Chapter 71 Truly A Shame
“White mana is the color of light and life. The ephemeral concept of the latter appears to be quite difficult to quantify.” Clayton began. “Light is simple, more mana equals a brighter light… though,” Clayton sighed. “There were what honestly looked like the ramblings of a madman that said something about a high concentration of white mana causing someone to be more attuned to righteousness.”
“Why do you think he was a madman?” Isaac questioned. With his fight with Judgement still somewhat fresh in his mind he was incredibly curious.
“It wasn’t provable. There were even some notations on his work by someone else that expressed doubt but the evidence was so inconclusive that they couldn’t entirely discount the possibility. That is why his notes even remained.” Clayton explained. “Do you understand the concepts behind light and life more than their names? I for one was having trouble understanding them.”
“Yes and no.” Isaac confessed. “If light is more than just the creation of electromagnetic waves in the visible spectrum then there should be a spell that kills someone with invisible light. If there is then I haven’t heard about it. If that is not what light does and it is simply the creation of the glowing effect then I am as lost as you are. As for life? That is as esoteric as they come. I can’t even think of a metric that can measure the amount of life something has. If it even existed, would I be considered dead because death mana heals me?”
Clayton looked utterly lost on the subject. “Well, it sounds like you understand it more than me so let us move on.” Isaac nodded in assent so Clayton continued: “Black mana is the color of shadows and death. As far as I can tell it is only the antithesis of light and life but I have witnessed solid shadows so my understanding cannot be correct.”
“I think that the reason shadows can be solid isn’t because shadows are tangible but because light isn’t. If that is the case, then a shadow cast on the ground is technically tangible but it is so incredibly thin that it cannot be measured. But when someone like me is using an ocean’s amount of mana to create shadows and compress them in on themselves, and hold them in place, they can appear to be as solid as steel. In the end it is simply the infinitesimal amount of density that a normal shadow possesses that makes them appear to be intangible.” Isaac explained. “As for death, I have no idea. The concept of life and death as an actual quantifiable force is entirely beyond me.”
Clayton nodded along with Isaac. “I can see that.” He agreed with Isaac’s theory on shadows and scribbled it down. “This has been quite helpful.” He said and looked up at Isaac like he was about to leave.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Isaac questioned.
Clayton looked confused for a moment before his eyes suddenly widened. “Oh, yes, I apologize.” He replied and quickly turned to another marked page in his notebook. “Combining colors of mana.” He read off the top of the page. “I have a few of them here but obviously not all of them.” He explained. “These were just the ones that were specifically mentioned at some point in the notes.”
“Alright.” Isaac replied. “Just start from the top then.”
Clayton nodded. “First we have acid. It is made with a mixture of Gia, lightning, and water creation aspects of their respective colors. The exact specifications vary from acid to acid. Well, instead of ‘Gia, lightning, and water’ it is ‘solid, plasmatic, and liquid’ creation aspects.” Clayton explained. “Though I must confess that plasmatic creation is still a bit beyond me but I fail to see how it interacts with solids and liquids to create a substance that eats through other materials.”
Isaac hummed in thought. “It has to be with how the different states of matter interact with one another.” He thought aloud. “I wonder if acids created this way always turn whatever material they’ve eaten into a gas and produce heat as a byproduct. If so then they would be creating the other two colors that are missing from the equation.”
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Clayton shook his head. “I have no idea.” He confessed. “The next one was poison which was Gia, death, and water or Gia, death, and air depending on the state of the poison. Again, the ratios vary based on the intended effect and the type of poison being created. This actually brings me to a question: Are you affected by poisons?” Clayton finished his explanation with a question.
“Yes.” Isaac replied simply. “There is a poison that can kill a god of poisons, I am sure of it. That is just how poisons work.”
Clayton nodded in understanding. “I am afraid that even though the listed elements make sense to me I do not understand how and why they work the way they do in spells like these.”
“It is physical matter creation being used to make something that is actually poisonous and it is being modified by the death mana to ensure that the effect is negative. The last element is simply the medium. At least that is my understanding of it.” Isaac replied. “Unless there is anything else, let’s move on to the next one.”
“This one has an exact ratio listed as the optimal amount.” Clayton began. “Thunder is made with thirty two percent of the energy storage aspect of yellow mana and sixty eight percent of the imparting of force from green mana.”
Isaac nodded in understanding. “The energy storage aspect is just used to draw out the impact over a longer amount of time to get the most transfer of energy with the least amount wasted. There are definitely times when the ratio will need to be changed but even then it will probably result in a rather large amount of wasted energy.” He explained. “That one was easy enough.”
Clayton nodded along and then moved on to the next one when he was sure that Isaac wasn’t going to add anything else. “The next one is one that you are very familiar with.” Clayton began. “Holy Light, Divine Fire, Radiant Fire, Heavenly Smite, all of these are the same things but with slightly tweaked ratios. The base ratio that is generally the most effective is sixty percent light, thirty percent life, and ten percent fire.”
“It is a perversion of white mana.” Isaac commented. “The added fire aspect is probably what makes it violent. I bet there is a version of black mana like this as well.”
“There is.” Clayton replied. “It is often seen as rapid necrosis and cellular death. It is often generally referred to as necrotic damage but its ratios can be tweaked just like with the white variant.” He explained. “The base ratios are sixty eight percent shadow, twenty five percent death, and seven percent water.”
“Water?” Isaac questioned.
“Why is the amount of shadow so high?” Lenna asked.
“The amount of shadow is so high because you need a ton of shadows in order to actually get anything out of them. The water aspect is what is confusing to me. I figured it would be fire as well.” Isaac replied.
“I think the reason that the water aspect is used is because it is the inverse of the fire aspect that is used in the white version.” Clayton postulated. “The next two might be even harder to understand.” He warned them. “Psychic and Reality.”
“Start with psychic. It’ll be best to get all of the ones that I’ll probably never properly understand out of the way first.” Isaac replied.
Clayton nodded. “Very well.” He said and shifted a little in his seat. “Psychic combinations vary greatly so no ratios are listed but they are always a combination of life, death, soul, space, and energy storage.” Clayton explained. “I have no idea.” He replied preemptively to Isaac's question.
“I… what?” Isaac stammered while he tried to understand why each of the pieces of the puzzle were there. Eventually he just shook his head. “You know what? Just move on. I don’t need to understand how psychic magics work, only how to protect myself from them.”
“Agreed.” Lenna added.
“Finally we have the last one that is listed that has some semblance of consistency. All of the spells that make fire, stone, lightning, wind, and water are so inconsistent that there are literal pages of research of different wizards trying to isolate different parts of the spells in order to prove their theories.” Clayton ranted. “Reality, the effect and the magic, is made with this exact ratio that is expressed in different ways through the spell forms: nine percent raw white mana, nine percent raw black mana, ten percent for each of the following; heat, impact absorption, energy storage, impact creation, and cold.” He stopped to take a breath before continuing: “Seven percent time, six percent gravity, and eighteen percent space.” He looked up from the notes at Isaac. “I am afraid that that is all that I can tell you. I have no idea why these need to be in this exact ratio and what that means.” He confessed.
Isaac looked like his brain was running a mile a minute as he tried to uncover the secrets to reality itself from the formula used to create its expression using magic. “White and black mana are the immaterial expression of existence, what is there but cannot be measured. Time is a constant used to anchor it all. Gravity is a constant to all things that have mass so that has to be there or else it wouldn’t technically exist. Space is obvious because everything exists within it. The rest of the rainbow are basically just the rules of reality involving and governing over all that is. Yes, that actually makes sense.” Isaac said more to himself than to the wizard sitting across from him who was rapidly scribbling in his notebook once again. “Out of all of the combinations reality and thunder actually make the most sense to me outright.”
“It is truly a shame that you cannot use any other colors of magic.” Clayton whispered under his breath. He looked up from his notes once he was done. “That is everything that I have. I hope that it helped you as much as it has helped me.”
Isaac nodded. “It helped some but not nearly as much as I had hoped.” Isaac confessed. “Now, do you have any ideas on how to cause unusual effects using only black mana and nothing else?”