“Go, I’ll catch up!” Pryte yelled before I even had a chance to question the scream. I took off at a run, pushing my body as fast as I could. I figured we had walked maybe two miles into the woods, and it took me less than five minutes to get myself back to my house. I was pretty sure that meant I was pushing past the world record level there. At least that part of my body still worked. As the house came into view, I saw what had caused the scream. There was a very large moose angrily headbutting Cecile as he guarded his plants.

  “Dammit, how do these animals keep getting past any kind of defenses we set up?” Cecile yelled as a loud cracking noise rang out, caused by the moose yet again smashing its head against Cecile’s. I had no idea why he thought that was the best way to handle this, but it wasn’t the first time I’d seen the man headbutt something, it just seemed like a bad idea still.

  “Aw, don’t hurt him. He’s just hungry,” Maud said gently. I had a feeling she was the owner of the loud scream, as I doubted Cecile or Elicec had done it, and while Elody was no longer floating, she was only looking on with mild interest.

  “Convince him of that!” Elicec yelled, sounding surprisingly angry.

  “Hey, big guy, how about you show us how you keep getting in? No one wants to hurt you; we just need to know how you’re being so sneaky,” Maud said. I didn’t think sweet-talking a moose was likely to work, but I also didn’t think anyone was in any real danger. Cecile could stop the animal at any moment, and despite the anger in his voice, he was clearly just trying to be nice.

  The moose vanished. One moment, it was stamping its feet at Cecile; the next, it was gone. “Uh, who did that?” I asked.

  “Wasn’t me,’ Cecile said, Elicec’s head looking just as confused. No one spoke up to take any credit.

  “Well, that may at least explain how it keeps getting in,” Elody said.

  “Do we somehow have a magical moose?” I asked, confused about how that could even happen.

  “Possibly, if it ate the right combinations of Cecile’s veggies, and with some dumb luck, yeah, it might be on the way to being the first native mana beast of Earth,” Elody said, now looking fully interested.

  “Great, so I’ve already got a rogue mana beast stealing food,” Cecile said, sighing loudly.

  “Pretty sure I got a new quest. Should that happen?” Maud said, interrupting Cecile’s sigh.

  “What’s the quest?” Elody asked.

  “Befriend Earth’s First Mana Beast,” Maud said cheerfully, while Cecile just sighed louder.

  “Alright, before Cecile loses it, we are going to have to find a way to feed this guy without it impacting our crops much. Can we set up a designated feeding area and mix in normal vegetables with just a few mana ones?” I asked, hoping it would be that simple.

  “It could work,” Elicec said, speaking up. It was rare to hear him be the voice of reason over his brother.

  “Yes, time to feed that moose!” Maud said excitedly. Leaving them to figure out what mana plants Cecile was willing to sacrifice to the cause I went inside to grab John to see what scraps he was willing to donate.

  “John, your girlfriend has decided to befriend a magical moose, any chance you’ve got some leftover vegetables we can use to help her?” I asked, trying not to laugh at his expression.

  “Honestly, I think I’d have believed your statement even if this hadn’t all happened. It’s a very Maud thing to do,” he replied as he opened up a cupboard and grabbed several wilting vegetables, and the remains of earlier meals he had yet brought to the compost heap. “Lead the way.”

  We found Cecile having already setup up a feeding stall for the moose and Maud carefully laying out some of the plants Cecile had selected. John added his mix to it while I looked around for any sight of the returned moose. While I didn’t see it, I did see a single figure, very unmoose-like, returning from the woods.

  “What did I miss?” Pryte yelled as he came jogging up several minutes later.

  “Earth has its first mana beast, and Maud has a quest to befriend. Hopefully, their idea works; it would be a shame to lose a primal beast,” Elody said.

  “Oh, that’s faster than I’d have expected, huh? Wonder if it’s the cloudwood,” Pryte said, looking over at the giant tree.

  “Hard to say, I’m still learning about it from Mel, but he also doesn’t know the full details of them,” Elody replied.

  “Let’s all try very hard to keep the primal mana beast alive, please. That’s a huge resource I didn’t factor into my future plans, so please help Maud with it,” Pryte yelled, making sure everyone present heard it.

  “You’re going to want to do more than a feeding area then. Once its sapience starts to set in, it’s going to want somewhere comfortable to live. We should work up some plans with Trolke before that happens. It will make the transition much easier on the beast,” Rabyn said, coming around the corner. I was no longer surprised he was the one urging gentle care. The man wasn’t remotely what I had initially expected him to be.

  Letting Rabyn go to work with the others I instead turned to Elody and Pryte. “Since I’ve got you both here, and they are now busy with a magical moose, ready to join me for an attempt at fortifying my core?” I asked, eager to get on with this. I wanted my mana channels to work again, as time for training with the new changes was quickly running out.

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  “Yeah, let’s get that over with,” Pryte said. Elody nodded in agreement. I pulled up a chat window to check on Corey and make sure he was also ready.

  I closed the chat window just as we opened the back door of the garage and filed inside. Corey was now floating over the table instead of resting on top of it. That was a good sign.

  “So what’s the plan?” Pryte said, closing the door behind himself.

  “Dave is going to remove me from the mallet and then attempt to insert me directly into his socketing system, and I think directly over his core would be the best spot. In theory, if he triggers his fortification immediately before his body has a chance to expel me, he may be able to redirect the core fortification energies into me, further bonding us,” Corey explained.

  “Bingo,” I said, grabbing the mallet and sitting down at the desk to work. A notification popped up asking if I was ready to remove the dungeon core as I pushed my finger into the spot the it was lodged. I confirmed I was and felt Corey easily release into my hand. That was step one. I’d worry about putting a new core in the mallet once this all worked.

  “Not to jump the gun, but what are you going to do with the mallet now? Seems a waste not to add another core,” Pryte asked.

  “I likely will add another one, but we will need to discuss that with the cores I have. First up, we need this to work,” I said, echoing my earlier thoughts.

  “Okay, not that I know what to do if this goes wrong, but I’m about to start, so hopefully it doesn’t,” I said with a nervous smile, looking at my two friends. Elody returned my smile while Pryte just shrugged.

  I opened my core status menu and selected the fortification option. Before confirming the start, I held Corey directly above my core and forced them into my body the same way I would with a mana or class orb. Unlike with those, I could feel a large backlash of energy building the second I had them firmly inside. Before it had a chance to reject them I quickly confirmed my selection, letting the fortification begin.

  Blackness flooded my vision again. “Would you like to fortify your core? Note that once the process has begun, it cannot be stopped, and any attempt to do so may result in irreparable harm towards your brain,” the System’s voice said exactly the same as it had the last time I had done this. I confirmed again that I wanted to.

  “Core fortification process… Error.” The system said just moments before I felt a backlash of energy across my body. Dammit, had I been wrong about this being the way to fix myself? I felt more cracks form across my channels as the System held on tight to me. Apparently, the error hadn’t been enough to disconnect me from the process.

  I forced myself to stop panicking and think. So my mana channels were still broken, obviously. Was there anything I could do to fix them enough from where I was stuck to at least get this process to finish? Wait, was Mana Tinkering viable here? It hadn’t been outside of this system, but it was possible with the more focused aspect of the fortification menu that I could utilize it. I focused hard on my socket system and envisioned the breaks. In the blackness in front of me, the image popped into view, reminding me of a map of a subway system.

  I could see where the core energy was attempting to flow, directly toward Corey, and failing. So the leaking soul mana before it found my core was still the same problem. Wait, what if I back flowed the soul energy from the new reservoir into Corey? Between them and my existing core, could they handle that level of energy? Could I even do it?

  I concentrated as hard as I could with my tinkering skill as the fortification started again, grabbing the flows as they skipped my core and forcing them, incredibly painfully, back toward Corey and my core. It felt like I was tearing fresh holes into my channels, so if this didn’t work, I was going to be in real trouble. Then again, at this point, it was all or nothing. I had no idea how to stop this now that I had started it.

  Finally, after what felt like an agonizingly long eternity, the voice returned. “Core fortification process underway. Would you like to evolve your affinity?” the System asked. I hadn’t expected that option again. Then again, maybe I needed to evolve the affinity to have any chance at this.

  “Yes, evolve the affinity,” I said, deciding it was for the best to do it, curious about just what I’d end up with. Would the evolution make use of Corey or just further refine the existing one?

  “Affinity evolution underway. All attributes and skills ranks… Error,” the voice said before I felt a searing spike of pain pierce my brain. It was quickly replaced by a new text box hovering in the blackness. I was starting to suspect any time I found text-only boxes without audio from the System, I was interacting with older, less-used routines, not counting, of course, where I had turned out the audio portion.

  New Core Detected.

  Socketing New Core in Progress.

  Fortification Energy Rerouted to New Core Installation.

  New Core Successfully Socketed.

  Mana channel fragmentation detected.

  Defragmentation in Progress.

  Defragmentation Complete.

  Dual Core Socket Detected.

  Core Optimization in Progress.

  Core Optimization Complete.

  Affinity Evolution Resumed.

  Affinity Evolution Complete.

  Primal mana beasts are a rarely seen sight on any integrated world, as the chances of them surviving the early days of integration are exceedingly low. Their power can be used in many ways to speed up early mana development, so they are often hunted for this use. There is also the problem that they can be seen as pests plundering early mana harvests, leading to their removal. The worlds that don’t do this are almost always better for it in the end, as primal mana beasts can be unrelenting allies in defense of their homeworlds.

  Mana Beasts, an Endangered Friend by Roril Thorl, Paladin of Agriculture Grand Warden of the Order

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