The Void Vault was silent once more.
The lingering scent of ozone, burnt salt, and the metallic tang of dried blood had finally begun to fade, filtered out by the sheer density of the Quintessence permeating the air. It was a sterile, absolute quiet that only a private dimension could offer.
Garrick sat on the edge of his conjured leaf-bed, his movements still stiff but no longer accompanied by the sickening sound of grinding bone. He rolled his newly healed left shoulder, wincing as the fresh skin pulled tight. It was a miracle—or rather, it was high-tier magical engineering.
The cursed-water mage looked around the infinite, shadowless white space with a mixture of profound awe and deep-seated suspicion.
"Boss," Garrick said, his voice still sounding like it had been dragged through a gravel pit. "I appreciate the five-star medical treatment, I really do. But this place… it's a bit too white. It's making my eyes hurt. It's like being trapped inside a giant, bleached skull."
Lencar stood a few paces away, his arms crossed over his chest. His splintered wooden mask reflected the shadowless light, making him look like an immovable statue of dark iron.
"Be grateful you're still alive to feel the eye strain, Garrick," Lencar replied, his tone dry and clinical. "The alternative was being entombed in a block of demonic ice at the bottom of the northern sea. I hear the lighting down there is much worse."
Garrick snorted, a wet, rough sound. He knew better than to push for a 'thank you' dinner or a warm sentiment. Dealing with Lencar was like dealing with a specialized tool: you used it, it worked, and you didn't expect it to smile back.
"Fair point. So, what's the play now? My ship is currently a floating toothpick, my cargo is in splinters, and my crew is still vibrating like tuning forks from that Spade ice spell. We aren't exactly in fighting shape."
Lencar tapped his chin, his mind already shifting into the logistical gear.
He didn't need a broken, half-sunk ship or a group of traumatized, loud-mouthed smugglers hanging around his private sanctuary. This dimension was for research, for storage, and for the kind of training that tended to kill anyone standing within a mile.
He needed them back in the field. He needed his sensors back on the board.
"You're going to the Forsaken Realm," Lencar stated flatly.
Garrick blinked, his jaw dropping slightly. "The Forsaken Realm? You've got to be kidding me. That dump? There's nothing there but dirt, potatoes, and peasants who can barely light a candle with their mana. It's the edge of the world."
"Exactly," Lencar said, his voice brooking no argument. "It is a blind spot. It is the perfect place for you to disappear while the Spade Kingdom's naval scouts scan the coast for your specific mana signature. They won't look for a high-tier smuggler in a place where the biggest crime is stealing a goat."
Lencar raised his right hand.
The air in the center of the white room warped violently.
A jagged, vertical line of absolute darkness tore open in the middle of the room, crackling with spatial static. Through the rift, a glimpse of a dusty, wind-swept trail and a few distant, thatched-roof houses could be seen.
"There's a small, nameless town on the outskirts. It's quiet. It's boring. It's secure. I've already mapped the coordinates."
Lencar glanced at the crates of ancient rune books—the "harvest"—that Garrick had nearly died to secure.
"Take your men. Get settled. Resume your usual work, but keep it low-profile. Collect information. I'll contact you through the tether when I have a specific objective for you."
Garrick sighed, a long, weary sound of resignation. He stood up, his joints popping, and began waving his surviving crew members toward the dark rift.
"Fine, fine. Forsaken Realm it is. I guess I'll learn to like the smell of manure. At least the booze is cheap there, and the Magic Knights don't bother patrolling the mud."
One by one, the battered smugglers stepped through the spatial rift, disappearing from the white vault into the dusty reality of the Clover Kingdom's fringe.
Garrick stopped at the threshold, his hand resting on the edge of the tear. He looked back at the masked figure one last time.
"…Hey, Boss."
"What?"
"That new spell… the Abyssal Rot Tide. That wasn't just my talent hitting a peak, was it?" Garrick's eyes narrowed slightly. "Don't go charging me extra for the soul-link upgrade next time we talk about commissions, alright?"
Lencar's lips curled into a faint, unseen smile behind the wood of his mask.
"I'll deduct the 'evolution fee' from your next successful delivery. Now, get out before I decide to test my new wind magic on your ship's debris."
Garrick laughed—a rough, genuine sound—and vanished into the darkness.
The portal snapped shut with a sharp pop.
Silence returned to the Void Vault.
Lencar let out a long, heavy breath, his shoulders slumping just a fraction of an inch.
The "human management" part of his day was finally over. Dealing with people was an inefficient use of processing power. They were unpredictable, they had egos, and they required constant recalibration.
He checked his internal clock, cross-referencing it with the flow of time in the outside world.
Two days.
He had exactly forty-eight hours before he had to be back in the town of Nairn, wearing a stained apron, chopping vegetables, and pretending to Rebecca that he didn't know how to rewrite the laws of physics.
"Two days is enough for a deep-dive," Lencar muttered to himself.
He walked to the absolute center of the Vault and sat down on the cold marble floor, crossing his legs in a meditative stance.
He wasn't thinking about ancient runes or stolen grimoires this time.
He was thinking about the fundamental flaw of the human body.
The fight between Garrick and the Spade mage, Kael Vortigen, had been a perfect data set. It had shown Lencar a glaring, pathetic weakness in how mages—even high-tier ones—handled defense.
Garrick's barriers had been shattered like sugar glass the moment Kael applied real pressure.
Why?
The answer was simple: the mana wasn't integrated. It was a shell. A costume. A mage would project their mana outward to form a wall, but that wall was disconnected from their physical mass. Once the barrier broke, the body was just soft, vulnerable meat.
"Mana Skin," Lencar whispered.
The term was common enough. He had already mastered the basics—it was the standard technique used by Magic Knight Captains and elites to survive in Grand Magic Zones. He could coat his body in a thin, protective layer of mana to resist environmental pressures, heat, or cold.
But for most, it was a passive skill. It was a "Stage 4" level technique used for utility.
"If I want to survive a direct, point-blank hit from a Zero Stage monster… this skin can't just be a layer of insulation. It needs to become a mobile, reactive fortress."
He closed his eyes, plunging his consciousness into the "debugger" mode he used for his magical experiments.
He began to circulate his Stage 3 Peak mana.
He didn't keep it in his meridians. He didn't channel it into a spell. He pushed it outward, through every pore in his skin simultaneously.
Slowly, a pale, shimmering, and incredibly dense aura began to coat his body.
"Analysis: The Standard Mana Skin is a static field," Lencar thought, his mind stripping away the fluff and looking at the raw code.
"It functions as a buffer. It absorbs impact until the density of the attacking spell exceeds the density of the defensive field. Once that threshold is crossed, the field shatters. It is binary. Success or failure."
"If I want to exceed the threshold, I need to change the fundamental logic. The skin shouldn't just absorb."
"It needs to perform Kinetic Redistribution."
Lencar began to manipulate the aura.
He didn't just try to make the layer thicker. That would just drain his mana faster. Instead, he made it move.
He began to vibrate the mana coating his skin at a terrifyingly high frequency. He created a microscopic, high-velocity layer of turbulence against his own epidermis. He was turning his skin into a literal orbital sander of magical energy.