Chapter 58 Insanity.
“How can that even be possible?” Lenna questioned immediately. If they had a way to keep someone down for good, regardless of the resources at that person’s disposal, then the prospect of putting down Jallen would become much more doable.
“I know some of the theory behind it but that’s not why I am here.” Esk replied politely. “You did answer my question though. Would you have killed him in a different way or not killed him at all if you knew this would happen?”
Isaac was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that he prevented a resurrection. He wanted to know the hows and whys. He shook his head to clear it and focus back on the question Esk had posited. “Listen Esk, I wasn’t thinking about how I was going to kill your brother. I wasn’t thinking about the consequences of doing so either. I understand that there are many people who harbor ill will towards Lenna just because she is a dark elf but he took it too far. I even gave him a chance to take it back and stand down but he threw it away.” Isaac explained. “The thought of him ever being resurrected never crossed my mind. If you really want to get into it, looking back, my temper had gotten the better of me. But, due to that fact, some other things happened that I wouldn’t trade for your brother’s eternal soul let alone his life.”
Esk nodded solemnly. “I understand.” He told Isaac. “Once this is over, I would like to fight you.”
“Oh?” Isaac questioned. “Are you looking to die again?”
Esk shook his head. “No, not to the death. I just need to cement in my mind that you are a natural disaster and not a human. That is the only way I think I can move past this.” Esk explained.
Isaac studied the young man next to him. He had changed a great deal from the hot tempered adventurer who challenged him to a duel on their first meeting. “Alright. When we return.” Isaac agreed. Isaac had no way of knowing what Esk had truly been through in the time since his resurrection. From the sounds of it he had received some counseling and mellowed out quite a bit. The meeting with the Reaper must have been quite the ordeal.
Esk nodded in understanding and thanks. “Thank you.” He told Isaac and then rejoined his group.
After a moment of silence as Esk fell into step with the rest of his party Isaac turned to Lenna. “We really need to figure out why his brother can’t be resurrected. There is one person specifically I want to use it on and at least one other that needs to be threatened by it.” He told one of his only two true companions, the other one couldn’t talk so Isaac barely counted him even if he was adorable.
Lenna nodded. “Agreed.” She replied. After a moment of thought she looked over at Isaac. “Who needs to be threatened by it?” She questioned.
“Elequin.” Isaac replied simply.
Lenna wanted to tease Isaac about his dislike of the courier but she really couldn’t. She didn’t like him either. He was far too chipper and seemed to know more than he should. His blinding speed also raised some questions. If he could complete deliveries at that speed then why did it always take him the estimated time to complete them. He had to be up to something in all that extra time. Lenna sighed. “Yes, Elequin.”
“I can explain the theory.” Fina said as she appeared next to Isaac. Isaac and Lenna had been too engrossed in their conversation to really take notice of the fact that she had sped up to catch them. Subconsciously they were always aware of their surroundings so her presence hadn’t startled either of them. It was more akin to noticing something that had always been there only because someone pointed it out. “I would like recompense however.”
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“Oh?” Isaac questioned. “I am curious but my curiosity can wait until we can get back and I can ask someone else.”
“My fee isn’t very large.” Fina replied. “I would just like to know how your boosting spell works. Getting into a melee is disadvantageous to us mages so I would like some guidance in exchange for the information.”
“That… is actually fair.” Isaac replied. “How good is your internal mana control?” He questioned. Part of the reason that he was telling her was because he wanted to know if it was even possible for someone other than him to boost themselves physically with their own mana. Another reason was that he was almost completely sure that even if she did figure it out, using it would burn through all of her mana in a few seconds.
“Amazing for my level, average for a mage of age.” Fina replied somewhat ashamed that she wasn’t a prodigy or something.
“Then I will explain it as directly as possible, as soon as you tell me why my magic keeps the dead dead.” Isaac told her. He left her dangling off the worst cliffhanger of her life.
She looked heart broken before schooling herself. “Your mana was too pure. When you pushed your power into his chest it smothered all of the other types of mana while isolating his core from the rest of his mana pathways. The core and soul overlap in multiple metrics. Damage to the soul can result in lower maximum mana capacity and damage to the core can often result in soul damage. You purged his core of every part of existence save for death, darkness, and shadow. His soul still exists but it was too damaged and disfigured to willingly accept the resurrection.” She explained and then took a deep breath. “Now, boosting spells?”
Isaac raised a finger for her to wait while he processed what she had told him. Lenna was silent as she came to a conclusion a bit before Isaac. She was more focused on the application while Isaac was getting distracted by concepts. “It probably won’t work on Jallen.” Lenna said eventually.
“Huh?” Isaac asked after getting pulled out of his thoughts on what color of mana was responsible for the soul. “Why not?” He questioned before realizing why she had said that. “Oh.” He replied to his own question. “He’s too dense.”
Lenna nodded. “You would have to completely overpower the will, mana, and oath of a maximum level, six hundred year old, born and bred, paladin with the backing of all of his ancestors.” She spoke his thoughts. “Even if it was possible,”
“I’d be healing him the entire time.” Isaac finished for her.
“His aura is also best at countering hostile mana.” Lenna finished nailing shut the coffin on their plan to end Jallen for good. Lenna nodded towards Fina. “She’s still waiting.” Lenna reminded Isaac.
“Oh, yes, boosting.” Isaac said and focused back on Fina’s difficulty. “I run pure death flames through every muscle fiber, ligament, tendon, and bone at the same time. The mana must be kept in line with your body’s natural flow. The mana has to overlap directly with your body and do exactly what your body is doing while it is doing it. When you take a step all of the mana in each of those muscles needs to move and contract at the exact same time as the muscles otherwise you will be fighting against yourself. I also don’t use spells. Everything I do is raw mana manipulation. I hope that helps.”
Fina looked at him slack jawed. After a moment she closed her mouth and shook her head. “You are just messing with me. Please, I answered your quarry, now answer mine.” She replied.
Isaac looked directly into her eyes. “Sorceress, that is how I box Tunnel Horrors. When the power boost hits a high enough density and fluidity I can feel the world start to slow down as even my nervous system starts to get enhanced.” He explained to her as seriously as he could. He truly wasn’t messing with her even if she had given him the perfect opportunity to do so.
“I… what? How?” Fina questioned. “That mental load alone is enough to kill someone. That isn’t even taking into account the absolutely ridiculous amount of mana it would take. My pathways would burst if I tried that. My blood would start being burned for mana.”
“I’m not sure if your mana pathways would burst.” Isaac replied. “The beginning stage of it is learning how to disperse the mana from your pathways into the surrounding tissue. I actually got some of the inspiration for it from a shadow sorcerer’s transformation.”
“This is insanity. I don’t know if an archmage could do that, let alone me.” Fina said exasperatedly. “Well, thank you for the honesty, I guess.” Fina said and slowed to rejoin her team while trying to figure out how to mimic what Isaac did but with a normal person’s amount of mana. What Isaac did was far more thorough than the Quicken spell. That spell was already as complicated as it could be for its level. It sped up a person’s progress through time while enhancing their gravity by the same amount. The effect was that a person seemed faster and more affected by gravity from the outside but from within the spell it appeared to slow down the world around the recipient.
Soon the group was close enough to the Ori-Masa that Isaac stopped them. “Their numbers are through the roof. I can’t even get a rough estimate.” He told the temporary team. “I think the best course of action is to split up into two teams. One team will confront the army directly at a choke point so they won’t be overrun. The second group will assassinate the one controlling them. Hopefully that will kill off the rest of them. If it doesn’t then we are in for a slog.” Isaac panned his gaze over all of those gathered. “Now, who can cast flight or Invisibility on Shy?”