色戒未删版

Author\'s note: keep giving your power stones, let\'s set the goal of 350 power stones for this week, we are about to reach 200, and we are only about 10 or so ranks away form getting into 200.

Well anyway, that\'s all. Enjoy the chapter

*********

\'So tell me what is mana?\' I asked as I used light magic to write in the air, the question,

"Something that you can use," Ena said after a bit of thinking,

\'Well you are not wrong, but let\'s give it a definition. Mana is the energy that all living beings have, even the air you breathe, or the food you eat has some quantity of mana in them,\' I said,

As I said this Ena, raised her hand and I nodded for her to continue,

"If it\'s everywhere, then why can\'t I use it?"

\'That is a good question child, according to what I have come to find, all beings possess mana cores inside their body, and that is what we use to wield mana. In the case of us beasts, this mana core is developed to a good extent but for you humanoid beings, it is not something that can develop on its own\' I explained as I showed her a mana core from the pile that I had been collecting for so many decades.

"T-then how can I develop it?" she asked, a bit too excited to wield mana of her own.

\'That is for you to find, I can only show you the path walking on that path is up to you\' I said as I jumped onto her table. She raised her hand once more to ask a question.

"Aham, Nova-" she said but I raised my paw and placed it on her lips.

\'It\'s Teacher Nova when we are in a class child\' I said,

"O-oh alright, T-teacher Nova, w-what is that on your face," she asked,

\'Oh this, these are glasses of course,\' as I fixed my glasses on my kitten face. \'All teachers need to wear glasses when they teach in a class. I don\'t have something to wear or else I would have already worn a teacher cosplay\' I explained, she looked confused by all the foreign terms that I was using.

And where did I get my glasses you ask? Well, I made them course, I used some sand and heated them to make plain glass and then made some wood in the shape of a frame, and wallah we have our glasses,

\'Now what you will learn, or more like research will be how to carve ruins for a magic circle, but of course, you don\'t know where to start right is for that you will give you this,\' I said as I gave her the mana core that I had been using to demonstrate.

"W-what do I do with it?" she asked as she barely caught the mana core I threw at her.

\'You see this is a mana core of a Random slime, they are a really rare species of slime, and one of them is my Slav- I mean my friend who happily gave his mana core for your study, this mana core contains a way for you to use fire magic, and your task is to find it,\' I said as I made a copy cat of myself and then placed it in my spot,

\'Now you can ask this copycat of mine for everything, your first task is to find how the mana core of a random slime, uses fire magic.\' I said as I jumped off the table and then started walking to the exit of the class form,

\'You can take as long as you want, remember child don\'t dig in for answers sometimes they are right on the surface,\' I said as I finally exited the room and closed the door behind me.

[don\'t you think it\'s too much for her first lesson?]

Well not really, she is a bright kid so I know she would figure it out soon, and I told her that I would teach her but not everything would be given to her on a silver platter,

[but she would need equipment to find her answers,]

Hmm, I know that\'s why I left the copycat there, and I even gave her a hint.

[well let\'s see what she would do]

Hmm, let\'s see,

I made my way out of my cave and jumped into the night tree forest, it was around noon, as the sun was at its zenith, and it was shining like crazy,

Now that I think about it there were reports of beasts going missing, huh I should investigate it and find out what is going on out there.

But before that Star can you create a 3D hologram of my mana core,

[why?]

Well you see, I found something while I was doing research for Ena, I think if I am right I might be able to modify my unique skills and even see how the system is created itself, so is it possible.

[well I can do that, but it would take a week or so if that\'s all you want a 3D model of it that is.]

No, I also want to modify it, so if possible can you make sure that I have the feature to edit stuff?

[are you crazy, what the fuck are you thinking, if you modify your mana core directly you might just die, and even worst than that you might fry your soul and go into a vegetative state for your whole life]

Ya I know, I thought something like that might happen, so, for now, I will just study it and when I am confident enough after experimenting on other beings I would do it on myself, who knows I might be able to just create my unique skills?

[you do know that it would take a long time to do that,]

Well not like I am gonna get old so might just research different things like a Lich would,

[so you\'re going to become a Lich kind of person, you do know that your mental age might change your view as years go by and you might only see everyone as a test subject or research material,]

Hmm, I might turn out to be like that, so you should create a safety protocol for that. Something that would not change my mindset in that direction.

[well that is an even bigger project than the last one, it might just take a thousand more years to do something like that]

Well do whatever you want, just make it happen.

[sure, I will start working on it right away.]

***

I reached the part of the forest I had never reached before, as I looked around I could see many new plants and creatures, like a deer that had hair like that of a horse on its neck, blue eyes, and horns with an irregular shape, root-like, with spikes growing from their surface. One of its horns was even growing out from the side of its face, how bizarre I thought as I looked at it from atop the tree, as I was looking at it a rabbit came out of the bush nearby making some rustling noises, as soon as the deer heard the noise of the rustling bush it looked toward it, and then something that I never expected happened,

[author\'s note: Reference art for the deer is in the comments]

The tear opened its mouth and I could see a row of sharp teeth, or should I call them fangs on full display, two pairs of fangs were curved outward. As it snarled and lunged Toward the poor rabbit, it grabbed it by its head, crushing it completely in its mouth.

The fuck did I just witness, I thought deer were supposed to be herbivorous why do they have fangs like that. Holy shit it\'s the stuff of nightmares,

Now I am getting curious about what more I would find, I quietly jumped from one tree to another leaving the deer behind,

However, after reaching a considerable distance I thought of something that made me curse,

Fuck I forgot to check what that creature was, well if I find it when I am going back I would use Appraisal on it to see its status,

[forget about that did you notice it yet?]

Notice what?

[Further, we go from the capital, the trees get smaller and smaller, and I am pretty sure when you used your skill on the world tree, there was enough mana for the whole forest and even some areas outside of the forest to get transformed. But the further we go the size just decreases, as if your mana got sucked out before it reached this area,]

Now that you say that it does look like that, and now that I think about It the soil looked different, its like someone had painted it to be reddish instead of brown like it\'s supposed to be,

[yap definitely, something is going on here]

Hmm, I think the villains of this arc are showing up.

[oh come on shut the fuck up, villains my ass.]

You don\'t have one.

[mother fuck-]

Oh, I found a skeleton.