The day was early.
Haru, a young teen with a fascination for both magic and technology, was woken up early by a loud bang from the hills. Must be people sparring again, he thought. As he got up, he made sure none of the shots had hit his house. While secluded, his house was closer to what most called the “Wastelands”. Endless fields of junk and ruined buildings, with the occasional patch of bare earth. Even living a few miles away was considered risky, given how little regulated the magic out here was. In the city, magic was regulated by law. Some spells were forbidden and were never to be used. Out in the wilds, most people knew these “forbidden” spells. Haru himself knew a few, but he swore to never use them.
When he looked out his window, he nearly got hit with a blast aimed at his head. He managed to shield himself in time, but it still meant someone fired at him.
“Hey you, small fry!” A voice from below yelled. “You’s on our territory!”
“You mean to tell me you just realized someone lives here?” He said back.
“Th’ boss said he saw someone here, and we’s doing the job for ‘im!” The bandit yelled, sounding even more angry than he first was.
“Well then, you’ll have to get up here first, because I ain’t heading down” Haru shot back.
They began rushing up the stairs. Technically he wasn’t heading down when he blew himself into the air, so it wasn’t like he was lying. Man, how am I supposed to stop them from taking my stuff? He asked himself. He was already in the air, which gave him an idea. He was always thinking of creative ways to use magic, and this one was no different. Moving quickly, he hit the intruders with a blast of air. The first two faded into nothingness. Shoulda thought that illusion magic would have made those others when they were so quiet, He thought.
The raider he had “conversed” with ran into Haru. Haru focused his magic into one hand. The resulting windburst blew the raider right off his tower and flying into the distance.
Now hopefully they leave me alone, he thought. If raiders can’t deal with somebody they tend to avoid them.
He noticed the old phone the raider had dropped. He was always interested in whatever working technology he could find, given the reliance on magic this far out.
I should try and find some stuff from the Wastelands today, maybe something I can fix. He thought.
For how well he used wind magic, it was tiring to use it for long amounts of time. So he had to walk out towards the mounds of junk that the Wastelands were made up of. Sometimes, beasts made of junk and large surges of magic would appear. Usually these didn’t attack unless attacked, true to the actions of “living” magic. If these beasts can be made of magic and scrapped technology, why have we not tried to make this “magical tech” our own? He thought.
He realized he could do that himself, with his tools at his outpost and enough luck. Excited over the idea of possibly making something never seen before, he decided to use his wind to get to his outpost faster. Once he landed, he quickly grabbed his tools and set out towards the most interesting-looking pile of scrapped tech. Within minutes of searching he found a few tanks and what looked like an old radio. He continued to sift through the piles of junk, collecting more scrap, until someone approached.
“HEY! This junk pile is ours!” The man said.
“If you hadn’t wanted people here, you should’ve kept people near this pile. Besides, there’s plenty of stuff here, and I’ve already had to fight today. Can’t we just come to a compromise?” Haru said.
“Fine, we’ll leave you alone. There’s plenty of scrap here anyway. Talking about it now makes me realize fighting over heaps is kinda stupid. Now, rare items on the other hand…” The man laughed and walked away.
Haru returned to his outpost with a sizable haul. He had found an old wagon and bike long ago, so he used that to transport stuff along a cleared path. Once he got back to his outpost, he set out some pieces that looked like they could be used. The old radio, the tanks and hoses, and some electrical parts and wire. If there is a frequency of noise and wavelength that can weaken magic, what if it could change it? Haru thought.
He dismantled the radio and took the tuning assembly out. People who used tuning magic could use noise to change their magic, but what if technology could tune it better?
He wired the radio antenna and some wire into a circle, and put foil around parts of the wire to reflect more of the waves inward. He threw a small ball of magic through as a test. Because it wasn’t turned on, nothing happened, but he wanted to make sure he could make the throw. He attached the setup to power, and tuned it to a frequency. He threw a magic ball through. This time, it suddenly shot forward and burned up after flying forward a decent distance. He tried a few different frequencies. One dispersed going through the waves, another broke into pieces and shot forward quickly, and another flipped around and shot towards him, shattering on contact with his hastily made shield.
So if I can make magical “bullets” change their action, what about streams and crystals? He thought.
He threw some magical crystals through the machine. The first one exploded on impact with the ground. The next one broke up and dissolved, while the third broke into high speed pieces that embedded into objects. The last one seemed to reflect any magic cast towards it. Some others changed color that seemed to not do anything at first, but looking closer revealed some could “store” magic, and others only worked when magic was put through them.
These could be useful for making portable tech, Haru thought, already taking pieces and putting things together. He made a somewhat crude magical “gun”, that used the magical crystals to fire energy bullets and streams when the frequency was changed. Mostly a sort of “attack”, using the previous energy projectiles as the resulting bullet. There was at least one stream output that could be used as a grappling hook, and another that worked like a welder flame, burning very bright and hot at a short range.
He had worked undisturbed for quite a while, which was uncommon out here. Shoulda ran into some raiders by now, but where are they? About five seconds after he thought that, a group of raiders came into the clearing where his outpost was. //Just HAD to think about it, didn’t I? //
“And what do you people want this time?” Haru asked.
“We heard you sent one of our boys flyin’, and we ain’t gonna let that slide this time.” The man in the front said.
“And I would assume you’re the boss of this group?” Haru shot back.
“Yeah, and you’ve been a real pain to deal with lately, so I figured I would come n’ deal with you personally.” The boss said.
With that, the boss and about 4 raiders charged towards Haru. He took aim with his new magigun, and fired a high velocity shot. It shot through two of the raiders which crumbled into dust. Illusion magic again, Haru thought. The raiders were getting a bit too close. He swapped to a scattershot mode, and hit the other two illusions with a blast.
“Isn’t like you’s doin’ any damage to me, I can just make more!” The boss yelled and made more illusions.
This gives me an idea…
Haru started to move large amounts of wire and batteries with magic energy into a ring around his outpost. He got it all together and quickly tuned it and switched it on. The illusions started to crumble, and the magic being casted by the raider boss dissipated.
“H-hey, why isn't my magic working?!” The boss had yelled out.
“Have you ever heard of a frequency that cancels magic?” Haru asked.
“Yeah, but that means you can't use magic either, so we're evenly matched, right?” The boss worriedly asked.
“Ah, sorry. Let me rephrase that question: Have you ever heard of a frequency that cancels specific magics?” Haru asked.
“T-that's impossible!” The raider boss shot back.
Haru aimed his magigun and shot a pellet. The raider went flying, and then Haru blew himself into the air and slammed the boss into the ground.
“Usually I don't have to fight this much, but you proved to be- huh?”
Haru was cut off by the boss starting to disintegrate into living magic. Odd, never thought living magic could take the form of a human being. The day was quite late, so Haru headed back to his house with his new tech. He was starving from forgetting to bring lunch out, so he made a larger meal for dinner than usual.
Afterwards, he was quite tired. He made sure everything was in order, got into his bed, and drifted off to sleep.
The day was over.