Year 582 on the New Kaledonian calendar.

A new year. We have been living in the elven village for over half a year. It did become colder here, but not by a lot. We are quite up north, so that was surprising. I gave up on trying to understand how this world works. Boshi town would have been colder than this, and it’s just a little bit more up north.

The blackouts had stopped. I went back to dizziness, but it was manageable. Bywen’s blackouts were very short now. She would need way more Ichor Pneuma to get her spirit tethers fixed.

I started getting closer to the age at where I will stop physically aging and would be developing some traits of my race that were becoming more distinct. Out of nowhere I got more filters from my Elgards eyes and its burden on me had become less and less. I was also getting lighter as usual, but my tails really fluffed up.

This might be specific to me because Rignef’s tails weren’t this fluffy, they did look a bit of battle worn though. I had the idea of using my tails more in battle and I had started practicing this, besides going back to practicing Dragonvein in the mornings. This didn’t stop my tails from fluffing up, and I needed a new brush as a result.

I had attempted to make a couch of the fur I had collected over the years, but I failed, so I had an enormous pillow sitting in the living room. It was quite popular. Greg and Raishin were currently fighting about who can sit in it.

Greg seems to have gotten taller and Raishin got some bulk, even though he was lazing around most of the time. Greg was radiating darkness, Raishin and I had a great time poking fun at it. He was truly befitting of the name Obsidian Prince, Raishin sometimes calls him Prince of Darkness and Greg hates it.

Nothing interesting had happened besides a big fight between Elliana and Leefa, causing Leefa to leave the village.

I could afford some breathing room because Ichor Pneuma was prolonging the time we have until we get screwed over. The next step shouldn’t be too hard or too long, but tuning is key. I had already made templates. I only had to fill them in correctly.

Greg had found the method to put the spirit vessel together. It would be a variation on the Magnum Opus. We would have to go through 4 processes which would decompose and order all ingredients in the first step. They would be reassembled in a better and complete state in the last step.

The only problem is that he has only found a very unspecific method that was missing a lot of details. But it was the only process that hit the requirements I had for putting this spirit vessel together. One of the most important requirements was that it should restore or retain the properties and functions of every ingredient.

If it wasn’t for Ichor Pneuma and the spirit bones I wouldn’t care, but this is important precisely because of those. It would also keep any magical spells and infusions intact. Greg was looking more into it.

For now, I will focus on what I can do. The ‘Mind’ of the spirit vessel. I had already set up for some elders to start teaching Bywen magic for when her vessel was completed. Spirits can’t use normal magic, so she will have to learn this from scratch. I had decided to slack until February and would start on the mind after I had made sure that I had slacked off enough.

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February came too fast, but this spirit vessel doesn’t create itself. My clones had been on point in documenting anything that was important. I had archived a copy of it so far. It might sound strange, but nothing my clones had written had gotten archived, not even automatically. I just remembered these, but I can forget, so I archived it before I would forget any details.

I had also renovated the living room with illusions and had coconuts disguised as pears in my fruit bowl. Not only that, but I lost count of how many fruits those peach-stealing elders had devoured. It was time to threaten their teeth.

The surveillance on me had lifted, so Jyno was free to do what he wanted to do. I don’t know where Inna had disappeared to, maybe she had left the village to adventure.

Greg was sitting on the big pillow and Elliana was observing.

Quite strange to have people staring at me all the time.

We are just curious.

I wonder what’s wrong with Raishin. He has been hunting a lot lately and keeps saying he needs to work on himself.

His dream is bugging him, he wants to work on himself to get the chick of his dreams, literally and figuratively.

It’s just… he rejected a hot elf chick who was genuinely interested in him. Normally that would be a good thing, but now I’m worried…

I’m worried too. Let’s just hope he meets the woman of his dreams soon.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Greg said as his shadow was acting odd and pointing west. It doesn’t seem as if he’s noticed.

I had finished my setup and started with the template for the mana conduits, which would be the part that mimics the blood vessel system but for mana. I would create a network and place the other components in it. If this framework was perfect, then other systems could borrow from its perfection. This was the only part I can’t screw up. The others could be easily replaced if I screwed up.

I messed around and used my mana control to create a network and started to reinforce it with mana runes. I had gotten inspiration from Azu’s research. This is a magic circle but just not circular. It’s a network shaped magic circle!

You just started, and I already have no idea what you’re doing…

Hehe just watch and learn.

This would be fine normally because magic circles are conductive to mana but there is one problem. Mana circles aren’t designed to stick around and have mana flowing through them continuously. This system isn’t allowed to fail. So, I knocked out the redundant mana runes that were needed for the template and replaced them with runes that contributed to stability.

I might have to bake the mana repair system in too to make sure I don’t accidentally break it. It had a weak basis so it wouldn’t accept the mana repair system very well, so I forced it in with a 30-second long [Elgard Overload]. It is cheating, yes, but nobody will complain if it works.

Time for a break. I can’t use my eyes anyway.

So, can you explain what you just did?

Well, this thing here is a magic circle but in a different shape. I had to make a template to make it work as intended, and I knocked out the redundant runes. I had to prevent it from collapsing on itself by forcing the repair system in it.

So instead of making it sturdy, you have the repair system constantly repair it?

Yup. It will kind of train itself, by doing so it will also prevent it from being destructive to the system. If this mana repair can keep the network running when it’s at its weakest, it will have no problems when I will inevitably enforce it.

“Where have you learned this?” Elliana said as she studied the magic circuit that was close to collapsing into itself.

The magic circle and mana rune thing? Azu’s lab. How to make this system? I’m just winging it.

Well having a good sense of how magic works and having Elgards eyes makes you qualified enough to mess around with this it seems. It seems to be working, which is good.

The system was holding on, although barely. The advantage of this ‘Mind’ aspect is, that it’s easy to recreate once I figure it out and finish it. It is similar to creating a magic circle or a barrier. All the work goes into creating it. Once it's finished, it could be easily reproduced.

If Elliana ever wants to pick up this research, she can just learn the series of magic circles, and she’s done. I got my Elgards eyes back. I let the repair system struggle for a bit longer before I started to reinforce the magic circuits and make them more mana conductive.

Furthermore, I went through a lot of processes of testing combinations of mana runes. But the magic circuits were done.

Elliana, can you flush mana through this? Try to be as rough with it as you can.

Elliana started to abuse the magic circuits. The repair system kicked in again, but it held up perfectly. She kept going until she got tired.

That is quite robust.

I’m not so sure about that.

I started hitting it with Dragonvein and the system broke down.

Yup, this still needs a lot of work.

Does it need to withstand Dragonvein?

If I ever want to use a spirit vessel, yes. Guess I have to punch out any defects of the previous system. I think I had a good start.

I remade the structure I had just destroyed and started to mess around and attempt to create something that could withstand abuse from Dragonvein.

Days came and went. Days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into months. I started to think that it didn’t need to be immune to Dragonvein but only highly robust. I finally succeeded on a quiet night in May.

Furthermore, I had made sure to keep up with the doses of Ichor Pneuma and Bywen was freed from the blackouts. I had spent most of my time researching. Elliana, Jyno and Greg often visited to observe or to talk, but I had no idea what Raishin was up to.

I had finished the hardest part of the ‘Mind’ so it was time to see what Raishin was up to.‎