Chapter 116. Mana Heart
[Warning! The density of Negative Energy within your world has reached a dangerous degree! A Demon King will be born in your world.]
After wiping the alcohol he accidentally spurted, Cedric reread the message that suddenly appeared in front of him.
Once he’s sure he didn’t imagine things, Cedric continued to read the other screens.
[Estimated time until the demon king’s birth: 100 years.]
[Estimated level of the newly born demon king: Upper to Peak Level 4.]
Cedric’s melancholic feelings immediately disappeared after reading the consecutive system warning.
He quickly controlled his mental power to observe the human territory. As the troublemaker of his world, Cedric can’t help but first check the humans.
Inside the Crystal Cube world, the humans are mostly peaceful, with at most some skirmishes between cities or villages. There aren’t any massive battles between kingdoms that could generate a lot of NE and trigger a demon king’s birth.
Then, he checked the dwarves and elves’ territory. The dwarves’ situation is also normal. Except for some NE that he could see on the dwarves’ battlefield against the underground giant ants, there’s nothing of note.
Finally, in the elves’ cities and villages, some elves generated NE upon their death. When Cedric checked the cause of their death, most of them were old elves who had heart attacks after hearing news of Ghiana’s passing.
Cedric guessed that those NE should be generated from their grief upon hearing news about Ghiana’s death.
Outside the villages and cities, many NE appear in the forests. Cedric found out that the amount of NE generated by every creature’s death has greatly increased while within the forest. Normally, they should’ve generated 1 unit of NE upon death; right now, they've somehow generated 5 to 10 units of NE.
He observed the animals and saw many peculiarities. From those peculiarities, Cedric felt every animal in the forest seemed to be in low spirits. It’s as if the whole forest suddenly felt depressed. Those depressed feelings should be the main cause of the sudden spike in NE production. Dying while feeling depressed makes them generate more NE than usual.
Once he thought of that point, Cedric immediately realized something and moved his mental power toward Elisa.
With his mental power, Cedric saw that Elisa’s depression had begun affecting the entire forest. From time to time, mana fluctuations spread from her, making the forest appear even bleaker. The scene carried a kind of tragic beauty for anyone who witnessed it.
“This made me truly realize Elisa is indeed possessing the whole forest instead of just a tree,” Cedric muttered before rechecking everything once again.
He controlled his mental power to thoroughly observe the Crystal Cube world. From the air to the sea, to underground. At last, Cedric screamed at the top of his lungs, “Hey, can you tell me why a demon king is born in my world?!”
[As you guessed, it’s because Elisa is grieving after Ghiana’s death. Due to her nature as something similar to the magical forest’s will, her grief causes the entire forest to fall into depression. Because of that, the amount of NE generated from their deaths increases several times over. The sudden spike becomes the final straw that breaks the camel’s neck and leads to the birth of a demon king.]
“The ‘straw that broke the camel’s neck’? Does that mean there are other reasons?”
Cedric somehow instantly recalled everything that had happened over the past few centuries and asked, “Are the other reasons related to Lacius?”
When talking about NE, Cedric can only think of all the mess Lacius created.
As he expected, the System read his mind again and replied with affirmation.
[Indeed.]
Cedric clutched his temple and asked the System again, “But whether it’s the war Lacius started or the people he killed, all of them don't involve a lot of people. Furthermore, they span a long time. So, shouldn’t my world have time to expel some of those NE?”
Cedric recalled reading that his world’s NE expulsion rate increased when it reached Level 2, so he was curious why that message didn’t seem to be in effect.
[The answer is a bit surprising. So, please create an armchair and sit first.]
Cedric has an extremely bad feeling. He followed the System’s suggestion and created an armchair to sit on.
[First and foremost, your world is… ummm, How should the System say it…]
The System paused for a moment after sending that screen.
Cedric waited with bated breath, but thankfully the wait didn't last long.
[It’s kinda clogged?]
“Clogged?”
[Yeah. Your Crystal Cube world’s NE dispelling function doesn’t seem to work correctly. Compared to a normal world, the speed at which your world discards NE to the void is several times slower.]
“First, the hero summoning function. Now, the NE dispelling function too?” Cedric ‘s eyes twitched.
[Don’t get too upset. Since realizing there are too many things wrong with your world, the System has always been busy trying to slowly peel and observe the problem with your world’s operating rules.]
“Are you trying to fix it?”
[Not really. The System is merely curious. Although not as ridiculous as your world, which lost most of its NE-discarding function and Hero-creation function, worlds with incomplete rules do occasionally appear in the universe. From the System’s observations, those worlds usually possess some hidden function. Those hidden functions are what cause their operational rules to be lacking in the first place. Even though those secret functions are often useless or even outright disadvantageous, the System still believes in your luck. After all, you’re someone who won a universe-level lottery and gained a world along with a godhood while still being a mortal.]
Cedric nodded, then reprimanded the System, “Wait! We’re digressing too much. Can you explain the relation between the damaged NE discarding function and why the demon king appeared?’
[As mentioned before, the speed at which your world discards NE to the void beyond your world is extremely slow. This made a lot of NE to stay within your world.]
[Furthermore, stronger creatures generate more NE. For example, at Elisa’s level, thanks to her special racial characteristic, she could even affect the surroundings to generate more NE after being affected by her emotion. You should know just how many high-ranking blessed have been killed by Lacius.
“Sigh… So, are you trying to say that the damaged NE discarding function, combined with the death of high-level blessed Lacius caused by his experiment, the war in the human territory, the people who died amidst misery, and other messes have caused NE to accumulate in my world?”
[Exactly.]
After hearing the System’s explanation, Cedric began to plan how he was going to handle the demon king. Although the demon king’s estimated level is incredibly high. Fortunately, the time until its birth is much longer than before.
“I have Elisa, who has the potential to reach Level 5. But she’s immobile, which makes things difficult. Except for her, the second-highest combat power in my world is Lacius. I am not too sure whether he could create a training method to reach Level 4 within that time. Or should I just go and help him?”
“But one of the main reasons I let him go, even after causing so much mess, is his research ability which helped me cut costs and time because he could research a training method by himself. Furthermore, even if Lacius advances, he’ll at most reach Mid Level 4. Even if I sent some Divine Items, I doubt he’ll be able to contend against the demon king alone. I am also not too inclined to give Lacius a Divine Item, especially after the mess he caused.’ Many thoughts swirled in Cedric’s head. At last, he decided to try several methods at once.
“It’s better to waste some GP rather than die from trying to save money.”
First, Cedric will stop researching new creatures and create a training method that’ll allow Lacius to bypass the limit of his talent and reach Level 4. Then, he has decided to visit Earth once more to seek another hero with Peak Level 4 or Level 5 potential.
After he made up his mind, Cedric immediately got to work.
Inside the Divine Space, Cedric reread the training method Elisa had comprehended thanks to her talent in nature element.
Once he finished reading the training method, Cedric copied Lacius’s bodies and a few other Level 3 blessed’s bodies as research materials.
With the material ready, he immediately gets to work.
While experimenting to make a training method that’ll let Lacius advance, Cedric also takes a peek at Lacius’s research note for inspiration.
After reading the note, Cedric had to admit that Lacius was indeed a genius. He had outlined several modifications that could lead to a training method capable of helping someone advance. If he had access to an unlimited number of Level 3 blessed as research material, Cedric believed Lacius might have been able to create that training method within less than thirty years.
Thanks to Elisa’s training method, Lacius’s research note, and a bit of study, Cedric’s understanding of Level 4 blessed has increased.
Unlike Level 0 to Level 3, which focus on accumulating energy to fill the body with special power, reaching Level 4 requires something entirely different. At least in his world, a creature must condense the mana in its body into a central core. That core regulates the flow of mana, increases mana absorption, and likely has other functions he has yet to discover.
For Elisa, her mana center should be located at the bottom of her main trunk, near her root system. The core is also slightly connected to her xylem and phloem. Whenever water, sugar, minerals, and other things are transported from her root and arrive at her mana center. Mana will be attached and spread throughout her body before returning following her phloem.
Through this, Cedric decided that the center of the human training method should be placed in the heart.
With that concept in mind, he began to experiment. Controlling the Level 3 body he created in the Divine Space, Cedric made them circulate the training method he had prepared.
Initially, the human heart would explode from the condensed mana. After carefully adjusting the training method, the heart finally stopped bursting. However, the problem didn’t end there. The bodies he created still had most of their blood vessels ruptured before they could successfully advance to Level 4.
It took Cedric five years to thoroughly perfect the training method for Level 4 earth element blessed.
Using this method, there was a chance for Level 3 blessed to advance even if their potential had run out. If the advancement failed, they would be injured. The mildest injuries would affect some veins and arteries, while the more serious cases would cause minor damage to the heart. It sounded severe, but at least they wouldn’t die immediately upon failure.
Trying to decrease the penalty for failure during advancement is also what took the longest. Otherwise, if it’s just a training method that’ll cause instant death upon advancement failure, he could’ve made it in less than a year.
He read the training method he just created and nodded in appreciation, “Let’s name the mana center as Mana Heart. It’s a down to earth and simple name that could be easily understood.”
Purchasing [Divine Intervention: Word] and [Divine Intervention: Image], Cedric contacted Lacius.
[A demon king will appear in less than a hundred years. It’ll have at least Upper Level 4 strength.]
[I shall bestow upon you a method to condense Mana Heart and advance to Level 4.]
Once Lacius is prepared, Cedric sends several images filled with annotations. Those are the training methods he created. Because of the increase in energy consumption, Cedric consumed 2 [Divine Intervention: Word] and 2 [Divine Intervention: Image] before the whole training method was sent to Lacius.
After giving the training method, Cedric decided to warn Lacius with words along the line of ‘stop causing trouble by killing high-level blessed. Also, don’t forget to cleanse your Temple from corruption.’