Supreme Magus

"Once closed, the mana channels cannot be opened again because your spell can't pass through the bones anymore, leaving their shape and properties fixed. An incompetent Forgemaster will ruin your bones, giving you equipment that has lost most of its mana conductivity, becoming barely better than silver.

"A scammer will give you bones with the perfect shape but no mana flow that have no Forgemastering value."

The Hydra focused on Second Life, moving her hands like an orchestra director, to better exert surgical precision in controlling the elemental flow through the bones.

After a few seconds, most of the skeleton had turned white again while the emerald energy was now condensed in the mana channels, making them perfectly visible to the naked eye.

"This is what you can expect when you do Second Life right." Faluel moved her fingers as if she was kneading something and the bones fused together, turning from a pile of bones into a single ivory-colored piece.

Yet the emerald flow through the mana channels didn't change in either number or intensity.

"This is when you are doing it wrong." The bones changed into a two-handed broadsword and three of the mana channels lost half of their radiance. "Here you can still salvage the situation, but if you screw up Second life any further…"

All the mana channels disappeared at once and the emerald energy now flowed solely along the surface of the blade.

"That's an irredeemable failure that would turn even the bones of a bright violet cored Awakened into a tool worthy of a caveman at best. Now it's your turn to give it a try."

Faluel pointed at the massive plate where the remains of her breakfast lay.

"Can I work with Lith as a team?" Solus asked.

"No. Be your own person. Especially now that you have gotten your body back." Faluel shook her head. "I'm training Solus, not Lith's accessory."

"Yes, Professor." Solus sighed as her flesh disappeared, replaced by a humanoid stone doll barely 1.3 meters (4'3") tall.

The sunlight that Faluel's arrays allowed to enter her lair had suddenly lost its warmth while the world around Solus seemed to have become painfully distant. Her sense of touch was dulled as if she wore surgical gloves while every noise reverberating through her stone skin sounded like an echo.

"I'm sorry, Solus, but I'm doing this for your own good." Faluel said.

"I'd better get to work. The sooner I understand Second Life, the sooner I can use my body again." The silver lining was that thanks to the latest model of the Sage Staff, Solus could keep her stone doll form indefinitely.

The flow of energy that the artifact provided her surpassed the consumption caused by being away from Lith, giving her the best next thing to Invigoration.

"Professor, there's something I don't understand." Lith said. "You said that we need this complex spell because Necromancy would destroy the mana channels, making them useless.

"Then how can undead use magic? What's the difference between these bones and Nyka?"

"It is true that Necromancy creates life, but it happens in two steps." Faluel replied. "First darkness magic destroys everything and then the combination of light and darkness gives birth to an undead.

"We are not going to reanimate these bones so only step one takes place. It's the same reason why turning a living into an undead takes time. The process destroys the mana channels the thralls used as living beings and creates new ones.

"That's why even though they are not Awakened and their bodies are filled with impurities the thralls and the undead can use true magic, something that normal humans can't."

"What about Quylla?" Friya asked with worry.

"She's a different case. Your sister isn't creating new channels to make up for a faulty core, she is slowly increasing her mana flow. Fake mages' mana is static, true mages like Emperor Beasts have a vigorous flow, and Awakened have full control over their mana core." The Hydra said.

"If Quylla succeeds, she will become like Nalrond. Yet if pushes it too far and the mana flow triggers her core, she'll Awaken and die."

"Are you telling me that the manipulation of the mana flow can trigger Awakening?" Nalrond asked.

"The basics of Awakening is to draw inside your body a huge amount of world energy, creating a flow so powerful that it affects your core as well, so yes." Faluel nodded.

"In this case, I'd like to try the Second Life spell with the others." Nalrond said. "The array is pretty simple and I'm a Healer first. Good case scenario, by mastering this technique I can save a lot of money while dealing with Forgemasters.

"Best case scenario, I can trigger my Awakening and fuse my two cores, just like Lith fused his life forces."

"It doesn't work that way." Faluel sighed, shaking her head. "Otherwise hybrids wouldn't be forced to choose between their life forces if Awakened early."

"It's still worth a try." Nalrond took the remains of a cow and took out his enhanced Forgemastery wand that the Hydra had made to allow non-Awakened mages to use Spirit Magic.

'I better keep an eye on him.' She thought. 'The meditation technique he showed me is similar to a breathing technique, just very inefficient. That and his study of Spirit Magic during the past two years might actually Awaken him.'

The group began working on their respective bones, each of them focusing on a different problem.

Friya had little practice with arrays. Even in its simplified version, the Forgemastering circles with seven elemental flows were hard to handle.

Protector was still more a warrior than a healer so his mana perception was still lacking and he had a tough time feeling the presence of the mana channels.

Solus' deep blue core lacked power, forcing her to split her focus between keeping the spell active, controlling the mana channels, and keeping her output to the maximum. One moment of distraction and she would fail.

'It's no wonder that the Headmasters of the academies have to be Forgemasters and that most men of the Queen's Corps are Forgemasters as well.' Lith thought while he compressed and reshaped the pile of bones into a replica of War. 

'Forgemastery is a discipline that requires the mana capacity of War Mages, the finesse of Healers, the mana perception of dimensional magic, and a mastery over the arrays like a Warden.

'That must be the reason so many Awakened dedicate their life to it, like Faluel and Menadion, while others choose to ignore it entirely. To truly master Forgemastery one must be an all-rounder whereas by avoiding its practice an Awakened has plenty of time to focus solely on a particular branch of magic.'

Lith completed his task quickly and efficiently, obtaining a bone sword with the same density of iron.

Nalrond was no Awakened, but between his two blue cores and his mastery over both light magic and arrays, Second Life was pretty simple to use.

'I've always felt the mana flowing through my body and now that I can use Spirit Magic, I can roughly understand the position of both my cores..' The Rezar could visualize the path of the pure mana that came out of his wand.