Reincarnated as a mana core

Jack walked into the strange forest around their little village, though he didn’t give much attention to the weird red flowers and annoying coconut throwing palm trees. The ones in the immediate vicinity of the village didn’t have any coconuts anymore anyway so he didn’t have to look out for that.

He nervously looked around to make sure he was alone before he knelt down and began to pray towards the spirit of the world, hoping that she wouldn’t ignore him.

The last time Jack had done this he had felt incredibly silly and didn’t expect to get any kind of answer. He as well as the rest of the villagers were well aware that there was something watching them, not thinking so after the bloody message was a sad form of denial. 

In his opinion they weren’t only observed, but the very ground they currently lived on belonged to that being. The others had told him he was taking it too far, but he couldn’t explain the high mana density or the fact that the horizon was clearly becoming larger otherwise.

So, while he hadn’t expected to get an answer, he still got one and the spirit had been as surprised as him. Jack had also gotten the impression that she was not fond of the way he had thrown himself to the ground to show his inferiority. Thinking back, he had to admit that it was a bit weird for such an entity to relish such things, not that he was an expert in gods and spirits. It might as well just be a personality trait, showing that the spirit was at least not a pitiful being.

Jack didn’t care much, he just really wanted to learn magic from the spirit. Sure, he was able to create a small flame and make things colder, but he couldn’t enchant a pot to freaking shoot a projectile that punched through trees with relative ease. He had also felt the incredible complexity of the enchantments and absolutely needed to learn that. There was simply no way Jack wouldn’t pursue the path of magic now that there was mana around.

He put his hands on his lap and took a deep breath. Then he infused his prayer with his mana. “Oh world spirit, please answer my plea and teach me in the arts of magic.”

Jack had to wait for a minute or two before something came back. “I swear if you pray one more time to me and pollute my beautiful core further with faith intent, I WILL throw dirt at you!”

He blinked, surprised by the annoyance and unsure of what to do. Jack had no idea what the spirit meant by pollute with faith intent, but the threat was clear. He only wondered why dirt.

“Just wait a minute before you do anything stupid.”

He got a bit excited. That answer was very promising and he couldn’t even imagine all the cool stuff he would be able to do in the future. Jack still held himself back from doing anything, not wanting to enrage the spirit and waited patiently. He hadn’t told anyone in the village about his prayers because of the same reason as he feared that might spell his doom.

About half an hour later the mana in his surroundings stirred and he felt something attempt to connect to his head. Out of instinct Jack tried to stop whatever it was, but his defense was simply ignored and the foreign mana touched his forehead. It didn’t do anything more than that however, which was a great relief for him.

The mana vibrated a bit and a minute later the connection to his head changed slightly. “Can you hear me?”

Jack’s eyes widened when he realized that a mental connection had been established and he tried to figure out how, but simply couldn’t make sense of the feeling of mana in his surroundings.

He looked up at the sky. “Yes, I can hear you, venerable spirit.”

A sense of smug satisfaction was transmitted, immediately followed by mild annoyance. “Stop that venerable and world spirit stuff, it’s annoying and a waste of time.”

Jack nodded. “As you wish.”

He could hear the spirit sigh and couldn’t help himself but ask with a slight smile. “So, why dirt?”

There was a moment of silence. “Why not? Now, can you get to the point, I have things to do.” Unknown to Jack, his conversation partner just didn’t want to have to explain her lack of skills in that regard. There had just not been a need for undeadly projectiles meant to annoy someone.

Jack nodded. “I wish for you to be my teacher in the magic arts.”

“Hmmm. You are aware I’m not a genie?”

He wanted to retord, but the voice didn’t give him a chance. “There will be restrictions, do you still wish to become my student?”

Jack hesitated for a moment, but decided not to ask what kind of restrictions and nodded.

“Allright, the rules are as follows. You are not allowed to leave my domain until I say so, you are not allowed to speak about my existence without my approval and you are absolutely forbidden from praying to me. If you break any of those rules I will stop teaching you and talking to you. If you continue to pray to me afterwards I will be forced to throw dirt on you, is that clear?”

He was a bit surprised by the rules. They were not the fate binding things he had expected and there wasn’t much of a punishment either, not that he wanted to take the risk of losing his teacher or being showered in dirt. “I understand, but isn’t that a bit lax? I could just spread the knowledge and claim to be the one who discovered it.”

A feeling similar to a shrug was transmitted over their connection. “I don’t care, as long as I and my close family know that I was the one who created something that is enough for me. Also, what use has that knowledge if I am the only one who has it? So many interesting things could happen if it spreads!”

Jack had to admit the spirit had a point. He wasn’t sure what the spirit was, but she didn’t seem to be bogged down by the burdens of humanity and was simply committed to her interests.

“Anyway, let’s get started. The faster I give you a task the faster I get to do my thing! First things first, how do you sense mana?”

His tail swished over the ground. “I have the skill [sense mana]. It lets me feel the mana in and around myself.”

The female voice grumbled a bit. “And here that little fox made me have to see mana before I got the skill, not that I would have gotten that good without seeing mana.”

The voice focused on him again. “Ahem, since you can’t see mana yet this will be your first task. While feeling mana is nice and all, constructing complex spell formations is a lot more difficult without seeing what you do.

“Ahh, but that doesn’t mean you should stop training the feeling, it’s still important especially in dangerous environments.”

The spirit paused for a second. “A little tip. Seeing mana is a bit like heat vision. I will check in with you every other day to see how things stand. Bye!”

And with that the connection vanished. 

Jack grinned to himself. He had learned a good few things from listening to the spirit and now he only had to make mana visible. Like heat vision she had said, interesting.

—

Rash looked at the portal with a tired expression. He and his team had been monitoring the small army for the last two days and it was time for a shift change.

Really, the fanatics should have long since reached the portal, but they had stopped about half a day's marsh away, which gave the lizard-kin village a chance to try and get some information about the fanatics' situation.

From the 100 or so victims of the army only a smattering 9 were left. The rest had all succumbed to either the harsh treatment or to the traps they walked into, with an exception of 7 individuals the villagers had managed to bring through the portal and through their wounds.

Without the ‘demons’ to disarm traps however, the angel in command had ordered a halt of the army. They were now waiting for reinforcements and more of their victims as far as Rash knew. Sadly, there hadn’t been more than the usual information about what was happening in the world so the villagers were still pretty much in the dark about the overall situation.

Rash looked at his three compagnons and they nodded to each other. Then with some effort he raised his hands and tail before he carefully stepped through the portal without having to stop for choosing his destination. He had gone through the thing often enough by now that it didn’t take him more than a split second to handle the system prompt.

On the other side of the portal Rash was greeted by two tens looking villagers on the wooden palisade, both of them holding pots for some reason. The moment they recognized him they relaxed somewhat and they nodded to each other.

Rash picked up a white stone and threw it through the portal, signaling his team to follow before he warily maneuvered through the insane amount of traps around the portal.

When he finally managed to get out of the compound, he was greeted by the two villagers again. Rash was really tired and just wanted to go to bed, but there was one thing that he simply had to ask. “What’s up with the pots?”

The two villagers looked at each other and began to grin evilly. During the next 10 minutes he learned to fear pots and to run away should he ever see soldiers with pots in their hands. Those things were truly scary.