Working with an Elf

Vaena sat down next to Felix naturally like she thought nothing of it as she asked, "May I ask what did you do to become a Runefather?"

Felix smiled, and a Runic Circle next to them. It quickly filled out, and activated.

'First Circle: Gravity Well'

Vaena looked completely unaffected by the gravitational pull, but her eyes did go wide as she asked, "How is this possible?"

Felix was about to disperse the Runic Spell to answer when he noticed something strange. The Dark Gate had started shaking when his Spell activated. That could be progress.

Still, he didn't know what it would do if he kept the Spell up so he dispersed the Mana and explained, "I am using my Mana to manifest Runes, which in turn influence the surrounding Mana. I am basically giving a temporary Ward to this area of the world."

Vaena's green eyes seemed to twinkle as she asked, "But how? This shouldn't be possible! The Runes can't just hang there to begin with."

"They aren't hanging on nothing, I am using the air as my support. Because of its low density, the only thing that can hang for even a moment is Mana. Of course, there's a few more elements to it, but I can't go revealing the entire thing now can I?"

Vaena shook her head as she mumbled, "Even if you did, I wouldn't be able to replicate this. How can you even draw the Runes fast enough to stop them from getting erased?"

Felix shrugged, "Training, and a very good Mana Manipulation."

Vaena looked at Felix with a look that said 'really?', but Felix ignored it as he pointed at the Dark Gate and said, "We should focus on this for now, right?"

Vaena obviously still had questions, but she still nodded and questioned, "Have you found anything from it?"

Felix rubbed the surface of the Dark Gate, and found that the Mana emanating from it, while still very strong, had gotten weaker.

"I didn't get much time with it, so I didn't get to read the Runes but I did notice that it seemed to get affected by gravity."

"How so?"

Felix pointed at the empty air, where his Runic Spell had appeared, and explained, "The Spell I used is called Gravity Well. It attracts everything around it by drastically increasing the gravitational pull of the affected area."

Felix half expected Vaena to not understand what he was talking about, but he realized he had underestimated this world's technological level as while shocked, Vaena asked, "You can affect gravity with your Magic?"

Although the conversation had returned to his Runic Magic, Felix still decided to answer in the form of a query, "What is the limit of Enchantment and Warding? What effect can't be achieved with the right set of Runes?"

Vaena stared at Felix for a few good seconds, before uttering, "This… alright, I think we should focus back on the Dark Gate, this can wait."

Felix nodded and resumed his prior analysis, "From what I heard, the Dark Gate opens a hole through space. As for gravity, when at its extreme, it happens to be able to bend spacetime. From this, I conclude that the spaces connected by the Dark Gate have been weakened, which is why it could be affected by my weak gravity spell."

Squinting her eyes at the Runes, Vaena argued, "This does seem to be the case, but blindly messing with spacetime can have devastating effects, so I think we better stick to reading the Runes for now."

Her eyes wandered the Dark Gate as she added after a few seconds, "I see around several hundred Runes… it should take me about 7 or 8 hours to decipher them all. Some of them are pretty rare to see."

Felix looked at her with a deadpan expression, which Vaena seemed to misunderstand as she boasted, "Ah yes, you must think I am boasting. But I am actually a Master level Rune Expert."

As she said that, a pen and a paper appeared in her hands.

Hearing what she said, it made Felix feel bad as he revealed, "I think I better do it."

Not letting her argue, Felix quickly grabbed the pen and paper from her, and quickly began translating the Runes on paper.

It took Felix a handful of minutes to translate all 215 Runes on the Dark Gate. Of course, the Enchant/Ward was not activated as he was writing with normal ink.

On the side though, Vaena was looking at the notebook in a daze.

Smiling, Felix pointed out, "I was told my theoretical knowledge was at the Grandmaster Level, don't feel down."

Vaena instantly perked up, "I'm not feeling down. I totally expected this from a Runefather."

Felix shook his head with a smile and the two continued their analysis of the Dark Gate.

Although a little clumsy at first, once Felix wrote down all the Runes she started showing her mastery of the craft.

While Felix knew all there was to know about the Runes themselves, because of his lack of experience he still had a lot to learn about how Runes affected each other and their effects when used together.

This wasn't something that could be learned in books, for there was a virtually infinite amount of what was called Influences.

If mastering Runes individually was the requirement for theoretical Runic knowledge, then learning to predict Influences was what would allow a Runesmith to reach the actual levels.

For example, despite his extensive knowledge of Runes, Felix was actually incapable of drawing Great Rank Enchants. That is because while he knows what each Rune does, he doesn't have enough experience to predict how they will affect each other when used together.

But Vaena, as a Master level Runic Expert, had exactly that experience he was lacking.

As a result, this session of research ended up benefiting both of them. Because of the sheer number of Runes they were dealing with, Felix started noticing several patterns among the Runes.

But what really mattered was that 6 hours in, not that long after night had fallen, the two of them finally managed to crack the Dark Gate, and destroy it by disrupting the flow of Mana inside it in a certain way.

The way the Dark Gate disappeared was a bit anticlimactic as it simply disappeared instantaneously when they were done.

Wiping her sweaty forehead with the back of her hand, Vaena exclaimed, "Well, that certainly was a record."

"It's not your first time?"

"On a Dark Gate? It is. But I dealt with a few other dimensional spells before. It usually takes me days."

Titling his head, Felix asked, "How come? You said yourself it would only take you 6-7 hours to deal with the Rune translation."

Shaking her head with a chuckle, Vaena replied, "I don't have your insane control over Mana. By the way, if you don't mind me asking, what rank is your Meditation Skill?"

"S Rank Inner Perfection."

Rolling her eyes, Vaena grumbled, "Of course you would, I don't know why I even asked."

Felix smiled and offered, "I have a few questions myself, actually."

Vaena raised an eyebrow and expressed, "Sure, but I'm not sure I could teach you much."

Felix crossed his arms and started, "I had a discussion with a fellow Runesmith, and something he said puzzled me. Imagine someone was cursed and had their Mana expenditure automatically increased by a factor of ten. Why would they face any trouble when they get to Level 50 and cross to Tier 1?"

Vaena looked surprised by the question, but still answered, "Well, I never heard of something similar, but I guess it would be impossible for them to go anywhere beyond Level 50."

"Why?"

Vaena pointed at her sternum and explained, "Increasing your level is, at its core, a numerical increase of your vital energy. You increase its quantity by earning levels. But at some point, every 50 levels, your body will reach its limit, blocking you from leveling up. That's when you rank up.

"And to do that, you need to use your Mana. It is different for everyone, but in the end it amounts to flooding your body with as much Mana as possible."

Frowning, Felix asked, "Does that mean having more Mana will allow for a better evolution?"

Vaena smiled and shook her head, "Interesting way to call it, evolution. But no. Every AP you get, whether it be through leveling up or training, is nothing more than a mass of vital energy, when broken down. The System simply allows you to give this vital energy the function you want.

"But when you evolve, all these APs momentarily return to a rawer form, assimilating into your Mana. It doesn't mean all your Stats will be transferred to your Spirit, so your total MP won't increase. It will simply allow you to strengthen your physical vessel through their essence."

Felix rubbed his nose in annoyance as he followed up, "So no matter how much MP I have, what actually matters is the percentage of Mana I manage to infuse throughout my body."

Vaena nodded, "That's right. For Tier 1, as it is the easiest evolution, you only need to use about 20% of your Mana to pass. Of course, the closer you are to 100%, the better it is."

"What does a higher percentage bring? Better Stats?"

"No, not exactly. Anyone who gets to Tier 1 will receive the same boost and the same AP per level. However, potential will be severely impacted by the rate of Mana used. One of the biggest factors is Mana Manipulation, as the Mana that doesn't get infused in your body will get out of sync with your body."

"What, you lose it?"

"No, but it becomes much harder to control. And since all your Mana turns back into one entity once the evolution is over, whatever amount of Mana out of sync will make your Mana Sync weaker. A bad evolution will also make it harder for you to earn AP through training. You've heard of the limits on these?"

Felix shrugged, "I know you can't get past 30 at Level 1 without special Skills or Titles."

"Yes. Well, a bad evolution will put that limit very low, and in many cases, make it impossible to earn anymore AP through training. Getting close to 100% Mana used though will drastically increase the limit, and make it easier to earn these AP through training."

Sighing internally, Felix asked, "So for someone with the aforementioned Curse, they would never be able to evolve to Tier 1 because they would only get up to 10% with a perfect evolution."

Vaena acquiesced, "That's right. But it's fine, that kind of Curse can't exist."

Feeling the urge to disagree, Felix asked, "How so?"

"Because even Gods wouldn't have the power to inflict such a cruel curse. Your theoretical person would never even lived past childhood."

Now truly curious, Felix urged her to go on.

She did.

"To start off, this kind of Curse could only be inflicted very early on, either in the womb or in the first few minutes of a baby's life, because for it to work it would require the Curse to merge deep into someone's soul to affect their Mana in such a way.

"Thing is, babies barely have any Mana. But that doesn't mean the Curse won't be active. As the Curse would be deeply woven into that person's soul, in case of Mana Deprivation, then it would start acting on the closest thing, their mind."

Felix started feeling uncomfortable, and Vaena continued, "If someone was really affected by this Curse, they would experience constant migraines, and they would get tired at the slightest mental effort. A child can't have the mind to resist something like this, their spirit would shatter before long."