Chapter 605 - Lessons and sandwiches

Sset (Hell, group 4) - So someone stole it?

Noname (Hell, group 4) - Yup, it’s gone.

NotDennis (Hell, group 4) - Holy fuck. Should we bail from the Academy?

Noname (Hell, group 4) - It is fine. Vic said the previous owners spent a long time figuring out how to use them. Apparently, they are nearly impossible to detonate without a special mechanism, so they spent months trying to inscribe them.

Sset (Hell, group 4) - Previous owners… So you really think there's no one in the Academy who might recognize what it is, someone who's far more skilled in inscriptions than a bunch of Earthlings with barely two years of experience?

Noname (Hell, group 4) - Nah. There’s definitely someone who could do it in days instead of months.

Knight (Hell, group 4) - I can’t see your face right now, but Nat, are you happy? I bet you are. I’m sure you are.

Noname (Hell, group 4) - Stop doxxing me, Knight.

Knight (Hell, group 4) - It was you who blabbered your full name for everyone to hear!

Sset (Hell, group 4) - Okay, let’s calm down. I know you well enough, and there’s no way you didn’t mark the warheads.

Noname (Hell, group 4) - All the marks are gone: the fake ones, the decoys, the hidden ones, and even the hidden hidden ones below the hidden ones.

StrongestOne (Hell, group 4) - Can’t you ask the servants who was on your floor or near your office? They have systems for that.

Noname (Hell, group 4) - I already did. I even told the tower butler that something was stolen from me, and we checked the presence detector and the list of people who entered that floor. We found nothing. Well, anyway, it will be fine. See you later.

With that, I close the Community and lie on my back.

Looks like someone wants to play. Fine, I'll give them a few days. If I don't catch them by then, I'll use my secret weapon.

As much as I’d like to test myself against the thermonuclear warhead, I’m not willing to risk the lives of the others.

But if I were alone...

***

“Assistant Professor Gwyn, may I ask for your assistance?” Professor Elian suddenly turns away from the few dozen students and addresses me in the middle of his lesson.

This is the second lesson I’ve had with him, and it’s the first time he’s done that since the first lesson, when he punished me so terribly.

I answer and take a step closer toward him. “Of course. How can I help?”

"You're an Amplificator, if I'm not mistaken, correct?"

“Yes,” I confirm, seeing no reason to lie.

His Mana Wavelength Iris flashes once as he observes me, the glow pulsing faintly before fading. Then he nods with an unreadable expression.

"That’s perfect. What I want you to do now is start releasing your mana. Do it slowly and steadily. Raise the pressure step by step and let it spread through the room. I want the students to feel the shift for themselves, to understand what it means when someone like you stops suppressing their presence."

I nod once and begin to release my mana. I shift the flow of Mana Cycling carefully, keeping it steady as I lower the effect of my Sneaky Mode I have been using the entire time. My mana starts pushing out from my body into the surrounding space.

“Now, listen carefully,” Professor Elian says, facing the students. “Assistant Professor Gwyn's Mana stat is probably extremely high. You can tell just from what we’ve seen so far. His presence alone makes that clear. There are signs I’m not going to explain just yet, but I’ll ask you about them during our lesson in three days. That gives you time to think it over.”

I increase the flow just a little. The pressure in the room responds accordingly.

“You’re not feeling sharpness. That would come from a high Mana Potency upgrade. Amplification doesn’t change the nature of the mana, only the amount the body contains. As we know, the first stage of Amplification doubles the mana stat. When someone with high amplification stops restricting their output, the environment saturates quickly.”

More students begin reacting. Some shift, adjusting their posture. A few instinctively form minor reinforcement layers along their skin as my mana seeps into the room.

“Good. That’s the expected response. When the ambient mana density increases faster than your body’s buffer tolerance, your nervous system reacts before your conscious mind does. This is how we measure baseline sensitivity.”

I release more, curious how long he will let me push it.

“Notice that Assistant Professor Gwyn is not using any external technique, yet he releases his mana very stably even as the amount increases. It clearly shows an impressive ability to manipulate larger amounts of mana, something that most skilled Amplificators have. There is currently no shaping, no direction, just an unstructured release. This is important. Amplification makes a difference even without manipulation. The effect you feel is due to the raw quantity of mana around you increasing so quickly.”

He pauses to let them sit with the discomfort. A few of the weaker students turn pale, appearing on the verge of vomiting. Others clench their teeth.

Some of the bodyguards look slightly confused, uncertain whether to interpret it as an attack. A few glance at Professor Elian, seemingly waiting for a signal.

Yet Professor Elian continues, unbothered at all.

“In technical terms, you’re experiencing localized mana compression. Ambient density is rising beyond your natural internal mana pressure, which creates an external–internal mismatch. Your natural barriers are being slightly forced inward. Of course, it is possible to defend against, and it’s just that you lack the experience. On top of that, Assistant Professor Gwyn has an unusually large mana pool.”

I hold the pressure steady and controlled, and do not stop.

The whole time, I’m wondering how far he’s going to take it.

“If he had Potency instead,” Elian continues, “you wouldn’t feel field compression. You’d feel field piercing. That’s how mana with Potency upgrade behaves. It interacts with your natural barrier’s edge and forces a reaction from your nerves, not your structure. Restoration upgrade would feel more rhythmic. You’d feel pulses, and the local field would fluctuate instead of building steadily. Obviously, all only if you are sensitive enough to observe these kinds of changes.”

I raise the output again.

“Now we’re entering what I like to call the threshold. Most of you should already feel shortness of breath or tightening in the chest. That’s because your own flow is being passively throttled by ambient saturation. Any more than that and the first ones will start to vomit and pass out. If I asked Assistant Professor Gwyn to push further and increase the speed of this process, simply releasing his mana would kill most of you sitting here from the raw pressure alone. And it doesn’t even require the use of a skill, passive, or trait. As I have said, Assistant Professor Gwyn possesses an impressive amount of mana even for an Amplificator.”

Our eyes meet for a moment, and he observes me with his Mana Wavelength Iris, the golden circle glowing around his black pupils and inside his violet eyes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him with that trait deactivated.

"That's enough, Assistant Professor Gwyn. Pull it back," he says calmly, unfazed by the dozens of students on the verge of passing out or the sudden flashes of mana as some try to defend themselves.

I cut the flow and draw it back into my body. The pressure vanishes almost instantly. Some students let out breaths they didn’t realize they were holding.

“This is the simplest form of mana pressure exposure training, and something that is good for you to experience so it doesn’t surprise you in the future. There are animals or monsters who can generate even more impressive pressure, as they have more powerful bodies capable of storing more mana,” Professor Elian says. “Understanding how mana attributes behave in isolation is the first step. Next time, we’ll introduce controlled shaping and observe how attribute combinations affect natural barriers.”

With that final demonstration, the lesson ends.

***

My current thief suspects are the pink wizard with the pointy hat and the adorable owl professor, of course, Professor Elian, and maybe Ari. Could she have used a servant or guard, or someone from her family, to check my room?

It could be the butler as well, someone in charge of the tower and its wards, who could also delete all signs of someone visiting. Maybe that assholish healer wanted to take revenge after Lily broke his wrist?

Kays is also an option, but he didn’t seem like the type. Sure, he complained a lot and threw insults, but nothing felt serious or mean spirited. Even while complaining, he listened and went along with the lesson, and didn’t once seem truly angry.

I pause my thoughts and, from the basket near me, pick up a sandwich and take a bite.

So good.

I take another bite and sip some grape-like juice. The bottle is still chilled, marked with a few simple inscriptions. Out of boredom, I quickly think of three ways to turn it into a bomb by altering the inscriptions and adding a bit more mana, then return to my sandwich.

It really does taste like a tuna sandwich.

Thankfully, I found a small garden that people do not seem to visit, and now I’m enjoying the quiet, sitting on a bench and ignoring people passing by. The weather is nice, and as many times before, I wish I could wear my Earth clothes. Thankfully, no one has stolen them. It might be weird, but I think I’d be more angry if someone stole them than the thermonuclear warhead.

Sure, it is a gift from my sister, but she would understand.

“Assistant Professor Gwyn!” I hear a familiar voice.

Still, I ignore it, don’t look up, and continue to bite into my sandwich.

That seems to make that damned impish thylarin even happier, and Ari giggles deviously. I can almost hear the expression I'm sure her face is making.

I hope my precious minion won’t end up like her, and I hope Izzy doesn’t either.

Ari stops in front of me, and a boy stands by her side. He is also a thylarin, but this one has only three arms: two on the left and one on the right. This second thylarin is quiet and quickly avoids my gaze as I look up from my lunch. He also has brown hair and the orange eyes that thylarin usually have.

“His name is Tyven. He’s a bit shy, but very kind and intelligent. Come on, Tyven, greet Assistant Professor Gwyn,” Ari says, introducing him.

“H-hello, Assistant Professor Gwyn,” Tyven says quietly, his eyes meeting mine for only a moment.

He glances where my Kinetic Mana Heart is, over which my Restrictive Training Emblem sits, then just as quickly to my chest where my Sealed Ignition Mana Heart is, and lastly not into my eyes, but at them. And just as quickly, he looks away.

Ari teases me briefly, reminding me that we have another lesson with Kays in the sensory deprivation tank in a few days. Then she pulls her friend along, and they leave for their next class.

I finish my sandwich while sitting there and increase the difficulty level of the currently activated Restrictive Training Emblem. It continuously damages my body, along with the waves of combusting thermal energy I generate in small amounts to heal myself passively, causing the pain I must constantly filter out.

Then I check my Sneaky Mode and Mana Cycling and conclude that it should be very difficult to notice any of what I’m hiding.

***

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