How had the cores before the Entity anchored things in place? That was the question that the Core had for the world, even if none could answer it. So much thought had been spent coming up with the ideas of anchors, so many loops and hoops being jumped through to make sure it would work in theory. Yet, the Entity knew that it had been done before, knew that a thousand had thought of it before it had even had a chance of such a thing. But… thinking back, even more, it was near-impossible for it to be told what methods were used. It had no list of events that had occurred before its creation, and neither were there any creatures old and wise enough to talk or say anything that the Core hadn't already known. It was quite annoying to be forced through.

Even more annoying was the lack of compliance coming from the Basalt. The first idea being tried out was to assimilate the higher density of Mana into the material itself, making it a part of its natural way of life. However, this was looking harder and harder to do, the Basalt seeming on full tilt into running into certain death. Every time a certain level of density was hit, the border cracked, and all the stone and material exploded outwards into a world of shrapnel. It was quite the dangerous procedure, that first attempt with the experiment causing the small jagged rocks to hit nearly every creature in its domain, the Core included. While those ten health points lost from the operation showed that it could be used in future attack tactics, the Core instead decided to focus on making a small wall able to hold off any future explosions.

And that small stone wall had certainly saved the domain a lot of unnecessary pain, so many explosions had. No matter how it was inserted, the Basalt would not be able to hold onto more energy than it was made for. It was a truth that wasn't well-liked, the Core even noting that it was bordering on being outright hated, yet more attempts were without issue. The Entity tried out different injection sites, administering the border itself the Mana instead of the inside, and then seeing if the maximum was increased. And it was… for a few minutes before it all destabilised due to the Mana balance being destroyed slowly, causing an explosion larger than any other before it.

Even a solid wall of stone hadn't been able to stop a few of those projectiles created, a few hitting the [Moss] at high enough speeds to kill certain spots. The [Giant-Ants] tending to that part of the plants had not been amused by it, making the Core decide to stop that avenue of thought. It even disregarded it as a possible tactic for defence. While the attack power of the technique was more than a little high, the energy required was at a level where other possibilities were much more efficient, being able to dole out more damage at half the cost.

So another method needed to be used. Here it came to be something closer to forcing the Mana to stay put through the power of Intent. While funnelling the Mana into a wall just through materials, not trying to join it but to stay beside it, the Core focused on the idea of it staying in that exact location in space, doing its best to keep away any form of Mana that would try and escape. It was hard to create, and it certainly required more than just a small bit of Mana to make work on a small patch of the wall, but the result was somewhat surprising.

Even with no thought surrounding the act of sustaining the Mana-Wall, it kept itself raised stopping any of the Mana from coming through. Not a single drop did, in fact, much to the surprise of the Core. It was scarily effective, to a point where it believed it might have found an answer to all its problems already.

Or the Core thought it had, for a minute or two, until it realized a smaller problem attached with it. The wall of Mana had been ordered to not move around intentionally, stopping all Mana from moving through. That was the entire thought when creating it, and that should have been perfectly fine. Yet it wasn't. And the Entity was beginning to realise why.

When two groupings of Mana moved towards each other, one having a higher density than the other, the one with a higher count would win at every point, whatever direction it had picked being the one that was made no matter what. Yet, there would always be a small bit of speed lost no matter what, the smaller grouping of Mana still taking a cut of the movement for itself.

But… that was all fine, right? A small bit of total movement was lost, but the higher density still picked the direction. Yes, it most certainly was fine when the higher-density was moving at all. However, this wasn't the case with the wall of Mana created, the Core very specifically stopping it from moving around internally. And when groups of Mana with lower density constantly pressed again it, them getting no real movement pushed back at them, they would win over time. That was an issue, the wall getting its location made further back over time.

The Core was forced to retrieve it at that point, taking the Mana back from itself. The idea of Intent made it possible. There was the possibility of making it stay in place without being pushed, but how that last step was done was something not truly known at the current moment. The Entity would have loved to say it could say, yet it was harder and harder. It needed some rope from the [System], just like had been done earlier on. It needed a tethering to the truth, something that would reveal the next step.

… Maybe that was the real objective. The Core didn't need to put the whole wall of Mana inside of the Basalt to make it connect. A corner barely even needed to be inside. The only thing truly required was a strong tether, one which could force the movement over to the physical object which would then provide the resistance needed t stop the Mana-wall from being pushed back over time!

Now was the question of how to implement it. Or in what order it needed to be done. For there were many, each having some pull for it. Would the tethers be made first, and, if so, how many tethers for each part of the Mana-Wall? Questions like that were needed to be answered beforehand, the Core having to deliberate on the grip-strength of a tether. It hadn't been done before yet it kinda needed to test it out.

Moving away from making the Mana-Walls from the briefest of moments, the Core tried to figure out how to measure the strength of a tether. Perhaps make a rope of standard size, create it with a specific amount of Mana, and then change the power at which it was pulled from both sides? That also implied that the Core knew how much it would require to hold beforehand. How much power did the tether need to hold? The Core put out Mana at the rate of about one Mana every eight seconds. Dividing that up by a hundred for each pane of the walls, it would be about… half of a quarter of a hundredth Mana per second. Not the most extreme amount, though that was technically the minimum. With time, it would likely grow and the tether wouldn't need to be remade just because of that, right? Instead, it would be better to make them sturdy from the start so that the usability would last for many months or even years. Though, they would likely have to be moved in that time due to expansion, but who needed to think about that?

A fiftieth of a Mana each second seemed appropriate enough as a requirement. With time, it would likely seem like a small thing, but the Core was currently scared of accidentally pushing Mana through in a burst-like fashion. It would likely have to circumvent those walls being created each time it wanted to do something like it. Such a task wouldn't be too hard to do, but the consequences of not doing it would be that a portion of the walls would be destroyed, likely using out a larger portion of Mana before it could be resealed.

But, thinking of consequences was not the way forward. Instead, the experiment was set up. A tether was put onto the air with a specific Mana inside while the two ends were being pushed with the power equivalent to a hundredth of a Mana on each side. It was hard to think in such specific amounts, but the [Mana-Sense] skill certainly helped in dividing it up into conscionable numbers. Perhaps the [System] could even prove useful in the future with such things.

Finding the balance of the testing was quite the hard one. With the first try, it split apart within a moment, having no chance of keeping up with the power. So… the cost for the tether was doubled up and attempted again. That failed as well and was therefore met with a tripling of the cost. That worked which then made the Core change it to a doubling instead of the original tripling. That didn't work. This was annoying but the Entity started cutting up and down, trying it out a few times to make sure there weren't any inconsistencies present, before finally finding the perfect balance after a full hour of working around. The actual number of particles present in the tether was counted at that point, the Core was not able to not do it. That was how long a time had been spent to make sure it worked flawlessly.

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The Core was just about ready to start implementing the barrier around its home before another message came along. It was certainly not what had been expected. Maybe an increase in [Mana-Manipulation] that had been gained steadily over time or something but most definitely not this.

Congratulations!

You have levelled up and reached level [6] You have been granted [1] attribute points.

Instantly putting the new point over in [Willpower] and letting it reach fourteen in total, the Core was certainly happy with the gain. It seemed that experience truly did count over to the Entity no matter what position the creatures doing the killing were in. There was some minor confusion on why they had started it up so quickly, though. Was the other base of operations really that close by?

Looking over at the [Moss] do double-check the time, it seemed fourteen hours had gone by in the blink of an eye. That was… unsettling. Things were starting to take more and more time, to the point where the Core hardly realised it anymore. The ability to dedicate the mind to a single task and nothing else was perhaps a great boon when only one thing needed to be thought about, but the fact that it was giving out such consequences of temporal dissonance was more than a little unsettling. Weeks had gone by before without notice. The Core could only fear when that would turn into a couple of months. Or maybe it could even reach the mystical years. There was no way to know.

What was clear, however, was the fact that the group would have to return within the next eight hours, lest they would be replaced. Though… when they came back, they would likely get another member to the group. With the new gain in [Willpower], nothing was stopping the Core to add another to the attacker's bunch. Making life tougher for the enemies would certainly be a boon for it, the losses stopping it from being able to attack the Core.

Not that it wasn't expecting some sort of retaliation. Because there most definitely would be. The Core knew that the time would come where the Queen had enough of the prodding and would send over a squadron help bent on tearing the Core in four different ways at once, making it lose its…

Well, that was quite peculiar. For a moment, the Entity had thought itself to have arms and legs. Double-checking to make sure there was no such thing, perhaps even doing it a third time to make extra sure, the Core grew a little confused. Never before had it attained any sort of physical body, so why did it think it had one now. Was he doing alright? Was the stress hitting him harder than normal? Maybe he needed to go down and see if she had anything that could-

Mentally blinding pain hit the Core, harder than ever before. The surroundings blurred together and, for just a moment, it swore it could sense the taste of oak and ash and thorn. Which didn't make sense, since it never could taste at all. Yet… it knows knew what that sensation was. How? It didn't try and question it. A moment before had been spent being distracted and it had given in to something that did not make sense inside. That had brought nothing but pain, nothing but a crippling feeling of it all burning up inside. The Entity refused to think about it again, fearing the pain would start anew if the soul catched wind of curiosity.

What was it doing before? The Core’s mind pulsed with pain just enough to make it grow weary of thinking at all, making it hard to figure out how memories worked again. There had been something about tethers, how they worked… oh, yes! The walls needed to be remade. That had been the task that the Entity had decided on, just after it had looked at the [Moss] and saw it was…

No, that wasn't quite right. Before, it could have sworn there was eight hours until the group of attackers would come back to show off their new levels. Yet the Entity must have been confused at the time since there was only four left now. It couldn't have been distracted with pointless thoughts for that long right? Of course not. The Core must just have looked at it in the wrong way at the time.

Going back to the task at hand, the Entity knew that it needed to speed up the process if it was to be finished before the group returned. That meant that the procedure had to be perfected quickly so that it could speedily go through it all without issue. And that was the hard part, however.

One small error surrounding the apparent speed needed for the walls was the massive amount of Mana required to make it work. One panel could be done with a hundred Mana. Not the highest cost in the world and it was certainly doable with some focus. But… making over a hundred and fifty of those? Now that was quite an expensive procedure. Manual regeneration would require to be put to the max if it was going to shovel in the… fifteen thousand Mana needed for the full set? That was more than the Core had used through most of its early life!

But… if that was the price needing to be paid, then the Entity would accept the debt. It was either that or doing it at a lower level where it would be needed to be redone in a few weeks. And that kind of short-term longevity was not accepted. Permanence was the greatest there ever wast

Complaining about it did nothing about the costs, however, and so the Core began to funnel in the Mana required while simultaneously expelling it into the required shapes. That wouldn't have been possible before, honestly, the extra point of will likely doing more of the heavy-lifting than the Core expected at the start. So much pressure was on it yet the feeling was slightly more bearable than usual. It was quite… surprising to say the least. There were some ideas about holding on with a strand of a tether yet it felt like more speed could be gained if it truly pushed.

Not that it would do such a thing, the Entity having a good chance of burning out before it finished. Four hours of work was already turning into the. There was no need to try to make it two and end up with it being eight instead. There were limits to how far the Core could go before the problems started up.

So the speed was consistent for that first hour, with almost an entire side of the walls being done with. The Mana-Density held up even after thirty minutes of staying around, the tethers being positioned in a way that made sure that gaps were not to be found in between the panels, while all the materials that were anchored to were held with a watchful eye to make sure the pressure on them wasn't affecting them negatively. It would have been quite the loss to suddenly find the pressing again hundreds of tons of material consistently for longer periods of times would make it so that they dislodged themselves and after that fall onto the Core and everybody else inside the domain. Truly be a sad day if such a thing ever happened. Luckily, the Entity knew it would recognize it several moments before it could start and would therefore be able to shield itself to some level. Sure, that shielding would likely involve rolling down a tube to a Moss-covered opening four meters down, where none of the other creatures could come with, but who truly needed to think of things like that? There were many other parts to make sure about.

One of those was the larger pressure put onto the remaining space. With less direction to choose from, the Mana thrown away was denser. This also had the side-effect of letting the Core see slightly more in one direction than the other. It was only a meter or two more, but it was an interesting tactic that could be used in the future. If handled correctly, the Core could open a small hole in the walls to let out excess Mana, which would likely grant it a twenty-ish second window where it could see a long distance in a specific direction. Sure, it would likely not be as accurate or perfect as a burst-fire, but it would certainly prove to be an interesting experience. Though, that was still saved for later when the Entity had the entire thing built. For now, there was still two this remaining.

Not that it felt like that, the Core speeding through it a bit faster than originally anticipated. The Entity was still well within the limits of what it could do without any ends attached, but that didn't mean that it wasn’t slightly worried. The confidence from the new [Willpower] was perhaps a bit too great? Many other thoughts could have come from the boost, so why had it so suddenly chosen to get overconfident in its abilities? The Core was meant to be surrounded by self-doubt. That was certainly better than attempting larger feats of mental strength and then failing speculatory, the consequences of its actions causing pain and destruction for all within its domain.

That led it to slow down a small bit, not wanting to see what could from speeding up a bit more. If one of the tethers or more of them was improperly put in place, the energy from the walls could theoretically slowly be siphoned over to the materials. If that happened… what was a good name for it. A timed explosion where the due date was between a minute and a year? A reason to stress indefinitely, in other words. If the Core messed up, there would be no way to no for a longer amount of time. Yet when it was shown off, the consequences could kill more than a few of its minions.

Another hour passed, this own reaching the expected points. All the sides had been done with careful precision, only the top and bottom needing to be finished then. The Core went through the bottom first, not truly caring to figure out what a focused stream of Mana in that direction held. No… it was much more interested in what there was fifty meters higher into the upper directions.

And when the panels and tethers down below were fully installed, it began to grow clearer. More and more dirt replaced the stone ten meters above, the intermediate layers growing more and more in favour of the more moldable material. When another twenty minutes passed, with only a few panels remaining to be installed properly, all the Mana generated being pushed in that single direction, dirt had overtaken it entirely. Though… there was no top seen. Even thirty meters up provided nothing.

… That was unacceptable, the Core wanting to know more. If thirty meters wasn't the distance to the surface, maybe a concentrated burst would show the true distance? Filling up its mind with Mana, putting it into a ball denser than most seen before, the new [Willpower] helping with that considerably, the shot was made and the results rained down.

For a brief moment, the Core’s world was wider than ever before.