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IT was three days before the deadline for the Magic Item Design Awards.
Olivia stood before the door to Gordon’s office, a weary expression on her face as she took a deep breath. In her hands, she clutched a white box with her ring in it.
I wonder what he’ll say…
She’d managed to overcome the problem he pointed out to her last time, but the method was a bit…questionable. The problem now was what he’d say about her process.
Olivia vigorously shook her head as her thoughts verged on turning negative.
Don’t go thinking you’re so stupid you might as well not have thought of anything. Right now, you’ve just got to keep forging ahead!
It was only three days until the deadline. She had no choice but to show him.
Making up her mind, she knocked on the door and heard Gordon call, “Come in,” from inside. Bracing herself, she went inside and saw Gordon, Harrison, and Laraconia. It looked like they’d been having some sort of meeting, as there was paperwork scattered across the desk.
Oh no! I was so nervous that I didn’t realize there were other people in his office!
“I am so sorry, I’ll come back later!” she exclaimed and went to jerk the door closed, but Gordon stopped her.
“Wait, in your hand, is that your piece for the competition?” he asked.
“Yes…”
“I’ll look at that first. It’s more urgent. Do you mind?” he questioned the men. Harrison shook his head, and Laraconia peered curiously at the box Olivia was holding.
“Ah, the competition everyone’s been talking about! I’d love to see your entry,” Laraconia encouraged enthusiastically.
Olivia froze, but Harrison nodded and urged her on, “I’d like to see it too.”
Gordon looked at Olivia. “The more people who can give you their knowledge, the better. Do you mind if these two see?”
“Uh, no. Please, go ahead.”
Feeling like this had turned into some big thing, Olivia walked stiffly to the desk and set the box down.
Gordon opened it, and the three let out impressed sounds.
Inside was an elegant ring with pink-hued metal gleaming as flower petals. Ten tiny magic stones glittered in the center of the flower and on the parts shaped as leaves.
Gordon let out a sound of admiration. “This is another refined design.”
“I imagine women will like that,” murmured Harrison, impressed, but Laraconia looked uncertain.
“It is beautiful, but those small stones will mean this piece has no chance on an efficacy basis. It may manage silver, but gold would be out of reach.”
A shadow fell over Gordon’s expression as he agreed and commented on how that was the same as her previous design.
Olivia smiled. “Gordon, could you please try passing mana through the ring?”
He did as she asked, looking confused as he did. The next moment, his eyes snapped wide in surprise. “This was imbued with a pale fish scale! Which means it has a 100 percent anti-poison effect!”
“What?!” Laraconia snatched the ring from Gordon. “Impossible! You can’t imbue stones this small with a pale fish scale!” Then he looked taken aback when he ran mana through the ring. “You’re right…”
Olivia puffed up with pride. “I made the ten stones on the ring act as one magic stone for imbuing!”
The three’s mouths worked up and down in their shock, then Laraconia shouted, “Are you serious?! This is the breakthrough of the century!”
“I don’t believe it!” uttered a bewildered Harrison. “But it definitely is a pale fish scale…”
“Olivia, this is incredible! How did you do it?!”
Pressed by the three, she cast her eyes aside. “I broke a large star diamond.”
“You…what?”
They stiffened and looked at her with an expression that said they didn’t comprehend her admission.
Olivia let out a long breath and cast her eyes down guiltily. “I had a magic stoneworker break down the large star diamond that was in the drawers to make ten small stones with the same characteristics.”
The idea that came to Olivia had been that if she couldn’t make stones with different peculiarities act as one stone, she could break down a large, perfectly pure stone of the highest class to make several small stones with the same characteristics.
It might just work, was her reasoning.
But that was where things got complicated. She took the magic stone to the stoneworker she usually worked with.
“Break apart a magic stone? What are you thinking?” he argued. “Smashing such a good magic stone is utter madness!”
After reasoning with him for an hour, he finally relented, “Well, if you really insist…” and he cut the stone into ten pieces.
Obviously, that alone wasn’t enough, either. After that, she had to conduct several trials. She worked late into the night, all the way until morning, on several occasions.
Then, using a new technique in which she placed several stones on the same magic circle and treated them like one, she finally finished her piece.
It was thanks to the skills she’d developed for imbuing small stones, which she gained through crafting magic jewelry, in combination with all the experience of imbuing large stones with strong personalities that she’d been working on like crazy these past seven months, as well as the skills for controlling magic circles she’d developed. They all played a large part. If one of those had been missing, she wouldn’t have been able to do it.
Laraconia burst into laughter. “Break a star diamond? You’re a curious one! No normal person would think of that!”
“Well, good job, I suppose, for thinking of breaking such an expensive stone into smaller ones,” commented Harrison, looking taken aback but smiling.
Gordon, however, was grinning broadly. “Well, well. This is the first good laugh I’ve had in a long time. I never imagined someone would do something like that.”
Olivia was starting to feel awkward. She looked at them somewhat resentfully. What she’d done didn’t deserve to be laughed at that much.
But after some time, Laraconia’s expression turned serious, and he murmured, “You know, this is actually incredible, isn’t it?”
“It is,” concurred Harrison. “Do you think applying this technique could even make flight possible?”
“It’s not entirely out of the question,” picked up Gordon. “The current sticking point is that the large magic stone necessary puts too much weight in one spot. With this, you could distribute the weight across a vessel while maintaining the mana levels.”
“It would need testing, but it could work if this can be made practical.”
“Indeed!”
Olivia stared at her ring as the three burst into a lively discussion, feeling relieved that at least her piece seemed all right.
After that, the three advised her to immediately file a patent for her new technique as it was extremely likely to become a revolutionary technology.
The next day, Olivia submitted her piece to the competition under the name Olivia Lysley. Gordon pointed out it could turn into a problem if her uncle heard about it, so she submitted it using her mother’s maiden name.