Chapter 30 - Wesley's Discovery (2)

Wesley immediately left the hall and went to find a washroom to clean off the blood. Luckily, the washroom was empty, so Wesley took off his shirt and used it to wipe the blood from his neck. He then began circulating mana around the wound to stop the bleeding.

The "healing" the third elder had offered was simply using mana to close a wound by stimulating the body’s natural clotting process. Light magic was preferred for this because it left no oddities in the skin after healing, whereas using other affinities caused subtle differences. For instance, closing a wound with fire affinity mana would make the resulting scar appear more red than usual.

Once Wesley stopped the bleeding, he continued cleaning the blood from his shirt. After about ten minutes, he left the academy grounds and made his way toward the Manor. The walk was brief, and he arrived at the Manor in around thirty minutes.

Upon entering, Wesley ran into Lane, who was in the middle of instructing some guards. Lane noticed Wesley out of the corner of his eye and turned to greet him, but immediately stopped when he noticed something.

“Ma...Master. You’re wounded.”

Seeing the clotting wound on Wesley’s neck and jaw, Lane couldn’t find the words to continue. Wesley, noting Lane’s astonished and worried expression, felt a slight, unexpected satisfaction at his concern. But Wesley had other priorities, so he replied in a firm, uninterested tone:

“Lane, this is just a scratch. Come—I have something to discuss with you.”

Lane was surprised at Wesley’s tone, wondering what could be so important that it outweighed concern over his injury. He nodded and followed Wesley, who was already heading toward the Manor entrance. As they walked, Wesley continued:

“Lane, I need you to move my bed, training armor, and post into the basement.”

Lane was puzzled by the order and hesitantly asked, “Are you planning to stay in the basement for a while, Master?”

“Yes. The academic year is over, and since I won’t be attending classes for the next month, I’ll spend my time training.”

“Understood, Master. I’ll have everything moved immediately. Is there anything else you need me to do?”

“Ensure that I am not disturbed during this month.”

“Yes, Master.”

Wesley went upstairs to change out of his bloodied uniform and to take a bath. When he returned downstairs, Lane was already waiting for him.

“Master, everything has been prepared,” Lane said.

Wesley nodded, then patted Lane on the shoulder. “I’ll leave everything in your hands, Lane. If there’s an emergency, inform me. Also, make sure that little Sala continues her lessons.”

“Yes, Master.”

Wesley turned and headed to the basement, walking in without hesitation. The room was as dark as usual, with no light sources anywhere. The only difference now was that a bed was set up in the center, with a dark training post nearby.

Wesley locked the basement door, then walked over to the bed and sat cross-legged on it. However, he didn’t invoke his Dark Domain to begin refining mana. Instead, he simply sat there, staring into the darkness with eyes full of thought.

- - - - - - - - - -

For the past year, Wesley had spent countless hours pondering how to derive a spell similar to *Holy Port* from his own *Dark Warp*. Unfortunately, he had only seen the spell once and never again, leaving him with no clear direction on how to approach developing such a technique.

Nevertheless, he kept experimenting and testing various methods, devising countless applications—all of which ultimately failed to deliver the results he desired.

However, when the third elder used *Holy Port* to save his student, Wesley experienced a moment of epiphany. The anger from being attacked and the pain from his wound abruptly vanished as he felt something click in his mind.

How is it that the third elder can use *Holy Port* to appear in open space? For example, *Dark Warp* opens a tunnel between two points, but it requires shadows or darkness in those locations, forcing Wesley to use the shadows of walls or corners to create the tunnel. It’s also likely that the light equivalent of *Dark Warp*, *Holy Jump*, works similarly.

But the third elder had appeared in an open area, without a wall or any typical medium. Wesley suddenly understood—there *was* a medium, just not one he had expected. The third elder must have used the surrounding light elements as a medium to open the tunnel.

This wasn’t the most surprising revelation, however. Shadows are essentially dark elements, so Wesley already knew they could be used as a medium. But this thought prompted another question: where does the tunnel itself come from?

Wesley had taken the tunnel at the core of these spells for granted, thinking only about opening it without questioning its origins. Now, with his focus on the tunnel, Wesley realized something profound.

The tunnel, simply put, is a connection between elements. Mages merely use their mana to expand the tunnel and then pass through it. While this knowledge wasn’t too complex, it led Wesley to a new conclusion: the tunnel is always open.

Since mages only use mana to enlarge the tunnel, they don’t create it—it’s always open between elements.

With this realization, Wesley understood that the incantation for invoking *Dark Warp* was essentially unnecessary. If he wanted to warp somewhere instantaneously, all he needed to do was gather an immense concentration of dark elements to create a large, combined tunnel rather than forcibly enlarging a single one.

While Wesley wasn’t entirely certain his theory would work, he rushed home and decided to lock himself in the basement to test it. The basement was the ideal location for his experiments since the amount of dark elements needed would be too high in other settings.

Currently, Wesley was sitting cross-legged on his bed, thinking about how to concentrate a large amount of dark elements around himself. He could invoke his *Dark Domain* and manually draw the elements to him, but that would be overkill—like using lightning to kill a chicken.

Instead, Wesley tried another approach. He poured his mana into a single element, hoping to attract others like a magnet. Although this method was less wasteful than using *Dark Domain*, the elements converged too slowly to be useful in combat.

Next, Wesley tried using the elements as they were in their natural positions, but this, too, proved insufficient, as the tunnel remained too small to use.

Now he faced another problem: he needed a way to instantly attract dark elements to himself. If the process was too slow, it would be useless in battle, and if it required too much mana, it would be impractical. Still, Wesley wasn’t discouraged; he knew the result he wanted, and he only had to connect the dots.

A week passed in a flash. During this time, Wesley stayed in the basement, only leaving once a day to use the bathroom. Aside from brief hours spent sleeping, exercising each morning, and eating twice a day, Wesley spent the rest of his time working out a solution to converge the dark elements around him.

At that moment, he was training in his armor, practicing each of the *Silent Sword* techniques repeatedly. As he continued, he wondered if he could use mana to enhance his swordsmanship. With this thought, Wesley infused his sword with mana, hoping to make it sharper, faster, or somehow more reactive.

As soon as his mana entered the sword, he sensed it following countless tiny veins within its core. These veins were microscopic and numbered in the millions. They ran through the entire sword in complex patterns Wesley couldn’t fully understand.

The moment Wesley's mana entered the sword, dark elements from all over the room rushed toward it, as if drawn by an immense magnet. Startled, Wesley quickly withdrew his mana, and the dark elements returned to normal. He stood there, astonished by his discovery.

Wesley had always sensed that his sword had an affinity with dark elements, as he could control it easily within his *Dark Domain*. But he’d never thought to infuse it with mana and had intended to ask his master about it the next time they met.

Now, however, having seen the sword's response, Wesley was ecstatic. He’d finally found a way to instantly gather dark elements around him. And the mystery surrounding the sword itself fascinated him deeply.

Wesley immediately removed his training armor, returned to his bed, and sat cross-legged. After taking a few deep breaths, he infused the sword with mana once more. Just like before, dark elements surged toward the sword from every corner of the room, but this time Wesley didn’t stop them.

Within a fraction of a second, dark elements surrounded Wesley from head to toe, turning him into a shadowy figure in the center of the basement. Then, with a single thought, Wesley’s body vanished from the bed and reappeared in the farthest corner of the basement, still cloaked in darkness.

The entire process took less than a quarter of a second—many times faster than the third elder’s *Holy Port*. Overwhelmed with excitement, Wesley gazed at his sword as if it were a priceless treasure. It was incredible luck to have stumbled upon a solution to his most vexing problem so easily.

Wesley promptly warped back to his bed and sat down. Now that he had succeeded in deriving a technique that matched, if not exceeded, *Holy Port*, Wesley wanted to explore the mysteries of his sword further. He was most intrigued by what might happen if he allowed dark elements to flow freely into the sword.

Wesley immediately infused mana into the sword, watching as dark elements poured into it like a torrent. However, they weren’t just being attracted by his mana—they were absorbed by the sword itself, circulating endlessly through its intricate veins. As more elements filled the sword, the veins held a constant flow.

After nearly two hours of absorbing and circulating the dark elements, the absorption finally stopped as the sword’s veins became fully saturated. The elements settled in the sword, unmoving.

Seeing the dark elements still inside the sword, Wesley was astonished. His sword could store dark elements, and in tremendous amounts. While Wesley needed only a split second’s worth of gathered dark elements to perform *Dark Port*, this sword had collected elements for two hours—an unfathomable capacity.

With this newfound ability, Wesley realized that his new technique, which he would call *Dark Port*, required a vast concentration of dark elements. Although he could easily perform it in dark or shadowy places, it would be impossible during the day or in bright environments. But now, he could carry his dark elements with him wherever he went.

This revelation filled Wesley with joy. He would have to thank his master for this remarkable sword, as it not only enabled him to perform a powerful technique but also erased its primary limitation.