Chapter 36: Essence Cores.

The whispers started before Aldric’s mouth had finished closing.

“…another half-demon? Are you serious?”

“Look at those horns. They’re even bigger than Ilyasviel’s.”

“Shit, don’t tell me that’s her.”

There had been many whispers since I had come to this Academy. Most of those whispers had been in crowds. Barely audible. In this otherwise quiet room, these whispers carried. I let the words pass. Even without the [System], some things were universal. The strong whispered about those they feared. The weak whispered about those they hated.

The Inker took a moment to settle, and I saw the effort it cost him. He took a deep breath, one that was just as audible in the quiet room. He crossed the chamber in four strides. “You are both late. Very late.” He sighed, “Come.” He did not wait for an answer. Ash and I looked at each other, then followed. The whispers only grew louder as we moved effortlessly through the room.

He led us to the far corner, away from the rest. His gaze caught on something behind us. I followed it. Ren was there, hovering between two students. One was Edda. I had not seen her immediately. She sat with her back straight and her eyes closed. The other was a boy. He was slight, perhaps fourteen, with dark hair that fell over his eyes and the tiniest nubs of bone rising from his temples. They were so small they might have been mistaken for a trick of the light. His hands rested on his knees and his eyes were shut. Nothing about him glowed.

“You,” Aldric called, pointing at Ren. “Ren Eryn! Since you’ve decided to come in here, you will make yourself useful. Walk the students through their breathing exercises. Some of them are near their final stage. I am sure you can tell which.”

Ren’s mouth dropped open. “I’m not a-“

“Do as you are told.” The Inker said, not breaking stride. Ren’s jaw clenched. She shot me a look, though I had done nothing. She turned on her heel and stalked toward the nearest row of students, muttering something that did not carry over the distance.

The Inker settled onto a low stone and gestured for us to sit. The floor was cool beneath me. Ash sat next to me, closer than was necessary. We stared at the Inker. He sighed before he began.

“It seems that the Archon,” Aldric said, “has left the particulars of your instruction to me. I am to explain what I can and see you through your core formation.” He paused. “I will start with some rather…unfortunate news.” He looked at me, and for once, there was no sneer behind his eyes.

He began with basics we had already heard -Essence, its importance, and why a core mattered at all. Neither Ash nor I had asked him to repeat any of it. I suspected he was stretching his explanation to make Ren work longer “An Essence Core,” he said. “Is carved directly out of…or rather inside, a mana core. I said before that it is a painful process, this is why.” Both Ash and I looked at each other, then back at the Inker. “Think of your mana core as your birthright. The land you were born to.” He glanced between us. “To make an Essence Core is to build a foundation on that land, so that one day that foundation may be something great.”

“Then one’s potential is limited from birth,” Ash said what I was thinking.

“Yes,” Aldric said easily. “One can build a better foundation on suitable land. This much is obvious.”

Ash’s core, from what I had felt of it, was no small thing. Especially for a human. Mine had let me wage battles that might never end. This body was different, and my capacity was not quite that extreme, but still. I saw the same understanding in Ash’s blue eyes, followed by the smallest of smirks.

“It is not quite as simple as you are imagining,” Aldric said dryly. “The bigger your Mana Core, the harder it is to carve into an Essence Core. The less of it you probably will. The smaller the Mana Core, the more of it you can reshape for Essence. Exceptions aside, most people fall in the same range as far as capacity is concerned.” The greatest exception in history sat before him, and he did not know it.

“Then there must be a measure for this,” I said.

Aldric nodded. “The measure is efficiency. The ratio of your Essence Core to your mana core. An average person achieves perhaps forty to fifty percent. Meaning their Essence Core occupies roughly half their mana core’s total volume. This is respectable and is sufficient for most purposes.” He raised a finger. “A talented cultivator with good instruction and access to resonance chambers might reach sixty to sixty five percent. This is considered excellent.” He raised a second finger. “An incredible core is around seventy five percent efficient. These are rare enough to be noteworthy. Of course, as I said, some cores are easier to reshape than others, so a number might be technically impressive, but practically not worth comment.”

He waited. I could admit that this was rather interesting. There was nothing like this in the old System. “How does the formation itself work?” Ash asked. She had leaned toward me without quite seeming to notice. Her side pressed against mine. Between us, the egg in the satchel pulsed once.

I had not been listening. The Inker was still speaking. “-agonizing in practice. You must fill your mana core to its fullest capacity. The resonance chamber provides denser mana that makes this faster and more complete than attempting it in the open air. You must do it until it aches, until you think your core might explode from the inside.”

He looked between us. “Then, you produce Essence through your mark. You force it into the core, replacing some of that mana. This is where the pain begins. Holding Essence is normally impossible, but when a core is full to bursting, you can. With enough focus.” His eyes went distant. “This is perhaps one of the more painful things most people will ever go through, but you endure.”

I did not like the shape of this roundabout instruction. Pain? I had felt pain. “And what happens then?” I pressed. My voice was sharp.

The Inker stared at me. He frowned, but still answered, “The mark does the rest.” He lowered his hand. “As Essence is held inside the core, the mark begins to impose a…structure on the surrounding mana. It carves channels into it, one for holding Essence that does not leak. The process happens on its own. It feels like something alive burning inside you.” The Inker shook himself, “Your task is simply to keep feeding it Essence and to not lose consciousness while it reshapes you from the inside.”

“Simply,” Ash said.

“I did say it was straightforward in concept.” The ghost of a smile crossed his face and died. “The final step is mostly just endurance. As more of the core is carved, the pain grows. There is no technique that dulls this.” He looked between us. “Many people pass out during formation. Most pass out, in fact. That is when most stop. When consciousness is lost, naturally, the process stops. Others simply lose focus and cannot endure the pain anymore, though that is rarer.”

“And it cannot be resumed once it stops,” I said. I had already suspected as much from the way he had framed the explanation.

“Yes. There is no second attempt. There is no correction. Once the process properly starts, you must see it through.” His emphasis there was not subtle. “This is why will matters more than talent, and more than technique.” He looked between us. “There are two reasons this process takes weeks. The first is the time needed to make Essence at all. The second is so you can practice with the pain. Hold your core to bursting and get used to the feeling. Channel the tiniest bit of Essence into your core, such that some of the pain can come, but the process itself won’t start. That way, when the time comes, it is easier.” He frowned. “Though, truth be told, it is still painful in the end.”

I turned it the process over in my mind. Fill the core to bursting, produce Essence and force it in and then finally endure the pain that follows. It was brutal, but not complex. I suspected it was the System doing the carving, not the marks. Not that it changed anything. Ash was warm against my side. I adjusted the satchel.

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“Now.” Aldric clasped his hands together. “For the difficult part.” He looked at me. “You carry two marks of the same order. Two…” He glanced at the distant students. “…marks of the same order. This is a problem.'”

I frowned. Ash spoke before I could. “Explain.” The word was sharper than I had expected.

Aldric eyed her, then turned back to me. “If you have two marks of different orders, the process is more complex and slower, but that’s all. A Primal and a Cypher could, for instance, carve the same core without any conflict at all. Their Essences would carve the Core into two different structures, but they would both work. The issue is that they would add inefficiency in the boundary between them”

He turned to Ash. “For you, this boundary is an added limitation, besides the pain. This boundary normally takes up ten percent of your core. So, if you had an Essence Core that was seventy percent efficient, it would have been eighty percent, had you only one mark.”

“We’ll see,” Ash said. Her voice was perfectly even.

Aldric shook his head faintly and turned to me. “There…there is a problem. One almost nobody faces, as most everyone with two marks received marks of different orders. For those of the same order….”

“Explain.” I said it loud enough that it carried. I did not appreciate his theatrics.

The Inker sighed. “Two marks of the same order cannot carve the same core,” he said. “They impose the same type of structure in the exact same places, and the two carvings destroy each other. It is like two sculptors attacking the same block of marble from opposite sides. Other…strange things might happen. It is a rarity among rarities, you see.” He spread his hands. “There is one, and only one solution to this. You choose one mark to carve your core, and the other operates on raw mana alone. What mana is left from the inefficiency, that is.”