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He created a long iron tube and snaked it all the way up the side of the cave, through the bathhouse doors, and down the tunnel to the waterfall. He would capture the lake water at the opening of the tube and then push it all the way to exit with a moving inner wall of iron.

It wasn't terribly difficult, but Hector still found it to be a somewhat interesting form of training--both because of the sheer volume of iron and water involved and because so much of his work had to be done without visual reference. He had to rely almost entirely on his imagination. Moreover, the total travel distance of the tube was greater than his sphere of influence with materialization, so he had to keep walking back and forth as well.

Tedious was certainly one word for it, though.

It no doubt would've been much faster to drill down below the lake and simply let the water drain out on its own, but the big concern there was that, with so much water in need of removal, the amount of drilling required would be too dangerous. The structural stability of the cave itself might become compromised--not to mention the possibility of encountering volcanic gases. Reapers could phase through the rock and locate lava, since it emitted light, but gases remained invisible to them.

It was a shame, too, because one or two destruction users probably could've taken care of that job in a few days.

This did, however, get Hector thinking about the local environment a bit more. He was starting to wonder if he should try to recruit a geologist. Maybe not right now but eventually, perhaps.

On the subject of recruitment, however, one other person had recently gained Hector's attention: a woman named Madison Reach.