14 First Leap into Eternity

"RASENGAN!!!"

Yuri brought his hand down on the target's shoulder and what followed was an outward explosion of torrential gales. Like a hurricane, the Rasengan's air currents spread out and tore the target's enchantments off in a spray of light then turned the target into woodchips little by little.

Yuri stumbled back from the air pressure and covered his eyes with his arm to stop the hail of wood from hitting him.

After that, he looked up and observed his handiwork with pride.

[Unique Spell Created: 200 RP]

[Skill Created - Basic Mana Manipulation: 1000 RP]

"Haha, sick. Let's check it out"

[Basic Mana Manipulation: All basic spells gain increased control and casting speed. Mana efficiency increased by 20%]

"It's an all-around casting buff, the perfect skill for any mage. Now that I have this, I better get going"

He exited the Destruction Hall and went straight toward the last tower area while following signs for the Enchanting wing. He took a set of stairs 3 floors down and discovered that there were a lot fewer students in this hall. Almost as bad as the Expert class he took.

He entered one of three visible doors in the entire hall and found that he was 15 minutes early, yet there were already 5 people here. The room wasn't shaped like a Roman coliseum like the last couple he sat in, it looked like a normal lecture hall with a chalkboard-looking thing and 4 rows of seats. The only difference is a table with a pentagram and a troll skull fitted with a green orb ready for pondering up above it was fitted in every corner.

After receiving inquisitive looks for being the late transfer guy here, he took a seat in the second row behind the early comers. He noticed a familiar redhead among the students, one he met in the practice fields on his first day.

Tossing aside those thoughts, he waited silently for another 15 minutes while he thought about the ritual he was planning tonight and any unforeseen circumstances to avoid like how to seal off the room and not alert anyone.

The door interrupted him several times, spitting out student after student before finally revealing a very dapper and lean gentleman with a black and combed haircut. He looked to be 35 years old, and wasn't even wearing a mage robe, and had his buttoned-up sleeves rolled up. It was the most hipster thing he had seen since his death.

"Good Evening class," Said the apparent teacher in a very ga *cough cough* fanciful British-like voice. "And welcome to you too, Mr. Nightingale." It appears he knew him.

"Here's your textbook," Said the teacher. "Please don't blow it up, ahahaha." It appears he also had a reputation.

"My name is Mr. Gadsworth. The last few days have been spent on the use of souls and the study of runes and their effects on the process. You can catch up with the first 30 pages, or you'll have a terrible time" Yuri had already gotten used to it.

"Alright class, As you know an item can only have 5 total enchantments, one for every point of the pentagram. We've yet to find a material that can handle more anyway."

'Challenge accepted' Added Yuri in his head.

"Inside the triangles that mark the points of the pentagram, you must create your formation or formation matrix to denote the enchantment while adding its targeted area of the item to the edges of the triangle. You will each be given a copper pendant and a petty soul gem for each attempt and may choose between 'Fire Protection' or a minor 'Ward' spell to add to it. I will answer any questions, you have. We only have four tables, so you must get out of line after every attempt. Now begin." Gadsworth gave a review for review's sake and sent them off.

Yuri didn't move, but opened his book and read about what a formation matrix was and what kind of runes were dealt with. The only difference between what he learned in destruction and this book's rune language was that this book had more runes with more purposes. The Formation Matrix was simple. A primary formation that was in charge of the main property, like protect, or reflect, or burn or whatnot, would be the biggest and most central. Another smaller formation would connect to that one and would define how this enchantment behaved, when it activated, how much power is used, etc. They were too complex to use in a single ring around the primary formation, so they connected multiple. The edge of the pentagram's point that held the matrix would help define which part of the item held the enchantment, since without doing that a sword that would burn whenever it hit something would also burn its hilt and the wielder's hand.

Overall, the hardest thing to do was catch up on the rune language. Luckily, he has impeccable calligraphy skills.

40 minutes passed in total silence for our resident bookworm, the sizzles and small explosions happening 15 feet away from him seeming worlds away as he was drawn in his studies. Gadsworth looked at him strangely but nodded in approval for what he deemed as incredible concentration.

After every student had tried on their own, and less than 50% of them had shown only minor success, he decided to pull his desk toward the center of his front floor and perform a demonstration.

"It seems to me like most of you are getting stuck on the process of soul infusion. We are currently using petty souls which are mostly animals without the intelligence or willpower to resist, so if you get stuck here for long you'll never be shit" Gadsworth said frankly.

He quickly pulled out a paper with the Minor Ward Formation Matrix on his, then laid it on the bottom triangle and slammed his hand on it and the table below. The paper became blank, and he pulled it away to reveal that it had been pasted perfectly onto the enchantment table. Yuri withheld the urge to clap.

He pulled out a copper pendant and SLAMMED it onto the center pentagon. He then pulled out a petty soul gem and gently fit it into the troll skull's third eye socket. He pulled back and put both hands on either side of the pentagram and fueled the whole thing with mana. The formation matrix and pentagram lit up with blue lines and started to drain into the pentagon alone. That was when he looked at the soul gem in the skull and pulled it out of the skull

'Wait...what? Is that thing just a placeholder?!' Yuri was baffled.

Gadsworth hung the soul gem over the infused pentagon, and let it go! It was held suspended there for a while, and then Yuri watched as it was disintegrated into dust and moved into the pendant while seemingly disappearing.

'I still don't know what the soul did'

"The soul is in charge of providing the will that holds the enchantment to the item and replaces the brain for things like spell control. This is why you will need to routinely recharge your item with soul gems, or it will lose its ability to use its enchantment" Gadsworth said after reading his mind.

'Ah' Yuri acknowledged while lifting his brows slightly. 'What a crock of shit. If its a spell that's attached to you via an item, why not just use the will in your own mana every time you charge an item'

"Thunder boy!" Gadsworth said while pointing at Yuri.

"Huh?!" Yuri frowned.

"Come up here and throw a firebolt at me, right now," Said Gad while putting on the amulet. The students didn't know why he was calling him thunder boy.

"As you wish," Said Yuri while grinning mischievously.

"You agreed to that too easily."

"The teacher's word is law. I would never doubt you!" Yuri feigned his reasons while charging a firebolt.

"Hey hey hey, take it easy this is a petty soul gem." Yuri begrudgingly made it smaller. "There, that's good, now go!"

Yuri threw the firebolt at the speed of a bullet, and the amulet's enchantment sensed the incoming projectile and kicked into gear. An invisible beam exited the necklace and formed a Ward right in front of Gadsworth's nose that stretched to his middle chest. It appears that his enchantment matrix was given directives to detect an incoming projectile or interference, while also calculating its trajectory and using its energy efficiently to cover as much area as necessary.

For a normal spell that is.

The Ward held, but Gadsworth didn't. The pseudo-Brit was pushed back 3 feet while his feet slid across the floor and he instinctively crossed his arms up to guard his face.

He looked back up at his cheeky student with a look of exasperation. The rest of the 13 students were looking at him with various reactions of frowns and raised eyebrows. Sensei cleared his throat, and said, "Do you all get the idea now? Then continue practicing till the end of class and come to me with any questions."

Yuri exited stage right and didn't go back to his desk but to an enchantment table in the back. He grabbed a copper pendant and a soul gem on an adjacent table, the provided crystal chalk, and went to work. He didn't want to be a revolutionary yet, he had to start with what he was given. But that didn't mean he wouldn't go above and beyond.

He made two Formation Matrix on the two 'arm' edges of the star. One for the ward, which he tried to design as well Gadsworth did, and the other for Fire Protection, which he added a few ideas of his own to.

On three edges of the pentagon, he added lines that would connect the enchantments to perform in tandem. A Fire Ward. The matrix for Fire Protection had a couple of sub formations that would serve to let the effect act as a coating for the ward, and to disperse any heat by slowing the molecular vibration of anything that touches the ward. This made it cool to the touch. Getting that kind of scientific language into the formation using primitive runes was a pain, specifically with the fact that he had to make his font size smaller and redo the whole thing multiple times. Yuri dominated the table for over 25 minutes, and 6 students were gathering around the table while whispering between themselves and asking if they knew what he was doing.

Yuri finally finished his enchantment and made the medal of the pendant the focus while avoiding the chain. He put both hands on the table and fueled the pentagram as delicately as he could. His formations were made so tightly they looked like six glowing drink coasters. After the blue glow turned the formations into light and drew them into the central pentagon, Yuri pulled the soul gem from the skull and dropped it into the center. He watched as it floated there and disintegrated. Then, with a final flash, the process was done. He gently lifted the pendant, the students stepped aside for him, and he brought it to Gads desk before laying it down.

Gads lifted his spectacles and looked away from the book he was reading. He picked up the pendant by the chain and appraised it like an experienced jeweler. The hard thing about enchanting is that the results of a successful attempt don't appear as runes on the item thanks to the soul gem, so appraising an enchanted object takes an expert eye along with the conspicuous pair of glasses he is wearing.

'Two enchantments already? It looks like he imitated Flame Ward with them too, the other students won't be taught this for another two weeks. Mana control is always the issue when facing letters that small, anyone else would've broken them.' Gads thought to himself.

"I thought you were just a destruction monster, but it turns out you're also an enchantment monster as well, golden boy" Gads made his thoughts known. He wasn't envious in the least, and Gadsworth has so far only spoken in a teasing manner.

"You have an A+ for this material, Mr. Nightingale. Please come back tomorrow for an accelerated assignment I will have prepared. You are dismissed for the day" He wasn't about to let the Arch Mage's apprentice waste time on his watch. Maybe he should recommend Savos grants the kid a personal enchant table for his troubles.

Yuri bowed slightly, before taking his book from his desk and striding out of the room under the astonished gaze of the rest of the students. After a brief moment of contemplation, Gads noticed and curtly projected, "Back to work, students".

The class was a hands-on course, which means it was longer than average. He left an hour and a half early, which he was very happy about. He took extra long steps on the way back to his dorm, and couldn't wait to start his ritual.

He made his way to room 13, swung the door open, closed it, threw the enchanters book onto his dresser, and pulled the Eternal Heart book out. He gently placed it onto the desk he had next to his bed and flipped it to the formation page before checking the Exchange for a room sealing tool.

After paying 300 RP for a bell covered in unfamiliar runes, he rang it and the runes flew off the bell and covered the walls in every inch before fading away.

'That should last 6 hours. Plenty of time'

Yuri then found a wooden bowl, then used a mana construct knife to open his wrist vein and drained about 4 ounces of blood into it before he dipped his hand into a little bit of a potion and rubbed the affected area.

Yuri then paid the system for a high-quality scroll and fine brush and started copying the contents of the formation onto the scroll rune by singular rune, mark by mark, making damn well sure the intent for each one was correct. After 3 hours of copying, and funneling mana into it to make sure the entire thing was connected properly, he started his next spell.

The five open circles around the center will stay as an augmented part of his heart and didn't need to be filled at the moment. Instead, he needed to provide an enormous amount of mana to all five points at once.

He then continued to his final spell before the ritual. He looked into his body and created a purple field outlining the exact area of his heart. He then used the purple shield to drag it out of his chest gently, and gently place it into the center circle of the formation. His heart, along with the form-fitting shield, was still beating. Blood could be seen entering the heart's valves and then disappearing on exit to flow back into his veins. The field was like a multi-faceted portal that recorded an organ's behavior for a moment and allowed it to continue while it was being operated on elsewhere.

Yuri couldn't bring the Eye of Magnus out without crushing the room, but he didn't have to. He connected to it, and his mana threatened to explode but he wasn't in danger yet. With this strain, he refocused himself.

Yuri began chanting in a solemn tone.

"As minister of my mana, I begin this sacred journey. Origin of my blood, foundation of my spirit, be cast into a new mold and leap into eternity."

Mana sprung from both of his hands in thick ropes and snaked into the five circles on the formation. Yuri drained all of his own mana and felt exhausted, but continued. He then drew from the inventory slot the Eye rested in and used that to continue filling the process. Every single beautiful calligraphic stroke in the curvy runes shone as brightly as a beacon. This phenomenon spread to all the outlines and shapes surrounding the five circles before joining the centerpiece and the heart.

"Let my name be called Progenitor, let my blood continue to antiquity. Devour and be filled, heal and be fulfilled, all pestilence shy die in vain."

The center circle and the runes surrounding it stretched the mana it was holding up into tentacles and bound the entire organ tightly in chains. The purple shield served no protection. Yuri felt every inch of his heart being squeezed, penetrated, stitched, corrupted. He felt the cells in his heart burn and die while its mitosis process was hijacked and replaced with an entirely new one. His heart gained neon blue veins throughout its inside and out, the flesh went from red to a translucent pink. It kept absorbing mana and causing him enormous pain, but he resisted the urge to scream and chanted the last lines through gritted teeth.

"Nourish the body to its completion, bind the soul to its transcendence, of this Lord Nightingale proclaims. Let my Eternal Heart bear witness till it beats its last."

The rest of the scroll continued to drain into the five circles. The scroll was now empty aside from the five spell circles, which cut off contact with the mana Yuri was supplying. He quickly used the Eye to refill himself while observing the rest of the process.

The five empty circles turned into runic disks of light and floated off the paper and around the blue heart. The last of the mana in the center circle turned into strings and threaded themselves into his heart. The five circles then approached it and branded themselves onto a different empty section with a painful sizzle that Yuri fully felt. This time, he did scream.

The light faded, the circles became black runed marks that remained, and his heart beat in the now silent room. The ritual was over.

Yuri could finally hear himself gasping, his forehead covered in a cold sweat, and his clothes damp from the same. He needed to finish this.

He held up both hands with palms up as if in prayer, and the purple shield holding his heart floated in front of him and sank into his chest. He looked inside himself, rotated the organ, and changed its orientation countless times before he was perfectly happy with the way it sat in his chest and connected all his valves. He then released the shield spell...

And immediately gasped for air and fainted.