Chapter 242 - It’s A Trap!

Jiran Teleported, pulling himself through a synapse until his stomach heaved uncontrollably from pushing too far. When he emerged, the ball of condensed hydrogen and oxygen Armament prepared in advance detonated, sending him hurtling through the air. His aura’s grasp against the framework crumbled space as he tore himself forward. 

All the while, Foresight's warning that he was going the wrong direction blared louder and louder down his spine. He didn't care. He wouldn't stop. The people he truly cared for, his family by choice, could be dying at that very moment and his only thoughts were of how to reach them sooner.

The distance shrunk, and the devastation of what Niya’s mana unleashed became clearer. Her energies painted the sky in hues of black, green, and orange. Right alongside them were his own, a glaring beacon to any with Mana Sight that he was involved, and proof she had used the new formation he designed for her.

Never in his wildest dreams did he imagine she would unleash such a thing in the center of a city. The death toll was unimaginable; the mere brushing of the thought against his consciousness sent him spiraling down a hole he didn't dare tread until he knew they were alive.

When he drew close enough to observe the debris that hadn't even started falling yet, his minds stuttered, not understanding what they were seeing. The pieces spread far and wide through the air weren't leftovers of the cathedral at all, but people, hundreds of them just beginning to feel the pull of gravity.

From tier two, all the way to nine, people fell from where they were caught in the blast, a blast that seemed to have only harmed the building itself. When Jiran caught sight of a dozen low-tier children, his heart started to beat again and the wave of prickling dread creeping through him was banished. 

Those without a Manabody were already being scooped from the air and safely deposited on the ground. He found them there, Cameron and Niya standing in the center of an expanding ring of force. The worst damage to the surroundings was being caused by the expanding shockwave of Niya’s attack pushing her own body into the ground. Armament intercepted it, Elemental Castigation flashing into reality long enough to counter the expelling forces with a short, circular wall of stone.

Cameron's sobbing roar snapped Jiran's focus back to them. It was a cry rife with despair, “Olive!” He launched himself with the full force of Oneness and the formations built into his suit. The only explanation for his actions was shock, since the princess was nowhere in sight and Cameron was now hurtling toward several of the most powerful manapools in the city.

Unfortunately, Jiran wasn't given time to stop his friend. Fifteen tier nine figures Teleported to surround them. Ten circled Jiran and the other five appeared above Niya and Cameron. Neither reacted to their arrival, though with their current attributes, that was no surprise. Niya’s arms rose slowly, palms out in surrender. A tremendous hammer of combined auras slammed into them, blasting both deep into the ground. An area encompassing four city blocks cratered under the auric forces. Jiran was entirely unable to come to their rescue, having his own problems to worry about.

The force of ten tier nine auras crushed him from every direction, pincering him in a sphere. He fought back valiantly but was rapidly losing and knew he had no chance of escaping without Teleport. Since it would be on cooldown for several seconds, he would have to fight his way out, or surrender.

“Yield!” One of the Templari shouted as the framework buckled and crumbled, only to be repaired by the combined intent of Jiran’s captors.

Channelings were already charging, numerous hands pointing his direction with deadly intent. Jiran did’nt respond, and once more the same Templari roared furiously, “Jiran of Feylon, this is your final warning! Yield or suffer unimaginable agony!”

Not like this! Damnit Niya! 

As with all plans, Jiran’s had fallen apart the moment contact with the enemy was made. Knowing there were at least nineteen Templari, revealing what he could so soon, and only catching ten of them in the process could easily lead to his death. He had counted on trapping most if not all of them, ten was unacceptable. They were faster than him, their mana more Concentrated, and they had an actual Teleportation skill with a much lower cooldown than what he could manage.

One of the Templari that attacked Cameron and Niya began charging an element as well, his arms pointed toward the ground, his desire to eliminate Jiran’s cousin and friend unmistakable. Out of time and options, Jiran could only try, “Stop him! He's about to kill Cameron Amyntas!”

The Templari shared confused looks, Jiran's stomach dropping out from beneath him even before their leader responded, “Are you not aware? Only direct descendents of the emperors are untouchable. Minor nobles die all the time. After the catastrophe he caused, there will be none who mourn his loss.” If their words weren't enough, the fact not one of them had ceased their Channeling was.

Jiran gave up. His shoulders slumping in defeat. Everything had simply escalated too quickly, and events were now beyond his control. The worst part, the most frustrating detail that made him feel like the universe itself was looking on with laughter in its eyes; the five bastards about to kill his cousin and best friend were just beyond the reach of his trap.

“So be it,” Jiran's mana-infused voice set off alarm bells in the Templari who heard him. They had drawn closer in an effort to restrict his Manabody, straining against his superior understanding of the soul. Jiran's aura was pushed in so far by this point, it barely extended beyond the limits of his skin. Coincidentally, that was right where he needed it to enter a state of Oneness.

Mana, aura, muscle, and thought united in purpose. Armament opened a hole in space, and Elemental Castigation converted the raw energy within into a lance of elemental light that stabbed into the eyes of the Templari aiming at Niya and Cameron. The woman shrieked, the instant attack not strong enough to kill her outright but it did interrupt her attack.

That was but one of Jiran's minds, the others launched a series of simultaneous actions at the Templari foolish enough to crowd around him. The masterium embedded in his armor shone with a dull radiance as they were flooded with his mana. Positioned so at least one faced each direction, the rippling distortions washed outward, swallowing the Templari in an ocean of empowered energy they had little ability to resist.

Their Channelings were disrupted, the elements gathering beneath their flesh turning chaotic and refusing to be controlled. But control them they must, lest their bodies be torn apart from the inside. Screams of rage and agony accompanied the air filling with unstable elements as channels were purged, leaving behind ruptured, blackened bodies. Elemental Castigation and Enthralling Touch were there, eager to take advantage of their lapse in focus. He assimilated with their Channelings, and then absorbed what moments ago was meant to destroy him. 

The masterium’s distortions had already penetrated deep into the Templari. Normally, Jiran would never have the capacity to take control of a higher tier’s mana even if it were outside their body, let alone safely buried in their manapools. The moment of surprise, combined with the masterium’s amplification, gave him a fraction of a second to overwhelm the grip they held over their mana. Enthralling Touch rode the distorting wave like a champion charging before his army, diving into the Templari with a triumphant warcry.

Ten voices crying out in shocked outrage were suddenly silenced by panic. Jiran didn’t notice, nor did he realize their auras wane as all their focus was directed inward. His minds remained fully dedicated to their task. With a roar, he pulled. All his intent and will demanded their mana become his, and much of it did. But it was not enough, each of them managing to retain over ten percent. The brief window of surprise passed as the Templari tightened their hold on what was left.

Jiran was far from done. Even as most of what he’d taken funneled into Armament, the rest flooded every nook and cranny of their bodies in search of the talismans he knew were there. He found the paper-thin formations and pierced the membranes protecting the mana trapped within. He took that as well, then Elemental Castigation promptly converted it into a series of detonations that ripped the Templari apart from the inside.

Volatile elemental energy accompanied the showers of gore that blasted from their chests. However, a tier nine’s durability was not so easily overcome. Their wounds closed rapidly, and that was exactly what Jiran expected them to do. Had they chosen to attack with the little mana they had left, or even create more distance, they may very well have overcome him. In that critical moment, their mental states were far from optimal, giving him one last chance to complete his plan.

A second wave of disruption released from his armor. Once more their mana was sent into chaos, the gaping wounds faltering in their regeneration. Jiran gathered all his accumulated knowledge of mana, from his very first realization that mana was artificial, to his most recent, that some skills, like Mana Venom, could upgrade mana to a higher tier. With his intent and mental image solidified, Enthralling Touch once more attempted to plunder the depths of their manapools.

A tug-of-war on the razor’s edge of life and death began as the Templari dipped toward the ground, their auras faltering. Jiran was no exception, his focus entirely dedicated toward domination. Unfortunately, he could instantly tell he was going to fail. His skills were operating at their limit, pushing and pulling against the Templaris’ mana, able to manipulate it to a small degree, but not quite enough to fully take control now that their focus was entirely dedicated inward.

His gaze met their leader’s, finding mounting terror looking back at him. He was so close, and they both knew it. Jiran closed his eyes, shutting out sight, sound, and even refusing to acknowledge the feedback from his own mana. All the lessons he learned about manipulating mana were on the tip of his brain, and he cycled through them at a blistering pace in search of anything he’d missed, a connection or correlation that could bridge the gap in his knowledge and give him the edge he needed.

The only distraction he couldn’t silence was Foresight’s warning, which had rapidly built to an unbearable buzz. This was the first time in his life he had fully ignored it, and it shouted its displeasure in a warbling cry that rocked through his body. Like a dam shattering, one realization after another fell into place at a whirling speed faster than rational thought. The clues had been there for so long, stacked in place, and only waiting for the first to fall.

It started when Jiran finally understood the annoying vibrations Foresight used to warn him weren’t caused by mana. If they were, he would know. Or would he? Perhaps, they were a form of mana he didn’t yet have the ability to perceive, like tracking density with his naked eyes being just out of reach. It made sense for it to be mana, afterall, there was an undeniable connection between mana and the soul. He had learned as much when forming his aspect.

There were three other times when this realization could have become clear; First, when creating his earliest technique, allowing him to summon Daughter. Then again, when Madra’s mana was able to use his soul as a storage space. And lastly, when curing Shara revealed the relationship between mana, skills, and the soulwall.

Daughter and Shara’s circumstances blazed in his memory. Both had revealed a truth that was easily overlooked as coincidence, but when viewed together, the connection was obvious. With Daughter, his mana had interacted with his soulwall, and a technique formed. Shara’s technique was directly atop her tap, and she was dying without a way to control the feedback loop between mana, technique, and soulwall.

Those two instances formed a simple equation that settled into Jiran’s minds as though it had always been there: Intent, mana, and soulwall combined, equaled the birth of a technique. And it was all too likely skills worked the same way. The only difference was skills were a forced creation during ascension, which ultimately only replaced the intent portion of the equation. Jiran’s heart seized and his jaw dropped as that realization dawned.

He adjusted his intent, and instead of pushing more mana through his skill, it flooded into his tap, spreading across his soulwall in search of what he suspected was there. Whether it was Daughter, instinct, or the additional realizations that led him there didn’t matter, only that he found what he was looking for.

The shadow of himself that existed in his soul-space arrived at a seemingly empty expanse of his soulwall. The wall was ice-blue, stretching up and to the sides beyond his ability to perceive. Being large enough to contain the galaxy that was his soul, it was far larger than his ability to comprehend. 

That was exactly why he never noticed it before. They were simply too large to see when your perspective was limited to that of a speck of existence facing the cosmic forces that be. Jiran knew he was less than a mote of dust when compared to a galaxy, and so, his shadowy form had inadvertently created him to match that understanding.

With a thought, he swelled in size, his soul-space shrinking around him as his perspective grew to match a planet, then a star, then a solar system, and beyond. The image took shape; a sigil-like symbol of dizzying intricacy embedded directly into his soulwall. Each and every one of its woven lines were larger than his previous perception could have spotted. Its core pulsed, resonating with the power already directed toward the Templari.

Just as impactful to Jiran's stunned awareness was how thin the soulwall itself appeared from his new viewpoint. But Jiran was out of time. Even though only fractions of a second had passed during his introspection, that was more than enough for a tier nine to take advantage of his lapse. There was nothing delicate or intricate about the way he smashed his mana and intent into the gargantuan sigil. However, the results spoke for themselves.

With his eyes still closed, he saw the notifications even as Enthralling Touch received a massive boost in power, easily overwhelming the Templari on the precipice of victory, pilfering the last of their mana.

Mana Confluence: + 1

Mana Confluence threshold reached: Primary skill evolution available

Enthralling Touch: + 8

As their mana was ripped free and flooded into him, Jiran burst into laughter that only a madman could appreciate. The Templari leader was right before him, his fist reared back and a roar on his lips that turned into a heart-wrenching cry, “Noooo! That’s impossible! Give it back!”