Chương 17: The Light Between the Fields

Sieghart's first attempt at creating a mana potion produced a bucket of water. His second attempt produced two. That wasn't the intended result. He had begun with a simple theory. Water Creation converted mana into physical water. If he forced more mana into the spell without increasing the amount of water, perhaps the excess energy would remain inside the liquid. The result would be water rich in mana. In other words, a mana potion. Such potions appeared frequently in his books.

Warriors and mages drank them to replenish their reserves, recover from magical exhaustion, and continue using their abilities. The descriptions varied depending on the quality of the potion, but all of them contained concentrated mana suspended in a liquid medium. Sieghart possessed infinite mana. Producing mana potions should have been the most obvious way to convert that advantage into money. Unfortunately, Water Creation interpreted additional power as a request for additional water.

When Sieghart pushed more mana into the spell, the stream widened until it filled a bucket in seconds. When he increased the output further, the pressure launched the bucket across the room and soaked half the wall. He cleaned the room before Elara could see the mess. His third experiment took place outside. Sieghart placed several ceramic cups on the ground and produced water while gradually increasing his mana input. As expected, the volume and pressure rose together. He needed to separate them.

That was easier said than done. His mana possessed no measurable limit, but the spell followed its own structure. Water Creation determined how much liquid appeared based on the amount of mana flowing through it. To produce a richer liquid, Sieghart needed to force more mana into less water. He focused on compression. Instead of allowing the water to escape immediately, he formed a magical boundary around a single droplet. Mana continued flowing into the spell while Sieghart prevented the liquid from expanding.

The droplet trembled above his palm. Pressure built inside it. Sieghart reduced the size farther. The water became perfectly round. Its surface remained stable despite the increasing power he poured into it, and a faint distortion appeared in the surrounding air. That looked promising. Then the droplet shot away from his hand. It crossed the yard and struck a wooden fence hard enough to leave a small dent. Sieghart stared at the mark. He had created a projectile. Useful. Not a potion.

The compressed mana had increased the water's pressure rather than remaining within the liquid. The moment Sieghart released control, that pressure converted into motion. He repeated the experiment with a cup. This time, he created a small quantity of water while maintaining a high mana input. He carefully reduced the pressure before allowing the liquid to settle. The result looked ordinary. No glow. No unusual color. No visible mana. Sieghart tasted it. It was water. That proved very little.

His mana was already infinite, so even if the liquid restored magical energy, he wouldn't notice the effect. He required someone with a limited mana pool. His grandparents became his test subjects. They simply didn't know it. Sieghart filled a pitcher with his supposedly enhanced water and brought it to the fields during the afternoon. Elara and Edric had been working beneath the sun for several hours, making them likely to drink without asking too many questions.

"I brought water," Sieghart said. Elara smiled.

"That was thoughtful." Sieghart watched closely while she filled a cup. Elara drank half of it, paused, and looked at the liquid. Sieghart's hopes rose.

"Is something wrong?" Edric asked.

"It tastes fresh." That was all. Edric drank next. He finished the cup, wiped his mouth, and returned to adjusting the wheel of a farming tool. Neither of them recovered visible mana. Sieghart waited for several minutes in case the effect required time. Nothing happened. Eventually, Elara used a minor Wind spell to clear dust from the tool. Her eyes dimmed afterward at exactly the same rate as usual. The water possessed no meaningful mana. Sieghart's experiment had failed.

At least he had kept his grandparents hydrated. That counted as a partial success. He continued testing for several days. He varied the amount of mana, the volume of liquid, the temperature, and the emotional state used to create it. The result never changed. Water Creation produced water. Extra mana could increase the amount, pressure, temperature control, and precision, but it couldn't alter the substance's fundamental nature. Once the spell ended, any energy used to control the water dispersed.

Sieghart couldn't simply trap mana inside it. He would need another spell, an alchemical ingredient, or a container capable of retaining magical energy. Still, the experiments improved his control. Using more mana on a smaller quantity of water made that water much easier to manipulate while the spell remained active. Sieghart could maintain droplets in the air, change their shape, spin them, or launch them with considerable force. His concentrated cutting stream benefited from that discovery.

He could now keep the line thinner than his smallest finger without allowing it to break apart. The pressure increased, and the spinning water carved visible marks into smaller stones within seconds. Sieghart recorded the results in his notebook.

'What now…' Sieghart tapped the quill against the page. His options remained limited. Fire, water, wind, and earth provided countless combinations, but his spells were still basic. He could create destructive fireballs, pressurized water, strong gusts, and small movements of soil. That was enough to fight. It wasn't enough to manufacture advanced products. Sieghart needed more spells. This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Alternatively, he needed to learn how magical tools were created. The enchanted harvesting equipment on the farm consumed blue stones. Runes inside the tools transformed the stones' stored mana into predetermined magical effects. If Sieghart could create something similar, his infinite mana would become far more useful. A tool charged by him might operate for years. Perhaps decades. Ordinary magical items required mana stones, which made them expensive to maintain.

An item containing a massive reserve could eliminate that cost. Farmers would buy tools that never needed recharging. Merchants would want wagons powered by persistent Wind Magic. Homes could possess permanent heating, lighting, and clean water. Sieghart imagined creating a magical stone filled with infinite mana. That might be excessive. If the container cracked, the results could range from harmless energy loss to removing the surrounding town from the map. He would begin with something smaller.

A stone capable of powering a tool for one year would already be valuable. Learning enchantment became another priority. Unfortunately, none of his current books explained the process. They described magical tools, their uses, and the types of stones they consumed, but the actual construction techniques belonged to specialists. Useful knowledge was always the expensive kind. Sieghart sighed and turned the page. Healing Magic offered another possible path to money.

He hadn't unlocked it yet, but White Magic contained more than Support Magic. Its description mentioned restoration, which suggested healing should be possible. In times of war, someone capable of healing without running out of mana would be invaluable. Sieghart could treat soldiers continuously. He could operate an entire healing station alone, assuming his concentration and spell speed improved enough. People would pay enormous amounts for that service. The downside was obvious.

He would need to work close to the war. More specifically, he might have to work with his father. Lord Alaric commanded the border's defenses. If Sieghart revealed unlimited healing ability during an invasion, House Emberhart would claim his services immediately. His father might even act proud. This is my son, whom I sent away after one old man declared him useless. Sieghart imagined the reunion. It wasn't particularly heartwarming.

He had no desire to become a convenient resource for the family that abandoned him. Healing ordinary soldiers was one thing. Returning to House Emberhart and accepting their expectations again was another.

'Yeah, fat chance…' The thought left an uncomfortable tightness in his chest. Sieghart liked to pretend that his parents no longer mattered, yet the possibility of facing them again still made him feel like the rejected child they had sent away. Infinite mana had strengthened his spells, but it had done nothing to erase that particular weakness. He needed independence before revealing anything extraordinary. Money would help. Knowledge would help more. Sieghart looked at the collection of books inside his room.

Magical knowledge seemed remarkably scarce in this world. People had used Aura and magic for centuries, yet most spells remained basic utility techniques. Fire lit wood. Water irrigated fields. Wind cleared dust. Earth softened soil. Where were the teleportation spells? The barriers? The enchanted towers, flying ships, and artificial creatures? Even combat magic appeared underdeveloped because warriors dismissed it as too slow.

"What is the point of having infinite mana if no one knows what to do with mana?" Perhaps that was his role. Maybe he hadn't been given infinite mana to inherit an established path. Perhaps he was supposed to create one. That sounded arrogant. Sieghart was four years old, and his greatest accomplishments included farming efficiently and murdering a boulder. Still, every magical field had to begin somewhere. If the world lacked advanced combat magic, he could develop it.

If magical tools consumed too many resources, he could improve them. If no one had discovered a way to use infinite mana, then Sieghart had plenty of time to experiment. Failure wasn't a serious obstacle when attempts cost him nothing. He closed his notebook. The farmhouse had fallen silent hours earlier. A candle burned beside his bed, illuminating the pages and the scattered cups remaining from his experiments. Sieghart stretched his sore fingers and looked through the window.

The moon stood high above the fields. Then he noticed the light. It appeared between two distant rows of crops. A faint glow moved near the ground before vanishing behind the plants. Several seconds later, it appeared again farther to the left. Sieghart became still. An inexplicable pressure settled over the room. The light was small, but the darkness surrounding it suddenly seemed much larger, pressing against the farmhouse from every direction.

Sieghart told himself that it might be a worker searching for something, yet the thought sounded unconvincing even inside his own head. It was close to midnight. No farm worker should have been in the fields. Edric had instructed everyone to return home before dark while the border remained under attack. Patrols checked the nearby roads during the evening, but they carried lanterns and moved openly. This light was different. It was dim, irregular, and partially concealed. Someone…

or something was moving through the crops. Sieghart listened. The farmhouse remained quiet. His grandparents' door didn't open. He couldn't hear footsteps in the corridor or movement downstairs. Neither of them had noticed. He could wake them. That would be the sensible choice. Edric possessed combat training and an enchanted bow. Elara knew enough magic to support him. Sieghart was a four-year-old child with no real battle experience. His fingers felt colder against the windowsill.

What if the light belonged to several intruders rather than one? What if he woke his grandparents only after something had already happened? Every possibility became worse the longer he watched, and not knowing what waited outside frightened him more than any monster he could clearly see. By the time he reached their room, explained what he had seen, and led them outside, the intruder might already reach the house. Or disappear. Sieghart watched the light move again. It was coming closer. He activated Protection.

White mana spread beneath his skin, reinforcing his entire body. He opened the window and climbed onto the sill. The ground waited below. His bedroom was on the second floor, but he had practiced for this. Wind Magic had improved since his first attempts at moving himself by a centimeter. Sieghart jumped. Cold night air rushed around him. He pointed both palms downward and released compressed blasts of wind. The force slowed his fall, pushing his body slightly away from the wall. His boots struck the ground.

Sieghart bent his knees and rolled across the grass. Protection absorbed most of the impact, leaving him unharmed. He rose immediately. The light flickered between the crops once more. Sieghart summoned the feeling of anger and prepared Fireball while moving toward the fields. Every intelligent part of his mind said that investigating alone was a terrible idea. Unfortunately, curiosity had already won. He only hoped he wouldn't regret the decision soon. This was exactly how people earned stupid deaths, he thought.

First, they noticed something suspicious. Then they decided they could handle it alone. Finally, someone found whatever remained of them the next morning. The joke failed to calm him, but turning back while his grandparents slept defenseless felt even worse.