Miles log, entry five and a half. The first half of the page got burned so I'm starting again.

Well, anyway, I guess I'm doing science again?

Kind of. I'm currently hovering inside a meteor's impact crater talking to myself. Mining is a slow and exhausting process, made only more tiresome by the… meteor... heads? Yeah, I dunno, I'm no good with names, sue me. These things pop out from the surface of the meteoric metal whenever I'm not looking, just a big flaming face on a clump of burning rock flying straight at me. They're not quick but they're relentless. Almost like this stuff is alive and they're trying to drive me away.

I can't discount that possibility, I guess. So much of what I'm dealing with is more like renaissance era alchemy or witchcraft than any codified science.

Well, I've already been burned plenty, so I guess I've earned a little witchcraft. I suppose I'd better record what I've found out so far, and why.

First off, the meteor site. I stumbled across it on my way back from the beach. My initial discovery was that despite having been exposed to the environment for at least multiple days? It's still hot. Like, really hot. And I discovered this, naturally, by touching it.

Yeah, sounds dumb, but there's no such thing as radiation in this dimension. There's nothing that "feels" hot at a distance. Either you're fine, or you're touching something and you're on fire. No middle ground. I swear by the amount of third degree burns I've had since I got here I should have way too much nerve damage to even notice at this point, but that's not how things work in here in backwards world. Mixed blessing, I guess.

Oh, that's why I'm flying, by the way. So I don't burn up while I dig.

It was while I was checking out the crater for the first time, liberating a sample for study with the stick of dynamite I picked up from the last bunny I saw when I met my first meteor head. I was scooping the metal into my hammerspace when it kind of snuck up on me. I hit it with my tails and, as you probably guessed, set myself on fire. Again. But I also found out a neat new feature of my glove. When I swung, a pair of bones shot out of my hammerspace like a bullet. I don't even have to do much more than swing at something now I've got the hang of it, and I haven't found a limit to how often I can do it either so I've been dealing with the heads at a nice safe distance since then.

Convenient as it is, and I admit I have shot a few skull and crossbones off together while shouting "Arrr!", which was pretty fun, I can't help but worry how little I understand the glove or Yorick - the uh, the "assistant" I found that's mass producing arrows for me at the edge of the crater. I assume they're both fragments of the skull giant, part of Mister Skin. Or at least his "shadow". Are these gifts? Gifts that could be taken away? Or is there a price that I just haven't noticed? And if there's a little of Skin's shadow that's part of me now… what does that mean about me?

...

Well, anyway, I still don't know what kind of metal this is, though honestly I've just been guessing so far anyway. Not like there's any mineralogical tests I can rely on here, and the metal I swore was gold turned out to be harder than iron. What I do know is that this stuff is different. Energised, like the black shards and all those energy orbs I picked up, but… in a different way, I guess? Different frequencies?

Yeah, real science right there. "This rock isn't like that rock, and it glows different."

Fortunately it didn't take long to figure out that forging up a simple coil of meteorite metal and a triggering mechanism produced a simple unidirectional wave motion pulse cascade. Or, in other words, an energy beam. It consumes the same energy source as the spell does, with one important exception.

Sorry meteor head came out right under me, had to deal with it. They're coming a bit less frequently now that I've mined out most of the meteorite at least. Now where was I? Right, the raygun.

Yeah, so there's one shared characteristic between the meteor pistol I made, the skull spell, and blackshard stick. In all three cases the actual source of the energy is "me". Even if I don't quite understand the mechanics of that, there is definitely something that depletes as I use it, and that refills from the surrounding environment. I'll call this "mojo". For the spark stick, it was very efficient, like a direct conversion between mojo and fire, but weak, at least compared to anything that's not a bunny. The shards and energy orbs I attached to that stick have their own power, which serve as a catalyst for the mojo to make a much bigger boom, while the spell I read seems to operate like a line of code, processing mojo in a specific way to output a specific effect. Maybe whoever wrote it just understands how things work in this world to make that happen? I dunno, I try not to think about it. Literally. I can feel it...

Anyway, then there's the pistol. At first glance it works exactly the same way, the coil focuses mojo into a tight beam, pretty efficient but not too powerful. But when you hook it up to a large source of refined meteorite? The meteorite itself provides energy for the shot - and that energy never runs out.

It's a little depressing to think just how easily I could have had this when I was fighting the giant skull if I'd come here first, but hindsight is twenty-twenty. Forty-forty in my case. Heh.

As soon as I found something that actually worked, I started iterating. If one pistol coil doesn't pack much of a punch, what about two or three? If a single meteorite core doesn't output enough power to run them all, what about multiple cores at once? And if I'm going to be strapping two heavy metal cylinders to my back to power the thing, why not some gear to protect myself? It's not like I can make rings here, after all.

I should know, I tried. And I'm trying not to think about what that means for back home. I've spent a lot of time hanging out with my flower today already.

At least in some good news I can say that I've already worked through one of the big roadblocks in my design by using bones. A bit morbid, but compared to gold they're twice as hard and work to conduct whatever mojo substitute the meteorite is putting out, so I'm glad I picked them up.

Wait, I didn't just go graverobbing or anything. A bunch of skeletons attacked me when I was looking for my pickaxe in the catacombs. So yeah, I picked some up remains since they looked like the ones my glove shoots. I did say I was doing stuff more like witchcraft than science, right? Not too different from scavenging robots for parts, though I wonder if I'd feel differently about using them if they were mobian bones.

… Well, I guess I already know the answer to that one.

I did see some more books down there too, but I have a prior appointment, so I'll have to give the whole "underground haunted graveyard" a miss this time. Real shame. The only reason I've held off this long is because of all the people that have turned into monsters when I talk to them. When I head out to see Cosmo I want to be ready for anything.

Miles out.