She finds herself standing on a glass platform, floating unsupported in a cloudless blue sky. In front of her, on the center of the platform, is a slab of textured black stone, ringed with a decorative border styled after gigantic eyes.

In her hand is a book.

She's not usually aware of her dreams. It's strange, to be so aware.

She flips open the book in her hands. It is a book about forestry, or perhaps what she imagines a forestry book would be, since she's never exactly read anything on the subject. Her subconscious seems to have decided that the book should mostly consist of details about bees and how to raise them.

She doesn't really want to dream about reading about bees.

If she thinks about it, there's a sort of ... emptiness, to her hands. It feels like she could be holding other things.

She wants to be reading something else, and so now she is. Materials and You, a book about forging weapons out of increasingly improbable substances.

That's not really appealing either. The book blurs again, and she pages through the introduction to On the Dynamics of Integration before giving it up as a bad job.

It's her dream, and she wants to explore, not page through imagined textbooks. She hops up on the black stone plinth, and spins to take in the view.

The island is alone in the bright blue void — or nearly so. To her left and right float some slightly more distant platforms, one made of wood and one of stone. Where she was first standing, there is a chest made of bronze.

Treasure! That's more like it.

Vivian lifts the lid of the chest, thoughts of magical artifacts and gold coming to mind. She should really find a new D&D group, but she just never has the time ...

There's no gold, but there are magical artifacts — three wands, a flat, yellow, technological gadget, sixteen small stone squares, a jumble of little machines, and ...

... a glowing book.

Vivian bites her lip.

She said she was done with books. But this one is glowing. She waffles for a moment, and then pages through it.

You may be surprised to find yourself on a floating platform in the middle of an empty void. I can assure you that it is not the result of one of your many "benders" but in fact a serious matter.

As I have complained to Headmaster R.W. Tema on many occasions, your behaviour at this academy has been distinctly less than impressive. You are constantly late to class, do not take proper notes, and answer back in an undeservedly arrogant tone.

If it were up to me, you would have been expelled from Grimboil's Academy years ago, but for some reason the other masters seem to want to give you endless second chances.

I can assure you, however, that this is your last chance.

You have failed to achieve sufficient academic marks and it is my right as Master of Examinations to demand you take a make-up test or be expelled.

The test I have chosen for you is a very old one, the Ultimate Alchemy Exam.

You have been banished to the void realm and cannot return until the exam is completed.

Nearby, you should find special barrels containing infinite amounts of:
a) Cobblestone
b) Wood Logs (Oak)

Your task is to alchemize these cobblestone and oak logs into the rarest and most difficult substance to create — "Clay"!

I trust after all the lectures you've slept through, that you are aware of the great difficulty of "clay alchemy". The exam is open book, so do make use of Professor Mezz's "JEI Spell" for information.

In addition, your feet have been blessed with a flying spell and your stomach has been blessed with an anti-hunger charm.

I would wish you luck, but surely a wonderchild such as yourself has no need for it. So I will simply say "do not be afraid to give up".

Yours,
Professor Spite
Master of Examinations

She blinks at the book in confusion. What is this, some sort of magically-flavored stress-flashback to highschool? That's not the kind of thing she needed, thanks brain.

There's an addendum, in another hand on the facing page:

Don't let old Spitesy get ya down. The ultimate alchemy exam ain't exactly easy but it's very doable. Just keep your goal in sight and you'd be surprised at what can be accomplished.

btw — it ain't part of the exam, but if you really want to show up old Spitesy, see if you can completely automate the entire clay alchemy process.

It's something he failed when he took the ultimate test, and I know it bugs him. :)

p.s. I snuck an acceleration wand into the exam chest. Don't tell anyone.

Vivian is increasingly dubious of her subconscious's choice of dream material.

But, well — it's not as though dreams usually make sense. And if she understood the book ... she can fly. Or, rather, of course she can fly, it's her dream, but she's now very much aware of the possibility.

She drops the book and takes to the skies, feeling the wind blow past her.

After a few minutes, she gets bored doing tricks, and just hangs in space, staring at the floating platforms.

It's ... surprisingly boring, for a flying dream. No forests or plains to soar over. Just her, and the floating islands.

She wants there to be something more to look at, but no amount of unpracticed lucid visualization makes it appear.

She swoops down to investigate the stone island.

It's made of rings of concentric stone, with various inset decorations. In the center, on top of a stone pillar, sits a barrel.

With an act of will, Vivian pulls a stone out of it, and then turns it over in her hands.

Then she pulls another. And another.

Sure enough, with the classic feeling of dream logic, the barrel gets no less full. She tries putting her stones back, and see that it gets no more full either.

She sits on the edge of the platform and dangles her legs over the void as she considers what to do next.

Well ... in the car, she voiced her desire to create. It's not quite the same thing, in a dream — nobody else will be able to see it.

But perhaps that's a bonus. Nobody to scorn the things she makes, whatever those will be.

She grabs another stone, and feels its texture. It doesn't feel right for carving, although she could not explain why it doesn't feel right if anyone asked. So instead she wants to build something big. Maybe she can make her own floating island.

She concentrates, and sets the stones in the air. And they float! They hold position as though fixed in place with absolute rigidity.

Quickly, she builds out a platform, occasionally going back to the barrel for more rocks.

It looks terrible.

The unfinished texture of the stone just doesn't look good next to the textured and variegated stone of the existing island.

She floats for a while, pondering what to do about it. She considers whether she can make the stones in her hand into some other kind of stone ...

... and options bloom in her mind.

She can make 65 different things out of this stone, by arranging it on a wooden surface in the right patterns. Or she could bake it, or moisten it, or squeeze it into lava, or chisel it, or any number of other things.

She doesn't know how she knows it, just that she does.

She considers making some stone slabs or stairs, but what she really needs is a chisel — that would let her put some really pretty patterns on it, and at least let her spice up her stone platform a bit.

But she doesn't have a chisel.

A chisel is made from a stick and a piece of iron.

Can she get iron, though ... refined, not ore. Maybe she could put tiny bits of iron together to get one? But she doesn't have any tiny bits.

She could try to melt bits of iron out of the stone, but it feels like that would just get her a different kind of stone. What can she ...

Oh! If she just packs more stone into the fire, she can get iron out.

It makes no sense. It blatantly violates not only physics, but common sense. On the other hand, who cares? It's her dream.

Now she just needs a place to make a fire and keep the heat contained — she could make a stone box ...

She flies to the wood platform, and pulls some logs out of the barrel there. She breaks them in her hands to make boards, and then lays the boards out to make a crafting surface.

The crude table would look just fine on the wood platform, but she has an impulse to leave the original islands alone. She wants to make something that is hers. So she flies to her platform, sets the table down, and starts making a furnace out of stone.

A moment later she plops it down next to her table, and crams a bunch of stone and wood into it.

The wood lights spontaneously, casting light across the darkening platform.

She turns and looks up at the stars. They're different — not constellations she recognizes. And the Milky Way is conspicuously absent. Even the moon is new, barely visible in how it eclipses the stars.

By the time she looks back down, her furnace is cold and empty, except for several lumps of iron.

She takes the iron from the forge, and some glowing orbs of light come with it, flowing toward her chest and filling her with a comforting glow.

Vivian laughs, and she isn't sure whether it's with happiness or exhaustion. It's ridiculous — so many weird little details. But it doesn't matter.

The important thing is that she has iron now. She combines it with some of her wood, and flourishes her new chisel.

Now ... what kinds of patterns should she make?

She makes a few different kinds, and lines them up to compare.

There are ... a lot of options. It feels almost paralyzing, trying to figure out which one would be best.

Only ...

Vivian looks over at the existing stone platform. Part of the reason it looks better, she decides, is the variety of different stones. Any one of these, left to cover a whole expanse, would be lacking.

So maybe if she uses this kind for the border, and that kind for the interior, and then maybe this other kind as an accent ...

She quickly wears out her chisel obtaining piles of different types of stone.