Chapter 38 - Study Session and a startling discovery

"Rea, I'm going to be doing some studying. Do you want to join?"

"Yes, Ava-sama!!"

We went back to the capital briefly to obtain some paper, then returned to the [Labyrinth] just in case our studies created any mishaps. In the meantime, I had begun to attempt manipulating my mana. Having seen how Rea's [Limit Break] worked, I figured that I could directly mimic the process to gain access to more fundamental skills through manipulating my mana directly. As such, I had begun to knead and circulate the mana in my body in an effort to increase its density without crystallising it. From watching Rea, I had now understood that when mana crystallised, it was the expression of a skill. I performed a few skills myself to confirm that, and it was proven to be true.

Instead, what I wanted to do was to have as much dense mana as I possibly could in my body, such that I could perhaps increase the amount of power that I could output, or increase my casting speed. To be honest, I had no idea what compressing my mana would do, as everything was governed and optimised by the . However, it seemed like it might become something beneficial, so I tried it anyway.

I absent-mindedly left it running as Rea and I began to study the structure of magic. We first copied down the runic arrays of each {Subskill} that we could use from the field of [Void Magic], then isolated areas that looked different and attempted to figure out how each set of runes affected the runic array. By the end of the week, we had figured out how the compiled [Void Magic], as well as the process for magic compilation as a whole.

First, mana was gathered. Then, the mana would be formed into what we called Greater Runes, those which formed the basis of the form of magic itself. For example, for {Subskill: Void Storage}, the Greater Runes were [Space], [Dark], [Size], [Location], [Function], [Condition]. The first two were self-explanatory, and underpinned all of [Void Magic]. They were the runes used to designate the kind of attributes that the magic had. Since [Void Magic] was made from a synthesis that had [Spatial Magic] and [Dark Magic] as the ingredients, it could be considered a composite attribute magic. [Size] was similarly a no-brainer. The size of the storage needed to be specified. [Location] controlled where the storage was located relative to the caster. [Function] designated what the magic would be used for. [Condition] specified the start and end conditions of the magic.

Once the Greater Runes were in place, the Lesser Runes would begin to fill in the space with instructions on how the magic was meant to be compiled. For example, we had managed to figure out that under [Space], the lesser runes that filled it were [Isolation] and [Stasis], while under [Dark] were [Concealment] and [Inviolability]. Finally, once the runes were all selected, the mana would be crystallised into the runic array, creating the magic.

We had also found out that if we attempted to compile this magic on our own and removed the [Dark] arm of the runic array, we could degrade the magic back into {Subskill: Spatial Storage}. From this experiment, we had both gained [Runic Magic Lv.1], which quickly became [Runic Manipulation Lv.1] as we studied further. Of course, I quickly integrated [Elemental Manipulation], [Poison Manipulation], and [Light Manipulation] into [Runic Manipulation], which caused a veritable explosion in my head with all the different runes that were usable for compiling magic. However, thanks to support, if I wanted to cast any of the related magics, I could still do it instantly.

While Rea worked to develop ever more forms of defensive magic in her role as a [Guardian], I worked instead to develop more forms of combat magic, eventually settling on using the light, dark, and spatial attributes to create a new {Subskill: Mirror World}, which would enclose the designated targets within an illusory space that distorted perception and reflected falsehoods. Especially against human opponents, this should prove extremely effective. It was, however, a relatively heavy runic array, requiring no fewer than twelve Greater Runes, which would certainly increase the cast time a tad. However, with multi-cast I had no need to worry.

It did, however, have the weakness of all of my current skills - if the opponent possessed an that could bypass, negate, or break through the effects of {Mirror World}, there would be nothing I could do about it. took precedence, after all. The purely offensive or purely defensive I could generally ignore, since I could evade or bypass some of them, but the those which had more unique effects would be troublesome. There was less than a month left on our schedule - the rebellion was about to swing into full force soon.

Thinking about this, I went ahead and attempted to create another runic array that would hopefully boost my combat abilities. I wanted a heavy hitter that would bypass elemental nullifications, and that could only come about if I could create a kind of magic that possessed a composite attribute that was made up of more than just the elemental magics. Therefore, I decided to add [Light] and [Dark] to the composition as well. However, it was nowhere near that simple. [Fire] and [Water] refused to participate in the same runic array without any buffers, as did [Earth] and [Wind]. I had to invert my original thought process and instead use 12 Greater Runes to stabilise the array, instead of the initial 8 that I had been planning.

The way I attempted to make this array work was by first compositing the elemental attributes into [Lightning], [Metal], [Wood], and [Ice], and [Light] and [Dark] into [Chaos]. This was the easy part. The difficult part came in further compositing the rest. To achieve this, [Chaos] needed to act as the bridge for all of them to function together. Ironic, but thus was the nature of this array. The array finally stabilised afterwards, compiling into a spell that inflicted heavy [Primordial] attribute damage, and also applied four status effects, [Bleed], [Slow], [Paralysis], and [Decay]. While being slowed and being paralysed seemed to overlap, [Paralysis] was mostly a physical status condition, while [Slow] affected mostly the rate of mana circulation and runic compilation through that slowed mana.

Thankfully, it was finally considered a success, and I obtained [Primordial Manipulation], which I subsequently reintegrated into [Runic Manipulation]. Using [Primordial Manipulation] as an offensive tool was about as close as I could get to creating what was essentially a mana cannon. However, disarrayed mana was extremely difficult to use without first separating the useful attributes and rearranging them into an array, which meant that the idea of a pure mana cannon itself was pretty unfeasible.

Yet, with this, my {Subskill: Eyes of the Void} could finally be used to great effect.

{Subskill: Eyes of the Void

Subskill Description: Targets a sacrifice for the void.

Subskill Prerequisites: [Void Control].

Subskill Effects: Executes a target with five or more status conditions. Success rate scales with [WPR] and rank, inversely with target Rank, [WPR], and [WIS]. Skill can only be used once per opponent.}

Just then, I heard the mechanical voice once again.

-Conditions have been met. [Mana Compression Lv.1] has been acquired. Congratulations on acquiring an ancient Cultivation method.