"Any idea when your main body and Scarlet would be back? The ball I talked about has been scheduled for three months later."

"Three months…they might miss it altogether. But, I'll try to send the message and let you know their decision." Seven didn't have much hope of sending Will back to Ebony. They were too far out, and Dusk wasn't present to help.

"I have a question about this clone spell of yours."

"Go ahead."

"Do you not see yourselves as Ebony but a separate entity? Why the segregation, even though you're clones?"

"It's not perfect, and we are not Ebony. Our predecessors, the sculptures or 'clones', saw themselves as Ebony because that's how Ebony made them. Smaller versions of himself. The Numbers, on the other hand, are fractional. We are parts of a whole. The more of us, the less each of us affects Ebony. My experience is merely 1 out of over 30 for Ebony, even if I experience something that impacts me intensely, Ebony would feel it diluted after taking in all the Number's experience. This is well within the usage of Will that neither of us is familiar with, much less masters of Will manipulation."

"If I can't use Will, I can't use a clone-type spell perfectly. That's why clone-type spells are so exceedingly rare." Mallory muttered under her breath.

"Since there are Tier 3 versions, there are rudimentary clones such as us Numbers."

"….I would hardly call you rudimentary even amongst the clone-type spell I've seen the Elves cast."

"I have seen those too. Duke Mannaty, if I got that right. His clones and his family members are all over their forests. If I'm not wrong, they charge a seed or plant with their interesting mana, probably mixed with some other energy that isn't Will but very similar, and the plants would explode into something like a Treeant. While they don't share appearances, their thoughts and abilities are connected, and he could cast through any of these plant bodies of his. So far, I have only sensed 2 to 3 bodies linked to a unique mana signature. A low count, but each clone seemed to have equivalent power to their main body as far as we could tell. Impressive." Seven had done their homework on public figures of note.

"Spirit. The Mannaty Family's lineage skill requires them to hold onto a pouch of special seeds from birth, imbue their mana constantly till they are King-ranked and can imbue spirit that would give birth to these clone bodies. They are said to be one of the Noblest Elven households present on Elcra. Rumours amongst the Elcrian Nobles are that members of the Mannaty Family don't have those clones for show, they can't be killed unless all their clonal bodies are killed and each member has their main body or a clonal body stored in the Elven Domain."

"Do they get hurt when they lose a clonal body?" Seven was interested, but the Elven Domain was out of their viewing range. That Domain wasn't just strong, it did not welcome them either. He'd only seen 4 of these clones in Tidal's forest, home to the Elves, but knew next to nothing about the true Elven Domain outside of Tidal.

"If records from past wars are right, gravely."

'Then I doubt Spirit energy is used. Did they somehow split their soul? Just like how Xin's mask has part of her soul. That would make their clones near perfect, but how would an existence with a separated soul feel? Does Xin feel weird when her mask is away from her? Ebony needs to ask these things.' If Seven or any of the Numbers were hurt, Ebony wouldn't feel any pain or lose any of his resources.

They were legitimately separate entities till they reconnected with each other through Will. They were the only ones harmed when attacked.

This also only changed after Ebony's rule of not having an active connection. Though they were able to reach out any time they wanted, and vice versa.

However, for safety and self-preservation, all the Numbers had an active connection through the Will Relay Buffers and to Dusk unless they sensed something harmful that could target Will. A large crystal storage encased in a Turtle Fort temporarily took Dusk's job of being a Will storage. Ebony remained as an entity, differentiating himself from the Numbers.

Hence their distinction.

"The reason we separate ourselves is for Ebony to receive different points of view and more importantly, different paths of growth. If all of us were exactly like Ebony, we would only grow like him. By fractioning us, each of us is capable of having slightly different thoughts. This limitation lets us find different solutions to the same problem. Some things that Ebony might never come up with due to his broad scope of abilities or mindset. Of course, it's mainly because this is the most efficient way of growing our Will capacity that we have found so far."

"I see, thank you for the insight."

"I would like to ask you something too, your mana-being Physique. What quality of ingredient did you use to kickstart your mutation? How many percentage Mana-Being are you? Do you sense what I call mana chassis throughout your body?"

"I didn't use any external ingredient, I took apart my brain matter, reorganised it and found what I think you're referring to as mana chassis and found that it is also present throughout my body, just like the sample of your finger I got. After breaking down my brain matter, I managed to use this mana chassis to rebuild my body."

'Is this what they call a genius or mad scientist…did she just manually edit her genetics or baseline traits?' Seven and Ebony always thought that Mallory had ridiculous abilities for her age and level but this was something else altogether. He needed Ful's sap as the jumpstart energy and Xin also used Ancient-ranked ingredients to do something similar.

Mallory was claiming to directly break herself down without external energy and change herself. It was an understatement to call these acts risky.

"Did you sense a decrease in effective Intelligence or Wisdom stat?" Seven had information about Baseline Traits, but he couldn't speak when he tried to. Mallory hadn't read the book or had the relevant knowledge, and even as a clone-type spell, he was stopped from uttering the words he wanted to by an unseen power.

"Intelligence, yes. My spells and manipulation got close to 40% weaker, even though my Intelligence stat remained the same. As for Wisdom, I think it increased in effect instead."

"Was it worth it?"

"It is fascinatingly hard to heal. My effective Constitution feels all unbalanced. I have been experimenting with healing spells for us. Our mana is deeply tied to Vitality, yet our Vitality has its separate stream. I now understand how you regenerate body parts filled with Vitality, yet weakened. I believe this mana-life-force mixture simply doesn't have the same qualities as our original Vitality that is required to refill regenerated limbs for it to get back its full strength."

"Does having mana chassis across one's body help with mana regeneration while casting or manipulating mana?"

"Yes! Because it's no longer concentrated within our brains. Its segregation helps us utilise mana segregationally too. Simulating the same ability as Parallel Thought and the likes that advanced mages use to multicast or meditate while casting, but more naturally since we are 'physically-mentally' present throughout our body."

'So Ebony had that additional advantage too.' Seven thought that, but then dismissed it.

It made no difference, even before he awoke his mana-being genetics with the help of Gen and Ful's sap, he could already do the same by his compartmentalised mind.

As for Parallel Thought, a Tier 3 Skill with a Tier 4 and 5 version out there, it was a Skill not native to Elcra. It wasn't even native to the Elves but some other race from far away. Parallel Thought was the only version and Tier that made it to the market, and was a famed Skill not just for mages but also many non-combatant Classes.

Full information on its training to its highest refinement as a Tier 3 Skill was monopolised and sold but the owners and makers were anonymous, protected by Eidolon and possibly the God of Knowledge.

The coming and publication of Hex was an explosion of knowledge for Elcra. With even Tier 4 and 5 skills being available for trade, it was amazing how little societal havoc was going on. Few could obtain a portable module of Hex, but the District Quest Halls all had public modules already available to the public.

The economy was another problem that Ebony never bothered with, but was slowly forced to at least take note of.

Mana being a common currency and Elcra's mana being similar to the universal standard, they didn't suffer too much, other than being open to a wider market. The standard situation of the rich getting richer was more obvious since the rich could quickly obtain better resources while they widened their ability gap with the poor.

Elcrian craftsman, including Dwarven craft was no longer anything sought after due to higher quality goods in the open market. While Dwarven techniques were top-notch even on a universal scale, the Dwarves on Elcra did not have a strong connection with their otherworldly ancestor,s unlike the Elves. They were even considered unrelated to other Dwarves.

Ebony, having the benefit of Elven and Xeng craft since his youth, wasn't impressed. The same couldn't be said for the Empire.

Seven and Mallory fell into a discussion of their Physique, and she went as deep as she could about their anatomy and why they are harder to heal via arcane healing spells.

As a new tutor, with an entire field and a singular classroom assigned to him, he had full attendance on his first day as an instructor. Though he preferred to be called Trainer because there were going to be more practical lessons and fewer instructions.

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"Good morning. As you are all aware, this is a training class on pure combat. However, I will still conduct a few in-class discussions when your body rests after practical combat training. We'll skip that for today while I gauge your understanding."

"Sir!" Masline the Fourth raised his hand straight up.

"No need to address me, in this class, efficiency is key. Just ask."

"I was just curious, and I believe it's the same for everyone here, but what is the passing criteria of your class? How long will it last?"

"The end goal of being my students?" Seven considered for a moment, having an end goal was indeed important. And this was an Academy, he had to give them a passing criteria, but not so much a time span. There were classes here that had schedules dozens of years long.

"This is a class on combat. You pass when you beat Ebony."

"You? Sir?"

"If you really have to address me, Seven is fine. Question one: How many of you are aware of what I am?"

4 hands rose. Raika, Tiha, Entras and the ice mage girl.

"You are a construct made of ice, moved by unconscious manipulation." The people who knew him let the younger ice mage speak up.

"Unconscious manipulation…what the Imperials call a Fourth Order Mage, a Domain Mage utilises a Domain. This skill is an area of control that a mage has and is formed with Will. I am a construct imbued with Will. There are around 30 of us, each with very similar capabilities. An imperfect clone." Seven overestimated the comprehension of the younger kids and warriors.

They had no idea what he was talking about.

To clear the questioning eyes of the uneducated and the young, he plucked an arm off. "I do not have a physical human body." He removed the refractions and shut off parts of the runes that gave him hues of colour that made him look exactly like Ebony. Turning into an ice blue moving statue.

It seemed like other than Masline, the rest of his class didn't shout out their intense confusion or curiosity as much. It was a pattern amongst people who could fight and patiently take a test that lasted hours to days. He quietened their 'how are you moving' and questions about his spell or whether he could teach them to do the same.

"Each of you has your own skill set and growth path. My training will not require you to abandon any of that, but cut down useless parts and refine useful parts to become a better version of what you envision yourself to be. Since all of you have passed the simple test, you've shown that you at least want to grow strong. You will prove that when you beat Ebony and pass as my student. As for how long it'll take, that depends on you and me. To beat Ebony with your natural disadvantage…you'll have to train a few times harder than Ebony. Don't worry about the training plans, I have enough that even Ebony can't do some of it since he gained a weakness."

"What weakness?"

"You'll have to find out. Now let's begin. The topic today is mana perception and manipulation. All of you, warriors and knights in training, should be able to perceive mana. Today, each of you will have to tell me how much of your mana and a foreign mana entity I will conjure to the accuracy of 3 decimal points without reading your status screen. Raika, 10 decimal points for you and Tiha, 15 for you. The three of the unclassed can perceive mana too, but training your sensitivity now isn't all that useful, so you can start by moving your mana internally and attempt to conjure it out of your body."

Seven's lesson went by quickly, and his students proved they could meet the minimum standards in class, so he transitioned onto the field for practical combat on day 2 onwards.

It was odd.

None of them, Raika included seemed to be familiar with 6-hour-long, maximum intensity training twice a day. "I know I said I won't be teaching a specific skill, but after seeing your inept abilities and in the face of efficiency, take this book. It is my Core Skill up to Tier 5. By the end of this week, all of you need to have its Tier 1 version. Raika and Tiha Tier 3 and 2, respectively."

Interval mental meditation and focus training to rest their bodies was more strange to them. But their recovery, even with Seven's mana and their expensive use of Will wasn't getting his students to regenerate mana fast enough for effective training.

Their shock when he pulled out a personal Core Skill that's detailed with training methods and tips all the way to Tier 5 was exaggerated in their eyes, but some of them seemed more shocked that he had a Meditation Type skill as a Core Skill.

He planned to have them train individually for quite a while. Work on their mind-body connection and fully utilise every point of their stats for those has levels and stats but weren't able to exert either their Strength, Agility or their Intelligence fully. This seemed to be a problem for most Imperials. They had the stats but couldn't exert all of it to their full potential.

A common case of a lack of training and usage of their stats.

Each of their opponents was a conjured version of themselves.

Warriors using their own techniques and masteries, and mages facing copies of their spells against themselves.

Simulating and putting a Journeyman's skills and spells into practice against themselves was hardly a challenge. After weeks of waking up, being beaten, meditating, eating, beaten, eating and fainting, they finally got rid of their inconsequential pride for being 19 out of 600 to pass the bare minimum bar to train.

Finally back in the classroom after weeks, even Masline didn't have the energy to voice random questions and thoughts on the top of his mind.

"Now all of you have the bare rudimentary grasp of moving your body to avoid dying by tripping yourself. Your spell casting no longer affects your body movement and the ability to go into meditation within 10 seconds after most situations where pain and fear are stepping in. I suppose it's time to learn some useful mana manipulation techniques." Seven lamented that the group of healers had complained to Mallory, and they needed their rest. His students' mental state were resilient thanks to his soothing aura, but not indestructible.

Amongst his first training aims was to constantly target their legs. Now, warriors and mages alike were keeping themselves mobile at all times. Learning from pain and fear was as effective as he remembered. They must have learned well after watching, feeling and healing from frozen, shattered, burned, sawed-off, sliced-off legs and more.

They were so lucky, Ebony didn't have such healing fallback during his time on Earth, but the greatest healers on the planet was all at Mallory's command. But since they were 'normal', their minds weren't taking it well, and it wasn't great to make them think they can regenerate limbs when they couldn't actually do that themselves.

Seven untied a large sack and poured out the iron balls he got from the apprentice blacksmith class on campus.

"These are Inferior-ranked iron orbs. The objective today is to melt them with your mana."

"Easy enough." Rauthar Blaze of the Blaze Viscount family, the level 100 fire mage, was typically excitable and loud. A trait shared by the two fire mages in his class. Gaining 5 levels in a few weeks was good for them, but nothing surprising for Seven.

However, just like Masline, they cooled off after his training sessions and didn't have the energy to look up from his desk.

"Arcane, without elements." Seven added.

"What? How can we melt iron with pure mana?"

Seven rippled mana into the orb, melting the iron from within and rippling in the same motion from down to up before solidifying and melting again like a bubbling water fountain. "Rauthar and Luca, was there any fire elemental mana?" He asked both fire mages in his class. Luca Ember of the Ember Baron family was the lowest-ranked Noble amongst his students.

Seven converted mana into ice and repeated the exercise. "Seren and Tiha, what did you sense?" The two ice mages in his class were addressed. Seren Dolty was a commoner and the first of her line to have the aptitude for ice magic, but from a long line of mages.

"Yo-you used ice mana to melt the iron ore. And it's producing heat so-so your ice is hot." Seren had a Generic Skill to accurately sense temperature, both hot and cold, so she could tell what was happening even better than the Frost Elf Tiha.

"Trainer Seven, what use is that for us?" The apprentice swordsman Apol, never introduced his last name. He always had a serious expression and never interacted with his classmates much even though they were currently living in a dorm that Mallory built within the grounds that Seven was loaned.

Instead of explaining, Seven drew his longsword, imbued and vibrated mana and gently sliced the corner off his table. "No need to be a fire mage to use heat as a weapon."

"What about me, Trainer Seven? I don't use weapons." Tharnuminium Tower, the Dwarf of Ducal lineage, raised his hand.

Seven did the same by picking up a metal shield he had in his classroom for his demonstration against Tharmuminium. He asked one of them to toss a projectile at him and he melted it in the same way. "You'll need more precise control where only one side is heated unless you don't mind melting your arms or whatever you're protecting behind your shield."

"Ehm, Trainer Seven. Do we really need to use heat? My ice will melt before my projectiles hit the target. And using it ranged will have our arcane control release once we fire our spell off, we can't use Will. And if our projectiles overlap with a creature's magic body, all control is useless, making the arcane spell unusable in battle unless we are touching the object." Seren raised her concerns.

"Walk before you run is a phrase I used to hear, but you should begin learning how to fall first, then crawl. To answer your question about ranged usage of this, you can directly fire off a channelled stream of mana, it doesn't have to be ice. Like this." Seven pointed at a target right outside the classroom window and channelled a beam of mana that melted a hole in his target.

"This allows you to keep contact with your mana, and your magic body will follow. Although weakened the moment this contact reaches your target's magic body, it's a good way to bypass and overlap your magic body over your target's. You can control your spell and manual manipulation of mana touches your target this way."

"I see! I didn't think of that!" Seren bonked her fist on top of an open palm. She was one of the few who could retain an energetic mood even after his training.

"Shaen, this is actually most useful for us fist fighters. Your human body, especially, isn't all that good as a weapon. These auxiliary techniques can help a lot. Other than just vibrational heat control, you need to learn how to send your mana deep into your target for a piercing effect that your fists alone can't produce right now. Other than piercing, you can also try destructive impact if you're targeting to break scales and armours without hurting your target too much." Seven called out the only other martial artist here.

Shaen Veil was Hector's bodyguard Welser's grandnephew. The leader of the Eclipse Guards probably told his family it was a good chance to learn from another martial artist. Ebony heard from Hector when they were young that Welser was also mainly a martial artist.

Demonstrating the effect, Seven punched a wooden plank to snap it with his fist while mana was punched out to break a second plank placed behind. "One good knock of this to juggle your opponent's brain, crush their mobility while their stunned and most Journeyman, Master ranked creatures can't defend or run properly anymore."

It would even work on Grandmasters and Kings, but at that evolutionary stage, it wasn't rare for monsters to have bodies that could protect themselves well enough to wait for their brains to settle from a light impact or shock.

'Huh. Ebony's on the way back. That's fast, did they even get to Cinderash? Something must have happened.' Seven considered Ebony's one new weakness that he never shared or infected any of the Numbers with. Scarlet Rhael Xin.

They don't receive many memories concerning them or her. Their private time is still their own, and the Numbers weren't allowed in their home, so this weakness of theirs never spread to the Numbers while Dusk was overprotective; that was the Domain's purpose.

The Numbers only cared about themselves and Ebony. Teaching students was for his benefit.

Seven waited for Ebony to tell them he was within safety range before sending any updates to their Will generator. When he got the okay, he informed Mallory that they could make it to the little 'ball' of theirs.

But that was none of Seven and his student's business.

They needed to create someone stronger than themselves.

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