danmachi: runes master

Chapter 3: First Rune

Ben woke up and ran to the tower. On his way, he stepped into a restaurant named Hostess of Fertility. He ordered three plates of hashbrowns and sausage and began eating, devouring every bit. Then, Ben started a conversation with a girl named Syr.

"Nice to meet you, I'm Syr."

"Oh, yeah, nice to meet you too. My name's Ben. Now then, how much does this all cost?" Ben asked while taking out one of his bags full of valis.

"12,000 valis for all three plates," Syr replied.

Ben set the money on the table with 500 extra valis and walked away. Once he got out of the restaurant, he started running to the tower again.

Ben ran inside the tower and greeted Abby again. "Hi, Abby, I'm back. Did you get anyone to accept my request for me to see their magic? And also, any information about that house? Hats for House?"

"Yes, I did. I misread the price—it costs about 2.5 million valis, so I guess that was a bit of a bust. Sorry."

"Oh, it's fine. But what about my magic request?"

"Great news! There is a Level Two adventurer willing to show you the magic Shock, which can shock an opponent and potentially stun them."

"Great! Where is she?"

"Right next to you," Abby said with a small, amused smile.

"What?… Oh shit, when did you get next to me?"

"I walked up a few minutes ago. Now then, my name is Camilla Afra, Level Two adventurer. You are?"

"Oh, my name is Ben. Now then, how does 5,000 valis per cast sound?"

"5,000 valis per cast is a bit low. What about 8,000? I can only cast a spell eight times every four hours because of mana regeneration time."

"Sure. Now then, Abby, do you know where we can do this practice? And also, do you know where I can get a writing utensil and something to write on?"

"You can get writing chalk from a salesman at the shop two stores down for 30,000 valis per pack of six sticks. They're about the size of an average person's hand. And you can rent the training rooms in the arena for 10,000 per hour."

"Wait, do you guys not have a system of measurement?"

"Of course we do. We have scales."

"What about length, height, and width?"

"What is width?"

"Oh god, I forgot you guys are still in the medieval tech age—just with some advancements due to magic," Ben thought to himself.

Ben started thinking if he could make money off of the business side of this messed-up world.

"I'll start doing things like that later. For now, I'm gonna continue exploring this dungeon," Ben thought.

"Yeah, Abby, where was that arena again?"

Ben first went to the store and bought a pack of chalk. He also found some writing boards there for 1,000 valis each, made of stone, and bought 20 of them. Then, he went to the arena and rented a room for two hours. This left him 80,000 valis poorer. Adding on the 12,000 he spent on food, he only had 416,000 valis left.

"Alright, let's get started," Ben said as he took out the chalk and a board, getting ready to draw. He then asked Camilla to cast her magic. She did.

"So the magic seal is way more simple, with way simpler runes," Ben thought while drawing it. He only got halfway done before the seal disappeared.

"Please cast it again," Ben asked.

Camilla cast the spell again, and Ben finished the seal. He then put his hand on it, and with directions from his Runic Eyes, they basically showed him how to circulate the magic into the seal. He activated each rune, and the seal sent sparks into Ben's body. He realized he must have made a mistake in the seal, so he asked Camilla to cast it once more. He redrew it, put his hand to it, pushed in magic, and realized two things: the effect still shocked him, and the runic magic took a lot less mana from him than it did from Camilla. He wondered if it was because he was using a seal and not "magic."

"Alright," he said. He then asked Camilla if she knew any other spells.

"I know two others—Fireball and Lightning Storm."

Ben then asked her to show him Fireball, which he found had a very simple seal. He finished it easily, put his hand to it, and tried to cast it. It did make a fireball on the seal—but it burned Ben's hand. Ben just added that to his list of injuries: a cut face, a cut on the back of his hand, and cracked ribs. He started thinking about finding someone to heal him so it wouldn't get worse.

Ben then asked Camilla to cast Lightning Storm. She agreed, cast it, and Ben was surprised—the seal was so much more complex and took twice as much of Camilla's magic. Ben started steadily drawing it but didn't finish in time. He asked Camilla to cast it one more time, and he barely finished it before it disappeared.

Ben then paid Camilla 64,000 valis, leaving him with 352,000 valis.

Ben then started trying to fix the seal and was able to change the Shock seal to just kind of stay in one place for a bit while shocking anything that touched it. He did this by using a part of the Lightning Storm seal that he found out kept it together while it moved.

He then started carving the seal onto two of the stone boards with the dagger he got back from Abby. He also carved a place to hold them on the back, picked them up, and activated the seal—immediately getting shocked. He realized he did not know the tune or set of runes that would keep the seal from shocking him.

So he had an idea. He decided the best thing to do was to sell a few of these boards with seals because he realized no one could replicate them. The person would need to be able to use a special frequency of mana while drawing, which his eye did for him.

He then carved the most advanced Lightning Storm seal onto the remaining 14 boards with his dagger, packed up all 20 boards in his hands, and walked over. Then, Ben started walking back to the dungeon.

Once he got there, he started talking. "Ha, Abby, I want to sell these boards I made. They have a magic seal on them that activates the magic Lightning Storm when mana is pushed into each rune on the seal."

"It does what?!!!" Abby said, alarmed.

"Listen, Ben, if your seals do this, there are many gods that will come after you, try to force you into their familias, or worse. You can't just go selling this stuff—especially without a familia's backing."

"Oh, sorry, Abby. I didn't know."

"It's okay. You're young, and it's fine to make mistakes."

"I'm 22," Ben said in retort.

"I'm 88," Abby said, smiling and laughing at Ben. "You humans are always kids to us elves."

"Oh," Ben said in an understanding manner.

"Ha, Ben, want me to introduce you to the Loki familia? I'm sure they will take you in," Abby asked.

"Sure," Ben said. "Now then, is there anywhere I can put my money rather than on my person? Also, I am getting nowhere in this dungeon without, like, a bag. Can you direct me to where I can buy a backpack or something that I can carry all my loot in?"

"There's a store right next to this one that carries basic equipment. It should have some bags for you to buy for like 8,000 valis. And after that, let's get you a falna—the sooner you get one, the better."

"Sounds good," Ben said. "Oh, one more thing. Is there someone who can fix my injuries? I have a few cracked ribs, and as you can see, a cut on my face and the back of my hand. I'd rather not get infected."

"Infected?"

"Uhm, how do I explain… It's like when you get a direct wound, like a cut or scrape, and it starts changing color and you start getting sick."

"Oh, I see. There is someone who can heal you, but for ribs, it will cost about 50,000 valis."

"Damn, does anything not cost an exorbitant amount of dough? I only have 352,000 valis left. Damn, this sucks. Okay, where is she?"

"I didn't say she. His name is John Esonge. He's part of the Demeter familia. He has the magic Healing Hands, which can heal injuries depending on the amount of mana he puts into the magic."

"Cool. Where is he?"

Abby told Ben where the guy lived—obviously in the Demeter familia.

"It sometimes feels like that kid has no idea about this place at all," Abby thought. "But the weird thing is, when investigating him, it's like he doesn't exist. No backstory. He didn't even go through the gate—he simply appeared. Well… I hope he didn't break in," Abby said to herself while Ben walked off.

Hope you guys like the chapter I spent 2 hours writing it

-Gachadevildog

I spent about 30 minutes fixing this dumbass's grammer mistakes and that was after we checked it through grammerly

-Themasterofsystems