An Unexpected Portal

Fanny was relieved to see that Banner lived comfortably. The 'Boiled Frog' apologue was total nonsense in terms of scientific experiment, but it was a quite reasonable metaphor for the human condition.

If Banner was sufficiently attached to the stability of his current life, it would be easy to manipulate him into doing almost anything.

Fanny left after a brief chat with Banner. A vacation was coming soon, so he would have enough time to solve the Banner and Hulk conundrum.

In the hot summer, Fanny practiced 'Explosion Magic' on the snow mountain, doing his part to the global temperature increase.

"!"

A complex and mysterious magic array appeared in front of his palm. A pillar of flame rushed out with a brilliant light. Fanny ended the skill practice after hitting a boulder in front of him.

"The power is still not enough!" Fanny thought to himself as he looked at the charred boulder in front of him.

Releasing 'Explosion Magic' without a chant increased its casting speed, but it also greatly reduced the power. On the other hand, chanting the spell was time-consuming and also increased energy use. It would be troublesome if Fanny spent the time to chant but couldn't finish all the enemy with that one spell.

Using 'Ars Magna' to increase the power would only worsen the time and energy requirement.

Yet Fanny couldn't think of any effective solution right now. Anyway, the power reduction was relative; even without the chant, 'Explosion Magic' was still more powerful than most modern weapons.

Fanny returned to Kamar-Taj and found mages who had already started to cultivate, even though it was still early morning. Despite their diligence, however, the average weight of Kamar-Taj mages had increased by five pounds since Fanny's arrival.

"Morning, Fanny!"

Among them, Wong displayed this fact most clearly. He was initially just a little lazy and chubby, but his friendship with Fanny had weighed him down.

"Morning, Wong!"

Fanny looked at Wong's round belly and considered whether he should tell him about this problem.

"Give me two!"

There wasn't any need to ask what Wong was demanding. Fanny immediately summoned three 'Sumire Karaage Rolls' and handed them to Wong.

However, Wong only took two and stared reluctantly at the last one. "I feel like I've been gaining weight recently. I need to restrain myself!"

"Is this really what you call restraint?"

Fanny was a little speechless as he also looked at the remaining fried chicken in his hand. He then pushed the last roll to Wong and said, "You need a full stomach to steel your resolve to lose weight. Don't starve yourself."

"That's true!" Wong was easily convinced out of his hesitance. He happily received the last fried chicken roll.

"Sigh!"

Fanny suddenly felt sinful. If this continued, Kamar-Taj would be crowded with round bellies. When Ancient One inspects the disciples again in the future, would she mention that they're the fattest generation she had taught?!

Fanny bid farewell to Wong and looked for Ancient One with deep guilt in his heart. When he found her, he immediately asked, "Master, would you like a fried chicken roll?"

If he made Ancient One fat as well, there wouldn't be any problem with being the chubbiest generation!

"Okay, thank you!"

Ancient One was a little puzzled, but she didn't sense any malice, so she accepted the 'Sumire Karaage Rolls' that Fanny summoned.

Even a big shot like Ancient One couldn't defend against the power of 'Sumire Karaage Rolls.' She subconsciously smiled.

However, Ancient One had very strong self-control. She rejected any further 'goodwill' from Fanny after eating only one roll.

Fanny didn't press further when he saw Ancient One stop eating. In any case, it would be fine as long as he alone didn't become fat. It didn't matter if the other mages all became as fat as Wong; fighting them would still net experience points all the same.

"Master, can you teach me more about the Mirror Dimension?" Fanny looked at Ancient One with pitiful eyes, finally getting into the real purpose of finding her.

He had given up on the secrets of Astral Magic, but accessing Mirror Dimension was one of his primary objectives. He could not give that up no matter what.

"This is a very profound knowledge!" Ancient One replied while looking into Fanny's eyes.

"That's why I came to find you!" Fanny rolled his eyes; he knew Ancient One wouldn't care about his rudeness. He continued, "I don't even know the basics; what really are dimensional spaces?"

"You don't have to think too much about it." Ancient One waved her hand gently in the air, and cracks appeared in the empty space—as if it turned into a shattered mirror.

Ancient One turned around and instructed, "Try to feel the difference between it and the normal space."

Fanny took a step forward and entered the cracked space, holding his breath. He focused on sensing and probing the mirror space that Ancient One created. He was almost at the cusp of understanding something, but it was as vague as distant light in the fog. He ultimately couldn't grasp it yet.

After a while, Ancient One pulled Fanny out and undid the spell. She advised, "In some ways, this spell is actually related to the portal spell. You should study the portal spell again and truly master it."

Fanny nodded and thanked Ancient One respectfully. He then continued asking questions, with Ancient One answering him patiently.

Fanny left Kamar-Taj and returned home. He looked at the Sling Ring on his fingers in a daze.

This thing had never left his body since the day he got it. He couldn't be more familiar with it than he already had.

The portal spell looked deceptively simple, but it involved mastery of spatial manipulation, so it indeed involved the matter of dimensions. However, the Sling Ring took over a large portion of the required manipulation. Thus, users of Sling Ring didn't have to actually master the spell.

Fanny recalled Ancient One's words regarding the portal spell. What he needed to do now was to study the exact mechanism of the Sling Ring, which would go hand-in-hand with understanding the Mirror Dimension.

Fanny used the Sling Ring to carefully open a portal, using his heart to feel and sense the entirety of the process.

It was a novel, wonderful feeling, which caused him to forget that he needed to set the portal's destination.

To open a portal, the coordinates and mental image of the location were required. But these requirements were not actually necessary; casting the spell without these conditions would require the involvement of other spells.

In short, Fanny had never opened a portal without a destination. He couldn't even if he wanted to.

But today, luck had it that he unexpectedly did what he had thought impossible. Fanny was perplexed at the dark scenery beyond the portal. The sight was rather unsettling.

However, before he could do anything else, the portal suddenly became unstable. The circling sparks of energy stopped sustaining themselves, and a few seconds later, it was completely extinguished along with the portal.

This was the first time Fanny had encountered such a situation. He could only frown.