This wasn’t what I was expecting when I stepped outside. The landscape was breathtaking, but my situation was heart-stopping. I took a moment to thank the universe that my new body considered a heartbeat and breathing more of a suggestion than an actual requirement for living. After calming down a little I look again at my little cave’s precarious situation.
The tree under whose roots I decided to make my new home, decided that reenacting “The Creation of Adam” by Michelangelo (the famous finger-touching painting) is appropriate tree behavior. The poor thing was reaching for God over the cliff edge like its life depended on it. It looked like it was one storm away from ascending to heaven.
After once again realizing that life isn’t fair and cursing at gravity for being such a hypocritical little bi… I mean gravity is so great it has two standards: one for me and one for everyone else. Anyway, I moved closer to the edge to take a peek at nature’s sprawling beauty.
Below, colors dance atop the black ocean with the rays of dawn moving playfully between the little flying dancers. A little lower, the flowing wind is stripping trees of their majestic cloak, throwing the leaves in the silent waves of shadow mana. After getting an eyeful of nature’s beauty, I nudge the system.
‘Hey, system, is nature such a handsome fellow just here, or is this world so good-looking all-around?’
‘This place is so beautiful because it's close to a mana source, and thus the colorful flora and fauna. It also looks better in your eyes because you can see mana. On another note, I feel the need to remind you about what you just thought about ‘Nature's Valley’ and all those birds playing down there. And no the birds are not ‘Great Tits’.’
‘I blame it on English. It shouldn’t be so easy to sexualize nature.’
‘And the birds?’
‘The fault of those who chose the name. I have the pure mind of a newborn child.’
The system probably gave up on arguing with those who refuse to see the truth, thus earning me an automatic win in our little argument.
Feeling good about annoying the only conversation partner I will probably have for a long time, I go on my journey of exploring the forest behind me. Not that I don’t want to explore the valley, but I don’t trust myself to scale a 20-meter cliff without falling and then also get back up.
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The forest was fun for about 30 minutes. You can only see so many colors of the rainbow until you get used to it. Oh, look, a blue plant that looks suspiciously similar to one of those red-leafed house plants. And look, an orange butterfly, this one might not be magical on second thought. A black tree with white spots on it, what’s that supposed to be? Star affinity or something? The one that takes the crown is a half-meter bush with something that looks like shimmering red blueberries. I have never seen something that screams poisonous better than that bush. On the other hand, the animals were more of a disappointment.
In the 30 minutes I’ve been walking, all I’ve seen were 6 birds, a squirrel, and a hedgehog. Not one was on fire or changing colors, so my expectations of the inhabitants of a magical forest were not met. From all the novels I’ve read, I was ready to have encountered at least a wolf pack, a huge bear, and a lich raising their undead army to take over the world. Not even a “You have encountered a wild Doom Butterfly”— absolutely nothing.
At least the insects were something to look at. I saw a purple caterpillar that melted anything it stepped on. I’d hazard a guess that it had poison affinity. I also, unfortunately, had the pleasure of hearing the cricket that made the most obnoxious sound in existence. Although those were dangerous or annoying, the one that takes the cake for the scariest affinity is a spider that could make invisible silk. It also could turn itself invisible if it wasn’t moving.
‘Is this the most boring forest in existence or am I doing something wrong?’
‘It’s a normal forest. What were you expecting?’
‘I wanted to at least see a stag or something, not supercharged bugs.’
‘As I said there is a mana source in the valley, so all the stronger or more magical animals are moving in that direction. You will only see those that were driven out here on the outskirts. And you found the magical bugs because the mana in the air is enough for them to use for a lifetime.’
‘Well now I’m bored, and before you remind me of all those things I could be doing to improve myself I’ll go find myself a new hobby. Because, for some reason, my old hobbies became impractical in my current situation.’
Taking into consideration my current body and its features I decided on wood carving. Maybe I will try engraving on stone and painting if making wood sculptures fails miserably. I angled myself towards home and started running.
After 5 minutes of running and one faceplant later I found a suitable tree. It was dead, wasn’t rotten, and the system assured me that undead trees aren’t a thing in this world. While wondering what an undead tree would do differently from a normal tree I got myself a broken branch and continued my jog home.
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After trying to carve 3 teaspoons and getting 2 misshapen pieces of wood and a spoon-looking wooden mini-spatula, I had some revelations about my new form:
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
1. Scratching things had a cathartic effect on me.
2. Having better motor control doesn’t make you good at carving.
3. My emotions got trawled before the system said they should.
‘Hey system-’
‘I know what you want to ask. The timing discrepancy is because you have a way better affinity with the shadow element than initially calculated.’
‘Then how do affinities work?’
‘I should be a replacement for missing instincts so all I can say is: It’s based on your personality. At least from low to divine affinity.’
‘So how much shadow mana likes my personality is how much easier it is to control?’
‘That’s the just of it.’
‘Then I must have a great personality.’
‘After you finished inflating your ego, we could do something fun.’
That piqued my interest so I agreed without much thinking. That’s how I found myself an hour later trying to woo some shadow mana.
‘You said it's gonna be fun.’
‘For me it is.’
Noting that the system is a sadist, I continue mentally shouting at liquid shadows to be mine. At least this time they moved a little.
‘What should I do with the mana after it's refined?’
‘You put it in the Shadow Realm channel with the rest of the mana.’
I move to sit in the shadow. This time I mentally rehearse Enter my channel and be mine, wait, that sounds so wrong. Channel… Mana channel… Mana pool? Mana pool it is. This time I try with less shadow ‘Enter my mana pool and be mine’. My artificial instincts haven’t stopped me yet so I’m good━ probably.
Okay, first step done, now to get it to my mind. Where the fu…frick is my mind? The system said that it is on some of the channels between the body and soul. And where is that? Who knows. I’ll try to cheat then. ‘Go to my mind’. The mana moves through a fourth… the channel moves through the fourth dimension so the mana moves through a fifth dimension. I try to follow it and fail miserably.
On the bright side, I have 2 more mana according to my imaginary friend.
‘Weren’t you supposed to help me with the mana?’
‘Instincts are pretty vague. You also learn more by finding the answer than by having it handed to you.’’
‘I wanted to say that you could have helped more, but you helped more by doing less. Damn mind readers making my arguments obsolete before I even have the chance to express them.’
‘It would help with what you are going to do later if you find your mind and map some of the soul-body channels.’
I change my approach this time. I try to make the unrefined shadow mana flow in a tickle towards my mind. It took about 3 trees of about 15 mana each to find what I was looking for.
‘There is nothing there.’
‘It’s there.’
‘Is it so small I can’t see it?’
‘I wouldn’t say. If you map more channels you’ll get it. Also, if you used refined mana it would have been easier.’
‘And you tell me that now?’
‘You needed refined mana and never asked if there was an easier way.’
‘Is there an easier way?’
‘The best way you have is using your mana and following it mentally.’
‘I asked easier, not best.’
‘Then you could use a soul stone, find a material that grants enlightenment on the topic of souls, or find one of the artifacts that show you the truths of the universe. There are also other ways, but I can’t tell you about that.’
The best way it is then.
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‘System, what is wrong with those channels? I've mapped 14 and at least 2 should intersect but they don’t. And then the smallest channel is almost half the length of the longest one. You can’t expect me to believe that my mind is that large and somehow I haven’t found it.’
‘First, that is not the channel length but the body-mind length. Second, your soul spans 156 different dimensions so most of the channels you found aren’t even on the same planes.’
‘I don’t even know what to say to that. At least tell me that the mind doesn’t span that many.’
‘Only 25 for your mind. You also have 250 channels that go through the mind and 50 that don’t. All channels go through the same 25 dimensions as your mind. Also, some smaller channels go between the channels in the same dimensions. This is all I’m allowed to say.’
‘So to understand better I need to map my channels.’
‘Precisely.’
Well, I could try carving or doing the channel thing. I don’t have enough wood to try another teaspoon and although mapping my channels isn’t exciting, it’s not boring either. So…
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I try to reach for more external mana, but I come up empty.
‘System where did all the shadow mana go?’
‘The sun has set.’
‘And?’
‘No light means no shadows and no shadows mean no shadow mana.’
You’d think that a shadow creature with night vision would be nocturnal, but no I get to be diurnal.
‘Shadow elementals are technically crepuscular as that is when the most shadow mana is produced.’
‘Ok, I get it, more shadows, more shadow mana. I’ll take that lesson on shadow mana later. Now please tell me why I can't find my mind. I mapped all the channels going there. It’s so frustrating I feel like I am stuck at 99% of the way there and I’m just missing the last step.’
‘The last step you are missing is sensing your mental energy. You technically found your mental world or mental palace━ you can call it what you want━, but you can’t see it. I’ll teach you that sensing exercise tomorrow.’
Now I feel annoyed and frustrated. It feels like I haven’t learned anything and all that I’ve done is useless. I feel even more annoyed at myself because I know that I’ve advanced my mana manipulation and mapped my mana channels, but I still want instant gratification from my actions like a child.
‘Then tell me what you’ve learnt. If you voice it you’ll probably feel better.’
‘I’ve only mapped the channels to the mind, but besides what you’ve said, each dimension has exactly 10 channels. Between these channels, there are 20 sub-channels that connect them. From the shape of the sub-channels, I’d guess that they are two-way, but only take the body input from channel A and the mind input from channel B, and can’t transmit mind from A and body from B.’
‘Then what do you think the purpose of the subchannels is?’
‘To take the burden from one of the channels if there is too much? But then the mental energy would still be bottlenecked between the sub-channels. So that doesn’t seem to be it. That’s all I have.’
‘The bottleneck situation won’t happen. The more you use them the wider they get. The sub-channels only have a purpose if one of the channels gets severed or blocked.’
‘Oh, that makes a lot of sense.’
‘Now go to sleep to rest your mind.’
I won’t argue with probably the most knowledgeable entity in this world that shadow monsters shouldn't sleep and go in my cave made out of roots. Root cave? That still needs some work. I lie down and discover that my cat-body doesn’t feel comfortable to sleep in for some reason. I switch to my shadow. This one is even worse. I can’t even close my metaphorical eyes. I switch again, to my Shadow Realm body. I black out instantly. My last thought was So this is what heaven feels like.