The Core would not say no to such a thing, agreeing to the idea quickly enough. While it did imagine there would be issues with the manipulation of Space, there were no ideas about what couldn’t be done with the skill. There were no limits on just what potential such a thing would have. [Space-Manipulation]. Even the name sounded wonderful, even if the Entity had just made it up. It was sure that the Queen would explain the details perfectly.

‘With that room cut out of the way, you should have just about… one thousand cubic meters to work with. It would seem more than enough to work with on a smaller scale yet filling up the tunnel to the entire way up to the surface would not be good for that. There is no real way of doing that the basic way,’ the Queen confessed, though she wasn’t seeming too unhappy about it. The Core wasn’t either, really, more confused on why she hadn’t told it how to bend space yet. ‘Luckily, I do believe that we can take the approach had before. Little Rock, you have been told about how to separate your mind near-fully from your creatures, yet you might not have realized you can do the same to the Mana you send out. It might not be to the degree, but it more than allows you to grow and expand.’

… What? Ignoring the wasted time not talking about the manipulation of space, the Core had to take a step back to rethink just what had been told. It could distance itself from the Mana sent out? But wouldn’t that just assimilate it into the air around and become useless?

‘Why would that do me any good?’ the Core questioned, not understanding it at all. ‘If I did that, it would do nothing positive and only be a waste of energy that could have been used in other ways.’

‘That is what you would think, yes. But there are more secrets to the trade than you would imagine,’ the Queen said. ‘You might not realise it now, due to your lack of [Area-Spells], but the mental fortitude for creating a large area within your constant range of observation can be quite grating to the mind. With even the smaller circles, full observation can cause minds to shatter. Which is why the commonly used technique doesn’t do that anymore, only following along the outlines and filling the inside with less important Mana.’

‘Less important?’

‘I suppose you could call it a down-graded tier of your own energy if that makes more sense to you. It is of the same quality as your Energy, will still allow feedback in some limited capacity, and can be grown to much more extreme sizes than your normal view can since that very same feedback is limited. It is more constricted in its use, yes, but the utility in that small gap is unimaginable,’ the ant continued, clearly happy with the technique in more ways than the Core could imagine. ‘You might start out by thinking that it just wastes away your energy, but that is what the Outline stops. Instead of letting it be released, you create a wall of high-density energy around. By having what’s inside already be detached and not ever-growing in density, you can have the area be wide and massive while only having direct control over a smaller layer on the sides. It’s quite ingenious, but there are some parts of these walls which will require you to Tether them to solid material, lest they will just-’

‘Float away?’ the Core said, already starting to guess what the premise was.

‘...Yes, that is correct. I can’t say I expected you to know that,’ the Queen confessed. Her emotion sounded a little confused. ‘But, this technique is quite hard at your level, due to the larger swath of Mana that needs to be set up perfectly. Even one crack can make the entire thing topple down and force you to redo it. While there are some ways to fill it in slowly, I would have to say that-’

‘I think I’ll just use Panels instead of making it one big wall,’ the Core interjected once again, though that second incurred the wrath of the Ant Queen who had so graciously decided to explain everything. ‘It will stop the chance of everything falling apart and just isolate the issue to a few meters instead, allowing for a fix before it all becomes cracked and weak.

The Queen was not happy with that. Not happy at all, her mood clear to the skies, even if those very same skies were invisible due to the stone above them. The gist of it was that she was not happy at being interrupted but also very interested in just what the rock was talking about.

‘Separating them into smaller forms might sound good in theory, but the actual application of it into the real world would be quite the work ahead. The inner walls of such things would require tremendous amounts of energy, even at your current level. I am not sure you would be able to get it done in the next few years.’

‘I have already done it before,’ the Core commented, though it waited for her to finish this time. It was nice like that. ‘All the walls around you have been made into Mana-Walls as well by using only Panelling and the tethering of them to Physical Material. It’s what has allowed me to even gain the current size I am at.’

‘...oh,’ was all the Queen had to say at that. Some parts of the ant seemed entirely unstressed at that moment as if some part of its mind had been unlocked. ‘I should have expected it would be something like that. The older Cores are capable of doing much more than what you have done here yet they mostly use pure [Willpower] to contain their Mana in their desired densities. That you used a technique normally kept for high-power area spells did not come to me naturally, I must confess, yet it does make more sense with what I’ve previously seen. And… these barriers I’ve detected all over the place, put into hexagonal shapes, what exactly are their purpose?’

‘They are there as a last defence of sorts. If the Panelling somehow gets damaged, the inner defence will stop larger amounts of Mana from slipping out. While it does make natural Mana travel harder, it can be possible with a few orders to the Barriers,’ the Core supplied helpfully.

‘Ordering the Walls? Another technique you shouldn’t have known about yet but I suppose surprise is something I have to adjust to,’ the Queen said. Her age seemed to increase at that moment, though it regained its former youth moments later. ‘But, putting that interjection behind us, I do believe I still have something to explain to you. Every piece of Mana in this room is under your direct control. While you might have already known the technique required for the walls, the mental separation of your Mana is still at large. It is a peculiar sensation, so I do believe that you will have to try and figure it out yourself, though still knowing that it is there. After that, I think I can try to figure out just how much the System allows you to see, but let us take it one step at a time. Just try to separate a few particles of Mana from your own mind while keeping it inside this place. Tell me if you succeed.’

And then the Queen just wandered off like there was nothing else to say, leaving the Core with the task of figuring it out for itself. The Entity was not too surprised at the need for self-reflection, yet the distance that the ant was creating was quite something. With a few ants on their tail, she just… walked outside its domain with no further comments. Such a thing would have never happened with the other creatures at its disposal, none of them smart enough to do such a thing without being prompted to it. The Core supposed that such a thing was something it would need to adapt to in the future, now that it had intelligent creatures under its command. However, it was still slightly annoying.

Were dumber creatures better then? Or were the positive qualities of a smart creature more important? It was hard to say, both sides seeming quite good in different situations. When the Core needed something done to exact detail, the ability to make the dumb creature do it on repeat without any alterations would seem like the perfect tool to have. It wasn’t smart enough to comment, make alterations to the pattern, or really even understand what it was doing. A smart creature, however, could be given a more vague order and just be expected to fill in the blanks for themselves. If the Entity wasn't sure how to do something, it could just make an underling figure it out. That certainly couldn’t be done with a dumb creature. Even the fragment of the Core inside would prove little to no help in the overall scheme of things.

Yet a new situation did also prove valuable. If the Core disconnected from a creature near-fully, taking away the fragment of itself that was normally stored inside the thing, a dumb creature would return to its original intelligence while a smart creature would likely feel no adverse effects at all. While the dumb creature could then likely starve to death, a smart one could be ordered to gain food and nutrition for itself beforehand. The Core could even create smaller pieces of Mana that could be consumed independently, which would allow for a larger amount of prep but much less work during the actual process, making it much more reasonable.

However, the requirements for the smarter creatures did also seem higher. The Queen was the only smart ant found at all, and she was a [Dungeon-Boss]. While the Core most certainly wanted more of her, it was clear that she was a one-time deal, with no chances of creating another being there. Another smart creature would have to be found and that was unlikely with how things were going.

But finding another dumb creature? That was easy. The Core could create ten at that very moment without any effort, the only costs being the Mana required for the actual process. Anything else was purely superficial. It was a wonderful thing, and most surely one that would provide benefits.

So the smarter creatures could do more things, could do the things that dumb creatures could, and were generally more trusted. The dumber creatures, on the other hand, were in greater numbers, could still be used for many tasks, and could be replaced with no hard work. Both had positives but also had limits that were quite extreme. The Core would have to call it a draw for now, though it would perhaps push over to the smarter ones in the future. It depended on how it scaled up, to be honest.

Until then, there was some work to get done. If the Queen was to be trusted, Mana could be separated from the Entity’s mind. It sounded completely weird and would likely not make sense until it was tried, yet the Core still thought it could work. Not because it had any technical hints or anything but due to it trusting the Queen. She was unable to become a traitor, after all, which did provide some comforts.

Yet there was also some wondering on just how it was meant to work. Pulling out a long strand of Mana and settling it onto the air in no finer fashion, the Entity began to wonder just what it was meant to pull on. It needed for the Energy to decrease by a tier in its mind. Not in the way where it became of inferior quality or density but only a piece of Mana less focused on. That was certainly a hard thing to ask for since the strand was the single most focused on a piece of Energy in the entire Domain, at that moment. Being set with the task of making it less so? It just didn’t make sense to the Entity.

Which was why it wanted to do what it had done several times before. It wanted to use the magical [Intent]. It was not the most prominent of tools it had used throughout its life. It was very rough in the making, was expensive to an extreme degree, and couldn't be trusted on at more advanced levels. But it could do so many basic things that it must have been able to do what the Queen had asked of the Core. Surely, it could take away focus from the Mana, right?

Those were the thoughts had at the start of the process. After a few minutes of using [Intent], however, the Core’s ideas did begin to change for the worst. Putting more Mana into the play, Mana which was being used actively, only had the adverse effect of creating more focus on the Energy instead of making it disappear. And scaling up the cost of how much Mana was being used did nothing but expending it. The Energy meant to be put into the background and become noticeable was instead just expended. It provided no benefit, it did nothing, and the Core was forced to accept that the previous method of solving its problems would work this time around. It was annoying but there was no way to go around it.

That left it back at the start, forced to try and force a change with only its mind. No Mana was allowed to be used since that would only make it more noticed. Adding onto energy to make it less focused on also seemed quite… idiotic. There was no realm where such a logical leap would make sense. Even the Core could see the idiocracy that was its previous plan. But, the hard thing to accept was that it had no others that seemed to have any chance of working.

The pure mental technique was required to make it work, mixed in with [Mana-Manipulation]. The skill hadn't been thought about much throughout the Core’s time alive, since it mostly upgraded itself through other tasks. Yet, now that it was something which the Entity had to use solely, lest it wouldn’t be able to make the current task work, it couldn’t help but think back to how much the skill had helped it throughout its life. It was the first skill ever gained, the first skill that showed promise, the only skill that could be directly attributed to allowing it to gain the confidence of the system. While [Mana-Sense] played a part in the early life as well, it would have been utterly useless without [Mana-Manipulation]. One could exist without the other but the opposite was not true at all. Bringing up both skills in question, the Core looked upon them as they were.

[Mana-Manipulation]

Description

Rarity

Cost

Allows for the user to manipulate [Mana Currents]

Rare

Passive

[Mana-Sense]

Description

Rarity

Cost

Allows for the user to sense [Mana Currents]

Rare

Passive

Each hadn’t changed their descriptions since the start, nothing was added or removed. The Core sometimes wondered why that was so, not fully understanding the reasoning behind it. Both skills had been upgraded multiple times throughout their life yet their actual uses had never changed much. Were their goals simply so noble that even extra power did nothing but increase their dedication to that area of specializations? The Core supposed it could respect that, knowing that it would likely be unable to do the same. The desire to grow to the sides instead of just up was too much to handle and it leapt into that temptation more than it could ever hope to quantify.

But that lack of resistance did bring results as well. While it might not have grown as much in singular areas as it could have, the sheer amount of skills gained throughout its life was more than it would have ever hoped for. While, yes, several had never been upgraded, the fact that they were there proved more than the Core could hope for. It showed that even the most abstract path could work in the long run.

But… those two skills had done more than they had, even when staying on their path. Their [Synergy] was off the charts as well, the Core not sure it had any other two skills which worked as well as those two. The [Mana-Manipulation] allowed it to interact with the most fundamental energy of the world, yet it could not see what it was doing without [Mana-Sense] there to guide its way, lightning up every piece of Mana that it could see in the distance. It was a beautiful thing and certainly something that the Core could understand the importance of. When removing [Mana-Manipulation] from the entry, no other skills could work even close to as good together, both skills having so much in common that it was unfathomable.

Their ability to reach the essence of the world, and not just the bases of fields that were sprouted from it, allowed for a deeper understanding of the deepest fundamentals. The Core liked to think it understood more about those pieces of Energy, yet it knew that each upgrade would allow for an even deeper scale to be found. It was still in the macroscopic world, forced to obey its rules. What would happen when it went deeper? Would it be able to see the truth, the smallest point of it all? Could it see the secret of [True Creation]? There was a long way before it would ever reach such a pinnacle of being yet it was sure that it would try. And who knew? It could even succeed. Looking over the skills once again, it understood that [Mana-Currents] were its current limit. In time, it would go deeper, but those waves of Mana send out were the only thing that it had to worry about for now.

… That did make the Core wonder. [Mana-Currents] were not just strings of Mana sent out but waves of energy moving through the space at incredible speeds. The Entity had always looked at its own Mana and felt the need to always know where everything was. Because of that, the Mana answered by sending out more waves than it normally did, letting every piece know their exact location concerning everything else. It had never truly thought much about it due to it being such a minor detail back in the day of its creation, yet perhaps it was something to think about now.

What if it changed its ideas about the need to see? What if the Mana ahead responded again? Instead of its Energy always needing to show off where it was, what if those that did were the exception instead of the rule? It would allow for the base to be unfocused while the Core could pick and choose when to actually think about a specific piece of an area. The reaction time would likely increase yet it seemed ingenious.

With a thought, the Core slowed down its desires for knowledge, its desire to know where the world around it was. It wasn’t able to stop it to any extent, its mind always running at full throttle. Yet slowing it was more than in the realm of possibilities, though it took a lot of effort to do. Yet when it finally started up, the Core could feel the Mana close to its body start to fall out of focus, start to become only slightly noticeable. It was still there, of course. The Entity could still feel it if it tried. Yet that innate connection was diminished to nearly nothing.

The Entity had achieved its goal. It had figured it out.

A [Skill] has been improved!

You have understood [Mana-Manipulation] more deeply