Reincarnated as a mana core

Mana Hearts

When mana organisms die, their accumulated mana is freed, heightening the mana density of the surroundings. Organisms level 25 or higher form a mana heart that contains some of the accumulated mana of the organism. The form of the heart is unique to the species of the organism.

 

—

POV Argul

Argul and Alyra ran in the direction they had heard the gunshot from. It was a highly unpleasant experience for Argul, because of her height. She left behind a path of broken branchen that had been in her way. Thankfully it didn’t hurt as much as it would have as a human because of her fur.

A second gunshot sounded through the forest and was followed by an explosion. That made Argul a lot more weary. She was not prepared for explosives right now. As she searched for fire or smoke she found nothing. That was weird.

Something screeched in a horrifying way.

They continued their run and Argul could now make out the smell of blood in the air. After two minutes they came upon a trail of blood that led to the corpse of some kind of abomination. In a tree nearby another of the things was hanging limply. It had been impaled on the branch and blood was still dripping to the ground.

Argul looked disgusted at the scene. “What the hell are these things?” Then she sniffed at one of the corpses and retched. That was awful.

Alyra continued walking in the direction of the explosion and didn’t regard the things further. “Humans, at least they had been until they came into contact with too much mana.”

Argul looked at them. It was definitely not a nice way to end and killing them might as well be considered as a service.

She followed Alyra and looked for clues of what had happened here. She noticed a rifle laying on the ground as if it had been thrown away and really wanted to pick it up, but let it be as it would only slow her down. 

They followed the trail and it slowly became obvious that only one human had fought here. There was only one pair of footprints besides the ones of more abominations. On the tree in front of them there was a piece of fabric that had been ripped off of some clothing.

About twenty meters behind the tree another corpse laid. Argul decided to call them corrupted. Its legs were missing, but she guessed there had to be a reason for all the fleshy bits that were strewn around the whole place.

They walked another forty meters before the next corrupted corpse came into view. A part of its back was missing and its eyes had started to melt for some reason. It was disgusting and Argul made sure to give it a wide berth. 

She heard something wheeze and gurgle and turned her head in the direction of the sound. In front of another birch tree one of the corrupted was still living and slowly dragging itself through its own blood puddle. The legs of the corrupted were a mangled mass and one of its tentacles had been ripped in half.

Argul immediately shot it with a magic missile and missed. The missile hit a random tree and punched a hole right through it. She blushed embarrassed and made sure not to miss the barely moving target the second time.

This time she hit the center of the corrupted. It rocked forward from the impact and then stopped moving. There was now a hole in its back which started to fill with blood. Argul cleared her throat. “You have seen nothing.”

Alyra looked at her and gave her an evil grin. “Of course mom. I have not seen you missing a square meter of unmoving flesh. It never happened.” 

Argul struck her tongue out at her, which considering her current appearance had not the intended effect and then turned away from her daughter.

Aina jumped from Argul’s back and started to gobble up the corpse. It could have looked cute were it not for all the flesh and blood around.

Something snored and Argul nearly got a heart attack. She laid her ears flat and bared her teeth in the direction of the sound. Alyra looked at the source of the sound and then at Argul before she began to laugh.

Argul blushed again when she saw the man with the rifle on the back who was laying face down in the dirt. It didn’t look like the most comfortable position and Argul rolled him over using her head.

A dirty sport bag that had been laying underneath the man came into view. She decided to risk it and changed into her humanoid form. Then she took hold of the bag and was surprised by its weight. What the hell was he carrying around?

When Argul opened the back a lot of ammunition came into view, which explained the weight. She rummaged a bit around in the back and found some hopefully unused clothes. Just to be sure she concentrated on her mana manipulation and made the mana move in a complicated pattern of crossing lines with the intent to clean.

She noticed a lot of things that should not happen like the fabric being destroyed and started to actively improve the spell. It took about 5 minutes before she couldn’t find anything to make it better and the clothes were as clean as possible, though they were a bit bleached and the fabric thinned in some spots.

Argul put on the boy shorts and a muddy green shirt. Then she looked at the trousers. They looked like they were part of an army uniform with green camouflage coloring, so maybe the man was some kind of soldier. 

She looked at him again. He was wearing a light blue mostly shredded shirt and brown outdoor pants. Why carry around an army uniform and wear your own stuff?

Argul shrugged. She didn’t care and could ask later. She tried to put on the pants, but had a problem with her tail. Argul looked at Alyra’s claws for a second. “Could you give me a paw or even better, a claw?”

Alyra rolled her eyes and walked to Argul before she held out her paw. Argul took it and started to cut a hole inside the pants where his silver tail would be, using Alyra’s claw.

Then she put on the pants and they actually fit, even if they were a bit tight around her rear. Not like the shirt that was not made for people of Argul’s height. She looked at the man again and well, he was maybe 160 cm tall so it made sense that he wasn’t wearing the pants. They were just too large for him.

Argul was a bit annoyed with the shirt. It was too short and her belly was showing. Actually wouldn’t she look kinda nice with that outfit if she also had an army jacket and cap?

She rummaged a bit more through the bag and found what she had searched for. Then she put on the jacket, which was also too large for the man and shot two holes inside the cap for her ears before she put it on her head.

Argul pirouetted until she faced Alyra, put her hands on her hips and made a serious face. “How do I look?”

Alyra looked him over for a bit with a thoughtful expression. “It does have its charm. The pants punctuate your behind a lot, making it appear even bigger and more arousing.”

Argul blushed hard and Alyra grinned gleefully at him. “You know, if you were to wear the jacket just on your shoulders and put on a taut breast band instead of the shirt it would look even better. With the sniper rifle there you would like the squad captain in some kind of comic.”

Argul looked down embarrassed and then thought about what Alyra had said. As she imagined her current form the way Alyra had described it, she realized she would actually look super cool. For the first time in her life she would have style. Argul looked at the shirt she was wearing thoughtfully and then at the sniper rifle still strapped to the man.

A plan appeared in her mind. A plan that would likely be super embarrassing in the beginning and she would be ogled at a lot, but people would do so anyways and now she would also look nice. It would really add to her already fierce face.

Argul took off the jacket and shirt. Then she mutilated the shirt, turning it into a breast band and put that back on. She laid the jacket around her shoulders completing her looks. Argul walked to the man and started to try taking the rifle without waking him up. It was a bit difficult, but she eventually managed it.

Argul turned back to Alyra and smiled brightly. Fuck people, now she looked nice!!

 

—

Arthur’s POV

Arthur woke up with a start and looked around panicked. A huge white fox laid left to him and besides the fox stood the angel that would tell him he would go to hell. He sighed. He had not wanted to die today, but it was likely the same for his teammates.

He looked at the female angel. She was wearing a standard military jacket and pants with green camouflage coloring and an army cap. The woman was currently leaning against a tree while playing with a rifle- Wait that was his rifle!

Also why wasn’t she wearing any boots?

He eyed the clothes of the woman and felt for his bag. It was open and his neatly stacked ammunition holders were a mess. Those were his clothes as well!

What the hell was happening right now?

Arthur moved his left arm and it hurt like hell, but it at least wasn’t dislocated anymore.

The woman looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “So you are awake. Mind telling us your name?” 

Arthur had to admit she was beautiful and arousing, in a dangerous kind of way.

She pointed at herself. “I’m Argul”

Then she pointed at the large fox. “That’s Alyra, she can speak just so you know.”

The fox, Alyra, sat up and glared at Argul while also growling. “You destroyed all my fun! How could you?” 

Argul grinned at her. “Payback time”

Alyra pouted.

It was all too much for Arthur and nothing made sense anymore. First his team mutated into some kind of abomination and now this. Wait! The things. “What happened to the things that were hunting me?”

Argul pointed at the tree Arthur had run around before tripping. “Well, the last one we killed before it managed to get to you, even though going by its condition that was highly unlikely to happen anyways. Aina is currently eating it. The other four were already dead.”

She turned and stared him directly in the eyes, her gaze full of curiosity. “Actually where did all the explosions come from? Your bag doesn’t look like it's safe carrying such stuff around in it.”

Arthur sighed. Everything hurt and the day was shit. He decided to answer, he couldn’t move anyway right now and was fully at their mercy. “Name’s Arthur. The explosions were my guns blowing up for some reason.” Then he cursed about how shit his day was.

Argul looked at him and then nodded while tapping her index finger on her chin. “Makes sense. Mana would mess with the current technology. We would have to develop some kind of rune coding and then safeguard the current technology with that.”

Arthur only now noticed the animal ears and the fox tail, which was swinging a bit, on Argul. It was weird, but didn’t look necessarily bad. Arthur nodded himself. Of course mana would mess with the current technology. Wait mana?

Had he heard that right? “Mana?”

Argul looked at him as if he was dump, but then you could slowly see realization dawning on her. She facepalmed herself. “Right of course you wouldn’t know. Mana is slowly spreading through this universe.”

She waved her hand as if it wasn’t anything special. “Which is by the way not the universe our earth had been in anymore.”

Argul’s tone became serious and there was a lot of urgency in it. “Sadly our old universe still has influence over a lot of us. What happened to these five will happen everywhere else too in a while. I would really like to save as many people as possible, but have no idea of the surroundings. Mind showing us the way?”

Arthurs day had just gotten worse. “Fuck! Yes.”