Where was she?
It was a hazy thought, of course, as she was just waking up.
She had a bizarre dream.
No, it was more like a nightmare, and she…
Elizabeth opened her eyes, sitting up abruptly.
“Ugh…”
She held her head in discomfort.
She felt dizzy.
After all, she had used up almost all of her mana.
The only reason she wasn’t losing control was because she was in the academy.
How did she get here?
Well, it was obvious, but she didn’t want to think about it for now.
Getting up unsteadily, she headed towards the bookshelf.
She took out three books and put them back in a different order.
The bookshelf shook and moved to the side, revealing an elevator.
She walked in, and the door closed.
It started descending.
Half a minute later it stopped, the door slid open, and she walked out.
In front of her there was another door engraved with many runes.
She put her hand over it, and a tiny bolt of silver-blue lightning hit it.
The runes flashed with power, and the door slid up.
There was a blue light coming from the other side.
The first thing she saw was runes, countless runes, some floating, some engraved in the room.
Elizabeth knew that those were just the visible ones.
There were countless more hidden inside this room.
It was a massive room indeed, yet her eyes were attracted to the center where a giant sphere was hovering over a platform.
This was the most important place in the academy.
This was where all the controls for the academy, the enchantments for its daily operation, and the runes that ran the programs were, and the hovering sphere was the core of the academy.
For a moment she just admired the sphere.
She could feel a connection to it.
Of course she would, after all it was filled with her mana.
Feeling another headache growing, she walked towards the sphere.
It responded to her, a strand of mana spreading towards her.
She put her hand over it, and instantly mana flooded her body.
In no time she had two-thirds of her mana back.
She could continue, but that was not necessary, so she let go.
The strand returned back to the core.
She took a deep breath, calming herself down.
She couldn’t help but sigh in amazement.
This was truly a work of miracle, the life’s work of one of the greatest mages in history, the first headmaster and also the founder of the academy, Hermes Lorens Granwood, one of the heroes of humanity and so much more.
The idea was simple.
One of the weaknesses of a Unique Mana Holder is slow mana regeneration, so to counter this weakness he created a mana core just like how demons had, yet this core could do so much more.
He had succeeded in creating a base model, and the successive headmasters and trusted teachers had managed to improve it, yet his contribution still remained the highest.
She had stored half of her mana in the core whenever she could over the past almost three years.
At this point she didn’t have to worry about running out of mana for whatever and whoever she faced as long as she was in the Academy.
She could still grow.
She gritted her teeth.
The defeat from her battle with Ken was expected, yet how it happened and how easily he beat her had shattered her illusion of being powerful.
Yet it was how he played with her, no, how she let him play with her, that truly made her angry.
She was angry at him for doing that to her.
She was angry with herself for letting that bastard get into her mind again.
She needed to train, to grow stronger.
She felt it during her battle.
She could improve.
But for now she needed to check something else.
One of the advantages of this core that was discovered later was the fact that it had an effect similar to a Unique Dominance, as within the range of the academy no one could use magic except the Unique Mana Holder.
Normally the Unique Dominance owner could choose who could use magic and who couldn’t, but since the core was semi-independent of the mana holder this was a problem.
Of course, there was a solution: permits.
She made a gesture, and runes gathered in front of her into a hologram.
She searched for the permits section.
The permits for the teachers were their badges.
And the permits for the students were their student badges, which only allowed them to perform magic in certain places in the academy.
A list of permits and the corresponding people that had them hovered before her eyes as she began checking.
When Ken was here he used magic many times.
That wasn’t supposed to happen.
Of course he could use magic, but without a permit it would trigger an alarm and notify her instantly.
Yet it didn’t happen, so that must mean that he had a permit.
Yet as she kept examining the list, a frown formed on her face.
She couldn’t find it.