Chronicles of the True Wizard

Felix was back in the rest room, having completely devoured the feast that reappeared every day or so and was sitting up in bed, the last part of Mind, Body, Mana in front of him.

In this final part, we will explore dissections and mappings of creatures with mana cores and channels as well as some of the more gruesome experiments.

In the majority of sentient creatures, non sentient creatures and objects, mana is evenly spread throughout the body, but seems to exist shifted in a dimension we cannot access. The most prevalent theory is that there is essentially another spatial dimension that we are unable to access, observe or manipulate significantly, where mana exists. When we draw on our mana pools or regenerate mana from the environment we pull the mana to be in line with our own existence within this dimension.

For those without a mathematical and theoretical physics background, imagine we exist entirely within a sheet of paper. This sheet of paper is at 0 on a ruler. Now we take another piece of paper and place it at 1 on the ruler, mana exists naturally in this sheet. When we regenerate mana, or pull on our mana pools to cast spells we reach into the paper at 1 and pull it to 0. Whether or not this is the truth of the universe this theory has explained many known and confirmed phenomena regarding mana to date.

There exist some creatures in the multiverse that contain a central location within their bodies that exists in reality, containing a large pool of mana that they can draw upon. This is typically referred to as a mana core. There are many forms of cores, appearing in every known state of mana. Some creatures even have multiple cores or cores containing a combination of mana forms.

The book went on to discuss creatures with single and multiple cores spread out, cores that were gaseous, liquid and solid. The gaseous and liquid states were usable whereas the solid core tends to be a backup as it is difficult to use. This was mostly a cursory look as it was difficult to look at solely mana cores without talking about mana channels.

Almost all of the creatures with, and some without, a mana core also have mana channels. When the mana is already in reality, there needs to be a path to move it where it is needed. Typically, in beasts, this is to their muscles and organs as they infuse them with mana. For the majority of us sentient creatures, we simply move the mana before pulling on it to our own dimension meaning we move it without physical resistance.

There are some creatures with mana channels and cores that have achieved sentience, but there are no confirmed cases of them having the ability to manipulate or interact with their core or channels to any degree. This does not however, hinder it's function in any way. Mana cores and channels are typically larger and more responsive than a typical mana pool as the act of pulling mana from it's dimension is typically the bottle neck with mana manipulation.

They also appear to be much more effective at infusing the body with mana than any of the attempts discussed in part 2. There are known cases of mana channels being meticulously transplanted into a sentient creature resulting in increased stats and performance of basic organs, even mental processes.

The book went on to describe these cases, as well as the surgeries involved in them, in excruciating detail, denoting the placement of channels as well as the solutions when they didn't line up perfectly. It also discussed the confirmed benefits that are achievable through mana channels and infusion of organs. The most surprising to Felix, were some cases where the stats of the test subject simply increased, similar to infusing energy in entire systems.

Finally, the book contained an index of all known categories of mana channel and core placements within different creatures. The diagrams were odd, as the creatures form had to be obscured, resulting in childish outlines surrounding meticulously precise channel diagrams. They ranged from a few thick tubes to what appeared to be an entire circulatory system.

In closing, I hope this book has brought you insight into the ways sentient creatures use mana, how it may be used in future and how you could use it now. Mana is one of the most interesting aspects of the universe, in my opinion, and I hope that in the future, more research is conducted and distributed so as to further it's study. Thank you for reading, Ahedorya

Felix wasn't sure if he would be able to sleep considering how excited he was to start designing his mana channels and cores, but he knew he had to sleep now. He quickly depleted the entirety of his energy pool by buffing himself as much as he could and exerting himself on the immovable walls of the dungeon. Doing so, he was exhausted so he slept as soon as he laid down.

When Felix woke up, he headed out right away. He quickly found and completed his first room, then was interrupted before he could collect the reward. A System message appeared to Felix and a second chest also rumbled into existence as he read the message.

Puzzle Dungeon B

You have successfully completed half of the rooms.

Rewards:

Dungeon Map.

Opening the second chest, he found a familiar stack of paper that he quickly used to fill in his own map. Inspecting the map, he decided that he would complete the entire dungeon again this time, except now it would take much less time and he was already half way there. He figured the rest should only take another three days or so now that he had the directions. Also, he found that he had been correct, there was more than one blue room and surprisingly, there were no trap rooms.

Felix managed to complete 32 rooms before getting tired, including the one that rewarded the dungeon map. In total, he managed to level up 11 times and collected a ton of random materials. The rewards were definitely less exciting overall, but they had more potential.

In the last dungeon, he was getting a ridiculous amount of wooden equipment to practice enchanting which were useless for anything else. In this dungeon, he was getting random materials he could actually turn into something. Though, he didn't have too many ideas at the moment as most of what he had created in the dungeon rooms were household items or easier to accomplish with a spell. He figured they were likely more useful to those with a limited spell list that couldn't just learn or design a new spell specifically for cooking or cleaning.

He also got a lot of ward components, often multiple from a single room but now he was starting to get slight variations similar to what he started getting in the other dungeon. They were still useful, but less exciting as their effects and use cases were almost identical to components he already had.

Almost done, just one more sleep.

Felix finished off the feast in the rest room and drank some of the undisclosed fruity drink from his flask. He bathed and cleaned his clothes through their enchantment before finally pulling out Manaverse.

This book is designed to introduce the reader to mana, it's various forms and properties, how they affect it's uses as well as where they can be found. This book goes as in depth as possible and is curated to contain the most relevant information without exceeding the E grade. Unfortunately, the Epic rarity seems unavoidable at this point. I have consulted with many professors, tutors, and high grade beings to determine what is relevant and what is unnecessary and it seems this is as common as it will get.

In general, you will not find any specific research, reasoning or any names in this book. Instead, the current working theories as well as what we know to be true will be provided and distinguished between.

The Basics: Mana comes in various states or forms these being solid, liquid and gas. There are other states but they are mostly theoretical and not usually relevant; these include a parallel to plasma as well as a super-solid state. There are other theoretical states between the others, but they are not common and are not even confirmed to actually exist.

The states of mana are largely parallel to the common states of matter. As a solid, mana is generally a crystalline substance though not always. As a liquid it resembles slightly thicker and bluer water. As a gas, it appears as a blue mist. These phases appear in nature in many places with the gaseous form being the most common form. In it's dimension it is a gas and when it is pulled over to ours, it comes as such. The odd part is, mana does not interact with temperature the way physical matter does. It does not have a temperature and therefore cannot distribute or consume thermal energy.

This neatly brings us to mana density. Given that we cannot detect any form of temperature from mana, even if it may have one, we instead compare it based on it's density. In liquid form, denser mana is thicker and tends to travel slower than lighter mana. Ironically, solid mana is not always denser than liquid mana or gaseous mana. There does not seem to be any relation between the density and state of mana, or none that are known.

The book went on to talk about different places in nature that the different states of mana could be found. Felix mostly skimmed through these sections, skipping over the uninteresting and unimportant parts. The entire book was already stored in his Memory Palace so if they ever became relevant, he could refer back at any time.

Properties of Mana: Mana appears to have different properties from normal matter, as we discussed in the previous section, it does not interact with temperature deltas the way matter would. It also seems to have different energy levels, separate from any temperature value that we have no way of quantifying. No metric for quantifying these energy levels has been agreed upon but the range is generally considered to start at calm and end at agitated. In it's calm state, mana is easy to manipulate and non reactive. In it's agitated state, it is reactive and generally harmful as well as being more difficult to deal with. In general, mana is kept in a calm state except in harmful spells and projectiles. Even then, it is likely to react with the medium through which it travels so it is generally recommended to avoid agitated mana if found. There is no known process to specifically agitate mana.

…

Mana also appears to have a form of inertia and flow. The inertia is simple and understandable, the flow is confusing. It seems to be the case, that mana in general wants to flow in a specific everchanging direction. In some areas, mana with no inertia, will simply begin to flow in a specific direction, almost as if an invisible force, similar to gravity, is manipulating it. The only issue with the gravity theory, is that the direction it flows seems to change at random. Many have tried to understand it, but no acceptable theory has ever been presented.

…

Mana also seems to have attunements as there have been plants and creatures that appear to pull mana from their pool and cast spells with no fire nodes, creating fire. The working theory is that mana can be attuned and that is what the transformation nodes in a spell do, attune mana. How these attunements are created is a current field of study with no viable explanation thus far.

Attuned mana appears to have odd properties as well. It appears as though attunement affects the speed, density range, as well as having odd interactions with energy levels. In general, this is not relevant to the vast majority of the multiverse, but it is an interesting research case for those with a research profession.

…

Finally, mana also appears to have affinities to mostly sentient creatures but generally, anything. Mana with an affinity or even without one is difficult to manipulate. Most sentient creatures with mana pools will slowly affinize mana to themselves, making it more likely to cooperate. The vast majority of mana has either no affinity or a weak affinity which can easily be changed. There have been cases of mana with strong affinities that cannot be changed, but these are generally harmful to interact with so minimal study of these has occurred. This is sometimes referred to as the alignment of mana.

After having skimmed through the entirety of the book, pulling out the most relevant information, Felix closed and stowed the text. As he had come to expect with textbook style books there was a lot of irrelevant information between the relevant chunks. Summarized, he figured he didn't lose more than 5% of the total information, though maybe it would be more useful to a researcher. He did however, learn a lot from the book and had many ideas on what to do with his [E - Arcane] Skill Test Cube: Mana Control. He had completed it, or so The System had said, but it didn't feel right. Now he was pretty sure that was because he wasn't supposed to individually manipulate all of the mana to be slower or faster but instead change it's density, state or attunement.

Unfortunately, he had a dungeon to finish and sleep to catch up on, but he was ecstatic to start experimenting with it when he got home to Tri-Peak. After that, he would read the Spell Form Primer then start working on Mana Channels, a passive energy buff skill and finally make some new spells. He was hoping he would be ready to fight the world bosses at that point as, even though he had almost a half of the tutorial left, he was feeling pressed for time overall. He wasn't sure what he would face outside of the tutorial and was hoping to get as much of his todo list completed as he could. He had many more things on the low priority list as well, such as familiars, weapons, armor, enchanting, meditation and more.

He exhausted himself again similarly to last night to combat his excitement and passed out once more. . . . . .