And then, it started.
The long process of completely reforming his network of Mana pathways.
For now, Shang decided to keep his old network unchanged. Instead, he would add a second network connecting to the first one.
Like this, he could still use all of his attacks without having to figure out what Mana pathways he would need exactly in the future.
Then, when he understood all of his Mana pathways for all States, he would delete the old network and only use the new one.
But, for now, he would keep both.
Shang started to cast Callen's Spell. It had been several years since he had cast it the last time, and he was a bit out of practice, but it only took a couple of hours to get back into the groove.
After that, Shang started to actually change his Mana pathways.
The first time he did it, he was quite nervous. After all, one mistake could essentially cripple him permanently.
Because of that, he triple and quadruple-checked every Spell he was about to cast.
When he finished the first Spell, Shang felt a burning sensation come from his right middle finger.
At this moment, a new Mana pathway was forming inside his finger, and Shang suddenly felt like his entire body had been thrown into icy water.
Shang's right eye closed halfway.
He took deep breaths.
His shoulders sunk.
For the first time in over 60 years, Shang felt tired.
For the first time in forever, Shang wanted to sleep.
In the next couple of seconds, Shang almost stopped thinking.
SNAP!
Then, he suddenly snapped to attention.
All the heat returned, and the tiredness vanished.
It was like nothing had happened.
Shang looked with interest at his finger, and he saw the new Mana pathway.
'Sure enough, creating a new pathway consumes a tremendous amount of Mana. This small Mana pathway needed so much of my Mana that I felt like I was about to die of hypothermia, even though that clearly wasn't the case.'
Then, Shang took a deep breath as he compared the size of this tiny Mana pathway with the far bigger ones he would need to build.
'I'm essentially playing with the energy reserves of my body. I can't do anything that goes beyond all the Mana inside my body. The Spell is essentially acting just like Darkness Mana poisoning. If all my Mana gets used up while the poisoning hasn't been resolved yet, I will die.'
'This means that I have to create the Mana pathways slowly and in small bursts. I can't create an entire Mana pathway with one Spell. Luckily, I don't need to create a full one with a single Spell. I can simply create 10% of a Mana pathway and then create another 10%.'
'The process in and of itself isn't dangerous. It's only dangerous if I get impatient or make an error during the calculations. As long as I follow the rules and protocol, there won't be a problem.'
'I guess it's a bit like driving. Kind of easy, but one mistake can have devastating consequences.'
Shang sat down and calculated his next change.
After checking everything, again and again, Shang performed the second Spell.
A new Mana pathway appeared in Shang's right middle finger, but it stopped growing at the halfway mark.
In comparison to the first time, Shang felt a bit exhausted but not tired. He felt a bit cool but not freezing.
'That's far easier. Alright, next one.'
Shang created the next Mana pathway.
And the next one.
And the next one.
After a while, Shang's mind returned to its state of routine, but compared to before, Shang was still extra careful.
Whenever he noticed that he wasn't checking everything in detail, his right eye widened, and he forced himself to check everything again.
He couldn't allow himself to become complacent in routine.
This was different from training.
In training, Shang essentially couldn't accidentally take a step back. He would always step forward, even if some steps weren't super great.
But if Shang made a mistake here, he would be blowing his own brains out.
A lot of time passed.
Shang still had no idea how long he had been gone from the Storm Kingdom, but he knew it had been a really long time.
And on this day, Shang reached his first checkpoint.
Shang took a deep breath and inspected all his pathways.
At this moment, there were innumerable disconnected pipes going throughout his body.
If one looked at a tree and took away the trunk and the branches connecting directly to the trunk, one could see what Shang's body looked like right now.
It was essentially a mess of small tubes leading nowhere at the edges of his body.
'The Great Sword State specific Mana pathways are finished.'
Then, Shang focused on the remainder of his body.
'Now, I need to create the entire base framework that I need for every State.'
'This will take a looooong time.'
The Mana pathways Shang had placed were insanely numerous.
Shang guessed that he was probably at over a million, and Shang needed several minutes for only a single one.
But the base framework was even crazier.
Shang wouldn't need to create that many Mana pathways, but they would need to be insanely stable and big, which would require even more Mana.
Shang knew that he would be playing with his life if he decided to create more than 10% of a medium Mana pathway with one Spell.
And the big ones would take even longer.
'Well, at least I only have to do it once,' Shang thought. 'I will have to do the individual pathways for all four States, but I need to create the base framework only once.'
'Might as well create it now.'
Shang had already been isolated for a very long time, and now, he was about to create the entire base framework for his Mana pathways, which would take a great number of years.
Yet, it didn't matter.
Shang had known from the very beginning that forging a new Path was extremely difficult.
If the warrior Path were more powerful, Shang could probably simply ask someone to create a plan of Mana pathways for him and let it be completed by someone else in just a couple of years.
What needed decades of Shang's dedicated training and planning now would only take maybe a bit more than a year for warriors in the future.
While perfecting one's techniques was the most time-consuming process for all the warriors, this was actually the least time-consuming part for Shang.
Planning and recreating the Mana pathways took much longer than perfecting his techniques.
But Shang was willing to do it.
