I sat on the wooden floor of the room that was still difficult to call my own. The room was dark, lit up only by the moonlight shining in through the single window. I had considered relighting the candle which Caelen and Mira had blown out after wishing me a good night, but I decided to try the mana collection in the dark, figuring it would help me focus.

  Thinking back to the previous events that had transpired earlier in the day, I closed my eyes and crossed my tiny legs, just as Mira had instructed Liora to do earlier. The first step would be to sense for my core, the ball of mana which should be located at the center of my chest , according to Mira. The way she described it when she was helping Liora was to close your eyes and focus on the center of your chest until you sensed a small mass of energy. Hearing her describe that didn't sound that helpful, but I was sure that if I actively tried it instead of just listening it would make more sense.

  Alright, ball of mana, where are you?

  With my eyes closed I focused all of my attention to my sternum and tried to feel for whatever was there. I sat there in the darkness for around twenty minutes, focusing on that area and trying to feel for some sort of energy, but I felt nothing. Frustrated, my brows furrowed but my eyes remained shut.

  What was I doing wrong? Liora seemed to sense it so easily, without even trying. Why was I having so much trouble? She was an eight year old girl while I was a well accomplished and experienced grown man. Why couldn’t I get the hang of something that was apparently so simple.

  Come on, focus.

  Determined not to get beaten out by a child, I tried again. I turned my attention from my frustration back to the center of my chest. I tried to feel around for some sort of anomaly, something different. I even tried to visualize a hand feeling around the area for the core, hoping that would help, but still, nothing.

  “What the hell!” I let out in frustration, before realizing that that was a mistake.

  I had said it loud enough that I was sure Caelen and Mira, or maybe even Liora, had heard. The walls of the home were thin and the rooms weren't far apart so me yelling out loud wouldn't be hard to hear. If they caught me up this late, doing whatever it was that I was trying to do, I was sure I would get in at least some sort of trouble. If I was only risking getting caught by Caelen or Liora, I wouldn't have really cared. But I wasn't about to risk getting another flick from that evil woman Mira.

  Deciding not to take any chances, I rushed back to my bed and climbed into it. Then, I covered myself up in the blanket and pretended to be asleep. I waited in quiet suspense for what felt like an eternity, waiting for someone to come into the room, but in the end no one did.

  I waited in bed for another thirty minutes just to be sure, then I got back out of bed to continue my endeavor. This time, however, I would be more careful.

  Taking my place back on the floor, I crossed my legs and closed my eyes, just as before. For the next hour, I tried my absolute hardest to find my core. It was the most concentrated I had ever been in my life, both of them. In the end, I still couldn't feel anything. I furrowed my brows in anger but caught myself before I could scream.

  I was pissed. I had spent hours trying to do what Liora could do in minutes. There was no way that me of all people was having this issue. Sure, I was in a completely foreign world which I knew nothing about and was trying to do this without an instructor, but I should've been able to do it. I should have been able to grasp a concept that even an eight year old girl could. If I couldn't even get through this first step, then how would I get to the step of using mana, or even gathering it.

  But wait a minute, Liora said that everyone was born with a core, which meant that unless I was disabled, i had to have too. Was sensing the core even required to use mana? If I already knew that it was there, couldn't I just skip this step and move on. Would that even work? My guess was that it would be sort of like blindly firing a gun—one that you didn't know was loaded or not.

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  If I just skipped the step of finding my core and instead just assumed that it was there, I could follow Mira's instructions and move on with my night. It was getting late anyway, and even with my adult mind I was still tired, though my child body likely wasn't helping.

  Screw it

  I closed my eyes again and got in the same position as before. Then, I began doing the same breathing exercises that Mira had instructed Liora to perform earlier. I calmed myself and focused on breathing in and out in a controlled manner. When Liora had done it, she mentioned how she could sense mana around her just like in her core, and how she could feel her core slowly collecting mana. I, however, seemingly didn't have that ability. Instead, I would need to sit there and continuously perform the breathing exercises, hoping that what I was doing was working.

  For the next hour, I did exactly that. I focused on my breathing while also trying to feel around me for mana. Unsurprisingly, i couldn't sense anything but this time i wasn't upset. In fact, the breathing exercises were sort of therapeutic in a way. It was nice to not think of anything but my breathing. After the hour was up, I slowly opened my eyes and got onto my feet. Admittedly, I didn't feel any different. But after an hour of trying to blindly gather mana, I had to have gathered at least some, right?

  After doing all of this, I wondered if I should have called it a night. It had taken me way longer than expected to get to this point and my three-year-old body was exhausted. After thinking about it for a moment though, I remembered how I had been humiliated that day. Thoughts of Mira doing what she did motivated me to keep going. I needed to learn how to protect myself and hopefully even strengthen myself with mana. That way, next time she tried something like that, I could bash her face in. I grinned to myself and began laughing maniacally before catching myself.

  “Shit” I said aloud before rushing back to my bed and doing the same routine that I had done earlier when I had accidentally yelled. After waiting around twenty minutes just to be safe I got back out of bed.

  I went back to my usual spot in the center of the room. My next objective for the night was to figure out how to use the mana that I had gathered. Mira hadn't gotten around that step yet, ending her lesson on gathering mana, so I would need to figure that part out on my own. I guess I could've waited until Mira explained it, but I was already eager to start after thinking about obliterating all of her teeth.

  After wiping the grin off my face from that thought, I decided to think things through. How could I take the mana from my core and make it do what i wanted. I first thought about when caelen had used his magic to conjure up a ball of water. The way he did it was so effortless. It wasn't like the wizard movies where you needed to recite some ancient words, he did it without speaking, just holding his hand out and the mana did what it needed to do.

  So if you didn't need to use words then how did you control it? I began pacing around my room with my tiny fingers to my chin as I got lost in thought. Thinking of my other experiences with magic and mana, I thought of how Liora described feeling mana. She could feel it, sense it. She could sense the mana and the core itself. That had to mean that there was some sort of connection between the mind, body, and core.

  I decided that I would try to somehow use my mind and body to get the mana to do what i wanted. But how? I couldn't sense a thing. And to be honest, I was slightly worried that I didn't have a core all together. Still, I had to figure something out.

  Maybe I'm thinking too hard

  That could've been it. Everytime i saw someone do something with mana it was effortless, it came naturally. I closed my eyes and decided to just try something, anything. I opened my hand and held it out with the palm facing up. Then, I waited for something to happen.

  Of course, nothing did. I opened my eyes and stared at my held out palm. For a moment, I considered going to bed, but I used my anger at Mira to keep going through the yawning.

  Maybe i need to move the mana forcefully

  I closed my eyes again and this time, I visualized a core at my sternum. I couldn't actually feel one there or anything but I still imagined one. Then, I imagined some form of energy, almost liquid, flowing from the core, through my arm, and to my palm.

  Still nothing.

  I opened my eyes and looked at my palm. There was no ball of water, no nothing. This time I was ready to give up, but I decided to give it another go. I decided to do the same visualization as I had done before, for no other reason than I had no other ideas.

  I closed my eyes and again visualized a core, right where Mira had said it was located. This time, instead of visualizing mana calmly flowing to my palm, I imagined a hand forcefully pulling apart the core like a cracked egg. My thought process was that since I couldn't sense mana, that meant that of course I couldn't guide it. So, wouldn't it be easier to forcefully release it and let it do its own thing?

  This time, something did happen. As soon as I opened my core and released all of the mana, I could feel a sort of invigorating energy throughout my entire body. All the muscles in my body tensed with strength and my body felt more energized, more focused. I felt powerful, I felt better than I had in the three years I had been in this world. I grinned to myself, knowing that I had done it, that this was it.

  I’d taught myself how to gather and utilize mana.