From the carriage window, Aldric held the communication stone, surrounded by a faint white glow, as he carefully observed the sphere of darkness. Since the sphere had appeared, it hadn't moved from the carriage where Eric was, despite Aldric's many attempts to investigate and communicate with it. All of his efforts ended in failure, except for the obvious conclusion: it was a being with a powerful affinity for darkness.
"It seems that I can only reach the tower to figure out what this is," Aldric muttered, feeling powerless in this situation. This frustrated him—despite the vast knowledge he had gathered over the years, he couldn't decipher this thing. However, the frustration only fueled his thirst for knowledge, knowing there were still mysteries waiting to be uncovered.
"Aldric, you don't need to worry about that being; it's an ally of the tower. Just let it carry out its mission and act as if you saw nothing, for your own well-being. Moreover, it is crucial that the boy reaches the tower," said Meredith calmly through the communication stone.
"Mission? What mission does that thing have?" Aldric asked, intrigued by what might have brought the being here.
"That's not something you need to know, Aldric. Just don't interfere with its path and focus on completing your task," Meredith replied sternly before cutting off the communication.
'She's a difficult woman to deal with, always bound by her rules and protocols. It's rare for her to share any relevant information, but no matter. I'll uncover it sooner or later,' Aldric thought, analyzing their conversation. A question popped into his mind, triggered by the omission of a seemingly trivial detail: 'Why is the boy important?' No matter how much Aldric thought about it, he found no reason for Meredith to care about the boy—unless it had to do with the event all novice mages experience: the awakening of their affinities.
"That must be it. He must've awakened a powerful affinity for all this to happen. It's a shame I can't figure it out because of that thing, but I'll uncover it eventually. For now, this mission is almost over," Aldric said as he sat down near the window to rest.
Inside the carriage, Eric lay reading the 'Book of the Dead'. To his fascination, he found numerous useful spells alongside general information about the world. Throughout his reading, he came across several sections detailing specific knowledge, and most importantly, a technique to enhance his mental power and advance in magic. This technique was known as the 'Mana Body'.
The technique outlined the process of creating a mana storage source through mental power. First, the practitioner needed to accumulate enough mental energy and train with artifacts that helped them perceive the mana surrounding them. Once the user could sense mana without relying on these artifacts, they would be ready to try controlling it with their mind—pressing it, guiding it through their body, and ultimately merging with it.
Eric understood that the goal of this technique was to achieve synchronization with mana, allowing the body to adapt more easily to high concentrations of it. Furthermore, this process provided significant benefits: by imbuing the body with mana, the user's spells would become stronger, their ability to process and retain information would increase, and their lifespan would be extended, as their body would transform into something akin to mana itself.
According to the book, the process was divided into seven stages, each representing a different level on the path of magic:
First Stage: In this initial phase, the user learned to control and imbue small parts of their body with mana, granting them a slight increase in lifespan and mental capacity. It also allowed them to perform feats impossible for a normal human. However, this stage was only just enough to survive high concentrations of mana, as overexposure could cause both internal and external damage, depending on the individual. Those unable to reach this stage tended to implode if exposed to too much mana.
Second Stage: The user's body developed an affinity with mana, enabling them to manipulate it without harm, except under extraordinary circumstances. In this phase, the user could cast a wide variety of spells, the most powerful being capable of causing small natural disasters.
There was no information about the following stages, as the corresponding pages were blank, just like many other parts of the book. This left Eric slightly uneasy, wondering whether the book was incomplete or if he needed to fulfill some kind of requirement to unlock the rest of its content. He decided to leave those concerns to his "future self" and continued flipping through the pages until he reached the seventh stage, which, to his relief, was not blank. However, it contained only a brief text:
'The user who reaches this stage will attain a complete Mana Body, gaining a long lifespan, provided they maintain enough mana within their body to cover the required energy expenditure, as this energy is essential for long-term survival.'
After reading that passage, Eric closed the book and began analyzing all the information he had absorbed over the past few hours. Fortunately, the book's contents were not too complicated, except for the 'Mana Body' technique, whose concepts were somewhat abstract. However, it served as a good initial guide to help him learn how to control and imbue his body with mana. With time, he might fully understand what the book was trying to convey—only by trying could he be sure.
Aside from the technique, there was something else Eric liked: he finally knew where he was. As he turned a page and looked back at the one before the section describing his attributes, he found a large map spanning both pages. At the top of the map, written in beautiful calligraphy with golden patterns, was the word 'Arcanthys'.