The thaumaturge

My fingers moved swiftly, slipping in and out of pockets with practiced precision. By the time I paused to take stock of my gains, I had collected 16 copper-colored coins and around 5 with a silvery sheen. As I examined one of the coins more closely, something caught my eye—a faint magical engraving etched along its edge.

The markings were subtle, but unmistakable to someone like me. They bore a striking resemblance to the inscriptions I used on my gems, though these were far weaker in potency.

From a quick glance, it seemed the inscription served a dual purpose: to verify the coin's authenticity and to record its rightful owner. For someone like me—a thief, at least for the moment—this was less than ideal. Every coin I pocketed carried a signature, a problem that could expose me if I wasn't careful.

But luck, or rather skill, was on my side. This was my craft, my domain. I had spent years perfecting the art of manipulating magical inscriptions, bending them to my will. I had developed on this craft without ever having a teacher. I had created this in my world through just seeing a single gate once way back when my wife was taken.

I examined the coin again, its faint magical engraving glinting in the light. Now it was clear—this world, too, relied on such inscriptions. I had suspected as much ever since I witnessed the portal that took my wife.

I slipped into an alley, careful not to attract attention. Pulling out my engraving tools, I began to examine the coin closely. The delicate craftsmanship of the markings on its edge intrigued me—simple, yet precise. My mind raced as I considered how best to alter the engraving without leaving a trace of tampering. I had to make sure that nothing about the coin's authenticity would be questioned. I had to make sure that if they had a scanner they would not be able to see whether I had tampered with the engravings.

I carefully analyzed the structure of the engraving. It was subtle, the owner's signature almost hidden within a complex pattern. I could change it, but I had to do so in a way that wouldn't distort the overall design. If I made one small mistake the coin would become unusable as a good scanner could see whether it was real or fake.

Then I pulled out a small handaxe engraved with a gem that said DESTRUCTION. This was one of the strongest gems I have made in all of my time as a thaumaturge, that is what I had called the process of imbueing these gems with a inscription giving them special powers. Though this gem was extremely powerfull it had 2 downsides. The first downside is that if you use the gem you could not use it again within that same day, I have done a multitude of experiments with this gem and the prerequisites to useing the gem were quite specific. 1st prerequisite was that it could only be used with a handaxe, the second prerequisite was that the handaxe must be lefthanded.

After making the gem once I have never succeeded in making another, when making this one it felt as if a extraterrestrial being had taken over my being. I knew not what I was doing while making this gem I had forgotten all the processes to making it, even the camera in the corner of my room had stopped filming.

The second downside to the gem is that if you use it your body gets slowed down to around a tenth of the original speed of the body. I knew where this downside came from but I could not fix it as I was afraid to make the gem stop functioning.

The gem had 2 abilities; you could prefectly cut something in half and the second ability is to make something disappear. As this gem is very powerful it takes a small incantation to activate the ability of the DESTRUCTION gem.

I then aimed the handaxe at the coin infront of me which I had put on its side and hit it really hard. Atleast that is what I had tried to do but due to my body getting slowed down to around a tenth to its original speed the hit was not as hard as I would have liked it to be but that did not matter as even with the weakest hit the coin would have perfectly split in half.

As half of the coin fell to the left and the other half to the right I noticed there were no engravings in the innards of the coin. This made my life alot easier. I would not have to slowely break open every coin and replace the engraving located in their middle.

I stood up again getting ready to depart from the alleyway I was located, the was atleast until I noticed a looming shadow above me. As I looked up I noticed a man with a massive stature.

As I noticed him I reached into my bag to grab the big staff with the DISINTEGRATE gem as a precaution to make sure I could easily kill the man if he decided to attack me. He then pulled out a dagger which looked more like a toy in his massive hands. He then said the following: "Give me all your money or you are dead." The gem on the top started glowing and as he noticed I was not scared of him he started falling back a little, he had become scared of me. I then decided even though he would have run had I asked him, that would kill this big oaf. The DISINTEGRATE gem triggered and he turned to dust as I walked away from the location I had just killed him.

I did not know why I had killed him it was not necessary but my subconsious told me to do it so I had done it.

After this little exchange I started heading to an inn that was nearby—I had noticed it while pickpocketing the people around me.