Supreme Magus

Back in his room, Lith used Invigoration on one of the few boxes he had left, carefully studying its pseudo cores, mana pathways, and the mana crystals that sealed it.

He had taken notes on everything he learned so far about them, and thanks to Soluspedia he could remember everything with but a thought.

He started simultaneously attacking the mana pathways and the mana crystals, letting the energy they contained leak at the same rate. While both were draining, Lith also had to prevent the three pseudo cores desynchronizing.

The last time he attempted opening the boxes, he failed because he had never wielded a crystal embedded item. Therefore he didn’t know that the only way to prevent the prevent destructive desynchronization was to imitate the mana signature of the crystals and inject mana in the pseudo cores every time they would go out of phase.

The process was long and required surgical precision. Lith had already learned that if he damaged the mana pathways too much, making the energy leak happen too fast, the box would just explode.

He had to bide his time, slowly eroding the pathways and corrupting the crystal with darkness magic while using spirit magic to keep the pseudo cores stable.

’Damn, how can normal Forgemasters open these frigging things without Invigoration? I already consumed thrice my whole mana reserve and I have a lot of it.’ Lith thought.

When the box was finally opened, Lith was drenched in sweat.

’Don’t push yourself so hard! You have yet to recover completely. Remember there’s only so much Invigoration can do until you are back to your peak condition.’ Solus was still worried about him.

After the breakthrough, Lith’s body had quickly returned to its old appearance, except for the grey streaks in his hair. She had no idea how having lost so much life force would affect him in the long term, but Solus was certain there would be a price to pay.

At the moment, Lith was around 80% of his full strength and was getting better by the day. Yet because of his injuries, using his full focus would make Lith tire faster than usual and Invigoration could only restore his mana up to his current limit.

Lith nodded. He couldn’t wait to take a hot bath and relax. A long time had passed since he had a vision of the future, he had yet to understand if the boxes still held any significance.

He pressed the blue crystal in the center of the briefcase-looking box and watched it unfold. The box grew bigger and bigger until it became the size and shape of a huge wardrobe. When Lith opened it, he remained flabbergasted.

Inside there was the closest thing to an Earth portable chemical lab he had ever seen. To make things even weirder, it seemed to be completely automated. Mechanical hands opened and mixed the content of several glass containers.

There were even a few Bunsen burners that the hands would light with a flintstone and use them to briefly warm up some of the liquids. In a few minutes the process was complete and one of the hands placed a small flask containing a transparent liquid at the center of the cabinet.

Chemistry and Alchemy were too different for Lith to understand what he had just seen. Also, most of the ingredients were magical in nature and had no counterpart on Earth.

’Solus, you are the one following the Alchemy lessons. Any idea of what has just happened?’ Lith asked.

’Beats me. I only have fourth year knowledge.’ She mentally shrugged. ’I can prepare fire seeds, low tier potions, and some basic wands but that’s all. This stuff is advanced Alchemy, to the point where I have seen this machine perform at least five reactions that Professor Ryner told us were impossible.

In theory, everything should have been blown up to pieces. Whoever did this is a true genius!’

Lith took the flask, examining it with Invigoration while it was still sealed with a stopper. Whatever it was, it didn’t seem to be magical in nature. With no other option, Lith conjured a small but strong barrier around the flask, fearing it would explode.

Then, he opened it from a distance with spirit magic. Once again, nothing happened.

’Damn, I hate riddles. Couldn’t they add a warning label or an instruction manual? There is only one way to understand what the heck this is.’

Lith removed the stopper, taking a single droplet of the silver liquid it contained with water magic and put it on his own tongue. It was tasteless and odorless too, making it impossible to understand its nature with an external examination.

Lith was forced to swallow it and keep an eye on it with Invigoration. Everything that followed didn’t make sense to him.

The droplet didn’t disperse nor did it mix with his saliva. It went straight for his stomach, remaining unaffected by the acids, then it entered the bloodstream via his intestine and then spread out evenly through all of his body.

Lith didn’t feel any better or worse for it, but he wasn’t willing to ingest another droplet blindly. He used Invigoration to cleanse it from his system, instantly recognizing the unpleasant feeling that followed.

The liquid was resisting his efforts, nullifying part of the mana he employed as soon as they made contact. Yet he had cleansed so much of that toxin that the procedure was second nature to him, easily purging it out of his body.

’F*ck me sideways! This is the anti magic parasite toxin! In an even more powerful and effective form at that. Why the heck did they send it to the White Griffon academy? Poisoning someone with this thing makes no sense.

’As soon as a mage loses their powers, the scheme would be revealed. Killing someone with this stuff takes weeks. Also, why send all this terrible contraption? Why didn’t they just give their accomplices the flask?’

Lith received the answer to his question a few minutes later, while he was still remembering the details about his vision. Both the droplet he had extracted from his body and the liquid in the flask became cloudy before turning into a fine dust.

’That’s some first rate paranoia!’ Solus blurted out.

’That’s why. Once the stopper is removed, the toxin must be used quickly or it self destructs, leaving no proof behind. Still, it doesn’t make sense. You, Marth, Manohar, there are a lot of people in the White Griffon that would immediately recognize it.

What’s the point of making the students or the Professor lose their powers?’

’Maybe they were planning to use the toxin to make them helpless during an assault?’ Lith realized how idiotic the idea was as soon as he thought it out loud.

Even without their magic, the Professors could still rely on the arrays. Fueled by the power core, they were the academy’s greatest weapon and defense at the same time. Also, even if completely powerless, Linjos could still use the communication amulet and the Warp Gate in his office to call for help.

Lith searched the rest of the cabinet for clues. Aside from the magical ingredients, all heavily protected by thick enchanted glass, there was just a single drawer. Inside, Lith found three envelopes.

Each one contained a different item and several pills of unknown purpose. The quality of the items varied greatly. One was a plain ring, identical to the magical ones students would exchange points for.

Another was a precious necklace with several diamonds embedded and the last one looked like a cheap bracelet, something that only someone of humble origins would wear. No matter if their design was elaborate or plain, they all had the same enchantment.

When he used Invigoration for the first time on one of them, he was amazed by the complexity of the forgemastered spell matrix. It held five pseudo cores that required so many mana pathways that there was not an inch of the item that wasn’t filled with runes.

He also discovered several small magic crystals embedded in each one of them, crafted so masterfully to be almost invisible unless one knew where to look.

Lith had no idea what could require such a complex enchantment, so he imprinted the ring with his mana and then he wore it. After several attempts, Lith realized that, whatever was its purpose, it wasn’t something as simple as point and shoot.

After taking the ring off, Lith opened two more boxes. Each one contained the portable lab and had its own drawer with a different set of accessories. No two were alike. Each magical item was accompanied by several pills. It was the only thing they had in common aside from the enchantment.

’All this time and effort and I’ve just moved from square one to square two. I need to understand the reason they smuggled the toxin inside the academy and what the heck these things are.

’I wish I could ask the Marchioness or Lady Ernas for help, but I have no way to explain to them why I have more boxes nor how I managed to open them. Damn, I could really use a vision right now.

Useless dryads and their half baked gifts.’

After a long hot bath, Lith went to sleep. He was exhausted, only rest could help him recover from the damage his body had sustained. It took him some time to fall asleep. It wasn’t just that he couldn’t stop thinking about the boxes, but he also really missed Phloria.

He had got so used to her presence that, ever since he left house Ernas, he had trouble sleeping. His rest would be disturbed by nightmares about Protector’s death and by the recurring visions of his loved ones dying over and over again.

’From tomorrow onward, I’ll train myself to stop Death Vision whenever my focus is not required for something important. I’m starting to get tired of this sh*t. I still have too many things to do before I can allow myself to waste time on self pity.

’No matter what the future holds. As long as my strength keeps increasing, the number of threats to whoever I hold dear will become less and less. We’re in this together, right Solus?’ Lith thought.

’Always.’ She replied, giving him hope.

***

The next morning, the first lesson was the Magic Crystals class. However, the Professor that entered the room after the second gong wasn’t Nalear. The students were curious and worried at the same time.

No one had seen Professor Nalear since the attack, so they were naturally concerned something may have happened to her. On the other hand, there was something majestic in the newcomer’s appearance that piqued everyone’s curiosity.

The new Professor was a woman, around thirty years old with chin length red hair. She was very tall, almost 1.8 meter (5’11") high with a muscular build that was more suited to a front line soldier than a Professor.

There was something noble about the grace of her movements. Each one of them seemed to be full of strength yet incredibly delicate. She exuded an aura of power that Lith had never experienced before, completely different from the killing intent he usually employed.

He felt like he was staring to a natural born leader, someone that people would gladly give their life for, even if they had only known her for a few hours. They were polar opposites, if she was the sun then he was the moon.

"Good morning, students. I’m Professor Amyla Farg. I will replace Professor Nalear until she makes a full recovery. During the three days of siege, she was tainted by a Valor’s life force while attempting to protect you.

"She didn’t receive proper care until the undead was disposed of, so she fell into a coma and has yet to recover." Many students became pale while remembering that night, Lith included.

"Don’t worry, the worst is over. Her condition is stable and slowly improving. If she has managed to survive until now, I’m sure she will overcome the hurdle and awaken soon. Very few among those tainted managed to survive, she is one of the lucky ones."

She looked for a moment at Lith’s group and many students did the same. Yurial’s and Phloria’s miraculous survival was a well known fact, so they couldn’t help but wonder how they managed to come out unscathed.

Farg tried not to stare for too long at Lith. Professor Farg was actually a member of the Queen’s Corpse, the secret unit of Awakened ones at the service of the Crown.

Tyris had sent her to keep an eye on the hybrid and make sure he wasn’t a threat. Her orders were clear: "Observe him without interfering and kill him at the first sign of danger."

"Today’s lesson is a little special. It’s something that you were supposed to learn during your trip to the mines, but I doubt any of you want to go back to the mining town again. Hence, the Headmaster was kind enough to reinforce the protections of the classroom and transport high tier crystals here."

She clapped her hands, making a mana blade required for crystalsmithing and a deep blue crystal the size of a coconut appear on each student’s desk.

"Before we start, I want to warn each one of you of the risks this exercise involves. The array surrounding the class will keep you perfectly safe, but the same cannot be said for your academic career."