When Rory had first been plunked onto Aelia decades ago, he had barely been more than a child, a measly twenty-six or twenty-seven years old.

How have I forgotten how old I was when I first arrived?

At the time, it had been a constant struggle of discovery and fighting against a world that seemed designed to push him into a corner, his specialty as a crafter making it extremely difficult in those first few tiers to advance.

While Rory might have once more found himself somewhere new, he was far from the ignorant and helpless 'child' that he had been before. He was the founder of the largest city on Aelia, at least the largest city based on side comments from Aelia herself, and a well-accomplished fighter and crafter.

He also had a stash of goodies stored inside his inventory.

All of that was to say, the prospect of beginning anew was far from paralyzing. First, though, was that Rory needed a forge, as one of the few things that wasn't easily recreated was the Stellar Forge. Oh sure, with enough time, he could probably find the materials needed to build a new one, but Rory didn't want to retread old paths.

Stellar Forge? Old and boring.

Volcanic Crucible - the name was still very much a work in progress - now that was new and interesting.

With a vision in mind, Rory had begun getting busy. First, he needed an easily workable material, but that was surprisingly easy. The volcanic stone had proven to be capable of resisting the heat of the volcano and the magma within, so he just needed to capitalize on it. His plan was simple: he would melt the stone before pouring it, creating an obsidian lip around the small magma lake that he could inscribe runes.

Now, how was he going to melt rock that couldn't be melted by magma that was hotter than any magma ever found on Earth?

Easy, magic.

Chiseling a small circle into the ground near the magma lake, Rory then pulled a small pyroxene bowl from his inventory. Using the small bowl, he then proceeded to scoop up some of the golden magma and pour it into the circular trough. Tossing a few low-grade crystals inside the magma, it began to bubble before the crystals soon melted. Carving a few lesser runes around the circle, Rory nodded to himself. Using the same pyroxene bowl, he filled it with some of the abundance of stone left from his digging operation. Placing the bowl within the bound circle, Rory began to fill it with Pneuma, much easier to do than when he was lower tier. Knowing how intense the heat would have to be, it still took over three hours to fill it with what he could manage now that he couldn't simply drain it from Ehkorrus itself.

Finally, with all the steps covered, Rory activated the entire thing with a tiny flex of his intent. The bound circle seemed to absorb the magma poured into its trough as the runes surrounding it likewise vanished. In return, the interior of the bound circle suddenly glowed with a brilliant gold light, which intensified to a blinding white light that forced Rory to avert his gaze; the heat felt scorching even through the barrier of the bound circle.

For a minute straight, the blinding light before finally fading. With the light gone, Rory examined the pyroxene bowl. The bowl had lived up to its name, withstanding the intense heat that even the volcanic stone had failed against. The ground was a rosy, red color, softened stone that was quickly hardening into obsidian. Inside the bowl, the stone placed had also melted into a slurry of obsidian.

Knowing he had to be quick, Rory then set to pouring the molten obsidian into the same trough that he had originally poured the magma. Letting the obsidian cool, Rory waited until it reached the perfect temperature to begin inscribing runes into the halfway-solid obsidian with his crafting knife. Placed within a physical medium such as he had, they wouldn't have to be re-inscribed every single time, and they would have a higher efficiency as they were able to withstand the full force of any gathered pneuma.

Letting it cool, Rory then spent some time digging a channel from the bound circle and connecting it to the golden magma pond. Once it had been opened, golden magma began to flow slowly, covering the now-cooled obsidian. Just short of overflowing, Rory dropped a stone in the channel, his inelegant way to prevent the lava from continuously flowing.

"I need some pneuma crushers," Rory said as he looked at the janky setup. Pneuma crushers would continuously draw Pneuma inward, grinding it against itself as the Pneuma was refined and absorbed by the bound circle, ensuring a constant supply. Given that the Pneuma here was richer than the Pneuma of the Ehkorrian forest, Rory wouldn't need much more than a standard four-pillar setup.

But.

Grabbing an item from his inventory, Rory held up the recently acquired tier-seven monster core. Based on a simple ascension scale, the core had a limit of around a hundredth of the monster core used for Ehkorrus, but that would be more than enough for his short-term plans.

Lucky break; otherwise, I'd need to set up some pneuma crushers for anything requiring a constant pneuma supply.

He still had to make the first set of Pneuma Crushers, unfortunately. Still, on the bright side, if you weren't after something super efficient or advanced, a basic Pneuma crusher was nothing more than obelisks with some inscriptions and maybe a gem or two.

Given how much stone he had to work with, Rory snatched some of the stone he'd deposited into his inventory. Grabbing four that looked usable, Rory sat down next to the magma pond, knife in hand, as he began chiseling into the vaguely pillar-shaped stones. Going for replaceability, Rory soon whipped up four Pneuma crushers. Sure, they'd need to be remade every week, but the materials involved were exceptionally cheap, the most 'expensive' component being a room gem he topped each one with.

Placing them around the initial bound circle, Rory set up a secondary bound with a pillar at ninety degrees from one another. A quick carve into the stone between the bound circles linked them as Rory nodded to himself.

"Perfect,"

With a quick flex of his will, the Pneuma crushers began drawing Pneuma inward. The larger bound circle stored the unrefined Pneuma. At the same time, over time, the refined Pneuma would be injected into the smaller bound circle.

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Placing the pyroxene bowl back into the center of the smaller bound circle, Rory filled it up with stone once again.

And now it needs time to 'charge' up.

Looking around the cave, Rory shrugged, as there was not much else to do for the moment. While he could have begun to mine the Rubedo, he didn't want to accidentally damage his pickaxe if the metal were too much for the stabilized steel to withstand, at least not until he had a halfway functional forge set up.

Leaving the cavern and making his way out of the tunnel into the volcano, Rory began to scale his way down the mountain, which turned into a game of reverse Spider-Man, leaping far off from the mountain before whipping threads of projected Pneuma toward the volcano and pulling himself back down. Traveling like that, he was able to make it down the mountainside in only minutes.

Traveling a bit from the foot of the volcano, Rory approached the edge of the 'forest' of coral-like trees, examining them for some time.

"Interesting,"

Volcanic Ash Coral

Quality: Common

A type of flora commonly found in special volcanic regions; it is relatively rare to find it elsewhere. It is adapted to harsh climates and can continue to grow even if chopped down. It is known to come in two forms, the Volcanic Ash form and the Deep Stone Magma form.

"Very interesting," Rory repeated. If he understood correctly, he could chop down some of the coral trees, replant them, and they would continue to grow as if nothing had happened. Second, the mention of a 'Deep Stone Magma' form led him to believe that even if it were to be planted in or around magma, the tree would be right as rain.

Rain might actually kill it, so right as…. Acid rain? You know what, never mind, it's a good thing Apostolos isn't here to make fun of me.

The description altered his plan ever so slightly. Rather than chopping it down and removing limbs so that he could use them as support beams for his tunnel, he would instead chop offshoots from the coral trees and transplant them within the stone of the tunnel, where they would hopefully grow up and into the ceiling, forming a natural web way of branches within the stone that would add to the overall structural integrity.

Also, I have a skill for this that I haven't used in a long ass time.

Green Thumb

Rarity: Common. Skill Level: Inexperienced.

Any hand-planted flora can be granted a permanent 1% growth rate increase at the cost of a small amount of Pneuma. It may also be channeled with life-aspect essences for greater variable results.

It was a skill he had obtained not long after he'd first appeared on Aelia, at least not long in the grand scheme of things. If he transplanted the coral trees, he might be able to jumpstart their growth without much hassle.

"You know, I never really spent much time experimenting with this skill, but I bet I could do some fancy stuff with it combined with Alchemical Transmutation."

The very first bloodwood tree had essentially been a proto version of that very process, transmuting Sol's Glory into Bloodwood before transmutation was ever even a thing.

Yeah, it's definitely an interesting idea worth exploring.

Rory knew that blood essence and blood affinity could 'fuse' with specific other essences or affinities without dominating them, such as how Ehkorrus has a 'Star Blood' theme going. Furthermore, when you got down into it, magma was essentially the 'blood' of the planet.

And I do have a bunch of conceptually pure magma to work with.

A new experiment shaping in his mind, Rory temporarily placed it on the back burner as he instead pulled out a handsaw from his inventory. Getting to work, he soon committed a heinous act of amputation to most of the nearby coral trees, filling a significant portion of his inventory. As he made his way back up the volcano, Rory faintly noticed a shift in the lighting. Glancing up, Rory shrugged, not seeing anything out of the ordinary, until realization hit him like a sack of bricks.

Oh, fuck I'm a moron.

The mountain, and all the islands for that matter, weren't just floating in the sky; they were also upside down. A glance up was easy to mistake for a gloomy night sky, but it was instead a black ocean far above them. The suns, meanwhile, were below them, and with the constant ash and smoke in the air, it had become all too easy to lose track of the cycle of day and night. Nighttime would always appear brighter due to the active volcanoes, and the smoke, ash, and haze would obscure daylight.

Whoops.

The slight changes in the lighting that he had been ignoring, therefore, were more than likely to be the multiple suns setting and rising.

Damn, losing track of time will be easy as hell here.

It was an observation Rory would have to keep in mind, but now that he'd noticed it once, surely it would be less of an issue.

Surely.

Returning to their artificial tunnel, Rory began the process of planting each nub from the coral trees into the ground beneath him, one on both the left and right sides of the tunnel. It was more taxing than regular gardening, considering he had to smash a hole into the stone, plant the nub, and then re-cover it while also channeling Green Thumb with each usage. Each time he planted one, he also ensured that some of his blood essence was channeled through the skill. It was tiring, but not nearly as tiring as when he had been lower tier; there was 'more' of himself to give than in the past.

Taking however long he needed to finish, Rory at last returned to the main cavern. Eia had changed locations but was otherwise still absorbing the heat and residual energy from the magma pool.

Bum.

Ignoring the snake, Rory made his way to his flash kiln, a glorified circle. Since he'd been out, the innermost bound circle had been well saturated with high-grade Pneuma.

Perfect.

Bowl placed with some stone instead, Rory activated the setup, and only a minute later, he had another bowl of the molten obsidian. Taking the bowl out of the bound circle, he then proceeded to pour its contents around the magma pool, building a lip. It wasn't even close to enough, enough for only a single percentage of the circumference, but that was why Rory had gone through the trouble of constructing a temporary processor for melting down any stone. Refilling the bowl, Rory proceeded to fire up the bound circle again as he took the intermediary minute to add some runes to the bit of cooling obsidian he had poured.

Repeating the process several times, Rory only took a break when he'd burnt through the built-up high-grade Pneuma, ten refills worth. Nearly a tenth of the circumference had been handled by that point, earning a satisfied nod from Rory.

See, not too bad after all.

The work wasn't necessarily quick, but it was progressing.

And that was all he needed.

Sometime later

Rory wiped the sweat from his brow, looking at the result of his labor. Surrounding the magma pool was a lip of obsidian with runes inscribed, meant to constantly infuse Pneuma into the magma, saturating it fully while also cranking the heat up even further. While that seemed far too simple for as many runes as he had needed, it was meant to thoroughly describe the exact current the Pneuma would travel as it slowly seeped into the magma, seen by the fact that the magma pool was now a slow-motion whirlpool. The closer you got to the center, the greater the heat, the very center in a league of its own as far as the temperature went.

There was also one other 'set' of runes he'd added, but they wouldn't show their worth -if they ever did- for some time.

Perfect.

All of that was the groundwork for the newest forge he was planning to construct.

Step one… Done. If you could even call it step one. Still need a walkway, a chain, and an unmelting container that also doesn't prevent the transfer of heat… Yeah, a decent amount.

While there was still quite a bit of work to do, at the very least, Rory felt confident that the heat of the innermost portion of the magma pool, and just above it, was now hot enough to melt or forge metals properly.

A glance over to the red metal still embedded within the walls elicited a quick frown from Rory as he huffed.

Soon.

However, before that, he would need some materials to work with, and there was one in particular he had in mind.

"Hey, you lazy bum," Rory said, startling the snake, who raised her head to gaze at him. "I'm going hunting; I need a lot of bones. You in?"

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