Mana is a mysterious energy that has existed for as long as life existed, or maybe even before.

It is found inside each and every living creature and it also exists as an ever present veil that covers every surface of the world, seemingly limitless.

While the records of its discovery are lost to time, it has been something essential to mages and art of magic. In fact it is the very foundation of magecraft and yet despite their best efforts, not one mage was ever close to finding out its true origin.

Every person has a fixed mana capacity that grows ever so slowly until they reach full maturity, and like all humans, everyone’s capacity will be different with others born greater than others.

Mages throughout the eras have sought ways to get past this natural hurdle and have come up with two methods that work hand in hand to fully eliminate this problem; Internal condensation and Capacity refresh.

Internal condensation is a technique that allows a person to condense internal mana they naturally possess allowing to store a far larger amount than they normally would have been able to.

However, internal mana takes time to regenerate and if one uses up the mana they stored, they will have to rest a substantial amount of time in order to replenish it. This is the usual method taught to beginners as a person’s normal mana capacity is very low.

Capacity refresh however uses external mana that naturally exists outside of a person and uses it to continually refill their mana every time they use a spell, this is of course limited by a person’s natural capacity.

In order to fully break through humanity’s limit, a mage must master and combine these two techniques. However, one must have a full mastery of one technique before learning the other lest they want to face a gruesome end of either dying as a dry and shriveled husk, or bursting into a brilliant explosion of energy and various internal organs.

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“It can’t be!” Rossa said, still questioning whether what she was seeing was reality. In her head she realized that Sylvester was born with an unusually large mana capacity allowing him to take advantage of capacity refresh.

“Since when have I started looking down on others so quickly?” Rossa pondered over this question as she continued to watch the battle between Sylvester and the golem.

As the grey smoke started to clear, the two figures became visible for all to see. They were two armored humanoids.

One of which was wearing something resembling that of a western medieval knight, but completely overloaded with the symbol of a heart. It had a long cape with a giant red heart printed on to it, chest plate shaped into a red heart, and finally a heart shaped shield to go along with a heart themed sword.

To top it all of, its head piece is just a helmet with a large heart for a face. Truly it felt like valentines just looking at it.

The other however resembled the image of a Samurai with it’s japanese styled armor and sandals, and a straw hat on its head.

Unlike its companion, this one possessed the theme of spades. Small spade symbols danged from the strawhat and the same spade shapes were all imprinted on its armor.

It also used a black bow and seemed to be carrying arrows whose tips are shaped into spades.

“Behold!” Sylvester exclaimed in a loud voice. “A variation of the Shikigami arts that I learned during my time in Japan.”

“Truth be told, I didn’t make these myself since I was a foreigner and the local spirits didn’t quite trust me. So the man who taught me this art decided to make two slightly modified versions just for me. The Jack of hearts and the Jack of spades.” He explained.

“But in exchange for his gift, he asked me to create my own Shikigami assistants one day and show it to him.” Sylvester smiled as he continued with his monologue.

“Now then.” Sylvester took off his cap and transformed it back into a tophat, pulling out his swallowtail coat and white gloves in the process. He then threw the hat into the air as he donned the coat and gloves in one smooth motion, the hat landing squarely on his head almost at the same time.

“Let us begin the main event!” Sylvester declared as he snapped his fingers.

Immediately, the two Shikigami assistants Jerked their heads to face the golem, and immediately assumed a fighting pose. The two then charged forward with their weapons pointed forward, with Sylvester closely behind.

The golem reacted by launching an attack of its own using the blue spears, hurling them at Sylvester’s position only to be blocked by the heart shaped shield of the Jack of hearts.

Sylvester then gathered mana into his hands and casted an invisible platform 5 meters above the golem. Repeating the same action, he once again gathered enough mana to allow him to cast Trapdoor next.

Sylvester’s figure was swallowed by the trap door and he appeared right in front of golem’s body. However as his figure emerged from the floor, he was in the process of pulling a small round object from his top hat and immediately threw it towards the golem.

Without wasting a second he casted another spell, gravity shift and pulled himself toward the invisible platform he set up earlier. The round object suddenly exploded into a thick cloud of smoke that seemingly obscured the golem’s vision as it was unable to immediately retaliate.

With the Golem’s attention completely taken and its view hidnered. The two Shikigami assistants made their moves.

The Jack of hearts inserted its sword into the shield, causing it to transform into a large broadsword, with heart shaped accents. The Jack of spades planted its feet onto the ground and prepared to shoot an arrow that was overcharged with mana.

The Jack of hearts then jumped behind the golem’s main body, which was still obscured in smoke, and prepared to thrust it’s blade towards it. At the same time the Jack of Spades released its overcharged arrow.

Their attacks connected at the same time, blowing the smoke away. Yet despite the seemingly powerful attack, it simply did no damage to the body, as the sword simply bounced off and the arrow looked like it was absorbed.

The Jack of hearts then jumped away from the main body to avoid the inevitable counter attack now that the smoke has cleared.

Sylvester who observed it from above while dangling upside down simply nodded in amusement.

“It seems that even if I use a shikigami, it still counts as a magic spell from me, therefore is completely blocked.” Sylvester commented, still standing upside down.

“Alright, I think that’s enough now headmaster!” he said as he snapped his fingers, causing the Jack of spades and Jack of hearts to puff into smoke and return to being simple cards.

Sylvester stretched out his hand and said “Point return!”, and soon the two cards came flying into his hand, which he immediately placed back into his hat.

The rectangular prism that encased Rossa started to fade away as Sylvester adjusted his hat and coat.

“I think I’ve had my fun.” He said as the prism that encased Rossa disappeared. “Hey! Young mistress!” He shouted in order to get Rossa’s attention.

“I trust you understand what we need to do now right?” Sylvester asked to which Rossa simply nodded in agreement.

“Well then it’s showtime!” Sylvester said as he cancelled the effects of gravity shift letting fall to the floor. As he landed he then ran straight towards the golem, casting “Burst Akimbo” at the main body. This act was not intended to do any damage to the body, but only to serve as a distraction and keep its attention only towards him.

Sylvester realized the golem has an ability to be completely immune to a person’s offensive spells when it has been hit by a spell at least once, indicated by the floating pyramids that will change its color. But it can only be immune to one person at any given time.

In order for it to change its target it needs to be attacked once by another person and during this time, it is vulnerable for one attack. This is the built in weakness for this particular training golem.

Sylvester realized this when he shot it with a burst finger at the beginning of his turn, sadly if it had been a stronger spell he would have finished this fight earlier.

Dodging nimbly left and right, he continued to catch the attention of the golem as Rossa took advantage of this opportunity and casted a three line spell.

“Oh great and mighty blades”
“Brilliant light of the olden age”
“Slice through and make the darkness fade!”

Rossa found out that the reason she wasn’t able to destroy the golem at the start was because her spell wasn’t strong enough, as shown by Sylvester’s direct attack that simply bounced off. She laughed at herself when she realized that she could have ended this entire trial at the start had she not acted hastily.

“Swords of Light!” With these words, her spell was unleashed upon the hapless golem.

With its attention completely on Sylvester, the spell easily met its mark, as three magic circles formed above the main body. Three large swords made of light then pierced the transparent glass like housing nesting the core. Rays of light then started leaking from the ever growing number of cracks found on its surface.

Sylvester then jumped to safety using mana fortification and gave himself ample distance to avoid the incoming blast.

As more cracks began to appear an blinding light radiated from the now pierced black core. Suddenly a violent and bright explosion engulfed the diamond. Expanding from within, the golem was shattered, its many pieces showered everywhere with a large portion of it falling from the sky like confetti.

Sylvester then looked up, took his tophat of and placed it on his chest. He stretched out his left hand and did a graceful bow.