Chapter 92 – Flux

"I don't have any problem with you leaving. In fact, this may be a good opportunity. There are definitely class 3's over there, and they're just walking bundles of experience for you. Who knows, they may be able to push you up to class 4."

"If they're already at the level to where I can level up, this may be worse than we think. But I agree."

Riddick nodded and became less opposed to leaving after hearing Dream.

"Well, I can't go with you, but I can help with any preparations you need. Whether it's enchantments, transportation, or whatever else. So if you need anything, let me know."

"I could actually use your help with some things, so I'll take you up on that offer. Just wait for my call."

"Sure. Anything else?"

"Other than that intelligence, no."

"Right. Actually, hang on."

Dream took out some metal from his inventory and began forging it. He made another tablet and enchanted it.

"You can use this as a printer. It'll print whatever is on the screen onto a piece of paper using mana. So I'll send you the data on that and you can just use that to print it. Wiki will help you if you need anything."

"...Very well. Then I'll be going."

Dream and Riddick left the stadium and said bye, going their separate ways. Dream compiled a report in his head with the intelligence about the demons he had and sent it to the tablet. He then walked back to the dorm.

When he walked into his dorm, he found that Arrina and Mara were already there.

"Oh, what's up."

"Hi! I can't believe we did it!"

Arrina stood and got all excited again. Mara smiled seeing that.

"You worked hard. But this is only the beginning. We'll be back on our schedule tomorrow, just incorporating intermediate magic. Which I also need to begin studying."

"Ok. But why aren't you more excited? We've gone up a class! I've been looking forward to this day for 2 years!"

"Heh, congratulations."

"We really do need to celebrate! Oh! Why don't I get some alcohol and bring it here. We can drink tonight!" 

"I-I've never had alcohol..." (Mara)

"Really? Then we really need to drink tonight! I'll be back in a bit!"

Arrina excitedly ran out of the room, leaving Dream and Mara alone.

"...She really is excited." (Mara)

"Ya, she is. Though I won't be getting drunk tonight."

"What's it like?"

"Hmm, I guess it's not bad. It can be fun If you don't go overboard. Were you thinking of trying it?"

"...I guess I could."

"Huh. Well, no pressure. Do what you're comfortable with."

Mara nodded to him. She had become very comfortable with them. Especially Arrina. They had been bonding a lot over Arrina's training, and it was easier to befriend her since they were both girls. Not that her and Dream had a bad relationship, it was just different. 

Overall, the three had become really close. Mara was comfortable enough with them to try something she never had before, and Arrina wasn't guarded emotionally from them since they saw her cry basically every night. And Dream was always very casual with them and they felt he was really easy to be around. So although the three were very different, they got along great.

Soon, Arrina came back with plenty of alcohol. 

"Where did you even get this? You don't have an inventory."

Dream spoke confusedly. She hadn' been gone for very long and came bag with two whole bags of bottles.

"I went to a shop near the academy. Although it costed me quite a bit."

"How much?"

"Like a gold. But it's alright."

"...How much money do you have on you right now?"

"Hmm, maybe a few gold."

"...Take this."

Dream took out a bag from his inventory and dropped it on the table. It clanked heavily against the wood, and one could immediately tell that there was a lot of money in there.

"I-I don't need it. It wasn't that much."

"I'm not repaying you for the alcohol. Think of it as an allowance from your teacher. I can't have my student barely able to pay for some drinks. There's like 60 some-odd gold in there. It's yours now."

"Bu-"

"No buts. You'll pay me back in hard work. This is only what you deserve."

"...sniff"

"Oh god."

"S-shut up! You...I...Thank you."

"Oh."

Arrina came over and gave Dream a hug. He didn't reject and hugged back. He also waved over Mara.

'Come here.'

'No, that's fine.'

'Not asking. Come give your friend a hug. She's...sad or something.'

'...'

Mara sighed and came over, awkwardly getting in on the hug. Arrina noticed and invited her in while still weeping a bit.

"...*sniff* Thanks." (Arrina)

"S-Sure." (Mara)

They all released each other. Arrina picked up a bottle from the table and opened it up.

"Alright. It's time for drinking. Mara, just follow my lead."

Saying that, Arrina threw the bottle back, guzzling half before setting it down.

"Ahh..."

"Yea, don't follow her lead. Here."

Dream brought out a glass before pouring some beer like drink into it and handing it to Mara.

"Pace yourself."

"Ok.....Blehh"

Mara tried some and it immediately became clear how she wasn't a fan. Dream chuckled and had her try a different glass.

"Try this."

"...It's juicy."

"That's because it's made with juice. You'll like it better."

Dream had handed her a different bottle with a margarita mix in it. Meanwhile, Arrina went to town with her own liquor.

For the next few hours, Dream kept bringing out different liquors for them to try. It didn't take long for Mara to get buzzed, and Arrina wasn't trying to pace herself so she was gone even faster. Dream just sat back and watched their funny little interactions. Turns out alcohol was the perfect way to get Mara all riled up and outgoing. 

But it soon turned into another sob fest when Arrina began crying for some reason. Dream stopped trying to find the reason a while ago and just let her do her thing. Though Mara seemed to be affected by the mood and although she didn't want to, she also began crying.

It wasn't long before Dream had an angry crybaby yelling at him and another quietly sobbing on his lap. He felt like a parent. 

'I did not sign up for this.'

[Hehe, you let two emotionally awkward girls get drunk, what did you think was going to happen?]

'...Fair point.'

Dream sighed and accepted his fate.

After a while, both girls fell asleep when Dream began stroking their hair as they lay next to him. There might also have been some magic thrown in there, but that's beside the point. They were both asleep now, and silence finally descended upon the room. He carried them over to the bed to sleep. 

"*sigh* Alright. Onto my next order of business. How's the facility?"

[It's moving along well. You'll be thrilled to see the numbers.]

Over these past 5 days, Dream definitely did not idle on the mining operations. Every night when Arrina fell asleep and Mara left, he would go out to the facility and expand his fleet.

The Iron deposit was only the first of several deposits that they found. After Dream had gone out and deployed more scanners and expanded their range, he was able to find deposits of more Iron, some silicon, gold, and even silver. He also deployed more mining teams that went out to dig these deposits.

These mining teams were extremely efficient. He would get batches throughout the day carrying dozens of tons of minerals. And they would automatically process themselves at the facility. So right now, Dream had tons of materials just waiting to be used.

"How much of everything?"

[400 tons of steel, 30 tons of Gold, 20 tons of Silver, and the Silicon hasn't been processed yet. We also have lots of phosphorous and sulfur as byproducts from the refining.]

"Nice. Especially that Silver, or I should say Mithril. Do we know what grade it is?"

[On the scale of one through 8, 50% is grade 6 while the rest decreases in grade.]

"No grade 7 huh...You know what we need to figure out? Why the hell Silver has grades. What makes it stronger? I would love to know if we could take that silver and boost its grade."

[It seems to be some natural process. So I see no reason why we couldn't replicate it.]

"Then let's head down there and try."

Dream stood up and left the girls in the dorm, locking it so nobody would stumble in on them. 

He quickly left the city and made it to the facility. He went inside and walked past all the bustling machines and robots before coming to the storage area.

"...I like this kind of sight."

When he entered he was greeted with massive pallets of steel ingots and sheets. There were also some pallets of Silver and gold, but those were in much smaller amounts.

Dream went over to the Silver first. He grabbed an ingot bigger than his hand off a pallet.

"Grade 6. Where's a grade 2?"

Dream looked around before an ingot came flying over to him. He caught it and saw that it was a grade 2. He then brought out a table and chair and sat down to inspect the ingots.

"So, what're the differences between these?"

[...There isn't.]

"Like, none?"

[Well, other than the mana concentration no. Physically, this is just silver. And atomically these two ingots are identical. They're the stable isotope of 109 and they have their correct amount of electrons. Just as silver should.]

"So...Why does one have more mana than the other?"

[I don't know. But it's interesting. This means that mana doesn't actually affect physical objects.]

"Then how do I do everything I do if mana doesn't affect physical objects?"

[Again, I'm not sure. But when you look at this silver, it's only silver, despite it being stronger than normal silver. That means that the silver is taking on properties outside of itself. Sure we can manipulate this silver to do different things, but the matter that makes up the silver is never breaking the rules of the fundamental forces. It still bonds the way it should and the particles act accordingly.]

"...But that still brings us back to the initial problem. How does it become stronger if nothing is physically affecting it?"

[The properties are a result of the mana. But the mana doesn't actually interact with the material physically, otherwise this silver would look and act different atomically. I mean, if the fundamental forces that constituted the rules of matter changed due to mana, then this whole world would cease to exist. So we can firmly determine that mana does nothing physically. But it still has its influence on matter. Or at least we think it does.]

"Hmm...So theoretically, if we remove the mana inside the silver it would lose its strength. Let's try that."

After he spoke, Dream sucked all the mana within the silver away. All the mana was removed, and the silver was turned into regular silver.

[This manaless silver acts as base silver would. It's not nearly as strong as steel, unlike when it has mana.]

"I also noticed something when removing the mana. It was harder to remove the mana from the grade 6 silver than the grade 2 silver. It was like it was attracted to it, like a magnet. Even right now I can feel the attractive force on the mana coming from the silver."

[I'm picking up on that too. Very weird.]

"Extremely."

[The grade 2 attractive force is weaker than the grade 6. So the difference between them lies within the origin of this attractive force.]

"Something that attracts mana, and it's attached to this silver. It's different than mana. And we can't see it. It's a totally different energy."

[I think we've made a new discovery. This mysterious energy that attracts mana and attaches itself to ordinary matter. It let's mana give materials miraculous properties without actually affecting the material. And yes, we can't detect it. But now we know it's there. What should we call it?]

"Hmm..."

[How about Flux?]

"...Flux. Cool."

Dream nodded at the name. This Flux seemed to be the middle man between mana and matter, and it's what caused this silver to strengthen and gain its properties. 

"So, how do we control this flux? It seems that if we get more flux in one place, then it'll bring in more mana, which is what makes silver into this Mithril. But we can't detect this flux."

[Well, let's look at it from an Earth perspective. Materials from Earth, before it gained mana, had none of this flux. Remember when you infused a bunch of mana into that bullet and it exploded? Well, It wasn't because of the mana since mana can't affect physical matter. It was likely this flux. Maybe the flux was overloaded with mana and exploded. Even with the materials like this Mithril, if you infuse more than its base amount of mana, it'll slowly release the mana until it returns to its normal levels.]

"So how does this let us control flux?"

[...Well It's hard to explain why, but I think mana also has a certain effect on flux. This explosion is an example of that, how mana can affect flux. So I'm not sure how, but I think If we experiment with mana concentrations in weak materials like grade 1 or 2 Mitril, then we'll be able to see how flux interacts with mana.]

"Hmm, that's really all we can do right now either way. So, let's start."

Dream stopped thinking about it and began the experiment. He brought over several ingots of Grade 1 through 6 Mithril and put them on the table.

"So the first thing we should do is see what these explosions do."

Dream picked up a bar of grade 1 Mithril and began dumping mana into it. This stuff was closer to regular silver than Mithril, and it couldn't contain a lot of mana. So it didn't take long for him to begin reaching its limits. But it was interesting how he discovered these limits.

"The mana becomes unstable when it reaches its limits."

[I can see that. It's like gas in a container. When there's more, the pressure to escape increases.]

"So let's see what happens when we push it to the very limit."

Dream kept infusing his mana little by little. The mana became more and more unstable until finally, it exploded.

*Boom!*

<[Material Magic] has leveled up!>

<[Material Magic] has leveled up!>

<[Material Magic] has leveled up!>

<[Material Magic] has...>

The bar exploded into nothing. From what Dream could see, the bar literally just disappeared. He also felt pressure from the explosion on his hand, but it was minor. Not only that, but he got several level ups!

"Material Magic leveled up 8 times. So what happened?"

[When it exploded, all the atoms of the bar were separated and released. Though the explosion wasn't enough to make it deadly or cause nuclear reactions. Oh, look over there.]

Sophia pointed in a direction and Dream looked. A couple feet away on the floor was some chunks of silver in varying sizes. Though none were bigger than a marble. He also found some chunks on his clothes, and even some on his hand. 

[They must've rebonded. It was just hard to notice due to the insane speeds.]

"So that's what the pressure on my hand was."

[So that seems to be the only way mana can affect matter, through exploding the flux. But even then, it's only the flux that really affects the matter.]

"So does mana separate flux?"

[...Bring over those chunks of silver. I saw something during the explosion, and I think I know the answer.]

Dream did what she said and the thousands of little pieces of silver brought themselves to the table. She scanned them with mana and also removed mana, testing the flux.

[I was right, the flux has been dissipated. These chunks and their pull on mana is incredibly small now, almost nonexistent. So the flux has been removed. And you know what I noticed when the bar exploded? The immediate surroundings pulled on the nearby mana, an obvious result of the flux being spread out. We can use this. Dream, I think I know how to make stronger materials!]