"Now!" Ewan crossed his arms over each other and leaned back a few degrees. "Time for the next lesson!"

  "What are you doing?"

  "I'm trying out these dramatic poses an acquaintance of mine showed me." He leaned back farther and pointed into the sky. "They're quite fun."

  "Why, though?" Dryth asked.

  "I'm psyching myself up to teach you, of course. Getting back through the gate was boring and I want to be suitably energetic to teach."

  "Right..."

  "Anyhoo, the lesson itself. Today, or well, tonight, we'll be discussing breaking cards down into shards and then assembling shards into new cards, a lesson that every student can enjoy!" He pointed at Dryth. "Dear student number one, I'm sure that the all-knowing Association run school you attended taught you all you needed to know about this subject, so please, enlighten us!" He said, sarcasm dripping from every word.

  "Hey! Why can't I go first this time?"

  "Oh, apologies, Sindri." Ewan gave him a small bow. "Please, tell us what you know."

  Sindri rose up, trying to emulate someone sitting up straight. "I will! Cards can be broken into shards through a suitable exertion of will. Regular force won't damage cards in any way, the only way to turn them into shards is to want it with one in your possession and then put a small amount of effort into them, such as twisting, biting, pinching, or so on! They'll then shattered into shards."

  "Good, and very professional! How many shards will a card break in to?"

  "Between one and four! You need five shards to make a new card and you'll never get enough to make the card you broke back into a card!"

  "Excellent! What else do you know?"

  "Uh... I can't think of anything else!"

  "Alright, then it's lecture time!" He grabbed a piece chalk and drew a rectangle on the board. "Here is a representation of a card. The five kinds of shards you need to make a new card are the for corners and the center." He drew a circle in the middle of the rectangle then added more lines to divide the part outside the circle into four. "As Sindri explained, you'll never get all five pieces you need from a card meaning you can't just break a card down and put it back together again. I can't think of reason why you'd do that, but it's not possible so it doesn't matter. Now," He pointed over his shoulder at Dryth with the chalk, "Dryth, which shard among the five types is most important?"

  Dryth did his best to remember his previous lessons, even if the information in them wasn't always right. "I don't know?"

  "Ah, I'm actually glad to hear that, because it's a trick question! None of the pieces are any more important than any of the others." He tapped on the circle in the middle of his drawing. "Many people believe that the center piece is somehow better or more important than the others and that it has more impact on what cards are formed when you piece shards together, but testing has shown there's no such effect! Next question! How does one go about assembling shards into a new card?"

  "It's the opposite of what Sindri said. You place the five shards together so that they're laid out like a card and kind of, will them together and they become a card."

  "What about the edges of each shard? I don't know if either of you have seen a shard in person, but they don't break evenly and have different shaped edges. How does that affect things?"

  Dryth and Sindri both looked at each other, mentally confirming that neither of them had even heard of that. "It doesn't?" Sindri ventured after a moment.

  "Good! Looks like neither of you have been polluted with some of the erroneous assumptions about the subject. Shards aren't literal puzzles, it doesn't matter if the breaks along the edges match up or don't." Ewan set the chalk down and grabbed a chair that he pulled over to Dryth's seat. "Alright, let's talk about some of the interesting bits! How the shards you have, and the cards they used to be, affects new cards you make!" He pulled a piece of paper from a pocket and ripped it into five pieces. "Let's pretend that these are our five shards. To begin with, it I for whatever reason managed to get five shards of the right layout all from a specific card, what happens if I assemble them into a new card?"

  "They become that card again!"

  "Generally, yes. If I got five shards from Produce Light cards and assembled them, I'd get a Produce Light card."

  "Wait, you said 'generally'." Dryth interrupted, "Does that mean there are cases where you wouldn't?"

  "Yes! There are indeed such cases, but we'll cover that in a moment. What happens if I have four shards from one card and one from another, what happens then? Will it be the same card?"

  "No!" Sindri quickly answered, "It'll be heavily influenced by the card that a majority of the shards are from, but it won't be the same card!"

  "Correct! If I have four shards from Produce Light and one from, say a fire spell like Fireball, I might get something like Produce Heat or Produce Flame. Seems like you've had a better education on this topic than Dryth has, Sindri."

  "Haha! Yes! ... Wait, is that a good thing?"

  Dryth shrugged. "I'm not hurt if you want it to be a completion, since I'm getting to learn now."

  "Then, ha! I'm winning!"

  Ewan grinned at both of them. "Well, with Sindri in the lead, let's break it down a little bit. The shards you use to make a new card affect which card you'll get and the more shards you use from one card the more they'll be affected. There's a similar but less strong effect if you use shards that are from similar cards, like Fireball and Produce Flame, which are both fire element cards."

  "What about the strength of cards? How do those affect the final product?" Dryth asked.

  "Good question! That's a lot less well understood. We know that generally using shards from stronger cards make strong cards and using shards from weaker cards tends to dilute the power from the stronger shards. But there's no precise scale of the 'power' of cards and there have been times someone's assembled shards from cards that are considered very strong and gotten a weak card as a result. Most people agree using shards from powerful cards is recommended, but to be ready to get a dud at any time. Next, I'll ask a question to lead you down a particular line of thought. What limits are there when combining shards?"

  "... I don't know."

  "Are there any besides having all the right pieces? You can't use a center piece shard as a bottom left corner and so on, but I can't think of anything else."

  Ewan nodded encouragingly. "That's correct, those are the only limits that anyone knows of. What does that tell you? What does that make you think about?"

  Dryth and Sindri both settled in to think about it, but neither of them reached the conclusion Ewan was looking for.

  "That's alright, it's late and you two went on your first bounty today. I'll ask another question to jog your minds. There are no limits on combining shards except for using the right pieces. What happens if I use shards from different colored cards?"

  Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  "Oh!" Dryth sat up straight and stared at Ewan. "What happens?"

  "Oh, is this about weird human things and caring what color cards are?"

  "This affects you too, Sindri, just in a less obvious way. If I take four shards from a red card and one from a blue card, what kind of card will I get when I make the new card?"

  "A red one? I feel like this is leading me on but I've never head of a card that's multiple colors before, so I guess it'd default to whichever color is most there."

  Ewan shook his head sadly. "The failures of our education system. There are multi-colored cards Dryth, although their very rare on this plane and are thus quite expensive. There are occasionally even multi-colored Soul Cards, although." He let out a breath from the side of his mouth. "That's a whole can of worms to talk about. The answer is one I doubt either of you would get though. No matter what composition of shards you use to make a new card, the resulting card will always be one that the person combining the shards can put in their deck."

  Dryth blinked at his teacher. "What?"

  "I know, isn't that interesting? That's where my 'generally' from earlier comes in. If any of the three of use, who can use magic, combine five shards from Produce Light, it will make a Produce Light card. But if someone who can't slot blue cards into their deck combines five Produce light shards into a card, they'll get something else entirely!"

  Dryth stared down in shock at the five pieces of paper Ewan had arrange back into the shape of a sheet.

  "What does this have to do with me?" Sindri asked.

  Ewan gestured at Dryth to hand him something, which startled Dryth out of his shocked staring.

  "What do you want?" He asked after a moment when Ewan refused to say anything.

  Rolling his eyes, Ewan pointed at Dryth's pocket. "The card you two got earlier from the gremlins."

  "Oh." Dryth pulled it out and handed it to him.

  "Thank you. Now, Sindri, the two of you got this Claw Swipe card from the gremlins, which you can't put in your deck regardless of color because you lack the physical requirements to use it, namely claws or talons. Now, if you break this card down and then somehow get more Claw Swipe shards to fill in whatever gaps there would be, what would you get if you combined them?"

  Sindri perked up with new excitement. "I'd get a card I can put in my deck!"

  "Correct!" Ewan reached out and tapped Sindri on the nose. "And that my students, is all of the verifiable information we have about combining shards into cards. Everything else after this is more of an art than a science, as much as I'm loath to admit that. But that does mean something fun!" He set the card on the table and tapped it a few times. "This card is useless to you, which means its merely fodder to make new cards with, and we can start right now!"

  "But that's the only card we have." Dryth pointed out.

  "That's the only card you two have. I have more than I can deal with on some days, and while I normally insist my students get their cards on their own and not leech on my supply, this is a lesson so I'll donate some cards to break down, since neither of you have gotten an extra Produce Light or Sparkle Dart from your contract yet." He pointed at the Claw Swipe. "Now, there's a good chance that the shards from this card will influence the card in a melee combat direction, which will probably suit Sindri better than Dryth." He bounced his eyebrows at the coatl. "So young Sindri, I'd like to recommend that Dryth break down the card to get practice of that, then you can assemble a new one and we'll see what turns out."

  "Is that okay with you?" Sindri turned to ask Dryth.

  "Of course it is. We're partners, anything that makes you stronger makes me stronger. I'd prefer to not be running up close to anything we're fighting, which is probably Ewan suggested we let you use those shards."

  "It is indeed. Following this lesson I'm going to make the two of you use cards or shards you acquire on your own for any future cards you make, but today for the lesson I'll be supplying enough materials to let you each make one card that suits whatever style of deck you're going for at the moment, but I'm not going to just give you anything you want and you definitely have to use up this card before I start giving you any handouts. With all that combined, you using these shards is likely better than Dryth."

  "Alright! Go ahead and break it then!"

  Dryth picked up the card and looked at it for a moment. Part of him felt like this was some kind of sacrilege, but breaking cards into shards was part of everyday life. Literally, people did it in their regular ordinary lives every single day. Shrugging off that weird lingering feeling, Dryth concentrated on wanting the card to shatter, then gently squeezed with his thumb like he was going to poke it through the card. It felt like he was driving his thumb into a burlap sack full of grain with barely any give and then with a tinkling sound the card shattered into pieces, throwing up sparkling dust that vanished into the air after a second.

  "And that students, is how a card turns into shards. How many did we get?" Ewan leaned over and counted while tapping the shards. "One, two, and..." He tapped the piece still in Dryth's hand. "That's three. An excellent break Dryth, it's always sad to only get one or two shards. And on of them's a center piece, the superstition would say this is a good omen for how often you'll get average or better breaks." He took the third shard out of Dryth's hand and set it in front of Sindri. "Right, Sindri, it's up to you how many of these pieces you use. What kind of card would you like to try and make?"

  Sindri stared down at the three shards for a long time. "I think a melee attack would be good, so all three. The plan we went with today against the gremlins was simple, but simple can be good. I was just thinking, though, that if the gremlins had been just a little bit tougher I wouldn't have been able to kill the first one with one bite, which would have made everything go a complete different direction. So a melee attack card would let me be stronger in that exact moment."

  "Alright then, we'll use these three shards for your first newly made card! What other characteristics would you like to try and include?"

  "Light magic, since I get big bonuses to it!"

  "Oh, good that actually lets me stick to some restrictions for you to keep you from getting lazy." Ewan reached into his pocket and pulled out a small stack of cards. "I grabbed these to fill in the gaps and it works nicely because its possible for you to get these on your own, so it won't feel like I'm holding your hands." He set one of them face up just below the three shards, revealing a Sparkle Dart card. "Go ahead and break this and we'll see if we get the two pieces we need to make you a new card."

  "Wait, won't using Sparkle Dart make it possible for it to end up as a different ranged attack?" Dryth wondered.

  "Perhaps, but I have other options to replace the Claw Swipe shards if need be. They'll be of similar strength, but you two will be leaving this lesson with cards that suit what you're after one way or another."

  Dryth opened his mouth, but he couldn't think of the right thing to say. After a long thought he eventually just settled for a simple "Thank you."

  "Yeah, thanks Ewan!"

  "Of course, you're most welcome. Making sure my students have the tools they need to succeed is part of my job."

  The first Sparkle Dart Sindri broke down ended up giving one of the shards he needed, a top right corner, but not the other. The second one he broke down didn't give him the top left corner he needed to have all five, but the third did. Ewan set the extra shards aside and arranged the five in the right positions in front of Sindri. "There. Fingers are so useful, aren't they?"

  "That's why I have Dryth!"

  "Hey!"

  Sindri sent him the emotional equivalent of a big grin, then gently set his chin on the arranged shards. Dryth couldn't perfectly see it since his partner's head was in the way but he caught a glimpse of the edges of the shards melting together before they all flashed and there was a whole card in front of them. Together all three of them leaned in to see what Sindri had made. The picture that slowly faded was of Sindri's open mouth with his fangs extended. There were two glowing constructs that looked like larger versions of his fangs coming from his actual fangs as the image of his mouth slowly descended toward the viewer. Then, like all cards, the image vanished leaving the card's description behind.

  "That's a good card!" Sindri cheered, "I can definitely use that!"

  "Yes, that does seem like an excellent result!" Ewan declared happily. "If you're happy with it, go ahead and slot it in."

  "I will!" Sindri zone out for a second, during which the card vanished. When he was back in reality he turned an expectant gaze on Dryth. "What kind of card do you want to make?"

  Dryth had been thinking it over while Sindri had broken down the Sparkle Darts and made his new Fangs of Light. "Since Sindri was thinking about how our fight against the gremlins could have gone wrong, I started thinking about how it did. We got lucky that I recovered from blinding myself faster than the gremlins did, but blinding the enemy is still a good tactic. Is it possible to make a card that would make it harder for me to get blinded or would let me bounce back from it faster?"

  "Oh! Now that's a fun idea." Ewan took a moment to muse. "Cards like that do exist, so it's possible. It's definitely going to take more time and shards than Sindri did though." He shot Dryth a fake annoyed look that turned into a grin. "Good thing I like you two. You only get to keep the one card though, anything else we make while you try for the one you're after you'll have to earn off me or make yourself later. Now, I think we'll start with some passive effect cards from a few different monsters that use light-based attacks, those might be your best bet. I'll run get them."