I noticed that, I like that the story has this theme that the hero is not necessarily the hero because they are uber powerful or are the chosen one, but because they think and act logically and are able to adapt.

 

This is why I fucking hate the mind spiders

 

Maybe they somehow learned about the death of the Cyoria colony and were suspicious?

Though the whole empath human who knows about their techniques should be suspicious on its own...

 

I don't think we've got enough to go on. They could be allied with Red. They could just have wanted to interrogate him on their terms. Will be interesting to find out.

 

I suspect it was all just a terrible misunderstanding.

 

Hey guys. New to this forum and this thread. Just started reading mother of learning and i got a theory i wanted to run by you.


If a person is highly skilled in shaping, could he/she possible shape it outside their body? We know that the hole is pooring out a lot of mana and a person can absorb that mana into their soul or what ever they do with it. Problem is that is highly dangerous since that person gets sick by using that mana.

i remembered Zorian finding out that the ancient mage used very long rituals to use their magic since they where really bad at shaping, so shaping is kinda new and very few people are really proficient at it.

Well i have started rambling but i had it on my mind for a while now. Let me know what you guys think.

 

Do you mean shaping the ambient mana around you, or taking your own mana and shaping that while it is outside of you? Because I think the latter is possible, but I'm not so sure about the former. It seems that you have to sort of "grab" the ambient mana into yourself before you can use it, but I could be wrong.

The sickness, I think, comes from grabbing too much ambient mana and trying to use it too fast- from what I understand, you can sort of sip on the ambient mana, take your time, and assimilate it and be able to use it harmlessly.

I could be wrong- I didn't pay super close attention to all the magical theory stuff.

 

I mean the former. Sure, if that was possible than that would make that person godlike, so i guess it is impossible or it would make that person very unbalanced Just a thought i had for a while now.

I think you are right about the sickness coming from grabbing it too fast, since Zorian did run out of mana very quickly when he left school, so i guess all mages do absorb the mana when around sources like the hole.

 

I don't really enjoy how the meeting got portrayed in the latest chapter. During chapter 17 he was so much better prepared when about to deal with the aranea. Now, a couple of years of restarts after that, he apparent had nothing other than simply trying to outrun them.

Even if he got complacent about meeting aranea this time (which I find strange, considering Zorian's paranoia), it doesn't explain why he didn't even try an attack against the group of aranea cutting him off. He just came to a stop and let them attack his shield en masse. We know that aranea are quite vulnerable to fire spells and he already spent a few restarts with Alanic, he could've surely done something like send a fireball at them in an attempt to force them away from blocking the path.

I'm not saying he should've won or even caused them significant harm, but apart from using his mind shield he both acted like and demonstrated the skills of his chapter one self when trying to escape. After so many years of restarts I'd have expected at least an attempt to attack rather than stand in place when they surrounded him.

 

He didn't want them to rip open his mind. There are a few reasons for this:

1. Once they're in, they win. They can stop him from running and they get to take their sweet ass time.

2. If they get in, they can learn about the timeloop; learn about Red Robes; learn Zorian's secrets and shit.

3. We know from the memory packets that mind magic carries across the timeloops (at least for Zorian, Zach, and Red Robes). I doubt they'd leave him with something as benign as a memory packet; best case scenario: he's a vegetable, worst case: he's their mind slave agent until they're done with him or Red Robes finds and kills them.

It's not like he could actually run away. It was a pretty well done ambush.

 

He was able to both keep up a mental defence and attack the two escorts he had, so I don't see why he shouldn't have been able to do the same thing to the huge group. Even if he couldn't do it easily because of numbers or whatever, there were way too many of them to prevent his mind from being broken through in the first place, so he should've attempted an escape via offense (or just blown himself up).

I have no problems with him losing, but the manner in which he did it; no traps/preparation despite having over a week of notice before the meeting, no real attempt to fight back, just struck me badly. It's something I'd have expected of a fresh Zorian that just happened to know some mind magic, not someone honing his skills over the last several years. Even when he first met with the Cyoria matriarch he had more of a plan than just "create a shield then run away".

In any case the next chapter might have Zorian realise/fix these issues after this close call.

 

It does seem odd he didn't try to use any fire spells, given he did spend a lot of time honing them. But that's probably the only discrepency and I don't think it's a terribly large one - but a good thing to point out.

 

What's the point of him fighting though, really? The risk is that their mind attacks do lasting damage through the time loops - which they did. The reward is what, he feels badass at taking down a few Aranea and then the entire colony declares war against him and he spends a pointless loop using them as target practice?

Better just take the route of suicide and lowering the risk of them causing lasting harm. There's no gain in him continuing a time loop as fucked as that anyway. The main thing that seemed odd is that his suicide plan is something that seemed to occur to him while in the midst of being attacked, not immediately.

Liked that we finally saw some interaction with his parents, as short as it was. More Kirielle is always good too.

 

Updated. Remembered to post before reading this time.

 

I like the new teacher. An apt name indeed.

 

The Arachna continue to be awesome and entertaining. Really like the whole species and the differences between the webs. Their outlooks on humanity are amusing as well.

 

Aranea stuff is great, yeah; he should honestly just spend a couple chapters with subterranean spelunking with some groups. He's not going to beat any of the major antagonists with common magic methinks, he's probably better off learning more obscure things, especially considering his limited mana capacity.