The straw mattress was hard as hell, but for Kanos's back, which felt like it was about to snap, it felt like sleeping in a five-star hotel bed. He just collapsed onto it. His breathing was still shallow, his throat feeling hot every time he took in air.
Belida closed the wooden door of their rented room. The sound of the iron bar sliding into place sounded pretty heavy. The giant man checked the small window facing the narrow alley, making sure no one had followed them from the one-eyed man's shop.
"You lost a lot of blood just for a small knife," Belida said. He pulled up a rickety chair and sat right in front of the door, blocking the only way in.
Kanos opened one eye. His head was still spinning wildly. "That was pure steel, big guy. You think it's easy turning squid water into solid metal?"
Kanos sat up slowly, holding back a wince. He placed the five glass bottles of black ink and a dull leather-bound sketchbook on the rotting wooden table next to his bed. It was the loot—or 'business transaction'—from the shop earlier.
Kanos pictured the blue system box in his head. The transparent panel instantly lit up in front of his eyes.
[ HP: 8/60 ]
[ PHYSICAL STATUS: INTERNAL INJURIES, EXTREME EXHAUSTION ]
"Eight," Kanos muttered. The corner of his mouth twitched. "I have eight health points left. If I trip over a rock on the street, I'd probably just drop dead."
Belida watched Kanos from across the room. "Guild weaponsmiths need hot furnaces, heavy hammers, and days to forge a single steel karambit. You did it in five seconds with only squid liquid and a broken stick. Of course your body pays the price."
"And the price is my own life," Kanos fired back sarcastically.
He pulled the sketchbook closer, opening its first page. The paper was rough, yellowish like old parchment. It definitely wasn't the expensive sketchbooks he usually bought at his favorite store back in Jakarta, but the paper fibers felt thick enough to hold wet ink without bleeding through to the back page.
Kanos uncorked one of the ink bottles. He dipped the tip of the frayed wood he had chewed on earlier.
"Are you trying to kill yourself?" Belida's voice suddenly rose, his body leaning forward, ready to stand up. "You said you only have eight health points left."
"Relax. I just want to test a reasonable limit," Kanos answered.
His eyes focused on the paper. His brain pictured something incredibly easy, simple, and small in size. A glass marble. It didn't need a complex frame, it didn't need sharp angles, just one perfectly round curve.
The ink stroke flowed smoothly, forming a circle the size of a thumbnail.
The nausea hit again, but this time it was just a minor twitch in his temple. The drawn circle on the paper glowed blue. Luminous dust from the air was slowly sucked in, gathering in the middle of the line, and... pop.
A clear glass marble dropped onto Kanos's lap.
Kanos checked his blue panel again. His health dropped from eight to seven. He caught the marble, then tossed it gently toward Belida.
Belida caught the marble with two fingers. His dark blue eyes stared intently at the small, transparent object.
"That squid liquid is pitch black," Belida said quietly. "But you made clear glass from it."
"The ink just acts as a tether, Belida. For the rest of it, the dust in this crazy air fills in the true form," Kanos explained. He wiped the cold sweat from his neck. "Size, density, and the complexity of the material determine how much of my energy gets drained. As long as I understand how light passes through glass, the air responds and shapes it exactly like that."
Belida was silent for a long time. He gripped the glass marble until it was hidden inside his right fist. "Your magic is terrifying, Illustrator."
"Being able to kill its own user is always terrifying." Kanos closed his sketchbook, placing his wooden brush on the table. "The problem is, we need more of this ink."
Belida raised an eyebrow.
"If I'm gonna make you a steel sword or a full set of armor decent enough to replace that scrap metal on your arm, these five bottles definitely won't be enough," Kanos continued. "The lines need more ink so the frame stays stable. And I really don't want to bleed to death while drawing the hilt. Where can we find more of this ink? Or ones with better quality?"
Belida glanced at the closed window behind him. His gaze was directed straight toward the center of the city.
"Alchemical ink is made from monster blood or magical plant sap. The stronger the monster, the stronger the ink's essence," Belida answered. "All those materials come from one place in this city."
"That giant hole in the middle of the city earlier," Kanos immediately guessed.
Belida nodded. "The Marrath Hole. A forty-floor dungeon. The economic chain of this city, the castes, the coins, even the lives of its people revolve around it. Adventurers go inside, kill monsters, and bring the materials to the surface to sell to the guilds."
Kanos massaged the bridge of his nose. Made sense. This was a classic RPG. You need crafting materials, you enter a dungeon. You need money, you sell loot. The only difference was, if he died in that hole, there was no respawn button.
"So if you need quality ink without having to rob another old man's shop, we have to go down there," Belida added flatly.
Kanos took a deep breath. His lungs felt heavy. His peaceful life in the apartment, listening to lo-fi music and working on commission revisions, now sounded like absolute heaven.
"Tomorrow," Kanos finally said. He lay back down, closing his eyes to fight the dizziness. "Tomorrow morning, I'll draw you a real weapon. You go in and hit things, I wait in the back. After that, we'll go make some money in that damn hole."
"Are you sure you won't die drawing it tomorrow?"
Kanos gave a faint grin without opening his eyes. "That's exactly why you need to let me sleep tonight. Don't kick my foot again even if my breathing sounds like it's about to stop."
There was no reply from Belida, but the sound of a chair scraping as it was pulled back slightly could be heard. The giant man got into a comfortable position in front of the door, completely ready to stand guard all night.
Kanos shut his eyes tight, but his brain, too used to pulling all-nighters, refused to compromise. The pain in his ribs made him restless. To distract himself, he summoned the blue system box in his head again. This time, he asked the system to display his full status.
A wider transparent blue screen stretched across the darkness of his eyelids.
[ NAME: KANOS ]
[ LEVEL: 2 ]
[ CLASS: ERROR ]
[ HP: 7/60 ]
[ MANA: ??? ]
[ STRENGTH: 5 ]
[ AGILITY: 5 ]
[ ENDURANCE: 3 ]
[ SKILLS: ART TO REALITY (TIER 1), STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS (PASSIVE) ]
His eyes snagged on the words Tier 1. Tier one. Kanos smirked inwardly. If there was a tier one, that meant there was a tier two, three, and so on. His thoughts started running wild, typical of an artist's brain that was just handed a limitless new medium.
This afternoon he made a clay knife. Then a charcoal mace. Now a pure steel karambit using ink. All of them were inanimate objects. Things with static structures.
"Hey, Belida," Kanos called out softly, his voice barely a whisper.
"Go to sleep," Belida replied from the door.
"Do you think..." Kanos swallowed hard, feeling like the question he was about to ask was incredibly stupid. "If I can make inanimate objects real... do you think later on I'd be able to draw living things? Like... drawing a monster. Or a giant golem that can walk on its own?"
A rough scoff came from the direction of the door. Belida clearly thought it was the delirious joke of a guy suffering from blood loss.
"Making a small knife nearly killed you," the giant man answered flatly and coldly. "If you tried to draw a monster, you would bleed to death before you even finished drawing its eyes. Don't dream too far."
Kanos laughed softly. The laugh made his chest sting again. "True. Stupid idea. I'd die a dumb death."
He closed the blue panel. The idea did sound like the fantasy of a kid playing too many modern video games. Nonsense.
But in the deepest corner of his mind, his crazy instincts were already starting to piece together rough sketches. I wonder what the bone anatomy of a golem looks like?
Kanos let his consciousness slowly sink. His right hand, resting on his stomach, still made small, reflexive twitches, unconsciously practicing drawing lines. Not just for the weapon he was going to make tomorrow morning, but for the insane ideas waiting to be drawn in the future.