Little author's note: Sorry this was suppose to be out yesterday but I had to finalize some of my thoughts on the world building aspect.

Chapter 10: Mana and Ki

Fang woke up early in the morning, grabbed East and headed to the house’s back years to get in some morning exercise. Because of his young age there wasn’t much he could do other than running and sword practice but it was enough to to prepare him for the day. After that he had a quick breakfast and headed to his mother’s study to wait for her to begin her lesson for the day.

“Fang you’re early. Well I guess it makes sense as today I'll be speaking about mana and ki.”

This was the reason Fang had finished up early, today his mother would teach him about the mana and ki of this world. After using mana through East in her blood tome form for more than a week Fang had noticed that the mana had a fundamental difference from what he remembered.

When fang was a gladiator the mana around him was like a raw and wild energy that he forced under his will. And the mana in his current surroundings while seemingly raw and wild seemed to follow a set of rules and deviated slightly depending on one’s surroundings.

Even areas that seemed normal enough would have different variations of mana in one place. This is what had been preventing him from dominating the mana around him and bringing it under his will.

As for ki his father had only roughly explained it as refined mana that wouldn’t cause direct harm to the body.

“Then I'll start with mana, mana is the energy that is used by mages to cast spells it is also used to power various magic tools. Mana is everywhere in the atmosphere but certain places will have higher densities of mana. These places make it possible to do various things but mostly they produce mana beast much faster.”

Up until this point these were things that Fang had either figured out on his own or managed to hear from his father. But this would still not explain the reason why he could not control mana in the same way as he did so before.

From his understanding mana control came from two things the body and one’s understanding, or experience.

His body while not having a great connection with mana was something that could be worked on, he had done so in his past life, the only problem was that doing so would take years off his life.

But that didn’t really bother Fang much as his mother told him that his life span would at the very least be around five hundred years so losing ten or twenty years wasn’t a big issue for him.

As for his understanding of mana it was already at what he considered a high realm, or at the very least world's above what he was capable of now.

“Then going into the details of mana. It can generally be divided into four kinds fire, water, earth, and air, all mana has a property and is guided by the laws of that element.”

Fang grew confused for a second but realized his mistake. In his previous life mana was a raw energy with no properties whatsoever, even when he used the Lightning attack or when the bird shot out fire it was converted into that element.

In this life mana in the atmosphere was already in the form of an element and followed certain laws. This explained the patterns he saw while the mana was seemingly free and wild.

“Then under each element there are variations such as my blood spells, they are a form of water mana being manipulated as a variant. Other elements also have variants such as lightning being a variant of fire or metal being a variant of earth.”

To Fang this was something new and also the final piece of what was restraining him all he had to do now was separate the different variations of mana and use them independently for their own purposes.

“Then it’s also important for you to know about ki, ki is used by those who aren’t able to sense mana on their own. A ki refiner or ki warrior is someone who with some external help is able to refine mana into ki and use it to strengthen his or her body.”

“Do not think that ki refiners are weak as any could be deadly in close range and a higher level ki refiner would be able to kill even at a distance. Even some who can sense and manipulate mana chose to refine some ki as it is the only way to strengthen the body beyond it’s natural limits. That is because a living being can only be so strong and mana in it’s raw form as used by mages to cast spells would be extremely harmful to the body.”

This was something that Fang knew all too well, as a gladiator he was forced to do anything to kill his opponent even things as dangerous as using raw mana to strengthen himself, eventually his body did adapt but not until he had suffered greatly.

Even know while he was planning to undergo that same hellish anguish to strengthen his body’s connection to mana he would take it slow to allow some recovery.

“The other important thing for you to know is that those of different races have different aptitudes for different elements. The humans have an average connection to every element, although there are exceptions such as your aunt Liz who can only use the air element.”

“The beast kin also have a good connection to every element but that’s only if you consider them as a whole, individual tribes of the beast kin might have good aptitude for curtain elements and not others. Another thing about the beast kin is that while they are able to sense mana, they are not able to manipulate it enough to cast spells, therefor they were the first ki refiners and the one’s who introduced it to the other races long ago.”

“Dwarves are in general unable to sense mana and become ki refiners, there is the odd one or two but there are exceptions to everything, they are only able to connect to the earth and fire ki. As for elves we are split into two groups one group is proficient with a variant of the earth and water element that creates the wood element while the other is proficient in the wind element.”

Fang suddenly had a thought, his dwarven blood must have run strong because he was completely unable to sense mana without the help of East in her blood tome form. if not for that although he would have still had problems with mana having it’s own property then he would have at least been able to fight the guard of the noble child off.

“Then now that we have covered mana and ki for the most part I'll explain how a magician and a ki refiner are ranked.”

This was something new to Fang as his previous life never had a ranking system for control over mana at most it would depend on how large a force you could fight alone.

“Magicians or mages, some even like to call themselves witches, are ranked depending on the level of spell the or she is able to cast. First there are the level one through four spells with level four spells being the strongest. Those are generally anything like a level one fireball to a level four firestorm spell.”

“Then after level four spells is the level of understanding a law, usually at this level a magician will create his or her own spell with the understanding of one of the laws that the element they use follows, this will also be applied to and strengthen all his or her previously learned spells.”

“The level after that is the domain level were the magician creates an area around him or herself where that person is in complete control over an element, this is the level which I am currently in. the last level is the Saint level, every major power has at least one or two public saints that will protect them, at this level one is not limited to an area but is said to control their element completely.”

Going by this Fang wasn’t sure we're he would place if he had his former strength because the mana in his previous life did not contain laws and although he could freely control the mana around him he had to store it in his body for it to be truly effective. However using it that way ended in his death.

“Ki refiners also have various levels the first is core refinement were one refines ki and creates a ki core to store and further refine his or her ki, in this level other than creating a core the body will strengthen but not much else. The second level is when one can circulate the ki from his or her core throughout the body without causing damage as the ki circulates through the body the ki refiner will grow considerably stronger.”

“The third level is when the ki refiner is able to project the ki in his or her core outside of his or her body, making it possible to use more devastating attacks. After that is the change or adaption of properties in which the ki in one’s body changes from it’s standard form into the properties of one of the elements greatly increasing it’s strength.”

“The sixth level is understanding of a law and is similar to the understanding of a magician. The seventh level is the brake level in which one breaks his or her core and infuses it into one’s body, the effects of this make it possible for the ki refiner to have monstrous strength. and lastly ki refiners also have a saint level but it has only been seen in the strongest of beast kin tribes and a well guarded secret. In this aspect the dwarven kingdom gets along by finaly raising the few magicians they have into saints and having a large number of brake level ki refiners.”

Everything said was new to Fang and it was taking him longer to process all the information at once.

The concept of a core was completely foreign to him but made a lot of sense because this way instead of needing to use and outside object as a medium one could use the ki core. In an ideal situation even his final lightning attack would not have previously killed him, as long as he held back some and used just enough force to kill his enemies.

This was something he had to do this way having a core and combining that with his plan to allow his body to withstand raw mana his power would be unimaginably high then his previous life’s.

“Mother, as a half dwarf half elf what is my elemental aptitude?”

This was important as his body determine what elements he could use, if he forced a different element onto himself it would be detrimental. Although he would eventually still reach the peak of his previous strength and even soar higher it would be that much harder to accomplish.

“Hmm I'm not entirely sure we will have to test it in a few weeks until then the only thing to do is see if you can sense mana on your own. If you can not it isn’t a problem that just means you’re more suitable to be a ki refiner. then today’s lesson is over that was a lot of information so go to your room and digest it.”

Fang nodded and walked back to his room.

_______________

Luna watched her son walk out of the study and let out a sigh after he had closed the door. The reason of her new worry was Fang.

According to her husband fang could not sense mana, in reality any child with aptitude for it would show signs at the age of four early five being the latest. In the dwarven kingdom that would not be a problem, after all none of the dwarves could sense it. But everywhere else ki refiners were looked down upon.

Especially those who becam ki refiners without a choice. Some ki refiners who could sense mana but chose the rout of a ki refiner were still somewhat respected but those who were born unable to sense mana and then became ki refiners through outside help were not looked upon all that favorably.

Of course Luna did not have the same opinion one of her old comrades was in that same group and could fight any of them off in his worst condition if it wasn’t for the fact that her blood control was so special and vicious Luna would have no confidence against him.

But to reach that level required great sacrifice, luckily Fang had elf blood in him and could afford to spend one or two hundred years on his ki refinement. Even some elves who had stagnated in their path as a magician would turn to ki refinement for a hundred years or so and made great accomplishments before returning to their original path.

With some extreme luck luck Fang would inherit the blood element variant from her and even as a ki refiner he would never be looked down on.

(Author's note: so this did take longer then I thought and it's an explination chapter. Also for those that wanted to know why Fang was haveing trouble with mana control. It might seem shorter but this is a little above 2000 according to word count. Other than that I shall continue to ask people to read the first two chapters of way other work Broken One's New Life http://royalroadl.com/fiction/5877 and thank you for reading. Comments are helpful especially if there is something I'm missing. Such as the reason for Fangs lack of control with mana. I know there was a comment about the coat or ashes in it's chapter but I'm waiting a bit to revival more on that. For now it's the cover of the book when it turned into a coat in his fight with the four beasts.)

:)