Alone within the large crystal-illuminated space of the dungeon, Lewis touched the large pillar of glowing crystal three times his height and felt its mana. For some reason, it reminded him of a plant as he used [Mana detection] to peer deeper into the mana-rich crystal.
He had somewhat expected it to be a large container filled with mana, like a natural jar of sorts, but it appeared to be a lot more complex than that. Just like the layers of a tree or even the cells of a human, the crystal was separated into countless smaller crystals that each seemed to trap mana, all these tiny crystals sticking to each other like magnets and fusing to form this larger whole. Since it seemed to be emitting a pale blue light, Lewis had assumed the stored mana had some sort of affinity to it, similar to the fire mana he had the opportunity to get very familiar with.
However, instead of his mana detection providing him with an intuitive understanding of the mana's aspect, he instead only got the vague feeling that it was tight. Or would "compressed" be more accurate?
Deducing how a certain mana made him feel was hardly an easy task; he could only deduce fire mana so easily because of how obvious it was, carrying the scent of faint smoke and ripple of heat that he was familiar with outside of its mana incarnation. But these crystals, on the other hand, gave him only a faint sense of being compressed with no hint about the nature of the trapped mana. Or perhaps that was all there was to its nature?
Either way, he focused on his own recovering mana pool, finding it to be well over half full again, and began to impose his will on it, pushing a small amount out through the hand resting on the large crystal. With his powerful mana detection skill, he could easily make out the dark cloud of anti-mana that leaked from his palm, the anti-mana touching the large crystal and spreading along its surface. But to Lewis's surprise, the crystal didn't begin to disintegrate like the spell stone; instead just lost a bit of its brightness wherever his mana made contact.
But he definitely felt a difference from before, the points he added to intelligence and willpower having a visible effect as he felt his ability to direct the mana increase. He tried expelling some more mana again, but this time he focused on the dark cloud and willed it to stay condensed, wanting to form it into a stick shape rather than have it puff out like a cloud. Focusing on that mental image, he found his mana responding to his will as it exited from his palm and formed a blurry tube shape, still appearing very cloudlike with parts drifting off, but the whole was far more concentrated than before.
When he pushed that into the crystal, he immediately noticed the difference, the crystal's light dimming far more at the spot he was aiming at while leaving the area around it fairly untouched. It hardly seemed that impressive, but Lewis was thrilled at the discovery. The issue he had noticed with his anti-mana was that if he wanted to overcome a dense amount of mana, he needed to smooth it with more anti-mana than it could withstand for it to be destroyed, his own mana essentially acting like acid to any form of magic energy. This was the same thing he did in the tunnel to stop that flamethrower spell. The issue with that is, like this large crystal, he had no way of expelling anywhere near enough mana to overwhelm and dissolve it.
But using more of his own mana than the other person is basically just the magic equivalent of brute forcing it. And that wasn't the standard he wanted to set for himself. If he did, then he would only ever be able to nullify lower-level spells by expending more mana than them each time, not exactly a sustainable strategy. No, brute strength of any kind was never the answer; he needed control.
If his spiritual alignment spell had only given him the ability to increase his base strength, then he would never have been able to so easily deal with those speedy goblins. The only reason he was able to properly harness that surge of power was thanks to his mind being able to keep up and make adjustments on the fly, optimizing his actions to a degree he is incapable of without the spell. That was what he planned to do here, using his anti-mana as a tactical weapon instead of a brute instrument.
Moving his hand away, he found that a portion of the crystal had crumbled and flaked away, leaving behind a small hole where his mana had touched, the light of the crystal shards having utterly disappeared as it returned to a transparent color. Picking up a small piece of the crystal, he found it to be utterly devoid of mana as it crumbled between his fingers, the empty crystal dissolving into nothingness, but with it came another hint.
Are these entirely made of mana, then? Is that why they are so hard to dissolve, even with my anti-mana?
It seemed the crystal was not only filled with mana but also built from it, the mana simply taking on different states, like a cup of water made from ice. The condensed liquid state of the mana acted as the foundation, while the crystallized exterior served as the container. The only way he would get through it is if he could overpower the mana within it first, something that was impossible unless he focused the reach of his mana to that effect.
He drilled a few more holes into that large mana crystal, learning to better condense and control his anti-mana with each new attempt, trying to turn it into a true weapon rather than using it like a madman flinging magic burning acid. But as he managed to make his best pencil-shaped anti-mana form yet, he suddenly heard movement behind him.
Turning around with a smile, he expected to see the others having returned. It had only been a few minutes, so he was about to say they got here fast, but his mouth simply dropped open as he saw what had actually appeared.
At the base of the second crystal pillar, a strange stone-like insect had emerged, seemingly rising from the ground as if stepping out of water, its eight grey legs reminding him of a spider, as a single red eye in the center of the creature's head fixed onto Lewis. The stone spider was only as tall as the goblins, but its legs made it appear considerably larger than its actual body, which was more like a big elliptical rock separated into three segments, one for the head, body, and abdomen.
Lewis just stared at it for a moment, his mind having trouble processing what he was seeing as the creature stayed as motionless as a statue, something he was wondering if it actually was, considering it was made entirely from stone. But after a moment, its single large red eye twitched, and its eight stone legs exploded into action, going from motionless to full speed instantaneously. Lewis jumped in surprise, taking a few hurried steps back as the stone arachne ran towards him, its feet clacking on the stone ground, the same sound as the goblin carvers when they were chipping away at their obsidian blades.
When the creature was within reach, one of its stone legs shot out towards him like a spear, the tip of its leg sharpened to a point as it attempted to pierce him, but Lewis had recovered from his initial shock and activated [Spiritual alignment].
Spell: Spiritual alignment is on cooldown for 21:41
Lewis hadn't expected his spell to fail to activate and so was too slow to dodge out of the way of the creature's spiked leg as it pierced into his thigh, the stone spider managing to embed itself nearly to the bone, despite Lewis's increased constitution.
He let out a loud cry as he grasped the offending limb and managed to yank it out, holding the creature's leg above the sharp point as he roared and tried to lift it, realizing how much weaker he was without his boosting spell active, as he barely managed to get the thing off the ground, its heavy stone body forcing Lewis to abandon his plan of smashing it back into the ground, instead settling on flinging it away from himself. But even then, it barely flew a few meters before sliding along the ground, its sharp legs stopping its movement abruptly as it got back to its feet.
Using the brief window of time he had bought himself, he winced as he inspected his bleeding thigh, noticing with some relief the minimal quantity of blood, the spider having missed any important arteries but still leaving a rather nasty wound that would limit his movement. Still, he was surprised at how little the creature managed to stab into his body. With the strength behind that leg, it should have been more than enough to utterly destroy a normal person's limb, yet even now, he saw the bleeding stop as the wound started itching, his body already working to repair the damage. Lewis was surprised at this, not having expected constitution to improve his regeneration as well, but he supposed it made sense. Constitution did include toughness, but it was far from the only thing it improved. Constitution involves everything about a person's organism, from the durability of their bones to the resiliency and robustness of their cells, including that of their natural regeneration, something he was now witnessing firsthand. Still, it was nothing miraculous, far from the feats he was sure Lee could perform with her magic, but it would likely save him weeks of healing if left unattended.
But he had no time to admire his body's improved resiliency as the clacking of the spiders' return forced him to get moving himself, limping away to get more space, his mind racing about ways to kill the thing.
Unlike the goblins, this enemy was made entirely of stone, meaning its strength was far from enough to crush it; it might even struggle if he had spiritual alignment active. He needed something else, but unlike the others, unless it was to cancel out a spell, he had no other tricks apart from hitting something really hard.
He backed up around the large crystal pillar, trying to keep the stone spider on the other side of it like a game of tag, only with far greater stakes. He considered trying to stab it with his obsidian blade, but the creature's long and pointy legs would be within reach of him again if he got close, and he doubted he would be lucky enough to only get stabbed by a single one of them the next time.
But just as he considered running back out through those large stone doors and rejoining the others, he suddenly felt a very familiar sensation, that of fire mana. Looking at the stone spider on the other side of the large crystal pillar, it seemed it was annoyed at his attempts to keep it at bay, as it was charging up some sort of attack, fire mana building within its red eye.
Right away, Lewis knew why the eye had seemed familiar, its vivid red color reminding him of the spell stone from the goblin mage. The creature's eye, like the rest of its body, was made of stone, so he hadn't put it together until he felt the fire mana building, but more than that, as he really focused his magical senses on the creature, he found it was channeling from its abdomen into its eye, the pale mana being turned into red fire mana as the familiar flame-thrower spell charged, and a smile crept onto his face.
Of course, this is a stone spider; it's hardly a normal lifeform, probably not even alive in the first place, so why wouldn't it run on mana? All I have to do is destroy the core of its power with my anti-mana; no need to break through its stone body at all.
Activating [Anti-magic mantle], a magic-destroying field sprang up around him, but this time, he felt like he possessed far greater control over it, a feeling of being able to extend its reach or simply funneling more mana into it to increase its density. He wasn't even sure how he knew, but mentally pushed more mana into his mantle while keeping it close to his body, ensuring the wave of flames that was to come didn't get through, and not a moment too soon, as the moment he stepped out from around the large crystal, his body was washed in searing flames that attempted to burn him to a crisp. Only the flames failed to do more than warm his body up as they vanished the moment they entered the invisible threshold of his anti-magic mantle. The skills' increased controllability meant he could deal with even powerful magic without needing to manually expel large quantities of mana like before, which was a relief, as he wasn't sure he wanted to damage his spirit any further or have the cooldown for his spiritual alignment further increased.
Despite his injured leg, Lewis limped forward through the sudden rush of flames, hiding his approach from the spider by not even trying to avoid its attack. Unfortunately, with all the fire around him, he wasn't able to properly locate the spider's mana and was forced to blindly stumble towards where he thought it would be, a portion of his mind already primed to deliver his attack.
After the stream of flames had been engulfing him for about two seconds, his hurried stumbling brought him out of the spell's range and right before the stone spider. He noticed its body jerk in surprise at his sudden arrival from the flames, the spider no doubt confused by his unscathed state, but Lewis didn't give it the chance to think as he slammed his open palm down on the creature's abdomen, aiming for where he had faintly sensed its gathered mana, expelling a pulse of anti-mana from his palm at the same time, focusing to make it as condensed as possible, knowing if this failed to kill it, his body would be skewered by the spider's sharp limbs.
The anti-mana projectile shot straight down into its abdomen, its stone body not helping it in the slightest as his attack struck true. The creature froze immediately, the mana in its abdomen flaring briefly before disappearing entirely, his anti-mana having destroyed it utterly, the same way he dispelled incoming spells.
He could have aimed directly for its eye and broken its ability to use its fire spell, but he would rather end this with a single move, and he was pretty sure that the mana that it had used from its abdomen was the source of all its power, its life source, the reason it had been able to live and move in the first place despite possessing a body of stone, so he destroyed its mana core and watched its stone body collapse, all its pieces coming apart as if they were never attached in the first place.
You have slain Stone arachnid - lvl 15 (35 TP)
Skill: Anti-magic mantle has reached Level 8
Skill: Anti-magic mantle has reached Level 9
Skill: Mana detection has reached Level 6
Skill: Mana detection has reached Level 7
Congratulations! You have reached Level 6 (+3 free points awarded)
Lewis chuckled lightly as he read over the notifications, surprised at the creature's high level, but considering it was made entirely out of stone and could bathe its foes in fire, yeah, it was only lucky that Lewis had the right tool for the job. He couldn't imagine the other being able to beat this thing easily.
He bent down and picked up the ruby stone that had served for its eye, making sure his anti-mana was back inside his body to avoid a repeat of last time.
Matt's gonna love this. Oh, and the one from the goblin mage is still in the cave, too. Now it makes sense where they got those spell stones, and it's hardly surprising they only had two of them, considering how hard it must have been to take down these stone spiders.
But as he leaned over, he got a glimpse of a blue crystal buried within the creature's abdomen, the stone having cracked open after it had fallen apart, revealing what appeared to be a spherical crystal with a large split down the middle. It took him a minute to dig it out from the crumbling stone body, but when he did, he immediately knew what he had sensed within the creature when it had charged up its fire spell.
[F-rank mana core (damaged)]
It seemed his guess about the creature was right, but he hadn't expected it to possess an actual mana core.
Do I also have one of these crystals embedded in my body, then?
But just then, he heard footsteps behind him and turned to find the others this time.