The Demon Lord Is An Angel
Chapter 143: Space To Improve

Chapter 143: Space To Improve

"That cannot be!" General Sreev declared for what felt like the millionth time.

"I assure you, it is," Kir said. "Space and time are the same thing, and since gravity affects space, it also affects time. We are moving marginally faster in time than an object farther from this world, and slightly faster still than an object outside the solar system, and still slightly faster than an object existing on its own, with no other object to be attracted to."

Kir was enjoying himself. It had taken all of two hours to reverse their dynamic once he’d made the first crack in Sreev’s frankly medieval notions. And all without doing any math whatsoever. The hours after that had flown by.

In that time, Sreev had managed to fill fourteen pages with facts that he needed to verify. Kir, of course, had provided him with a few experiments that would do just that. They were in a pause when Captain Litty interrupted them to deliver the day’s report.

"My apologies, young master, but there are matters of the army to deal with. I will need an hour to do so and devise ways to optimize your development," the General bowed sincerely.

"Take your time," Kir said, lifting a glass of unexpectedly delicious wine to his lips. Sreev had offered an Aytherian variety but Kir had wanted to try something from Hell. The distillation was primarily from something known as "pumice fruit," and he’d been surprised to find that it was subtly sweet and very fruity with a tang he didn’t recognize until learning it was, according to Sreev, "probably sulferberry."

Wines from Hell tended to have few primary ingredients and a wide array of added flavors depending on what was available with sunlight, water, and volcanic activity being highly variable. Sreev said he found the chaos enjoyable, and guessing the year of a wine by its ingredients was a pastime for Hell’s more historically inclined sommeliers.

Kir passed the hour thinking about what he’d revealed to Sreev and questioning himself on whether any of it was particularly deadly. In retrospect, the General had been rather skeptical, even after Kir managed to convince him of some truths, and even Kir had to admit that most of his knowledge dealt only with the physical realm.

Dungeons, for example, were at the very least spacetime anomalies. Once that caveat had been established, Kir finally knew why there was so much disconnect between him and his lessons at the Norneau Academy.

It wasn’t just that everything he’d learned there had been at least half-wrong on the sciences side, it was that he hadn’t had access to the more advanced bodily, mental, and soul studies; two fields that had been identified to him freely by the demonic General, if not in those terms.

Dividing the advancement of magics into physical, mental, and soul studies made the most sense to Kir. From what he’d learned, demon mage-apprentices learned a bit of all three, depending on their master. The last, however, was treated with the most caution, since it carried the highest risk of magic going awry in spectacular fashion. The goal of initial mage training was to bring an apprentice to a point where they connected with magic in their own way, which allowed them to emphasize some aspect of it.

In retrospect, that explained why his mother, Bridget, had been so good with wind magic while his mom, Darlae, had so emphasized her body. He recalled his duels, how unfocused most of the students had been with one exception; Daisy - AKA "The Destroyer" - whose magical expression had been anti-magic. He’d need to ask her about that when he got back.

If he wanted to enact greater magic, he would really have to start understanding magic itself.

Thinking back on his experiences, it now made sense to him why Kordia had been so eager to get special student status. The actual study of magic was there, whereas the rest of the college focused on giving students a decent foundation and honing the skills they already had. It was hardly a comprehensive curriculum, but like the difference between a bachelor’s degree and a doctorate, it produced capable mages and relied on the interest of the students to develop further.

And he’d been a fool to think he had it all figured out.

Kir laughed at himself. Maybe if he hadn’t been sidetracked by an attempted murder, he’d have realized what the real game was...

But at least he’d learned some history and geography; and his post-sealing combat training hadn’t gone to waste... though Amarena provided many lessons in how lacking he still was in controlling his enhancement magic. There had to be a better way than just flooding magic into concepts of speed and strength... Maybe if he knew how bodies actually worked... But that was something to ask Kordia.

A flash of thought made him imagine Kordia wearing a professor’s cloak. Then he chuckled at the thought of teaching proper physics when he got back. One thing was certain though, he needed to find a way to stay off of Heaven’s radar if he was going to continue there with Rain and Kordia.

Near the end of the hour, Sreev returned with several papers covered in demonic script, that he secreted in his desk before turning to Kir.

"I’ve thought of the first few things we can do to improve your development... Given our present time constraints."

Kir sat up straighter. "I’m all ears."

Sreev squinted and turned his head slightly. "What an odd turn of phrase... but I think I understand it means you are listening. Be careful saying that around vampires though, they can be a bit touchy about their ears."

He cleared his throat.

"Firstly, as you are already somewhat along the path to bodily development, and I am not presently able to pursue such a study, I felt it prudent to focus on your mental development in the foremost sense." He pulled a piece of paper from thin air - revealing for the first time his own dimensional storage - and lay it on the desk. "I noticed your spell tattoos, and since you seem to have a skilled artist, you can have them place this design on you, just at the base of your neck."

"What will it do?" Kir asked, accepting the sheet as soon as Sreev finished the final, precise line. The spell circle was elegant and simple; resembling to his mind a curvy form of circuitry. It lacked any language that Kir could see.

"Ideally, it will resonate with the appropriate sensory pathways. You would experience enhancements to your body and mental senses. Sight, hearing, touch, smell, taste, balance, intuition, comprehension, memory, emotion, and mirror-sense. In practice, even gnossinians find the increased information difficult to manage for the first few years.

On the soul side of things, you’ll begin by having your manasight always active but soon you should be able to gain more senses for how to read mana. When you master these things, it will give you far more acumen and ease your reification... up to near-totality at any rate."

Kir nodded. He somewhat understood, but there were still many things that Sreev said he might not be ready for. One was that he would have to find his own way to overcome the final hurdle.

The General continued. "And speaking of tattoos, I noticed that you have several small storages tattooed into you. The designs are efficient but you would be better served combining them into a single space. Fortunately, they are alike enough in features and resonance that it can be easily done, and I can provide this for you."

"They’re for different things," Kir said.

"Ah yes, your wings and weapons, as well as odds and ends."

Kir stiffened and the General held up a calming hand. "When you allowed my inspection, I could sense the ’shape’ of what was stored but little else; and I was more interested in the spell circles. Remarkably efficient, perhaps I might copy them later for some of the more mature imps. Perhaps a reward for learning the Common tongue."

Kir couldn’t help but feel that he might have given more than he was getting, but he held his tongue as Sreev continued.

"There’s no reason for you to limit yourself to a few access points when you could simply integrate it and have it be anywhere, tied to where you desire it to be so." As if to demonstrate he reached into the air above him and produced another piece of paper. Then he began to scribe out equations in demonic script.

"What I propose is using the circle on your back and layering the others into it. I would even be able to reform some of the excess ink into the sensory enhancement circle, though you would likely want a master to correct it. It would take only a slight modification from there to enable more will-based access, and I would need to remove some of the more confining runes, but essentially you have the mana to sustain the slight decrease in efficiency that will result from the combined space, which should have a slightly multiplicative gain thanks to the magical resonance of the identical patterns..."

He thought for a moment before finishing his math and underlining the answer. "I believe you would be looking at a space equal to twenty by twenty measures, assuming you want it rectangular. Most demons use the sense of depth as an organizing factor."

Kir nodded, wondering what he would do with such a space. "How long will it take?"

"About an hour. And you will need to empty your smaller storages. Your wings are fine, since they are a part of you, and what I will be doing is essentially binding the conceptual space available to you by the tattoo. In fact, the presence of your wings will serve as a bit of an anchor, and an emission point for you to practice strengthening your soul aura, while your reification brings your soul senses to a more sustainable level. It will also keep you from smothering the local space in your aura, which can be a problem."

"What?" Kir didn’t like the sound of that.

"It’s perfectly safe, and if you wish to undo it, simply alter or destroy the tattoo and the binding will come undone. Of course, that would mean everything you have stored will come out at once, but there shouldn’t be lasting damage as long as you perform basic mana meditations."

"I don’t plan on giving up my storage," Kir said. "But what did you mean about smothering places with my aura?"

"Aura is the manifestation of your ability to control local mana. Well, such that exists. Expanding it would help significantly in mitigating the damage of hostile magics, weakening barriers, and even charming spirits if I remember right. It would be like... hmm... taking control of magic directly, though within about a measure or so around from a person’s center that would be difficult. But trivial for a fully reified being, at least against anyone below archmage."

That distance, Kir realized, also directly corresponded to most people’s ability to shield themselves.

"And these are the only two things you can think of?"

"Young master, I could think of a thousand ways you need to improve if you are to have a less... chaotic disposition with your magic. But that would require you to apprentice to me, and it would hardly be sporting of me to take an apprentice while I am still one myself.

Kir’s eyes widened a bit. "You’re still an apprentice? I thought you were an archmage."

Sreev laughed deeply, which was a slightly more disturbing sound than Kir anticipated. "Perhaps compared to an aytherian, I would be ranked as such. But you misunderstand. I am apprenticed solely to overcome my deficiency in bodily applications of magic. I can be a teacher, a General, as my master wills, but to take an apprentice would be the height of arrogance, especially since I am so young."

To Kir, Sreev didn’t look young. More like a withered tree, half a millennium old. "So... what does your teacher look like, then?"

"Like your father of course."