Reading through the nearly sixteen pages of content concerning creating mages took almost half an hour. It was dense, filled with guidelines, warnings, strict details, and a whole host of limitations. About ten minutes in, I gave up trying to keep it straight in my head and grabbed a data pad so Ahsoka could type out an outline of sorts while I read through everything, listing out specific things to her as I went along.

  First off, I had been correct, this was not a simple chant, where I could say a few words and cast a spell, and be done with the whole process. Turning someone into a mage would likely take about four to five hours, more if the subject met specific conditions. It started with the ritual, or at least settling into a ritual circle, which we would not be able to leave until everything was finished. I would then use a series of spells, which I would need to learn, both on my Grimoire and on the subject. They would then put on a pair of rings, and I would need to cast two different spells at once, one on the ritual circle and the other on the subject.

  I would then be forced to hold this spell for hours until the ritual had completed, at which point it would turn to dust, as would the enchanted rings. The spell would only take a trickle of magic, slow enough that I would likely regenerate my magic reserves even while casting it, but the idea of holding a spell for hours was... not something I could envision. The closest analogy I had was the early enchantment process, when it used to take me hours to enchant a single thing.

  The entire process sounds bizarre, in no small part because of the inclusion of the ritual. It was such a strange concept, utterly foreign to anything else I had been doing so far. The closest was the creation of my enchanting table, but that was more about the materials and the spells I cast on them rather than a proper voodoo or witchcraft ritual.

  I half expected it to ask me to burn some sage and kill a goat.

  The strangeness and length of the process were not the only things worth noting, either. There were several limitations to keep in mind, one of them very significant. For one, as I had mentioned to Ashoka when I was first skimming the pages, the subjects I "awakened" would never really be as quick to learn magic as I was. I couldn't tell if it was because my magic was just more straightforward, so I could understand and master it faster, or if the powers that be, the ones who sent me here, had somehow primed me for learning magic. Either way, learning even basic spells would be challenging and time-consuming. On top of that, very few people would have the same amount of Mana or Magicka that I started with. It would still grow over time, and they could do the same meditative exercises that I now did almost instinctively when I had any spare time, but it would take quite some time for anyone to approach how much mana I had access to now.

  Even further restricting the passing of magic, I was the only one who could perform the ritual to create a mage. I could pass on that ability before or when I died, but until then, I had complete control. This was both a blessing and a curse. For one, it meant that I could control who got the magic, meaning I didn't have to worry about people gifting it to people I didn't like or who I thought were dangerous. It also meant that, if I ever messed up and gave magic to someone who snapped or went evil, I didn't need to worry about them creating a mage army.

  On the other hand, it was a bit sad that I couldn't just spread magic throughout the galaxy. Magic, even the gamified, simplistic magic that I had, was a wonderful, if dangerous, thing, and having the admittedly unrealistic fantasy that someday the galaxy could have magic through every corner still kinda sucked.

  Kids didn't even have a chance of inheriting from their parents, not even if both of them had magic. Instead, someone born to one or two magical parents would likely start off with more mana and have a better grasp of magic if I or someone else unlocked their magic.

  Perhaps the most astounding limitation, though it was more of a sacrifice, was that anyone whom I turned into a mage lost their connection to the Force.

  Now, they didn't become all of a sudden. Instead, their connection was reduced all the way down to my low, nebulous, hard-to-detect level. For some, like Jedi or other people with a strong, instinctual, and yet untrained connection to the Force, there was no way they could ever become a mage. Going through the ritual would be like cutting off a limb, blinding and deafening them at the same time.

  When I explained how it worked, Ahsoka nearly dropped the datapad she was using, her face going pale.

  "That's… Deacon, that's horrifying!" she said, putting the datapad down on the coffee table limply.

  "It's certainly not something we should do lightly," I responded, not quite agreeing with her reaction. "And I would never suggest that a Jedi or even someone particularly Force sensitive get it done, it would likely be pretty traumatic for them. But for a random person, someone with already low force sensitivity…? I mean, you don't think I'm some sort of abomination, do you?"

  "No, of course not," she said, shaking her head. "But… the idea just seems so… extreme. The Force is everything, it's life and death, and the universe itself. Cutting yourself off from that… it sounds like torture. It sounds like someone volunteering to maim themselves."

  "Well, for one thing, it's not torture, I feel fine," I pointed out. "I've never had any negative effects from having such a weak connection to the Force. In fact, I'm pretty sure I still feel at least the basic connection, in moments like when coming home to Nirn for the first time in a while, or when I pissed off Vader too much."

  "Still... cutting yourself off..."

  "We aren't cutting anything off," I repeated patiently. "Just lowering it down to my level."

  "Deacon, your connection to the Force is more than a little strange," Ahsoka pointed out with a frown. "I struggle to pick you up from even across the city, and that's me. Someone who loves you and has a deep connection to you. I doubt most Jedi could pick you out of a crowd from a hundred meters or so."

  "Well… why don't you meditate on it, Ahsoka?" I suggested. "I mean, I can't say I won't be doing the ritual, no matter what the Force thinks, I won't hold back such a force multiplier from my people, but…"

  "Right, that's fair," Ahsoka nodded, looking at me with a fond, if not perplexed look. "I… I will meditate on this. Maybe… we keep this to ourselves, though, at least for now? I'm not sure how the other Jedi will react."

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  "I have a handful of spells to learn, two enchantments to make, and a bunch of resources to gather," I respond, gesturing to the book. "Not to mention, I need to figure out who I'm selecting. This isn't going to happen any time soon."

  She nodded in understanding before leaning over to kiss my cheek. She then stood, grabbed a few things, and headed out to one of the quiet gardens. There she would be able to meditate in peace. Hopefully, the Force would have some sort of sign of feeling for her, something to reassure her it was all right.

  If I was being honest, if Ahsoka stormed back in and explained that the Force was horrified by the idea, I would definitely think twice about the process. I had said we would be doing it either way, and I likely would, but it would probably start with a less-than-willing subject captured from a slaver group.

  Ahsoka was correct, the Force was life, and if trimming that down had a different, adverse effect on a native than it did to me? I didn't want to accidentally drive anyone insane, or worse, create some sort of Forceless abomination.

  As she left, I sat back to read through the instructions again, my mind trying to pull apart and organize the massive amount of information that had just been dropped into my lap.

  It was a bit obvious, at least to me, that most of, if not all of these limitations and conditions had been set by the entities that stranded me here. All of it seemed like it was specifically tuned to keep the concept of magic as a small group, not something that could spread exponentially. It was too clean-cut to be anything other than deliberate, though I didn't necessarily disagree with the steps taken. Sacrificing the majority of a person's connection to the Force was a bit out there, but considering how worried they had been about making me too powerful, I was not overly surprised.

  Something told me that a Jedi with magic would be one hell of a tough nut to crack, and if magic proliferated unimpeded, it would happen eventually. Just being able to heal and refresh their stamina on demand alone would drastically increase the power of a Jedi. Even worse, if one of the few Jedi or Sith who liked to dabble in more esoteric and large-scale concepts ever got hold of it, I didn't know what sort of repercussions there would be.

  So, despite their fingerprints being all over the restrictions and limitations, I wouldn't complain. Not when I would soon be able to spread the ability to heal to my ground teams. I wouldn't be our only silver bullet anymore, now we would have a whole armory full of them.

  Despite the absolutely groundbreaking news that I had just received, the galaxy did not stop turning to let me figure it out. While I was reading through the spells I would need to learn, I got a message from Sheora. The intel office had finally found a target worth tracking down on the data core we recovered, and she wanted to discuss it with me.

  About twenty minutes later, I was walking through the halls of the Fury, having hitched a ride on a transport from the surface. As I made my way to Sheora's office, she looked up at me from her desk.

  "You need to invest in a holoprojector in your home," She said, gesturing to the seat on the other side of her desk. "Coming up here for every meeting is a bit silly."

  "I enjoy the ride," I admitted with a shrug. "Plus, talking to you or taking a message usually leads to coming up here for meetings anyway."

  In reality, I was reluctant to put a way to have meetings and such directly into my home. I liked getting out and meeting my people, but if I were presented with a way to take my meetings without ever leaving my home?

  It was better to keep me moving.

  "It's your time," She said with a shrug. "So. We found a lead that looks worth investigating. The ship data core listed five operating rally points, four of which were over populated planets. Those are useless, since they would have been long since cleaned up. One of them, however, was set along a planet deep in the Outer Rim."

  "Didn't we already do something similar?" I asked with a frown. "We got something like that off the black box."

  "Kind of, but this was more of a checkpoint," She explained. "This seems to be a legitimate CIS rally point. If it hasn't been located by the Empire, it should at least have some infrastructure. Fuel ships, sensor buoys, maybe even a station."

  "And the chances of it already being cleared out?"

  "I have no idea, there is no way to know," She explained with a shrug. "But this is the kind of lead that led to finding the Fury, so it's definitely worth checking out. Just… don't get your hopes up. Also, I should point out that the fact that we have no idea what is there goes both ways. It might be nothing, but it could also be way more than we can handle."

  "Sounds like it might be better to go in quietly until we can get the lay of the land," I said with a frown, scratching my chin. "CIS assets should be fully deactivated, but our own work shows that they aren't that hard to turn back on again."

  While we were definitely going to go and check out this rally point, there was no rush. Any issues that might be waiting for us would wait until the following day, so when I contacted my people, I let them know we would be departing the following morning, so they could spread the news and prepare accordingly.

  In the meantime, I spent some time walking around the large orbiting ship, visiting Miru and having lunch with her and a few of the other engineers. They were excited to see, or at least hear, how the plasma dart would hold up in a real combat, though I didn't have the heart to tell them that I would prefer we not have to use any explosives in the coming mission.

  Eventually, I traveled back down to Vercopa. As I returned home, I was surprised to find that Ahsoka was already there, waiting for me on the couch. She seemed to be looking better, her face considerably less pale and her look certainly less unnerved by our earlier discovery.

  "So… did you find what you were looking for in your meditation?" I asked as I sat down beside her. "You seem… less disturbed."

  "I did, both from the Force and my own mind," She admitted, letting out a long breath. "Despite my initial reaction… I couldn't feel anything negative from the Force."

  I nodded simply, waiting for her to continue. I wasn't overly surprised by the news, but I was glad to hear I wouldn't be committing crimes against the sentient psychic will that controlled this universe.

  "It seems to, bizarrely enough, trust that your magic won't hurt it," Ahsoka explained. "It wasn't that clear, obviously, but that's what I sensed from it. I also realized that I was being… maybe a bit overly negative. I can't imagine giving up the Force, but for most people it really wouldn't be like giving up much, especially since they would still technically be connected, just with the same muted, low-level you have."

  "I don't blame you for reacting so harshly," I assured her, putting my arm around her. "I can imagine it would sound pretty horrifying to anyone who used the Force consistently. Or relied on it in any way."

  She hummed in appreciation, leaning against me slightly on the couch.

  "And besides, think of it this way. The Jedi won't be alone anymore," I said with a smile. "Imagine an order of magic users working alongside the new Jedi order, working together to stop evil and keep the peace. Imagine pairs, one Jedi and one Mage, working together on missions, being sent out to investigate corruption."

  "That... That does sound nice," she admitted. "The Jedi order.... not being alone..."

  We sat on the couch, leaning on each other and imagining the future. After a few minutes of snuggling, I explained the mission that Sheora had found for us, and that we would be leaving in the morning.