B3 Chapter 386: Tales, pt. 5

Atop a peak that brushed the sky, Ianmus grit his teeth and reached for the mana deep within himself, leaning on his Glass Mind as much as he could.

He split his pool into two streams; great deluges that washed out from muscle and marrow. His grip slipped, as the power bucked and writhed — channeling like this was almost beyond him.

It wasn’t normal weaving, not the kind where he split his mana into multiple threads to work on a complex spell structure. That was doable. Not easy, but doable.

He’d been stuck at this point for hours.

At first, it had been disorienting to find himself atop a mountain in an unknown range, surrounded by alpine forests far below. But wherever he was — or more accurately, wherever Xenanra had recreated — the mana density was not so high as to make the weather dangerous. Even meager as it was, his Vitality was enough for the sharp cutting wind to only be an uncomfortable distraction.

Unfortunately, in his current circumstances, any distraction was detested.

When the System had told him what he needed to do, he hadn’t dared believe it at first. With his Mentis focused on the channeling and weaving of spells, he’d expected some feat of magery — something that pushed him to his limits.

Instead, it had demanded he cast two spells at once. An impossibility — at least at his tier.

It wasn’t the split and focus required. It wasn’t that he had to multitask — no, that was easy enough with a Glass Mind and high mental stats. Sure, it was far more difficult when the details you were paying attention to were utterly unrelated — but it was possible. He’d been doing it for a long time, speeding up his channeling and casting by threading spells together from multiple directions at once.

The problem with dual casting was the demands it placed on your intent and your will. The burden of channeling two different mana structures at once was crushing.

Few ever attained it.

He’d spent long hours in the stacks of Sunspire studying magic both historical and contemporary, and as valedictorian he’d often coordinated with his peers in the other spires. To his knowledge, there were only three in Mystral who had mastered the art to the point where they could cast two spells just as easily as one:

The Headmasters of Sunspire, Oceanspire, and Emberspire.

Three of the few publicly known third tiers in the city, with a wealth of stats that would have drowned his own.

Yet they didn’t have the benefits of a Glass Mind — let alone one as specialized as his. One born to cast.

Mouth pursed, Ianmus redoubled his grip on his mana and moved through the motions to channel Solar Ray — not once, but twice.

At this stage, he dared not attempt to duplicate anything freecast. The added time, complexity, and cost would be far too much. Simple sorcery was enough for now.

Even then, he stumbled often. Yet, his progress still came steadily — a complex stream of solar mana woven in front of each of his hands.

A quarter done. Then half.

His focus slipped as the burden grew too great. The spells shattered. Backlash rocked through his body, his stomach heaving with nausea as he grappled with the turbulence.

Yet he steadied himself, feeling the cold wind as he waited for his mana to refill.

Four more times he tried, and four more times he failed — each time his spell weaves broken by his own inability to split his intent into two simultaneous mana constructs.

Ianmus grit his teeth. No matter the purpose of this trial, he would not fail.

His Mentis was one of dynamism — of controlled and guided change. To avoid the stagnation he had seen in the ancient institutions of his home, he would learn, he would grow, and he would teach. If there was a way to do this so early, he would be the one to find it.

Rising from meditation, Ianmus gripped his mana once more and channeled.

Sweat built on his brow, a crushing pressure building in his skull. Oozing from his bones, his mana caused his muscles to spasm — phantom lightning surging through him as he demanded the energy to obey. Two streams split, and two knots of intent spun at the tip of each hand.

They built slowly, as if he were but an apprentice casting his first Spotlight cantrip.

The pace worsened by the fact that he did not even have his staff — his casting focus.

By the end, he was bowed over and trembling, but his mana tore free all the same; collapsed into a single moment of ejection, as he had demanded.

Two lances of light ripped across the snowy mountain peak, bright lines that connected earth and sky.

Joy burbled its way free of his chest as he stared at each. Ianmus howled his glee to the sky and snow. He’d done it! Stolen something that was in the realm of archmages!

It would be utterly unusable in battle — for now, at least. Any scenario worth spending so much time and effort casting two simple spells would be better spent packing more power and energy into a single one.

But to learn it so early…

There were secrets here. Secrets he would find, plunder, and apply elsewhere — and hopefully teach to others.

Eventually, at least. This was just the start.

He hadn’t mastered this trick by half. He barely felt the glimmering weight of Mentis, suffusing what Xenanra had called Authority through his mind and into the world around him.

Next, he would work on freecasting the spell, then later, separate and unrelated spells — something that he expected would increase the difficulty by an entire order of magnitude. The friction between the requirements would add to the strain on his intent.

It was one thing for his Glass Mind to duplicate what he was already doing. It was another for its task to be entirely different.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

He breathed out, grinning as he watched his fogged breath roll out over the icy peak.

“You best get back to it.”

…

Kaius smiled at his friend’s tale. For someone who had been so insistent that Kenva’s Corporus trial had been a little too light on struggle, it really did seem like the mage’s trial had been something he thoroughly enjoyed

“See, now your reaction seems a little exaggerated, because we all know you would’ve been having the time of your bloody life there. Rotten roots—throw any mage on a mountaintop and tell them they have as much time as they want to work on their spellcasting? I think you’d see some weep with joy. Hells, I think I would.”

Ianmus scratched the back of his head awkwardly. “You might be right there.”