I was sitting on the deck, enjoying the sunset colors reflecting off the water in a tranquil mood. Mahya was still playing with the engine, so we were sailing on wind power alone, and today, there was almost no wind. I watched the bank drift by and felt drowsy from the peace and quiet when Mahya approached me with a purposeful stride.
“Did you make the list Lis advised you to make of everything you need to do?” she asked, her voice throwing me out of the serene moment.
“No ... why do you ask?” I replied, glancing up at her, startled by the sudden question.
“I need you to add something when you finally make the list.”
“What?”
“Some kind of wind magic. I bought the spell Wind Funnel to steer the balloon, but you shouldn’t buy one—you’d better develop it yourself.” Mahya’s eyes narrowed when she emphasized the last part.
“Okay, I’ll add it to the virtual list.”
“You probably should make it an actual list.” She tilted her head, a slight smirk on her lips, like she could already predict my reluctance.
“Yeah, you’re right.” I sighed, realizing she had a point.
“Also, it’s your turn to steer the boat.” Mahya pointed toward the helm, her expression softening into a small smile as she turned to leave me to my thoughts.
I got up, went to the helm, positioned myself, took a pen and paper, and began making the list.
1. Practice mind-splitting and increase the number of splits.
2. Practice mana control.
3. Learn advanced aspects.
4. Create a loot spell instead of just mana manipulation—may need two spells, one for monsters and the other for the rest.
5. Build a ranged spell.
6. Continue practicing affecting matter through mana.
7. Learn how to channel external mana.
8. Learn to channel mana through Rue.
9. Wind or air spell.
10. Find a painless way to enlarge the secondary channels.
11. Selective Profile popping out.
12. Do something with the stone balls—I know they’ll be useful, but need to figure out how.
Well, I had a lot of work ahead of me. I reviewed the list and selected item number seven as the most crucial—I needed to figure out how to channel external mana.
My time at the helm was always my favorite; I used it to practice my telekinesis. The first three days we sailed, I controlled the sails manually until I was at the helm and had to change one of the sails, but I couldn’t leave the helm because we were too close to the bank, so I moved the sail with telekinesis. From that moment on, I trained to do it only with telekinesis.
At first, it wasn’t easy because the spell couldn’t reach everywhere I needed to, but little by little, with training and as I leveled up the spell, especially after it reached level 10, I learned how to control things on the whole boat.
Now, a thought occurred to me: while the annoying book referred to it as channeling external mana, Lis consistently referred to it as controlling external mana. Maybe I shouldn’t channel it at all, but control it instead?
I started trying to do the same things I did with telekinesis with my mana. I started small by attempting to control the helm, using my mana instead of my hands. It required total concentration, but was quite simple. Next, I tried to adjust the sail’s angle using my mana but couldn’t reach it. My mana reached a certain distance and dissipated.
I recalled the first book Lis gave me to learn about mana and the exercises I did while studying it. I returned to these exercises, but this time with a twist. My goal was not to control my mana but external mana, so I tried to see if I could move or influence external mana based on the principles I learned from that book.
After three hours of failed attempts—the mana refused to cooperate—I tried something new. I flowed my mana around me, then tried to move it—not just my own, but together with the external mana. It sort of worked. I did move the surrounding mana, but ninety percent of it—or maybe even more—was my mana, not external mana. But the fact that some of the mana was external proved that I was on the right track.
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I continued to practice with the same idea, and when Alfonsen came to replace me at the helm, I told him I would continue to steer, and he had the evening off. In the middle of the night, when I had to drop anchor and go to sleep, I reached the point where I controlled about twenty percent of the external mana. I still felt it wasn’t perfect, because I had almost to drain my entire mana pool to fill the surrounding space to get to that stage.
The next day, after thinking a bit about my exercises from yesterday, I had to admit that it was a failure. Maybe I moved some external mana, but it wasn’t the right direction. What helped me was that when I was in the right direction, I always felt that I was in the right direction—not knowledge from the system, but my inner knowledge that told me I was on the right track. This time, I didn’t have it.
I thought about going back to searching for books, but I didn’t feel like it. The last book was so annoying that I gave up on reading. Oh, and I had to use a whole bunch of mana and learn all these languages to find something similar.
I always succeed when I figure things out myself, so I would do the same this time, even if I make mistakes. If you don’t make mistakes, you don’t learn, I told myself. I spent the entire day lost in thought, trying to crack this puzzle. At some point, I asked myself, “How do you control something outside of you?”
This stopped me short. I did control something that was outside of me. All the stone balls I created were not a part of me; instead, I manipulated the mana within the stone to alter it, affecting external mana. It wasn’t the ambient mana; it had a shape and an aspect, but it was still the external mana I controlled!
This time, I was sure I was on the right track; there was no doubt in my mind. I sat down and activated my mana awareness. I aimed not to perceive my surroundings, people, or objects, but to sense the entirety of the world. As I pushed my awareness to its limits, I discovered that my field of mana sensing grew, enabling me to reach both banks.
That’s a pleasant surprise.
After I reached the limit of my mana sensing, I sat and felt everything around me—the water, the banks, the fish in the water, the wind—and then I began to feel the mana. I felt the mana all around me, not in objects or elements. I sank deeper and deeper until I was one with the world and the mana. After losing track of time, I saw it was sunset and realized we were approaching Nanjing; I couldn’t determine how much time had passed.
I replaced Alphonse at the helm; he still didn’t feel comfortable steering the boat into a marina, and we sailed into Nanjing. We had no specific plans in Nanjing, so the following day, we bought five more computers just to be safe, made a list of the interesting things in the city, and went exploring.
We visited the Confucius Temple complex, which was very peaceful, as well as the Presidential Palace and the Linggu Temple complex. Rue and I toured the Nanjing Museum and the Ming Xiaoling Tomb alone—they were still not interested in “old things buried underground.”
I went on another market tour and bought more cooking supplies and a lot of street food; Nanjing had a great selection.
Following a five-day stay in Nanjing, we set sail for Zhenjiang. We reached Zhenjiang that evening, since it was relatively close, and the strong wind helped us get there quickly. After mooring in the marina, I made an elaborate stir-fry for dinner, and we sat down to eat.
I asked Alfonsen, “Do you know if the wizard in your kingdom channels external mana or controls it?”
Alfonsen paused, his brow furrowing in thought. “I am uncertain. My father mentioned channeling it,” he began, his voice tinged with doubt, “but I wonder if he exercises control over it instead?” He glanced away, his expression pensive. “I do not possess enough understanding of wizard magic to determine the difference between the two.”
“Okay, thanks.” I nodded, appreciating his honesty, even if it left me with more questions than answers.
After dinner, I returned to my practice and focused on immersing myself in the mana again. However, this time, I split my mind into three sections before fully immersing myself in the mana. This was an opportunity to improve my mana control and practice mind-split. Once I fully immersed myself in the mana, I attempted to manipulate it using the other part of my mind. I managed to move it and even ruffle the sails, but that was it. Nevertheless, it showed that I was making progress in the right direction. After five or six hours of training, I reached a stage where I could adjust the sail angle using external mana, similar to telekinesis. It wasn’t flawless; reaching this stage required complete immersion in ambient mana, which took considerable time. But it was progress; I knew I was on the right track, and my mana control progressed from [Novice] to [Apprentice].
“What a nice and cooperative system,” I thought, giving it a mental thumbs-up. I felt amusement directed at me, and I had to admit that it was nicer to receive amusement than a rebuke.