"You want to unlock you're mana?" Gorkuis said as he came closer to Leroy
"Yes, I feel like iv already become skilled enough to where I'm not overstepping and I won't be overwhelmed by starting mana training as well," Leroy said, his face serious as he faced Gorkuis.
"Right, I did promise the Captain to teach you for two weeks so I'll help you out, it'll make it easier for the others to trust their backs to you during battle as well if you are stronger" Gorkuis replied as he nodded his head and went on to explain.
"Everyone in this world has mana, it simply is locked from them and they can't use it, this is mostly a natural precaution that our body takes so that it can protect itself. If someone expends all the mana in their body then they would suffer mana exhaustion and die in a few minutes unless they were supplied mana by a priest"
"I see" Leroy nodded as Gorkuis continued to explain the workings of mana.
"Only priests can supply mana as inherently your body rejects all outside influences in its mana circuit, and priests have much calmer mana than others, this doesn't mean that their mana cant be rejected of course as there are cases where their mana doesn't get accepted and gets considered as an attack by your body, causing reactions all over your body and ending up in death."
"I see, that makes mana exhaustion the most dangerous thing for a wielder then?" Leroy asked
"That's right, unlike other wounds that a healer can fix, mana exhaustion is basically a roulette to see if your body rejects the outside mana or not and if it can then adapt that mana and use it for its own needs, that's why mana unlocking is dangerous"
"What's mana unlocking got to do with mana exhaustion?" Leroy asked perplexed.
"It's because the only method we commoners can use to unlock our mana is by sensing the mana that you can use right now, which is a very minuscule amount, and then using that to grab the rest of the mana that's unlocked in your body and make it burst, this causes high mana expenditure and can end in mana exhaustion very easily," Gorkuis explained as he sat down on the ground and looked at Leroy with a much more serious stare.
"Are you sure you want to undergo this? We do not have any priests around and if you do enter a mana exhaustion state then it's a guaranteed death"
Leroy sat there and thought about it, his index finger and thumb holding his chin, it was becoming a habit whenever he thought about something serious.
'It is certainly extremely dangerous, and this explains why the amount of mana users is far lower than what I had thought there would be, even in the Jackals, one of the best mercenary corps there are only 5 people out of the 15 that have their mana unlocked. But do I want to live my life as someone who can't even protect themselves?' Leroy continued to stand and think for the next few minutes.
Gorkuis waited patiently for him to come to a conclusion as this was truly a very important decision in Leroy's life, would he continue as a normal person or would he risk it all and embrace the supernatural?
'No, I can't ever allow what happened to me in the slums to occur again, never. I refuse to be played by the whims of other people' Leroy thought finally as he lifted his head to look directly into Gorkuis's eyes.
"I'm ready, I want to do this," Leroy said with conviction dripping from his voice.
"All right, sit down in front of me with your back facing my way," Gorkuis said as he nodded his head and waved his hand, calling Leroy over.
Doing so, Leroy sat with his back facing Gorkuis.
"I'm going to need you to relax your body entirely and I'm going to start by pricking your skin with my mana without injecting it inside your body, this will allow you to get a feel for mana and then you're going to have to start sensing inside of you for a similar feeling."
Leroy nodded and said
"Ok, let's get started"
Finally, Gorkuis put his hands on Leroy's back and started releasing his mana, if you looked closely a faint blue aura almost mist-like was slowly covering Leroy's entire body and starting to attach to him.
'Ugh' Leroy grunted as he started to feel the mana pricking his skin, it was a truly uncomfortable feeling.
'If his mana is only pricking me very lightly and it's causing this much pain then how much pain would I suffer if he injected it inside me like he said that healers do when you are in a mana exhaustion state?'
Leroy thought for a second and then shook his head and closed his eyes, concentrating on getting a feel for the mana around him.
After a while Gorkuis stopped and got up from the ground, staring at Leroy who was not sweating buckets as he concentrated.
'Crazy, a crazy monster' Gorkuis thought as he stared at Leroy.
'It should have taken a few days for him to even be able to feel my mana and where it was going to prick him, but he already got that down in a few minutes and could already see where my mana was moving.'
Leroy on the other hand was trying his hardest to move his mana inside of him.
He had already felt his own mana quite easily but moving it to grab the rest of it that was locked between what he felt was a huge wall was quite a strenuous task.
'It feels like I'm trying to grab water' Leroy thought as he continued on his endeavor.
He continued to try and grab the mana but failed miserably while his mental strength was going down rapidly.
'What I'm trying to do is grab it forcefully and that's not working at all, what if I think of it like I'm trying to mold it and let it flow in a certain direction without me actually forcefully pushing it that way and more like redirecting it in the road I want it to walk on' Leroy suddenly had a new idea and started trying to put it to practice almost immediately.
Focusing his mind, he started to will the mana slowly as he tried to redirect its normal pathway toward where he wanted it to go.
He was trying to direct it towards what felt like a huge ball in the middle filled with energy that was surrounded by a thick wall.
And as he continued to try, he finally did it the mana started flowing in that direction.
It was now on a direct course to collide with the wall surrounding the ball of energy.
The collision was imminent.