"Just stand there."

She gets up, draws her fancy wand from her inventory, and starts gesturing in his direction and saying non-words. Various particle effects begin to happen, the wind picks up (even though they're indoors), and it feels... ticklish.

But after about two minutes of complicated casting, there is a change. A crescendo in the sparkles and the wind, until all of the sparkles shoot right into Peter. He yelps in surprise as they pull him into the air, making him float in place and... changing him.

He feels the change, but he definitely could not describe it. There are metaphors he could reach for, it's like opening your eyes for the first time or learning how to move a muscle you couldn't move before, but it's not really like any of that. It's new, and it's different, and he definitely deeply understands now what the empty canvas motion of doing magic is. He could do it, he knows he could, he can feel it in his soul, and as he slowly floats back down he can also feel it in his body, an energising current running through his limbs.

"It's done," Cara says as she puts her wand away and reaches into her inventory for a fist-sized blue crystal engraved with the three arcane runes of the main schools of magic. The glimmerstone, presumably. "How do you feel?"

Peter looks down at his body and around himself to take stock, stretching his fingers and limbs. "I feel magical," he says, and it sounds so ridiculous but it's true.

The Sage smiles at him and offers him the crystal. "This is a glimmerstone. It's keyed to the portal just outside, and you can use it to come here from wherever you are. It takes about a day to recharge after being used."

He accepts the stone and places it in his inventory, then bows deeply. "Thank you very much. I will do my best with this gift."

"I'm sure you will," she says, and then she sits back down and gets back to her journal.

Ah, yes. This Unit Of Interaction^tm has ended so she can return to her previous activity. Of course.

Well, he's explored some of these floating islands while he was here, when he was taking a break from reading the books, and he knows where the nearest shopping island is. He walks over to it—well. He jogs over to it, he's feeling a bit too energetic for anything short of a brisk pace, and finds the Wands & Co. Emporium, manned by a ghost.

That was a slight shock the first time he saw them but you know what, he is not going to complain about the fact that people don't vanish forever when they die. That is in fact a pretty good thing in his opinion.

"Good afternoon," he greets them. "Can I look at your selection of wands?"

"Certainly," they say in the creepy echo-y way ghosts seem to. They open a little display from their inventory and start their sales pitches. They also explain that these are not all possible wands they sell, as wands need to be individually manually enchanted and so their wares change from day to day—except for the very basic wooden wand, which they can enchant themself and so they have a near-unlimited supply of that one.

Peter did read a bit of a book that was specifically about wands, since he figured he'd want to get one and he wanted to understand them a bit better. It seems like they vary very little in function—some wands are definitely better than others, and some are more specialised, but the effect is not world-shattering, and novice wizards are advised to just get a simple basic one to start with and should they ever feel like they need a new one they can always get it later (despite the salesperson's insistence that a novice wizard will want the best wand to jumpstart their career).

So he does go for the most basic one, for §100, and after some empty pleasantries moves on to another shop.

A cauldron is also something he could buy, and he might eventually, but cauldrons are much more expensive, and besides the Magic Manor offers free use of their cauldrons for novice wizards learning the ropes, so whenever he feels like it he can just hop back here. He'll pass on that for now. The stores are also selling ingredients and crystals and familiar orbs (artefacts that have trapped some magical beast ready for a familiar bond, which Peter would feel a lot worse about if he wasn't pretty sure animals are even more of soulless automata than people) and some potions.

Including one called "Potion of Plentiful Needs", for §5.

"Excuse me," he tells the ghost manning that store. "What is a Potion of Plentiful Needs, please?"

"Oh, it's this wonderful little thing that just makes you feel better."

"Better... about...?"

"Everything!"

Helpful. Whatever.

"I'll have two, please."

So he'll successfully exchange money for goods!

Yay capitalism. He browses the other stores some more, but eventually decides to just go home.

As he does, he fetches the vial of potion he just bought from his inventory and studies it a bit. It's a dark purple liquid that bubbles and swirls even when he's perfectly still, and when he unstoppers it a pleasantly-smelling light green vapour escapes it.

Also, the pleasantly-smelling light green vapour seems to unaccountably form the shape of a smiley face every now and then before dissipating into the air.

Weird.

He downs it in one go.

Holy shit.

He feels—better. About everything. Almost literally? He was slightly hungry and slightly thirsty, and now he's not. He feels like he just woke up rested and refreshed from the best night's sleep in his life in the best bed that has ever been created. All minor pains from just existing—soreness from walking, back pain from not sleeping great, itchiness on the back of his knee—everything—is gone. He doesn't need to go to the bathroom, he doesn't need to shower, it even removed the vague traces of dust and sweat on his skin that one accumulates just for existing. He even feels socially fulfilled, in a way he hasn't felt, well, ever. Like he just had a very nice, interesting, deep conversation with some of his best friends in which everyone had very good points and had a ton of fun together.

What the fuck.

He runs back to the store and gets another ten of these and when he gets back home the first thing he does is start practising magic while aiming to get the spell for duplicating objects that he read about because if that works even on magical objects he has found the fucking elixir of happiness and it cost only §5.

After the rush from the "feel better about literally everything" potion dies down a few hours later, Peter still hasn't made any breakthrough on a copying spell. Still, practising magic is weirdly engrossing and meditative. Not particularly intellectually stimulating, but it's like playing some puzzle game for a while.

And by then he's remembered that he does, actually, need to find a job. Now, how does the job market work when one came to existence last week?

It turns out that the answer is "painfully straightforwardly". He found a job ad, he clicked the link, he applied to it, and he... got the job. No interviews, no anything.

Sure, it's an entry-level position at Dewey, Cheatem & Howe Incorporated as a "mailroom technician", because apparently every position is entry-level, but whatever. It's a famous investment firm and investment firms are good for making money, or so he's heard (by which he means he has this memory from the Before Times). It might be soul-crushing, but he won't find out until he tries, and when everyone else is... Like That^tm... well, it should be easy enough to shine.

He starts tomorrow, bright and early at 9AM, which he would usually detest but if this potion turns out to entirely replace the need for sleep, well... that won't be a problem anymore, now, will it?

Probably not.