“What is it?” Krahe questioned, turning the strange cigar over in her hand. It was much heavier than one might expect. Its scent reminded her of metal shavings, gunpowder, fusion reactor coolant. Heavy and industrial, yet it also had aromatic notes of perhaps some kind of incense or aromatic resin.

  Rather than answer, Favonia smirked, and, reaching into her hair again, took out a pair of glasses. Silver frame, circular lenses. At a glance the same type of design as the Prospector’s Eyes, yet comparing the two almost seemed ridiculous. Though doubtful, Krahe took them in hand, taking hers off. She didn’t go so far as to place them fully on her head, but just looking through these glasses was already a bit much. Without any supply of thauma, they drew a distinct outline of everything in sight. It faded out of view in an instant, but a mere thought would highlight an object within her field of vision, raising its level of visual detail such that it stood out without necessarily drawing attention from anything else.

  Favonia bit the end off of her cigar and just ate it outright, then lit the cigar off of the gemstone on the back of her left hand. It came alight in bright red flame, giving off glowing-red smoke.

  “The cigar is for answering my question forthrightly despite the fact I haven’t proven that I am trustworthy, based solely on the fact Casus believes I am trustworthy. The glasses are a gift, because I know better than anyone how many times my sight has saved me from poisoning or a curse. I wasn’t sure what type you might prefer, so I had a friend make a pair with the full suite of features that I figured would be useful. They’re not imprinted yet, you need to smear some blood on them before they’ll work for you.”

  “Blood?” Krahe asked, still focused on the glasses. The lenses were neither glass nor any kind of polymer, and the metal definitely wasn’t silver. She could see a shifting pattern on the inside of the frame where it joined to the lenses, as well as the sides of the lenses themselves. “Microscopic runes, maybe?” she thougtht.

  “I don’t like thaumic imprints," Favonia answered. "Convenient, but too fallible. A one-way blood binding is better. If someone gets ahold of them and tries to use the link to get at you, it’ll set off an embedded curse and send the glasses back to your Kenoma Sack, at the thief's expense. Their problem if the strain kills them.”

  Pulling the glasses away from her face, Krahe glanced down at the cigar, then up at Favonia.

  “What’s the-”

  Favonia interrupted, “No catch. I have only gotten as far as I have because I have been aided by others. To offer aid to another crusader, just as I have been aided in the past, is the bare minimum.”

  Upon giving it some thought, Krahe figured she might as well. She made a tiny incision on her forearm, dipping one of the arm-ends of the spectacles in it. It instantly seeped into the metal, filling countless microscopic grooves, only to be completely absorbed. Right then and there, the glasses became her property in a manner that could not be subverted by any method other than her death. She put them on in place of the Prospector’s Eyes, and a mere thought brought up a readout of their characteristics. Favonia, with pride audible in her voice, began bragging about the features.

  “Some fundamental vision-enhancement features, a multi-layered adjustable-intensity face-obscuring shroud, and two ‘big’ enchantments, one for each lens since they have to be all in one piece. One’s a set of sturdy chains and the other, a handful of salt for your scourge. With the first, if you meet someone’s gaze, you can make them freeze up for a moment. Two charges, recharge time depends on you. The second one makes thaumaturgies hurt as if they’d struck flesh even if you hit wards, slightly less through a barrier or a particularly thick Mamon Armor. It costs more to cast them that way, of course, but nothing’s free.”

  When Krahe attempted to call up the glasses’ specifications, she found that they offered up two choices: A “pure system-generated” readout, and a file titled “spec readout edited - draft 4”. After going over the first, she opened the second and found it preferable, as its wording was clearer and less repetitive, and it had additional notes attached. Krahe couldn’t think of any features they could possibly be missing, it was almost as if she had designed these specifically as a direct upgrade for the Prospector’s Eyes as they were now. If anything was evidence of similar mentality between them, it was this.

  NOTE: System-generated appraisal readout adjusted for readability and reduced repetition. This artifact. This artifact. This artifact. This artifact. Remove this when final readout draft complete. DON’T FORGET AGAIN. DRAFT 4

  [OCULAE PEREGRINUS]

  [Tags:]

  Pure

  Sacred

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Fourth-order

  Artifact

  Eyewear

  Active

  Bloodbound

  [Charge (Vinculae Peregrinus):]

  2/2

  [Details:]

  Environmental Analysis (Selective Highlight)

  Vision Zoom (At-Will, x10 Maximum)

  Self-Adjusting Flash Protection

  Appraise Object B3 (At-Will)

  Anti-Appraisal Penetration B3

  Extended Highlight Magic Object B1

  Detect Baneworm C3

  Detect Evoy B1

  Detect Life C2 (At-Will, Range 10m, Universal Penetration B3)

  This Artifact:

  Cannot be removed from its bearer by force.

  Bestows its wearer with the boon “Salting the Wounds”

  Possesses the unique function “Salt Mountain’s Visage”

  Possesses the unique function “Vinculae Peregrinus”

  Salt Mountain’s Visage

  When supplied with thauma, this artifact can produce a “Mask of Salt”.

  Depending on the bearer's intent, the mask can operate subtly by way of refracting and deflecting attention from the holder’s face, or may entirely obscure it with an impenetrable perception-barrier.

  ATTACHED NOTE (REFORMAT TO SYS. FORMAT BEFORE FINAL DRAFT): Original system description too verbose. Actual description: Besides making it hard to look at your face, it can also make people see something else in its place, but the nature of the material won’t permit it to be used for impersonating others. At the absolute maximum setting it makes your head look like a billowing mass of salt and anyone who looks at it directly has their eyes crust over with salt for moment. Thauma-hungry at higher settings, but the cost is “fair” no matter your entropy tolerance.

  Vinculae Peregrinus

  At-will, when meeting the eyes (or closest equivalent) of another, the holder may expend one charge to impose the properties of “salt” upon both the target’s Physical and Astral Body. Thauma-burning, channeling, etc. will be interrupted, and the physical body, including all clothing, will be temporarily transmuted into solid salt crystal. The full effect is equivalent to completely halting a target for a short time.

  Current minimum duration: 0.19s

  Current maximum duration: 0.59s

  All duration metrics simulated under baseline reality conditions.

  ATTACHED NOTE: This operates through brute conceptual override. For that reason, the system cannot fully predict how exactly it will manifest, but the fundamental features will be consistent. Always leaves behind salt remnants in the form of Hard Entropy equivalent to 10% of your maximum tolerance. The purifying aspect of salt means that this, too, has long-term benefits, but they are minor.

  It only lasts for as short a time as it does because the world-law snaps back quickly. You can make it stick better by pre-salting the target. It will also last much longer under compromised reality conditions, e.g. inside a Hazard Zone. The same applies for entities that compromise reality by their nature, e.g. kenomaic beings intruding into our world. Being hit with this is unpleasant to somewhat painful for most humanoids, but extremely painful for anything or anyone carrying a significant amount of impurity, unless it has already been purified in some way (you will likely not encounter such individuals outside the service of the Twin Churches).

  [SALTING THE WOUNDS]

  [Tags:]

  Pure

  Sacred

  Elemental Affinity

  Thaumaturgy Enhancement

  Construct Enhancement

  [Details:]

  Grants Second-order Elemental Affinity: Salt

  The bearer may imbue the power of this Boon - the “Pain of Salted Wounds” - into her thaumaturgies and constructs. Thusly-imbued, such thaumaturgies will inflict pain as if they had struck bare flesh even if they strike Wards, Barriers, or any other manner of magical defense. This effect permeates even through physical defenses, albeit to a lesser degree. Should the strike land on bare flesh to begin with, the pain will be magnified instead.

  ATTACHED NOTE: Conceptual operation, subtler than the Vinculae.

  “Salt, huh?” Krahe questioned. She had no way to know that what this system readout described was anywhere outside the Seven Spokes System’s standard purview, but her gut told her it was the case. The “salt” described within the readout gave her an indescribable, almost imperceptible sense of the profound. It was a mere whisper of what she had sensed inside an actual temple or shrine, but it was still undeniably there.

  Favonia puffed from her cigar. It hadn’t become any shorter since she’d started smoking it. “To say it safely, those lenses aren’t made of actual salt any more than alarite is a type of bronze. What actually lies behind it, gives it power, is one of the greater mysteries of the Grafting Church. It’s best if you don’t comprehend it yet, you would likely turn into a pillar of salt.”

  “An infohazard for the unenlightened, got it,” Krahe nodded before returning to the readout, just to make sure she hadn’t missed anything.

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