The consequences of this conversation were severe. Selene seemed to think I was fated to change this world, and I have no idea what that means. War? Ruling the world? Changing the magic systems? All I have are questions, and very little answers! 

I know that I don’t want my parents involved in whatever turmoil I will cause. Whether I die to my mana core formation, or if I bring changes to the world afterwards. If I want to live, I need to be able to use the resources that I have, namely this abyssal power given to me. 

The consequences for doing so might be great, but I am likely going to die in the mana core formation anyways. The abyssal power might be able to at least contain the explosion to just harming me if anything else. 

This is a gamble, and the bet is my life. Either I will succeed and live, or fail and die. 

“Please trust that I can do this. We all know that I am not a normal kid, and I wish I had the answers you wanted. It is important that I try this.” I said to my parents, trying to ignore the worry on their faces. 

My parents stopped and considered what I asked. “You get one try, and if I sense anything going wrong you will stop the second I say so.” My father spoke up and made the decision, placing a hand on my mother’s shoulder to comfort her. She was worried, but gave a small nod at me in agreement with my father. 

I took a deep breath. One shot is all I have. Both in mana capacity, and with my parents approval. I need to feel how the mana flowed and changed when casting the spell, if I can even get that far. 

Clearing my mind of any distractions, as I was still unsure how the chant fully influenced magic besides attracting the magical pattern formation. 

Holding out my right hand, I repeated the same process my mother did slowly, keeping an “eye” on how the mana in my channels flowed. What my assumption was, is that when a mage casts a spell, the mana stored in the core flowed to wherever it was being outputted. Due to the core-less nature of my body, when speaking the chant the mana across my channels moved to gather in my chest, to my right arm, and finally to my hand. 

When the mana reached my hand, I had thought there would be some kind of conversion from the colorless mana to the elemental mana of the spell. The mana reaching my hand stayed the same as it was, and I could feel the ambient mana start to obey the.. Desire of my mana? 

Is that how a chant functioned? It placed some kind of message like a wish into the mana, and the ambient mana helped accomplish it with the mage’s mana as a fuel source? 

When the mana and the ambient worked together to form the same pattern my mother had done, my hand glowed. A bright blue and green glow! It was slightly brighter than when my mother performed it, and I looked at my parents in excitement. “Look! I did it!” I said, and my parents were staring at me in shock. I quickly imagined blocking the flow of mana to my hand and the spell was cancelled. 

“D-Damian, you saw that right?” My mother asked my father. “Yes. It was just a two year old casting a Tier 1 spell without a mana core or known affinity.” 

“Did I do something wrong?” Yes. Yes I did. My parents deserved some sort of reaction that made them think I was still a child. I would rather them think I’m some sort of prodigy than dig deeper into the way I am. 

“No, Luce. We are just surprised. It is really amazing what you did!” Father said to me. My parents seemed to realize that the way they responded would look bad to a child. “Yeah, sweetie! It was just something we didn’t know was possible!” My mother joined in to comfort me. 

This feels wrong, and I know it. A child does not need to worry about keeping their parents safe, but I am not a normal child. Peace is likely not in the cards for me, and it will only become more true if I grow and survive the process of core formation. 

My father looked me over and asked, “How do you feel, son? Do you feel tired, in pain.. Anything?”. 

I considered how to answer. Physically, everything felt okay. My mana capacity took a hit, but there is no sign of damage or impending doom. “Everything seems okay, Dad. When I cast the spell, it felt like it had the mana around my body go to my hand. There is less mana in my channels now, and nothing feels weird besides that.” 

My parents looked at each other again, seemingly having a conversation with their eyes. Not wanting me to see them freaking out? If only they knew that casting the spell was step one, I needed to understand how the mana flowed for a spell so that I can understand how to control the flow of it. The real target was seeing if I could interact with my abyssal power like Selene did. 

Realizing my parents would be needing to talk in private, I asked “May I go lay back down? I am starting to feel sleepy again”. My poor parents were forced to deal with their seemingly adult one second, and childlike the next child due to being a poor actor. 

“Of course, Luce. Go get some rest and we can talk about this later” My father said to me. I got up and gave them both a huge and started walking back into my room. 

My parents are aware that at least to some extent, I can cast magic. There was still plenty of mana in my system, and casting the spell opened my eyes to the feeling of the way mana flows. Before, I could loosely encourage it to go through my body and work on any impurities blocking the mana channels humans make when they grow their channels. Now? I could begin to learn how to fully control it at will.

Healing Hand used less mana than I expected, and I am unsure if it is due to my colorless mana being considered a “pure” mana, and therefore more efficient to use with magic, or if it is that I do not understand the capacity I hold already. 

When Selene fed the mana into my body, I was being overloaded and there was no way for me to pay attention to how her mana accessed the abyssal power. All I know is that it IS accessible. 

I went into my room and closed the door, and sat down on the bed in the standard meditation pose of crossing my legs and placing my hands over my knees.

Selene warned me to be careful gathering too much mana into my chest, and I imagine it has something to do with forming a mana core when enough gathers into one spot. In theory, I think it would be a result of enough mana of the mage’s affinity gathering to form a core made of that element. 

That gives more validity to my theory that my colorless mana is a “pure” version, and is either a mixture of the elements in harmony, or a true combination and that it is some “higher” form of mana. Both would allow the usage of multiple elements, yet I have a gut feeling it leans towards the latter. The first option would likely work by stripping the element needed from the supply of mana, and the others would remain. 

Instead, when I cast Healing Hand, it felt like it was a connection to the ambient with no barrier. So perhaps it functions like a highly efficient fuel, such as using an oil lamp over a wooden torch? There is a lot to experiment with, and I still needed to exercise caution. If this mana of mine was a stronger version of mana, it might also require less to start a core formation. 

Problem remains that I needed to create access to my abyssal power. It was a gamble, and I knew that this was messing with forces beyond my understanding. Why would the Lady of the Abyss give me this power if not to help me, going as far to say I can use or discard it if I wanted? 

I could apologize to Selene later. This was my gamble to make, and my consequences to deal with if it goes wrong. Selene does not deserve to sacrifice her life in exchange for my own. So, how do I go about doing this in the “safest” way? Working on my mana control to grab a tiny amount of mana to probe where the mana reacted with Selene? It’s a start at least.

I cleared my mind of distractions, and focused on feeling the mana in my body. Focus on the area in my chest, take control. 

The mana listens to my will, I imagine it moving up and it does. Too much of it reacts and shoots into my chest. No! Away from there! The mana rushes out of my chest region and into the surrounding areas, and I instantly feel the force hit my body. It hurts! 

The force of the mana slamming around my body hurts. I feel a drip on my hand, and open my eyes to see a drop of blood has fallen from my nose onto my hand. 

Shit. Mom is not going to like this. 

Wait, I can cast the spell to fix it now! This is perfect so I can practice casting the spell without using the chant by memorizing how the mana flows and do it on my own. 

I hold my hand up to my nose, and attempt to will the mana into my hand and create the “bait” for the ambient to create the pattern without the chant. The mana moves but too much goes along with it. The accumulated mana flowing into my arm with no release starts to strain my channels and hurts once again. Amazing work, Lucian. 

I quietly grit the chant through my teeth to not let my parents hear, and the Healing Hand spell glows on my hand brighter than earlier. Too much mana! It heals the nosebleed, and I quickly end the spell and start taking deep breaths. I did not notice until now that I am sweating from the exertion. 

If I pool up the mana in the place that casts the spell, the spell is stronger but uses up more mana. The pain in my arm is also gone, and I no longer feel the strain on my channels either. In fact, the channels in my right arm feel stronger after. Does it work similar to working out your muscles to make them stronger? 

Pain is something I experienced for the entirety of my life in my previous world. Hunger, Sickness, Battles, Training, the list goes on. I exerted myself to the limit in some form every day there. Selene said the reason people with higher affinity fail or die in the process of forming their cores is because their bodies could not handle the impact of the conflict created by the multiple elements forming a core. 

I can use my mana to damage and strain my body, while also pooling the mana to “work out” my mana channels, and then use Healing Hand to heal the damage while working on casting the spell without the chant and master mana control to access my abyssal power. It’s a hellish training cycle but it uses my best ability– The ability to withstand pain.

Selene and my parents would rightly throw a fit if they knew about this, and I would feel the same in their shoes. This is my life though, and I will give myself the best fighting chance to survive the future. 

Let’s begin this training hell!