Chapter 233: Balancing Mana

The pair made sure the fire was not burning at all anymore and made their way inside. Now that they were done Walker noticed they had both become covered in grey ash, The fire he had started was constantly raining ash on them while they focused, they had been too distracted to notice this. Since this was the case the two headed off to clean up. They were extremely hungry having skipped lunch and pushed in to dinner, however it was well worth the entire day spent trying to figure out how to meld these elements in to a form they could use. 

Finding that everyone was already at the table the two jumped in eating before saying anything to anyone. They got a few worried looks but Gil who had headed out to the training field when he had woken up saw that the two were hard at work training, so he had taken it upon himself to keep everyone away from disturbing them. He knew that this was an important task for the two of them to develop their skills. This would not only make the two of them stronger but also the entire party.

The addition of the decaying flames Midnight would be practicing on the gear forged was anybody's guess, the only person that seemed to have an idea was the wandering blacksmith who had started altering the forge at a rapid pace. He knew the ins and outs of different elements' effects on the materials he would use. Thus the party would allow him free reign to make whatever changes that were necessary. 

After the two had taken their fill and dinner had started to die down Hilda shooed them away to bed, she was still Walker's mother and she swore up and down that after training all day he needed rest. Midnight being part of the family was also forced off to sleep, however she was not as deterred as Walker was since she liked to nap after eating anyway. After a but more pushing Walker gave in and let sleep take him.

Feeling a nudge to his shoulder Walker woke up before the sun had even started to rise. Midnight was pushing her head in to his shoulder trying to wake him up. Onyx was wrapped in a coil on her back and immediately relayed her full desire. "Sister says it is the perfect time to train her new skill." 

Walker wondered why it was the perfect time to train her skills now but not feeling too tired he started to get up without arguing. The three of them went downstairs and outside to the dark training field. The moon was just starting to set over the horizon making it extremely early in the morning. Midnight had woken him up well before the sun would rise. "Brother can you make one of the light orbs for me to eat? I am still hungry since it is too early for me to properly enjoy the sun." Walker obliged onyx and made ten of the yellow light orbs for him to eat. "Thank you brother." Onyx greedily snapped them up before wrapping himself around Walker's shoulders and watching him and Midnight prepare a small fire. 

As the fire started to grow the two of them took up spots like they had before. The difference this time was that Walker was able to use the black flame skill to create a black fire ball in his hands. Much to his surprise the flame dissipated almost instantly. This was not as easy as it had been before. Walker looked to Midnight who also was struggling, her decaying breath skill was much smaller and needed much more of the fire they had built to support it. 

"Are we failing because there isn't enough light mana around to keep the black flames balanced?" Walker mumbled this out loud while creating another ball of black flames. This time she used his mana manipulation to pull more light elemental mana near. It proved to still be ineffective though. Walker decided that he needed to increase the draw of the light elemental mana more so he created a few of the yellow light orbs he had made before. " Leave these ones for now, I need them to test a theory."

Creating yet another black flames Walker pulled the higher amount of light elemental mana towards it finally balancing out the flames. This skill had now proven to be more delicate than he expected. The naturally stronger dark elemental mana was easily flowing to the flames since it was darker at this time of night. The light elemental mana was only brought out from the moon and stars so there was not as much around.

Midnight had given up on forcing out more of the flames but instead tried to concentrate the ones she could make. There was already a noticeable difference, instead of spreading out in a wide arc the flames were now being sent out in a small stream at greater distance. The flames that had been orange and yellow on their fire were not dancing with a bit of darkness. This was another change from the previous day, The higher light elemental mana from the day had made the darkness elemental mana stand out in the, not the opposite was happening twitch the light elemental mana. Walker was not sure how to use this to his advantage. 

It was obvious that in the height of day that the light element spells would be strongest. The same was said for darkness element spells at the peak of night. This may be the perfect chance for him to try and practice some dark elemental skills. He had some that he refused to use because of their danger such as the mana desolation skill which was indeed of the darkness element. The fact that it destroyed the targets mana system was just too dangerous to use around any of his party. So it was time to manipulate the shadows. 

Onyx watched intently as Walker released his black flames and instead started to manipulate the dark elemental mana in the shadows to condense in to a solid ball of pure darkness. Onyx was a bit fearful of this since it was the opposite of what he would normally eat. The thing was he could hide in shadows in tattoo form and even had an affinity for darkness mana, it almost called to him. "Brother hold that ball of darkness there." Onyx slowly moved from Walker's shoulder and tried to touch the ball of darkness. His nose tipped it slightly and the ball seemed to stick to him like glue. It melted over his entire body making him nearly pitch black with no shine on his scales at all. 

Onyx immediately snapped out eating the yellow light orbs that Walker had created. There was still no light shine on Onyx's scales like usual, "Brother I need more light." The voice Onyx used to relay this message was desperate, Walker responded by creating a yellow light orb after yellow light obs. Onyx ate them all up until a slight shine started to show through his scales. "Brother, I was able to understand something about myself. The darkness elemental mana can balance in my body as well as the light elemental mana." 

Onyx seemed to be switching between the two different elements on his scales to balance them, Walker was surprised that he had found a way to practice his own affinities for the two elements without using skills. This was purely manipulating mana within his body now something anyone could do. 

Walker returned to creating his shadow ball while keeping an eye on Onyx and Midnight who both were practicing their own ways. The ball of darkness was not at all like the light orbs, it was able to change shape much easier as if it did not need a form to exist. This must be why shadows could seemingly copy any shape in reference to the light around something. 

Walker shaped the dark ball of mana, he first made a spike that looks sharp but his hand actually moved through it when he tried to touch it. This spike wasn't really there because the darkness elemental mana was not condensed enough. Walker focused more of his mana in to manipulating the element to try and achieve this. Slowly the deeper the darkness grew the more physical the shadow spike seemed to be. 

Time passed as they all experimented with the different elements manas, Walker finally felt resistance from the dark elemental spike after taking over an hour to condense it. Darkness elemental mana did not seem to want to stay in a solid form and was trying to spread out again. Walker wondered why this was the case when light elemental mana easily condensed, could it be because light elemental mana was always flowing through the air? While darkness elemental man shifted and spread out as big as it could at all times? Walker was left with so many more questions than he had started with looking at the darkness elemental spike.