“I don’t want to speak too soon, but it looks like I don’t need an instruction manual,” I said.
Amelia leaned in to examine my work, letting her tunic hang open, showing her ample cleavage.
“It’s beautiful,” she breathed. “The lines are perfectly drawn.” She touched the outline with her finger. She ran her warm fingers over the whole image. “I can barely feel where you cut the skin.” The touch of her skin on mine sent a shiver down my back.
“I’d like to be able to add some other colors,” I said. The tattoos were all completely orange. “But I guess we’ll have to wait until we get some other Beast Cores. I wonder what effect it would have adding other colors to it.”
“Well,” Amelia sat back and got that schoolteacher look on her face again. “Other colors would represent different elemental affinities. So, they wouldn’t be compatible with a Fire tattoo.”
“Couldn’t we combine other elements in the same spell?” I asked. “My Mana could still power the whole tattoo and cast a spell with different types of damage.”
Amelia paused and put her fingers to her temple again, thinking. “There are no spells like that in this book, but it might be possible. I’ll need to research further.”
I ran my fingers over the fresh tattoo thoughtfully. The healing was complete. There was no trace of a wound. “Let me know what you need for your research and we’ll go and find it.” I said. “I want to learn as much as I can about combining these tattoos.”
This new power of mine changed everything. This morning, I had been a simple country farmer, enslaved and on his way to the mines. Tonight, I found I was a powerful Ink Mage, and, as far as I knew, the only one in the world.
Unique and incredible power had been handed to me, and the consequences which came with that were huge. With this power, I could change the world. I had a responsibility to find out everything I could about what this power was, and what I could do with it. There could be no doubt that I had some great task to do now; it was my destiny.
From slave to Ink Mage, and all in the course of one day. On balance, it felt pretty damn good.
I got to my feet and stretched. Afternoon had turned to evening while we’d been working and now sunset was quickly approaching. The sun was almost at the horizon, and the tall trees were casting deep shadows across the little clearing.
Amelia stood as well, then gave me an intent look. “Well, go on. Aren’t you going to try out your new skill?”
I smiled broadly at her. “I guess I am!”
The excitement in Amelia’s face was infectious.
“I’m looking forward to this,” she said.
Chapter Four
Evening was deepening around us. I held up my arm again and looked at my new tattoo. It should give me the ability to use projectile fire magic.
Now it was time to test my new ability.
I scanned the clearing for something I could blast spells at. Over on one side of the clearing was a stack of boulders, three yards high, five yards wide, and covered in a thick growth of damp moss.
“That’ll do nicely,” I said as I turned to face the stack. It made a good target, because I didn’t want to take the chance of hitting any trees and starting a fire. That was a real danger using this spell in a forest.
“I’ll stay out of the way,” said Amelia, taking up a position behind me and off to my right.
I took a deep breath and centered myself, then drew some Mana down from my pool and focused it into my arm. This time, I guided it into the big flame in the middle of the original tattoo, then on, into the three spears behind it. The runes glowed warmly in the cool dimness of the clearing. Once these two elements of the rune were filled with Mana, I forced the magical energy out onto my hand.
Three fireballs appeared, equidistant, crackling away on my palm. They were smaller than the single fireball I’d cast previously, just as Amelia had said they would be.
“It’s working!” I heard Amelia breathe.
She sounded impressed, but I was wondering if there would be a way to upgrade their size. I’d need an augmentation on the existing tattoo before that, or perhaps more Mana could do the trick. For now, this single cast was using a big chunk of my Mana.
“Here goes,” I said.
I drew my hand back and hurled the three fireballs. They flashed blindingly bright in the fading light as they flew forward with a woosh. As they rushed toward the boulders, they started to spread out. All three burst against the piles of stones ten yards away, but one almost missed the boulders altogether. I hadn’t expected them to fan out like that. Now that I’d seen them in action, it made sense that they would grow further apart as they traveled through the air.
I looked at my tattoo on my arm, and the three spears were glowing.
“You did it!” Amelia exclaimed.
Her eyes were shining at me when I looked at her.
“This will be amazing for fighting mobs of monsters if we get attacked by more than one,” I said. “I’ll have to practice my accuracy though because I almost missed the boulder completely with the right-most fireball.”
“I can hardly believe that worked,” Amelia said.
“I’m a bit dumbfounded myself,” I said. “I managed to draw a new tattoo. This is huge.”
“I wonder how many more tattoos you can wear,” Amelia said.
I grinned. “As many as I can fit on my body. I’ll make sure of that.”
I looked at the rocks again. The fireballs had each left a black scorch mark against the stone, but they
