"What have you done?" For the first time, the king's voice bears emotion in it. "How do you have that mana!" he screams. "You shouldn't be able to!"
The small black orb over the palm of my hand threatens to explode, so I force my mind into handling it, my body constantly regenerating at immense speed, allowing me to do something that would otherwise kill me.
I feel the orb start pulling mana from me on its own. I don't even send it toward it, yet it absorbs bits of my mana that leak from my body now that I have all my passives and constructs deactivated. Everything else is unaffected, and only the mana starts to get pulled toward the pitch-dark orb with beautiful sparks of multicolored light inside it.
It's not like it's sucking it in or absorbing it; it's all as if the sheer density and quality of the mana it's made of pull all the weaker mana toward it and dominate it.
I reach out, grab the orb, and force it to change; it slowly expands and extends into the shape of a short dagger, a pitch-black dagger that looks like it's absorbing the light and imprisoning it inside.
The moment I hold it, the black mana starts pulling more and more mana from my body, as if payment just for using it. The amount it pulls is immense, and I know I will last only a few seconds, even with my mana reserves. So I take a step toward the king and slash through the air, cutting off his connection to the saint he has through his sword and crown.
Immediately, two items lose some of their shine, and the king loses his immensely fast regeneration.
"Oh," he says, shocked even as I stab the black dagger toward him; his skill fires off, the one that continued to absorb all of our attacks, yet this time the dagger made with the use of [Focus] ignores his absorption and goes right into his heart, the man still too shocked to dodge.
A weaker version of regeneration fires up, but it's not enough. I watch as the dagger pulsates and absorbs the mana from his body, slowly sucking it in. It pulls it straight from his heart and dominates it without any problem.
The king falls to his knees, unbelievingly staring at me, "Please, do not hurt her," are his last words before the light disappears from his eyes.
As he dies and is rid of all of his mana, I feel the dagger start to reach toward me and my mana. I let go of the dagger and Mantle, the newest construct, activates and resists, and keeps my mana inside my body now that I'm not touching the dagger.
The pull is weak, yet I feel it trying to get more of my non-concentrated mana. I allow it and feed the dagger a bit more, and when I grab it, I find out that I'm unable to get rid of it; the mana is too dense, too powerful for me to disrupt or take under my control. I can only feed it with my mana in exchange for this dagger, this black mana listening to me.
The thing is my creation, my mana, yet I'm unable to take it back under my control, and it constantly absorbs a massive amount of mana as I touch it, no matter how much or what I do to try to stop it.
I boost my body and then throw the dagger outside of the tower, as far as I can, somewhere toward the wall.
Okay, let's finish the floor; the dagger can stay here and disappear with the third floor.
I then look at the king one more time and grab his crown, sword, as well the sword Aias had. The bracelet is still on my arm.
[Perception] encompasses as large an area of the tower as I can, and I quickly locate the others. Before moving toward them, I look out and see golden, white, and red lightning cracking in the sky and hear buildings crashing as Tess continues her fight with Edwal. I spot them moving at immense speed, jumping from roof to roof while lightning tracks their bodies and continues to shoot toward their opponents.
Two javelins constantly follow Tess and attack the blonde man, flying through the air at terrifying speed. A bit further, I see Min-Jae and the twins helping her when the opportunity arises.
They should be fine, and I think Tess wouldn't appreciate me taking the fun fight from her. So instead, I put the crown on my head, put one sword into the scabbard I take from the king, and put it on my waist. Then, while holding the sword of the dead Aias, I head towards the others.
My heart is still beating wildly as I walk. Should I stop them from killing the Saint? We can spend a few more weeks here, and I will have a chance to practice using [Focus] to concentrate my mana even further.
Up until now, I didn't even dare to try it, as even using [Mana Infusion] and [Redistribution] made the mana extremely dangerous. The mana always ended up exploding, which I see more as an unintended side effect.
No, what I'm trying to do is try to imitate the effect I think a different mana attribute upgrade would have—Potency, the upgrade Lissandra picked. The only reason why I went with Amplification was that I already had a plan in mind to do it my own way: my extremely janky and roundabout way that would only continue to improve in the future.
I use kinetic energy to push myself higher and land on one of the balconies inside the elevator tunnel, then do it again to get to the others quicker.
So, what is that black mana? Did I succeed? And if I learn to control it, can I somewhat replace my mana with this black one with tiny sparks of light that shine inside? Or is it something else?
Anyway, who cares? It's dangerous as heck. It can't be that bad, even if it's not what I intended!
It's also a shame that I can't use active tempering right now. My body is healing too quickly and regenerating before I can "temper" it.
I glance at my notifications and it looks like I did get two more levels from finishing the king, and [Mana Manipulation] went up by a staggering two levels, reaching level 39, probably hitting another bottleneck. [Focus] also grew by two levels.
Overall, it went pretty well, I would say.
"Nathaniel," Lily welcomes me the moment I step inside the room where she, Sophie, Isabella, Biscuit, and Hadwin are. There are giant silver doors that are charred, with some scratches on them, yet it's clear that they didn't get any further.
"It's fine; the king is dead and Tess will deal with Edwal. We don't have to hurry anymore," I look at them. "So get comfortable and we will open the door a bit later."
What kind of dumbass would miss such an amazing opportunity to train highly dangerous skills that would otherwise kill you?
It doesn't take that long, and Tess returns together with the remaining members of our group. She is holding Edwal's chest armor in her hand and throws it on the ground as she enters. The armor isn't damaged at all, not even scratched, and there is only blood on its surface.
Tess's face is serious, and she doesn't seem in that good a mood, "King?" she asks.
"Nat took care of him," Hadwin says as he steps a bit closer to her, glancing at all of them. Obviously, because of the healing aura, there are no wounds; they just seem to be tired. "We decided to wait a bit before opening the door. We can spend a few more days collecting supplies or even training now that we don't have to worry about wounds."
"Let me guess, Nathaniel's idea?" Tess flicks a strand of her hair off her face.
"Yes," Hadwin confirms.
I gracefully ignore them and continue to examine the items.
Crown of Eternal Vigilance (Epic): This finely crafted crown used to be seamlessly linked to a revered saint. It no longer bears a connection to its healing powers.
Bracelet of Enduring Guard (Epic): Elegantly designed bracelet with extreme durability. Seamlessly bonded with a revered saint and connected to its healing powers.
Shortsword of Perpetual Shelter (Epic): This finely crafted sword used to be seamlessly linked to a revered saint. It no longer bears a connection to its healing powers.
Longsword of Lasting Refuge (Epic): Elegantly designed longsword with extreme durability. Seamlessly bonded with a revered saint and connected to its healing powers.
Nice, it looks like the rarities go like this: common, uncommon, rare, epic. As for the items, they are of the highest rarity we've seen up until now, but I think the moment we take them off the 3rd floor, they will become much less useful to the point where rare items might be better.
Sure, they will stay durable, but that's it. Without their main effect, the connection to the Saint's healing aura, they are just that: durable items.
Also, the crown and shortsword are no longer connected to the saint. I blame the black mana dagger I made, which currently lies somewhere outside, and knowing how this shitty tutorial works, it will soon awaken consciousness and try to kill us all.
Well, anyway, I can keep the bracelet and give the longsword to Tess so she can train while holding onto it and then maybe pass it to others.
"Hadwin, are you fine?" I hear Sophie's voice, and when I look up, I immediately see what she noticed with her [Manipulation].
Hadwin is holding his arm, and there is a painful expression on his face, and inside that arm, there is mana swirling.
It's not his mana.
In one quick movement, I stand up and boost myself closer, then slash with the sword in my hand, cutting off his arm at the shoulder. The look in his eyes is almost thankful, and I feel him strengthening his body. I cut again, and a bigger piece of his shoulder disappears, and I do not feel foreign mana inside his body.
I fuel my heart with my mana and constantly shoot kinetic energy at the cut-off arm that is now connected to the piece of the shoulder I cut off later.
Yet, no matter how much I try, I'm unable to destroy the arm in one attack, something I should be able to do. The arm is much tougher than it should be and regenerates way too quickly.
I concentrate my thermal energy and dark yellow flames encompass the arm, which just refuses to burn; instead.
Then I feel a short pulse from it and the arm connects to the healing aura of the saint in the same way the items I took do.
"Fuck," is what I say as the cut off arm starts twitching and expanding, "Lily, destroy the saint as quickly as possible!" I shout at our healer and turn back to the arm.
First, the shoulder appears, and then the chest, from which the head grows quickly, followed by the second arm and two legs. The flesh continues to twitch, bend, break, and reform. The arm and figure become smaller and slimmer, and soon a woman stands here.
A young woman, around my age and slightly shorter than me. She has a slim yet athletic figure and the body of a person who is used to moving, an athlete or a fighter. The body is muscular and fit, yet not overly so, still maintaining womanly curves.
The naked woman with long gray hair opens her eyes and smiles, her gaze focused solely on me.
"What are you, a cockroach? Why don't you just die?" I rouse up my mana and turn to face her.
"That's quite a rude thing to say to a pretty young woman, little pup," even saying that, Lissandra takes a battle stance and smiles.
"What have you done?" For the first time, the king's voice bears emotion in it. "How do you have that mana!" he screams. "You shouldn't be able to!"
The small black orb over the palm of my hand threatens to explode, so I force my mind into handling it, my body constantly regenerating at immense speed, allowing me to do something that would otherwise kill me.
I feel the orb start pulling mana from me on its own. I don't even send it toward it, yet it absorbs bits of my mana that leak from my body now that I have all my passives and constructs deactivated. Everything else is unaffected, and only the mana starts to get pulled toward the pitch-dark orb with beautiful sparks of multicolored light inside it.
It's not like it's sucking it in or absorbing it; it's all as if the sheer density and quality of the mana it's made of pull all the weaker mana toward it and dominate it.
I reach out, grab the orb, and force it to change; it slowly expands and extends into the shape of a short dagger, a pitch-black dagger that looks like it's absorbing the light and imprisoning it inside.
The moment I hold it, the black mana starts pulling more and more mana from my body, as if payment just for using it. The amount it pulls is immense, and I know I will last only a few seconds, even with my mana reserves. So I take a step toward the king and slash through the air, cutting off his connection to the saint he has through his sword and crown.
Immediately, two items lose some of their shine, and the king loses his immensely fast regeneration.
"Oh," he says, shocked even as I stab the black dagger toward him; his skill fires off, the one that continued to absorb all of our attacks, yet this time the dagger made with the use of [Focus] ignores his absorption and goes right into his heart, the man still too shocked to dodge.
A weaker version of regeneration fires up, but it's not enough. I watch as the dagger pulsates and absorbs the mana from his body, slowly sucking it in. It pulls it straight from his heart and dominates it without any problem.
The king falls to his knees, unbelievingly staring at me, "Please, do not hurt her," are his last words before the light disappears from his eyes.
As he dies and is rid of all of his mana, I feel the dagger start to reach toward me and my mana. I let go of the dagger and Mantle, the newest construct, activates and resists, and keeps my mana inside my body now that I'm not touching the dagger.
The pull is weak, yet I feel it trying to get more of my non-concentrated mana. I allow it and feed the dagger a bit more, and when I grab it, I find out that I'm unable to get rid of it; the mana is too dense, too powerful for me to disrupt or take under my control. I can only feed it with my mana in exchange for this dagger, this black mana listening to me.
The thing is my creation, my mana, yet I'm unable to take it back under my control, and it constantly absorbs a massive amount of mana as I touch it, no matter how much or what I do to try to stop it.
I boost my body and then throw the dagger outside of the tower, as far as I can, somewhere toward the wall.
Okay, let's finish the floor; the dagger can stay here and disappear with the third floor.
I then look at the king one more time and grab his crown, sword, as well the sword Aias had. The bracelet is still on my arm.
[Perception] encompasses as large an area of the tower as I can, and I quickly locate the others. Before moving toward them, I look out and see golden, white, and red lightning cracking in the sky and hear buildings crashing as Tess continues her fight with Edwal. I spot them moving at immense speed, jumping from roof to roof while lightning tracks their bodies and continues to shoot toward their opponents.
Two javelins constantly follow Tess and attack the blonde man, flying through the air at terrifying speed. A bit further, I see Min-Jae and the twins helping her when the opportunity arises.
They should be fine, and I think Tess wouldn't appreciate me taking the fun fight from her. So instead, I put the crown on my head, put one sword into the scabbard I take from the king, and put it on my waist. Then, while holding the sword of the dead Aias, I head towards the others.
My heart is still beating wildly as I walk. Should I stop them from killing the Saint? We can spend a few more weeks here, and I will have a chance to practice using [Focus] to concentrate my mana even further.
Up until now, I didn't even dare to try it, as even using [Mana Infusion] and [Redistribution] made the mana extremely dangerous. The mana always ended up exploding, which I see more as an unintended side effect.
No, what I'm trying to do is try to imitate the effect I think a different mana attribute upgrade would have—Potency, the upgrade Lissandra picked. The only reason why I went with Amplification was that I already had a plan in mind to do it my own way: my extremely janky and roundabout way that would only continue to improve in the future.
I use kinetic energy to push myself higher and land on one of the balconies inside the elevator tunnel, then do it again to get to the others quicker.
So, what is that black mana? Did I succeed? And if I learn to control it, can I somewhat replace my mana with this black one with tiny sparks of light that shine inside? Or is it something else?
Anyway, who cares? It's dangerous as heck. It can't be that bad, even if it's not what I intended!
It's also a shame that I can't use active tempering right now. My body is healing too quickly and regenerating before I can "temper" it.
I glance at my notifications and it looks like I did get two more levels from finishing the king, and [Mana Manipulation] went up by a staggering two levels, reaching level 39, probably hitting another bottleneck. [Focus] also grew by two levels.
Overall, it went pretty well, I would say.
"Nathaniel," Lily welcomes me the moment I step inside the room where she, Sophie, Isabella, Biscuit, and Hadwin are. There are giant silver doors that are charred, with some scratches on them, yet it's clear that they didn't get any further.
"It's fine; the king is dead and Tess will deal with Edwal. We don't have to hurry anymore," I look at them. "So get comfortable and we will open the door a bit later."
What kind of dumbass would miss such an amazing opportunity to train highly dangerous skills that would otherwise kill you?
It doesn't take that long, and Tess returns together with the remaining members of our group. She is holding Edwal's chest armor in her hand and throws it on the ground as she enters. The armor isn't damaged at all, not even scratched, and there is only blood on its surface.
Tess's face is serious, and she doesn't seem in that good a mood, "King?" she asks.
"Nat took care of him," Hadwin says as he steps a bit closer to her, glancing at all of them. Obviously, because of the healing aura, there are no wounds; they just seem to be tired. "We decided to wait a bit before opening the door. We can spend a few more days collecting supplies or even training now that we don't have to worry about wounds."
"Let me guess, Nathaniel's idea?" Tess flicks a strand of her hair off her face.
"Yes," Hadwin confirms.
I gracefully ignore them and continue to examine the items.
Crown of Eternal Vigilance (Epic): This finely crafted crown used to be seamlessly linked to a revered saint. It no longer bears a connection to its healing powers.
Bracelet of Enduring Guard (Epic): Elegantly designed bracelet with extreme durability. Seamlessly bonded with a revered saint and connected to its healing powers.
Shortsword of Perpetual Shelter (Epic): This finely crafted sword used to be seamlessly linked to a revered saint. It no longer bears a connection to its healing powers.
Longsword of Lasting Refuge (Epic): Elegantly designed longsword with extreme durability. Seamlessly bonded with a revered saint and connected to its healing powers.
Nice, it looks like the rarities go like this: common, uncommon, rare, epic. As for the items, they are of the highest rarity we've seen up until now, but I think the moment we take them off the 3rd floor, they will become much less useful to the point where rare items might be better.
Sure, they will stay durable, but that's it. Without their main effect, the connection to the Saint's healing aura, they are just that: durable items.
Also, the crown and shortsword are no longer connected to the saint. I blame the black mana dagger I made, which currently lies somewhere outside, and knowing how this shitty tutorial works, it will soon awaken consciousness and try to kill us all.
Well, anyway, I can keep the bracelet and give the longsword to Tess so she can train while holding onto it and then maybe pass it to others.
"Hadwin, are you fine?" I hear Sophie's voice, and when I look up, I immediately see what she noticed with her [Manipulation].
Hadwin is holding his arm, and there is a painful expression on his face, and inside that arm, there is mana swirling.
It's not his mana.
In one quick movement, I stand up and boost myself closer, then slash with the sword in my hand, cutting off his arm at the shoulder. The look in his eyes is almost thankful, and I feel him strengthening his body. I cut again, and a bigger piece of his shoulder disappears, and I do not feel foreign mana inside his body.
I fuel my heart with my mana and constantly shoot kinetic energy at the cut-off arm that is now connected to the piece of the shoulder I cut off later.
Yet, no matter how much I try, I'm unable to destroy the arm in one attack, something I should be able to do. The arm is much tougher than it should be and regenerates way too quickly.
I concentrate my thermal energy and dark yellow flames encompass the arm, which just refuses to burn; instead.
Then I feel a short pulse from it and the arm connects to the healing aura of the saint in the same way the items I took do.
"Fuck," is what I say as the cut off arm starts twitching and expanding, "Lily, destroy the saint as quickly as possible!" I shout at our healer and turn back to the arm.
First, the shoulder appears, and then the chest, from which the head grows quickly, followed by the second arm and two legs. The flesh continues to twitch, bend, break, and reform. The arm and figure become smaller and slimmer, and soon a woman stands here.
A young woman, around my age and slightly shorter than me. She has a slim yet athletic figure and the body of a person who is used to moving, an athlete or a fighter. The body is muscular and fit, yet not overly so, still maintaining womanly curves.
The naked woman with long gray hair opens her eyes and smiles, her gaze focused solely on me.
"What are you, a cockroach? Why don't you just die?" I rouse up my mana and turn to face her.
"That's quite a rude thing to say to a pretty young woman, little pup," even saying that, Lissandra takes a battle stance and smiles.
