Tale of Eldramir

Walking through the halls of the Grand Cathedral on his own never stopped feeling strange to Ezekiel. This place was supposed to be a holy site, meant to represent the bond and presence of the Spirits in the lives of humans, as well as to show respect and reverence to the Ancients that shaped this world. He had always expected the Scholars of the Church of Ten to be like the clergy from his old world, holding the Ancients and their teachings above all else.

He was pleasantly surprised to find out that it was more like a private research association than an actual religious order. The Scholars of the Church were exactly that, scholars who delved into the records and knowledge passed down by the Ancients to further explore the mysteries of mana and magic.

They all worshiped the Ancients, giving prayers and thanks as one should to a benefactor and savior of such renown as the Ancients were, but there was a calm and methodical logic to how the Scholars conducted themselves.

“Finally! It’s about time you got here ya little brat! I’ve been waiting for several hours.” Scholar Quentin Rudy exclaimed as Ezekiel knocked on and entered the door that led to the room he would be practicing in.

“I’m half an hour early.” Ezekiel stated in a deadpan tone of voice.

“Which means you’re half an hour late!” Quentin happily rebuked, ignoring the looks of pity and apology that two of the room's other occupants sent towards Ezekiel.

Ezekiel couldn’t help but sigh in resignation. He was excited at first, thinking that Quentin would be exceptionally helpful in his studies and practice regarding his mana accumulation, but it seemed like even among such learned scholars, there were always a few odd eggs.

Quentin Rudy being one of the exceptionally eccentric ones.

“Alright kiddo, step into the circle and so we can get started for today.” Quentin Rudy, Tier three Mage and Scholar of the Church of Ten said as Ezekiel finished putting away his satchel after entering Quentin’s practice room.

“As you say, Scholar Rudy.” Ezekiel said as he stepped into the large circle engraved in the ground. It was an enchanted circle that had the language of the Ancient’s used to give meaning and direction to the mana that they were trying to study.

It had been roughly a month since Ezekiel had been introduced to the Church members who were assigned to help him with his practice. Since then, little progress had been made regarding his mana accumulation. Although he had been able to practice every day, unlike before when he was trying to hide it, the number of times he retained more mana than he expended was not exceptionally high.

Try as he might, the proximity to so many Tempest mages at once tended to offset the balance of ambient mana in the surroundings of the room they practiced in. Meaning that He needed to be much more careful in how he was gathering mana within himself.

This, however, was something that Scholar Rudy found fascinating, as it was a well-known fact that, whilst visible to all who meditate properly, the fact that a higher Tier Mage’s presence contributed to the formation of ambient mana of a specific type wasn’t something that was considered to be a problem by most.

However, given that the whole project they were working on revolved around the creation and gathering of Void mana, the imbalance of mana types meant that they needed to develop a means to re-balance the mana in such a way as to ensure that equal parts of opposing mana were present for the formation of Void mana.

This problem had yet to be solved in any meaningful manner, but the work being done was something that could help all fields of mana study should there be any results that panned out.

The fact that his parent’s presence did not affect the balance in an ambient area did raise some questions. But it was assumed that it was mainly due to the fact that Radiant and Obscure mana were nowhere near as abundant as Tempest and Cavern. The fact that Evelyn and Warren also had significantly better meditation techniques, as well as familiar Spirits, also meant that their hold on their mana was significantly better than the Scholar’s and their acolytes.

Yet, regardless of these discoveries and the slow progress he was making, Ezekiel found himself having quite a bit of fun studying and practicing in a controlled environment. With the presence of a Life mage at all times, Ezekiel also felt that he could start experimenting with different mana types in his cultivation.

Instead of only trying to gather Tempest and Cavern mana, he would sometimes switch to Flame and Glacial, or Radiant and Obscure, when the resources allowed it. This did lead to some advancements in his progress, as it meant that he didn’t have to wait until two specific types of mana naturally accumulated in the areas where he trained at.

It did lead to some burns and frostbite when the elemental mana was expelled alongside the Void mana he used to move. Surprisingly enough, it seems like Radiant and Obscure mana didn’t have as noticeable of an effect. Sure, he’d nearly blinded himself when he’d expelled a few flashes of Radiant mana, and his fingers seemed to fade away as they were covered in shadows when he expelled Obscure mana, but those effects were far less damaging than the other elements.

It was just such a shame that the ambient mana of those types was so sparse. The only way he would be able to gather more mana was if he used a higher-level meditation technique. Alas, it proved to be of no use, as the higher-level techniques required affinities with their elements, or bonds with specific Spirits, else nothing tended to happen.

Luckily, even though they’d had a few setbacks, and his mana had only accumulated to just over forty motes of Void mana, he still found himself looking forward to the various experiments and studies they were performing day by day.

“So, what are we doing this time?” Ezekiel asked as he entered into the circle. As he did, the various symbols and runes lit up to surround him with an aurora of lights.

Although he was used to having to do seemingly useless actions during their practicing, he was used to it by now, and he tended to learn something new almost every time. For instance, just last week they found out that Void mana would take the form of a different mana type even without the presence of other mana types.

This was something they discovered when Quentin had Rudy expel several motes of mana into the atmosphere whilst standing in the middle of a null mana zone created by a different magic circle. That one prevented the presence of mana from entering it, so it was completely empty of ambient mana within.

It took slightly longer, but the Void mana still turned into Tempest mana when let in the air for a time. Similarly, the Void mana that was sent into a stone they had placed inside the circle changed to Cavern mana. This happened with all the elements they could safely test within the confines of their workroom. The one thing that didn’t happen was the large spell-like effects that occurred whenever Void mana was used on other mana types.

“Will we be re-confirming records of past ages, or trying something new?” Ezekiel asked as he thought about some of the experiments he had done previously.

It turned out that, whilst there were records of some test and research into Void mana, the majority were lost, and it was uncertain amongst the Scholars which records were true, and which records were hearsay or stories. So, it was requested that they study what they could and did their best to figure out which records were true, and which records were not.

Ezekiel would rather be practicing as much as he could right now, but he knew that helping the Church with their studies and research would hopefully be helpful in the future.

“You’ll be excited this time around kiddo! We’re using your example to try and make a new meditation technique! Hopefully this one will give you a bit more control over how much mana of what types you absorb.” Quentin said, snapping Ezekiel out of his thoughts.

“Scholar Rudy, are you sure we should be jumping right into it like that?” Issa asked from the side. Whilst she was excited to be learning more about the different uses of Void mana, she still didn’t like seeing a kid five years younger than she was burning, freezing, or cutting up portions of his body just so she could heal him. It was surprising the first few times, but now it was just frustrating and annoying.

“Oh, stop being such a stick in the mud Issa! Make like your element and live a little!” Quentin said as he flitted about the room. “Now, where were those notes I had on the estimated images of Void representative symbology? I know I have them somewhere... Aha! Here we are! Right next to the prototype Glacial mana accumulator I grabbed from Hiiro’s workroom. That reminds me, we’ll have to put that to use before he comes back to get it.”

Merlot perked up at hearing about a Glacial mana-based relic, even if it was a prototype, if it could help with his mana accumulation that would be amazing.

“No, Merlot. You can’t use an experimental prototype relic for your personal use. It could mess you up more than you already are.” A bored and apathetic voice called out from the side.

Trent Solts, a gray eyed man in his twenties was looking over his own notes as he focused on comparing some texts detailing the teachings of the Ancients from before the Age of Hubris. This was only a copy of the text, as the original was locked in a storage vault beneath the cathedral. It had been found and recovered nearly a century ago, in a ruin that was discovered when the area around Harkem was reclaimed.

“Besides. It’s not more mana that you need, it’s finding your third Chakra. If you can’t do that then it doesn’t matter how much mana you get. You’ll never become a true Scholar.” Trent continued to say as Merlot started to grow angry. “Not that you’re likely to break through even if you do.”

“You little-”

“Enough! Can the both of you stop fighting for just one day? I swear, why is it that the two of you are less mature than me and Ezekiel?” Issa interjected so as to stop yet another argument from breaking out. “And you! Scholar Rudy! Why aren’t you saying anything?”

“Because I have more important things to worry about than a spat between my juniors. So long as they finish their work and help me when I need it, that’s all I care about. Now come over here you three. Merlot, I want you watching out manantennaes, they’ll give us a rough reading on how much mana is moving towards Ezekiel as he meditates. Trent, you take note of any fluctuations in the circle. That’ll give us an idea of how stable the movement of mana is. Issa, you hold back and be ready to reattach some limbs, heal some burns, or otherwise fix whatever parts of Ezekiel’s body that get damaged during this test.” Quentin said in a manic pace as he looked over his notes on the process once again.

Merlot headed over to the strange and intricately carved relics on one side of the circle. They looked like the antennae of a moth, hence the name Manantennae. They were a relic recreated from the Age of Hubris, where people used such devices to measure the flow and intensity of the movement of mana within a certain area.

“Ezekiel, here. A description of the new method, and a professional drawing of what we want you to try visualizing in your mind when you enter your meditative trance.” Quentin carelessly threw a small stack of papers, that were pinned together, over his shoulder at Ezekiel as he said this.

“Alright, so we’re just doing this. You do know that the expected time it takes for a person to successfully enter into a meditative trance with a new technique is at least a week, right?” Ezekiel said in a sarcastic tone of voice. “That also only if the technique allows for one to resonate with the mana of the world. And here you are, expecting me to get on my first try?”

“Are you saying you can’t?” Quentin asked with a raised eyebrow, as if asking Ezekiel who he was trying to fool.

“Of course, I can. I just wanted to voice my thoughts so that in the event it does fail, I can blame it on you as you have confirmed you knew about these facts beforehand, but still asked me to do something considered impossible. Now let's get started.” Ezekiel quickly stated as he sat down and crossed his legs.

It took him a few minutes to read through the description of the technique. It was based off of the double element visualization that Ezekiel had tried before, but instead of visualizing two separate images circling around each other, this technique describes a singular image of two elements fully blended together. In this case, it detailed the image of a stone with carved holes allowing the passage of wind through it without obstruction.

Ezekiel sighed in frustration. He knew that this technique wasn’t going to work as Quentin thought it would. There was no conflict between the elements, meaning that there was no Will to enforce a clash that would cause them to cancel one another out.

He exited the circle and voiced his thoughts on the technique, but Quentin wouldn’t let him go without trying it.

“How can you know something won’t work if you don’t even try? Not sit back down and start meditating. We have a healer on hand, and if something does happen to your spirit paths, so long as you’re still alive, I’ll personally pay for your recovery.” Quentin stated as he pushed Ezekiel back into the circle.

Ezekiel couldn’t help but look around the room for help, but whilst Merlot looked a little annoyed at his complaint, Trent couldn’t care less, and Issa was biting her lip in concern, but she, just like the rest, knew that it was either Ezekiel uses the technique, or they wait until the end of the day, doing nothing, when one of Ezekiel’s parents came by to get him because he was late for dinner.

It had happened once or twice before, but at that time it was because they’d gotten caught up in their research and were looking through a number of tomes for ideas to use for this new technique.

Ezekiel just signed, worried about how much mana he was going to lose whilst expelling the excess mana inside him. He didn’t think he’d die from this, but he was certainly going to ask Quentin to investigate who helped in the creation of this technique, as he doubted that anyone who actually read his notes would make such a glaring mistake.

Sitting back down, Ezekiel places the papers to the side, just beyond the edges of the circle before closing his eyes.

He immediately started imagining the rock with holes in it though which gusts of winds blew. He could almost hear whistling as the wind blew through the stone.

It took him several minutes before he found himself surrounded by a number of lights representing the different motes of mana around him. As he did, he immediately saw different amounts of gray and brown lights headed towards him. He immediately tried altering the image, just enough so that there were different ratios of Tempest and Cavern mana.

Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like it was going to work. No matter how much he changed the image, from a stone with small holes to a stone with large holes. Ezekiel couldn’t change the pace in which the mana flowed towards him. The image of the wind through the stone somehow translated as the wind showing its superiority, as it represented the wear and tear of a stone buffeted by wind and broken down.

He ended up absorbing nearly triple the amount of Tempest mana compared to Cavern mana. The technique also didn’t bring the elemental mana together, as the Tempest mana instead flowed around the Cavern mana, but not once did they actually conflict and cancel out.

Realizing that this was getting dangerous, Ezekiel stopped his visualization and willed his Void mana to grab onto the motes of elemental mana. There were five Cavern motes versus seventeen Tempest motes. He knew that this was going to hurt just as much as it did when he expelled thirteen motes of Tempest when he had first met Lina.

Bracing himself, he first made his mana force the Cavern mana to touch some of the Tempest mana, giving him five more Void motes. He then used those new motes in tandem with seven others to forcibly move the remaining Tempest motes to his fingers. He then immediately threw his hand in the air, giving the rest of the room’s occupants just enough time to brace before releasing a gale of wind from his fingers, shredding them once again, but this time not losing any bones.

“Aaaarggh” Ezekiel screamed as he fell on his back, arms now clutched to his chest as he cried in pain. Issa ran forwards the moment the winds died down to an acceptable level, entering the circle and holding Ezekiel’s bloodied hands in her own glowing green ones.

The pain immediately faded as he started to heal.

“Thank you.” Ezekiel mutters as he stared at the ceiling whilst his hands were healed. It wasn’t as fast as Lina’s, but he knew that an hour or so of healing, with breaks in between, meant that, not only would he regain his fingers, but would also mean that he was healed before he had to leave later that afternoon.

“No worries. It’s what I’m here for.” Issa said simply as she focused on regrowing the nerves in his fingers. As she examined the damage, she realized that it would almost have been easier to regrow his fingers from stumps at this point. But she wasn’t going to just rip off what remained just to make things easier for herself.

“Hahahaha! Fantastic, absolutely fantastic!” Quentin exclaimed in glee as he looked over his notes whilst peering at the various devices he had around the workroom that were dedicated to reading and measuring mana and natural phenomena. “Merlot! Did you get a good read on the pacing of the mana?”

“Yes, Quentin, I did, and from what it says it seems like young Ezekiel was correct. The pacing was indeed unequal, with nearly triple the amount of Tempest mana being gathered than Cavern mana.” Merlot explained as he looked at how the manantennae in front of him had reacted when Ezekiel had started meditating. “Not only that, but I think that the time between the flow of mana stopping, and the sudden gale coming from Ezekiel’s fingers means that the mana did not naturally combine, as he also said. Out of curiosity, did you actually manage to retain any Void mana?”

Ezekiel took a moment to reply, debating whether or not he should be serious or snarky, given that he just blew off the meat on his fingers in the name of science. Or at least this world’s magical equivalent.

“I did, yes. But the amount of Void mana I formed was so miniscule compared to the remaining Tempest mana that it means that I actually have less mana right now than I did when I first entered the room. I started with more than forty, and now I have barely thirty.” Ezekiel explained in a pained and frustrated voice.

He couldn’t help but glare at Issa as she looked down at him in pity. He couldn’t help it. He hated having to go through these continuous motions of gain and loss when it came to his progress. If he had a mana crystal then maybe he’d be able to do something about it, but for now, it seemed like it was the slow and not so steady way for him.

“Hmph, well, we can’t be having that, now can we?” Quentin said as he rummaged around in the drawers of his desk. “Ah! There you are. Here you go, kiddo, take this and top up. We need you to be able to go through more experiments, and you’re useless to me without mana, so...”

Quentin pulled out a small lock box from his desk, drawing a key from his robes and opening it. He then threw a somewhat familiar gemstone at Ezekiel, who let it bounce off his chest as he didn’t have the hands necessary to grab it.

Looking over at the object that was thrown at him, Ezekiel immediately recognized the item for what it was. It was a pure mana crystal. Something that would allow him to directly absorb Void mana to add to his own.

“A pure crystal? But... I can’t afford this!” Ezekiel exclaimed as he looked back at Quentin.

“You’re not getting paid to help with this otherwise, are you? So, just take the stone, top up, and get ready, we’ve got two more techniques that we need you to try.” Quentin said as he waved off Ezekiel’s concerns before going back to examining his notes and other devices in the room.

Looking at Issa and the others, Ezekiel noticed that Trent looked envious at him being given free money, Merlot looked annoyed and resigned, whilst Issa just looked happy that Ezekiel actually got something from this.

Suddenly, a thought crossed Ezekiel’s mind before he considered officially accepting this gift.

“Wait... you didn’t take this crystal from one of the other Scholars, did you?” He asked as he gave Quentin a pointed look. One that was followed by the three other people in the room.

Quentin just looked insulted as he turned to see the pointed stared of accusation directed at him.

“You stinky brat! I did not take this crystal from anyone else. I never take anything from my fellow scholars that cannot be returned. When it will be is undetermined, but I wouldn’t give you a consumable item and tell you to use it if I had grabbed it from someone else first. Every Scholar received a pure mana crystal yesterday, after a new mine was discovered just a few miles east of here, at the foot of Mount Hurst by the Everclear Sea.” Quentin explained as he waved them all off.

“Now absorb that mana and get ready to work. As soon as you’re healed up we’ll be going again. Your expectations were right, so we’ll be skipping a number of techniques that were created, as they hold similar issues as what you listed before, but we’ve still got enough to take us through the day!” Quentin continued briefly before looking for a book as he muttered about the historical imagery of the Ancients and their embodied representations.

Ezekiel ignored him as he looked back at the crystal lying next to him.

“Issa, could you pause for a second and put the crystal on my chest? Unless my absorption of it will interrupt your work at healing me.” He asked as he turned his attention to the young woman who was slowly regrowing the flesh of his fingers.

“There shouldn’t be any issues, just give me a second to finish these nerves and I’ll grab it.” Issa replied as she continued to focus on Ezekiel’s fingers. He just nodded his head and leaned back as she worked.

After a few moments, Ezekiel felt a small weight placed upon his chest. Opening his eyes, he saw that it was the pure crystal.

“Thank you.” He said before closing his eyes once again. Issa just smiled as she continued to heal his fingers.

Ezekiel took a moment to center himself. Focusing on the simple images of the elements that were provided by the church to enter a meditative trance, he quickly fell into the state of awareness that showed him the various motes of mana around him. Letting the image fade to the back of his mind, he looked around at the mana around him.

He saw the green mana of Life focused on his hands, slowly stitching his fingers together and seemingly reforming flesh from nothing. But he also noticed the large orb of pure white sitting on his chest. Curious as to what the mana in a mana crystal looked like, as he had never really examined one before, he decided to focus on it a bit more. As he examined it more closely, he was shocked and amazed at what he saw.

It was like looking at a spiral galaxy. The motes of white lite were spinning around each other as the floated around in the mana crystal. They were not static nor erratic, spinning leisurely as the moved around, with some motes getting closer to the center and then floating further away. It was a cycle which never allowed the mana grouped at the center to grow or shrink, as every mote was immediately replaced as it moved to and from the center of the spiral.

Ezekiel realized that this was it. This was the image he was looking for. He had gotten close to the ideal shape with his elemental Yin-Yang image, but that wasn’t enough. It worked for now, but if he wanted to make an officially accepted meditation technique, there could be no flaws. This spiraling shape was much more accurate, and it would help his own research if he could figure out why.

Realizing that he wouldn’t get much further just by staring at the mana literally sitting on him, he decided that it would be best to finish absorbing the mana, and then figure things out after.

Extending his will into the crystal through its direct contact with his chest. Ezekiel found that it was surprisingly simple to absorb it. He was also ecstatic to realize that this crystal had nearly thirty motes of Void mana within it. Meaning that he had nearly doubled his accumulated mana. He had just under sixty at this point, and he felt confident that he’d be able to get through the following experiments with ease.

Thinking of the upcoming experiments also made him think back to what he saw in the pure crystal. It reminded him of something from before. It seemed like Void mana had similarities to various forms of force, and the transfer of energy, never disappearing, and always being replaced when coming or going. So he had an idea for something he wanted to try with the next attempt.

Opening his eyes, he noticed that everyone in the room was staring at him.

“Ezekiel, are you alright?” Issa asked with concern in her voice.

“Yeah, I’m fine. What’s wrong?” Ezekiel said, not understanding why he was suddenly the center of attention.

“You were in a meditative state for nearly an hour. As an un-Tiered human, you should only be able to meditate continuously for ten minutes. The only reason we didn’t wake you up ourselves is because I was examining your health the whole time, and Scholar Rudy wanted to see what would happen.” Issa explained as she let go of Ezekiel’s now regrown hands.

“Indeed, indeed. So, tell me what happened kiddo.” Quentin exclaimed as he reached down and pulled Ezekiel to his feet.

“Well, I think I figured something out when I was meditating on the pure crystal. I saw the way the mana inside of it was behaving, and I have an idea I want to try on this next experiment.” Ezekiel explained as he reached out to grab another stack of papers detailing another technique from Quentin.

“Fantastic! Then let’s get started right away. Merlot, Trent, do as you did before, and Issa, step out of the circle and get ready for some healing.” Quentin said excitedly as he moved to his own examination apparatuses. Ezekiel almost wanted to say that he should probably wait for a while, but he didn’t feel any fatigue from his meditation, so he decided to just go with it.

Whilst the three journeymen and apprentices moved to do as they were told, Ezekiel read through the new technique, realizing that this one would be dangerous if he took in too much of the wrong element. Glacial and Flame. One would freeze him, the other would burn him.

Sitting down without complaint, Ezekiel started visualizing the image detailed in the book. This one seemed to be working off the idea that water naturally doused fire, that it would be a good idea to visualize a flame spouting from a block of ice, something that did happen in nature when gas pockets were trapped in the ice and released through crack.

Remembering the videos of his past, and picturing a fire lit from gasses in the ice, Ezekiel successfully visualized the detailed image, and once again entered into a meditative trance.

He immediately noticed an imbalance of mana. As the image depicted fire being fueled by gasses in the ice, the Glacial mana was much slower to gather, whilst the Flame was much faster. Not as fast as the Tempest from the previous technique, but there was still nearly double the amount when he dropped his image to stop the mana from accumulating.

Once again, he was forced to manually create Void mana by using his own mana to manipulate the Flame and Glacial motes inside him. This time there were seven new Void motes, and eight remaining Flame motes. As per usual, he directed the mana towards his fingers, but this time he didn’t push the motes of mana out right away, as he had also brought extra Void mood to his hands.

This was the idea that he had from the pure crystal. He was going to attempt something that had never been done before, and that he knew he wouldn’t be able to do with anything but Void mana.

Taking the image of the void mana cycling in and out, always replacing any mana that was sent out with a new mote of mana that was taken in, Ezekiel lined up the mana, using Void motes to touch the Flame motes, and then used additional Void motes to ram into the ones touching the Flames motes.

Ezekiel was mentally crossing his fingers as he prayed to the Ancients that his idea would work. He wasn’t a physicist, but he prayed that what he could remember about Newton cradles from his past life was accurate enough, and his assumptions about Void mana were close enough, for this idea to work.

As the motes of Void mana impacted on each other, a small amount of force traveled through the stationary motes, and the Flame motes were pushed forwards, all eight of them exiting his body, and once again floating freely in the world around him. No spell effects occurred at all as this happened.

Ezekiel opened his eyes letting out a sigh of relief as he looked around the room. He barely had enough time to open his mouth before Issa barreled into him screaming to ask if he was okay.

“Ezekiel! Ezekiel, look at me! You’re going to be okay, okay? You need to focus on me and tell me what hurts.” Issa said in a panic as she held Ezekiel down and covered him with a glowing green light.

“What happened? Why was there no kaboom? There is always a kaboom when we play with fire.” Quentin said in confusion as he moved forwards.

“If there wasn’t an explosion then that means he didn’t let the mana out.” Issa stated as she continued to examine Ezekiel for spiritual injuries. She slowly calmed down from confusion as she realized there were any.

“... How...?” She muttered under her breath as she realized that Ezekiel wasn’t hurt in any way.

“Scholar Rudy! Can you please take a look at this. I’m a little confused by what the manantennae are telling me.” Merlot said as he called out to Quentin.

Quentin immediately rushed over, Trent followed right behind him, wanting to see why there was no explosion, as the stuff he was looking over showed no abnormal readings.

Looking at and examining the symbols that had lit up on the manantennae, they saw the same things as Merlot did. They saw that there were several motes of Flame mana that had moved in the opposite direction of Ezekiel’s body. They saw that he had pushed the unattuned mana from his body without losing any mana or empowering an elemental phenomenon.

“So...” Ezekiel said quietly, still pinned down by Issa. “I guess my new trick worked, and we should probably talk about that before we continue any further. Issa, can you let me up now?”

Issa, Quentin, Merlot, and Trent just looked at the boy laying on the ground in front of them. Gob smacked at the fact that he had single handedly discovered yet another secret of Void mana.