Spirit

I directed my Spirit from its Sea to my body. Then, starting from my chest, I moved the Spirit down my right arm. The moment it passed into the black portion of my arm, my Spirit corrupted into a black, staticky energy.

That energy then traveled down my arm, which had long ago turned into a black blade as my comfortability with molding my appendages exponentially increased over the last few weeks of training.

From swords, daggers, hammers, even keys – my ability to shapeshift my arms has become almost entirely mastered. Unfortunately, no matter how many times I try, I can't seem to separate any portion of my arm to make it into a projectile.

If I could freely throw shurikens, daggers, or maybe even bullets, I'd be a close-ranged and long-ranged menace. But as I said, that doesn't seem to be possible.

So instead, under Baku's guidance, I selected a small list of various weapons I could transform my arms into to practice with.

In that list includes the katana-like sword my right arm resembles at the moment. The katana, the first weapon I'd like to train and master using.

A few seconds later, my corrupted Spirit coated the edge of the black katana's blade. The energy sparked like lightning, but didn't produce any light and instead seemed to devour it as dark sparks exploded off its edge.

I raised my katana shaped arm and slashed downwards. Immediately, a gust of wind impacted the stone ground and waves of dust cleared from the floor. In front of me, however, a black wave of energy erupted forward and traveled ten meters ahead before slowly fading away.

"Finally!" I yelled.

[New Ability |Corrupt Slash| Learned]

[Spirit Stat Increase D → D+]

I raised my sword again and slashed at the ground in front of me. Almost instantaneously, a small portion of my Spirit traveled from my Sea to my blade's edge where it then exploded outwards along the path of my slash.

The black, harrowing energy flew forward in the shape of a crescent and slammed into the stone ground of my Domain, instantly penetrating two feet into the stone and devouring the stone like it was mere butter.

I swung my sword again. Another black streak launched into the sky. Then another and another. I completely emptied my Spirit Sea using |Corrupt Slash| and when I did so a smile formed on my face.

I can use |Corrupt Slash| twenty times before completely running out of Spirit!

Having spent all of my Spirit, I returned to Baku's side and sat next to the furrball. Currently, the devilish bear was in the midst of playing a game of solitaire – another game I taught him to pass the time while I monotonously trained.

"Congratulations on successfully learning another Ability, my Lord." The bear said indifferently, the entirety of his attention on the cards placed before him.

"Yes, you sound quite energetic about it." I rolled my eyes, "Hey Baku, why do I have to learn my Abilities while Olive and the rest are simply given them?"

Continuing to not look at me, the bear responded, "That's because the Lessers use mana while my Lord uses Spirit. The two sources of energy are functionally different."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Spirit is another gift of Nobility, a source of power granted to those favored by the Progenitors. Although both Spirit and mana exist in the universe around us, only Spirit is able to freely exert its influence on reality while mana must first be converted to reality itself. It is the reason why mana possesses a system of Affinity whereas Spirit does not." The bear concluded.

"What?" I asked, completely lost.

Baku finally looked up from the cards with an agitated expression on his face. Sitting up, he crossed his arms in front of his chest and begrudgingly said, "When you think of mana you think of Wizards, right? Or maybe you refer to them as Mages? Either way, those Mages typically have specialties, no? Fire Mages, water, air, wood, metal, the list of elemental Affinities goes on, but there's also time and space affinities, summoning, influencing, mind reading, the list is truly bountiful – my point, however, is that the wielder of mana must convert it to something first. They must convert it to fire, to grass, gold, whatever their optimal Affinity is – mana requires a transformation. Spirit does not. Spirit acts as a universal element in of itself and due to that, my Lord is able to freely manipulate its shape, sharpness, temperature, buoyancy; with enough practice Spirit can become anything its wielder wants it to become."

I nodded my head. Baku's explanation helped clear a lot of things up, but it didn't really answer my original question. Even though that explains why I have to learn my own Abilities, since I can theoretically create any Ability I want, it doesn't explain why or how the others were miraculously granted theirs.

Mentioning this point to Baku, he quickly replied.

"Although speculation, my Lord, I suspect the humans that gained Classes gained them due to possessing a naturally high Affinity with one of mana's thousands of branches. In this line of thought, it is not accurate to say that any of the humans 'awakened' – the Status merely recognized their already high Affinity and found a suitable Class that corresponds with their primary and secondary Affinities. Since I suspect the Status to be a variant of a System itself, likely created by a Progenitor different from the one who created my Lords, the Status simply grants these lucky few an Ability. Like my Lords System, various achievements probably exist to systematically deliver Abilities, Traits, and even Items. It is likely that the Status System grants an Ability upon receiving a Class and grants a Class upon meeting an Affinity criteria."

And without the Status recognizing their Affinity, how would mundane humans ever discover it? Earth is supposed to be famously known for being extremely lacking in the mana department – at least that's what we always depicted ourselves as.

Even in the event that Earth has adequate mana in its environment, like Baku said, humans lack any means of detecting mana!

If you can't even detect mana, how will you ever control it?

"So what are the ways to move mana and how come nobody has discovered mana before?" I asked. Although undiscovered on my Earth and presumably Olive's Earth, within all of the universe someone must have stumbled across mana.

"For one, humans are born with an abysmal connection to mana!" Baku snorted.

"Then how can some of them have Affinities?" I followed up.

"An Affinity has nothing to do with mana, my Lord. An Affinity is merely a closeness to something – much like a bond. Every entity possesses an Affinity to everything. It is raising that Affinity that is so troublesome and likely occurs naturally and unknowingly."

I nodded my head along. That sort of makes sense. If Affinity is gained through exposure it would explain why only a few people have Classes since only a few people would happen to interact with one of the Affinities in such great quantity. Still, however, it seems the exact method to raise an Affinity is vague.

"In terms of controlling mana, it is most commonly done in one of two ways. Option one, the Mage can recite incantations that mimic the flow of mana required to cast whichever spell is in question. Or option two, the Mage can create hand gestures which similarly move the mana in the appropriate directions to complete the desired spell. Although more methods exist, these two are the most commonly used across the universe, but as I'm sure my Lord has noticed, these two methods require the Mage to be able to detect mana themselves. For the non-Mage, or humans in this instance, those that cannot detect mana and therefore cannot manipulate it themselves, can utilize Runes and Circles to control mana in their stead."

I widened my eyes upon hearing this, "So regular people can use mana if they just write the correct Runes or draw the right Circles?"

To which Baku simply replied, "Yes."

"But Isaac doesn't recite an incantation or perform hand signs when using his energy slash." I countered.

"That is because with enough practice a Mage can reduce the length of the incantation or hand gestures until they don't need one at all. Incantations and hand gestures are merely tools to teach Mages where to move mana to complete the desired transformation."

I thought long and hard about Baku's words. If what he was explaining is correct, then that means mana likely exists on Earth. In fact, mana and Spirit are probably evenly distributed throughout the universe apart from a very few, distinct places. The Void being one of those distinct places.

In that case, the reason mundane people never discovered mana is just because they had no means to detect it. And without a higher power teaching them the correct Runes or Circles, it becomes a complete and utter guessing game in the dark and nobody got lucky. Or if someone did get lucky then the government does a damn good job keeping magic under wraps.

But with the introduction of the Status, this will ultimately change because now people are being explicitly told they have the ability to perform magic, they just have to somehow make it out of the jungle. None of this answers where the Status came from or why they were all teleported to the jungle, but I'm slowly learning more and more about the great expanse.

Hopefully I'll actually be able to go back to it soon! I swung my hand in the air and a much smaller |Corrupt Slash| flew from my fingertips and sliced into the stone.

I want to talk to another human for crying out loud!

***

For the tenth summoning, alongside the sending off of Adams' and his men, it was decided to throw a celebration for the newcomers. With that in mind, more people than normal returned to the dojo to pick up the newbies.

Olive and Summer volunteered as two of the aids. Standing together in the hallway outside of the classrooms, the doors were already slid open and Olive could see the backs of many familiar people: Isaac, Adams, Fey, Church, Doc. All five self-appointed spokespersons wanted to be present for the tenth.

And in the very next moment, from nothing, became something! The figures of over twenty women appeared in various classrooms and immediately chatter spread like wildfire through the dojo!

During this initial panic, Olive studied the newly summoned. This group of women appeared older than the last, but not by much, with most of the women seeming to be in their mid thirties. The oldest woman in the room, a woman with a head of gray hair, appeared near the same age as Admiral Adams – but even then, she appeared incredibly fit for her age.

On the other end of the spectrum, the youngest member of group ten appeared to be in her early twenties. A far cry from the sixteen year olds that had been summoned previously.

'Odd.' Olive thought to herself while the self-appointed spokespersons all individually began their sales pitch.

Another hour later and the newly integrated group of women, alongside the many people who came for their summoning, roared goodbyes through the thicket of the jungle and waved their hands in the sky.

Descending a vast hill before them, Admiral Adams and his militia marched into the jungle in search of the key to the gates of the black pyramid.