Earth, stone, sand, or crystals were all sides of a very multifaceted coin. To learn any of these branches, you had to invest a little effort, time, and brainpower — just to find connections with your original element of earth. For me, as someone who had already mastered a fairly complex branch, it wasn't that difficult to start learning new ones; it wasn't a whole new direction of magic. Let the Avatar rack his brains over completely new elements, I just had to tie the power of crystals to my existing foundation.
But... in my attempts to learn something from my neighbours, other hard workers, I was nicknamed "mole." In the local slang, that was the name for someone who bothered you and tried to sniff out the secrets of your magic. In short, I didn't get along with anyone. Perhaps the crystal mages themselves were similar loners, and this was their so-called distinguishing feature, but something told me not to believe this.
"Hey, kid, looking for some advice?" When I was feeling down after watching people, I returned to the digging area and started punching the crystals, and a voice rang out. Turning around, I saw a cheerful guy sitting on the ground, surrounded by a pile of crystals.
"Can you tell me how to develop crystal magic? I felt hope. Even in the darkest depths, there is always a glimmer of hope. This was the first person with a genuine smile I had met in the last couple of hours. I stopped in front of him, and forgive me for the tautology, Wang Shin Tong, and saw a crystal-clear blue crystal held out towards me.
"To master the magic of crystals... you must think like a crystal. You must become a crystal," he spoke like some kind of guru, using riddles and enigmas to grab my attention. Then he placed the blue crystal on the ground, ground it into dust with his fist, bent down... and sniffed everything that was there. "I'll sniff it all out!"
...On that day, the only thing I understood was the tiny difference between drug addicts and gurus. Since no one was helping me, I decided to learn everything myself. I stood in front of the crystal wall and, with difficulty and beads of sweat, began to try to dig it out and subdue it along the way. My only hope was the first open chakra. After all, how was I worse than the other miners?
The next day, after spending the night in a really large room, which nevertheless contained nothing but a bed, a table and a toilet — elite Spartan conditions, where leisure was limited to books — I returned to dig the tunnel, where I realised that not many people were working with the crystals, maybe a dozen, although there were about a hundred of them in the entire cave. The newbies tried to subdue the new branch, hoping to earn double pay, but the crystals didn't separate easily under their rough blows. Some gave up altogether after yesterday's events, when the mages got tired of freeing the guys and decided to leave them to crystallise a little for fun. I came to their aid alone and managed to tear pieces of gennomite from them.
I wasn't doing it for the money; it had become a matter of principle. I hit the wall like a jackhammer, spending several hours at a time and tearing my fists apart. My experience as a blacksmith, where you have to constantly strike with unyielding force, helped. I began to understand. Only by relentlessly trying to fight the growing crystal, only by being more persistent than it, could you master this material. That's what distinguished the miners around me from the newbies: they were all persistent. The main thing is not to confuse this with stubbornness.
"Newbie!
As soon as I managed to separate several huge pieces with a few blows of my fist, and a smile I had never seen before lit up my face, I was called over. A man passing through the cave with a small container beckoned me over, asking me to grab the crystals I had extracted. "Now that you've learned how to mine properly, you'll be able to crush it yourself and make abrasive out of it," I took a deep breath, focusing all my attention on the man. The glasses on my eyes did not betray my intense and seemingly angry gaze, which allowed me to communicate calmly with people. "Watch and learn, I won't repeat it. Take the container, put the crystals in it, and pound them with your fists. Have you ever hit sand? I hope so, because that's the main secret."
Spirit
Without saying a word, I raised my fist, repeating a movement that I had probably been practising since childhood. With a light touch, I caused vibrations in the crystal, destroying its bonds and causing it to crumble into pieces, literally like sand. The man who had been watching this flashed his eyes and rubbed the back of his head.
"That was fast... In any case, this skill can be used to disable its ability to grow. You can try to eat it, but if you're not confident in your abilities, don't even think about it. First, your digestive tract will crystallise, then your veins, and finally your skin will start to break down.
The guy seemed to be trying to scare me, but I was only interested in one thing.
"Is it abrasive already?" I asked, discouraged, running my hand over the sharp particles. It was light, but much sharper than the sand I had encountered in the desert.
"Yes. Put them in these little discs, and at the end of the day, take them to the warehouse, and you'll get paid. Although I wouldn't count on making much profit from them," he said with a snort, leaving me alone. I must have spent several hours having fun breaking crystals and making sharp sand. It made much sharper blades that could be sharpened much thinner, to the same ten degrees as all kinds of sharp razors; it was used to make convenient circular saws, also suitable for processing crystals, but most importantly, it was compact. I made myself several rings, one for each finger. All the crystals were different colours, and I limited their growth so that I wouldn't end up in a kind of trap one night — I really didn't want to win the Darwin Award. Only if I wanted to, by pushing it to grow, could I first obtain the material and then grind it into sharp sand.
It was a small farm, but now I could get sand even while in the heavens. It was worth coming here to work just for that. But the crystal itself was also very useful for many tasks. In an attempt to learn how to use it better, I continued to spend my days here.
***
"Dagoth, I still don't understand how you learned to break this damn Jemmonite so quickly. I'm ready to smash my head open, but nothing works! Tired of the monotonous work, the guy fell on his backside and took out his disposable ration. The food here was excellent, it must be said — there was plenty of meat and lots of other vitamins to keep the dusty workers healthy. For me, it was like divine nectar, because I didn't spend much money, and I had no reason to support a family, so I spent part of my salary on extra rations. This allowed me to grow faster, because even though I was already of age, it was only by local standards.
In my world, I would still be considered a growing punk.
The guy who took a liking to me was the only newcomer who didn't give up. His name was Roach. Everyone else had given up on him too, they even almost nicknamed him the second mole, but he was lucky to stumble upon me. It was easy for me to help another council member.
"Don't give up.
"Yeah, yeah, I heard the same thing from my mum," he rolled his eyes gloomily, "But what do you think I'm doing? I've been slaving away here for almost a week and haven't earned a penny. They only pay for the amount of work you do and abrasive discs, and I've got neither. Probably the same as talent.
"Then why don't you go to the smithy?
"Because... I want to learn, and then they'll pay me more if I master such a rare skill. And then I'll join the army. I'll be the first soldier in crystal armour with a sword shining in the sun! I like the idea that I'll go down in history.
"I'm sorry to disappoint you, but there have been several magicians who used crystals in the history of our people, take General Cheng, for example, or Lord Terracotta, who was born over three hundred years ago... - I fell silent when I saw the boredom on his face," - ...Then listen to your mother's advice. The secret of crystals lies in your own perseverance.
"Here you go again," he rolled his eyes and, finishing his meal, decided to pour his emotions into his efforts. The boy wanted to achieve something, his fists pounding the target like a machine gun. After giving him a couple of tips so as not to see such a stupid waste of energy, he finally began to see results. "Oh, not bad, huh? Say it's good!
His fists left long cracks in the quartz wall.
"Um... wait, Roach," sensing something was wrong, as if my advice had slightly tilted the scales of luck for this guy, I tried to stop him.
"You said yourself that you can't stop. I'll be like a battering ram, they'll call me Crystal Bull!Hr-ya-ya-ya*
At that moment, another blow caused a large network of cracks. He was using his strength incorrectly, causing the ceiling to become covered with a frightening web. The miners recognised the familiar sound, raised their heads, and immediately began to retreat.
Duduh*
At that moment, debris began to fall from the ceiling. While large stones were not too difficult to deflect, the clusters of crystals, which were much more resistant to magic, could only be blocked with shields. That is why some wrapped their bodies in various armour and left the cave as quickly as possible. But who would have thought that Roach and I would be so unlucky? A large crystal instantly separated us from the exit and continued to fall from above. Black dust even appeared — there must have been a coal deposit nearby.
Seeing how dangerous the collapse was, I mechanically broke several crystals around me, turning them into more or less smooth sand, and wrapped myself and the frightened boy in it. Above, powerful blows rained down on my barrier. Clumps of ice fell without stopping, and it was very difficult to move.
"Holy spirit, what have I done!" cried the boy lying beneath me, clutching his head. "We're going to die, I've killed us both!"
"I doubt it," I said calmly.
"How can you be so calm?!
"We're not far from the exit, they'll dig us out quickly. If worse comes to worst, we'll get out ourselves — there's definitely a cavity above us.
"Phew, phew, phew, so we won't die? His trousers were almost wet. I moved away mechanically, just so I wouldn't get dirty. If he hadn't shouted, I would have felt that the collapse had stopped. I could feel particles falling from above, so I had to put on a filter. It would save us for a couple of seconds, until we could knock the dust down to the ground.
Guided by cold reason, I did everything I could to survive, even removing the stones from the roof of our sand dome. And when I finally removed our protection, I saw dust floating in the air... a mixture of coal, crystals and stone, which were moving very quickly through the air due to the remnants of incorrectly poured magical power. It was a mesmerising sight, at which...
"Is that lightning?" Roach wondered, seeing several electric flashes caused by the rapid rattling of the dust. I watched this beauty with bated breath, wondering how such a thing was possible. Unfortunately, the dust quickly settled, and the culprit nailed it to the ground so as not to ruin the filters.
Then I blinked, frowned, and turned to the young man who was trembling with fear. Looking at him as if he were a promising magician eager to devote his energies to the study of magic, I decided to give him some life advice. Grabbing him by the shoulder, I looked him roughly in the eyes. So much so that he began to tremble.
"Before you master crystals, you'd better study the earth better. And learn the mentality of simple earth mages, what they are like by nature, and only then pursue your goals. Because if you tremble at every turn, you won't even be able to master a simple pebble.
My harsh words left him speechless. While he was thinking, I cleaned up the mess, knowing full well that someone else was digging on the other side.
After that day, Roach left the factory, citing ill health due to lack of sunlight as the reason for his departure. The collapse of the cave revealed a cavity that allowed us to reach our destination faster — the guy's luck clearly surpassed my own. We reached the cave with the jammite deposits and set it up faster than planned. And I... still remembering that strange phenomenon with the lightning, decided to send Afka to the library to find some information explaining what it was.
A few days later, she brought me a book written by a scholar from the Shi Wong desert, entitled Sandstorms and Static Electricity.
***
Advanced chapters:
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