Bloody Mary and the Magical Revolution

Ambient Mana Rune (Mana 2)

“Then deactivate this telepathy spell and get working.” Sylvia answers teasingly, “I’ll be right here if you need anything.” she adds with a firm hug.

Mary answers the hug with a nod.

“Then I’ll talk to you later.”

She replies, briefly closing her eyes as she begins to reach out to the ethereal feeling of the active telepathy spell. Mary grasps the thread of mana connecting her to Sylvia and mentally snaps it.

“That did it.” said the maid.

Mary nods again in agreement.

‘At least the first part is easy enough.’ Thinks the princess.

With her now-established experience, Mary quickly clears her mind through meditation, grasping and neutralising a clump of her mana, and promptly gives it an order.

‘Ambient Mana.’ Mary orders the clump of neutral mana.

As had happened before, the mana before her twists into a brand-new rune.

“So that’s an ambient mana rune? I think I’ve seen Elizabeth use something similar in some of her spells.” Sylvia interjects, "Hers were higher level though."

‘The basics work first.’

Mary mentally answers, well aware that Sylvia cannot hear her commentary at the moment.

‘It looks like this might actually work.’ Mary thinks as she eyes the minuscule changes in the room’s mana current now that the ambient mana rune is present.

Mary frowns consideringly as she stares at the two tiny slivers of mana that have reached out from her new rune and attached themselves to the ambient mana of the room around her.

‘So, an ambient mana rune attaches itself to natural mana flows.’ She thinks as she eyes the rune, ‘But apart from the rune itself, none of the mana gathers around it. That will have to be where I add my logic then.’

“It looks like ambient mana runes create artificial convergences in mana flows.” Sylvia interjects with some extra context, to which Mary sends her a surprised look.

Sylvia smirks at Mary's surprise and continues, “You might not have noticed, but the masses of mana in the room are due to two or more mana streams converging, which causes a small amount of build-up.”

“This ambient mana rune looks like it creates an artificial convergence; I guess the more powerful the rune, the more mana gets pulled through it.”

Mary answers with an accepting nod.

‘Without any additional logic it might add some minuscule efficiency to a spell; this is something I should test first.’

With a pulse of concentration, Mary disperses her newest rune and instead focuses on creating a small test spell.

‘A simple fireball, but with the ambient rune attached.’

Briefly, Mary recalls the last fireball spell she had used and inserts her newest rune into it, careful not to disrupt the spell any further.

A fireball blooms into being, and Mary frowns as she eyes it, attempting to compare it to the one in her memory. She immediately notices that much like the ambient mana rune, this fireball has added itself to the room’s mana streams.

‘Some of the rooms' mana is being used.’

Mary notes as she stares at the streams of mana now flowing through the fireball; to her mild surprise, she watches as a mana flow exits the fireball, although it is noticeably thinner than the flow that enters it.

She frowns as she attempts to find any other differences with her original fireball spell, but by memory alone, she fails to find anything of note.

‘This won’t get me anywhere.’

With a grimace of concentration, a second noticeably smaller fireball blooms into place, this one absent the new rune that Mary had created.

“Already getting into multi-spell casting then, princess?” Sylvia interjects with amusement.

Mary resists the urge to throw a glare at the maid, finding her mind too distracted while keeping the two spells active at the same time.

With both fireballs before her, Mary instantly notices that the first is larger.

‘That must be the default power boost from having multiple runes in the spell.’ Mary notes and then frowns as she feels each of the spells drain on her mana reserves.

'There's no extra power drain. So, does a basic ambient mana rune completely power itself?’

Mary nods to herself and carefully starts to dismiss the two fireballs.

‘Part of the mana flow still left the active spell; I want a way to stop any of that mana from escaping.’

But how to do that, she wondered.

‘Logic that turns the ambient mana rune into a battery seems the best way; that should keep the extra mana flow in the spell rather than letting it escape.’

Mary nods at the thought; the logic was at least consistent. And then Mary considers her telepathy spell, which she would be adding to.

‘I’m already reaching my limits for adding complicated formulas; I need something simple that denotes a battery's nature.’

Mary thinks with a grimace.

‘Considering how mana logic has worked thus far, the rune itself handles defining mana. I just need a way to tell it to gather rather than continue.’

Mary closes her eyes in thought.

‘Symbology works too, although it is supposedly less efficient. Could I just add an actual battery to the spell formula?’

With a thoughtful frown, Mary commits to her decision and creates a new spell circle.

Fire once again blooms in the air, as Mary quickly creates the two-rune fireball spell.

Mary eyes the fireball, easily noticing that it is the same size as the last time, despite the extra logic that created it.

‘Ambient mana flows in but not out. But the fireball is not larger. Did it work then?’

With confidence, Mary once again creates a second active fireball; the two-rune spell floats next to its twin.

“Mana drain is less on the first one.” Sylvia interjects, this time with helpful commentary.

Mary nods in agreement.

‘The size is the same, but the mana drain with battery logic is noticeably less.’

Mary frowns as she feels the mana leaving her reserves for the still active fireballs, attempting to gauge the cost more precisely.

‘Maybe about two-thirds of the original cost?’

She blinks in temporary surprise before once again eyeing the fireballs.

‘I think if my battery logic were better, I could push that down even further.’

With a shake of her head, Mary dismisses the two fireballs and instead spins up her telepathy spell, adding the new rune and logic to it.

“Back to talk, then, princess?” Sylvia asks with a smile.

“Yes.” Mary replies in her still-masculine mental voice; momentarily she is distracted by the decreased mana cost of the new telepathy spell.

“I think the ambient mana rune has doubled the time I can keep this spell active.”

Mary explains happily.

Sylvia blinks before smiling, “That’s good news. So, what do you want to talk about next?”

Mary frowns as she considers her options; with a moment's thought, she has two things to focus on, doesn’t she?

“I suppose I have two immediate priorities; the first is a passive spell using the ambient mana rune to increase my mana regeneration.” Mary states thoughtfully.

“That should work; I’ve heard of spells like that before.” Sylvia answers humming, “I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that the extremely hidden ambient mana rune is what allows the guilds to do that trick.”

“… I’ve been wanting to ask. How is this rune not common knowledge? Isn’t it obvious?” Mary asks in confusion.

“It is. But most people that want to pursue magic join the guilds, and then they don’t talk about their spell developments. And those guilds can also censor magic books… because it’s so obvious, it’s not something that Terrans think about without prompting.” Sylvia answers, shame flickering across her features.

“And independent mages don’t tend to last very long either.” She finishes bitterly.

“How did the guilds get that powerful anyway? I can’t imagine people from Earth allowing it to happen.” Mary asks in confusion.

“For the most part they didn’t.” Sylvia answers with a shrug, “Magic is heavily dependent on knowledge; that means unless you want to be a monfocused specialist, like what you see with farmers, you need to be educated.”

“The people who can afford to be educated are nobles and wealthy merchants.” Said Sylvia, finishing her explanation.

“And that means that those groups did their best to stop their so-called lesser from getting into magic institutions too, huh?” Mary adds for her.

“Yes. Exactly like that.” Sylvia answers reluctantly.

Mary frowns briefly and then shakes her head, dismissing this line of questioning.

“My second priority is creating a better ambient mana rune. How do I increase the level and power of my runes, Sylvia?”

Mary asks her maid pointedly.

“Power is straightforward enough, really. Princess, when you’ve created your runes thus far, you’ve been using a miniscule amount of mana during the creation process. Increase the amount of mana used in the creation process, and you increase the power of the rune.”

Sylvia smiles as she answers.

“This is harder than it sounds, of course, because the difficulty of clearing intent from mana gets exponentially higher the more mana you use. The other problem is that you need to use a correct range of mana for your rune creation.”

“And while the guilds know the clearly defined amounts of mana needed for each power level, that is not something they share with the public.”

Mary grimaces as she understands the problem.

“Do you know how much mana I need for the next power level?” Mary asks hopefully.

“I do, but you would have to use the entirety of your mana reserves to create that rune.” Sylvia answers.

Mary sighs before continuing, "Well, what about the level? You called it sophistication, right? I suppose that is knowledge-based."

“Got it in one princess.” Sylvia answers amusedly, “Each level of rune requires intensive study. The guilds impose strict restrictions on access to that knowledge.”

Mary feels herself twitch as rage enters her mental voice. “So there’s nothing that can be done then? If the guilds restrict all knowledge, then how can I learn magic?”

“It is a problem to some degree.” Sylvia answers in sympathy, “Fortunately, this palace has an extensive library, which does include a large magic section, although it’s not a match for one of the guilds.”

“And of course, I am here!” Sylvia announces mischievously, gaining a glare from Mary in response.

“And I might know where to find your mother's personal collection.” Sylvia finishes sadly.

“My mother's personal collection?” Mary asks questioningly.

“Oh, she gathered many books during her adventures; I know where she stored them and, more importantly, how to access them.” Sylvia answers, nostalgia thick in her voice.

“And none of them know about it?” Mary asks, baffled.

“Oh, they suspect that she had a hidden library of sorts. But Elizabeth had always known that she might get enslaved and took precautions, both in the defences of the library and with her own mind.” Sylvia answers with a potent mix of pride, sadness, and anger, which is clear in her voice.

“It’s something that she’s been punished for relentlessly, but you can’t give away the location of something when you don’t remember where it is, right?” Sylvia asks with a sad smile.

“She erased her memories of where the library is?!” Mary exclaims in surprise.

“To be specific, she had a trigger in her mind; if it detected any form of human enchantment, then the secrets she needed to keep would be erased.”

Mary pauses for a moment, for the first time truly appreciating the sort of woman her mother apparently was.

‘I’ll save her. But first I need to save myself.’ Mary firmly promises.

“So, can you get me books on the study of mana? Or ambient mana?” Mary asks directly.

“I think books like that do exist, in both the royal library and Elizabeth's personal collection.” Sylvia answers smiling, “I’ll bring them to you tomorrow.”

Mary smiles in relief and then suddenly yawns.

“Then, can I have a meal before a rest?” she asks, her embarrassment plain.