Chapter 161: New runes
While Percy prided himself as a relatively fast reader, he was operating under a strict self-imposed time limit during this visit. Naturally, he couldn’t afford to carefully read all seven of the volumes he’d just bought.
Luckily, he didn’t need to either. Obviously, he had no intention of learning hundreds of variants of the new runes – he just had to pick the ones most suitable for his current needs. Consequently, he’d devoted the first few days of his reading time to skimming over the books, identifying the best candidates.
The preservation rune had a circular shape in general – like most of the Vault’s enchantments – though it differed slightly from the concealment rune he’d previously mastered. It was made of two concentric circles, down from three, though it contained many more curved lines linking the two shapes.
Each sub-variant differed some more from the general case, altering the properties of the enchantment subtly, to make it more suitable for specific applications or mana types. In the end, Percy found 13 variants in total that could be used with soul mana to do what he wanted.
‘But only 4 of them work with other mana types too… Hmmm… What if I draw them using my fused mana? Can I get them to work on both souls and corporeal objects at the same time?’
Percy was confident it should work, though it wouldn’t be without cost. According to the book, the less specialized the rune was, the lower its efficiency would be in each area, which frankly made sense. Picking a variant suitable for multiple tasks would make its effect about 10~15% less potent.
‘It’s not that bad. All things considered, it’s a small price to pay for versatility. At least, it’s better than wasting my time learning two separate variants…’
Beyond that, there were a few more factors to take into consideration. For example, he had to pick a variant that could be overlapped with other runes in general, and his own concealment runes in particular. This would make his life easier later, once he graduated from basic runecrafting and started working on composing the runes together into more complex enchantments.
Suffice to say, it took a fair amount of head scratching, but Percy eventually settled on a variant he deemed to be the best match for his needs.