CHAPTER 77:Preparations 2

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"Signature?" Leo pondered for what felt like the umpteenth time that night.

He stood still beneath the swaying trees, his body unmoving, but his mind wandered far and wide. The assassin retraced all he had learned regarding mana signatures. Bits and pieces from conversations, battles, fleeting insights—it all came together in his head like an unfinished puzzle.

First of all, there were the forsaken and fallen creatures whose mana pulsed black or grey depending on their rank . Humans, on the other hand, were rather... bland. Their silhouettes glowed dimly, empty vessels filled with flickering light. Lamps. That's what they were—individual lamps, each with a unique flame, some barely alight, others nearly bursting with radiance.

Elves were similar, although mages and battle-hardened warriors gave off a much brighter output. Their bodies radiated a more intense glow, like polished gems amidst pebbles.

Then there was Bethran. The wolf. From his signature alone, Leo assumed werewolves glowed white—though he wasn't entirely sure if that was universal or just something peculiar to his friend. And then came the vampire matriarch—the old monster who had once towered before him in power and pride. Her signature had been a glowing crimson that burned into memory, lingering in the air even after death.

"Always gives me the creeps anytime I think about it," Leo muttered, a cold shiver running down his spine. He made a mental note to revisit that cursed forest someday... just in case.

"Let's try this again."

In the blink of an eye, everything turned black.

No stars. No moon. No gentle silver glow in the sky. Just silhouettes—some still, some shifting—enclosed in a strange blue grid that covered everything. It felt like standing inside an endless cage, woven together with threads of mana.

But even in that vast darkness, he could sense the trees, boulders, and brush. Their outlines remained, encased in the grid, though the colors shifted. Creatures emerged next—faint glimmers of life. Squirrels nestled deep in hollows. A fox prowling somewhere close. Birds soaring overhead. Even the cunning mountain lion preparing to pounce on an unaware deer.

It was all there. Life. Death. The hunt.

Yet, one thing remained missing.

Himself.

He couldn't see his own silhouette.

He blinked. Nothing. He moved his hands. He felt them move—but saw nothing.

"What's different?" he asked aloud, more to the air than anything. "Why can't I see myself?"

This had never bothered him before, but now that he thought about it... it was odd. He was there—he could feel, breathe, think—but in the grid, he didn't exist.

"Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way."

Leo redirected his gaze. The mountain lion was moving—stalking, closer now. Its powerful body tense, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

A loud cry tore through the night.

The deer collapsed, and smaller critters scattered.

"Poor beast," Leo sighed, watching as the deer's mana dimmed. But then something caught his eye. A shimmer. A flicker of mana—seeping from the deer's neck.

"That's new..."

He narrowed his gaze. Drops of mana fell with the blood.

"Why hadn't I noticed this before?"

The answer slammed into him.

"Blood!" Leo gasped. "It all makes sense now."

For centuries, mages and scholars had debated how mana circulated in living things. One popular theory—the Locksworth circulation—proposed that mana flowed from the brain to the heart in a system like blood. That theory was presented by a brilliant old mage and later contested by none other than his own daughter—Matriarch Hilda Locksworth.

She had proposed something completely different. That mana wasn't produced internally—it was absorbed from the surroundings.

To prove her theory, she performed a strange experiment. She locked several rats in a cube made entirely of Antium. The cube was sealed, but filled with air, food, and insects. At first, everything was fine. The rats even mated.

Then... a week passed.

All of them—parents, younglings—dead. Shriveled, lifeless husks.

Critics cried foul. Starvation, maybe? But no—there were no signs of cannibalism, none of the usual traces of hunger-driven madness.

Hilda's theory, now dubbed the "Mana Absorption Theory," was accepted universally. It became gospel for scholars.

But Leo's eye had just revealed something different.

"Fascinating..." he whispered, rubbing his chin. "Maybe... mana is absorbed... but then refined inside the body?"

His gaze returned to the grid, where a new realization stirred.

"Perhaps Hilda was partly right, but incomplete."

Suddenly, he lunged forward and grabbed a mouse scurrying across the grass. The creature squealed, its small body trembling in his grip.

"Don't squirm. I'm learning here," Leo muttered, narrowing his eyes.

At first, the mouse appeared as just another silhouette—nothing special. But Leo refused to back down. He concentrated harder, pushing his senses, reaching beyond what the azure eye normally showed him.

"It worked before... against that demon..." he breathed, taking in the swirling mana around him.

And then—it happened.

The inside of the mouse opened before him—not physically, but through the lens of mana. Organs appeared in dim outlines, indistinct yet visible.

One pulsed brighter than the rest—its mana vibrant, alive. The heart.

Leo smiled. A wide, toothy grin of genuine satisfaction.

"Maybe I should've been an academic," he chuckled, tapping the mouse's chest with a finger.

There it was, a core. A small orb nested within the heart, faintly resembling the larger one he'd seen during the battle against Wulfe's demon.

In that moment, Leo understood.

Threads of mana drifted from the air—into the mouse's nostrils, through the lungs, and into the heart. They wove around the orb at breakneck speed, forming a structure that pulsed and shrank with each beat. From there, finer threads—refined mana—spread out to every organ, powering the body.

A cycle.

Intake. Refinement. Distribution. Exhaust.

Leo's mouth opened slightly in awe.

"I can't believe it," he whispered, utterly mesmerized. He hadn't even noticed the mouse gnawing on his finger until—

"OUCH!"

He dropped the little rascal. It scurried off into the underbrush, leaving him sucking on a bleeding fingertip.

"That little fella really packs a punch..."

But then... something changed.

His eyes widened.

Drip. Drip.

Azure mana.

From his bleeding finger.

Leo held his breath and looked down at himself.

And there—within the grid—stood a bright blue human-shaped silhouette. Glowing. Alive. Him.

A wild shout tore from his throat, scattering birds from treetops.

For the first time, Leo could see himself.

And if one had looked into that strange mana grid... they would have seen a lone figure leaping in joy, arms flailing, performing what could only be described as a victory dance.

...

Far away, in a distant ivory castle, a dark-skinned mage with bright turquoise eyes sat before a golden mirror, braiding her hair. A smile formed on the reflective surface, faint but unmistakable.

"And so, begins the journey," she whispered, her voice barely louder than a breeze.