A Quiet Rune Scribe

JAN 25 Saturday. I sit in the breakroom across from Daisy and Maple with Blaz to my left as we eat our lunch, It's been a few weeks now since Maple started working at the library and I've gotten to know her better in that time, she doesn't have family in the city although she did mention some family elsewhere, overall she's good at her job and seems like a decent coworker and given some time maybe a friend.

My thoughts are interrupted by Blaz asking me something "so colt you have any plans for your two weeks."

"I'm not sure in all honesty" I answer back, we get two weeks of vacation every year that can be used from June until March, I wasn't able to use it last year as I started in late April, I don't really know what to do with it though, I don't have family to visit or anything important to do.

"I think I might just take the two weeks off and relax some."

Blaz lets out a chuckle "colt I've gotten to know you and I know for a fact you'd use that time to learn or practice something."

Daisy adds to his comment "I have to agree with Blaz you train like the world is going to end" I'm stunned for a moment before giving a laugh, we spend the rest of lunch chatting about mundane stuff.

After my shift I head home, as I enter my apartment I see Entropy hopping around on the floor greeting me with several caws, "nice to see you too girl" I pick her up and place her on my back, over the past two weeks she's grown a lot her feathers are completely grown in now.

Even her flight feathers have reached their full size meaning she can fly, she already does some, flapping her wings to climb on top of furniture or my shelves and cabinets, she's also very intelligent beyond even regular crows, although this world seems to have many intelligent animals so I'm not sure if she's much of an outlier.

She seems to understand me to a degree moving out of the way when I ask or sometimes bringing me something I need, she does get confused when asked to do more complex things but she is only a month old so maybe in time she'll understand me better.

She's grown into an adolescent crow, she now looks mostly like a regular crow the only large differences being her completely black feathers and her eyes also being completely black, she also won't leave me alone anymore to the point of trying to follow me out of the apartment when I go to work.

Today I think it's time she gets some practice with flying, before I leave I check on my plants the environment spells seem to be working well and I haven't needed to give any life magic to them and the plants still look healthy, my experiments in selective breeding have also gone well as at this point the juniper berries I'm growing are almost three times their starting size.

My plan today is to take Entropy to the park for some flight practice, I grab some juniper berries and feed them to Entropy who's taking a liking to them I also place some in a bag for snacks for the both of us, I put my saddlebags on my back and have Entropy stand on my back before leaving my apartment.

This is the first time I'm taking Entropy outside so I'm keeping a close eye on her, as we walk through the streets Entropy draws little attention as many ponies have pets so having a crow with me, even if she looks a bit odd, goes mostly unnoticed a few young ponies did ask to pet her, but she didn't seem to like the idea much so I said no.

I walk through the park for a while before finding an empty field and setting my bags on the ground, "ready girl?" I ask Entropy who gives a caw in response, I hold her in my field and raise her a few dozen feet in the air before letting go, she flaps her wings trying to fly.

She fails dropping through the air some before gliding to a stop and landing on the grass, I walk over to her and feed her a berry as a treat before we try again, we repeat this several times and each time she gets a little further from me, I pick her up and seeing her tired I grab a book out of my bag before sitting down and reading some while she rests.

We spend some time resting before we start again and this time she flies much further seeming to have learned a lot from our first attempt, and after a few more tries she's flying a circle around me, she can fly but she'll need much more practice and to grow some as she can't fly far right now getting tired quickly.

It's mid day when we return back home, Entropy flies off my back landing on the counter top when we enter the main room, I spend some time making myself some lunch and feeding Entropy a full meal I fill a bowl with some cubed raw fish for some protein to help her develop some muscle, along with a few berries and some carrot pieces taking my time to cut it up small before placing it and leaving her to enjoy her food.

I've been thinking about what Blaz asked me earlier today, what do I want to do with my two weeks off? Well I decided on something, camping specifically going camping in one of the forests around equestria.

I liked camping when I was young in my last life and I haven't done it in more then two decades so I think it could be fun, I'll have to inform Daisy a week in advance so I'll tell her tomorrow, I'll also buy supplies tomorrow as well, but for now I'll be breeding plants for the rest of today.

time skip

JAN 26 Sunday, I'm walking out of the library after my shift, I told Daisy about my camping trip and signed a form for my two week vacation I have February second until February sixteenth off.

I make my way home to grab my bags and check on Entropy, she greeted me like always with a few caws and some chirps I give her some attention and scratches before grabbing my saddlebags and leaving to make my way to the markets.

As I walk through the markets I'm looking for several things, I need a tent and a decent backpack along with a compass and map, you'd think I'd need more but not really I can grow my own food and create fire so the only thing left is water and I have an idea for that.

I look through the market and find a tent and a backpack, the tent is made from green cotton canvas not amazing but it'll keep me dry, the backpack is made from brown canvas, I also found a decent compass and a map that while a little crude works just fine and the last thing I bought was a small metal flask.

As I make my way home I try the backpack placing it on top of my saddlebags it fits well and feels comfortable, I enter my apartment and place my new things in my work room before eating some lunch with Entropy and getting to work, I start with the metal flask I bought.

I'm going to need a source of water on my camping trip so I'm planning to enchant a gem to fill this flask, I'm not sure the flask can handle the magic from the spells so it's probably best if I use a gem along with the flask, I start by looking through my notes for anything that will be useful.

I can use the same spell I used for the desert enchantment to gather water, the problem is that the air isn't clean so I'll also need it to filter or boil the water, I grab one of my small sapphires and start thinking my way through this problem.

First I'm going to need a way to tell the spell when to stop filling the flask, I go through my notes and not finding much decide to make a very simple spell for this, I start with a two empty circles and add the runic word for weight then add some math making the output for the spell the flasks weight.

I then realize I don't even have a way to weigh the flask in the first place, I spend over an hour making a spell to weigh things and because I don't have anything that I know the weight of I have to use more runic symbols then I wanted to so the spell takes more power then necessary but the spell works.

As I spend the next hour adjusting the spell to get the weight of the flask right I think about what I've learned of runes, when I discovered that the meaning of runes mattered to their function I researched it, I had several questions and found a few answers.

First how does the meaning of a runic word effect a spell?, when you cast a spell you need to understand at least what the runic word means as in if the word is for cold or hot, if you understand the math and what the words mean you can cast the spell but for those who are creating spells you need to understand not just what the word means but the context around the word.

When I was using the light rune to create something you couldn't see I was using the right word I just wasn't using it with the right meaning as the word was never meant to be used that way, witch brings me on to my second question where does the meaning and context of a word come from?.

Is it the belief of ponies or the thoughts of the beings who created the rune that determines what it does?, and after much research I've found that nopony really knows some theories but nothing solid it seems I've stumbled on one of the great unknowns of this world.

Third, can a runic word's meaning and context be forgotten and if they can then what?, yes they can and have been forgotten and when they are forgotten the spells using that rune become useless as while you could still try casting them you will have unpredictable and potentially dangerous results.

And finally where do new runic words come from?, they come from ponies, when somepony want's to create a new runic word then need to things a symbol and something else not completely know, lets say you have a new effect or concept and you want to turn it into a runic word.

First you'll need a unique symbol preferably it should have something to do with the effect or concept, then you need to place it inside a matrix for a spell that would use the new runic symbol while keeping the symbols meaning and effect in your mind before attempting to cast the spell.

This is where things get odd as sometimes this will work just fine and you have a new runic symbol, or sometimes the effect is random or the most likely outcome nothing happens and the spell just fails, many ideas have speculated on why some fail while others succeed but there seems to be no real pattern.

The only things we do know is that keeping the new symbols effect in mind when you create and cast the spell can improve your chances at success but by how much is also very inconsistent, there is also some who think one's knowledge and emotions along with there belief in the spell working helps but no evidence has been found to prove if this is true or not.

I move away from my thoughts having found the proper weight for when the flask is full and empty, I enchant the flask with a spell to tell the gem when it's full by sending it's weight to the water condensing spell and having it stop when full.

I enchanted the sapphire with the condensing spell it has two activation requirements first a simple double tap for the link and when the flasks enchantment says it's not full, this will let me turn off the water condensing enchantment when it's not needed.

The sapphire will condense water and have it flow into the open flask, the two main problems with this setup is that while I was able to get the spell to target the flask to fill it it doesn't have enough power to do this more than a foot away and the more the gem and flask move around the more time it'll take to get the water in the flask without hitting something in the way.

The small sapphire I'm using doesn't have enough power to fix these problems so while traveling I'll need to keep the flask and gem as still as possible to avoid any problems, the final enchantment I add is a spell that purifies water this spell takes a decent amount of magic as it uses a fair few symbols but I solved that by making it only purify water in a very small area the inside of the flask, and the spells can purify my flask in only a few seconds as the spell may take a decent amount of magic but is fast working.

Along with the last bit of magic capacity of the gem I use a second link and by modifying the water spell a little I have the water purifying spell activate when the flask is done filling itself.

I move on to the last thing I'll want with me when camping, I plan to camp in a forest that isn't that dangerous but it's not a commonly visited forest either and will have some dangers so I'll need some protections, first my dagger I honestly forgot I bought this as I've had little use for it beyond keeping it in my bags incase it's ever needed.

I start by adding the enchantment I use for my wood carving tools, I can't think of anything else a blade would need for now so I move onto the next and largest thing, I take one of the large rubies and enchant it to hold magic before working on a shield that would protect my camp from anything that would seek to harm me.

I enchant the ruby with a decently strong shield I'll need to work on it through the week but it shouldn't be to hard as it doesn't need to power anything else, the shield will cover a thirty feet area, I have to spend some time making sure the shield will let me and Entropy through along with air as I don't want to suffocate.

After finishing the shield I don't have anything else to do so I make myself and Entropy some dinner before showering and heading to bed.