The Explanations of a Bored... Deity?

Mitchel looked up from the three info cards, staring at the magic Asian office lady with a bewildered expression.

She glared back. "Don't look at me like I did anything, you're the one with the weird stuff," she told him. Then, rolling her neck, she sighed. "But I suppose I should do what I can to explain.

"Okay, first up, Dominant's Tithe..." a copy of the card seemed to separate from the one floating in front of Mitchel, spinning around to float in front of her. She frowned at it. "... Huh. This is... huh." She glanced up at Mitchel. "You know, I think there might be a paperwork issue or something? This looks like a method that's supposed to draw upon a familiar but it doesn't give you one. Hm." She stared at the card for another moment, then sighed and leaned back. "I'll take responsibility for this mistake if you go with this one; if you take the Familiar Boon in the next section, I'll reimburse you the cost."

Well, that's something, I guess, Mitchel thought to himself.

"Anyway, TLDR, bind slaves. More slaves equal more mana. Physically stronger slaves equal more mana. Makes sense - your slaves are supposed to cover for your weaknesses, and since you're supposed to be a wizard in your next life, you're probably not going to be hitting the gym too often. Obviously, your Familiar will count as a ****."

Mitchel was internally wincing. He didn't like the sound of needing to enslave people in order to gain mana. Though maybe it was possible to just... avoid using the more problematic parts? The card had said he would override the slaves' free will, but what if he ordered them to just act as they would anyways, or refused to give them orders? Maybe that would work?

"The secondary pools also have a couple minor benefits that weren't mentioned - due to their extradimensional nature, they can't be targeted by effects that drain or damage your mana pool, and sensory effects won't detect them. They're also immune to 'mana clash' or 'mana burn' type effects, where people try and turn your own magical power against you or your slaves, though frankly, you're unlikely to find those a problem either way."

She thought for a moment. "Also, [Mana Throughput] and [Mana Generation] are equal to your Magnitude, barring any Boons you pick up. [Mana Pool], on the other hand, is equal to 100 times your Magnitude. So 15, 15, and 1,500, going off that weird 15 stat-line you have going on."

Aside from the requirement to enslave people, Mitchel thought that it was a pretty good deal. Using that 15 Magnitude, he should be able to bind 15 people, each of whom would give him at least 15 mana every 30 seconds - for a minimum of 225 every half of a minute, or 450 every minute. And he'd be able to store up to 1,500 mana on his own, and another 1,500 with each thrall, for a total of 24,000 mana if he was completely maxed out. And if what the office lady had said earlier was true, those numbers would only grow.

"So, next we'd have Ecstatic Generation." She let out another sigh after she copied and glanced over the info card. "Seriously, what is this bullshit? Sex generating magical energy? I mean, okay, tantric rituals are a thing, sure, but that's not usually the primary method! Ugh, whatever, I guess your power generation options are just as weird as you are, weirdo."

Mitchel felt compelled to say something, but she held up her hand. "You know what? Forget it, let me focus on doing my job. Anyway, in summary, have sex, get mana. You get some multipliers based on your sympathetic resonance with the people you're fucking, so ideally try to fuck your opposite sex clone, but more likely, just fuck your kids or whatever." She ignored Mitchel's agahst expression. "You've got fertility control, but no STD immunities, so watch out for that, I guess. Practically speaking, this is for the sort of mage who's able to carefully ration out their casting over the course of the day. And like I said earlier, the secondary pool's also got a couple minor benefits that weren't mentioned in the description. Can't be targeted by effects that drain or damage your mana pool, sensory effects won't detect it. Heck, since you don't have other regeneration methods, you could theoretically keep your main pool entirely empty and just convince everyone that you aren't a mage because you can't fill your pool. Finally, it's still immune to mana clashing effects."

That's a clever trick, though dangerous if something were to somehow block mana transfer from the secondary pool, Mitchel mused. Though I'd assume if something could do that, they'd probably be able to block most magic period.

"Anyway, as a reminder, [Mana Generation], [Mana Throughput], and [Mana Density] refer to your magnitude, because you're weird and all your numbers are the same. [Mana Pool] doesn't, because it's how much mana you can hold - it's 100 times your Magnitude. All that put together means you'd have a normal [Mana Pool] of 1,500, but that secondary one would be 22,500."

And the same size in total as the Dominant's Tithe option, Mitchel realized. But with the downside that, as she said, you have to be more careful - it'd be hard to refill the pool in a serious situation, like a fight or some sort of natural disaster. On the other hand, if I abused all those multipliers, I'd be able to fill up both pools a hell of a lot faster.

"Now, last one, Exhibitive Creation." She again looked at the copied info card, face mophing into a glare. "Aaaand we're getting weirder, at least tantric rituals have some precedence! Nakey equals better magic is... it's like someone took ambient mana generation and made it perverted! Whatever, at least it comes with some useful secondary traits. Since normally walking into a fight or a blizzard or whatever naked would kill you, you can just slip on a metal ring or whatever, and it'll be like you're wearing plate armor. The description doesn't mention it, but I'm _pretty _sure subdermal implants also work fine, and that bit about defensive magics means that if you're completely naked, any alchemical treatments or armoring spells or whatever are going to be twice as effective. I guess this is effective if you're, like, a dragon or something, but can you imagine just walking down the street without a strip of clothing?" She froze, blinking at the middle distance. "...wait, is this a sex thing? Are these all sex things?"

A shake of her head, and she skimmed the card again. "Oh, right, [Mana Generation] and [Mana Throughput] are still equal to your Magnitude."

One the one hand, it was much faster than the other two options, generating that 15 mana every 3 seconds as opposed to every 30, and not having too many prerequisites. On the other hand...

Yeah, I don't see myself being comfortable prancing around with just a ring on. Not even with those defense benefits.

"So, what's it going to be?" the office lady interrupted Mitchel's thoughts. "Come on now, we don't have forever. Well, maybe you do, but I have things to do!"