Chapter 193: Portals

"Alright," Evin said.

"Portals can be generally divided into three types: combat portals, material portals and energy portals. Combat portals are self-explanatory, material portals are for teleporting physical objects and also people, and energy portals are mostly used to transport energy. An example would be engravings that transport mana to your Mana Complex. I won't teach you all of them at the same time so you'll have to spend some time learning one of them before I decide whether to teach you one of the other two. We'll start with combat and work our way up since those are the easiest." 

"Okay," Evin replied simply.

"Let's see… As you've seen before, combat portals are the main method of offense and defense for Cosmics. The portals I used to cut at people and the portal armor that I can create, they're all classified as Combat portals, but let's first start with offensive ones," Rith began.

"What's the difference between a transportation portal and a combat one?" Evin asked.

"One cuts with its insides, while the other doesn't. You can decide which it does through your will," the Cosmic answered.

According to Rith, Combat portals were widely recognized as the form of magic that were the sharpest in the World. But obviously, there were some limitations to this. The first thing Evin learned was that portals had to always come in a pairs. There simply couldn't be a portal that existed by itself, without a destination that it lead to. 

But when one was using them offensively, the other side of the portal that was trying to cut someone wasn't as important. Evin could simply designate a place and condition himself in such a way that he would never fail that portal.

Rith stated that the best place for the other end of such portals would be the inside of a Storage Dimension of some sorts that the caster owned. She explained that when she casts offensive portals, she always creates the other end inside her storage ring. By doing that, if she manages to cut off someone's hands, the lost limb would end up in Rith's possession and the chances of the enemy finding their arms and reattaching them through the World of Life would become nil.

This was another reason why the Easterners never performed well against the Cosmics. The Cosmic portals ignored their invulnerability and also greatly weakened their healing properties. Though it didn't nullify it, since the more talented Easterners could regrow their lost limbs with some effort.

At any rate, it was vital for Evin to have a similar spot for himself. He decided that it should be the inside of the new Storage Ring he created, as it was the only logical choice. The other Storage Ring he had contained most of his possessions, and he didn't want to turn his shadow into a place that occasionally spawned heads and limbs.

The next thing he learned was that portals had two sides to them. Its inner side and its outer side. Its inner side was the one that teleported things, while the outer side was its edge that bordered the rest of the World. 

Apparently, the outer side couldn't cut at all and only the inner side was sharp enough to do so… So if Evin wanted to use the World of Space to rip off someone's hand for example, he had to somehow have their hands go through a portal first and close it afterwards. He couldn't just throw a portal against his enemies like it was a disc, hoping that it could kill them.

Evin felt like it was a bit annoying to calculate the distance between yourself and your enemy while casting portals, but Rith explained that when one was trying to kill someone with a portal, it's precision and cleanliness wasn't that important. It was actually more effective to have deficient portals, since by just having it wrap around his enemies, Evin could misalign their bodies in some way or another.

"Now, before I start teaching you specific methods of imagination, try to create a portal by yourself. Who knows? Maybe you'll be talented enough to succeed with some effort," Rith said.

Evin was a bit wary, since he never bothered to try and create one, but he still tried his best to create a doorway between the space inside his new storage ring and two steps in front of him. He imagined a magical doorway that connected the two places, one with the ability to let an object phase through it. 

But try as he could, Evin simply wasn't able to create something. There wasn't even a sizzle or a fumble. Evin didn't know if this was normal or not, but since Rith didn't comment in any shape or form, he kept on going, trying other forms of imagination, hoping one of them worked. He then changed his approach and tried to create a portal between himself and some other place in his vision, properly calculating the distance between the two points, but still, nothing seemed to work.

After about an hour of absolutely nothing, Evin was beginning to lose his patience.

"Perhaps I'm not talented enough at this?" he asked Rith. 

"Hmm… You're not doing badly, actually. Obviously, it's a new subject to you, so it's natural that you wouldn't succeed in the first hour. I'll give it another few days. Sometimes, these things just take some time and practice," Rith reassured him.

'You're so nice… But it's okay to just tell me that I suck. I won't kill myself or anything,' Evin thought dramatically in his head.

"Is it better if I find my own method of imagination?" Evin asked.

"Well, I can't tell for sure. You started to do well near the end of it, when you were trying to create two portals in front of yourself. Why was that?"

"I don't really know if I was doing alright, or not… but I tried to think of the distance between two objects mathematically, using myself as the center of the coordinate... like the book instructed me to. Hmm, perhaps I'm struggling a bit, since the inside of the Storage Ring is in a completely different dimension, so it's hard for me to imagine the distance between it and a spot in the main World?" Evin asked.

"In that case, just focus on getting the math correct. Eventually you'll succeed.... Sigh, but seriously, how can you be such a logic-based mage, through and through?" Rith shook her head and continued: "Alright, since you're not really finding success with this, let's take a break and then go to some other theoretical stuff,"

Rith said and the two had a small snack break. Twenty minutes later, the two sat down and started to talk about defensive uses of the World of Space.

"Nasst should've told you how to always keep some kind of defensive measure passively, right? Is it Time energy?"

"Yes, though I'm struggling a bit to keep it up, so I probably have to rely on Runa for defense."

"That's fine as well, but remember to keep working on your passive defenses diligently. Not everyone gets to use Time energy like you, after all. But anyhow, my portal armor could also be considered a form of passive defense. How do you think I keep those portals up, while moving about normally?" Rith asked.

"I'm guessing you designate yourself as the center of a three-dimensional coordinate and make it so that the portal armor stays a certain distance away from you," Evin answered.

"That's right. One thing you could get used to if you want to use the World of Space, is to consider yourself the center of the universe. If you want to create a portal two steps in front of yourself, you must calculate the exact distance between you and the portal you're trying to create. If you want to create a portal that moves, you must think of how it will move relative to you. You have to imagine them as your own orbits, I suppose," Rith said.

"When do you think I'll be able to create a Portal Armor like yourself?" Evin asked curiously.

"I'm not sure. Perhaps when you become a lesser-imposer. Hmm, I'll tell you some more stuff after we see how you perform Combat portals. Just remembter that Material portals are a more polished and non-deadly form of Combat portals. You might take some time to wrap your head around Energy portals as well, but if all else fails, we'll just have to memorize specific imagination methods. For now, let's prepare a bit for tomorrow. Uh, do you have any questions?" Rith asked.

"I've heard that most mages are unable to work the World of Space so easily, why is that? I mean, if you just taught them to imagine things in a specific way shouldn't every one of them learn these things over time?" Evin asked. 

"Hmm, I'd like to tell you that there's something deep behind people's improficiencies, but at the end of the day, it's just that. First, they could lack talent, where even if we tell them what to imagine scene by scene, they could still fail to create something substantial. And second, they could lack the willingness to invest their free time into the World of Space. For example, you can start drawing from tomorrow on with the goal to become one of the best artists in the World, so that you can maybe sell your art for money. But after trying out some drawings, you realize that your talent at arts is abysmal. Will you decide to spend thousands of hours practicing your art skills, or will you give up on this goal of yours and start focusing on whatever you're good at?" Rith asked.

"But I'm really good at painting, though," Evin complained playfully.

"Shut up," Rith replied almost immediately, before continuing: "You get what I'm saying. Just because a mage could dedicate their efforts to learning the World of Space, it doesn't mean they should. Same thing with a non-mage becoming an artist or a singer."

Evin nodded and the two ended their lecture and started to prepare for the journey tomorrow.

Thoguh, there wasn't much for them to prepare, since they could shove them all to their storage rings, so they were finished with their task quite fast. 

Evin would also occasionally enter his shadow to see how the patch of black soil was growing, smiling to himself like an idiot everytime he felt like it became bigger.

…