The Insider System

Chapter 106: Speed Limit

Lake had been controlling the two separate vortexes in an inverse manner for about 30 minutes at this point. It had been hard at first because splitting his attention was something he had never really done until today when he was compressing the cube but in that instance his attention had mainly been on the insides of the cube and keeping it in shape had been nothing.

Now that he had the hang of controlling the speed of the vortexes he thought he could try to break the limit. Dissipating one of the vortexes Lake started to speed up the other one until he got to the max set speed. Feeling his progress come to a halt, Lake guessed it wasn't going to be as easy as he had hoped.

He thought he would be able to get past the limit now even if it was just by a little because of all the training he had done in the last hour or so. He had no idea what he was doing wrong and thought maybe there was some form of affinity for different principles. He remembered when the Temple head had told him he would be good at earth magic because he understood how to turn things solid.

He had no idea what she had been basing that off of when she had said it but she had been right because it seemed that was all he could do when it came to magic. Apparently turning Wind mana solid was supposed to be much harder than speeding it up because the section about turning it solid had been much longer but he had been able to do it in less than 20 minutes and he had already spent double that amount on speed if you added the time from earlier.

Lake shrugged and just reformed the two small vortexes. The book had said this was the best way and Lake would be stupid to try and come up with some new method before he had actually made any progress. It wasn't like he had anything to do today so he could just stay here till he got hungry or tired.

Continuing the process Lake was eventually to the point where he didn't even need to think about what he was doing anymore. Lake thought maybe this meant he was finally ready because when he had made the cube earlier before he had started to stretch it out this was about the amount of effort he had put into it.

He had just thought about what he wanted and it had happened all on its own and now the vortexes were doing the same thing with no manual control being added by him. This time when one of the vortexes got to max speed instead of starting the slowing process Lake pushed it trying to get it to go even a little faster then it was supposed to.

Lake felt some form of snap come from the vortex and it directly exploded. Lake hadn't been expecting anything like this to happen but since it hadn't happened before he thought it meant he had made some progress. Using the other vortex Lake did the same thing again but got ready for the snap that had happened last time and when it did he took manual control to make sure it didn't explode like last time.

Feeling the speed rise, Lake knew the explosion had been caused by him changing the speed principle last time without him being ready to control the new much stronger version of wind mana he had made. It seemed as you raised the speed the mana could go it also made it much harder to control.

It made perfect sense Lake just hadn't been ready for it. Lake smiled now that he had been able to do this; it meant he would be able to learn the Fly spell. He just needed to get the mana up to a speed where it would be able to take him off the ground, growing the vortex by adding more mana. Lake listened to the rumbling noise it was causing as small amounts of Wind mana were being forced past the speed limit as he added them. Once the vortex was around the size of his body Lake moved it around him where he was standing in the eye of the vortex and did his best to raise the speed until he heard a voice tell him the name of the spell he was trying to use. "Fly."

Lake felt his feet lift off the ground and his head bash into the ceiling of the room. If he had put any thought into his actions he would have probably been able to avoid this but he had been caught up in what he had been using. Thankfully it seemed this room had been designed with things like this in mind and Lake hadn't hurt himself because the ceiling was soft like a pillow.

Landing back on the ground, Lake walked out into the bigger area outside to see Joy was still here and was sitting on the ground with a red sphere surrounding her. "Lake had seen her use something similar in the battle against Nelg so Lake knew Joy was using this opportunity to practice magic while she had been waiting for him.

Lake remembered Joy telling him she could only use something called Antimagic when he had asked her about which elements she could use so Lake had no idea what it was past its name. Not bothering her, Lake started the vortex again and once it was going fast enough Lake said "Fly."

Getting into the air, Lake slowed himself down so he wouldn't smack his head again. Once he was stable Lake realized why there was a limit on the Wind element and you could only learn Fly once you broke it. It was so you would be able to control your speed and not kill yourself on accident the first time you tried to use it.

Lake could see if there hadn't been a limit people would try to fly before they were ready and not be able to land or stop himself from slamming into a wall or something. Lake wondered if the amount of forethought put into this by the God or Goddess of Wind reflected on what they would be like if Lake ever met them.

Maybe they would be extremely cautious or not like it when people died. As he flew around the room Lake saw that Joy had noticed him and was now watching him. Slowing down and heading towards her, Lake saw her out stretch her hand and say "Disrupt."

He saw a red beam fly and smack into the vortex that he was using to fly. Right after the impact happened, Lake felt his spell crumble and he crashed into the floor. Once again he found the place he landed was soft and he wasn't hurt in any way but he was confused why Joy had done this until he heard her laugh.

It was just a prank apparently. "That's something you should remember if you ever plan to use Fly during a battle. I've killed people by doing something as small as what I just did to you at a good moment during a fight." Lake guessed this was probably a good thing for him to realize as soon as possible, so he said. "Thank you for this lesson."

It felt odd thanking someone for something like this but she had only done this because she knew it was perfectly safe. "If I was you I wouldn't use fly in battle until you can recast it instantly." Lake nodded and asked. "Can Antimagic do that to any element or are there exceptions?"

"It has more to do with the person than what element they are using. It just messes with the principles that were in your spell making it hard for you to control if you are inexperienced in magic. If you had been practicing magic for a lot longer than I have you would have been fine and only experienced a small hiccup."

Lake nodded he still didn't really understand Antimagic very well but this was a start and he only needed to ask one more thing before he knew if he could use it as well. "Is it just an element with an odd name, or is it different?"

"There's a God of Antimagic if that's what you're asking, but the only way someone can use it is if they are given the common version of Comprehension and Antimagic is their one Affinity. Someone like you who can use Different elements can't use it."

Lak nodded He could see why Joy would think this because under normal circumstances she would probably be right Lake was pretty sure Joy had seen him use 4 elements up to this point so she would think he had either an epic or a legendary version of Comprehension which would exclude him from Antimagic but he bet she was wrong.

The only way Lake saw it not working for him was if the God of Antimagic himself stopped him but Lake had no intentions of doing it Infront of Joy so he just said. "You want to eat dinner in my room tonight? You're already in the spire so you might as well." Joy shook her head and said. "I was planning on going to the cafeteria that Millie reopened. The food isn't as good as what she was serving us in her room, but you can get it at any time now so it's a good trade off."

Lake guessed this was why Millie hadn't been in her room earlier when he had knocked it seemed her new apprentices had arrived and she had moved her operation into a bigger area than the small kitchen she had been using in her room. "Ok let's go there then." Joy helped him onto his feet and they both started the long walk downstairs.