Chapter 10: Chapter 8 – Mana Core

The two went through their usual morning ritual, and Jake checked out the newest dungeon.

 

 

It looked like they were fighting undead again. This time, it was no longer a beginner dungeon. In addition, it was no longer zombies, but skeletons. Jake found the level disparity quite odd, considering the previous dungeon he completed was only level three at the maximum. They had two full weeks to clear this dungeon, a cemetery this time. Jake was a little worried: a spear is not a great weapon against skeletons, especially if they are armed. Not only that, but the boss was a skeleton mage, and again still their level range was much higher than the zombies he had cleared.

Jake would read the [Alliance Wiki] on skeletons before they headed into the dungeon, if they did at all today. Jake was resolved to try to complete his spiral today. For that reason, he skipped the usual spear drills and settled in on his training area, to which the demoness joined him, touching his chest near his core.

He began his usual efforts to set his core spinning, trying to draw and hold the channels that allowed the mana to flow freely. From what Jake could tell, it seemed the goal was to make a never-ending spiral that would draw mana into itself from the surrounding area, and that same mana would keep it spinning in perpetuity. Tighter and tighter he used his will to keep the shape of the spiral while keeping the center of his mana spinning, while the demoness helped smooth the edges of the channels as the vortex extended outward outside his actual core.

The speed of the spiral increased and increased, and Jake’s focus and determination on completing this task had reached higher than it ever had. It was like he had dozens of mental hands holding and drawing the mana into the shape that he wanted, and he kept adding more and more, along with the demoness. Eventually, it was like something snapped, and the speed of the spiral increased even further. Jake almost stopped what he was doing, but a mental prod from the demoness urged him to continue and redouble his efforts.

The speed would increase every few seconds of him smoothing out the edges, and he could just feel the inner section increasing in density. It seemed the denser the inside got and the faster it spun, the more it would draw in the energy from the surrounding area. With that, he began doing his best to spin the inner circle further, focusing on that and allowing the demoness to focus on smoothing the rest of the spiral.

Eventually, he could feel satisfaction from the demoness, and he could tell that she was no longer smoothing out the outside of the spiral. His actions on the inside of the spiral seemed to make things faster, but letting go, he could see that it would continue on his own. He stopped looking inward, and tried to look at the demoness, but found she was gone.

She came flying back into the area of the living room, only she had…pom poms? Made of shredded tissue paper. She did a dance, and it seemed she spelled out JAKE using her body, and jumping up and down. It seemed she really wanted to celebrate their success. Jake cheered as well, but it took him a moment to realize where she had seen a cheerleader: an old show where they had to save the cheerleader in order to save the world. Jake was ecstatic at their success, but he went over and checked the notifications on his phone.

 

 

 

 

 

Jake reviewed the description for each of the items, and felt like he had really hit the jackpot. Compared to yesterday, his ability to cast mana bolts had more than doubled. Not only that, but the mana core actually boosted all of his attributes, somehow. Improving his core will allow him to both keep his melee attributes relevant, but also improve his attribute budget for his mental ones. For Jake, this was major. Once this skill reached level 5, it would completely make up for the fact that Jake was human, and then some.

Jake looked over at the demoness, and she was beaming. He did his best to send over his praise and appreciation to her for helping him to accomplish this. He knew that even if he knew how to make the core, without her help he likely would have needed at least two more ranks of [Mana Control], and by then he may not even have been successful: with each level the system seemed to apply more of its template to him and his soul, and his ability to influence the mana deep in his chest became lower and lower, despite his control increasing, Jake had realized.

How she knew how to do this Jake was dying to know, but he definitely could not argue with the results. This was a gift that would keep on giving as it would make it so that the number of spells per fight that he could use would increase dramatically. In addition to the utility benefit, he could simply feel his core now, and it was growing ever so slowly. It was providing qualitative improvements to himself in ways that he could not even begin to understand.

Jake was overwhelmed with emotion. This was the best thing anyone had ever done for him in his entire life. While he worked hard for it, the demoness was there every step of the way, and he never could have done it on his own. They had spent hours, day after day working on this, and the demoness pushed on without complaint. He could tell that this thing, while it only took around a week to accomplish, would change his life, his future. 

He also thought about how much the demoness had helped him in all of his tasks. If not for having her along, he would still be trudging through the goblin caves, sneaking around in the dark, and coming home to an empty apartment. Instead, he had a friendly companion that improved his mood, and brought joy with her antics, and helped him with his personal advancement. He decided to voice his appreciation.

“Thank you so much. I’m so glad you’re the one that answered my call. I just wish I could do something so great for you.”

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He was already overwhelmed with his own emotions, so he couldn’t really understand all the ones that the demoness slammed into him after that statement. She seemed to shake her head no, but he could only pick out that she was happy, and that she seemed to want to reply but was frustrated. It almost seemed like she was crying, but he could not see for sure through the shadows.

Jake guessed because she still couldn’t speak with him, she was a little distressed. He tried to send reassurance to her; he could wait to hear a response. They would improve their mana and bond, and they would continue to be together all the time; he wasn’t going anywhere. To this, she seemed to nod and smile.

Jake had a lot of goals to accomplish still. He would make something to eat, as finishing the spiral did in fact take several hours, and he was a bit exhausted and hungry. Hopefully some food would get him back into fighting shape so that they could at least try out the dungeon today, to see what to expect. He would read the wiki entries on skeletons a little more closely, and check the forums as well, at least. Jake had a sneaking suspicion that finishing the stamina regeneration spell would now only be a small challenge, now that his mana control improved.

Having eaten, Jake felt a lot better. But he still wasn’t ready to go into the dungeon, and even the demoness seemed to be lacking energy too. Jake had never felt like such a prisoner before. If it took him getting a loan of 100,000 credits to go somewhere other than his [Refuge] or the dungeon, he would probably take it.

Unfortunately, clearing the two beginner dungeons just hadn’t earned him the ability to leave his [Refuge], and a movie marathon was just not in the cards either. Finally, Jake had an idea. Since they couldn’t leave, they would go on a virtual tour and plan out the types of places they would like to go when they finally did complete the [Trial] and receive the ability to travel.

He could show her the places he grew up using the panoramic views, and some of his photos he had.  He was really glad that the [Refuge] had left the ability to surf the web, though how it managed from sub-space he didn’t know, and he didn’t really care.

The demoness looked and listened with interest, as Jake laid out where he grew up and the last few years of his life. He got so engrossed in telling her about his life and places that he had been and where they could hopefully go someday, to things perhaps similar at least since they wouldn’t be able to go to Earth: that he hardly realized that it was getting quite late. Still, he had fun, and she seemed to enjoy his stories. It was great to relax and not think about the dungeon for a few hours. They headed off to bed; tomorrow, they had some skeletons to kill.

Jake woke up feeling full of energy, perhaps a result of his new core. As he turned to look at the demoness, he found that the shadowy blurriness had decreased yet again. Before, he could not tell the color of her features as they were oversaturated with darkness, but now he could see much more clearly. She had black hair and her robes were red with gold trim. Her horns, tail, and wings all appeared to be the same bronze-looking color. Like her elfin ears, her face also showed the same elf-like beauty that one might expect, with high cheekbones and narrow chin.

She had grown yet again, getting closer to two feet tall now. Despite her short size, he could see her womanly curves that lie underneath her tight robes. Ever since she started absorbing crystals at night, she would wake up a bit later than Jake. He browsed his [Menu] in his mind, looking up skeletons and skeleton mages while he waited for her to wake up. It was recommended to bring holy water for difficult opponents or to save yourself in a pinch, and the skeletons were weak to fire. Low level skeletons were not usually much of a challenge. You could target their skull, their spine, or their mana core to get a killing blow, but usually could just destroy their joints and render them ineffective.

With Jake fighting Tier 0 skeletons, the entire bone structure could be destroyed by a single blunt blow. It wasn’t until the skeletons wore armor that it could become much more difficult to target those weak-points, and you would get worn down by their overwhelming numbers and limitless stamina. When it came to dismantling, various bones and their core were worthwhile.

He would load up his gym bag with weird stuff once again. He found the ability to just drop the bag of loot and fight, leaving his valuable and potentially life-saving supplies in his backpack was the right way of doing things; if he had to run, deciding on carrying extra weight bogged down with loot and his healing supplies was not a choice he’d want to make.

The demoness stirred, and Jake looked over with a smile. He was really looking forward to when the shadows were gone and the bond was repaired, he hoped there might only be a few days left. She awoke, to which he greeted her good morning and they set to getting ready for the day. 

Now that the spiral was completed, Jake could focus his efforts on learning the set of spells that Fhesiah could teach him, and finish learning his stamina regeneration spell. The sort of force push ability seemed like it would be quite useful when Jake was surrounded by enemies, and if he could make a large flame, it would be useful against the skeletons.

He finished his spear drills with the help of the demoness and moved on to finishing reading the book on stamina regeneration and to try to cast it. Reading the book, it turned out that this spell was not considered a spell-form, but a form of Framework-assisted casting.

Understanding the nature of the spell, having the prerequisite mana control, and using the appropriate amount of mana with the intent to initiate the spell and keep it going was enough. He would have to repeat this process and increase the mana regeneration required in order to effect additional targets. 

After another hour of reading and practice, he finally managed it. When Jake finished the book and understood it in its entirety, it was like [The Framework] would then allow or help him in order to cast the spell. Framework-assisted spells were different, as they followed their own set of rules. They improved in various ways with each level of proficiency with their usage, along with improving [Mana Control], unlike Jake’s [Lesser Spell-forms] or he assumed [Runic Magic].

 

 

The spell might have taken a large portion of his mana regeneration before he completed his mana core, but now it was easy to keep active for him and still be able to regenerate used mana. The effect of the spell felt like it would allow him to walk near indefinitely in regards to his body not becoming tired; of course, his mind would need rest, but his body would not.

If he jogged, instead of being able to jog for ten or fifteen miles before he became so exhausted that he would be useless, he could do more than double that, and recover twice as fast with a break. The spell made it so that he could take fewer breaks and fight for much longer, exactly what he needed. He planned on purchasing and learning the protection spell next, but for now he would learn the spells Fhesiah had to teach him.

They prepared and headed out. Jake decided he would keep the stamina regeneration going at all times, unless he for some reason ran out of mana and needed to recover quicker. They entered through the portal, and Jake once again found himself in a graveyard.

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