Author's Note: Sorry a few hours late for today, this one was also quite a long chapter.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gravity Magic

I was breathing hard, as though I had just run a 50 km marathon. One more to add what I learned today. [ Mana ] is essential to every human and when you’ve exhausted it, it’s an unpleasant feeling of pain and agony that awaits you. I’m almost close to fainting. It’s great that there’s no Sun in the sky, by now if I could calculate the time I would say it was afternoon. If there was an unbearable heat along with us, I’m certain I would’ve blacked out by now.

Water……I need water………at least for once right now, I want to stop thinking about anything. The more I think the more tired I feel. Given my personality I doubt that’s possible. How many thoughts does my brain process through everyday anyway? Oh God, stop thinking already.

Ah…..

Ahh……..

I see it. My house is so near. It’s just a few feet away. I have to be careful not to let Olivia see me in this state. She surely won’t let me go outside again otherwise.

Exhausted, I enter the house. Olivia is probably in the kitchen. I need to reach the water pot and drink some water fast. I didn’t want to drink at the lake, since I might just fall into it given my condition.

It’s amazing how my brain stays calm with clear thoughts, even during these moments. It’s thanks to it that I even managed to survive many gruesome planets with hell-like environments.

But still …. Just moving my body is getting annoying. I finally make it to the pot and take a canteen and use a cup to drink the water.

More …..more …..i just can’t stop drinking it. I’m glad the pot is large enough to store so much. Sara just filled it in the morning too. But my body feels like its aching and its heat is rising. I just want to keep drinking a little more.

Phew…… I didn’t think a 1 year old body would want that much water. I just kept drinking, until only a fourth of the pot is still left. I feel a little better now. I still feel sleepy though. My temperature returned to normal, I guess I can rest a little in my room. I still have enough strength to move there. Luckily Olivia didn’t spot me.

I just take a pillow and sleep on the floor. I don’t know why, but a floor always felt better for me to sleep in than on the bed. Yeah time to get some snooze. Wait ….I should check my [ Status ] just in case.

It looks like [ Mana ] has recovered to 25. So that’s the limit until I start feeling like this. What would happen if I use all of my [ Mana ] though. I really didn’t want to do it, the pain and tiredness just a moment ago wasn’t something I’d want to go through again. But I am curious as to what would happen. Seeing my state when I used so much , I don’t think I’ll die. Maybe I’ll just faint.

No good, I don’t want to do it. I was careless enough when I didn’t see I had used up so much [ Mana ]. Let me just sleep for now.

….

……

What the heck? I was sleepy right. Just rest already. Even though I’m closing my eyes and I feel tired, why can’t I go to sleep?

I remember not being able to sleep in space, but it shouldn’t be like that here. These thoughts won’t let me rest. I don’t really want to get back up though. Wait, should I think about something really boring? Imagine Sara talking about nice that guy whose name I can’t remember was.

……well I feel a bit sleepy, but not enough to quickly stop these thoughts and go to bed. Is it because, I’ve been sleeping only in the night. I remember reading about sleep cycles. I think my natural sleeping time would be at night with this body. Well I’ll at least test [ Mana Sight ] for now. I remember the feeling clearly now.

It was the same feeling as [ Status ] but slowly feeling a sensation over my head and moving it to slowly to the eyes. My first attempt was wrong and I got a little lucky getting somewhere around it. But repeating that same method didn’t work. If it weren’t for [ Gift of Time ] , I don’t know think I would’ve done much progress and probably made wrong decisions on it.

I can see it. A blue flowing mist-like aura, I think that would be the [ Mana ] in this world. I try to send [ Mana ] to my hands again and observe with my eyes. I can see that blue aura enwrapping it. I could see its shape clearly and could adjust however I wanted it. I observed the room and saw the clear flow, I thought [ Mana ] would cover this world more like the sea. But as I observed closely, I could see their being larger spots of a little darker blue mist and rest had lighter colored mist.

Looks like [ Mana ] concentration like this would probably be normal, since humans may absorb it as they sustain on it. Would the presence of [ Mana ] probably affect their growth cycles like this? I get a little emotional as watch my room. Thank you, I’ll help myself from getting more from you.

As I thought of checking to see if absorbing the denser mana was possible or not. I couldn’t move my body. I started feeling more tired. Wait does [ Mana Sight ] use too much [ Mana ]? I check [ Status ] and see my [ Mana ] drop from 1 to 0. I saw everything become dark again.

……this was the same feeling of darkness I felt when I died in the previous universe’s collapse. Wait did I die?...No. This feeling…..it’s closer to when I first woke up as an infant. When I first woke up in a new body, I immediately went unconscious. So when will I wake up again?

………Ah! I suddenly woke up. I don’t know how long I slept. At least this was one way fall asleep I suppose. I don’t think I slept for long, I don’t see anyone in my room. Dinner would be given a little late at night and since they didn’t call for me, I suppose no one came to check here. That means it isn’t dinner time, so I suppose I slept a few hours. But I’ll confirm just in case.

I go and see Olivia, she’s humming a sound while readying the food. She looks at me.

“Did you sleep enough, Orian? You shouldn’t run around too much in the village. I was worried since you slept too much. If you’re hungry, then I’ll provide dinner in a while. Can you go get your sister too, she’s in the shed.”(Olivia)

I nod at her and move. I look outside and it’s already night. The villagers are already lighting the pillars. Should I go and try it? There’s still one left on that side. I quickly check my [ Status ]. Looks like my [ Mana ] has recovered to 123. I don’t think using a tool should use up too much, but then again I might have really less [ Mana ] to begin with. I can’t clarify since I posses [Gift of Time] and others don’t. I’m just assuming that skill uses too much mana.

Standing here isn’t going to clear my doubts. I should just go and settle this matter. I sneak around, since its dark the villagers can’t see me near where the pillar isn’t lighted yet. I reach the pillar and place my hands on it. It looks like the villagers touch only this part which has a stone tablet on the surface of the pillar to use it. I think this would be the interface.

I let [ Mana ] flow through them, I also use [ Mana Sight]. I don’t really want to use it, but I have to see how the tool operates. I can see the [ Mana ] going through my hands, and it starts flowing through the inside of the pillar. As I increase the flow from my side, the flow within the pillar increases. The mana flows through until it reaches some sort of core in it. There’s a circular formation of [ Mana ] within the pillar and it pulls at the river of mana I’m sending to it.

The core which I could see, since that would what the container probably looked like within the pillar starts sending [ Mana ] to the upper part of the pillar. I see some sort of formation……is that a circle? And the circle has some strange signs written over it. Fire starts welling up on the pillar’s flat surface. I leave the place before anyone spots me. Luckily the villagers were still lighting the far away ones.

I check my [ Status ]. That’s weird….. why has my [ Mana ] only dropped to 115. Did the tool use only 8 mana? I can’t be accurate since my mana regenerates really fast

…..No, I think it probably used even less. Maybe about 3 or 4, since I know how much [ Mana Sight ] would consume. I’ll just test it once again. I send mana to my eyes and slowly count till all my fingers are closed. After about 10 second I open [ Status ] quickly. I can see my [ Mana ] has dropped to 110.

So considering whether my mana regenerates while I use it or not, [ Mana Sight] uses about 1 mana every second. I think it’s probably lesser since opening the [ Status ] also consumes a little [ Mana ]. I’ve confirmed how much mana my skills consume. It’s sad [ Status ] doesn’t show it. At least it’s useful in understanding and keeping track of all the skills.

Without it, I probably would’ve misunderstood about [ Gift of Time ]. It’s alright [ Status ] , you are useful.

I go to the shed and see Sara still feeding the Griffons. I call out to her, she finishes and comes my way. She has a weird smile on her face. Weird why? But it doesn’t look much like a happy one. I realize a little late, when I feel a sharp pain near my ear. Sara is pinching my ear and pulling at it really hard.

“ ow…..ow….stop it already Sara.”(Orian)

“ What’s with that way of calling me? Call me big sister, Orain”(Sara)

“Alright, I get it. Please stop it….it really hurts.”(Orian)

“Oh this…I think you don’t understand. This is for what you did in the morning. You left the pot barely empty. Do you even know how hard it is to carry a large pot of water from the lake to here? I even need to feed the Griffons so I need to do it twice. I went again and refilled it, but you were happily snoozing off in your room while I had to do the hard work. What’s with that?”(Sara)

“ I’m sorry, I just felt really tired and thirsty. I’ll help you from tomorrow with carrying the water back, so please forgive me.”(Orian)

Sara sighed.

“ You really are a lot of trouble. You don’t stay in one place and keep wandering around the whole village. Then you end up getting tired and doing this. Fine, I’ll let you off for now. Also help me feed the Griffons tomorrow too.”(Sara)

Please board the free sibling labor train today. You also get a discount with each kind offer.

I ended up agreeing to her demands but it’s not like I hated taking care of the Griffons anyway. We both return together for dinner and I head to sleep again.

I don’t know if I can sleep now, since I got up only a few minutes ago. I move my pillow to the part of the room which had the largest condensed mana. I try to simply close my eyes while I think. Before I realized, I’m already asleep.

I wake up in the morning the usual time. Actually I think it was late by a few hours. Although I can’t say exactly since this place doesn’t have such a convenient tool. I didn’t expect to fall asleep so quickly. Was it because I moved to the part with the most dense mana. It felt a little pleasant, when I did that. It was similar to moving to a slightly cold room. I should keep this in mind the next time I go to sleep.

As usual, I check my [ Status ] and although everything remains the same. I see my [ Mana ] is a little off. I am correctly reading it right…..then why is it showing my [ Mana ] to be 1120?

I use [ Mana Sight ] and check the room. There’s no dense mana in the room anymore, it’s all light colored like the rest. Did I absorb so much from my surroundings? And I didn’t just absorb from the place I slept. I remember the room had a few more spots like that. Then did I absorb from the whole room?

Was this because of yesterday? Did my body proactively improve my mana capacity since it thought I needed more? Well I actually do need a lot, if I’m going to be researching. This is actually a good thing. I really don’t want to use so much [ Mana ] again. But this is training in a way I suppose? If I have enough [ Mana ], I could easily use [ Mana Sight ] without having to worry about fainting and I could [ Gift of Time ] for longer duration of experiences into the future.

Speaking of which, I should check that ability again. I focus on [ Gift of Time ] and focus on [ Ability 1 ].

….huh? …..what’s this blinking on Ability 1. Wasn’t this the name [ Status ] gave to the ability of [ Gift of Time ]. I get the idea that I could change it for some reason. Does that mean the names of skills up till now were named by someone? Probably by some God who first made the skill. Does that mean I can name this skill?

Well it is a [ Unique ] skill. So I don’t think anyone else can use it. I could give it a name like [ Orian’s hypothesis modulation ….]. Yeah let’s not do that.

I should simply name it based on its effect, since it would be easier to categorize it. What would be the best name?

Ah…I know. How about [ Backtrack ]? I mean it technically allows me feel each and every moment from the future without me actually doing it. So yeah I’ll go with that. Once I decided on the name, I can see the slab say

[ Ability 1 has been named Backtrack ]

[ Backtrack: Can secure your future experience and return them to the present time. ]

I suppose I’ll discover more about it in the future. For now I really want to know more about [ Mana ], since this world basically is covered by it.

But still my mana capacity is more than double of what it used to be. I’m glad I can see myself improving.

As I enter the kitchen, Olivia smiles at me.

“Orian, you sure are eating and sleeping a lot. I didn’t think you liked y cooking so much, you gulped down even the leftovers yesterday night. Keep growing so you become a strong adult in the future.”(Olivia)

I happily nod. Did I eat so much yesterday? I probably didn’t realize at the time, I felt a lot hungry than usual when dinner was served. That means this body is growing properly. I finish my breakfast and head out to help Sara, I should hurry since I woke up late.

I check the shed and Sara isn’t there. Dari still isn’t going to be leaving to the city in a while. So the Griffons are still there. Did she go to the river already? I see the empty pot near the Griffons, I clean it using a cloth and carry it outside.

I see a crowd in the village today. What’s the commotion I wonder? Ah.. Sara is also there, I guess I’ll go check it out.

“ Big sis-“ ……(Orian)

As I go to call for her, I realize where everyone has gathered. They’re surrounding the pillar I lighted yesterday. Did I break it? I activate [ Mana Sight ]. No the [ Mana ] within seems to be working fine. Wait…..why is the [ Mana ] still there ?

I look at the top of the pillar and see the fire still burning. I break out in cold sweat. Did I accidently put too much mana into it? I’ll just go and ask her if she’s heard anything. I don’t want to think someone saw me yesterday, but if it did happen then I think I’m in trouble.

I call out to Sara and as she sees me holding the large pot, she walks towards me.

“ Well since you’re here. Go to the lake and fetch some water for the Griffons. Father’s leaving tomorrow so they need to be fed and taken care of.” (Sara)

“What happened here?”(Orian)

“ I don’t know. The adults are still talking about who lighted this pillar. The fire hasn’t gone out yet. They’re probably trying to check the cause for it. They won’t let you near there, since you’re too young. Go and finish the job, understand”(Sara)

“What are you going to do, Big sister?”(Orian)

“I’ll be going to meet Uncle Guez. I’ll stock up on the food, you just feed the Griffons what’s remaining at home.”(Sara)

I nod to Sara and head to the lake. I fill up the pot to the brim and carry it back. She was right this is quite heavy. I use my hips to support while I lift the weight, so it becomes more easier. I learnt that from the race which tried to improve their physical prowess, that using the right muscles in your body for the proper actions always made it easier.

Although it was heavy, I handled it easily. I carried the pot to the shed and provided the leftover fruits to the Griffons. They sure ate happily, and I finally poured the water into the large bowl they ate from. After taking care of them , I cleaned up the feathers. Any work done must be done perfectly.

There everything’s done. I finish up and head to my secret place in the village. I found a place which was little near to the forest along the lake where people didn’t come often. I planned on continuing my training there.

I started using [ Mana Sight ] and checked the mana concentration of the village. It was similar to my room and there were a few number of dense mana spots. Since I know how [ Magic ] works now, I’ll try using the [ Mana ] with the desire to apply it to use in some way.

Using [ Mana Sight ] it was easier to control mana flow, so I first started on its being in combat. As I heard about monsters, I should probably be strong enough to handle them so I need to improve my fighting potential.

But how do I do that? As I already know about, [ Strength ] , [ Agility ] and [ Endurance ] they can probably be increased by growth and training. I suppose I should start training my body physically as well. If only I could directly use the knowledge of that tribe on that terrible planet. I remember it, on a certain dark planet in the Starhead Galaxy where people with similar contrasts to humans lived. But they weren’t advanced on technology, they were however knowledgeable on biological improvement of the body through physical training techniques.

I don’t think I can thank them enough for teaching me how the body works, how smaller muscles impacted the growth and strength of the whole body. How to train them? What positions to use? I think it was because of that I had also grown taller, much more than the average kind. But there were a lot of equipment to use for that training. Basically heavy equipment, if I had any of it I could begin training from small , where growth to the body would be at the highest.

For now, I need to increase my defense. No matter how strong I get, if a sword cuts my hand, it will be cut. If I get burned, my skin will suffer. If a monster hits me with enough force, I’ll suffer from blunt damage. I could dislocate a few bones. Basically humans don’t have any form of strengthening their external skin or internal organs no matter how much they train. Getting hit would harden the skin to some extent but may end up leaving scars and may actually end up being targeted at that point thinking that part to be weak.

That would mean wear armor while going to combat. I don’t think I’ll have enough money to buy something like that from the blacksmith. Moreover they aren’t suits or vests made from the current technology yet.

So now, can I do something about it using [ Mana ]. I concentrate and let mana envelop my whole body and I desire it to protect me. Thoughts of protecting my body from all attacks runt through my mind. A layer of mana is covering my entire body while this happens. I feel my body is getting strengthened and my skin being covered.

I get some sort of alert like feeling and I just open my [ Status ].

[ Enhanced Defense learned]

[ Enhanced Defense improved to +1]

[ The body’s defense is improved by Mana. Low level attacks don’t damage you. You can use the first level Enhanced defense ]

[ Endurance : Enhanced Defense +1 equipped ]

[ Mana: 1105 ]

Ah…… it was possible to do it after all. This was sort of a Mana Defense mechanism. Looks like someone already created this skill long ago and its good against weak attacks.

Hmm…. How much is exactly considered weak by it?

Does it even protect me against the monster’s outside this village? Seeing my [ Mana ] right now , I don’t think it consumes much. All I have to do is use it once and the defense is maintained. I try pinching my arm and see my [ Mana ] dropped by 2. Since my other hand also had improved defense, I suppose it penetrated the others when I pinched it hard. It hurt like how it would normally would. Then that means when the defense has been overcome, it again regenerates if I have enough mana. A useful defense dependant on mana though.

I remove the enhanced defense from one hand and try to repeat the same. Like I thought, my other arm which has the defense feels hard as a rock. I can’t even inflict any pain from my other hand. I see there’s a change in the color on the hand with the defense equipped. It isn’t noticeable but you’ll feel it’s different if you see it closely.

I didn’t think too hard about the slight change in color. If you saw it from a little far, you wouldn’t even think there was any difference. I could guess this defense was strong. But I didn’t know how strong monsters were. If I’m planning on entering the forest, I should at least be ready for it.

If I could make such a simple defense, what would happen if I try to make it stronger? By using [ Mana Sight ], I send my mana to cover over the already existing mana to make a double layer defense. As I observe carefully and manipulate it, I finally am able to apply another layer.

I get the same feeling again this time and open [ Status ].

[ Enhanced Defense +1 improved to +2 ]

[ Enhanced Defense +2 ]

[ Endurance: Equipped Enhanced Defense +2 ]

[ Mana: 1080 ]

I see…. So it is possible like that. This was worth checking, I can be safe with something like this. But it seems to more [ Mana ] than the previous, well it is obvious though. It is 2 layers of Mana embedded on top of another.

Alright, I know this maybe too greedy of me. But I should try it, let me keep adding more layers and see how further it can improve.

-----After an hour -------

……what the…..

This is well…..disappointing.

I was only able to add one more layer, making it [ Enhanced Defense +3 ]. I tried repeating the same after using it again and again. I couldn’t make a fourth layer. I think I should understand that this applies the same in the previous world. Although this improved defense is good, I think it’s feeling a little disoriented. It’s like I have to keep watch over the third layer so it doesn’t fall of while managing the other layers.

Basically it’s imbalanced and in a way harder to maintain. I suppose moving would become more difficult if I had keep using this higher defense.

Although the previous one seemed enough, I still don’t think I should take light of monsters without any information. But wearing the three layered one is even worse, I can’t move too well. Adding a fourth layer is impossible.

What can I do? I can see the change on my skin. It looks metallic. Is this the reason it’s a higher defense. I suppose having such a body meant, it would survive attacks. But is this all, someone probably went a bit higher than this since the [ Status ] can still name it or did people simply try to adjust to move while using this defense. It would become too distracting wearing this.

Wait….maybe I should change my approach? The third layer almost seems unstable having to maintain to it all the time. How about joining the layer’s somehow? There was a method liked that used in strengthening battle suits.

I control the mana flow so that the three layers start combining. It’s like small threads are connecting in between each the layer. They seem like they are holding them together.

I immediately get the same feeling. I open [ Status]. This is going to become a habit probably.

[Enhanced Defense improved to +4 ]

[ Mana Sight improved to +3 ]

[ Enhanced Defense +4 ]

[ The body’s defense is improved by controlling the mana to a higher level. High level attacks deal insignificant damage. The Fourth level of Body Defense.]

[Endurance: Equipped Enhanced Defense +4]

[ Mana: 822 ]

This time I felt the change was really significant. I could move my body much more easily. The color of my body was now grey. I could freely strengthen the defense of my body. I enhanced one hand and touched it using the other. It felt a little similar to the battle suits that were made before in the previous world. It was close but not quite, but I knew what this feeling was. It was like touching hard graphite. Isn’t this Carbonization?

Basically my body could be strengthened based on the formation I gave my mind.

Why did [ Mana Sight ] improve? Looking closer, I had seen in between the many layers of mana and had improvised that structure which was harder than to stare at easily. So it improved because I could focus more on the structure of mana?

I think I’m beginning to understand how mana works in this world. Having mana makes it more easier and when probably controlled there’s a lot of things you can do. What would be impossible normally was possible through it’s application? But all these methods of application, someone already had done it and there maybe others using it. I really can’t wait to travel and find out for myself.

So defense has been covered. Now I need offense, can’t simply take hits for no reason. Should I try to use the [ Elemental Magic ]? I don’t think possible right now, since there was that other language in the textbook.

Couldn’t I observe how others would use it and simply implement it myself? I have [ Mana Sight ], so learning shouldn’t be a problem. I could try to learn [ Fire Magic ] from the pillar, but I need to see what’s at the top to understand it. There was something at the top which I couldn’t see properly which made the fire. Seeing the villagers are checking over it, I don’t think I can learn it easily now.

I’ll just [ Mana Sight ] for now. I just stare with a blank face over the whole village. I’m not worried since I have enough [ Mana ] now. I can see something beneath me. Is it because it improved a while ago? There’s mana within the earth too. Is it [ Earth Magic ]? No , it’s different. Now that I look at it, the entire ground is covered by [ Mana ].

What about Gravity? I almost forgot entirely about it. There was rare magic called [ Gravity Magic ]. Did the earth also use it by manipulating the [ Mana ] in that manner?

I get an idea. I try to walk and see some dregs of mana threads attached to my feet. I pick up a pebble, as I observe closer there’s a thread of mana connected to the pebble and the earth. As I pick it up, it’s still connected to the mana in the earth. I try to copy it, slowly infusing my own mana into the pebble. I connect it to the larger mana making a pulling like action. I let the pebble go from my height. It falls quickly to the ground making a small hole of its shape.

Next I pick up another pebble and this time disrupt the thread connecting it to the ground. I try to reduce the thread’s width. This time I drop the pebble, it instead falls down as though under no gravity.

!

As expected, that feeling came again. I opened my [ Status ].

[ Gravity Magic Learned]

[ Gravity Magic improved to +1]

[ The Magic connecting the earth, it also connects many other elements. Manipulating it through the use of mana, allow you control over different elements. First level Gravity Magic ]