Shades of the New World

Elashin didn't seem to expect rejection and didn't bother to hide his displeasure. His tone did a complete one eighty, becoming threatening and dangerous.

"Hm. I hope you won't regret your decisions. Though, thank you for your hospitality. I suppose we shall take our leave now," he replied curtly and went for the door.

Evin went to see them off, but was refused by the three. He stared intently at the three, wondering if they'll do something before leaving. Fortunately, they did not do anything suspicious before leaving. After a few seconds, Rith finally asked him.

"Why did you refuse?"

"I didn't like how he kept calling me his Child," Evin replied nonchalantly.

"Stop kidding… Though, I do agree it's annoying"

"Well, there are a lot of things I could do while I'm here. I don't even know if those guys were telling the truth. Besides, I will soon get enough money from you guys that I probably won't even know what to do with them so I don't need their resources. And I will also have to prove my loyalty afterwards. If I have to go through such a process, I'd rather do it in the kingdom. Plus, the man name Elashin seemed brainwashed," Evin replied.

Rith was a bit shocked with the answer. As she knew what kind of implications it had.

"How do you even know that? Perhaps he was just one of the more zealous believers?"

"Just a hunch. I could later confirm my hypothesis, but for now, I don't want to take the risk. More importantly, do you know anything about his talk of different Ascendants other than the Empress?"

"The Cosmics don't have information regarding that. Perhaps the higher ups know, but it's very likely that they don't. What do you think?" Rith replied.

"Who knows? Perhaps someone from another World has reincarnated as a Child of the Empress. Then their decision to declare itself an Empire would also make sense. Though if something like that happened to me, I don't know why I would declare it in such a way…" Evin pondered.

Rith thought about the matter a for a bit, and then shook her head.

"Sounds like a pain in the ass… I'll inform Abe, maybe he knows something,"

"Also, do you know how strong those three were?"

Rith shrugged in response, indicating she didn't. But added something in the end.

"You know, it's really hard to see how strong a mage is. The only way is to see their mana-core and judge by its size and circulation levels. And even then, most mages on a mission will have methods to hide it. There are also methods to hide which World you are currently imbued with, so that your enemies won't know what kind of attack they should be expecting," Rith finished explaining.

"What are the different rankings for mages, then?" Evin asked.

"It's a bit different in every country. But the Empire classifies the size and circulation levels in a very general way.

Beginner, quarter-core, half-core, lesser-imposer, super-imposer. The distinction is made by the size of the mana-cores, or to be more specific, by their core-to-heart ratio. This is because as the mana-core of a mage increases in size, it also kind of replaces their heart. 

So, a beginner mage's mana-core to heart ratio will be up 1/5 to 4/5. Which means that 20% of their heart will be a mana-core.

A quarter-core's will be from 20%-40%; a half-core will be 40%-60%; a lesser-imposer's will be 60%-80%; and a super-imposer's heart will be 80%-100%," Rith concluded.

"What do those differences mean, then?"

"Let's start from the bottom. Since your core is only about 10% of your heart, you can only absorb half of this 1 kg(2.2 lbs) crystal-grade lodestone at most. After its size reaches 19.9% you will be able to completely absorb this lodestone. But, when you reach the quarter-core stage, you will have a breakthrough and the amount that you will be able to absorb will rise from 1 to 10 kg worth of mana.

At the half-core stage you can absorb 10 - 100 kg (220 lbs) of mana. But at the Lesser-imposer stage, aside from the increase of your mana intake to 1000, you will be able to turn a tiny part of the main World around you into your most used/powerful magical World. At the Super-Imposer stage, a fixed area around you will become your most used/powerful magical World, which you can influence as your mana-core grows in size"

"Wait, what happens to the functions of my heart, then?" Evin asked, dubious of the new revelations. 

"Well, just as I explained, your mana-core slowly eats at your heart, gradually replacing it. Alongside the blood that flows in your body, it would start pumping natural mana inside you, helping you become a being of pure energy, like our Ancestor and the other Authorities. For an average mage, it would reach the size of roughly 35 % of their heart naturally until they are 15-years-old, at which point the process becomes much slower, requiring other methods to increase your core size"

"Does that mean I have to assimilate a World Core or something else to increase my own core's size?" Evin asked, 

"Yep, but you don't have to worry about that for the time being. And also, it would most often be Core Shards, or some other method of increasing your core size,"

"Then what about circulation?"

"That just increases with how much you use the Worlds. Think of it, like, I dunno… Your recharge time after running for a kilometer at full speed. I can't think of a good comparison," Rith said, cocking her head and holding her paw to her chin.

'Guess she means the cooldown timer,' Evin concluded and asked.

"Are there different ways of differentiating them?"

"Yes, it is measured by the seconds that are required for the mage to recharge after he had used an ability which costs all of his mana-core to be utilized. Try creating an illusion which will require you to spend all of your mana-core," Rith instructed.

Evin took out one of his 1 kg(2.2 lbs.) crystal lodestones, which only had the size of 2-3 cm(about an inch), because of how dense it was. He entered the World of Thoughts and then offered half of the mana inside the crystal lodestone in exchange for the energy of the World. He could feel that his mana-core's limit had been reached, so he left the World and just imagined the biggest fire he could create. A three meter wide white flame suddenly appeared in the room and died out after burning to its heart's content.

It wasn't hard for the two in the room at all, since the flame emitted no heat, aside from the little psychological effect.

"Tell me when you feel like you can do the same again," Rith instructed.

Evin only nodded and concentrated on his mana-core. After a few dozen seconds, he nodded at Rith.

"17 seconds. Not too bad," Rith said.

"What's your size and duration?" Evin asked.

"It's naturally a bit smaller than a human's but I could be considered a half-core with a 2 second circulation period," Rith said smugly.

"You're so strong. How are you so fast at circulation, though?"

"Mostly because the spells we use with the World of Space are very mana expensive, so we have a lot of chances to use our mana-cores fully"

"But aren't bigger mana cores harder to recharge compared to smaller ones?"

"Of course. Us Cosmics have an advantage here, since we have naturally smaller cores compared to you. For a human half-core mage that's equal to us, they would probably need a dozen seconds to completely recharge"

"Thanks for the info. Though, why did you suddenly decide to share info with me?" Evin asked, wondering if his talk with the Feline earlier had a positive effect.

"You never asked before, and it's not a big secret. Aran would probably tell you if you asked. Your grandfather as well," Rith said with indifference.