"If you can't avoid being seen, make them wish they hadn't looked."
---
Kai wiped soot from his hands and stared at the charred boot on his workbench.
"Okay. So maybe turning invisible wasn't the right priority."
The Cloakweave prototype had successfully suppressed the mana signature of his Arc Boots, but it also disrupted the Sparknet feedback loop, which promptly zapped his calf with 800 volts of 'innovation.'
He pulled the schematic closer and made a note.
"Note to self: Do not inscribe Cloakweave over control relays again."
[Blueprint: Cloakweave Sigil Layer v0.1 – Stability: 68% | Mana Suppression: Partial | Side Effects: Unpredictable]
He let out a slow breath and leaned back.
The workshop was lit with that cold twilight glow, and the residual scent of singed leather and mana discharge still clung to the air. Cloakweave was proving trickier than expected.
The theory was sound, create a series of interlocking insulation runes over key components, suppressing the ambient mana field they naturally emitted. Simple in principle. In practice? Not so much.
Especially with Lightning Affinity involved.
[Blueprint: Lightning constructs emit erratic pulse signatures. Harder to suppress. Recommendation… use grounding matrices + feedback dampeners in tandem.]
Kai rubbed his temples. "So, basically, my entire toolkit is loud and obnoxious by default."
[Correct. Your affinity is inherently high-output. Caution: full stealth is improbable. Moderate suppression is achievable.]
"Great," he muttered, then looked down at his half-sketched rune chain. "Alright, let's reroute Cloakweave to the outer shell only, leave internal relays exposed. That should reduce instability."
He began again.
Using a thin iron stylus, he etched a Cloakweave Sigil Chain around the outer casing of his Sparknet node. Each rune needed exact placement—no more than half a millimeter off-center. They formed a swirling, maze-like pattern that shimmered faintly once activated.
Then, he soldered a secondary rune anchor at the heel of the Arc Boot and began the insulation ritual.
Soft green light bled through the sigils.
He held his breath.
[Cloakweave Application: Successful – Mana Suppression Level: 43%]
[System Signature Visibility Reduced: 18 meters → 10 meters]
"Hey, that's actually decent!" Kai grinned, sliding the boot on carefully.
He powered it up and took a slow step.
No zaps. No explosions.
He checked his mana scanner—still displayed a faint echo, but far weaker than before. With refinements, he could probably get it under 5 meters. Not perfect invisibility, but enough to avoid passive detection.
He worked for hours, layering Cloakweave runes over every piece of gear he had nodes, gloves, Arc Boots, even his satchel.
Each construct's signature dimmed slightly, enough that even a trained mage would have to be within spitting distance to detect the mana bleed.
Of course, there were failures too.
One glove turned a sickly purple and made his fingers vibrate uncontrollably.
Another prototype shut off the Sparknet entirely requiring him to peel off freezing boots with a knife and sheer frustration.
At one point, Blueprint chimed in:
[Blueprint: Recommend resting. Neural stress at 63%. Mental fatigue impacting rune precision.]
"Sleep is for the tech-less," Kai grinned, eyes bloodshot.
[Blueprint: That was almost clever. You should still lie down.]
Eventually after a nap and eating a cold chunk of trail bread while washing it down with tea made from bitterroot and snowmelt, he stepped outside into the forest dusk.
The wind had gone still.
The air was thick with quiet.
And Kai was cloaked at least partially from the world around him.
He retraced his steps back to the edge of the woods where he'd last spotted the hooded figure. His Sonic Echo Nodes were active but quiet tonight, nothing stirred beyond the ambient sounds of settling snow and snapping twigs.
Then he saw it.
Something glinting at the base of a tree, partially buried in the frost.
He knelt and brushed snow aside.
A small metal token, no larger than a coin, lay in the earth. Hexagonal. Marked with strange geometric patterns like overlapping triangles inside a circle, with tiny etched runes along the edges.
He picked it up and turned it over.
No writing. No obvious mana signature.
But it felt… deliberate.
Not dropped by accident. Left behind.
A message.
[Blueprint: Unknown object. No internal mana flow. Constructed with alchemical metal. Design suggests high-tier artisan origin.]
Kai frowned. "You think they wanted me to find this?"
[Affirmative. The material is resistant to elemental erosion. Placed recently.]
He pocketed the token and scanned the woods one last time.
Still nothing. No watchers. No traps. No signs of hostility.
Just a growing sense that his little workshop in the woods wasn't as private as he thought.
Back in his shop, Kai locked the door for the first time since arriving.
He placed the token on a side shelf and stared at it while updating his journal.
"Cloakweave v0.1 – working but unstable. Lightning still leaks. Need to develop localized grounding dampeners next.
Also: Mysterious stalker may be leaving trail. Token found. Possible challenge?"
He set the pen down, then turned to his Interface Band.
[Lightning Affinity Integration: 10%]
[Stat Gain: +1 Focus]
[XP Gained: +10 | Total XP: 90 / 150]
He glanced at his gear all softly glowing, now faintly masked by his efforts.
They couldn't see him clearly anymore.
But if they did?
They'd see a problem.