Chapter 18 The Way Of Fire

"Do you need another handful brought up from Felwan’s place?" I asked Tivet. He immediately shook his head as he came out of the house with two beers.

"No, no, I just bring along one handful every time I go so there wouldn't be a need to bring anything with a wagon. The formula is already in place, so there's also no need to experiment, which means there’s no need for a lot of materials," he said while handing me a beer and sitting next to me in his workshop.

There were quite a lot of weird devices and shelves that held all kinds of different materials, most likely all of them from maps. The most obviously newly added storage was a larger place to hold wood and some types of wines I hadn’t seen before. I noticed Tivet getting a bit worried as I was looking around quite curiously.

"Don't worry. I know that you and Felwan have a good thing going on. I’m really not that worried about money to try to steal that formula. I’m just, in general, interested in this map-making stuff because, from what I understand, at higher levels, map-making becomes less predictable. So at that point, I guess your job kinda disappears," I said, returning an apologetic look.

Tivet nervously laughed a bit. "You don’t beat around the bush, now do you? It's interesting to be around someone so straightforward. You’re also right about my job disappearing, although I’m surprised you know about that. Kinda hard to get any information past level 50, even more so past the green ranks."

"Mark, guess I haven’t asked you, but I assume you’re trying to make it to the higher level, aren’t you?" I gave him a nod, so he continued.

"I don’t know how you can stomach it. I got my levels thanks to my family—we have a few combat-oriented members, and they helped the rest of us. We’ve always been more creators than fighters, but my stomach turns every time I have to fight. How do you handle that?"

"Honestly, Tivet, while I do get nervous, especially when the odds seem against me, I just fight. Nothing more to it."

He gave me a weak smile, and we paused, opened our beers, and drank a bit. It was getting a bit awkward, so I thought I’d change the topic.

"So, what do all these devices do?" I said while pointing at a few of the more interesting pieces that looked like fancy furniture.

"They are mainly for the purification of materials. None of this can be run without the few skills meant to go with the crafting passive tree. Do you know much about the crafting passive tree?" he asked, to which I shook my head. Well, I did know some, I obviously didn’t know it as well as the combat one.

"Like with the combat one, there are bonuses to about everything, but the main difference is, like for the magic tree on the combat passive, what you pick can change the whole passive tree. The changes are not as well recorded as the combat one, as there are families who hold secrets to certain combinations that change things."

"Well, my family doesn’t have any of those. Over who knows how many years civilization has existed, a lot of those secret combinations have gotten out, and we use one that allows us to use those devices made by artificers to purify materials so we can make maps that are as similar to each other as possible. That’s what most of the guild mapmakers also focus on."

"So, are you aiming to get that map approved by the guild to be in their official section?" I asked, but the question made Tivet laugh.

"Yeah, there’s no way to do that. Well, not entirely—perhaps my great-grandson could get this map approved, but not in its current state. I assume you know about the need to report map discrepancies?"

I nodded.

"If you aren’t getting the results they’re looking for—and those are extremely tight requirements—you can’t get your map approved. And if you get those tolerances correct, you would need to make and have qualified teams test thousands upon thousands of maps, and you can’t have any discrepancies in any of them, or you fail entirely."

"Wait, I’ve done quite a lot of goblin maps, and there are plenty of discrepancies I’ve seen. While I’ll admit they’re smaller than in your maps, it isn’t by a lot."

"Yeah, that’s not because of the map formula—it’s because of who is making the maps. If I wanted to, I’m good enough to get a job as a Guild map maker, but it’s a 10-year contract at the minimum. And while I could mess around with my own maps as much as possible, I couldn’t sell them. And while I might not have as much ambition as you do, I do want to make it to green rank and be able to do green maps as well as I can do grey maps."

"I guess making green maps is like a gold mine compared to making grey ones?"

"Oh, you have no idea. In green maps, the chance to drop orbs is significantly higher—not to mention the loot, which has a lot more potential to have modifiers."

That brought up a good question I hadn’t been able to find an answer to. "Can maps get modifiers?"

"Don’t spread this information around, but yes, they can. Have you ever seen a map be made?"

I nodded yes and then no to answer both those inquiries.

"Come, I’ll show you how to make one. If you ever get to red maps, never buy maps from someone you don’t know—it’s always better to make them yourself. Formulas out in the open market are safe enough, and while we map crafters can get better results, those who choose to specialize in making maps tougher and with better rewards usually have about the same level of discrepancies as you would—although without the extra boost to the dropped loot."

"So first, you would need a piece of rock. It needs to be quite dense and completely from one type. Granite is what is used around here. While exact dimensions aren’t needed, there are recommendations on how large you should get the base. For quite a while, they were just squares, but eventually, it was figured out that the corners weren’t the best for keeping things stable."

"Nowadays, almost every map device is made to slot in circular base plates, but every one of those can actually fit a bit smaller or a bit bigger base. Not many know that. So, any questions so far?"

"Why does it need to be dense rock?"

"Oh, that’s an easy question to answer. Technically, you could use basically any type of rock, but if it’s not dense enough, it will crack. Before you open a map, you need a certain amount of strength to hold the magic in place. Also, as a side note, the base material needs to be from a corresponding world rank. So, to make green maps, you would need rock from green-ranked worlds."

"That seems to make things quite straightforward," I said while taking another sip of beer.

I watched as Tivet went and took one of those bases off the shelf and then moved to the central table, which had a flat device about five times larger than the base plate. Tivet put it in the center and then pushed it down until I heard a click. The device then started to hum, and I saw magic being transferred into the base plate.

"You see these buttons here?" Tivet pointed at the lower half of the device, where there were quite a few buttons, each of them with their own runic symbols. One of them was pushed down—the same runic symbol that was on the trent map.

"Technically, you don’t need this device. You could just hold the base plate and channel mana into it in the pattern of one of these runes. What the runes do is determine the kind of terrain the map has. And see those outer circles there? They are kinda hard to see—those determine a lot of other things and are quite a bit more fickle than the large central rune that everyone can see."

"Technically, there are hundreds, possibly millions, of runes, each with their own variation. That’s why it’s not recommended to not use this kind of device. If you get even one corner wrong or have a bit less magic in one spot than another, you could end up with a completely different terrain.”

“That’s why we use this type of device—it just makes it so much easier and more consistent. Of course, this is a low-end model. There are a lot better ones that are even more accurate."

"Have you tried to do maps without this?" he immediately shook his head.

"No, I don’t have enough mana. To make a grey map, you would need to be able to throw out at least 20 exploding fireballs. This device has batteries that I charge over time so I can make the maps. Felwan helps and even sends a few of his workers as well."

He talked a bit more about the device, and we ended up joking around for a bit as it took the device about 20 minutes to finish making the rune. We heard quite a loud ding, which made Tivet get up and quickly move to the device.

"You see, now that the rune is done, you still need to supply it with magic—although a lot less of it. Now it's time to start stacking materials."

The table the device was on had many small drawers, and one by one, Tivet took out quite a few different materials—some dried-up leaves, sand, some rocks, and a few others.

"Every map needs base materials. That’s why they're in the drawers for quick access. It’s like potion making—they always have a few different types of liquids nearby that they constantly use for almost every concoction. This helps build the basis of the map. And yes, the rune symbol is just the beginning; you need to build up the structure of it one step at a time."

I watched as he placed a small pile of sand in the center, and a moment later, it seemed to freeze in place. Like that, he continued to add things, all of them freezing in place. He even added a one-inch by one-inch rock that was leaning against a dried-up leaf, which was standing almost entirely vertically, held up by nothing.

"Why do those things stay up like that?" I asked Tivet.

"That’s why you need to keep supplying the magic. It's like a ritual—the things are held in place because of ritual magic, so to say. The technical aspect is a lot more complicated, but that’s how I was taught when I was young. And in all honesty, you don't need to know anything else unless you want to get into professional map-making."

Finally, he went and took some pieces of the trent loot and some of the wines as well. “Absolutely everything affects map even your own mana. That’s why this device has purification filters. Although they’re not that good, and no filter can handle elemental mana. I got a bit carried away there.”

“Anyways, all the placements must be exact—yes, even the sand. A few grains that way or too many of them can affect how a map turns out. My passives allow me to mitigate that effect to a certain degree, and if I have a clear picture in my head of what I want, the outcome will be more likely. What also helps is the map skill.”

He showed me his wrist, where there was a wrist guard with a skill gem embedded in it. “Utility skills are quite difficult to get, and you need connections. This skill helps a lot, and without it, getting a map that's stable enough to not crumble away as soon as the ritual finishes is nearly impossible.”

When everything was in place, I watched as slowly all the objects sank into the base plate, and with a small flash of grey, the map was finished.

“Just like that, another map is done. There are devices to check the stability and to get a general idea of what's inside but making those kinds of devices for a high-ranked map is exceedingly difficult.”

Like that, we continued to talk until Felwan joined us, after which I continued to hang out with them quite long into the night. During my trip home, I was thinking over everything I had learned and also going over the checklist of what I needed to buy tomorrow.

It was going to be an interesting day, and hopefully, I would get the main skill I was looking for—Fire Dart. It was a variation of Fireball, but it would fit my build a lot better than Fireball would. I also think a late start to the day would be a good idea—I was quite tired.