Now that he had finally created some Fire Element Mana he could always go and get Lapis to teach him how to refine some Fire Element Essence, but the moment he stopped concentrating on his Core the mana would be dispersed and everything would be reset to zero. That seemed like a great waste of time and effort. There was only one solution to his predicament. Time to play with Fire!
Playing with Fire was dangerous, that's why he was going to play with it safely. There was no better place to store the Fire than inside one of his paper mache blasts.
Pour, pour, pour, goes the Fire Mana, filling up the sphere with all of its fiery contents. There was a fatal flaw with his plan.
Turns out that pouring liquid fire into a paper casing wasn't the smartest idea. Oh well, live and learn. The paper mache with the help of the Fire Mana turned into a flaming mache, before turning into a pile of ash that sank into the deepest parts of Alwin's mana pool. Remember kids, pollution's bad. Now, back to having some fun with the Fire Mana.
Since paper being paper will inevitably catch on fire, there was only one solution that Alwin could think of. He just had to make fireproof paper. How would one make fireproof paper? No idea. Okay, Alwin lied, he did have an idea. Time for the handy dandy remote control to come into play again.
Alwin scrolled through the settings of the mana paper hoping to find the 'Flammability' setting. After scrolling through the whole bloody list fifteen damn times, Alwin came to the conclusion that there was simply no such setting. There was a small lingering doubt in his head that made him wonder if he just happened to miss that setting fifteen times in a row. But, what are the chances of that happening... right?
On to more pressing matters, like how was he going to make paper fireproof. Alwin sat there thinking, his real face unconsciously scrunching up as he cycled through the dozens of ideas that flowed through his mind. Meanwhile, within his Core, the pair of no longer sizzling mental hands gave his consciousness a backrub that would hopefully help him generate some ideas. No idea if it was actually working, but boy did it feel good.
Then the hundred-and-twentieth idea dawned on him. Paint! He just had to coat the paper in a layer of fire-resistant paint. His plan was foolproof, plus it managed to keep in theme of the weird arts and crafts motif he had accidentally made.
Alwin gathered up two buckets of mana and with the help of his handy dandy remote, set them both to a healthy zero percent flammability. One bucket of mana to act as the binding agent, and the other bucket to help create the perfect paint consistency. Another zap with his remote made one bucket’s mana all sticky and gooey. It kind of reminded Alwin of himself. All that was left to do was mix the two buckets of mana into a third bucket till he got his desired consistency.
While one mental hand poured the buckets of mana the other stirred the resulting mixture. Alwin was doing the most important job out of all of them. Supervising.
Pour, stir, evaluate. Pour, stir, evaluate. The bucket of mana paint was just about complete. A spoonful of mana paint was lifted up into the air and poured back into the bucket. It reminded Alwin of someone answering nature's call. With that, the mana paint had achieved the desired consistency. There was one teensy weensy little problem. Alwin forgot to add any pigment and thus the paint was transparent! It was like applying sticky water.
All Alwin could do was sigh and move on with his day. That would be a problem for future Alwin.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
With the paint secured, all Alwin had to do was layer the paper with paint before he used them to create this new type of blast. The mental hands worked without rest, bristles dancing upon the surface of the paper as drops of paint coated every last inch of the surface. Now came the hardest part of the whole process—waiting for the blasted stuff to dry! But, good thing he had an oven nearby.
Toss the pieces of paper into the oven while making sure that none of them overlap each other, wait a bit then pull out the pieces of dried paper. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Miles more efficient than waiting for them to air dry.
Now perform all of the steps to creating a Spirit Burst Blast, but instead of filling it in with raw unfiltered mana, pour in the Fire Element Mana. Once that's done, toss your product into the oven then wait. Ignore the fact that the oven was slowly turning into a puddle of mental scrap as the heat it gave off only served to fan the flames of the Fire Mana. Maybe he should have thought this through a bit more. Anyway, that's all the steps to creating this new type of blast that Alwin would figure out the name for when he would inevitably shout it out when it left his Core.
Now that the oven had been reduced into a puddle of molten metal, the new unnamed Blast was nice and dry. In hindsight maybe he didn't even need to chuck it into the oven. The roaring Fire Mana was probably good enough to dry out the paper mache. Whatever. Time to find out what this new move was going to be called.
Alwin got his mental bat primed and ready, partaking in a couple of practice swings before the big reveal. Now that he was more warmed up—pun definitely intended—time to swing.
The mental bat collided with Alwin's brand new blast, spreading a wave of embers that scattered across the floor as it soared through his Core, before finally exiting. Also, in other news, that mental bat caught on fire, leaving the pair of hands that wielded it to drop it into his mana pool. Just as Alwin was about to comfort them, that same tickling sensation in his throat broke his consciousness away from his Core.
His eyes flashed open and he didn't even have time to complain about the cornea-piercing white room before he yelled out the name of his brand-new skill, "Fire Burst Blast!"
A sphere just like any of his previous Spirit Blasts, manifested right in front of him. Why did it look like a regular Spirit Blast? Shouldn't it be on Fire or something? Did he do something wrong or was the system bugging out? Whatever the case the not-on-fire Fire Burst Blast sailed through the room toward Lapis.
WAIT! It was flying toward Lapis! Oh no, oh no. Alwin was toast! Technically, Lapis would be toast, but who cares about technicalities right now. Alwin had to warn her to move out of the way before Lapis became pissed!
The moment Alwin opened his mouth, his slimy vocal cords already vibrating in preparation to speak, a glint of light caught his attention. A glass bowl with remnants of some sort of brown paste rested atop a foldable table. Alwin's eyes traveled towards the right and saw a frying pan placed atop a portable stove, the contents of the bowl most likely resided within that pan. Then his eyes shifted slightly upwards, towards the culprit. It was none other than Lapis.
Why that no good mean grand great master crystal! She broke their promise and was cooking instead of researching. That does it, Alwin wasn't going to warn her about the Fire Burst Blast! You reap what you sow, after all. Alwin sat there fuming, waiting for retribution to smack Lapis in the back.
Lapis was unaware of the danger that was fast approaching her. She hummed a tune as the Spirit Hands she commanded flicked its wrist, sending the contents of the frying pan—a pancake—into the air. As the pancake performed its acrobatic performance, the Fire Burst Blast veered off course flying straight toward the golden brown disc.
The two met in mid-air, crashing into one another, causing an explosion of fire to engulf the area. Lapis' voice overpowered the sound of the explosion, yelling out as her Spirit Hands caressed the pancake that fell to the ground.
Sniffles replaced her screams of horror as she whimpered out, "My perfect pancake burnt to a crisp. Who's the meanie who did that?"
She rotated her body toward the source of the blast. Anger had overtaken her despair and Alwin knew he was in for it. What should he do? There was only one thought that came to mind.
He began to whistle a tune while looking away from the approaching Lapis.
"Grand Great Student of mine, are you ready for a pop quiz?"