As silently as he could so as he could he left the room to not wake his child. He looked around again at his family home, the slight gloom could not tinging the elation he felt, it looked exactly the same as he remembered and his previous walkaround could not reduce the amazement he felt stepping foot in his home. Knowing it would be destroyed in the coming months made a spike of rage flair in his mind. But with a flex of his willpower, it cooled into the icy rage that had served him so very well the last time around.
Using that emotion, he leveraged the feeling to aid in his circulation of mana throughout his body, speeding up the frequency of his mana drawn in from his lung, and moving it not to his core but to directly pass through his heart. This was fundamental against the growth techniques prompted in the classes developed by the mages from old Earth, this principle was not something the system was aware of as safe. Hopefully, System would not intervene in what he was doing and possibly learn from him. If not he would need to access the Nexus nodes directly and add this new technique manually, along with all the new fail-safes and safeguards that would benefit earth and earth alone.
Spencer was starting to build a working theory on what had happened in the past, a theory that was half-formed at best, and would require access to a Nexus Node for confirmation.
Spencer's next goal was to solve Earth's largest handicap in the coming war, the slow growth of their individual power. It was discovered too late, that most of the Humans on Earth were able to store mana in every cell in their body, the blood, in particular, was able to move vasts amounts of power throughout the body. From what Spencer knew it was a taboo in the Mage empires or simply not possible for the mages to incorporate the mana into the body. What he was doing was effectively turning his entire body into a mana core.
If he tried to do what he was doing after having have selected a class, he would be inundated with warnings and quests that would reward him for changing his method back to a ‘safer’ tested technique.
Spencer felt that what was probably worse than constant annoying messages was that everything that passed through the Class, Quest and rewards functions of the System all drew information and guidance from the Nexus nodes and would be recorded on that node, eventually accessible through the internet like leylines from any of the other nodes. Over time the System would change to value experimentation, for it would then catalogue what worked and what didn't, however right now and for the next few years, the System would be very rigid and static, only able to access information already codified within the nexus nodes.
The mages of the past had made use of naturally forming meridians, the pseudo-spiritual pathways that had no physical presents in the body to move and store mana throughout the. Pathways that over time and use would carve physical mana channels into the body of the mage, creating a second mana circulatory system centred around a new ‘Heart’ known as a mana core. Young mages would start to practise at an early age, building a foundation for the creation of these channels, only ever making small adjustments to refine the placement of the pathways to avoid other biological systems and to combine smaller meridians into large combined ones. Almost the opposite to what Spencer was attempting, the mages of old would almost exclusively try to avoid the other systems of the body. Preferring to form mana channels in between and around, often creating the glowing vein-like channels close to the skin, between the musculature systems and epidermis layers.
The location of the mana core varied from mage to mage, but the knowledge in the System would suggest the base of the skull, above the heart or under the belly button had been the most common.
The methods The System would teach through the Class trainers would work for most humans of earth, but it was slow and suboptimal, in his past, Spencer had to rebuild his mana channels and his mana core after its foundation. He had used Mage’s method for 10 years, and after removing and using the technique he was going to use now he was able to attain the same level of power in just one year. A painful mistake, that correction required surgeries and mana formed spellwork carved into his flesh to enact. The scares on his old body were a result of both the runes that facilitated the re-alignment of his mana channels and the damages left after the original ones were removed. He had an opportunity not to sacrifice anything now, to start on the right path and help others do the same.
If he was to follow the Systems class method, upon class selection the System would create a small mana core foundation spell formula in the appropriate location. Many of the System classes offered different locations, however, the main three you could start with are the Mage at the base of the skull, the Fighter under the belly button and the Scout above the heart.
So without any more procrastination and planning as a distraction, Spencer folded his legs and sat in a lotus position and began.
With his eyes closed, he drew a simple spell form in the air to draw in ambient mana in the immediate vicinity to speed up the process. Focusing his will to maintain the spell he breathed in deeply sucking in the air and the higher concentration of mana around it. As his lungs absorbed oxygen and passed it onto his blood he concentrated on his bronchial taking in more oxygen. He held that image for a few seconds and then released it. Even with his weak manasence engaged he could still see the mana enriched air being absorbed into his blood and being passed through his heart and follow it as it traced through his arteries before being absorbed into various muscles and organs. Doing this enough would train his body to do this naturally, but for now.
Breath out.
Breath in, hold, absorb release
Breath in, hold, absorb release
Breath in, hold, absorb release
Hours passed
……
“Daddy daddy daddy” Victoria’s cheery voice broke his concentration and he stood instantly and turned to her.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
<..........>
The screens flashed into view, not a blue by a deep Green before being dismissed and Spencer felt a little fatigued and the weakness of his mind lifted, but he dismissed the feeling instantly.
She had a big smile and she was staring at her father with the same intensity as her sister in the spirit world, she nodded at him in a way only a child can and just like that the focus and intensity were gone, replaced with a child happy seeing her father.
Spencer crossed to the stairs instantly and picked her up in his arms, kissing the top of her head, she was giggling and trying to wrap her small arms around him in return.
Happiness joined with the lingering energy that had been buzzing around his mind since he started his meditation, making him jittery but anything aside from his daughter was pushed aside
“Daddy, I'm hungry” came her muffled demands.
“Ok, angl-e. We can get lots of food” Spencer said unable to hide the hitch in his voice
They both ate the last of the perishables that had been left, yogurts, cheese and cold snacks, basically clearing out all the food left in the fridge. Spencer drew a simple light rune with crayons onto the ground and wall behind the couch to provide some light, much to Victoria's delight. The light rune would only last for a few hours, while it burned through the materials used to create them.
As they both ate, Spencer brought up the messages that had been dismissed for more important things, but as his daughter was distracted by all the food, now was a good time to review them.
This was unexpected and faster than he thought would have happened, But he was cautious and needed more information.
Sending his will and a slight amount of mana he queried System
‘Request: Number: Humans at the class selection or mana core formation?’
The mana faded into nothing before being replaced with a new mana
A frown appeared on Spenser’s face, and he send another request into the aether.
‘Request: Location Local Nexus Node’
This time an arrow pointing South-West blinked twice before disappearing, the direction was easy to remember and like any System Quest, Spencer had an instinctual knowledge of what direction the arrow still pointed.
A small squeak of a demand broke through contemplation on the responses to his line of enquiry, bringing his attention back to more important developments, namely Victoria.
“Dad hurries up, I want that one, please” she ordered while dramatically pointing to the drawing she had been working on and the light runes Spencer had drawn. The implication was clear and in a tone that expected his immediate compliance.
Both father and daughter got comfortable on the couch with a stable table on their laps, some paper and crayons, while Spencer got to work, mage light flickering in the background, and with increasing regularity from the drawings themselves.
……..
Hours went by with Spencer drawing simple runes that could be powered by the ambient mana, and for him, it was the most fun he could remember having in the last 20 years.
He was not without his pragmatism, and as he sketch runes and spell formulas in the child's colouring-in book, the designs grew more complex. It wasn't long before the designs took in more power than materials could hold, even if Spencer only used the passive mana syphon runes to power them. With the extremely high ambient mana, Spencer was able to avoid the use of the storage runes, which always had a tendency to explode weak materials. By simply using a syphon rune as the input he was able to power his formula directly from the ambient mana. On a few occasions, the page he was working on disintegrated, the formula forcing more mana through the material that it could withstand, resulting in the bonds disintegrating at an atomic level, leaving only ash.
As his spell formula gained complexity in its programming, doing more complicated tasks and having a more powerful effect, he would need to store the excess mana or bleed it off with other effects the easiest was to form mana crystals that hovered above the sigils that empowered them. When the crystals were then used up they would dissolve into sparkling lights, much to her surprise and cheering of Victoria.
Spencer ended up spending equal measure in designing spell formulas, re-learn his muscle memory for sigildry and entertaining his daughter. But his main goal was to design a spell array that would dramatically speed up the formation of his mana blood core or heart of a dragon as the system would call it.
The use of Spell arrays was used to cast an extremely complex spell that would not require anything more than minimal input from the mage casting them, once designed, drawn, etched or built it required almost no will for the mage to hold the image and design in one's mind. The less impressive use was for the mage who didn't want to cast the same spell over and over, the light rune being an example. The spell arrays that sat in the middle of both use cases are formed onto items and are commonly referred to as enchants..
……
Victoria had long since fallen asleep, the darkness and constant sound of the rain lulling her into a deep sleep, nuzzled into her father's side.
Spencer had finished his final design and a spell array in the shape of a circle two meters in diameter, with the raw functionality of his own design that was a far cry from the elegance normally associated with other designs. Spencer's Spell array was brutal and to the point, it would do what he needed and not much else. It would draw in large amounts of mana and infuse it directly into his blood, the power would build over time starting at the lowest setting and slowly doubling in power every hour, his safety feature would be to leave the centre of the array and the proximity of a targeting sigil in the centre that would focus the spell on anyone inside.
He quickly used the first design to make a second that would do the same but with far less power, equivalent to the first level of power prior to the power jump.
With a look towards the glass backdoor, he thought to himself this was going to hurt.