Eluria Caldwin liked reading.
Research and theses on magic went without saying, but she also enjoyed history books, academic texts, biographies, dictionaries, and even adventure tales and romance novels. Ghost stories were...scary, but she would read them too. Any field and genre was hers to enjoy; thus, Eluria Caldwin could declare with full and unwavering confidence that she loved reading.
Another thing she was confident in was her love for naps.
By Eluria’s standards, naps were infinitely fascinating. Napping in her room made her feel safe enough to completely empty her mind and wake up fully reenergized. Napping under the shade of a tree while caressed by the breeze was the very epitome of cozy. Napping on a floatie with her feet dipping leisurely into the water on a sunny day was a truly serene experience. Napping face down on a sturdy rock while imagining everything the rock had seen and felt throughout its long life was a wonderful way to depart to dreamland. Napping anywhere felt good too, as long as it was under the inescapable clutches of a sudden bout of sleepiness.
Long story short, naps were great.
Eluria described them as “fascinating” because of the wide variety of flavors one could experience depending on when, where, and how the nap was initiated, but most would simply see it as a physiological phenomenon—something they had to do to survive, and nothing more. Some might have taken issue with the fact that she referred to it as a hobby at all, and she wouldn’t fault them for it either.
Moving on, there was one more thing Eluria was greatly confident in—and that was her love for walks.
This may have come as a surprise to many, who mainly knew her for her love of books or her tendency to coop up indoors when she was in the zone, but on the contrary, Eluria went on a lot of walks. Elven life in the forest had demanded a lot of moving around. By the time she’d enlisted in the Vegaltan army, hoping to test out her magic’s practicality, she’d built up enough stamina and strength to make the cut. Physical activity promoted blood circulation, among other things, and going on walks assisted in memorization by associating thoughts with scenery.
Long story short, walks were good for the body and mind—and that was why Eluria’s mood was currently as pleasant as could be.
“It’s been a while since I’ve gone on such a long walk,” she mused aloud as she strode across the ravaged continent.
Granted, she was in the middle of an operation, so she had to pick up the pace a bit, cast a few powerful support spells that none would usually think to use on a simple walk, and also trek over air on occasion to keep a straight path, but her legs were committing to the motion, and that was all that mattered.
Naturally, this made her a perfect target for Calamities and Offspring, but the creatures were ultimately of little hindrance to her progress.
“Ah... I forgot to ask Raid if I should unfreeze everything later,” she mumbled as she threw a glance back over her shoulder.
A world of ice stretched out as far as the eye could see. Pale and glistening blue blanketed the land, freezing everything in place—even the Calamities and Offspring—as if time itself had frozen over.
“The mana felt unpleasant back when I first arrived in this world, and it’s practically lethal poison to ordinary living beings...but upon closer inspection, it’s actually fascinating—it’s made for spells that utilize blended mana branches. The me of this world must’ve been a genius,” Eluria muttered, nodding proudly to herself.
This world of ice was not a product of Eluria’s magic, but rather a phenomenon she triggered by making use of the polluted mana contaminating this continent.
The reason Eluria had labeled the six mana branches as colors was because she saw the finished product—magic—as a painting. Even when blended together, mana was still just mana. You could mix paint to make new colors, adjust the brightness to produce varying hues, or even mix them incompletely to create unique patterns, but it was only when you put it upon a canvas while considering which colors to use and where to place or layer them that they altogether formed a “painting.”
Similarly, magic was the product of raw energy being given shape through complex layers of creativity and intricate processes of thought. However, much like how one could slap some random colors onto a canvas and call it a painting, the power and density of a spell made in such a slapdash way would be incomparably lower. Eluria’s Polyaggregate Expansion functioned on the same logic.
In any case, her investigation of this world’s polluted mana revealed that its true identity was “blended mana.” In other words, it was mana that was ready to become a spell—a “color” that could, by itself, produce a painting. When mixed with a living being’s natural mana, it caused a collapse to their physiological balance and consequently morphed them into Calamities and Offspring.
Thus, Eluria concluded that it was impossible to return paint from the canvas to the palette—or more literally, to completely erase polluted mana. However, she could tamper with the painting itself—perhaps add a new streak or extract a certain hue to adjust the existing colors. In the context of magic, this would allow her to manipulate the spell’s qualities. And since she was not casting her own spell but simply using her mana to alter the qualities of existing mana, it was—by definition of magic theory—classified as a “phenomenon.”
“Whoops... Gotta destroy them before I forget.”
Eluria’s gaze trailed over the frozen Calamities. With a snap of her finger, the living ice sculptures instantly crumbled into countless shards.
Once she’d figured out how to alter the polluted mana as she pleased, these Calamities no longer proved to be much of an issue—after all, they were essentially conglomerations of polluted mana. It was a simple matter to turn their very being into ice.