Lord Of Puppets

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"You bend the metal." – said Porai.

"it may not had been much."

"But the fact remains that you were able to cause reaction with this method remains." – said Porai as she held the glass filled with liquid metal.

"Mercury."

"It is somewhat extremely good material when it comes to magic, since it possess extremely high compatibility with mana."

"Mages often uses it for the ritual or item crafting because of it."

"However, the reaction that you had shown wasn’t the regular reaction caused when mages normally use the mercury, it was a reaction to the magic of specific type."

"The metal magic."

"If it was a regular magic reaction, it would cause something like a ripple to occur on the surface, but you somewhat pinched it instead, which is more than proof enough."

"And honestly speaking, you have learned it way too quickly."

{"?"}

{"You said that it may take several weeks or even months before I could do anything."}

"Yes. Yes, I did said that. Metal magic isn’t by any means easy to learn."

"However, I think there are 3 factors regarding why you could had learned it so quickly."

"The first reason is probably your main specialty, the earth magic."

"The second reason is probably the alchemy, you often use the forge type alchemy, an alchemy that focuses on helping of construction of object and materials, which you had probably used on the metal more than one time."

"And the third reason... Well, a very simple one."

"Your body."

"I mean, your even current body is also made out of metal.... So, you know.... You kind of get the gist since some of it is already part of you?"

"I honestly wasn’t sure, so I didn’t said anything, but maybe now it make sense considering how fast you caused the reaction."

"..."

"Still, one thing is getting affinity and another is using it."

"Metal magic isn’t just a rare elemental affinity, but at the same time, it is also extremely hard to use in specific situations." – said Porai as she dibbed her finger into the glass of mercury, before then lifting up her finger while controlling the mercury around her finger.

"Controlling this stuff isn’t easy at all."

"If anything, it is extremely problematic."

"In some way, it is like water and ice magic combinations."

"Soft, hard."

"Liquid, solid."

"Not only that, forming shape with it isn’t easy either." – said Porai as she used the mercury to create a table knife, before then turning it back into the liquid that flew right into the glass container once again.

"And there is also another problem, manifestation."

"As you know, you can use magic to manifest something of specific attribute."

"Use wind magic to create wind."

"Use fire magic to create fire."

"Use water magic to create water."

"Use earth magic to create earth."

"However, as you probably know already by now, different manifestation uses different amounts of mana."

"And out of these four basic elements, earth uses the most amount of mana to manifest something." – said Porai as she manifested a small rock with her own earth magic.

"It is way too solid."

"The ice magic is also solid, but its manifestation is much easier to create, making it consume way less mana." – said Porai as she created a small ice cube withing her palm.

"You probably know that too, since mostly you had used a form of earth manipulation during the combat, since it was just way cheaper."

"However, the manipulation isn’t easy either."

"You need to establish connection, establish the dominance and then you can do anything with it."

"Both manifestation and manipulations have its down and ups."

"But what about the metal magic? How it works?" – asked Porai as she made both the rock pebble and cube of ice disappear.

"Simple put, it sucks in both ways." – said Porai as she manifested a metallic knife, with nothing but her own magic and without using any of her liquid metal.

"Metal magic is extremely hard to use, both in terms of manifestation and in terms of manipulation."

"It uses a lot of mana, so to speak."

"Especially the manifestation, it consumes large amount of mana to just manifest this thing." – said Porai as she made the metallic blade disappear.

"And real metal isn’t easy either."

"Especially special kind of metals, they are extremely hard to use."

"Or metals with specific function, a nature."

"Or maybe those that possess an Item Skill."

"For example metal swords that have some kind of item skill attached to them."

"You can use some kinds of soft metals as easy weapons with the metal manipulations."

"There are ways I can use this liquid mercury to form a blade that will be able to cut stuff... But again, soft metal."

"However, there is way to somewhat cheat it out and make the best use of the metal manipulation."

"Do you know these metal bags that I’m carrying around myself all the time underneath that coat of mine?"

"They are special made metals that I’ve had created myself."

"And in the process of making them, I’ve used a LOT of my own mana."

"Straight up soaking every bit of with my own being."

"And as you know already, since I’ve asked you about it before, the materials that came from the user themselves have a kind of connection between themselves and the one who the material came out from."

"A link."

"I’ve created one between myself and my metal, making it be something like a false part of my body."

"And because of that link, I can somewhat cheat."

"This metal obeys me way easier than it should, allowing me to use way less significate amount of mana in order to manipulate this metal."

"And this also includes control, allowing me to manipulate it form way quicker."

{"So if I were to try using metal magic myself as a weapon, I would need to prepare same kind of special made metal?"}

"Precisely."

"It isn’t that you should, you must."

"If not, the metal magic will straight up waste up your entire mana in matters of seconds, be it manipulation or manifestation."

"..."

"Still, we won’t be doing anything like that yet."

"One thing is getting metal magic affinity and other is having ability to use, with just any other elements out there."

"So yeah, you won’t be in any close future be even able to use this stuff."

{"But I should be at least use it to the basic level?"}

"Yeb. Honestly knowing you, there is good chance that you should have at least good chance at learning the basic level."

"And this is something you want to acquire no matter what."

"The basic level."

{"Yes."}

{"In order for that experiment to even work, I need the metal magic, in order obtain ability to heal."}

"Yes, you do."

"And that just makes things just stacked, since you need to do a LOT of things if you want to develop both this dungeon and your new found territory."

"So yeah..."

"There is a lot of work to do."