Chapter 14: [Self Body Puppetry]

"We've been trudging around for nearly half an hour now, and we've veered pretty far off of our normal patrol route. What's the deal?" A soldier grumbled, his voice barely rising over the clink and shuffle of light armor. Surrounded by nearly two hundred others, his question echoed the silent thoughts of many in their group.

Although they weren't tired just yet, they were confused.

"From what I heard, one of the mages picked up on something with their magic. Though it sure would be nice to know what it was, right now, it just feels like we're just wandering aimlessly." Another soldier chimed in, prompting the first to respond in a sarcastic voice.

"Pfft, like the mages would bother filling us in on anything." They all belonged to the 20th Eastern Border Defense Company; typically, their duty was to patrol the area on the lookout for any kryle that may have slipped through their main defensive line. It wasn't something that happened very often, but it was a necessary measure. A single kryle slipping into the kingdom unnoticed could result in them being overrun, as long as they are given enough time.

However, that routine mission was now on hold, replaced by their current, mysterious trek. As they continued to banter, at the forefront were five figures who radiated a starkly different vibe from the mass of soldiers following behind them.

Three were clad in what appeared to be heavy, layered steel armor, each piece adorned with an intricate tapestry of ridges and swoops that gave it an almost otherworldly feel. Just one look was enough to tell anyone this armor was excessively heavy—too much for an ordinary person to wear and move freely.

Yet, these three men moved unfazed.

One of the knights, looking irritated, said, "As much as their complaints annoy me, they've got a point. If we don't stumble upon something quick, we'll have to double back to our patrol route. Are you absolutely sure you detected up on some weird creature?" He was talking to one of the two figures in front of him. These two weren't dressed for battle but in robes that were made of some kind of high-quality fabric.

The knight had his eyes on one of the figures in particular, who was holding a sleek black metal staff. It wasn't just a normal staff either; it looked almost too intricate, almost as if it was an ornament or something similar. Topping it off, however, was a purple gem encased in metal, pulsing softly with light.

The robed figure had nearly all white hair and a beard that reached down to the center of his chest.

Stroking it, he replied, "It'd be one thing if it was just me who sensed it," the old man said, not even turning to face the knight.

"But my disciple Grudeth felt it too," he added, nodding toward the younger man by his side, who was a spitting image of his mentor, except it was obvious he was much younger.

Grudeth chimed in, "Exactly as Master Azer mentioned, we both felt some creature tunneling through the earth around us with our sensory magic. Normally, we'd brush it off as some random beast, especially since it didn't give off any mana signatures. But then, out of nowhere, it completely disappeared from our senses. And I don't mean it just moved out of range; it was like it blinked out of existence. We can't sense it at all now."

Hearing this, the trio of knights behind them all scrunched up their faces, clearly troubled.

"I see. Do you think it may be a mana beast with antimagic properties? That could explain why you couldn't sense its mana. It also may have noticed it was being watched and purposely canceled out the sensory magic focused on it," suggested one of the knights, sparking a response from Master Azer, who shook his head.

"I considered that possibility as well; however, whenever antimagic is used, it creates notable disruptions in the spell it's affecting. However, there was nothing of the sort. It simply vanished completely. We can't afford to ignore something capable of that." Master Azer then paused, scanning their surroundings, before addressing the knights.

"Right beneath our feet was where we last sensed the creature. I'm going to switch to a probing spell and comb the area; keep on guard. If it can slip past the sensory magic of Adept and Master-level mages such as ourselves, then it may be able to avoid the sixth sense of an Adept-level knight as well." The three knights nodded, each laying a hand on the double-edged blades attached to their waists.

One knight spun around, barking at the soldiers, "Defensive positions, everyone! Stay alert!" They didn't know if the creature was still close, but erring on the side of caution was better than being caught off guard. Though puzzled, the soldiers quickly started to form up and brace for an attack from any direction.

Meanwhile, Master Azer tapped his staff on the ground, a signal that set things into motion.

Be it knights channeling aura or mages using mana, the jump from Apprentice to Adept to Master was huge. For mages in particular, Masters on average had mana reserves nearly ten times larger than Adepts, making mana-intensive sensory magic their forte.

As soon as Master Azer's staff made contact with the earth, mana surged from it, blanketing an eight-hundred-meter radius and penetrating through every object. Whether it be a blade of grass, a tree, or a random rock on the ground, every detail of anything it touched was instantly cataloged and recorded as information before flowing directly into Master Azer's mind.

For any ordinary person, this sudden influx of information would be overwhelming. But Master Azer navigated through the flood of data with precision.

Unlike the sensory magic spell they were using before, which worked by generating a large yet thin field of mana around them, tailored for sensing movement and mana changes, the probing spell Master Azer had cast worked on a more physical level, detecting anything that made contact with the ground, alive or not.

That was why, in just moments, Master Azer's expression suddenly turned serious as he shouted, "Behind us! It's attacking from the rear!"

They were currently in a narrow stone valley, flanked by towering stone hills on both sides, which meant everyone could hear and feel the loud explosion of rocks as it echoed through the air. Instantly, the three knights sprang into action, drawing their swords and moving with supernatural speed, becoming blurs of silver. They leaped from rock to rock, racing to confront the threat at the company's rear.

Master Azer and his disciple Grudeth stayed put; as mages, they could simply switch to optical sensory magic that would let them see the action at the back as though they were right there. And what they saw made them doubt their own eyes.

The knights, who had just arrived on the scene, were equally taken aback at the sight of their enemy.

"It's a monster, a Brownback Burrowing Snake, by the looks of it. Judging by its size, it's fully grown as well. But... It's scales; Master Azer, I've never seen anything like that before." Grudeth's voice conveyed his disbelief clearly as he spoke.

The snake, easily thirty meters long and three meters across, had torn through the earth with its jagged scales, which allowed it to move as easily underground as it did on the surface.

Its tongue flickered as the corpses of the soldiers who couldn't avoid its sudden attack lied scattered around its coiled-up body. They were broken and bent like toy dolls, their blood soaking up the newly created sand from the crushed rocks.

Yet, it wasn't the snake's size that horrified them; it was its scales. Instead of the usual brown, some of its scales flickered unnaturally, similar to a static TV screen back on Earth. Every now and then, a scale seemed to twist and flash, as if phasing in and out of reality.

Even just looking at it hurt the eyes of the soldiers.

Everything about it felt wrong as if it was something that wasn't supposed to exist.

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After Mia left, Magnus had originally planned to head back to his room. However, after lounging around for a bit, he noticed his body was sore all over, and his legs seemed ready to collapse under him if he dared to move.

"Ow, everything hurts..." he muttered to himself. So, after a few attempts to get up, Magnus opted to just stay where he was—better than hurting himself trying to get to his bed after all. On the plus side, it did give him some time to think, so he didn't mind.

I have to admit, I didn't expect things to go so smoothly after I came up with my new method of visualization. I guess I just really underestimated what the Command Console was capable of.

The main issue Magnus ran into before was not knowing at what point it was safe to start using the Command Console on his own body. Imagine he visualized himself executing a kick, but at the last second, a stray thought imagined his leg bending awkwardly. That's all it would take for the Command Console to accidentally break his leg.

Practicing meditation did help, offering him a firmer grip on his thoughts and impulses. Yet, even without stray thoughts muddying his concentration, there was always the fear that his understanding of human anatomy wasn't precise enough to avoid errors.

And that was where the Command Console came into play. That dream he had helped him realize that the Command Console didn't just have the ability to control the real world, but even things that were unreal, like the mind.

Until now, the real challenge with the Command Console wasn't actually the act of visualization, but the precision of it. Fighting against the natural chaos of the human mind, he needed to conjure a mental image sharp enough for the Command Console to lock on to while also maintaining that image until what wanted to happen was executed.

It was extremely difficult to do with all the intrusive thoughts getting in the way, and there were times he would need to completely start over since his mind had veered too far off course.

But now, things were different.

The Command Console could dive into and tweak his mindscape directly, which was surprisingly easy compared to altering the physical world. Still, he felt it made sense, considering everyone's mind was their own little universe.

So, the method became straightforward; he just swapped out his imagination for the Command Console. Instead of picturing a soap cube by himself, he'd instruct the Command Console to conjure up the image of the soap cube in his mind and stop it from changing.

At first, he thought he could use this as a shortcut to visualize anything he fancied. But it turned out not to be that simple. While the Command Console could twist and shape his thoughts, it also relied on his mind as a foundation.

For instance, if he asked the Command Console to imagine a cup, the mental image would likely match one of the cups from his house on Earth. After all, he basically knew those cups inside and out, from every angle.

But if he tried to get the Command Console to sketch out a car engine, the result would be fuzzy or outright wrong. That's because he never really studied an engine or cared to memorize any of its parts.

This revealed a key point about the Command Console: it could only mimic his imagination, carrying the same constraints, and, in a way, was even riskier. Your imagination couldn't create something so vast or complex that it would physically hurt you after all. Yet, the Command Console could craft a mental image so elaborate and massive that it could actually cause a headache.

He discovered this through some painful trial and error.

This also led to another interesting discovery about the Command Console. While it could do all sorts of things within his mindscape, translating those feats to reality was a different story. He could use it to turn a rock into gold in his mind with a thought, but he couldn't do the same in the real world.

He wasn't exactly sure why that was, but figuring it out was definitely on his to-do list. After all, if he managed to figure it out, he would basically be able to do anything.

Anyway, I think I'll call this entire process, or at least the process of me manipulating my body, [Self Body Puppetry]. After all, in this scenario, my body is acting like a puppet, with the Command Console being the strings. Though I guess that would make me the puppet master of myself, which doesn't really make sense.

The name was a bit misleading since he could technically only manipulate certain body parts at a time, at least for now.

Still, that didn't take away from the fact that the ability was ridiculously powerful.

In theory, if he were to arm wrestle the world's strongest person on Earth using [Self Body Puppetry], he would win—no contest. The same went for almost any show of strength. With the Command Console in control, his body could exert unparalleled force, moving as fast as he wanted, as long as he could properly imagine it.

The only real downside is that this doesn't make me invincible. I mean, sure, I could make my arm unmovable, but it could still be sliced in two. It's just that both halves would also be unmovable.

With that thought in mind, Magnus couldn't help but let out a yawn. There was still some time left in the day, but after his practice out in the courtyard, he was feeling a bit exhausted. Not to mention that the couch he was lying on was surprisingly comfortable.

Well, whatever, not like I'm on a time crunch or anything, I'll just take a nap.

Slowly shutting his eye Magnus drifted off to sleep.

By the time he woke up, it was already the next day. His body ached like he'd been through a marathon, and the sunlight streaming through the windows was a rude awakening, even with his eyes shut tight.

"Ugh… never going through that training again…" Magnus mumbled to himself as he slowly opened his eyes, expecting the comfort of the ceiling's view. Instead, a shadowy figure loomed over him, sporting a wide grin.

"Ah, fuck!" Magnus yelped, tumbling off the couch.

Bursting into laughter, the figure's deep voice filled the room as Magnus hit the floor. Squinting past the shadows, Magnus recognized the large silhouette by its beard – it was Gerald.

Big guys like him are supposed to be loud and clumsy, right? He's scared the shit out of me twice now.

"Gerald? What are you doing here?" Magnus picked himself up off the floor and asked, noticing Celia near the door, probably the one who brought Gerald here.

Trying to keep her composure, Celia was barely holding back a giggle, while Gerald, trying to catch his breath from laughing, replied, "Sorry for the scare, kid. Your maid there filled me in that you've been training. You should be careful pushing yourself like that." To that last point, Magnus agreed; luckily, now that he knew [Self Body Puppetry] worked as it should, he had no intention of ever overdoing it like that again.

Now that he knew it worked, he wouldn't be overdoing it again.

"Eh, it's okay. But let's not make a habit of this, alright? My heart can't even handle horror games, let alone real-life jump scares." Magnus's mention of horror games and jumpscares left Gerald and Celia looking puzzled, prompting him to steer the conversation elsewhere.

"Anyway, you kind of didn't answer my question. It's great seeing you and all, but don't you guys have soldier stuff to do? I mean, Mia just dropped by yesterday."

Hearing that, Gerald looked like he'd just remembered something important and said, "Oh, right. Mia's visit is actually why I'm here. She's swamped with captain duties, and Marcos vanishes every time we enter a city, leaving me as your welcome committee."

To this, Magnus cocked his head to the side and questioned, "Welcoming commitment for what exactly?"