Chapter 131—Gears of Bureaucracy

Tom had a lot of pent-up energy and a thousand different questions spinning in his head after reading the first of the three books Dimitri had supplied. He was relieved to discover after his daily isolation session, that Vturalta was rostered to supervise him. Out of the four open competitors, she was the one he was most comfortable chatting with.

While he was tempted to grill her immediately, he knew on a subconscious level that it was not the best approach. Instead, he attempted to focus on his work and started carving the ritual lines into the wood. The same thing was happening as what had occurred with the bracelets for April. Everything was becoming instinctive, and he barely had to concentrate when transposing the ritual.

“Stop,” his supervisor’s voice was harsh. “What did you just do?”

Stuffed up somehow, he was tempted to snap back. But instead he studied the disk in his hand.  The ritual was less than a quarter of the way through, and he had completely skipped the temporal moderating section. He winced when he saw the mistake and dropped the destroyed piece of wood into the discard pile. There was no recovering from that sort of blunder.

He grabbed another one and started again.

“Stop.”

He looked up in surprise and then down at the disk. It was equivalent to the quality he had been achieving weeks earlier. Ugly, amateur work where some of his angles were visibly different from what he needed. One was even fifteen degrees instead of twenty.

“I’ll do better.” He promised instinctively before grabbing another disk.

“Wait. What’s up, Tom? You’re clearly distracted.”

He lowered his head. “Sorry, I guess I am, but I feel bad asking as it’s not related…” he gestured at the disks. “To this.”

“If it’ll get you back on track, I’m happy to answer a few questions. Even tricky ones.”

“Are you sure?”

Her tentacles wiggled in a way that indicated a yes.

“Are you aware of Internal Mana Manipulation.”

“Of course. I use it regularly.”

“Really?” He responded excitedly. This was good. She might be a better resource than expected.

“It’s nothing special. The technique is relatively common. I’d say fifty percent of species use it.”

“Humans don’t. It isn’t even referenced in the experience shop.”

She seemed interested in that confession, and he could tell she was examining him with some special senses. “After studying your internals, that absence makes a lot of sense. DEUS doesn’t want to distract you with trivial stuff, and you’re not suited to internal mana manipulation because you don’t have any mana capillaries, so it’s understandable that she didn’t publish the technique.”

He stared at her, patiently waiting for more information. She didn’t volunteer anything. “What are mana capillaries?” he asked when it was clear nothing more would be forthcoming.

She splashed some water in amusement. “They’re pathways for me to get mana to where it needs to be. It makes internal mana manipulation far easier, but it’s a fundamental part of your biology and if your species was created or evolved on a mana less world, you just won’t have them.”

“Does that mean I can’t use the technique?”

She hesitated. “No. It doesn’t mean that, but it does limit the power you’ll be able to capture through the technique and makes the training more difficult.”

Tom nodded. He had been expecting that kind of answer, and he remembered reading a couple of cultivation books when he was younger. They had included the concept of mana channels and the process of burning them into existence or unblocking them. Maybe that knowledge was relevant here. “Can I create these channels?”

She quivered, and water splashed everywhere as she laughed. “Yes, it’s called body forging.”

“Great, how can I do that?” he interrupted.

“You didn’t let me finish. It is called body forging, and it’s a staple inclusion in fictions.”

He stared at her in shock. She was joking with him? His brief moment of elation vanished. “As in stories?” he clarified. “As in, it only exists in made up worlds?”

More water splashed at him. “Yes. In stories. Of course, theoretically it can be done, but theoretically almost everything is possible. In practice, body forging properly is about as likely as you elevating yourself to be a god. Even species with natural channels find creating new ones difficult or expanding their own network to be nearly impossible. It’s very much a case of you are what you were born with.”

“So, you’re saying that I can’t use internal mana manipulation and that trying it, is pointless.”

“I’ll be honest. You’re not going to get a three times boost or even a two times without supporting channels. I’ve heard of fighters in your position getting an eighty percent improvement in a physical aspect. I’ve also heard almost as many stories of people trying and failing.”

He decided he had to ask specific questions to extract the information he needed. The opportunity she had given him didn’t really exist, but if he pushed, it might be sufficient. “You just mentioned physical aspects, which imply there are other uses. What can internal mana manipulation actually do?”

“Speed, strength, toughness and the delivery of aspected mana through touch are the main ways it’s used. There’s also more exotic applications. I’ve seen people use it to control their size. It was a fascinating technique, but they started with great spatial abilities, so that’s probably beyond you. Still, it highlights how versatile you can be with your power. Being able to transition from ten centimetres tall to seven metres was very useful. Another altered their corporality, which basically let them phase through whatever they wanted. Then I guess there’s using internal mana manipulation to mimic having high resistances to certain attack types. Finally, there’s the medical application which is using it to fight off poisons, venoms and hostile mana. Masters of that method can cleanse themselves more efficiently than by using any spell. As you can see, the uses are varied, but it’s essentially taking your mana and making it do stuff in your body.”

Tom considered everything she had said. Size and incorporeally were beyond his ability to conceptualise, but the others weren’t. “I read about someone using velocity aspected mana.”

Vturalta stilled. “Conceptual mana types are hard to obtain and use. I imagine, given your lack of mana channels that you haven’t been exposed to the idea before.”

“No, I didn’t even realise they existed until I read an account of internal mana manipulation a couple of days ago.”

“Conceptual magic links to something called physics.”

“I know what physics is.”

“But do you know what it is in Existentia?” She immediately challenged.

Tom hesitated. He was pretty confident he knew the answer, but if Vturalta was talking, he might as well let her. “I can guess, but I don’t know the precise definition.”

“It’s basically the concept of if you remove magic, then how does the world function. That’s what’s physics is.”

It was very amusing. She said it like she was revealing a fundamental truth that would blow his mind. With his earth experience, it of course didn’t. “And velocity? How does that specific concept work?”

“It’s in the name. You just need to get mana to resonate with that fundamental idea of movement in a specific direction.”

Tom was pretty confident this was not something the thousand-year-old expert could explain to him, but he decided to push, anyway. “And how would I do that?”

“Everyone’s different. You’re a member of the current competition. You should know people who have experienced a world without magic, and they should be able to help. Their physics will differ from the physics in Existentia in small ways, but most of it should be the same. Most, and I have to stress that it is only most not all, and your universe might be different, but the majority of the non-magic realities function with common building blocks and rules.”

He thought about what non-magic different physics was actually like. Did things fall up instead of down or did magnetism just not work, or a host of other similar permutations. The concept was fascinating, and he could not help but wonder if some of the weird creatures he had fought had come from such a place. Was his assumption that they had originated in a magic rich environment wrong? Could he correct that assumption and improve the efficiency with which he fought some monsters. It was a critical insight, and he could see how adjusting his fighting style could make a difference. Evolving under different physics would imply physical weaknesses, which purely magical creatures would lack. It would totally change how he approached such monsters.

 She splashed some water at him, distracting him from his internal philosophising. She was, he noticed, amused.

“Stop thinking so hard. Internal Mana Manipulation is a long process. Most people advise you to start with pure mana, so you don’t need to worry about exotic, intellectual concepts like velocity. Pure Mana is the standard advice, but you might be one of the exceptions. Your access to precognition affinity mana changes things. If you can see a way to make it useful, then you should begin with that, as it means you’ll have far fewer painful accidents.”

“Do you have any suggestions?”

“As I said this stuff is very personal. You need to find your own path.”

He was very tempted to challenge her because she was clearly spinning shit because she didn’t know how precognition mana worked, but he managed to restrain himself. 

“Now enough distractions,” she ordered. “You have disks to make.”

Knowing that his window to extract information had closed he returned to working while his subconscious mulled over what she had said. No matter how much he thought about it he couldn’t see a way to use precognition mana effectively. He would do pure mana first and then the other affinities once they came online. 

A day later, he entered the isolation room excited to read the other books Dimitri had supplied, and then froze when he found it was already occupied.

Dread filled him and all those speeches, the literal hundreds he had received since he had been reincarnated, the reiteration of what to do in strange situations, kicked into action.

Without hesitation, he retreated to his upgraded pseudo system room. Vitals were displayed and showed a spike of blood pressure and heart rate that he hoped was normal. Within the system room, his throat dried out and true fear gripped him.

He wasn’t sure what was happening, and he didn’t trust the unknown.

On the screen, the child version of him looked at the women in abject shock, which comforted Tom somewhat. Apparently, his instinctive reaction was in line with how a normal child would react. “What… um… what are you doing here, miss?” His body stuttered.

“I’m a priestess of DEUS. I’m here to observe how you use the room.” She smiled warmly at him. “There’s no need to be worried.”

There was, Tom thought. There were lots of reasons for concern.

As he was in the system room, the thoughts were safe, and he watched wide eyed to see how a seven-year-old him without memories would react.

“This, this is an isolation room. No one is supposed to be in them,” his body told her defiantly. “Nobody, not a priestess, nobody.”

“This is a special case. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m just going to watch how you use the space. If you want, you can pretend I’m not even here.”

Tom in the system room wiped sweat off his brow and tried to control his breathing while his body watched in fascination as the priestess shut the door and initiated the room’s lock down procedures.

You’re safe, he reminded himself.

The power of the first title he had gotten in this life would protect him. While he was here, no one could tell that his body was anything other than a normal child. 

The whole thing still terrified him. He refused to believe for a moment that she was only here to observe. Even if she was a she, she had a different agenda. He just didn’t know what it was.

Tom stared at the screen. Studying her and straining to see if his illusion ability could be triggered to pierce the illusion and reveal the truth. Most of the theories he had come up with had her as an enemy, pretending to be a priestess. An assassin was the most likely explanation, but he didn’t understand how they would expect a ruse like that to work on any reincarnated.

It was possible they didn’t know about the title, but that seemed unlikely. After their years of hunting, at worse they must have deduced that some type of protection existed.

“Now, what do you normally do when you’re here, dear?” she asked as the door locked, sealing them inside, together. 

“Um,” his body waved at the toy boxes. “Usually I play, but on the days that I have hammer practice I do some of that, too.”

In the pseudo system room, Tom chuckled despite the situation he was in. It was amusing to observe just how much of a child he would have been without the memories of his prior life.

The priestess smiled. “That sounds wonderful. I’ll get you to do what you normally do in a moment, dear but first I have something to say. I swear on the GODs that I am human and a priestess of DEUS and on DEUS authority I also proclaim that this room is free of outside observation. Any reincarnator can show themselves and be protected from identification by outside forces. This I declare on the power of GODs and if I’ve spoken untruth may I be struck down where I stand in the next five seconds.”

Tom even from within the system room felt the thrum of the GODs confirming her statement. He knew at an irrefutable level that what she said was nothing but the truth.

This was not a trap.

She was real, a priestess and on his side.

“There we are,” she continued gently. “There’s been no divine retribution, so you can safely reveal yourself.”  

He hesitated, as his brain considered all angles. Trying to find out if there was a risk he wasn’t considering.

“This isn’t a trick, Tom. Come out. I enjoy playing with kids, but after two days of it I’m kind of over it.”

She knew his name, and he knew why she was here. He took back control over his body. “I wasn’t expecting anything like this.” He told her.

She laughed. “I’ve been briefed. But out of curiosity, if not a representative of DEUS, what else were you expecting.”

“What?” he stammered even as he registered the way she was speaking had changed. She was treating him as an adult instead of a kid. 

“Think about what you requested. You wanted someone to do a non-painful experiment on. The problem is that you’re a reincarnator and our running assumption is that everyone going in and out of the orphanage is subjected to divination magic. Most human minds are like putty against the tier of spells they’re using. And the ones who have resistances are mostly excluded because they’re still actively adventuring or are reincarnators. They also usually have the opposite of a small fate pool. That leaves you with me and my kind. Our relationship with our GODDESS protects us from mind magic and I and to be honest most of us also match the rest of your criteria. So I’m here. Now please show me why I had to drop everything and waste a week to get this two-hour session with you.”

Tom’s brain finally caught up to the reality of the situation. He had not considered the assassin’s threat fully when he had made the request to Dimitri. He had been imagining he would be getting some old lady from a nursing home, but the priestess was right: anyone like that would be prone to having her mind read. It was fortunate that Dimitri had seen the issue and developed a work around because if Tom had been managing it then he would have screwed it up.

“Well, first thank you for coming.”

“None of that.” She interrupted. “I’m not here for pleasantries. Just tell me why I’m here.”