The Prince of Demons

Nil

My reunion with Luna was unfortunately short lived as she was quite tired from her ordeal with Lord Utol; after verifying she was fine and hugging her a bit, she went to go to sleep as the exhaustion clearly began hitting her hard. I want to do more, but Luna wants some time to recover. I knew from her perspective it was a few hours, but she was gone for several days; I was glad she was back okay and unharmed. Krahinn assured me she would be fine; unfortunately his idea of comforting someone was to teach me the theory of <Warping Ward> while I had to put together the rest. As Luna left, I sighed before walking over to the auxiliary courtyard that I practiced in. According to Krahinn, this <Technique> was one that consumed vast amounts of <Mana> whenever you did it incorrectly and hardly any at all when formed properly. The note I had apparently left for myself was to imagine an array of anchors around myself; while it was likely an accurate starting point based on what Krahinn explained, controlling it properly was much easier said than done.

I resumed practicing setting up the array around myself, trying to bend the space around me without consuming all my <Mana>. Regrettably, my attempts were going through my <Mana> at an alarming rate. The silver lining was that at least I was not completely wiping it out in a single burst like it was when I started. I had to replenish my <Mana>, slowly cultivating more in order to resume my practice. I could sense Ryker nearby again, not that I expected him to stop by. Each time I tried talking to him he blew me off kind of rudely; I had no idea what I was doing wrong nor what I could've done to offended him to such a degree. Magus Supreme Praecan and Ryker tended to keep to themselves, so there was a chance he was just not interacting with me until after her proposal was accepted or denied. From what Luna told me, he was the hero of the Modinar Kingdom that waged a war against me and if history repeated itself, at some point I was going to have to defeat him. I would rather befriend him, which was proving to be quite difficult at the moment as he seemed to utterly hated my guts.

For now, I needed to get <Warping Ward> working as it was a necessary <Technique> if I wanted to defeat the Void King. Originally, I wanted to know why I hadn't been taught it sooner if it was so key, but Krahinn's assessment of the sheer amount of <Mana> needed to practice and learn it was spot on. My <Mana> was still recovering as I sat here. I can't think of what I'm doing wrong. Next time I should walk through it more carefully to try to gauge what I was not doing correctly. Maybe use my <Arcane Eye> for a little guidance? Krahinn made me cut way back on using it and learning <Magic> more properly, so it had been a while since I actually used it to learn; I could now at least use <Temporal Erasure> and <Dead Time> without the assistance of my <Arcane Eye> which was nice. Just because he was not actively watching me didn't mean I was going to slack on training properly. I kind of wish I had some lessons from my uncles, but the tension between them was getting unbearable. Probably want more of their lessons because Duthane and Krahinn a little bit have been filling in the gaps. Duthane's lessons were still miserable, but I at least got the point of them better now. I sighed as my <Mana> was mostly restored at this point. Time to attempt the task I was given now that I had warmed up trying to perform the <Technique>.

I stood up, setting up the array around me. Out of storage I pulled my bow, notching an arrow. The test was could I make it do a circle by just bending the space as needed. Krahinn specified as needed. It probably meant I didn't curve the space for it constantly, not that currently I could make it do more than half the circle. I launched the arrow, using my anchor points to try and make a circular space. My <Mana> began burning rapidly before something went wrong making the arrow launch vertically. What am I doing wrong? Why did it keep going up? I was definitely not telling it to go vertically, I was trying to turn it solely on the horizontal plane. I had maybe three more arrows before I had to restore my <Mana> yet again. The first hurdle was figuring out why it was going vertically rather than side to side. The arrow would vibrate violently before skyrocketing was my only clue as it was hard to sense and control the space at the same time for me. I needed to improve on that front, but improvement was for after I had the <Technique> working.

So, what could be causing the arrow to shoot up? It consistently shot up after maybe a quarter circle. I was consistently making the same mistake; I just had no idea what the mistake was. If I was bending the space around me, why was the velocity suddenly going up? How was I rotating it ninety degrees up? I made my array a bit finer, imagining several additional anchor points for the arrow to travel along. Let's see what happens. I notched another arrow, drew the string, and let the arrow fly. To my surprise, the arrow launched itself into the sky even faster this time. Interesting. Well, let's try the other idea of less anchor points. I spaced them out much further, lowering the number of anchors I was imagining for the <Technique>. I shot the next arrow, seeing it finally get passed a quarter turn before turning and going skyward. I have one more arrow before I have to recuperate my <Mana> again. With the more spaced array the arrow made it a lot further before it decided to go into the sky, but both the tightly packed and spaced array sent it to the sky. Why did they fail the same way?

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Logically speaking, they should have failed differently. Or was I imagining this incorrectly? The more spaced-out anchors bent the path of the arrow better. Why? I guess it was bending it in a larger circle rather than trying to finely control the space the arrow was in. Focus on making it work and then work on being able to fine tune the solution. I replayed both in my mind, trying to envision what the arrow did in each case. When there were more anchors the arrow's trajectory went awry faster. If I were to guess, it had something to do with multiple points of contact causing whatever the issue was faster. How could I stabilize it? Adding more anchors would cause it to fail faster, wouldn't it? I nearly slapped myself. Objects moved in three dimensions, so why were my anchors in two? It was similar to <Rotation Axes> where I likely needed more than a simple anchor.

I recreated the spaced-out array, this time with two layers of anchors. I shot the next arrow while aligning it between the anchors as best I could, bending the space around me into a circle. This time, the arrow actually did a full lap around me, but once it lost some speed and fell, the instant it got near the bottom layer of anchors the arrow went haywire and nearly shot back at me. I swerved out of the way as the arrow almost hit my head. It gained a lot of speed when it hit the edge and flew across the courtyard. That was the issue I was having, with only one anchor bending the space the edges were unstable. That was good news at least, I had a working solution, now I just needed to make it work better. First I needed to replenish my <Mana> before I could work on improving my <Warping Ward>. I sat down and began the process of getting my <Mana> back. I felt this was a rudimentary <Warping Ward> at best, if not just a woefully simplified version of it.

The note I left myself should've said a three-dimensional array. Was that even the best? Maybe a cylindrical coordinate system to help bend things around the central axis? Actually, could this method be applied to other <Techniques> now that I thought about it? What if I tried using the <Marionette Strings> with <Warping Ward>? Tie the strings to the reference anchors and use that to move around. Would that work? I was about to test that idea because I was curious. Would this be any more functional than <Air Step>? Do not use my <Arcane Eye> to rapidly refill my <Mana>. It was tempting, but Uncle Nez told me that should be reserved for actually fighting someone with lives on the line, not for general practice or training. Krahinn all but confirmed it as well, unfortunately. I slowly waited for my <Mana> to refill, waiting until I was back to full before trying my new idea. I created a much more thorough array of anchor points, getting ready to try something that hopefully worked. I attached a few strings to my body and the array, reinforced my body with <Mana> a bit more than I probably needed to, and took a deep breath. Please work. Please do not end badly. Should I wait for Krahinn to be safe? I could use the <Techniques> separately, so them combined should be manageable.

I did a small lift with the strings on my feet, seeing myself move up easily. It controlled like <Marionette Strings> still, if not a bit more stable. Okay. This should be good to go. I went to jump up, pulling myself via the strings straight up. My body went flying up, way higher than I intended. Whoa that catapulted me a lot further than I thought it would. My movement was stable, so I moved the strings anchor points, launching myself forward. A massive gust of wind swirled around me as I shot towards the edge of the castle grounds. Okay, I was getting the hang of this. I was moving rapidly away from the castle, so I took the strings, making them solid while fixing two different strings to anchors to try and rotate my path back to the castle with <Warping Ward>. My body felt the force as I turned sharply back towards the castle as I felt the blood get forced towards my feet. I think I would've passed out there if my body was not reinforced with <Mana> as my body was not a fan of the u-turn. Note to self, bending the space makes an odd acceleration for some reason. I needed to figure out if it could be controlled better while my current path aimed at one of the spires. I kicked out with <Air Step> to see how my course adjusted in the air. To my joy, I rose a bit and to the side, but not with the extreme speed from using the strings. Okay, now let's combine <Marionette Strings> and <Warping Ward> in the same motion since I had it set up. Good news, my path easily curved where I desired it with my limited <Warping Ward> as I manipulated the strings. Bad news, I gained way, way more speed than I ever thought was possible once I slipped to the edge of one of planes I made. I zipped across the sky, easily clearing the castle side to side in a mere moment.

This is way too fast. How did I slow down? This was too much speed as I used my <Arcane Eye> to process how fast I was moving. I kept having to turn myself to stay within the grounds of the castle in literally blinks. I guess I just had to go up to burn speed. Once I was near the center of one of the courtyards, or more of where I thought one was as I had to try to time my location, I bent space up to launch myself vertically. I turned my <Mana> off, feeling just how much I burned. That was a fun ten seconds. I wish it lasted longer, but my <Mana> was nearly completely gone. I looked around seeing the view of Umbra as I free fell back to the ground below. This view is so pleasant to look at. As I got close, I used my <Mana> to kill my momentum and adjust my position so I gently landed in the courtyard. My aim was not bad at all. My breathing was labored as I stood there, looking around a little as I replayed how to do that better in my mind. Wait, why was Ryker standing here? This was the auxiliary courtyard, and he had been avoiding me; his gaze was oddly intense as he glared at me. Was he waiting for me to land? I wonder what he wants.