronos dove into the system skills list to find that skill he had glanced at before. He remembered it was in the utility skills, but it took him some time to find where it had gone.
"Found it! I can't believe I had to go to the bottom of the list. Let's see, it's only ten points, that's surprisingly cheap for how useful it is."
{[Pocket Sphere]
Type: Spatial / Utility
Rank: 1
Description: Creates a sphere capable of storing a single object measuring one meter or less. Once an object is stored, the sphere shrinks to the size of a marble to easily be carried in a pocket.}
"It won't let me store anything alive, but it doesn't say anything about storing energy. Alright let's give this a try."
Holding out both hands he watched as two half circles shimmered into existence around a trash bin in the corner. Clapping his hands together, the half circles came together snapping into place swiftly shrinking to the size of a marble with the trash bin still inside it.
Picking up the marble he saw that the bin floated in its center and even shaking it didn't cause the bin to hit the sides of the sphere. There was also a thin line around its center that he could feel a small notch in.
"So, if I squeeze on this notch."
Pop!
The trash bin appeared on the ground in front of him just as it had been before he put it in the sphere.
"That's pretty cool. I wonder if I can store food. Most food definitely isn't alive but I'm not sure how it would classify plants. Does it slow time like my storage or does it just shrink things down? Hm, I'll need to experiment tomorrow."
He wasn't able to test how long consumables would last in just one night and the sphere was delicate enough that a small shock, like being crushed underfoot, would cause them to open but it would come in very helpful when they needed to move a lot of things at once.
Maybe Gregory could use them as a trap by shattering them above others and dropping boulders onto enemies or placing them in another creature's walking path to make them explode underfoot.
The objects inside of the sphere didn't seem to have any weight while the sphere stayed closed but the moment they opened the objects full weight would be applied.
It was already late at night by the time he was finished turning in for the night. His dreams were filled with the possibilities the [Pocket Sphere] would bring to his team.
The next morning, he was back in the power core room with old Tobias trying to capture life force in one of his [Pocket Sphere]'s. They had successfully recreated a sphere using enchantments and concordite but their antics looked a bit strange.
Along the wall were several enchanters watching an old man wave a sphere in the air above him at nothing while a young man kept touching a screen then yelling at the old man.
"That's too far! It's more to the right." Chronos yelled.
Old Tobias waved the sphere to his right, snapping it closed around nothing.
"Gah. So close. Can't you move a bit faster old man." Chronos complained as old Tobias barely missed the life force.
"How about we change places!? Capturing something you can't see isn't easy!" He snapped back.
"Trying to keep the life force in one place isn't any easier. It wants to move about." Chronos said.
"Maybe you should wave your hands around a bit more, old man." Called out one of the enchanters.
"I think running in circles like earlier would work better." Another joked.
A vein bulged on Old Tobias's forehead as he yelled at them, "Don't make me put one of you in this sphere!"
"I don't think that's possible. Those runes aren't meant to hold living beings." A younger enchanter said.
That young enchanter had good eyes. Old Tobias would have to look over his work later and see if he was worth investing more time in training.
"Old man right behind you." The enchanters laughed at Old Tobias as he practically did a backflip trying to capture the life force.
The head healer and Magnus walked in on this chaos a few minutes later. Seeing what Old Tobias was doing she cast a spell and stole the life force from Chronos before either of them got hurt.
"What are you two trying to do?" She asked while giving them a strange look.
Seeing her holding the life force with her bare hands Chronos realized that they were using the worst possible method to try and capture life force.
"Um, this is a little embarrassing, but we were trying to put that life force into the sphere there."
"And you didn't think to call a specialist in handling life force?" The healer raised an eyebrow at them.
Chronos blushed but Old Tobias didn't seem to care as he rushed up to the healer and slammed both sides of the sphere around it.
"Got it." Old Tobias cheered as the life force became visible within the sphere and the sphere shrunk to the size of a small apple.
It wasn't as small as the original spell but at that size a single healer could carry several of them at once.
"Oh, that will be very helpful, but we'll need to adjust the runes on it or the sphere will leak life force. We'll call them life spheres. How many can you make?" Asked the head healer.