Mana Suppression (1)

Edico paced back and forth, his body wrapped in a thick hide of gooseflesh. All the mana in the area had responded to Sara's call, combing waves through the grass as it shot into her channels like a tornado touching down.

This can't be possible…. he thought. When mages established cores, their chests sucked mana from the surrounding area, usually about twenty feet or so in diameter. That was an expectation. But with Lady Reece, her core was stealing mana from the clouds and forest, likely stretching out for miles. Just standing near her was uncomfortable. He looked down from the sky and saw Lady Reece wincing in pain. She's going to die like this!

If she didn't tame the mana flowing through her, it would shred her mana channels and send built-up mana pressure jutting through her muscles, tearing them apart. She'd die of shock—if she didn't, she'd die of severe tyrexis later. He needed to stop her, but….

Edico reached for her shoulder but held back. If I disrupt it…. She'll die. The only thing that could save her life was absolute concentration. What type of cruel joke is this? I'd die from this!

No, he'd be dead. There was no doubt. If he were in her position, even now, he'd be overwhelmed. Taming that much mana… it was unthinkable. And yet… Lady Reece was alive, bearing a fearless smile. She was sweating, and the wincing told him that she was fighting for her life, but she was grinning nevertheless as if to challenge the world.

Edico began pacing back and forth, waiting, listening, wincing for an hour, expecting her to scream and die.

Yet she never did.

Then another hour passed—and another. Hope welled in his heart, making him take a few steps toward her. But he always stopped, retreating into the distance, preparing himself for the worst. It wasn't until the third hour that his worry blended with his hope, and he found himself sitting next to Lady Reece, watching wave after wave of mana flood into her spirit channels, creating a chilling feeling in the moonlight as if the area was the lair of a legendary beast. The entire scene was incomprehensible, but the fact that she was still alive made him believe—believe that somehow, she would survive this ordeal that should've killed her hours ago. At most, another hour would pass, and then she'd wake from it—he was certain of it.

But she didn't.

Hours passed until a crackling fire he made was heating her skin to keep her warm, and the moon passed over the trees, but she didn't wake. Then, the sound of birds returned to the forest, and wagons passed by over the trade road, with merchants yelling to hurry, but she still didn't stir. Next came the sun, bringing guards with it. Edico greeted them, explaining that something of kingdom security was happening in the forest. They left, and when he returned, Lady Reece was still in a state of enlightenment, breathing mana in an intricate web. Finally, when it had reached a full twenty-four hours, taxing his body since the previous morning, Edico succumbed to his sleep deprivation and passed out. Yet even when he awoke, gasping for breaths as he heard the sound of chirping birds awakening the new day, she was still in the same place. It wasn't until mid-morning, when the sun reached over the trana trees, that she finally opened her eyes. And when she did, Edico witnessed something far more terrorizing than the fear he felt when she started developing her core.

2

When Sara's eyes opened, she turned and saw Edico staring at her in a state of shock. "What's wrong?"

"What's wrong?" Edico laughed and ran his fingers through his untied hair. He looked like an emotional wreck. "I don't even know how to answer that question."

Sara felt a bad premonition and looked down. Her shirt was drenched in sweat, her skin lobsterized and burning despite her accelerated healing. She swallowed and looked through the forest, combing her fingers through the dew-dotted grass. It was dark, but the sun was slowly returning to its throne to the sound of birds acting as its trumpets. Her intestines writhed like a coiling snake as she turned to Edico, preparing the question she knew the answer to and didn't want him to confirm. "How long have I been out?"

Edico chuckled, staring at the sky as if asking Delina why his reward for his suffering worry was her unbridled fury. "You've been out…." He laughed sharply, reaching a high key. "For a day and a half."

A day and a half? Sara thought. Mary did it in six hours! That was a major difference—a thirty-hour difference! Forget Sayon Twilight—it took Jason three hours to develop a Golden Core, and that was the top core of the kingdom!

Sara shot up, grabbing her cloak and belting on her arming sword.

"Sit down! You need to rest!"

"There's no time for that!"

"Listen to me. Your mana channels need to set. They've been strained for almost two days!"

"Then give me an elixir on the road," she said, unknotting her monta's rope. The monta started snorting uneasily, driven on by her energy.

"Think this through." He rushed to her side, grabbing her shoulders and turning her to him. "There's not enough time to make it to the trial on time, and you're not in the condition to make the trip, let alone do it faster."

"There is enough time," Sara shook him off and mounted her monta.

"Sure. If you go full speed, then there's a chance, but—"

"See? There's a chance if we go. Staying here is guaranteed failure."

Edico turned back to the camp. "Fine. Let's load up your armor, and we'll go."

"You do it. I'll catch up."

"I'm not leaving your side!" Edico's voice rose. "That's my duty!"

"Then leave it!" She wasn't just being a bitch. Armor was heavy and clunky. She couldn't wear it and ride fast enough, and attaching something so awkward to a monta could take thirty minutes.

"We can't leave royal armor lying around. That's a crime. If people wear it, they can—"

Sara released a primal, guttural roar in frustration and jumped off her monta, unsheathing her sword.

"What are you—"

Sara churned her mana core as she lifted her sword, amplifying her physical strength to the minimum amount necessary to cut through her armor. Then she swung down like a burly man driving a railroad spike. A terrorizing crunch followed as the blade punched through it, denting the armor as the sword ground through it like a rusty can opener. Then she pinned down the armor with her foot and ripped out the sword. Then she walked to the legs and hacked them off until the armor set was completely unusable.

"There. Tell the King that anyone wearing patchwork armor is a criminal. Let's go." Sara tried to sheath her sword, but it was bent. "God. We're heroes, not children!" Shoving the tip into the dirt, she kicked the hilt, snapping off the blade. The kingdom believed that if she had real armor, she wouldn't be able to fight from the weight. So they gave her thin armor and a weak arming sword, planning to trade them for array-reinforced equipment after she finished training. It was a logical move, but it was frustrating.

Holding only the handle, the only distinguishable part of the blade, Sara jumped back onto her monta. "Now I'm leaving. Catch up when you're ready." She guided the monta around a tree and then kicked it hard, hitting a breakneck speed through the forest.

3

Edico stared at the armor in a state of shock, unbelieving that he watched Lady Reece cut through royal armor with brute strength. No, it just looked that way. The most terrifying thing about Lady Reece was what happened the second after she opened her eyes. The cyclone of mana around her compressed the moment she opened her eyes, sticking onto her skin in a thin line. In an instant, she had suppressed her mana to the same natural output as she had before developing the monstrous core that he couldn't fathom. If someone didn't know that Lady Reece had a mana core, they wouldn't even expect it. It was that concealed.

That was just the beginning. Just a moment ago, when Lady Reece churned her core to increase her physical strength—something that wasn't intuitive—he barely noticed. Even for a genius, that level of control would take decades to develop—assuming it was possible.

Edico turned to Lady Reece to ask a toneless question when his mind snapped into focus, realizing that she had left. "What's that girl thinking?" he yelled, unsheathing his dagger. He sliced through the rope of his monta, making it buck and screech. He jumped on before it even calmed, turning the reins and bursting after her, leaving the armor behind him.