Ben spent the whole night going through all the conjuration knowledge in his head; including the Apprentice spells that he hadn't even used yet; in the end, he came up with a few possible spell structures for a new spell.

His mind was full of heaps and heaps of books on all available skills and even non-available skills, everytime he levelled up his skills, unlocked a perk or climbed the ranks of his Mage tree, more knowledge was added to his brain.

'Conjuration, for the layman unacquainted with its workings, connects the caster's mind with that of the summoned. It is a tenuous link, meant only to lure, hold, and dismiss, but in the hands of a Master, it can be much stronger. The Psijics and Dwemer can or could connect with the minds of others, and converse miles apart - a skill that is sometimes called telepathy,' he skimmed through a book available in his memory.

And this is what Ben was working on, to strengthen his link with Norene and then use it to make her his familiar. One of the biggest obstacles was whether or not he would be able to open a portal to Romania.

In the conjuration spells that he had used so far, Ben acted as an anchor. It could be compared to fishing, he throws out a bait and using that, he binds the summon to his will and pulls it to his location.

It is easy to send the creature back, just stop pulling on the line and it goes back where it came from as it doesn't belong here in the first place.

This was not the case with Norene, she belonged here and would not be able to return if he ever summoned her from Romania, and he neither had the space to keep her nor had food enough to feed her.

For this, he turned to the Way of the Psijic or the old way. The old way included transport spells, detection spells, absorption spells, reflection spells and other spells that work directly upon magical forces of the unseen world, with effects such as dispel, soul trap, and telekinesis.

Most of these spells are now part of either the Alteration or Conjuration school of magic but some were missing from the System, and portal creation was one of them.

Good thing is that the theory behind the spell is still available to Ben, it was as if the System was telling him to stop freeloading and start working.

The spell caster must know precisely where to generate the portals or he will face catastrophic consequences, which include getting lost between dimensions or teleporting into a rock. Hence, the mage must have been there or, at least, see clearly where the portal will spawn.

It sounded an awful lot like Apparating, and Ben was not confident about that at all, it seemed that portal creation will take a long ass time.

Luckily, portal seeds are a common component in apprentice-level portal creation. It was pretty much like using a Portkey but not really.

Portal seeds formed sort of a network with the mage at the centre and he can then access any of those nodes to open a portal to that place, it was easier and safe but the seed had to be placed at the destination first.

Another method of teleportation was through a network of lit braziers, it was kinda like the Floo network and need the fire to always be lit.

--

On Saturday morning, Ben was on the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest, invisible of course, killing wolfs and filling soul gems. He did not get too deep into the forest as he hadn't forgotten about the resident dark lord.

He had already prepared a portal seed and he just needed a few lesser soul gems to test the spell now. The seed can be made of any magic conducting metal and of any shape, it just had to be engraved with the Mage's Magicka, in a way it was Ben's first Enchantment and he even had a new skill to show for it.

Ben pulled out an object the size of an egg from under his robes, it looked like a coconut and it even split open in the middle like a coconut. It was made of copper and golden runes shimmered on its surface.

He placed a filled Lesser soul gem at its centre and closed it by screwing the two halves a few times clockwise and anticlockwise in a set pattern.

Since he didn't know if the Castle's anti-apparition wards would interfere with the portal, he had to test it out here in the open.

He placed the seed a few feet below ground and walked to a spot about fifty meters away from where he could still see this place.

He closed his eyes, trying to sense the seed and he spoke the incantation when he felt it clearly in his mind.

"Riven, drelden aetherius adrydd," the mysterious words of The Psijic reverbed through the surrounding as two identical, shimmering and swirling vortexes of energy opened in mid-air.

"Now, for the moment of truth," he said, picking up a small squeaking and growling ferret from its cage.

"Shh, [Calm] it'll be over before you know it," he said and threw the now very calm furball into the shimmering vortex.

It crossed multiple dimensions in an instant, travelling through spacetime even faster than light and appeared fifty meters away even before it could blink once.

It was still sitting on the ground peacefully as if nothing happened. Ben picked it up and checked for any wounds or other side effects.

"Now that I look at you, you're a stoat, not a ferret," he said, wiping off the mud on its face that made him confuse it for a baby ferret.

It looked innocently at Ben, tilting his head left and right, if Ben didn't know any better, he would have really taken it for a harmless animal.

But Ben knew that these cute little fur socks could even hunt Rabbits and other animals that were multiple times their size.

"Now, let's see if I can turn you into a familiar," Ben said as he pulled out a 'Rabbit leg' from under his robes and waved it in front of its nose.

With the help of delicious rabbit meat and a little bit of [Illusion] and [Restoration] magic, the short-tailed weasel quickly gave in to Ben's mind.

It was time for the test of his second self-created spell, [Tame Familiar].

"Yehkem sithil, manj yalor famil", and a bright covered the little stoat for a few seconds and a few runes glowed on its head for a few seconds before disappearing.

Ben opened his status, there were two new Apprentice spells in Alteration, [Tame Familiar] and [Seeded Portal].

He focused on Conjuration and found a new spell, [Summon Stoat].

*Chirp*chirp*whistle*

The little stoat chirped and raced with a bouncy gait to the spot he had been teleported from; Ben could now communicate with him mentally.

"Yehkem yalor, anuorin stoatil"

He cast the [Summon Stoat] spell and the little fur sock arrived in front of Ben with a flash.

Only problem was, he could not send him back, but that problem will be solved once he's able to open portals without seeds.

"Let's call you Slinky from now, Okay?"

"No? How about Whiskers, or do you like Mittens."

"Alright, no need to get so angsty," he said, calming the squeaking furball on his shoulder.

"Let me introduce you to my little Norene first and then we'll see how you like these names," he said with an evil smirk as he walked out of the forest.

He remained invisible, of course, as he was not as careless as a boy with round glasses who forgot about it, or will forget,

DreamyApe

I know what you guys are thinking, 'Just how many animals is this guy going to collect?' Right?

Well, the answer is--Gotta catch 'em all-- Seriously, suggest cute names for this cheap copy of a ferret.

Read more at patreon.com/DreamyApe and help me buy that Phalic-shaped rocket that the bald guy from Amazon is making.