Liz stared at Kancor for a few seconds, trying to distinguish if he was still playing with her. “Please!!!” She screamed once she understood he was serious.
“Hahahaha” Kancor laughed at her reaction. “Very well, we’ll start with the basics. Tell me what you see.”
He then raised two of his fingers, and a red light shined through his arm. Once the light reached the point of his digits, it flew a few inches away, forming a little sphere of red mana.
“I see a red sphere.” Said Liz, confused by the task.
“I know you see a red sphere, but do you see the mana that binds it to this realm? The silk-like strings that chain it to the physical world?” He asked.
“No…” Liz replied, almost like a child scolded by her teacher.
“Then focus more on my magic.” He ordered her.
Liz did what he told her and remained staring at his spell for several minutes. First 5, then 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 45, finally, an hour passed.
“I think I see it!!” She yelled with excitement. “Tiny little strings of mana floating around the sphere, they are both binding it and being binded by it, right!?”
“You do!?” Kancor was even more surprised than her. He expected this training to take a couple days at least. “This baby spirit has some next level magic affinity after all!”
Liz smiled at being praised, only to understand his full sentence a second later. “Wait did you called me bab-”
“Next lecture, close your eyes and tell me the shape of the sphere” He interrupted her.
“Whatever…” She muttered as she closed her eyes, focusing her senses on the mana surrounding her.
The world turned black for a couple minutes, until she started seeing the same red strings of mana as before. She then focused her attention in that direction, recognising a big mana blur. What shape is that, is it a square, no, a triangle?
“An arrowhead.” She said.
“Correct, what is it now?” He asked again.
Liz frowned for a moment as she tried to visualise the new shape. “Spear”
“And now?”
“Cube”
“Now?”
“Piramid”
…
“Nice, now tell me where it is” Kancor asked as the sphere moved around Liz’s body.
After some seconds, Liz raised her right hand and pointed at the sphere. “Here”
“Now?”
“Over there”
“Shape?”
“Cube”
“Now there are 2, where are they?”
“Together”
“Now?”
“To my right, one is a metre over the other…” She dubbed for a second. “The lower one is a circle, the top one an arrow pointing at it.”
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“9/10, there are 3, the third one is behind the circle.” Kancor corrected her, but Liz's mind was focused on another thing at that moment.
Notice: skill, lesser magic sense (passive) acquired.
“I just got a skill” She said, still surprised by it.
“It’s only natural to gain a skill after trai-” He stopped, processing her words. “You mean you did all of that without magic sense!?”
“Yes?” She replied, curious about his question.
“Then, little baby spirit, you are the second biggest prodigy I’ve ever seen?” He said.
I used to be one of the best mages to ever live back in my world… SECOND!? “Who is the first?” She asked.
“One old friend of mine.” He said, his face turned sour as he started reminiscing. “She was half spirit, so it probably has something to do with the race.”
“That's a possibility…” Liz didn’t really believe him, but she understood just by a look on his face that it wasn’t a pleasant conversation. “Anyways, now that I can feel mana, how do I cast spells?”
“Patience, little spirit, patience.” He said, slowly getting up. “As much as I would love to see how much you can develop, I shouldn’t cast more magic today.”
“Bu-” She tried to reply.
“No buts, besides, even if you don’t need to eat, I am a human.” He explained as he took what looked like some dried meat from one of his pant’s pockets.
“Fineee.” She gave up, rolling on her back as she lied down. “Why do you only wear pants, shouldn’t you try to cover your vital organs or something?”
“I used to have a shirt and even a nice coat.” He said as he chewed the dry food. “But after some time in the deadlands they were all torn apart.”
“I see, well, at least you managed to keep your pants, I spawned here naked.” She said, looking at her body again.
“Good to know you didn’t get rid of your clothes because you were an exhibitionist.” He joked. “You are really comfortable being naked in front of a man.”
“This is probably the only perk of having a genderless body, well, that and having no boobs to swing around when I run.” She replied. “What are we going to do when you are done eating?”
“We’ll head north, there’s another safespot where we can rest.” He explained as he swallowed the second last piece of meat. “I don’t like to stay too long in the same place, the plants don’t like it.”
“But it has only been a day, can we just wait till I’m able to cast simple magic?” She asked.
“Nope, we are leaving in 10 minutes” He replied instantly.
“Pleaseeeee.” She tried to make puppy eyes, but her face made it more of a scary sight, one that could cause nightmares even to the most experienced soldiers.
“We wouldn’t be in a rush if someone didn’t disturbed all the vines and trees in the area.” He scolded her.
“If you are that strong, why don’t you just kill them all?” She standed up and pointed at him. “I bet you would even level up a couple times and increase your lifespan in the process.”
“It's not worth the risk, each battle is a chance to get wounded and infected with more decay.” He also stood up and started heading towards the exit of the cave. “Now, are you going to be a good apprentice and follow my lead or are you going to abandon your master already?”
“...” She didn’t give him an answer, but followed him quietly.
Out of the cave the deadlands looked the same, a twisted forest with killing vines and an empty dark blue sky. They both walked through the little paths that weren’t covered in sharp blue grass while also keeping a safe distance from the trees.
Some red vines tried to attack them several times, but Kancor always killed them swiftly. Suddenly the branches of one of the trees tried to grab Liz, but she managed to dodge them. A moment later Kancor kicked the tree and blew its upper part off.
“Wow” Liz was amazed, not only by his feat. But also because he didn’t use any kind of magic during his attack. “How can you output that much power without mana?”
“What do you mean? I’m a knight, I don’t require any mana to perform this level.” He explained. “I have focused my skill points and passives in physical attributes after all.”
“Still, I thought you would enhance your body or something” She replied. “I’m starting to think that keeping my magic sense active is a waste of time.”
“Most certainly it is.” He said. “I’m not planning to cast any more magic today, and these plants don’t have a lot of tricks in their belt.”
“Boring…” She muttered. “I’m still going to keep it active, who knows, mabe me stumble upon a demon lord and I manage to see something exciting.”
“I’m glad to inform you that the demon lord is dead, my dear apprentice.” He said while resuming his march. “So unless our loved Malekith has become a soulless lich, we won’t be seeing him soon.”
There’s only one demon lord in this world? That's interesting. I should probably figure out which species exist and which not. She thought. “Can’t there be more demon lords or something?”
“Not probably, and if there is already a new one, then he must be quite low level, so it shouldn’t be hard for the church to deal with him.” Kancor explained. “Who knows, maybe you could become the next demon lord, it would be ironic.”
“I’m not interested in world domination yet, but thanks for the offer” She replied, walking behind him.
----------------------------------------
They reached the next cave some hours later. Kancor walked in first, slowly crawling on all fours like a beast of some sort. Once they made sure that the cave was empty, they sat down and began resting.
“Ok, I’m going to address the elephant in the room, why did you crawl there?” Liz asked.
“I have a skill that increases my stealth when I crawl.” He said, as if it was as normal as the colour of the sky.
“Whatever…” Liz just gave up on that. “Can you please teach me some basic magic before you go to sleep? that way I could practise while you sleep.”
“That's… Actually not that bad of an idea…” He thought about it for a couple of seconds before giving her the final answer. “Ok, but I will only do it once.”
“That’s more than enough.” She said smiling.
“Ok, first things first, I want you to focus your magic sense inside your body, specifically near your heart.” He explained as he sat down with his legs crossed. “I want you to find your magic circuit, to feel your mana slowly travelling through its veins and merging in its nodes.”
Liz followed his instructions as he said them, at first she struggled, then Kancor gave him the best advice he could have ever given.
“I want you to visualise the pool of mana stored inside your soul.”
Liz’s brain stopped for a moment, the realisation sinking in, the questions finally had an answer. Mana is stored directly in the soul. Those words enlightened Liz as she finally figured everything out.
Why this world’s system was available while you were alive. Why in her original world skills didn’t fully manifest until your core was mature. Why the soul was located inside the core. “The soul itself is the nexus.” She whispered, as her closed eyes were now piercing her flesh and staring directly at her soul.
Notice: Your understanding of this world’s laws has greatly increased.