The Runic Alchemist

Damian enjoyed the scenic journey back to the proper civilization. With an entire army and two third-rankers accompanying them, he didn't have to worry about monsters. In fact, seeing monsters roam freely in the forest was a welcome sight—it was good to see nature returning to normal, or at least as normal as it could be. The wildlife was still sparse, as many creatures had been controlled or killed, but some had survived and found their own natural habitats.

Encountering a monster or a large beast provided a refreshing change of pace, allowing Damian a chance to practice his mimicry spell to copy some of their abilities. He would go off alone or sometimes with a few friends to do this. As the main sensory type in his section of the army, he often reached the animals or monsters first, mostly copying their abilities and scaring them away when he was done; only a few aggressive ones required him to fight and kill. Which also earned him a decent collection of mana stones.

Damian had given the mana stone stash from the beastmen village back to Royce, hoping it would help restore his image among the beastmen, who frequently came in small groups asking about their chief. However, Vidalia remained firm, strictly forbidding anyone from visiting him. Damian knew Kazak's imprisonment and transport back to the capital in a cage was a grim matter. He had asked Valoris and some other noble-born captains about the punishment for forbidden spells or crafts, and they all answered with one word: death. Why Vidalia insisted on making a public show of Kazak's trial by taking him to the capital puzzled Damian. Perhaps they intended to experiment on him. Damian was against this thought, but considering the wars raging on all sides of their kingdom it wasn't that far off a guess. But then again, the elves and Eldoris, as a whole, followed the nature goddess, and their religion frowned upon taking unnecessary lives which was also the reason most soldiers looked at him with both respect and fear: respect for his power and fear because he took lives of Eldorians so freely and easily.

Damian found it contradictory that they could kill thousands in war without guilt but were bound by strict codes in other cases. Perhaps killing in self-defense or for protection was allowed. Executing Kazak in a remote corner of the kingdom wouldn't suffice either; it was politically wiser for him to be judged by the queen, making his execution a royal decree. From a political standpoint, powerful criminals, especially those from their own lands, had to be tried and judged publicly. Otherwise, beastmen across the kingdom might see this as another slight, further straining their already difficult lives. This could lead to unrest, with powerful beastmen individuals viewing Vidalia, Bonecrusher, and even the royalty unfavorably if justice was not transparently served.

The following days were some of the most peaceful Damian had experienced in months. He idly worked on his runic spells and expanded his mimicry spell collection, which had become extensive, encompassing various unique spells. The main trait Damian sought in monsters was their ability to absorb mana from the environment, harnessing it to boost their power during attacks. He had observed this phenomenon in a few monsters; they appeared to have minimal mana, but as they prepared to strike, their mana signatures rose, seemingly drawing energy from their surroundings. He noticed this with the larger version of Toph as well when it used the laser spell.

But he had no success and it sounded incredibly risky so instead of using mimicry spell on himself he used it on other monsters that were together or nearby but different kind and had different abilities. But nope, they could not copy the affinity of the other monster to use as theirs so the mana gathering thing was not working properly. The other stuff worked though. Damian had successfully given a weaker monster a webbed paw with a mimicry spell, using the frog's version of mimicry spell.

The ability to bestow this mimicry spell on others worked similarly to healing but was even more restrictive. It only functioned if Damian and the target were in physical contact. For example, to transfer night vision, he had to touch the target's closed eyes or at least their face. Like healing, the mimicry spell was time-consuming and required a lot of mana, especially when copying complex features. Currently, Damian couldn't surpass certain mana limits to replicate larger or more intricate traits, such as a humanoid limb of a monster to human. The mimicry spell required a fusion of light and dark elements, meaning he couldn't use mana dust either, and dark or chaos-element mana stones were nearly impossible to find.

A convenient aspect of bestowal spells was that once transferred, the target could power the spell with their own mana. However, finding someone who could wield light and dark elements with the necessary precision was rare. Barely doing the spell for a minute or two had the old captain Loydel cost a big chunk of his mana. Just maintaining a spell if it matched their own organs like special eyes or special nose was not that much mana hungry but conjuring things that humans had left behind in evolution like a tail or long canine teeth took mana and even maintaining them took mana, since it was wholly powered on magic and was not really a part of one's body.

Well there were some exceptions that made sense for more mana and then some that did not at all, Damian was still experimenting and had to see everything the animals and monsters had to offer him. The forest didn't offer much variety, and the humanoid creatures he needed were usually found in dangerous regions or specific dungeons. Still, features like improved scent and night vision proved useful when he needed them.

Through this process, Damian discovered that the mimicry spell indirectly helped him train his body. Once he deactivated a specific animal feature, he could still sense its lingering effect, and each use seemed to slightly improve his natural abilities. He already had a sharp sense of smell, and now it was getting even better—or so he thought. Perhaps it was just the aftereffects of the mimicry spell.