Chapter 139- Theories And Confirmations (Patreon)

Jiran’s hand reached for Shara’s shoulder and she instinctively jerked back. Though like prey before a snake, she was unable to break eye contact, "H-hold on, you only just arrived. It would be rude of me not to offer you a cup of tea first," She swallowed nervously, the color of her skin turning even more pasty.

"Teapot's broken, remember? It'll be fine, relax. I'm pretty good with mana."

Any further delays were rendered moot as Jiran’s hand reached her. His mana slithered through her skin, diving deeper until it reached her manapool and the passively activating technique within. She winced, sucking air through her teeth.

“It hurts! What are you doing to me?” She pushed away from him, sitting ramrod straight against the back of her chair.

“Exactly as I said, so far I’ve threaded some of my mana into your manapool. It might be uncomfortable, but resisting will only make it worse.”

Why is she in pain? I’ve done this several times before. Actually, this is the first time I’ve actively held my mana inside someone’s manapool. Usually, I’m giving them mana, which requires me to relinquish control so my mana can convert into theirs.

Jiran focused on the sensations coming from his mana, instantly grasping the problem. Shara was only tier four, while his mana’s concentration was slightly higher than a tier five's. He could feel her manapool trying to lower the concentration of his mana to bring it in line with something her body could handle. Jiran relaxed his control of the mana within her pool, allowing it to loosen and its concentration to degrade. He made sure not to submit the energy to her entirely, as that would cause it to flood into her technique and possibly kill her.

Shara breathed a sigh of relief and slackened in her chair, her tightly squeezed eyes fluttering open.

Can I lower the concentration of the rest of my mana? Or is it only working because it's in her manapool?

Jiran formed the intent and shook out his mana, only slightly surprised when it spread out beyond the confines of his skin, now taking up a much larger area since it was less condensed. With the lower concentration, came a loss of power and speed. The energy became less sensitive as well—the constant feedback of information about everything it came into contact with dulled into a relaxing background buzz. He tried to change it back to its original concentration and quickly discovered that it needed to be inside his body to make the shift.

Interesting. Potentially useful if I need to trick an enemy into thinking I’m a lower tier, I guess. Thanks for the idea, Shara. Five steps closer to one hundred, and hopefully, a new subskill.

Mana Confluence: + 5

He refocused on Shara’s manapool, steadily moving his mana closer to her flickering technique that danced between light, as mana was breathed in, and darkness as damaging energy was released. He traced her mana as it was sucked into an invisible whirlpool that somehow existed directly inside her technique. He was unable to see the whirlpool itself, only being able to perceive its existence due to the way her mana swirled as it vanished.

“I’m at your technique now. There’s some kind of hole, I can’t see where it goes from out here. I’m going to push some of my mana in,” She took another deep breath, then clenched the armrests of her chair tightly while bracing for another round of agony.

When she nodded, Jiran dipped a thread of his mana into the cyclone. He maintained tight control as it tried to suck down his energy. Deeper and deeper he went, clearly feeling his mana travel several meters despite still remaining within her chest. It abruptly stopped when it collided with a transparent barrier. He ‘watched,’ with interest as Shara’s mana collected on the barrier, and then flipped and inverted in a familiar way before sliding deeper into the hole, completely unobstructed. As her mana passed through, an equal amount of the dark energy escaped. With each breath she took, another grouping of mana would stop at the barrier, invert, and slide past. Each repeating cycle coincided perfectly with the flickering activations of her technique.

That inverting before her mana crosses the barrier is exactly what happens when I convert mana into my manabody. But she doesn't have a complete manabody yet, she’s only tier four. She has an aura, obviously, but it has such tiny quantities of mana in it that I can barely sense it. Why is her mana mixing with her aura after activating a technique in the first place? Whenever I used skills and techniques as a human, my mana didn’t interact with my aura in any way.

Jiran was careful not to let any of her mana, or the dark energy, interact with his mana as he tried a few times to push through the barrier when it opened. Each time, he was instantly rebuffed and Shara cringed with a tiny gasp.

This isn’t working.

Jiran withdrew his mana from her entirely, causing her to sag in relief. He sat back in a cushion of aura, blocking the sounds around him and closing his eyes to focus.

Whatever that black energy is, it’s coming from just beyond that barrier. It feels… fresh, right when it comes out and then quickly begins to degrade. That’s probably the only reason she’s still alive, the energy is much weaker by the time it gets to her manapool and spreads through her body.

I’ve got to get past that barrier. What do I know so far? Her technique won’t shut off, her mana is being drained into a hole that has something to do with her aura and—Wait! That’s it!

Jiran’s eyes flew open and he leaped to his feet in a blur. “I figured out some of what’s happening,” Jiran’s eyes flicked to Olive who was in a hushed conversation with Cameron and Mayalyn in the other room. “I have an idea of how to proceed. I have to warn you though, it’s probably going to be a lot more uncomfortable than what we’ve done so far.”

Shara frowned while shaking her head slowly, “What aren’t you telling me? You’re talking about my body, my very life. I want to know!” The fierceness she showed toward Niya came back in a flash.

“It’s not that I don’t want to tell you, I’ve just been told time and again to keep my mouth shut about certain topics. I’d be happy to explain everything after clearing it with Princess Oliviala.” The reminder of who Olive was had an instant, calming effect on the woman.

“You’ve really discovered something else about my illness? And you truly think you can help me?” When Jiran nodded firmly, she sniffled, barely holding back tears as her emotional roller-coaster took another sharp turn. “O-okay, do it. I don’t care how much it hurts, I know I won’t survive much longer anyway. You’ve learned more in a few minutes than others have in years. Whatever your plan is, I feel like it’s worth trying.”

“You’re probably going to feel really uncomfortable in the beginning, try to let your mind wander where it wants to go and accept whatever visions you see. The more you fight them, the more it’s going to hurt.”

“Visions I can do. Nothing new for me there,” She mumbled while sitting back in her chair.

With what I think is going on in there, I’m not at all surprised that she’s been having visions.

As gently as he could, Jiran wrapped her immaterial aura up with his own and pushed it inside her body. Her face scrunched up at first, then quickly relaxed. He nodded, expecting the experience to not be as bad for her due to the lack of substance within her manabody. When he kept pushing, further compacting her manabody deeper into her body, she clenched her teeth and groaned.

With confident movements, he wrapped her aura into an incredibly narrow tube—smaller than a needle—with a tiny bubble at the tip. He threaded his mana into the tube, insulating it from her body before lowering it into the whirlpool inside her divination technique. When the tiny bubble at the end with his mana in it pressed against the barrier and slid right through, Shara released a gasp and brought her hands to her stomach.

"I think I'm going to be sick," She loudly swallowed the bile rushing up her throat.

"Hold on, I'm almost there!” Jiran sent a wave of rejuvenating Mana Confluence through her, soothing her discomfort as much as possible.

In one swift motion, he pushed his mana through the bubble at the end of the tube, finally perceiving the space beyond the barrier. His mana was surrounded by undefinable darkness, all save for one exigent feature that stood out within the vast nothingness: A massive wall of shimmering blue like a curtain formed from a nebula. Jiran grinned at the familiar sight of a soulwall spread out before him.

That whirlpool is where her aura leaks into reality. Cameron told me they can be anywhere within the body and finding them can take decades. Well, hers just so happens to be directly on top of where her divination technique manifested. If I’m right, then the darkness seeping out of this place into her body is trace amounts of her soul. Back when Daughter first took me to my soul, she told me the soulwall protects the body from the soul. If I’m right about everything, I should find some kind of damage to her soulwall here.

Jiran spread out his mana, searching for anything that looked out of the ordinary but her soulwall was pristine and unblemished as far as he could perceive it. Shara was beginning to gag and thrash, making it hard for him to control both her aura and his mana at the same time. He wrapped her tightly in his aura to hold her still while frantically searching for what was wrong.

It only took him a second to realize what he needed to do: Follow the mana!

Jiran collected his mana back to where the tube of Shara’s aura was and carefully traced her mana as it shot forward and collided with her soulwall. Minute ripples spread through her soulwall wherever the motes of mana touched it and just as the ripples stilled, globs of darkness seeped away from the wall and zoomed off toward the whirlpool.

Having confirmed his theories, Jiran withdrew his mana from the dark space and pulled it all the way back up through the whirlpool before releasing her aura. Shara was panting and rivulets of sweat dripped down her face. Niya had returned and was lightly rubbing the woman’s back, both of them piercing him with hopeful gazes.

“I know exactly what’s wrong with your technique. I’m not quite sure how to fix it though. I’ll be right back.” Niya immediately followed as Jiran made his way to Olive and Cameron. Before making it two steps, he realized there was something he could do to at least temporarily help Shara. Mana Confluence created a lasso of mana that he lightly wrapped around her manapool while Enthralling Touch stole every single wisp of mana that was converted from her lungs which stopped any further transfer of dark soul-energy from leaking into her.

He waved the cousins over to him after he was five meters from Shara—the furthest distance he could control the lasso. Mayalyn joined them and after creating a shell of aura to block sound, he explained everything he had learned to the entire group.

“Do you have any idea why her mana would be going into her soul if there isn’t any visible damage? Or why her technique is constantly active?” Jiran nodded to Niya’s question.

“Yes, I have a few theories. Before that, I’d like to observe you use your own divination technique.” He nodded to Olive, “I’m pretty sure once I see that, I’ll have all the confirmation I need.”

“Oh, uhm, okay. Sure. Does it matter what question I ask my technique?”

“Nope, anything should be fine,” Jiran tried to send a thread of mana into her manapool, but her mana descended on his with a voracious hunger. His brows shot up as he dedicated a significant amount of focus to fending off her attempt to claim what was his. “Can you, uhh, stop trying to eat my mana so I can watch?”

“What? Oh! I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize what I was doing.”

“It’s fine, I’m the one who taught you to claim density, and with how high your molding is now, it’s not much of a surprise. You’ve really grown a lot stronger since we met,” Jiran’s fond smile caused her to blink at him in incomprehension with her mouth hanging slightly open.

She snapped back to the moment and mumbled something under her breath as her mana finally stopped trying to eat his. “Uhm, I’m going to start now. Are you ready?” When he nodded, her divination technique activated.

Mana Omnis let him watch as her mana rushed together, conglomerating into a tight ball only to be devoured by a bright golden light within her manapool. The thread of Jiran’s mana inside her pool swam into the light. He grit his teeth as her technique tore at his thread, seemingly desperate to rip it apart and devour it along with her mana. He persevered and pressed on, falling ever deeper into the golden light that was so much different than Shara’s.

For the briefest of moments, he saw a flash of darkness, and buried within that all-encompassing darkness, the face of a beautiful woman smiled back at him. One of her radiant blue eyes, composed of a trillion stars, winked at him before he heard an eerily echoing giggle. Then, his mana was devoured, and with it, his connection to her technique was severed, snapping his vision back to reality.