When I woke up, my body was still aching sowhat, reminding that using Health from the System to heal wasn't exactly perfect, or painless.
"I can't believe I was that reckless," I muttered, my body reminding of the cost of trying to use a skill without understanding it fully. It was arrogant of to self-experint without properly assessing the situation. I had assud a re one point of mana wouldn't be a problem.
At least, instead of a painful injury, I had received so upgrades to my skill, as well as a valid way to rapidly improve it. Curious to test, I went to the forge, and intentionally damaged one of the swords before repairing it again.
"Wow, controlled flow is amazing," I muttered as I repaired the weapon. It allowed to sohow nudge the enchantnt to the side while repairing. It didn't have too much of an advantage when I was repairing the sharpness enchantnt, as I had long learned how to bypass it.
Instead, I had pulled a broken weapon from the pile Eleanor had provided for to experint with, one with a simple durability enchantnt. I wasn't able to repair those before, because the enchantnt was shaped more like a web, making it difficult for to work on the tal without breaking the enchantnt.
Now, with my ability to nudge the enchantnt to the side without destroying it, I was actually able to repair it. It was a slow process, taking almost an hour of my ti before I could even reach halfway. Theoretically, mana blow might have been usable, but with each blow requiring at least one point of mana, it was not sothing I could test.
I quit there, because I had nudged too hard, and the enchantnt had destabilized.
However, that was not exactly bad news. A small mana cloud appeared as I destroyed the enchantnt. It was less than what had been revealed by destroying the ingot, but with my improved ditation, it was just enough for to capture it.
[ 1 Mana]
"That's a nice surprise," I muttered, my smile growing. The broken weapons that were here for my experints were not as valuable as the bronze ingots, aning I didn't have to choose between improving Repair, Forge, and ditation. It was good news.
"Now, to the not-so-good one," I said as I prepared myself to repeat the sa reversal trick. I needed to see if my newest perk would help reduce the pain sowhat. However, this ti, I first went to my bedroom.
I didn't want to be caught by a visitor. I closed my eyes, focusing on the flow of the mana, reversing the rotation of the orb as I pushed the mana out. The pain hit, but it was far less than I had expected.
[ditation (Common) - 11 - 13]
[-85 Health]
"Success through self-mutilation. My psychologist would have had a field day with it." For a mont, I wondered if he was still alive, but that was just a montary thought. Thinking if the friends from before the Cataclysm were alive or not was a quick road to ruin.
Especially for soone like , who had the misfortune to experience the disaster while traveling for a conference on the East Coast, and was caught halfway, surviving only because I chose to drive rather than fly … away from everyone I had ever known, lost in a town in the middle of nowhere.
"Focus," I muttered even as I went downstairs once more, picked so more broken weapons, and started destroying their enchantnts for extra mana, only to push said mana out of my body.
Every repeat damaged my body sowhat, but I ignored the potential risks. It was not my usual careful attitude … but what had following my careful attitude for three years given ? A pile of rejections while I eked out a pathetic living, barely able to afford a room that I could keep my books in.
No, so risk was inevitable.
With that in mind, I repeated the sa trick. As ditation reached twenty, I was required to exude three points of mana to increase ditation once, but considering the damage it created had already dropped to single digits, it had beco an acceptable tradeoff.
By midday, I had reached the point I had been searching for.
[ditation (Common) - 24 - 25]
[Perk Options — Efficient Absorption / Contained Flow / Enhanced Sensing]
"Oh, a difficult choice," I muttered as I examined the benefits. Contained Flow was clearly the next step of Controlled Flow, and taking it was tempting. But, in the end, I chose Enhanced Sensing.
The mont I did so, my ability to read the mana patterns had increased. I could see so surface-level details on the enchantnts … which were naturally incomprehensible, like trying to understand how a computer worked by opening the casing.
Still, it was better than looking from the outside.
I broke another enchantnt, and confird the sa thing was true for the mana cloud. Rather than seeing a featureless fog, I found myself looking at … a fog with slightly more discernible features.
Well, it was still only a Perk to a common skill.
The sa was true for the absorption. I could see that, as the epheral sphere rotated, the mana patterns turned slightly more discernible. And, that allowed to reverse the rotation smoothly. Three more attempts, and I had succeeded once more.
"No pain," I said happily. Finally, I was able to repeat that trick without hurting myself.
Of course, now that I had cleared the next threshold, the improvent of the skill would slow down noticeably. I doubted that I could get it to reach thirty even if I destroyed every weapon and material I had in here, including the forge.
An acceptable loss, as being able to improve a mana skill in a location with no environntal mana had already been pushing it. I just needed to return to the town, and ditate in my room safely to increase it even further.
Honestly, a part of was telling to quit and go back to town, maybe even migrate to one of the cities with a better environnt, preferably with a System Shop. But, one thing prevented .
I didn't know if I would be able to actually use the System Shop. Every city had certain rules when it ca to using those shops, as not everything was sold without limit. Eleanor had already revealed that the bronze mana ingots had a certain quota every day.
No, even if it slowed down the improvent of my newest skill, the opportunity to push my two production skills higher was too valuable. Not to ntion, quitting suddenly would anger my new bosses, which was not exactly smart.
I could always change my mind once I had taught the other blacksmiths how to repair the weapons.
With that, I returned downstairs, forging another dagger to test the benefits of ditation and my newest perk. "Beautiful," I muttered.
Having ditation didn't change the way I forged the weapon based on the skill, which was not surprising. It was clear that the autopilot of the System was working with far better detection than what it allowed to access.
Technically, it ant that Mana Forge drew no benefit from increasing ditation. It looked like the only reason that I received that skill was to gather mana, and trust Mana Forge and Mana Repair to use it.
Not exactly a rare event. The origin and the objective of the System were a mystery, but the working principles were not. It clearly expected every user to follow its guidance to rapidly improve. It had certain benefits to it, as I had experienced with my external combat skills.
Of course, there was the skill upgrade aspect, a great reward for overcoming those limitations, which made the subject a little murkier.
"Either way, it doesn't make my new perk any less valuable," I said to myself as I continued forging. ditation might not benefit Forging directly, but my newest perk allowed to observe the process even better.
Especially when I stopped occasionally to use Inspect, which gave a completely new set of information. With multiple thods of observation in place, I was able to watch the process of the skill more carefully, learning more and more.
And, observation was the cornerstone of science. It was the seventeenth century when humanity discovered the existence of bacteria, and it wasn't because we suddenly beca more intelligent. No, we simply invented the microscope, revealing the existence of a whole new world.
From there, many mysteries had been solved one by one. That had been true for X-ray, radar, and heat sensors … every ti our observation thods increased, the developnts followed.
No, I didn't care if increasing ditation didn't suddenly enhance my Forging abilities. It made learn and discover faster, which was all I needed. All I needed was to work with full focus and discover more and more secrets.
However, when the door opened, I imdiately interrupted my work, even smashing the dagger hard enough to ruin my work. I guessed it was not Eleanor, as she didn't bother keeping the sound down. anwhile, servants opened the door carefully, trying not to disturb .
Unfortunately, inadvertently, they still ruined it. I imdiately threw the dagger into the fire, letting it lt completely. Instead I pulled another sword, acting like I had been repairing them.
I didn't want others to realize just how much of my ti I spent experinting on unrelated subjects. I expected another servant to walk forward … instead, it was a mana cloud.
A nasty surprise.
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