Chapter 43: Sovereign of Mana
"Goliath!"
The moment Momo mana exploded and the huge sword responded by flying towards where Kim's mana pressure could be felt. Rentap had a shiver, chilling through his spine as the huge sword flew just above his head.
"Princess...gonna grow up as a fine woman!"
Rentap let out a hearty laugh and prepared his iai stance. Focusing all his mana for one powerful slash. He seized all his sense, waiting for the right moment. All he could hear now was the sound of his own heartbeat and the flow of mana. One breath two breath... and finally, Goliath collided with Kim's mana pressure and produce a deafening clanging sound of metals.
At first, it seems that Goliath was able to pierce through but after a while, it slowed down. Sensing that Goliath was struggling to break through, Momo gritted her teeth and held both of her arms upwards. The sky suddenly turned dark as black clouds gathered above them. Chain of lighting wildly jumping around. There were some would leak through and crushed the ground below.
Her eyes radiated with a purple glow. Her hair floating around in the air. She unleashed her mana and a thunderbolt stroke down to the ground. The thunder wasn't able to pierce through but still, it managed to cause distortion to Kim's mana pressure. That, however, was only the strayed aura of the real thing.
She made a downward motion with his arms and more straying lighting hitting Kim's mana pressure.
"Heaven Punishing, Azure Sword!"
With the four words, another giant sword, blue in colour appeared from the sky. It shot down to the ground like an arrow, slamming to Kim's mana pressure. Enveloping Kim like a lighting dome, trying to pierce through Kim's mana pressure that acted as an invisible barrier.
Conjuring both of these swords was prove to be a huge burden to Momo as she started to cough out some blood. She didn't falter and continue to focus on her mana or the sword would disappear. Cracks were forming, but it seems that Goliath was already breaking apart. Soon as Goliath was gone into thin air, Rentap opened his eyes.
"Forgive me for unsheathing my parang to you my brother, but you need to snap out of it!"
The ground started to tremble as Rentap slowly unsheathing his parang.
"Break!"
He made a slicing motion and the world started to shake violently!
The slice was pointed directly at where Goliath made some cracks. Rentap was waiting for this moment to break Kim's mana pressure entirely. Within this tense moment, Enggang squawked furiously.
"Are both of you a fool?! If both of your attacks go through that what will happen to the boy?!"
That moment, Momo and Rentap look at each other with a shocked face realizing they made a big mistake. Their face turned white and sweats profusely drops from their head to toes.
"Uncle! What should we do? I always thought master is strong enough to handle our attacks!"
"Bahahahaha! He's tough. He should be f- umph!"
Enggang gave Rentap a full swing to his cheek using its wing. He then flew towards Momo and gave her a light peck.
"Stop speaking nonsense, he just fought an otherworldly being that could devour a whole world. Momo, cancel your conjuring now!"
"Y-yes!"
The azure sword vanished in thin air when Momo cancelled her conjuring...but...the ferocious lightning was still lingering around, covering Kim's mana pressure like a dome made of thunder! Momo could only watch hoping the thunder would dissipate soon. The lightning itself might won't be able to break through but, Rentap's attack was unstoppable.
"Warrior! Why you always attack with your full power?!"
"Bahahahaha! It's bro Kim, I should at least use that much p- umph!"
Another wing flap straight to the cheek.
With Rentap's attack alone, it may not be able to break through, but the mana pressure has been severely weakened with Goliath powerful piercing blow and was still harassed by the azure sword lingering aura of lighting.
Soon not long after that, Kim's mana pressure started to dissipate as Rentap's attack continue to force through. The ground was split apart and the air was distorted due to the massively powerful attack. As the attack continuously dominating the mana pressure, the lingering thunder of azure sword joined in, forming a ferocious dragon!
Both of them can't stop rubbing their eyes when the saw their attack combined! Sensing that there was no way for them to stop the attack they both put their hands at the side of their heads and yelled at the same time
"Oh my goodness!!!"
Kim was standing there with his eyes closed.
"This is..."
"Your mental domain"
"But...why it's"
"Different?"
It used to be a dark empty void space which makes you feel like the domain is endless. If the floor were gone, you might endlessly fall into the abyss that was not there. Currently, Kim was standing in a vast plain grassy field. He can see the blue sky above him, but there were no clouds nor the sun. Although there was something, still it felt empty.
Then in the middle of the field, he could see bright red light flickering. He left the young man, and rush towards the light. Soon as he got close, he could see the light was flickering and waving about.
When moved nearer, he then realized that it was actually a flame. He finally standing in front of the flame and the young man was already behind him.
The flame was floating above the ground. It looked like it was alive. It was small like a campfire but burns gallantly like a god waiting to be worshipped. The Kim got close, the flame flickers as if it was trying to kneel before Kim.
Kim touched the flame out of curiosity. The flame seems to be happy around Kim as it danced around in excitement. Instead of getting burnt, he felt a warm familiar sensation enveloping his body.
"This is... my mana?"
"Yes"
"And here...why is it so different?"
"Here is your mental domain kid. Before you only contained your mana and they weren't able to form themselves. Now you finally set them free"
"If this would make me stronger, than why didn't you taught me earlier?"
"Because you were weak. You won't be able to handle all that excessive mana alone even with my mana memory. With all that power your body might explode before getting killed by a monster. Now, none of that matter... the moment you become a master, I knew you were ready to climb to the next stage.
'sovereign...'
The word sovereign suddenly pops into his mind when he heard the lich muttered it just while in battle.
"No time for explanation, you just need to experience it yourself. Wake up kid... have a test of your own power...this time, no more holding back... let it all out. Feel the mana. Make it yours!"
Kim could hear the voice laughter as he slowly faded away from his view...somehow it sounded like the voice was feeling satisfied and prideful of himself which kinda made him felt a bit annoyed.
Kim doesn't truly understand what the voice meant by feeling the mana. Does that mean that he was containing his mana without him noticing it? Is it because it was already in his nature to contain his mana without leaking anything?
Now that he thought about it, one of the first thing the voice taught him was too contained his mana to protect himself... he scratched the back of his head and gave up thinking.
'I will just do however I done it before. I need to feel it myself!'
He cancelled his domain and the scenery changed drastically. Kim was about to observe his surrounding when suddenly his mana sense detected powerful mana bursting toward him.
'Shoot that lecherous lich was still alive?'
But that maa felt too familiar. By then he realized the shocking and pale face of Momo and Rentap
"Master will be okay, right?"
"Bahahaha bahahaha bahahaha..."
Momo was having a monologue while Rentap already out of his mind feeling regret.
Kim let out a sigh.
'I will ask them about it later'
Without wasting any more time, he focused his mana sense toward the oncoming attack. Just as how he was able to grasp the lich mana before, again he was able to see the same thing with the attack coming from Rentap and Momo altogether. He knew it was them because their mana was distinguishable like fingerprints.
There weren't any voice, smell or taste...it was just the flow of mana. Some kind of a unique pattern that made mana owned by a person. It's like having the copyrights of one own's mana. Even for Kim, he had his own pattern. Kim was able to see and analyse this pattern by using his mana sense and the same thing when he was fighting the lich. However, this was only possible after spending some time with the mana user. Kim was able to determine the lich mana pattern while fighting her.
However, the most impressive was about to happen now.
Mana user could sense and wield mana as their own. Masters could feel mana and has full control of their own mana, wielding them to the utmost power they currently hold. For a sovereign of mana like Kim and the voice himself, they weren't just able to distinguish others mana. They could also manipulate that pattern into their own mana.
This was why the lich who was a master that was in her own league could lose control of her own mana. Kim already made them his own.
However, even if one could understand the pattern of others doesn't mean they could take control of others mana freely. It's claiming your rights, we must pay for what we want to own and that payment was by overthrown the user mana with a higher pool of mana.
Basically, Kim needed to invest a huge amount of mana which was bigger than the mana of a Demilich that has absorbed the mana of her entire world, that could control hundred thousands of undead monsters, that was able to travel to one world to another. Although the lich last attack was lacking in terms of her full strength it was still a huge scale attack.
Doing the same thing he did, he followed the aid of his mana memory and simply release his mana.
The mana clashed with the oncoming attack but instead of exploding, they actually converging. If one would explain the situation was, it looked like a cell undergoing phagocytosis. Like a certain slime monster devouring its prey.
Kim mana's enveloping everything, resonating with it and finally absorbing the mana. By then the scattering thunder dispersed and swirled around Kim's body. His hair rose due to the statics.
"Master!" Momo shouted with tears in her eyes. She couldn't think about how her master would scold her after this. "Maybe no milk in a week? NOOOOO!"
Despite the amount of mana that was unleashed by Kim, he could still feel the crushing pressure of Rentap's attack. He amplified his mana which caused the swirling spark to burst into blinding white lights. His pulled back his left hand in a spear form and enhanced his muscle.
With bulging muscle the thrust forward to face the beckoning power of Rentap's might. The collision of both attacks has caused the space to be distorted. If an ordinary mana user were to be within the vicinity of the impact his fleshy body would be ripped to pieces.
BOOM BOOM!
Sound of explosions ripping apart the entire area.
Kim then gathered his mana and the earth shone brilliantly. He could feel like he was one with the earth. He rose both his arms upwards and tow giant hand made emerged from the earth appearing beside the colliding force. The hands closing into each other to contain the ferocious mana. The hands were trembling trying to go against the force that was resisting its way.
Kim took a deep breath and unleashed more of his mana.
During that Momo and Rentap was also shining in the same light.
Even other warriors who came back to the earth suddenly rose up again when their mana sense was stimulated by Kim's mana.
"Brother Kim"
"Brother Kim"
.
.
.
"This... is his power? So strong yet... it's warm"
"Yes, this is Master mana. This warm feeling he gave me since the day he saved me"
Without no one noticing, the whole island of Borneo was shining with the same brilliant light. The massive mana was completely contained and exuded a powerful beam of light that shoots into the sky. It wasn't just the earth, even heaven was resonating with Kim's mana.