A Budding Scientist in a Fantasy World-Chapter 225
Alice observed the three enemy Immortals, and tried to swallow the anxiety building up in her stomach. Technically, the Illvarians had four Immortals on their side - but Doll wasn’t really a combatant, and any advantage her equipment granted them was outweighed by the number of Sigmusi arrayed against them. Alice hated even fights - they were dangerous and scary. She started thinking. Was there a way to win the fight? Alice wasn’t very good at normal fighting, but over the past year, she had learned that she was good at improvising and creating odd but effective tactics.
Her gaze snapped towards Emilia. Could she participate in some kind of upset that changed the battlefield in her favor? Alice had already confirmed that her antimagic mana could work wonders against Immortals - even temporarily shutting off their access to their Perks and drastically reducing their strength. If Alice could shut off Emilia’s Perks and access to the System, even for five seconds, that would be enough time for the other Immortals on board to remove her from the fight permanently.
For a moment, Alice felt a surge of hope… before it came crashing down.
Last time Emilia had tried to kidnap her, Alice had used exactly that trick against her. Emilia was an Immortal. She wasn’t stupid. Would Emilia really come here without some way to counter Alice’s ability? Especially if Alice was the target of this attack? Sure, Emilia might misjudge how Alice’s ability worked and ‘counter’ it incorrectly, but that was an unlikely gamble that could burn all of her antimagic mana on a wasted effort. Besides, while it was possible, Alice didn’t think it was likely. There must be plenty of other Immortals or monsters with unusual and dangerous tricks and magical abilities. An Immortal focused on combat wouldn’t live very long if they didn’t have good ways to constantly adapt, even without understanding the minutiae of how a hostile ability worked.
Worse, Emilia was acting with other Immortals. They would certainly share whatever method Emilia used to counter Alice. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have the confidence to ambush the group like this.
Alice hesitantly opened a portal, disguised with {Dimensional Camoflage}, and tried to stick a mana tendril into Emilia’s body. Alice’s worst fears proved true when her mana simply skittered off the surface of Emilia’s body, as if she were trying to drill through titanium with a wooden screw.
Even though Emilia hadn’t reached the ship after Myra knocked her away, Alice swore that she could see Emilia turn towards her and give her a knowing smile. Alice clenched her teeth in frustration.
So Emilia had, indeed, found a countermeasure against her. Alice suspected it was some kind of equipment, since Emilia didn’t look like she had levelled up and acquired a new Perk since Alice had last seen her. That was even more frustrating, since it meant the other two Immortals probably had copies of the enchanted item.
Alice’s best trick against Immortals had already been countered before the fight even started. Most of her other tricks were unable to influence the battlefield. She had no clue what to do, and Emilia was going to run Myra out of Perk uses at some point.
Allira’s humming grew deeper, and started to take on a darker, more guttural tone. She began to sing of the darkness that dwelled in human hearts, and a mad war that had brought devastation, and all of her shadows began to draw towards each other. Meanwhile, Emilia once again attempted to board their ship, only for Ethan’s mother to knock her away with a broomstick. Alice started to feel her heart clench. Was there really nothing she could do here?
She only had 13 magic tendrils. She could temporarily expand that to 18, though it would only last for a few minutes. That was more than enough to overpower a regular [Soldier], but far from the level of interfering with an Immortal battle. She didn’t have any exceptional enchanted items, except for the armor Ethan had given her long ago, before they had even set off for Morendia. That would give her an exceptional level of durability for someone of her level, but she needed offensive power right now.
Alice gritted her teeth, and searched for a new way forward. She searched for any advantage she had, any unique way to change the battle in their favor.
If she had one major advantage that other Immortals didn’t have… it was her compound magic seed. It had a mana conversion ratio of 332% - far beyond the level that other mages could realistically accomplish without investing a huge amount of time and Perks into it. Furthermore, her compound magic seed had access to all sorts of odd and powerful mana types. Alice had mostly built that compound magic seed into a knockoff version of the System, capable of rebuilding everything - but it could also do much more than that.
Alice briefly considered trying to influence the battlefield with Reality mana, but discarded the idea. She had no way of building up the requisite ‘beliefs’ of other [Sailors] and influencing the outcome of the battlefield in a reasonable timeframe. Besides, visibly manipulating human beliefs to change reality would give the Sigmusi a new and far more dangerous line of thought to pursue - and if the Sigmusi hadn’t realized how reality worked in this dimension, Alice certainly didn’t want to clue them in. Trying to use Reality mana to change the battlefield was unreliable if it worked, and dozens of times more dangerous if it succeeded - unless Alice managed to prevent a single Sigmusi from leaving this fight, and had a way to keep all the Illvarian [Sailors] from talking.
Then, in a flash of insight, Alice thought of a new idea.
Even Immortals could suffer from mana poisoning. While it wasn’t her original, intended use for her compound magic seed, she did have density mana attached to that particular seed. She also had a huge amount of raw mana, and pure mana to help guide and structure what she wanted the mana to do. She also had her dimensional mana trick to expand her range, meaning that she could hit an Immortal with nowhere near the Marium loss other Immortals would suffer if they tried the same trick. Most importantly, Alice could potentially use pure mana to keep her attack stealthy, even if another mage was looking at the area. She could coat the area in a light layer of pure mana first, to make sure it wasn’t immediately obvious just how much mana she was cramming into her target’s body.
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While it was normally incredibly hard to build the mana density needed to put an Immortal through a mana baptism, since they moved around a lot and had incredibly high mana density, this battlefield was uniquely suited to this tactic. Alice had zero confidence that any marium-efficient attacks she could make would actually harm an Immortal, and due to Ethan’s protection she could also maintain her concentration for several seconds without getting distracted by the need to keep herself alive. If it worked, even an Immortal would be in a terrible position. While Immortals had higher survival rates for mana baptisms than regular people, it was still abysmally low. That was even more true now that the System was down, since it was no longer helping people with baptisms. Better yet, even a successful mana baptism was excruciatingly painful and time consuming.
If Alice could somehow force one of the Sigmusi Immortals through a mana baptism, that would definitely tilt the battle in their favor, instead of the evenly matched fight currently taking place. There was only one question left. Would this actually work? Was there a Sigmusi Immortal she could target to make this idea an actionable plan?
Alice looked at Emilia, who was bounding towards them across, and then glanced at Brandon, who was recuperating on another Sigmusi ship and distracting Ethan. Trying to force Brandon through a mana baptism would be foolish - he was already a Mage, and unless Alice could whip up enough Broken mana to force him through a baptism anyway, it would be a pointless endeavor. However, turning mana into broken mana was an extra step in an already lengthy and time consuming process - and Brandon would have the mana sight to react to the danger the moment he realized what was happening. Emilia was also out - she was moving too fast for Alice to interfere with her. Alice would still need at least a few seconds to set up, even in the best case scenario, and with how much Emilia was moving around, there was no way Alice could get that while trying to target her.
That left the third Immortal. The one specifically here to track her. He might be the least impactful Immortal in a direct fight - but an Immortal was still an Immortal. Besides, the man was a problem. Even if the group escaped, he would continue to track them, meaning that another fight would happen sooner or later. The best way to deal with him was to get rid of him, so that the Sigmusi would be left blind if the group actually managed to slip away. Escaping the battlefield would still be difficult - but at least it would be possible if the final Immortal died.
Once Alice made her decision, she acted. She opened up a few portals with {Dimensional Camouflage} and then poked a few magic tendrils through - only to grunt in frustration as her portals came up short. The distance between the third Immortal’s ship and the Illvarian ship was too great, even with the extra mana provided by {Experimental Magic}. The [Slave Hunter] was much too far away for her to influence.
Alice hesitated for a moment, before she got a new idea. {System’s Ambition} still had seeds left for the month… so Alice could improve her dimensional mana base quite significantly if she wanted to. Alice already had a dimensional mana seed, so this felt like a bit of a waste when it came to her compound seed magic slots - but she could think of fringe case uses for it, at least. The System had used paired enchantments to access the rest of the world and spread itself to those who needed it, but dimensional mana might make the whole process easier or more efficient if she ever figured out a good way to deal with the broken mana issues. Besides, she also needed to live if she ever wanted to fix the System.
Alice quickly pulled her magic tendrils out of the battlefield, and signalled to Ethan that she needed a few minutes. Ethan nodded, and to her surprise, didn’t seem annoyed by Alice’s need to temporarily drop out of the fight - instead, he looked almost expectant. Clearly, Ethan had higher hopes for Alice’s weight on the battlefield than Alice herself.
Alice used one of her remaining uses for the month of {System’s Ambition} to try to create a dimensional magic seed - and found that it was much harder than expected. The battle raging around her, the danger present with each breath she took, the chaotic mana in the region as mages and magic tendrils whirled through the air - all of it created a chaotic din that was hard for Alice to adapt to. Every second she wasted, she felt anxiety, and with every arrow she sensed whiz by her position, she felt it grow worse. Even though she was protected by Ethan, she had never been so aware of how mortal she was on a battlefield controlled by Immortals and [Sailors] before. An unlucky hit to her brain would leave her with an injury even Ethan couldn’t heal.
It took nearly a minute for Alice to settle her thoughts and learn to ignore the battlefield - and that was only possible due to tremendous efforts, and the aid of her System-enhanced [Willpower].
Still, despite the struggle to ignore the raging battlefield, Alice managed to achieve her goal. She struggled her way into forming a proper dimensional seed, and then fused it into her knockoff System seed. Her eyes snapped open the moment she finished building and integrating a dimensional seed into her mad construct.
The battlefield around her still raged. Ethan hadn’t quite suffered during her absence, but it looked like Myra was struggling to help Ethan, keep the ship intact, and handle Emilia. Meanwhile, Allira had taken to harassing and destroying weaker Sigmusi ships to help the Illvaria side maintain numbers. Brandon was taking potshots at the battlefield, and generally distracting Ethan and making it hard for Ethan and Myra to handle Emilia. Meanwhile, the Sigmusi fleets had drifted closer - it almost looked as if they intended to board the ship, instead of just sinking it and killing everyone. The Immortal [Slave Hunter] had also picked up a bow and started shooting with deadly aim, putting further strain on Ethan’s kinetic mana and his focus.
Alice focused on the ship the [Slave Hunter] was stationed on. That ship wasn’t closing in at the same speed as the other ships - it was maintaining a greater distance from them. Perhaps it was because the [Slave Hunter] Immortal wasn’t as confident as the other two in a direct fight, or perhaps the Sigmusi were trying to lend him some degree of safety on the chaotic battlefield.
His shooting was terrifying enough. Alice was determined to make sure he never joined the battlefield properly. She opened a portal right on top of his position, and then shot a few magic tendrils through the portal and right next to the [Slave Hunter]. She immediately unloaded a huge amount of pure mana to create a light layer of mana in the area. It was just enough to make the area distracting to a mage - without making it obvious what she was doing. Then, before the enemy Immortal could react, Alice used every single drop of mana in her body to start pulling on her surroundings.
Mana rushed through the air and into the body of the Immortal, like a tidal wave being stuffed into a funnel. Density mana and pure mana all pulled at their surroundings, calling upon every speck of mana in the area to flood into Brandon’s body. Alice struggled to find purchase as her mind rebelled against the strain she was putting it under - but she didn’t let up. She pushed harder, and harder, and harder, and the mana in the air grew thicker. One of the Mages on the Sigmusi ship finally noticed what was happening, and started yelling at the [Slave Hunter] Immortal - but it was too late. The Immortal let out a heart-wrenching scream, before dropping to the deck. Alice grinned.
Success.
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