Ebony's Fable

"What do you want?" Tower Head of the Mage Association squinted while his overflowing Wisdom trembled ever so slightly.

"One. My clone. I gave you time, yet you haven't released him." Ebony felt the Elf's mana shake and knew that the Elf was not as composed as he presented himself to be.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Tower Head Dawnweave relaxed his nerves and adjusted his seating.

The teacup he was holding burst into flames and cracked into pieces, spilling—dropping a cup of frozen tea on his lap like a hot potato.

Within Ebony's mindspace, a chibi image of Tower Head was right beside the number 2,422,100,000.

Time has passed, without any recharge, Will would fade.

As Ebony used fully Will-saturated mana, the fading of Will also means loss of mana over time. This loss should be as unnoticeable as Sequester itself. If it wasn't sensed when it was injected, it wouldn't be perceived when it was lost to the surroundings.

Since Ebony's record only shows what he punched in and not what actually remains, he had to guess how much was left or whether or not the individuals' bodies could flush it out faster.

However, he was quite confident that Sequester remains in Tower Head Dawnweave. Even if it didn't, he was already in range and all the effect he needed was for Tower Head Dawnweave to think that he was infected.

"Release him, and you'll be released one day. If you don't intend to release him, I will do the same."

Ebony could see the not-so-subtle flushing of mana within the Tower Head. Neither of them was sure if he succeeded in clearing out foreign mana and Will within his body.

'These elders really have such an expansive mana capacity.' If he included expanding his mana to normal baseline density, his mana pool wasn't much smaller than most Elves he'd seen so far. But since he only used almost maximally compressed mana for most spells, he saw no need to calculate his capacity using that scale.

Ebony's mana was naturally purer and denser than this King Elf. This evolution of his had finally pit him ahead in this regard. So even if he were to decompress his mana all the way to base and cast the same arcane mana ball against Tower Head Dawnwave, he should easily come out on top, either piercing or crushing the opponent's mana ball.

However, just like him. Tower Head Dawnweave's mana was already compressed. But instead of semi-passive storage, he was able to tell that the Elf had to store a portion of his capacity as compressed mana. There was also the staff that held his compressed mana but this was hung on the walls, away from the man himself.

Holding compressed mana within one's body was exceedingly rare for Imperial mages. It was not comfortable and it was mentally taxing. For a mage, they would have to actively compress mana within themselves and then walk and carry on their daily lives with a constant mental strain.

As a partial mana-being, he had an easier time with this and holding compressed mana only benefited and did not hurt his body. But it did put a strain on his mental processing.

With a lower mana purity, the maximum density of Tower Head Dawnweave's mana was lower than his own no matter what tier or level his mana compression skill was. By the looks of it, the Elf was not capable of crystallising mana with just his mind.

'Mana purity is the key. I need to find some natural ingredient that helps make future Potential traits to mana purity cheaper.' Ebony used to focus on mana density for it was a clear, direct spell power up that made use of his high mana regeneration. Reaching the limit with merely Tier 4 to 5 mana compression skill and already solidifying mana, he was held back by mana purity. The higher his mana purity, the greater he could compress it without solidification.

As long as his mana purity wasn't high enough, there was no chance he could evolve his mana compression skill. Unless he was trying to achieve other states beyond solids. Until his mental strength or mana compression skill reached that state, he had no idea what was beyond crystallising mana and radiative mana.

The thing about radiative mana was that it only shows some effect at high densities. The solid mana bars and ores he conjures had the strongest radiative effect. It could be weakened by any material that was meant to disperse mana, but only until the physical warping damaged the mana dispersion effect. It could be the physical destruction of an enchantment, the constant warping and degeneration of a natural material's properties or the wear and tear of a runic mana dispersion formula.

"There's no use threatening me, I don't know anything about your clone!"

"Call me ignorant but I can hear my clone's voice on you." He didn't know how Tower Head Dawnweave was hiding or keeping his clone disconnected but he wasn't stupid.

"I know nothing about your clone or any voice." The Elf continued to claim ignorant.

"I see. You've already place it within your Elven Domain for someone else to research." Ebony hypothesised out loud to probe for any sort of muscular reaction.

"Leave my office." Tower Head Dawnwave's face twisted right, and a slap mark slowly reddened on it.

Ebony didn't move from his seat, nor did he conjure any mana hands. Utterly confusing Dawnweave. Having watched him so closely, Dawnweave saw that both Ebony's hands were full, one holding a cup the other holding the saucer for the teacup.

'I timed that nicely.' Ebony was impressed by himself.

The hand that he waved a few minutes ago just moved once more. Dawnweave didn't sense the gravity fluctuations so Ebony can't give himself a pat on the back yet. Another gravity mage would have sensed that coming.

Seeing the blow connect, Ebony suddenly thought of something and let the Elf ramble on. He set the saucer and tea cup down, then pushed it to the side for a second. Then he moved the cup back into the same position.

He waited for a second and saw the tea cup vibrate and 'jump' in place. He just delayed the teacup in that spatial region, then placed the teacup back to see what would happen when it overlaps with the duplicated momentum imprint of the teacup. The cup didn't break because he infused a small amount of mana within it to Mana Discern its internal changes, yet it accidentally protected the cup. He did it once more without mana infusion and the cup shattered into dust. The leftover tea was gone. Disappeared and not evaporated.

'For a brief moment, all the particles tried to overlap but I didn't place it back exactly to the particle. The near overlap had them push each other and shatter. But the delayed particles went back after the delayed spell was over, so it shouldn't be damaged yet actual version is already destroyed, so I can't tell if the one that goes back is unaffected.' He had better be careful playing around with this.

The only thing that should've been copied by Rhythmgrav Establishment should be motion, force and vector of whatever he cast it on. So he tested Rhythmgrav Establishment on an unmoving object to observe what he had just tested.

The Mage Association's leader had been ignored for a full minute and was getting livid, picking his staff off the wall. "Don't force my hand! You're not welcome in my office."

The heavy chair scraped against the floor as Ebony stood up, meeting the Elf's eye level. Ebony suppressed his aura all the time and didn't simulate any battles, so Dawnweave was free from seeing imaginations of the million ways he could die. All he saw were Ebony's endless depths.

The martial artist grabbed the back of Tower Head Dawnweave's collar and dragged him down the tower. Externally frozen solid before they walked past the door to his office, he walked down every step of the spiral tower with the thudding of the Elf's heels constantly echoing.

"Honey." Appearing with a flash of lightning under her feet, his wife arrived at the entrance.

"How's Athena?"

"Conscious. She's physically fine and tried to act fine but…her reactions are dull and delayed."

"…leave it to Yvette, mental healing is out of our scope."

On the bright side, if she could act fine her memories and mental facilities should not be harmed extensively.

"What's with that?" She leaned right, her hair swaying.

"Let's drop by the Elven Domain."

"Ooo we're picking a fight!"

"That's not the plan."

"Ahaha, it's happening anyway."

Ebony took out a few long swords that they got as gifts and got his wife to use them as temporary consumables. These were spiritless and she shouldn't feel too bad about melting them down if things got hot. At least in terms of durability, these were much better than her current longswords.

After that, he passed her a couple of fist-sized solid spheres saturated with Will and hiding Diametric Unity under a thin layer of Sequester and Preservation. As long as she pumped flames in, Sequester and Preservation will unravel and she can prepare an energy ball. Not necessarily a bomb, she could channel it as a mixed flamethrower if she wanted to. Then he passed a few hundred spheres of pure Preservation.

Preservation was the least Will-intensive, the sphere wouldn't run out of Will even if it burns flame inside constantly as all Coreflame types needed to exist as a flame not solid ice. This constantly consumes mana. Yet Preservation can keep the sphere, mana included, as a closed loo,p so it doesn't really lose much ice mana even if it constantly combusts into flames. So these were the only spheres that could be held for long periods.

The other mixture ones were time-limited items that would lose all their effects within a day if Ebony wasn't around to recharge them.

"Toss one and you can seal just about anyone. Just toss more if one isn't enough."

"That sounds fun but…are we really not picking a fight?"

"No."

"Aww. But why do I get the feeling you're so ready for one?"

Ebony gave her head a rub and their figures blinked away. She spoke as if she didn't already know what type of person he was.

❅❅❅

The Elven Domain doesn't hide or have illusions like the Frost Elven village. Finding it wasn't hard when Ebony had always kept track of where it was.

Travelling there, on the other hand had become a hassle. Why did the planetary expansion pull them so far away…

Since they were out in the open, Ebony kept charging the spheres he gave his wife for protection. Weeks had passed since the High Angel descended and spoke.

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Those who had good eyes, perception or sight-based skills would have long seen warp portals opening occasionally. Sometimes it opened in the sky, other times close to the ground. As for underground, Ebony didn't keep track. Perhaps the older Dwarven settlements are already facing invasion.

In fact, Ebony and his wife were currently surrounded.

"That's an expensive bike that doesn't come from this Worldcore. Rich nobles, drop all your storage and riches and you may leave."

"We haven't been robbed for so long this almost feels fresh." Xin leaned in and whispered into his ears. She spoke in Xenese, they've been doing so at home since he learned the language.

"Don't understand Gia? These country bumpkins!"

"Whatever, they must understand violence! HAHA!"

They claim to speak the same language as the couple.

'Must be hard making a living….' Ebony could not understand why these…8 Emperors were bandits, robbers or whatever they call themselves. At this point, they should be more than capable of earning money through various means.

It had to be said that Emperor might not be seen amongst the Imperials. The average Imperial can live and train their whole lives and not even evolve to Kings no matter how hard they try.

Biologically and genetically, these bandits were already ahead of 90% of the population, not just amongst the Empire just by the fact they met the basest of requirements to reach the ranks of an Emperor.

Banditry must be more lucrative than he thought.

These people were mostly freshly evolved, all under level 800. After somehow scraping through an evolution they must have been limited by either talent, training, resources or time.

"Can I test these out?"

Ebony nodded.

His wife cutely tossed the spheres of Preservation at one human who tried to slap the slow-moving ball to his face with his tower shield. The moment his shield touched the ball, it exploded into flames and the man was trapped in ice that continued to burn externally for a few seconds. The rest of the flames were already deep inside after the initial outburst.

"Oo, it's not as slow-acting as I thought."

The well-travelled bandit's shock and quick response aside, they got frozen one by one till Xin pointed at a scrawny mage, "this one has to die." But she had already decapitated him before any other conversation could be had.

If there was killing intent, it was too subtle for him to perceive. He trusted his wife wouldn't kill for no reason so he didn't stop her. It was literally one of her specialities.

Interestingly enough, while a few had some items that protected them from excessive arcane damage or spells in some manner, most didn't have good reflexes or their internal mana moved too slowly to form a counter. They might have found some way to force their evolution as it didn't seem like they got a good baseline improvement to their Physique or any at all compared to a King.

Duke Entras would have no problem taking three or four of them on at the same time. 'Emperors' of this strength wouldn't even be able to make the Empire of Ebbing Waves bat an eye. Ebony doubted these bandits can even take a city down. The barrier, siege weapon and magic towers might be enough to ward them off if the city was rich enough to sustain their magical defences against these people.

The rest of the frozen people started to walk against their will. Their destination was Tidal and they would park themselves at his old home. He'll move all the frozen statues in future, but that seemed to be a good parking spot for now.

The panic in their eyes was lost on both of them as they'd already continued on their journey,

Seeing new scenery, Ebony, who had been charging forward decided to take their trailer and move slowly instead. He kept rushing, thinking to get things done faster so much that he forgot to slow down and do what he wanted the most.

Travel.

New sights. New lands.

There was no better chance but to take his time and enjoy the journey. He had to remind himself that life wasn't just about training and getting stronger.

Their vehicle might not have the mechanical speed, but with a stream of gravity powered by him, its speed was still superior to before.

Ebony did not bring any gravity cubes out. They were all left with Dusk. But Dusk was already flying towards him. It was hard for Dusk to move now that his Will was locking themselves spatially but still more than possible.

The cubes were left at home with most of his Numbers that were under house-watching duties as Dusk was en route to him.

Dawnweave was trailing along the soil roped to the back of the trailer. Ebony was nice and gave the Elf a view of the sky instead of the earth.

Since they slowed down, the trip took almost a full month. The monster population and frenzy were pretty much back to normal within the first week and in many areas, even Grandmasters didn't exist, which was the norm before the Worldcore's Evolution. Masters and below, while getting a strength boost, did not make the planet a place that the average imperial cannot travel around.

Ebony even came across an Emperor who brought along subjects and claimed land already. They ignored him and vice versa.

Grandmasters and below practically do not have the capabilities to move between Worldcores. They had to be wealthy, connected to the means of using the wealth to travel out of a Worldcore and relatively strong to do so.

Unlike Elcra, a closed community on a high rank Worldcore, many other planets' residents are basically descendants of people who travelled to their worldcore and propagated over tens of thousands of years or longer.

The means of Eidolon are available even if the Worldcore was, say, Rare instead of Ancient. Uncommon and below Worldcores may even be conquered by a King or a couple of them. Their descendants would have extremely limited Natural Potential if there weren't good enough skills, good enough monsters, education and training, etc.

They would be generationally capped out at Grandmaster or King at best.

No matter Navin's fame or Oplot's family backer, this was now 'free real estate'. People would come even if it was just for the higher ambient essence purity, monsters to hunt and grow against, and resources to harvest.

So what if Navin controlled an extremely unbreakable territory?

That wouldn't stop Emperors from claiming resources for themselves if the mere King cannot control this much land.

At most, they would let Navin or the Empire of Ebbing Waves control a larger region than most Kings were capable of.

A non-mage's way of claiming territory was more technology, weaponry and architecture-based. Good ol' walls. Giant cannons. Magical towers that sense threats ahead of time. The works.

However, his Number's experience inside him summarised that this was simply wealth-based. Everything that can be achieved and obtained with money.

The really good stuff can't be bought with money alone.

Take the agriculture robots he had Sophia buy. They were the best being sold, not the best being made.

Ebony would go take a look once operations are ironed out. It just sounded a little boring since the monsters were weak and mostly cleared out but maybe there was something interesting no one thought to report to him or left undiscovered.

'Right, I should have Sophia get contacts to set up a warp portal there.' That would make travelling more convenient and safe. Spatial travel always held a risk.

Seeing so many people warp into Elcra, he should be able to find people who could set up a link to his company's worldcore.

The couple stored their mobile home and stood before the edges of the Elven Domain.

Ebony's eyes burned a bit more mana, trying to apply Mana Discern to his sight as well.

He could see the spirit of a massive tree stretch out to the skies and embrace the Elven Domain under it.

While not hidden under an illusion the Elven Domain was encapsulated. There was close to no leak of mana, nor could he 'see' who or how many Wills are supporting this combined effort Domain. At least, he wouldn't know for sure till he stepped past the edge.

The layer of arcane barrier was not so much defensive and more like a territory marking.

Xin had already hopped to the base of a tree happily and was excited about finding a rare mushroom with life-force-accelerating properties when eaten, temporarily speeding up healing. She used to have it after her training sessions as a child.

The mushroom wouldn't work on their current bodies but it was still a delicacy or so her reaction was telling him.

Ebony walked in after her and focused on Mana Discern.

There was no immediate response. Compared to his Domain, the Elven Domain was huge.

The mixture of Wills was too cluttered. He wasn't able to tell how many Wills supported this Domain. It was more than possible for there to be the Unfading Will of dead Elves from generations ago that still exists to this day.

By his estimation and understanding of their history, this Domain should not exceed 4000 years old. Since only a small number of Elven Kings could use Domain-type skills, Will manipulation the Domain's accumulation is actually not insurmountable.

First thing he noted was that the mana in this Domain was not fully saturated with Will like his. Whatever rules they set, it doesn't weaken either of them. But an unsaturated Domain meant weaker bending of reality to fit those rules anyway.

As expected, the rules of the Elven Domain seem to support plant growth more so than being hostile to any creature that enters.

It took them fifteen whole minutes, but a pair of 'quick-footed' archers were not far and called out to Xin after observing her picking mushrooms for a few minutes.

They do not know she is a Xeng. His wife no longer wears a mask everywhere she goes and doesn't hang it on her either. Her mask flowed inside her bloodstream on a normal day.

Ebony masks her face and figure with a mirage so she looks like the average human woman.

As for himself, he was just standing there without any active camouflage or mirage. The 2 archers simply couldn't register his presence.

'So they are okay with people entering their Domain.' The slow reaction was not unexpected.

This wasn't a perception focused Domain. If each supporter of this Domain shared senses, they must feel numb or weak reactions whenever someone entered. It would take time for any of the Will users to sense it, then send someone over.

Wildlife was all around so they couldn't just check every entry immediately.

Ebony also figured that they cannot differentiate whether a monster entered or a person. These two archers were ready to hunt with their bows drawn all the way till Xin was in their line of sight, and they rested their bows a little.

Not having a constant high definition scan was something he couldn't understand since it was so useful for detecting threats but it was none of his business and this wasn't his Domain.

"Human lady, these are Elven lands. Turn back after you're down." One of the Masters, a young kid sat on the branch while the other continued to watch Xin closely.

Xin harvested with consideration. She didn't harvest everything and let propagation be possible. This must have been a good sign for the plant-loving Elves and the reason for their politeness.

His wife heard them but continued to carefully place the mushrooms on a basket. She only stood up and looked up after she was done.

As she stood up, her essence pushed away Ebony's suppression that hid her life force.

The pair audibly gulped when they realized this human lady was a King-ranked individual hundreds of levels higher than them combined. The two of them combined weren't even level 300.

"Are you not coming down?" Xin questioned.

The two kids panicked a little but ultimately understood her demands. They hopped and stood before her with their heads bowed slightly.

Elven or not, their strong ancestors aside. A Master's life was under a King's control and it was usually silly to offend someone evolutions above you.

She did not bother tetting as a greeting. These kids didn't have the Elcrian habit of greeting either. They lived their whole lives within the Elven Domain and spoke Elcrian with a heavy accent, as if they were unfamiliar with this tongue.

Even at this range, neither of them even glanced at Ebony standing right beside Xin.

"Are members of the Dawnweave family home?" Xin questioned.

"Ah? OH, you're dear guests of the Dawnweave family!"

Xin tilted her head ever so slightly without replying. The kids made up their own conclusions.

"We-we know where they live. We can't bring you in but I'm sure their maids would let you in when they confirm you're their guest."

She gestured for them to lead the way.

Ebony followed along, dragging Dawnweave along the ground. Not even suppressing the sounds or hiding the soil trails. Yet the two archers didn't look back to see the two lines being drawn on the ground behind them.

As they took a forest trail, he stared in one particular direction.

One stream of Will is thicker than all the rest being directed into the spirit tree trunk.

'That one is their Emperor and their matriarch.' His mental reach had touched them, but he couldn't tell who noticed he sensed their Wills.

'These cheeky elves…a couple more Emperors are here besides their matriarch. Did they recently come or have they always been hiding here?' Now he was less confident that the thickest stream was their matriarch or some other senior that came to oversee Elcra's Elven Domain now that they are on a Legendary Worldcore and their society was accepted back to their wider community.

This thick stream may even be a Saint. Seeing how they sent a High Angel, it wasn't far-fetched to think they wanted a Saint to oversee this territory or even take a forceful measure to suppress the Empire in the near future.

'Shouldn't be.' Ebony concluded that the Will did not feel that potent. It was less 'intense' than his own and worlds apart from the High Angel's mere presence.

Even 'world's apart' was a massive understatement.