I stopped circulating mana.
The flow receded reluctantly, like water pulled back from a dam, and I finally turned my attention inward—really looked at myself.
The numbers came to me instinctively.
My magic capacity had increased.
Not marginally.
Not gradually.
It had jumped—from roughly sixty percent of the academy average to 11 times the average wizard.
I exhaled slowly.
But the relief and excitement lasted only a moment.
Because I could also feel what I didn't have.
My usable strength hovered at barely eighty percent of Average wizard.
The rest wasn't gone.
It was being drawn away.
Siphoned continuously through the link binding me to the Central Continent, bleeding into the land to stabilize what should never have endured this long. Leylines trembled beneath my awareness, straining against ancient damage. The mana storms that had thinned enough to let us through were no longer retreating.
They were regrouping.
Coiling.
Preparing to close again.
The continent would seal itself once more.
I could feel it as clearly as a tightening fist.
I had to leave.
This place would one day become my foundation. My fortress. The heart of everything I intended to build.
But today was not that day.
I checked the bag that had washed ashore with me.
Two water bottles.
Some dry rations.
A tracking device—its readings flickering wildly, rendered almost useless by the instability of the surrounding mana.
Water wasn't a concern.
I could purify seawater easily enough.
Food would be harder. Fishing, most likely. The sea around this continent was rich—dangerously so—but hunger was a problem for later.
Right now, I needed a way off this land.
There were no ships here.
Not intact ones. Not anything capable of surviving open seas, let alone the edge of a mana storm. Whatever vessels the Emperor's era had possessed were long gone—rotted, shattered, or swallowed by time.
Which meant there was only one option.
I had to build one.
I measured the time again.
Less than a week before the storms fully closed in.
At full speed, I could fly to the outer edge of the continent in two days.
That left me five days.
Five days to design, assemble, and launch a seaworthy vessel—alone.
I didn't waste time questioning whether it was possible.
I wasted no time at all.
I returned to the Grand Library and gathered what I needed—not grimoires, not spell records, not anything that would tempt me into reckless power.
I took Old Tongue learning texts.
Grammar. Structure. Phonetics.
I had no intention of revealing Sanskrit to the world—not yet. I wasn't strong enough to bear the consequences. Even the gods' tongue had limits, especially when my magic was already being drained to hold a continent together.
Words mattered.
Which words mattered even more.
With the books secured, I turned back toward the coast.
Five days.
The storms were already beginning to stir.
And I had a ship to build.
I reached the coast in a day and a half.
Faster than I had calculated.
I slowed only when the shoreline came into view, boots sinking into damp sand as I landed harder than I intended. My breathing was steady, but my body felt heavy—like I had been moving against resistance the entire way without realizing it.
The sea stretched endlessly before me.
And without warning, my mind drifted backward.
Five years.
Five years spent aboard the Aurora, fleeing the Eastern Continent. Long days and longer nights, when escape had become routine and fear had turned into discipline. During those years, my father and his friends had never wasted time.
They had taught the children.
Not fairy tales. Not comfort.
Ships.
How hulls were shaped to cut waves instead of fighting them. How balance mattered more than raw size. How weight distribution could mean the difference between endurance and capsizing. They taught us materials—what swelled, what cracked, what rotted. They taught us failure, because at sea, failure was never theoretical.
I had listened.
Absorbed.
Remembered.
I exhaled slowly.
Then I spoke.
Not in the common tongue.
Not in the Old Tongue.
I spoke in Sanskrit.
The words were calm. Precise. Absolute.
The land responded.
Nearby trees tore themselves free of the earth, roots snapping cleanly as if severed by an unseen blade. Trunks twisted midair, bark splitting as wood obeyed command rather than force. Branches sheared away. Logs aligned themselves.
I spoke again.
The timber split—clean, perfect planks forming without splinter or waste. Sap was driven out. Moisture evaporated. The wood hardened, treated and prepared in moments that should have taken weeks.
Again.
And again.
Each word carved something away from me.
Mana poured out in a steady, punishing flow. My channels burned as they strained to keep up, the expanded pathways groaning under the sheer demand. The continent pulled at me even as I worked, siphoning strength to keep itself from tearing apart.
By the time the last plank settled into place, my legs trembled.
The world tilted.
I stopped speaking.
Silence fell heavily over the shore.
My magic was gone.
Not empty.
Depleted.
I dropped to one knee in the sand, chest heaving, vision swimming as the last echoes of the god-tongue faded from the air.
The ship was only beginning to take shape.
And I had already paid dearly for the words I chose to speak.
That was my current limit.
Even with Sanskrit.
If I measured it objectively, the result was clear. What I could do now—exhausted, constrained, siphoned by the continent itself—was nearly twice as effective as what an average wizard could manage at full strength.
Average wizards were common.
They existed in large numbers, but their impact was limited. On a battlefield, they could harass, disrupt, support—but they could not decide outcomes. Against modern technology, firearms, artillery, and coordinated tactics, they were vulnerable. Dangerous in isolation, manageable in numbers.
They were not considered true threats.
They were regulated, monitored, sometimes employed—but rarely feared.
Geniuses were different.
Those born with vast mana reserves, refined pathways, or abnormal efficiency were an entirely separate breed. They were the ones capable of overwhelming defenses, reshaping engagements, breaking doctrines. One such wizard could tilt wars, destabilize regions, or force nations to negotiate.
Those were the ones who received everything.
Resources.Protection.Freedom.
Magic did not scale evenly.
It scaled exponentially.
And the world had learned—through blood and ruin—to invest only where the return was absolute.
The rest were expendable.
I pushed the thought aside.
Comparisons wouldn't build a ship.
For the next four days, I worked.
Not recklessly.
Not grandly.
Step by step.
I rested when my magic ran dry, ate when my hands began to shake, slept when exhaustion blurred the edge of thought. I used Sanskrit sparingly—only when it mattered, only when precision would save hours of labor.
Most of the work was mundane.
Measuring.
Aligning.
Binding.
I shaped the keel first, then the ribs, reinforcing stress points the way my father had taught us—never trusting calm seas, never assuming mercy from the ocean. I balanced weight carefully, knowing even a small miscalculation could doom the vessel long before it ever reached open water.
When magic was necessary, I spoke softly.
When it wasn't, I worked with my hands.
By the end of the fourth day, the outline of a ship rested on the shore—unfinished, rough, but real. Something that could float. Something that could endure long enough.
The storms were closer now.
I could feel them again—pressure building at the edge of awareness, the continent tightening its grip as it prepared to close itself away.