Ali forced down the itching, desperate urge to experiment. Every instinct screamed at him to poke and prod his new sense, to try to channel again, to do something. But the System's cold arithmetic held him in check. He was operating on vapors. One misstep could burn out his nascent channels or, worse, draw attention.
He resolved to let his core fill. To be patient. For a week, he did nothing but the normal labor and, in the quiet moments, feel.
[Time Skip: 7 Days. 182 Hours (Local Standard).]
[Passive Mana Regeneration Logged: ~0.00182 units added.]
[Total Mana: 0.00192/100.]
It was a pitiful gain. Less than two-thousandths of a single point. But it was his. The droplet had become a small bead. The sensation of his core was no longer a faint smudge but a definite, quiet hum in his center of gravity, like a tiny, silent watch was ticking inside him.
His Mana-Sense (Rudimentary) grew without active effort. Simply existing with an active core in a mana-suffused world was training it. He began to passively differentiate textures:
The longhouse had a warm, complex signature—the mingled, low-grade human cores of the family, plus the lingering traces of herbs, fire, and life.
The forest beyond the walls was a vast, deep-green symphony of countless tiny lives, with occasional pockets of cooler, or sharper, or darker energy moving through it—beasts, perhaps, or natural phenomena.
Lyra. Her signature was the one he unconsciously mapped most carefully. The guttering candle-flame of her own life, and the oppressive, cold void of the blockage. He noted, with a sinking feeling, that the void seemed to pulse faintly on colder days, and the candle-flame dimmed correspondingly. The data was being logged.
He also paid closer attention to the family's rare offhand comments, piecing together a more nuanced picture than Kaelen's blunt "nobles have more."
*System, your example of nobles recovering 1 or more mana per hour… it's a simplification, right? A dangerous one. If I ever think in such flat terms, I'm dead. A noble's bloodline matters. Not all are equal. One house might specialize in fire, their mana inherently hotter. Another in mental arts. Another might have a bloodline for beast-taming, or earth-shaping. Their cores are better, but also* different. And royals are another category entirely. And other races… they don't even use the same scale, do they?
[Social-Magical Stratification Model Updated.]
Acknowledgement: Prior model was reductive for baseline comprehension. Corrected analysis follows:
Human Society (Example):
Peasant/Commoner: Core Grade: Low-Peasant to Mid-Commoner. Mana is undifferentiated, low-potency. Used unconsciously for health, minor luck, or raw, unskilled bursts (a mother's fierce protective surge). Regeneration: very slow.
Guild Craftsman/Mage: Core Grade: High-Commoner to Low-Apprentice. Mana is slightly attuned to their craft (a blacksmith's mana might hold heat better). Skills are learned, not innate.
Nobility: Core Grade: Apprentice to Advanced. Here, Bloodline Specialization dominates.
House of Emberhearth: Bloodline attunement to Fire & Thermal Dynamics. Their mana is naturally hotter; fire spells cost them less and are more potent. Their core might regenerate faster when near heat.
House of Whispering Stone: Attunement to Earth and Sound. Their mana is dense, resonant.
House of the Clear Mind: Attunement to Mental and Illusion magic. Their mana is subtle, pervasive.
A noble from a non-magically specialized house (e.g., a trading or military house) might have a simply stronger general-purpose core (Advanced-Grade) but no elemental affinity.
Royalty/High Archmages: Core Grade: Expert to Master. Possess either supremely potent generalist cores or profound, unique specializations (e.g., a bloodline tied to a specific legendary spirit or elemental force).
Other Races:
Elves: Core structure is Floral/Woven. Mana is deeply tied to location (a forest, a glade). Regeneration is high in their home territory, lower elsewhere. Specializations are often environmental or botanical.
Dwarves: Core structure is Crystalline/Geometric. Mana is excellent for enchantment, rune-crafting, and earth-shaping. Resistant to external corruption but slow to change.
Beast-folk, Orcs, etc.: Have their own paradigms. An orc's mana might be tied to physical prowess and battle-rage, channeled almost purely internally to enhance the body.
Conclusion: You are correct. Assuming a "noble" is a generic mage is a fatal error. You must identify what kind of noble or opponent you face. Their specialization dictates their strengths, weaknesses, and tactical approach. Your mutable core is a blank slate; you can, in theory, develop in any direction or multiple directions, but you will always lack the instinctive, deep-rooted affinity of a true bloodline. This is both a weakness (you must learn everything from scratch) and a strength (you are not pigeonholed).
The week of passive observation ended with the arrival of two traders from Millers' Crossing, a rare event. They were rough men, but their clothes were of better make, and they drove a cart pulled by a weary-looking, thick-hided animal. Their auras, when Ali risked a fleeting, careful brush of his mana-sense, were like Bryn's but with a faint, greasy sheen of something else—guile? Travel?
He worked diligently, hauling pelts for Kaelen to trade, keeping his head down. But he listened.
"...the Baron's son is looking for a hunting party to go into the Deepwood," one trader said, sipping watered ale. "Paying in silver. Not coin many are eager to take. Lost three parties last season to the shadow-cats."
"Emberhearth levies are up again," grumbled the other. "For their 'Eternal Flame' ritual. More tax on coal and fire-runes. Squeezes the smiths at the Crossing."
"Did you hear about the incident at the Whispering Stone mine? A collapse, they say. But Old Gerran says he felt a 'song' from the deep that made his teeth ache before it happened. Nonsense, probably."
The snippets were gold. Emberhearth was a fire-affiliated noble house. Whispering Stone was earth and sound. The world was fleshing itself out, not in grand legends, but in petty taxes, mining accidents, and dangerous hunts for bored nobles.
At the week's end, the traders left. The steading felt smaller again, but Ali's mind was larger. He had a bead of mana in his core. He had a slightly sharper sense of the invisible world. And he had names, specializations, and a chilling understanding of the complexities of power.
That night, with his mana pool finally above zero (if barely), he faced his next choice. He could continue to hoard, to let the drip fill him unimaginably slowly. Or he could attempt his first Active Draw—to consciously pull mana from the environment into his core, speeding up the process but risking that 'ripple.'
The patience of the week warred with the desperate need to grow faster.
He sat in the dark shed, feeling the tiny hum in his core, listening to the vast, green symphony of mana outside the walls. The droplet in his bucket awaited his command.
It was time to learn how to scoop.