Everything hurts.

It's day three of our training with Albatos, and my beating continues unabated. Our days begin with balancing practice then turn to sparring between Orelio and me.

Though I call it sparring it's really a guise for Orelio beating the shit out of me. Sure, I hold the advantage in skill when it comes to straight sparring, but Albatos' random magical intervention to trip me up never fails to loosen my defenses enough for Orelio to land a blow.

"This sucks," Orelio says while looking dejected, "It's hard to improve significantly when I get free hits in."

"Oh, it sucks for you, does it?" I shoot back scathingly from the ground. Though his quarterstaff doesn't quite have the lethality of a spear, it's still capable of breaking bone. Testament to that is the blood leaking out of my shattered nose, the extreme aching of my arms, and the difficulty I have breathing which I presume is caused by a fractured or broken rib.

"Alright, that's enough," Albatos says with a clap, "Let's try this again, Stein."

"Yeah, yeah," I mutter under my breath. I still have no clue what I'm supposed to be doing, but since I know complaining won't get me anywhere I put my mind to the task. I've spent the last two days searching for some vague feeling of power from beyond, which has netted me jack all.

Suppose it's time to actually think about this.

I go over the discussion I had with Nika. She said healing magic was divided into two categories, the knowledgeable and the improvisational, as I called them. The church used knowledge to regenerate damage, while country doctors used what they knew of medical care to improv healing spells based on treatment methods.

Albatos said my healing had a golden glow to it, which likely put it in the knowledge category since the church's spells also have a golden glow to them. The problem is I know jack shit about human biology myself. I mean sure I have a general idea of where all the important parts and organs are, but I highly doubt general knowledge is enough to bring them back into existence.

Putting the pieces together, one would assume the blessing I received gave me the knowledge required to heal myself, but it didn't. We had already experimented with attempts to regenerate simple cuts, and that had turned out rather disastrously.

We had actually made more work for poor Vanderburst, as it turned out we had to completely cut out the portion of mutated flesh I had generated onto myself, so instead of healing a cut he had to heal a massive gash.

With a sigh, I give up. My pondering isn't bringing any new revelations to the table and I'm starting to feel lightheaded from the persistent nosebleed. With a wave, I call Vanderburst over.

As Vanderburst goes through the process of healing me Albatos walks over. With a sigh he says, "We'll be moving on from spells today. You've both gotten passably good at balancing magic so I think it's time we start prototyping some projections."

"What do you mean prototyping?" Orelio asks with a quizzical look.

"It means we'll be making projections, and finally elevating Stein to a first tier sorcerer."

"I already have a projection, so can I skip this part?" A flick to the head is the only response to that question.

Thanking Vanderburst, I stand up fully healed, "I thought there would be extra steps before we moved on to projections."

"You can think of a projection as simply a spell that by default consumes no mana."

"I thought it had something to do with the innate domain or whatever too?"

"It does, but until you understand the structure of domains, using them as a basis for instructing is pointless. Once you understand domains you can use mana to balance out a projection, but the cost to benefit ratio is usually exorbitant so it's not standard, and definitely not useful for protracted encounters."

"So how do we start?"

"Think of a spell to cast on yourself and balance it out to the point where there's no mana expended to use it."

"Any useful examples?"

"The easiest method for a projection onto yourself is to balance it out with either pain or damage, but those aren't exactly options I'd recommend. Figure it out yourself, it'll be more effective if it's an original concept."

I do so love being told to do a task without being told how to do it.

Putting my reservations aside I once again get to thinking about what effect I'd want and how to counterbalance it.

What effect do I want? Orelio's projections all increase his speed, so maybe it would be best to start along those lines. Instead of speed I'll increase my strength.

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With a desired effect decided that leaves the question of what the counterbalance would be. I already feel like my daily pain threshold has been reached, so I'm not too keen on the idea of additional suffering. Orelio's projection is based on a combo, so I wonder if I should do something similar. Suddenly I'm struck by a thought.

The combo aspect of Orelio's projection makes me think of the fighting games I played as a teen, which in turn makes me think of another kind of game. In JRPGs sometimes physical fighters didn't use mp for special attacks, but built up a gauge through normal attacks.

I don't have any special moves to pull off, but if I can build up a type of 'points' through basic attacks then consume a set number of points I could simply increase the force of my next blow.

With that image in my mind, I attempt to channel mana into the concept… and feel the flow break.

Well, I couldn't expect it to work first try.

I'd felt this sensation a lot in the past few days. It's what happens when you either balance a spell wrong or the concept isn't strong enough to materialize. I'm confident I have a good enough grasp of the idea, so the issue is in the balancing.

I hoped to be able to have a negligible counter effect like Orelio, but it seems the guy really is an overly talented freak.

Let's see, what if I add the condition that the only attacks that build up points are unarmed blows?

I use a rapier primarily when fighting, which made this next to worthless to me in a real scrap. But this is training, which means it doesn't matter how useless this ability might be, only that it works properly.

Funneling mana into the concept, I feel the spell start to form. Moving my body in the way that feels most natural I bring my fists up in a boxer's stance. With the activation motion complete I feel the projection take hold.

It's a strange thing, using magic without expending mana. It feels more akin to reinforcement than magic, since it feels like I imbued my body with mana without wasting it.

Walking over to a training dummy I take a stance. Prototyping is a pretty accurate way to describe this, I realize. Even though the concept was projected, I hadn't applied any specific rules onto it. It's like trying to describe a painting only using colors as descriptors.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

I punch the dummy, seeing if I feel anything. I wonder if Orelio keeps count or just generalizes what number he's at when his projection is active. Knowing him I bet he generalizes.

Though a punch constitutes a point, I don't feel any different after throwing it. Shrugging to myself, I throw another.

I keep throwing punches until the fifth punch lands with way more force than I intend. The dummy swings backward and then comes back around and hits me back while I stand there stunned.

"Come on, don't let a lifeless puppet beat you up too," Albatos says, walking over. Seeing me stare at my fist processing he asks, "Not what you expected to happen?"

"No, not really."

"That's why it takes patience to develop a projection. Trial and error is key. Don't let the beastkin intimidate you, he really is a freak for managing it the way he did."

"Yeah, I think I got it now."

"I like the look in your eye. I'll let you train on your own for the rest of today. Try not to hurt yourself."

As he starts to walk away I call out, "Wait, I wanted to ask you something."

"What?" His tone is neutral, and the slight twitch of his lip tells me he doesn't wish to talk any more than necessary.

"What do you think of that man, Isao?"

Albatos takes a slow and measured breath before answering, "I'm honestly not sure. He's so normal that at first I didn't believe he's the real deal. But I can't deny the presence that sword gives off."

"Yeah… Do you know of a way to exert a force on external objects without using magic or a domain?"

"I assume you mean without simply doing it yourself. Tell me what happened."

After a brief explanation of what Isao did in the pub Albatos falls silent, stroking his wisps of chin hairs.

After a minute he says, "My best guess would be a passive domain, but it seems unlikely."

"What's a passive domain?"

"It's easier to show you, Domain Expansion." I feel myself enveloped in Albatos' domain.

"You can feel this, right?" He asks, motioning to the space around us. At my nod he continues, "How about… now?"

As he speaks I feel the presence of his domain weaken considerably. It's still there, but it feels muted somehow.

"Faintly, yeah I still feel it."

"That's a passive domain. In a sense I've thinned the domain, making it less noticeable. It's possible to train yourself to thin it out even further, but I find it pointless so I haven't spent the time."

"Why's it pointless?"

"You can't project onto a passive domain, at least not by usual means. The projection fails to latch on so to speak."

"So even if he used a passive domain it still wouldn't explain him launching a slash."

"No, it wouldn't."

"So you're as clueless about it as I am."

He gives me a look that says he knows I'm baiting him, but he still responds, "I'd bet anything he got a handle on conceptual mastery that neither of us would be able to comprehend."

I don't bother asking the obvious and instead make a little waving motion for him to continue.

"Conceptual mastery is about how deep your understanding of a base concept is. It's said to be the unofficial threshold for fourth tier sorcery. The more profoundly you understand a concept the more your magic or projection can affect the world around you. It's said the sword god can cut anything, so I'd guess his conceptual mastery of cutting is unparalleled. Another example that comes to mind is Djudiria's Archmage, who's said to have a mastery over the concept of destruction."

With a frown I ask, "But even with conceptual mastery you still need magic or a projection, right? So if he didn't use either then how…?"

"I have no idea. More than anything, that proves he's the real deal. Cutting is an extremely common concept for sorcerers to try to master, and for a long time, it was thought that such a simple concept could only take you to fourth tier, that it wasn't as profound as it seemed. Then that man appeared and smashed through every record, every measurement for strength there was using only that concept. Frankly, I never believed most of the stories I heard about him. Now I wonder how many of them were true."