Len and Rick ate pastry’s filled with meat, potatoes and vegetables they’d bought from a cart, Len leading the way back to the Slumbering Willow.
A man was at the counter, he looked up as they approached. “Room?”
“Three E,” Len said.
He checked a piece of paper, “Alright.” He waved them on and watched the doorway again.
Len went through the gate and up to their room. He opened it slightly, kneeled and pushed the door jamb out of the way before pushing it open all the way.
They stepped inside, Rick moving towards the bunks. “You clean these already?”
“Yeah,” Len said, closing and locking the door, putting the door jamb under the frame with a kick.
“Nothing to write home about.” Rick looked over the room, then pushed open the shutters. He stuck his head out, checking out the alleyway below.
Len pulled his messenger bag off, putting it on the small table in the room and undid the straps, taking out the steel enchantment blanks and copper sheets Rick had given him. He checked on the paper bag from Olwell’s.
Rick came back inside the window and took off the two map cases, putting them next to the back packs.
“One on the right still has all the food in it, need to break it down into both packs. Clothes and gear are on the top bunk.” Len pushed out the chair with his foot and sat down, reaching back into his bag to take out his journal and chisel, before putting the bag down against the wall and sitting in the chair.
He opened his journal, running through the pages of information.
Enchantments were the same as any spell, it required power, direction and effect. The cultivation pad would be an interesting one, as the power portion of the spell was pushed to the max area to draw in as much mana as possible, then the direction pushed that mana out into the middle of the pad, and the effect worked to contain that mana and hold it in place.
An analogy would be the power was water, the direction was the pipe it went through and the effect was the bucket on the other side.
The balance was to keep the mana flowing, hold as much as possible and keep the enchantment powered.
Mana density is thin right now, the storms and eruptions haven’t happened yet. Mana density was the biggest factor a cultivator had to consider when increasing their core strength.
In regions of dense mana you could do multiple times the work.
He made an alteration, changing a rune to increase the amount of mana that would bleed out into the enchantment to power it.
When creating an enchantment other than the runes and lines that made it up, you had to take in account the material you were working with. There were, poor, mundane, common, uncommon and more tiers of material. Most stone was mundane, pig iron common and steel uncommon.
Mundane could hold one weak enchantment, pig iron a stronger version, steel it could hold two enchantments.
Work with what you have. He sucked on his teeth, tapping the back of his journal. “I’ll need one to draw in the mana, another to contain it.”
Another part to take into consideration was power source. You could use cores or mana stones, or other stored energy, or you could have the actual enchantment holding the energy to be used, or you could use ambient energy. Here it was just ambient mana in the area.
With a plan in place he picked up an enchantment block. Using his will he formed an image of the enchantment in reality. A blueprint made of glowing mana appeared over the blank. He infused it with a metal spell, drawing the surface of the metal that touched the blueprint up and away.
It was only a few millimetres but his mana dipped alarmingly for even that small spell.
I could use my mana to make such an enchantment in just a thought.
Len checked the blank, runes and lines were cleanly etched upon the metal’s surface. He placed it down on the table and picked up his chisel to work. Rick made noise behind him, organizing the backpacks so they’d be ready to go in a moment’s notice.
It would take Len a while to gather back that mana in the current low density. That was part of why having the cultivation pad would be so helpful.
As he chiseled, he focused on drawing mana in. The next part was going to take a whole lot more mana.
Making it from mundane or common materials would have been easier as the lower the grade of material the less mana required to directly affect it.
He checked his work, the lines and runes at the correct depth. Len put the chisel down and flipped through his journal.
He reviewed his notes and sketches out of habit more than a need. The direction was going to be the tricky one as he built out the enchantment’s structure of runes and lines in his mind. Melding in the concepts of compression and the metal element he reached out to the metal, putting his will upon it.
It was like greeting an old tool, knowing exactly how it would work in the hand.
He guided the metal into a new form, his mana draining from him. It would take someone who had formed two cores to be able to do the same work. Here he had only just formed his first core, he was nine whole stages, twenty-seven grades away from even forming his second core!
The steel compressed internally to the form he desired. The compression would retain or increase the structural integrity. Allowing it to take the strain of mana passing through.
Len let his spell pause as his mana dropped quickly to stop himself going into mana fatigue. Once he hit that point it would be hard to continue.
It was slow and frustrating, Len pushed that from his mind. Rushing is a sure way to invite mistakes in.
He focused on gathering mana and was quickly going again. His core might be weak but his will was strong.
When someone first started using their will, it would be like trying to pick up a pea with two frying pans, as one developed their control would become finer and finer.
For an enchanter who dealt with incredibly delicate runes and lines, he’d worked for years with his will, refining it constantly to the point that he could use it as well as his limbs and towards the end of his last life he could use them more reliably than his own hands.
He finished with his second pass, studying the blank.
He felt the mana drawn into the cultivation aid, like a plug had been pulled from a bathtub and the water was rushing out.
It drew in mana and pushed it out.
“Good,” He put it to the side and took out a second blank, starting to work on it. Rick had sorted out everything and was loading up the backpacks.
“What’s your plan?” Rick asked as they worked.
“I’m going to create a mana gathering formation. Then if you can lay them out in a triangle, they’ll work with one another creating a boundary and gathering mana up and pushing it inside. Add a fourth and make a square and it’ll add another fifty percent mana to the space.”
“You said you wanted four, you creating a double layer?” Rick asked.
“Yeah, an outer and inner square that will double the amount of mana drawn in by just a singular square,” Len said.
“When we started we had to snatch time between fights to cultivate,” Rick said.
“It’ll give us a massive boost,” Len said.
“Will it be too fast?” Rick asked. “We Don’t want to attract too much attention.”
“Rick, we don’t have to keep our cultivation low for fear that the God Emperor is going to kill us. Nor cap out the weapons and gear that we make for fear of it being stolen or him finding out. There are plenty of resources for the first time in nearly a hundred and thirty years.”
Len turned in his chair. Rick’s movements paused.
“Though gathering this much mana someone would?” Rick stumbled over his words.
“People barely know about mana. You see how Darnell looked at your saber? Confused by the enchantment. No one knows anything. Did you sense cores or even open mana gates in anyone?”
“In the hunter’s bureau there were some,” Rick trailed off.
“We don’t need to artificially slow down our cultivation for fear of Dennis finding out and hunting us down. Or other cultivators trying to steal out information and techniques. We’re unknown. People might not have developed mana sense or sight to even feel how strong we are.”
How many times had they held back inspiration to make a simpler piece of gear or hidden the true function of items to not draw attention.
Here there were no artificial boundaries. We could be the strongest people on the planet.
How many projects had they wanted to try but held back for fear of discovery?
“Rick, we need to get strong and fast for heading through the forest.” Len took a breath. “We have the knowledge and the ability, but never had the freedom. Don’t hold back now.”
“It took us three years to open all of our gates. It took me just a few seconds on that parade square,” Rick said.
“The younger one starts to temper their bodies and cultivate them the faster their strength will grow. We started cultivating when we were twenty-two without any idea of cultivation techniques or anything. By the time we reached a hundred and thirty, we barely formed our sixth core. Doing so only to support the raid on the vault.”
Rick gripped his fist tight. “It felt so wrong, having to hold ourselves back all the time. Slow our gains. Only talking in theories instead of making them realities.” He nodded to himself. “You’re right, we’ve got a second chance at this and we shouldn’t let it get past us.” He turned to look at Rick. “It’s a little unreal though. I keep thinking that we’re going to wake up and Dennis is there to kill us.”
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
“Even if its just a hallucination I’d like to give it my all,” Len said.
“Pretty fricking real to me,” Rick pinched himself and grinned. “Its going to take a bit to get used to. So you’re saying we could make those moving cities we talked about, or the armored trains and floating pads?”
Len blinked, it had been a long time since he thought on those projects, quietly letting his imagination die. “Yeah I don’t see why not, there’s no limit. Well we’d need a lot of materials for sure.”
“Plenty of people willing to work here if we got the coin,” Rick crossed his arms and grinned.
It was Len’s turn to become thoughtful, an idea, a dream he’d fantasized about in the back of his head. A melding of tech and magic.
He shook his head before his mind could wander too much and turned back to his work. “Hurry up with the bags, then fix us up some canteens. I’m getting thirsty. Shouldn’t take me too long fixing these up.”
Len finished up the third mana gathering marker. He put the first down in the corner he was working, the second in the corner under the bunk bed.
The third he placed near the door, about halfway between the other markers.
The mana they had been gathering focused and condensed between the three points.
Len drew in mana, relieving the strain that had come with constantly pushing so close to mana fatigue.
His body drank in the mana, his gates, raw from being opened and used so much already soothed and tempered as he circulated mana through them and through his channels.
Unconsciously he looped it through his cultivation technique, condensing it further and further.
The aches and pains of his overworked body that he’d returned to eased. The small cuts on his hands disappearing. Even small injuries hidden by youth were washed away.
“Feels good to have some more mana,” Rick said.
“Uhh huh,” Len said and drove the mana running through his body into his core.
His relaxed smile turned alarmed as the white vapor filled his core, condensing into a liquid, then solidifying. He barely registered any pressure as his core expanded slightly, changes rippliung through his channels as they branched off more, becoming stronger and wider in the process! The white drained out of the core, as a denser red vapor filled it rapidly, rushing through the liquid stage, then solid, growing bigger again!
This was just the mana he casually gathered and pushed towards his core else return it to the world and be wasted.
I was strong enough to bring up five cores to the ninth stage by myself. Thinking like this, raising the cultivation of just one core two stages was simple!
Each stage was harder than the one before and every core added another multiplier as well.
With that knowledge, wasn’t reaching six cores tens of thousands of time more difficult than achieving a white vapor core?
His core reached solid red a sense of euphoria washing through him as his channels and core grew once more. Len staggered, dropping to his knee.
Each grade of vapor, liquid and solid grew the capacity of his core, each changing color grade drastically increased not only his capacity, but the amount of mana he could draw in and the suffusion throughout his body.
Stay focused now! While it was exhilarating, he also balanced on a knife edge. His cultivation and power surged as his undeniable will had condensed so much accidentally. Though also a loss of focus would allow that condensed mana to roam free throughout his body, possibly leading to a cultivation divergence.
A young lad might be caught up in the exhilaration of it all but Len’s mind was focused and driven.
With a cracking noise Orange vapor spread through his body, he clenched his fists at the luxurious feeling as his cultivation began to slow, the vapor turning to liquid, calming halfway between liquid and solid.
Len took just the smallest amount of mana and spread it through his body, healing any injuries and calming his body.
He opened his eyes, soaked in sweat and impurities that had been pushed out of his pores.
“You cultivating already?” Rick asked.
“I didn’t mean to, I was just healing up and restoring my mana and then pushed the extra into my core,” Len stood up, grimacing at the smell.
He cast a cleansing spell, it flared to life, cleaning him and his clothes. Compared to the spell he’d used on the bed it was like drawing water from a thin pipe instead of trying to push it sideways through a fist.
“Will is a concept of the mind, as such it came with us when we regressed. Though we were old men, when healing ourselves we probably had to use a lot more mana than say a younger person might need. Though to us its not that much mana, to someone with barely a core it’s well, enough to get you to an orange liquid core?”
Rick’s eyes widened.
“Orange liquid! We haven’t even tempered our bodies, you looking to turn this place into raspberry jam!” He stabbed a finger out at Len. “I saw you were trying to hide it in your backpack too! Len are you one of those idiot lads who’d jump on a mithril cultivation pad to ‘get ahead’. Did I tell you about the potato kid?”
“I remember the potato kid!”
“Idiot jumped on a pad when he had a chance, started taking in all this damn mana. Caused his channels to diverge and he expanded, like a fucking potato!” Rick’s hands were way out to emphasize said size of potato kid. “Tempering! If you’re going to do anything over the top temper!”
“Didn’t you ‘temper’ him for five days by beating the crap out of him with your resonating strike?”
“Well all of the other bickering old farts were too scared. I had a theory, I had a plan and I had a test subject.” Rick threw out his hands and shrugged. “I don’t know what the big deal was!”
“I think the fact that he had some ancient bastard whaling on him with techniques usually used to forge weapons while laughing about the potato boy would give someone a little bit of mental trauma.”
“Mental resiliency! Got to look for the good things! He survived and his cultivation was much stronger and his body was stronger still!”
“It took him three years before he was willing to cultivate again.” Len said.
“Made him more careful about it too!” Rick pointed at him as if assured in his argument.
“He was an idiot,” Len agreed.
“Yeah, not the smartest one, determined little fucker.” Rick acknowledged.
“What happened to him?”
“Mana storm pushed a beast wave into a city he was protecting. Died on the walls.”
Len lowered his head Wait a minute. “Well he hasn’t died yet.”
“What do you?” Rick’s brain actually started working. “Being back in time. No he’s not, heck he was what fifteen years younger than us?”
“So he’d be two years old or so?”
“So a cuter potato,” Rick surmised.
“That’s what you get out of that?”
“Favorite plant potatoes.” Rick said. “How’s your body doing though?”
Len glared at him, he was not turning into a damn punching bag. “Body is strained, going to need some tempering but I’m alright. Going to work on the last few mana gathering markers. Won’t take long with this formation setup.”
“Good,” Rick clapped his hands together. “I’ll get started on the canteens!”
Len used his etching blueprint on the fourth blank, it was much deeper and detailed compared to before, his mana flowing easily as he took his chisel to it and created the internal structure he desired at the same time.
Rick put the backpacks against the wall opposite the bed, before grabbing the copper sheets and sitting on the lower bunk.
Len finished his fourth blank and went onto his fifth.
He bent them into shape, flicking the metal as he needed to alter them just exactly how he wanted, then used heating and metal spells to meld the sheets together into a water tight cup and a funnelled top.
Len looked up from his eighth and final mana gathering marker. Rick had put the ‘cups’ beside him and was cutting wood from the bunk bed to act as a stopper.
Len took out his knife but didn’t use the mana blade, the copper was thin enough already. The enchantment was simple, it would draw the water in the air around it to the canteen, the directional part was the trickiest to get it into the mouth of the canteen instead of just all over it.
He carved most of the enchantment into the inside of the cup.
“Here you are,” Rick said.
Len turned, catching the top of another canteen. He put it on the desk, carving the last parts of the enchantment. When the water reached the top of the canteen it would stop filling.
Len added a cleansing rune as well, you’d have to activate it with your own mana but it would cleanse the bottle and water within keeping it safe to drink no matter what.
He matched the funnelled top and the cup bottom together using his understanding of flame and metal to meld the two together.
The enchantment drew in mana and the bottle cooled. Len listened to the side, hearing water beading within.
“Want me to lay out the markers?” Rick asked.
“Sure,” Len said, handing the canteen and markers over to him. Rick traded him the other canteen top and Len went to work on it.
Rick put the canteen on the top bunk and then started laying out the markers, two squares, one inside the other and half turned.
Len pulled the stopper out of the second canteen so it could fill.
He moved his hand through the air, it was thick with mana and getting denser with every passing second.
“Body tempering first then,” Len said. “The stronger our bodies the more mana they can handle. Also I’m going to need it to stay ahead of my cultivation.” He hated the brutish training. Though the ladies do like how it looks.
“You got it.” Rick grinned. “Now there’s the slow way of pushups, situps, squats and using weights, or…” He held up his fist.
Len’s eye twitched, Rick’s smile taking on a crazy edge. Resonating Strike.
“Rock paper scissors?” Len tried to make it not come out pitiful. Rick’s smile only widened as he held out his hand.
“Rock paper, shoot.” They said together.
Shit, paper.
“Guess you’re going first, should give the pad time to gather more mana,” Rick said.
Fuck. It sounded pitiful even to Len.
***
Rick studied the ebbs and flows of the mana around him as Len sat down in the middle of the formation.
Rick grabbed his canteen and held it out to Len. He accepted it with a nod and finished off the water that had been captured inside.
Tempering the body meant breaking it down, then using mana to rebuild it stronger than before. If one didn’t have a strong enough body when cultivating they would have trouble drawing in more mana to increase their cultivation, or if they did increase their cultivation past what their body could handle it could make their cultivation to divert, collapse and create terrible health issues.
It was why the younger one was, the greater leaps they could make in their cultivation, the body could take more, be trained faster.
Though we figured out an even faster way to build up someone.
Using physical exercise and weight was great. Though was it not injuring the body and rebuilding it stronger? With the power of mana one could recover even faster, so would they not need greater injuries. Also to temper the organs and bones? That wasn’t something that you could do with just physical exercise.
“Temper the body, cultivate mana, steel the mind.” Len said as if he was going off to war.
Rick rubbed the back of his head awkwardly. This is for your own good. He couldn’t hide his own excitement buried deep within though “Want to lie down?”
“And have you break the floor? No thank you.”
I should be able to mitigate it and just focus it on his body. Rick shrugged. Like this he could go full out more.
“Lets see just how far we can push you,” Rick grinned.
“Fuck,” Len breathed out, trying to relax his body as much as possible.
Rick gathered mana through his body, organizing it to resonate through his channels, through his fist.
It was the same technique Rick used when smithing. Through his familiarity with it, he’d modified it to be an offensive fighting skill.
He’d strike his opponents armor, the mana threads resonating through the armor, harming the person inside.
Then he figured out ways to use the armor to increase the power of his blows.
With his control it had become a hellish technique, working through his enemy’s defense. That’s when I came up with the idea to use it on someone to break them down, and then they rebuild themselves with mana.
Rick set his feet and struck out at Len, hitting him in the shoulder, the impact transmitting through his skin, muscles, bones and organs.
Len yelled in his mouth, using his mana instinctively to help his natural recovery. Rick held a hand on Len’s back, feeling what was happening within Len’s body. Stress fractures on the bones, the organs took that better than I thought, same with the muscles.
Rick dished out another hit, checking the damage. Then started to pick up the pace, hitting Len and moving around him. His tendrils of mana, tearing through Len, breaking down his body as mana fought to increase his recovery.
Bruises appeared across Len’s body, rapidly recovering as Rick worked him over.
Rick paused as the mana remained dense. I could beat—train him continuously with this. Just how fast would we progress?
Rick tilted his head to the side, already they were progressing rapidly. It had taken them three years to form their first core. They’d done it in a day?
Rick picked up the pace, hitting harder, keeping a constant watch of Len, holding him in place with one hand and punching with the other.
Len grunted and groaned; his eyes closed tight. Rick moved around him his hits going faster as he tempered Len’s body like he’d hammer a piece of metal into shape.
“Hey!” A knock came from the door.
“Huh?” Rick turned facing the door.
“Keep the damn noise down! People are trying to sleep. If you want some privacy go to a place that has thicker walls. And you’re paying the clean the sheets tomorrow!” The man growled through the door.
Len grunted on the floor, his teeth clamped shut as he repaired his body.
Sheets, pay tomorrow privacy—Rick shivered down to his horrified bones.
“Its not like that!”
“Keep it down.” The man hissed and stomped away.
He made to open the door, but Len on the floor, sweaty and healing himself. Arggh! Rick dropped his hand.
Len pushed himself to his knee and then up to standing. He grabbed a backpack and pulled out a shirt, throwing it to Rick.
“Your turn.”
“Ah well you know we don’t want to keep everyone else awake,” Rick said. I didn’t go too overboard did I?
Len drew on his mana, it spread out through the room. He rose to standing and cracked his knuckles. “Temper the body, cultivate mana, steel the mind.”
It didn’t sound like a mantra anymore, it sounded like a declaration! His hand feel on Rick’s shoulder filled with boundless strength. As the body was tempered it naturally became stronger.
Rick sat where Len had been and bunched the shirt up, putting it between his teeth.
He drew the mana in—Len’s punch tore through his back, nearly bursting his organs and making his bones creak.
The impacts were measured to tear through him, injuring without killing. Len brought him to the edge of serious injury, moving constantly to spread it throughout.
There was so much mana it felt like Rick was drowning in it as it rushed through his body into his wounds, repairing them completely.
Is this tempering or did I do something wrong to you?
Rick couldn’t open his mouth to complain as Len continued the process.