Chapter 12

The next day after breakfast Nick decided to invest his stat points into willpower, mental control and mana. He thought that would be his best investment as long as he was using mana potions to replenish his reserves. Now his stats looked like this.

Statistics:

Strength 23

Dexterity 24

Stamina 25

Vitality 27

Constitution 27

Intelligence 52

Wisdom 41

Mental Control 66

Willpower 74

Perception 32

Charisma 14

Mana output 12

Mana 47

Mana Regeneration 12

Luck 18

0 free attribute points

His biggest limitation now was his Mana Output stat, as he could only pull 12 mana out of his core per second. Which was bearable for now, since he wasn't trying to speed cast spells, but was trying to learn how to cast. With that much mana, he could easily cast about 10 spells per mana pool.

During his training with Benedict, he honed his sword technique by performing different forms of movement. The only thing he thought he was good at was running fast with a sword, but he didn't see a new skill being offered, and he didn't want one anyway. His main goal was still the predicts skill, but he never got it. After training with the butler, Nick and Alice stayed behind to talk about the new spell for the day.

"So, Dylan. Today we will review the 1st level water spell "Water Manipulation", I think you should be able to get the mana conversion construct. This form is considered one of the simplest and it is even simpler than the air mana conversion form. Here, take the mana potion. I adjusted the dosage, but now you can only replenish your mana supply one and a half times, due to the low constitution stat and mana output, I can't give you more."

Alice took out a mana potion and a book that she handed to him, Nick drank the mana potion and put the book in his bag. He was actually just collecting Alice's books and was not going to read them, "for now". He had more important and interesting things to do than spell forms that he would not be able to understand and reproduce. Alice created a structure between her hands that looked like a water tornado. This did not seem simple to Nick at all. This spiral was made up of a lot of dense mana and only inside the structure was something similar to the structure of air mana.

"Don't worry, you'll soon realize that it's much easier than creating an air mana construct."

Nick decided to take her word for it and slowly began to assemble the structure between his hands. He tried very hard to do it the first time and spent about 100 mana, half of which dissipated in the process. But he got it right the first time, in about ten minutes. Nick was very pleased.

"Now watch as I pour mana into the structure and also activate it with willpower."

"Transformation of water mana."

Alice began to pour mana into the tornado, where it spread and swirled in different places and at the very bottom came out not the usual mana, but mana of a bluer color. Nick could even tell that it was water mana, by her feelings. He tried to do the same.

"Transformation of water mana."

Nick also tried to pour in mana and he even succeeded, but his conversion ratio was at best 1 to 2. Alice's was probably 9 to 1. Having spent 100 mana on the transformation, he had water mana in his hands, which felt completely his, he liked this feeling. The mana was very calm and obedient. While Nick admired her new mana, the mana transformation construct dissipated.

"Okay, now there are two ways to manipulate water. First, you can pour in your mana and try to control it with your willpower, or you can create a spell and use it to manipulate the water. Which do you want?"

"I just want to manipulate water, but what's stopping me from doing the same with regular mana?"

"It's nothing really, you can manipulate everything with pure mana, but if you want to manipulate something specific better, it makes sense to transform your mana and it will become much easier. Anyway, I'm not asking you to constantly transform mana to manipulate something, it was just a good lesson in mana construction."

If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"Thank you Miss Alice."

Alice handed him a flask with water inside it and Nick squeezed all his mana to pour it into a small volume of water. The harder he squeezed the mana, the better his control over the water became. On his first try, he was able to lift about 100 ml of water into the air and began moving it in different directions, flowing down his hand, and anything else he could think of. After about a minute, his control began to gradually decline until he could no longer control the mana and it dissipated.

"Dylan, to manipulate any object, be it earth or water, it doesn't matter. You spend your mana on it all the time. The longer you control the water, the less mana remains in it. Let's say you burn wood to get heat. Do you understand my analogy?"

"Yes, Miss Alice, I wanted to ask you. Is it possible to manipulate another person with ordinary mana?"

Alice decided to close her eyes to this question that undermined the morale of all the magicians and answered.

"Yes Dylan, an experienced mage could control a child with pure mana, but the older a person gets, the more mana is needed to overcome a person's resistance. It gets to the point where it is impossible for a mage to take control of someone unless he wants to burn that person from the inside with mana overload. There are mages who specialize in controlling people. In our kingdom, such mages are taken very seriously and all sorts of checks are carried out to ensure that such a mage does not abuse his position. These can be Mind Mages, Blood Mages, Healing Mages, Secret Mages and Soul Mages. All other owners of the branch of control magic that applies to people are illegal. These are Dark Mages, Necromancers, Flesh Mages and many other prohibited classes."

"What about bards, they can control people, can't they?"

"Yes, you are right about that, but only very strong bards can do that and they get the same permission from the government."

"Thank you for the explanation, Miss Alice."

"You're welcome, now you can try to control water with un-aspected mana."

Nick began to pull a lot of mana out of his core and for the first time felt a slight tension in his stomach and hands. Alice noticed this and answered him.

"This is a slight mana overload, finish your exercises and we'll go to the mansion. I heard that Miss Firel and Mr. Liam might be coming today."

Nick smiled and began to put more effort into practicing mana control. He put in all the remaining mana and was able to control about the same amount with water mana. Which was about 1:2, considering that he spent a lot of mana on the transformation form, he did not see the point in it. Alice, seeing this, decided to explain it to him.

"Hmm, that's because you drank a mana potion. If you use the mana from your core that you restored through meditation, or through regeneration. You will notice a significant increase in control using water mana. It's just that right now your mana doesn't have all the potential of your willpower in it, and therefore the difference is almost imperceptible. The stronger your willpower is, the easier it will be for you to control water using water mana than if you simply controlled it with pure mana. Understood?"

"Yes, Miss Alice. Would you like to meet Mrs. Firel and Mr. Liam with me?"

"Of course, it's not every time you can meet the Great Water Mage."

As they walked to the mansion, Nick decided to ask Alice about Liam's mother.

"Miss Alice, do you know what Mrs. Firel is remembered for in terms of her magic."

"Of course, I'm surprised that you don't know. The Changeable Water family is famous for their famous "Water Weapon" spell. They manipulate water by adding various elements to it and sometimes changing its composition. This family even shared their "Holy Water Weapon" spell, which is now used not only by the church, but also by the rest of the nobility. Mrs. Firel herself, as a Great Water Mage, was able to become famous in the battle against the Rukh lightning [Epic] 457 Lv. She was able to easily defeat this cruel monster. Her water magic was impenetrable to the Rukh lightning magic and when he decided to engage her in close combat, she cut off his wing with a special water blade spell. The monster was defeated very easily thanks to this spell, although Mrs. Firel did not say what level this spell is, many think that this spell is level 8 or higher. It is also known that Mrs. Firel has an [Epic] class, but no one knows the exact name or level does not know."

"Mmm, interesting."

Nick and Alice went into the mansion where they were invited to dinner, when they arrived they saw Miss Firel and Liam. Miss Firel had not changed at all in the five years that Nick had known her, as had all people who were over 20, but Liam now looked completely different. Firstly, his hair had acquired the color of light blue water with interspersed completely white shiny hair. As his parents had explained earlier, this was a sign of great affinity with the mana of water, even more than his parents and many other ancestors. His eyes had also slightly changed color, if before they were blue, now they had acquired the color of his hair and were light blue with white lines. In general, Liam looked like a real magical person, in addition to the unusualness of his hair and eyes, his face was incredibly beautiful, Nick was sure that Liam would never have problems in the future with finding a girlfriend for the night. Nick was almost jealous, although he still preferred his father's appearance, handsome and inconspicuous.

As dinner began, small talk ensued between the families. Nick's mother bragged about him training both the art of the phantom sword and the training of a secret mage. Firel told him that the change in Liam's appearance was definitely related to the beginning of his training as a water mage. She even told him that he was already able to cast the second-tier spell "Water Arrow" and was able to unlock the Water Magic Mastery skill. Nick knew that Liam was 8 months older than him and such an advantage was really big in this case, but he swore to himself that he would catch up with him faster in this. After dinner, everyone left and Nick invited Liam to his room for a private conversation.

"Liam, tell me what your plans are for life. I didn't ask you before because I thought it was too early, but considering that we need to choose classes, I decided to ask you about it."

"Yes, I agree, we need to start this conversation. I'm going to get two mage classes and combine them into one. I want to get a family class of Variable Water Weapon Mage [Rare] and Diamond Dust Manipulator Mage [Rare]. This way I'll get a class that will be much stronger, I checked everything I could in the family library and such a class combination is possible. But for this I need to level up both classes to level 100 and develop the schools of water magic and diamond dust to the [Rare] level. In general, it's feasible, what are your plans for your class?"

"My class will be simple, I will be a secret mage. I am not ready to give up all the advantages of various magics for the sake of one thing. Even if I could use time magic, I would still become a secret mage. It seems to me that people do not see that you can use different schools of magic in one spell to get the desired effect. Or it is so difficult that only a few use it."

"Okay, I like it. Being an arcane mage and a fast swordsman seems good. I plan on taking a melee class later, but I don't know what weapon I'll specialize in yet, there's still a lot of time for that."

"I agree that every battle mage needs a melee class. Actually, you and I are going to the academy together and after that I will gather my own group of adventurers, are you with me?"

Nick extended his hand to Liam and he laughed and shook it with more force before hugging Nick.

"Of course, why are you even asking?! I would never abandon my beloved friend!"