Chapter 8: Magic Is Hard...

[Day 7]

It has been a week since I started my new life in this mysterious world.

And I do not know a thing of where exactly I am yet!

Well, I have to grow stronger and find out.

For now, I have been caging myself in this little cave while practicing magic.

I practiced magic all day long yesterday and went to sleep, and now I am awake again, with most of the mana recovered.

Although I practiced for hours, I have barely managed to create something else than a stick of ice that cannot pierce anything.

Seriously, it falls into the floor and it immediately shatters.

Just how bad am I at magic?

However, I do not want to give up yet.

I have been eating the rabbit's veeeeery slowly, while also eating snow to fill my stomach, so I think I can keep up for a bit more.

Also, my leg is finally about to heal itself, and the wound in my stomach has fully closed.

I constantly licked it so it would not get infections, and it seems to have worked.

There was another wound in my back, but that one healed a bit before the stomach one.

Things are getting slightly better.

Now, I have to keep practicing magic.

I once more control the mana around my body and my Mana Core and slowly extract it into the outside world.

I begin to pour my intent and imagination into it.

Knife, knife, knife, knife.

I imagine the knife.

I want a sharp and strong ice knife that I can launch at my enemy's eyes.

I know I cannot make anything bigger because it would cost too much mana.

But a little knife I can create several times in a row would be enough for me.

So I begin imagining it.

I even begin embodying the knife within my mind.

I am the bone of my knife.

Ice is my body, and snow is my blood.

I have created over a thousand knives.

Unknown to Death.

Nor known to Life.

Have withstood pain to create many ice weapons.

Yet, those hands will never hold anything.

So as I pray, unlimited knife works!

...

Poof!

I pour my innermost chunni into this incantation, and it works.

Wait, IT WORKED?!

Suddenly, a knife appears out of thin air!

A knife made of ice!

I... did it!

The knife quickly falls off the floor.

But it does not shatter right away!

Only a tiny crack emerges.

I made it!

This is... my creation, how beautiful.

It is really a small ice knife.

But what is the point of creating them if I cannot launch them?

I have to learn how to launch them now.

When the knife is created through my intent and mana, 5 Mana are spent, and I have around 120, so I can last for a while.

I begin creating a new knife.

I can see the particles of magic slowly transmuting themselves into the ice element and materializing what I had in mind.

While the knife is created, it stays hovering in midair.

Just when it is about to end, I have to generate some kind of icy wind to push it forward.

My breath is an icy wind, but it is not strong enough to push anything, so I do not use it.

I have to create an icy wind myself as I did once when I escaped the rabbits.

That time, I infused the mana into the Ice Absorption skill effect, and it somehow intensified.

For a moment, it felt like I was able to absorb the essence of ice and control it like a flow of cold winds.

Now, I need to do this without it being immensely costly.

I have to trace the ice and learn how to do this.

I need to be able to both create the knife and then push the icy winds to create a proper projectile attack.

Man, this is seriously hard.

The knife falls to the floor, I was too slow, and I cannot manage...

I try to use the wind into the knife in the ground, but the knife just moves around, it is not the same, it needs to be in midair.

My control over these icy winds is terrible, it needs an even greater level of concentration and intent to even be able to shape and move the icy winds.

But as the minutes and hours go by, I keep pushing my limits and trying to figure out the right time...

Shaping the mana into icy winds is harder, even more, when I am also shaping it as the ice knife at the same time.

I have to think about the snowstorm each time I create icy winds, but it gets confusing because I am also creating the ice knife at the same time.

I have to create both things simultaneously and find the right time to push the knife.

This is literally the lowest-level offensive long-ranged spell I can create but it is already incredibly complex to create.

I cannot imagine how hard it would be if I did not have the System...

I keep pushing my limits and using my mana.

But each time, the ice knife falls before the icy wind is created, and everything is ruined.

But I keep practicing, I really do not have anything else to do anyway.

The knife falls, the icy winds flow, time goes flying and it is already night...

Until something else happens.

Ding!

<You learned the [Wind Magic: Level 1] Skill>

Wind... magic.

Oh...

What?!

So the "Icy Winds" were also partially Wind attribute?

So when I was conjuring them all this time... I was also earning wind magic proficiency?!

I guess that is why it was so hard, I do not really need to put ice into the winds, I can just conjure the winds alone and move the knife with it!

This could make it easier!

If it was not because I do not have affinity with wind, yet I learned it.

And when I create the knife, the winds I create explode everywhere except into the direction I want, and the knife almost fell over my own eyes.

I have so many cheats, yet it is quite hard to learn a single spell...

Ugh.

Alright, no time to give up!

I am going to feast on a large wolf one of these days, so I have to keep doing this crap.

Until I can finally manage!