“I can’t thank you enough for helping me clean up this mess.” the man says.

  A man props up a cabinet while still wearing soaked mage robes. He is a human man with a stubble for a beard and simple brown short hair.

  “My name is Dooley Jasup. I’m a wizard and this is my laboratory.” the man introducing himself as Dooley says. “You caught me in one of my experiments. You see, I’ve been invited to an exhibition at the castle. I’m just doing a bit of brushing up and polishing everything for the expo.”

  “Cool.” Ren says.

  “Who didn’t get an invite?” Feru asks.

  “I think everyone in the industrial district got one.” Dooley says.

  “Huh? I guess, I’m nothing special. I was kind of worried about showing something impressive.” Feru says.

  At those words, Ren grabs Feru by the waist and holds her up above her head.

  “My client here will be showing off the greatest military invention of all time.” Ren says.

  “Ah. It’s good to be ambitious.” Dooley says. “Everyone is going for that grant money, huh.”

  Feru struggles against Ren’s hands.

  “Alchemy right?” Dooley chuckles. “I’m excited to see what you come up with.”

  “What? How do you know?” Feru asks.

  “I visit you from time to time to buy magical regents.” Dooley says. “Do you not remember me?”

  “Uhh… well…” Feru awkwardly glances to the side as she speaks.

  Dooley reels back and clutches his chest like he was stabbed by Feru’s response.

  “Well, we’re not exactly neighbors. I suppose it can’t be helped.” Dooley says.

  “S- sorry.” Feru stammers. “If you don’t mind, what are you working on?”

  “Oh, just a bit of spellcraft.” Dooley says. “Everyone is aiming for that grant money. The best way to do that is to find an answer to that bulletproof question. From what I’ve heard, a lot of people are trying to make bulletproof armor or shields. I’m focusing less on defense like that and focusing more on offense. As you know, guns work by burning black powder. Black powder also has their weaknesses. Notably, they need to burn to explode. Being damp or wet also causes problems if you’re burning black powder. So me and a few of the mages here got to work on a new spell.”

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Dooley takes a pistol from a shelf and propped it up on a stand. He took a few steps back before clasping his hands together before pointing at the pistol.

  “Name Pending: Version 4!”

  Water is magically conjured in front of Dooley before it lances out at the pistol. The water engulfs the gun. The water then sits there while the pistol is fully submerged. Dooley walks over to the stand and picks up the pistol. The water follows the pistol despite being removed from the stand. He violently waves the pistol, but the water continues to engulf the gun. He then points the pistol at a practice dummy and pulls the trigger. The striker strikes as designed, but no musket ball shoots out.

  “Pretty neat, right?” Dooley says.

  “Wow!” Feru says.

  “Woah!” Lucia says.

  “The spell requires that you hit at least the gun or the holder of the gun.” Ren says. “In addition, the spell isn’t optimized for anyone but people who have an affinity or a lot of practice with water magic in particular. It can also be dispelled without too much trouble.”

  Feru and Lucia give Ren an awkward stare. Dooley scratches the back of his head when he hears Ren’s words.

  “Yeah. It’s not quite perfect yet.” Dooley chuckles.

  “At best, it’s a ‘cast and forget it’ sort of spell.” Ren continues. “If you hit, you can forget about that enemy using a gun. If they have another weapon, they can still use it. People don’t typically carry more than one gun, because guns are expensive.”

  “That’s right.” Dooley nods along with Ren’s explanation. “Hit someone with this and they can’t use the gun. Notably, the thing with so much kill power, a level 10 can do very lethal damage to someone of a much higher level wearing expensive armor.”

  “When is the expo again?” Ren asks.

  “Next octant.” Dooley says.

  “You have a lot of polishing to do.” Ren says.

  “Yeah. I know.” Dooley chuckles.

  “Only spellcasters who specialize in water can use this spell as it is.”

  “I know.”

  “You want to fix all of that in 8 days?”

  “Well, our hope is that we garner interest and get that grant. If we do, we can work on that.”

  “You want to sell an unfinished product.”

  “No, no, no. This isn’t a finished spell. We won’t tell anyone it’s a finished spell. We are going to the expo to try and pitch the idea to influential people. This is just a pitch to potential investors.”

  “But as it is now, only people who invested in the water spellcasting economy could use this.”

  “Yeah! I know, but I really believe that once the grant money comes in, I can expand on it.”

  “Why did you choose to do all this water stuff?” Feru speaks up.

  “Well, black powder itself has a few weaknesses.” Dooley says. “As powerful as it is, it too has it’s own weaknesses. You know, heavy winds and rain. That sort of thing.”

  “So you made an elemental weakness to the gun?” Feru asks.

  “It gets the job done.” Dooley nods.

  Feru thinks for a moment.

  “I have an idea!” Feru says.

  “Ahah! Well, I hope to see you all at the expo next octant.” Dooley chuckles to himself. “I’ll be looking forward to what you come up with.”

  Feru starts to walk out of the laboratory. Ren looks back at the door and then to Dooley and Lucia.

  “Should we go after her?” Ren asks.

  “I came here to help.” Lucia says.

  “This is where I work, so I can’t really just leave the place as a mess.” Dooley says.

  “Okay.” Ren says.

  Ren drops a pot she was holding before following after Feru. After a moment, Ren pokes her head back in the door way.

  “Your magic looks like spaghetti runes, by the way.” Ren says.

  “I know.” Dooley sighs.

  After that last jab at Dooley’s spell, Ren actually leaves.