Inheritor Of Magic: The Magi King

Wolfe altered the spell a little more, changing almost all the additional markings, other than the ones that would cause it to affect related targets.

The Oracle burst into laughter, while Cassie and Ella smirked and the others at their table slowly worked to translate the obscure runic language. Unlike Wolfe and the Witches who had it translated by the Inheritance Spell for them, they had to do it manually, and it was going to take some time.

"Who can tell me what this does? Obviously, it's the same basic fire spell, as I haven't changed any of the red portions. But what will it do now?" He asked the room.

One of the girls near the centre, a broad chested blonde with an infant on her knee, gestured toward the board.

"That modification should be for a reduction in power, and that one is something like a trickle, so it should be for warming? Possibly for making hot water?" She asked.

"Your interpretation of the runes is right, but not the overall effect because of the ones that you didn't know. Now, should I give it away, or would you like a moment?" Wolfe asked.

Half a second later, an old man in the back stood up. "That spell won't work. It's been altered too far for it to function."

Wolfe shrugged. "If you think so, feel free to come up and activate it on yourself, I can assure you that no lingering damage will be done."

The old man stepped up to the front with confident strides that were in direct contrast with his frail appearance.

He tapped the inscription, adding mana to activate it, then howled in pain and fell to his knees, while over a dozen others in the room did the same.

"That's right, it causes a burning and itching sensation in the groin that mimics Chlamydia. These additional runes make it target everyone with your direct bloodline."

The old man had dropped the spell a second after it had taken effect, but nobody was looking at the stage. Instead, there was a young man picking himself up off the floor that everyone was focused on.

"It seems I have made a social misstep. I know a spell to remove short-term memories, should we forget that this ever happened?" Wolfe asked, directing the question at Petros.

The Rank Eight Mage shook his head. "I think not. These events are all about gossip and shocking news. This should be the talk of the town for the next month, a lowborn soldier boy with the direct lineage of one of the town's great Sages."

The embarrassed old sage grumbled and stared at the boy. "You do look familiar. Boy, who is your mother?"

"Annie James, Sir. Scullery maid at your family's estate. I have never met my father." The boy replied.

The old man sighed. "Fine, I walked into this one, the joke's on me. I will have a word with Miss Annie and get to the bottom of the matter, it appears that we need to amend a bastard into the family tree somewhere."

He returned to his seat in the back, greatly annoyed, and all the other Elders in the room hurried to copy down the spell from the board.

Even if they didn't know all the runes, they could use it just as it was, and it would be both a wonderful prank, and a form of paternity test when someone was suspected of infidelity.

Wolfe altered the runes again.

"Since you are all writing that down, this version will make them glow with warm light instead of making their crotch burn. It's a bit more civilized."

One of the older women along the side of the room laughed. "I don't suppose that we can investigate that matter now, can we? Most of the likely culprits are right here in the room."

"That is up to all of you. I can pause the instruction while you satisfy your curiosity if you must." Wolfe reluctantly agreed.

"I believe that I must. After all, my husband is one of the suspects right now, and I would like to clear his name."

"In that case, cast it in reverse. All the Family members descended from their Patriarch, but the reverse is not true. Casting the spell on the young man will light up his direct lineage, so his parents, siblings and grandparents, but not uncles aunts or cousins." Wolfe explained.

The woman quickly cast the spell, and strangely, none of the men her age lit up. Just the boy and the Patriarch were in range of the spell, and the old man seemed an extremely unlikely suspect.

"Well, at least that clears my own conscience." The woman shrugged, happy to have deflected the gossip away from her husband.

But then she realized that the Patriarch was still lit up, and that might look awful for the Family.

Wolfe altered the spell himself and cast it again. The light on the old man dimmed to a quarter of what it was.

"There are two generations in between them. The boy's father should be the Patriarch's grandson.

But enough of that, we were talking about magical items before we got sidetracked. I think everyone knows the importance of actually understanding the runes that they're writing now." Wolfe explained.

"Now that you all understand that the step from basic to intermediate magic is in actually understanding what you're writing, next we can focus on how to get it on the item. Other than the ones I have already shown, who here can list three ways to affix the spell to an item?"

There was a pause, so Wolfe continued.

"You can imbue it directly onto the item as you cast it, which requires steady focus and a compatible item composition. Second, you can imbue it into a gem or crystal which holds magical effects easily, and then attach the gem to the item.

Or, thirdly, and this one will be new to many of you, if you engrave the inscription on the item, and then fill the engraving with a magically conductive material, like silver imbued paint, or inks made of certain magical plants, you can use that to hold and form the spell, so that the intense focus on the effect is not needed.

Done this way, you can inscribe the spell without ever activating it, which increases safety when creating magical weapons and esoteric effects."