Chapter 13: A *Bonk*, a Stab, and a Skip in my Step

Well that's certainly helpful.

Jackson still has some endorphins running through him as he walked- or jogged, he still had too much energy in him- to his campsite.

A magic category was mostly just an easier way to format your Schools and Spells. Essentially it would take all related schools and spells and average combine them all together. This came with other benefits too, such as filling specific gaps in control. Jackson was not able to directly influence specific parts of the body beyond blood and bone. He could control metabolism to a certain degree but that was about it. Now he'd be able to do things like.... Make his hair longer if he wanted to?

That's probably all I'd be able to do about now. I'll need some keratin pills if I want to really try it. I'd probably need level 50 and multiple abilities to at least suggest a neuron to do something specifically.

Triggering an adrenaline rush would be way easier if he could just control his neurons. Something to work on. He would spend the next two days getting as strong as he could anyway.

Eventually he got to his campsite and tossed everything down getting straight to work.

You know what? I'll just try it now. Proper preparation? I wanna get to it now! Let's start with... A beard, I don't want one but it'd be cool to see. I have a razor on me anyway.

Jackson went down to the river and stared at his reflection while he started mentally feeling at his jaw's hair follicles. He pushed to increase his metabolism as he chewed on some deer jerky that he ended up getting while he zoned out in town. He directed his blood towards his papillas and supplied his hair root with nutrients and the other things it would need. He began to try and make his hair grow, and to his surprise he got it first try, but he was eve more surprised when it kept going. There was no way his body actually had all the resources for this. 

Oh my God.

He touched his face.

I have a full beard and I'm only 16, bleh.

He got to shaving it right away.

Did I make that hair? My mana is certainly lower than it normally should be. I'll take it I guess, I just didn't know creation felt so... natural. Could I...

He looked at the razor he held as he finished shaving.

I'm... It's just for an experiment. Yeah.

Jackson, with great caution, nicked his arm to get a blood flow. He let out a slight wince before he manipulated his blood. He was much more sloppy then he was when he fought the Bear for whatever reason. Once he got enough to make a small bead in his hand, he coagulated some blood over his wound to stop his bleeding.

The blood that he floated above his hand sloshed slightly, he could feel it's warmth and viscosity.

I think I need some more vitamin C... A bit off topic.

Point is, he had some awareness of his blood and he could feel what it was. He could encourage more blood to be made through control of his bone marrow, but he couldn't make it. Now, maybe he could.

Jackson held the blood bead above his left hand while focusing on his right, he tried to think of blood itself and... Manifest it? 

It didn't work. But Jackson could feel that it was possible. There was some feeling in the back of his mind that made him think so at least. He held back a sigh, he did make progress after all, he dumped the blood in the river and then carried onto his next spell to finish.

That's right. He'd finally do the final push to get Mana Shield. He was already there essentially, he just had to keep sustained control over it and keep all the reinforcements active. He probably would have understood it properly if he could a actually have a stress test to go help him learn how to improve on it.

He felt awkward asking Meg, when he asked her outside the gate it was a spur of the moment confidence. There was no way he felt confident enough to ask now.

How do I get something to hit me without risking myself to much?

Eventually he came up with a solution. He tied a heavy rock to a rope and threw it over a tree branch. The rock swung and he had to move out of the way to not get hit. He held the other end of the rope in his hands which he secured to the ground after a bit of finagling. You could probably guess what he did from there.

Jackson repeatedly created a Mana Shield and pushed the rock so it would swing. He didn't need it to hit hard, just to hit hard enough. Each time the rock hit the shield it would ebb and flow around, seeming to cushion the blunt impact. Iff the shield was too stiff, it would shatter against too much blunt force, If it was too thin it would just pop. After a few attempts (and bruises). He felt confident enough in his spell to hold up again. He improved more and more each time until the Shield didn't pop.

A small *bonk* rang out, his shield still up. He pushed it again and again, each bonk accompanied by a small draw on his mana.

"Phew." He rubbed at his arm. "That was probably the strangest thing I've done."

Sure enough, when he pulled up his progress screen, he saw Mana Shield listed.

"I guess I'm a proper mage now, and I don't even get a consolation prize."

He shook his head, and put on a smile.

"Happy thoughts! I'm becoming more independent and reliable. That's a good thing."

He let out a small shudder.

Why can it never feel that way... At least this is solid proof that I'm worth something. Right? Right.

His smile became the slightest bit more genuine.

"Okay.... I need to go for a jog and grab some food. Dang it I should've bought more arrows. I'll make do."

     

Jackson was picking a few berries when he noticed a squirrel that sat right next to him. Strangely enough, it didn't scurry once Jackson noticed it. It just sat there, content with watching Jackson.

"Huh, hello there."

The squirrel just sat there, staring into his hands.

"You want some little guy? I shouldn't feed wildlife but... You're too cute."

Jackson tossed a berry at the squirrel, once it landed the squirrel started munching down on it immediately.

"Well this place is abundant so you're certainly not strapped for food..."

Jackson threw another berry that the squirrel gulped down quickly.

"Just lazy huh? I wish I could afford to be lazy... But there's always more to improve on. Speaking of, I think I should go."

He reached out to give the squirrel a small pat before moving on. For whatever reason he was a bit surprised when it scurried away.

"Oh yeah, it's a squirrel. I don't really know how I forgot about that."

He gave a short chuckle and began to walk back towards camp. Well, until he got impaled in the arm. 

As one would do, he screamed. His thoughts were all over the place, but he did notice that his right shoulder had what appeared to be a quill in it.

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"An Enkki? God Damnit!"

Jackson prided himself on never having a potty mouth, but "god damnit" it hurt. Looking from side to side he could see the underbrush rustling, a quill poking out from the leaves here and there, and more importantly, an exposed neck. The problem was that Jackson was generally incompetent in a fight. He was still panicking, yet sadly the sweet adrenaline didn't come to save him. If only there was a way to just have it at his beck and call.

Anyway, he activated Adrenaline Rush and Mana Shield. 

Talk about a stress test. I hope it's not weak to penetrating attacks. I'm not one for being stabbed. Ouch.

Jackson had pulled out his bow and knocked back an arrow, all he had to do was keep a steady eye on the Enkki now. It was circling him, but wasn't exactly the most subtle. He pulled back and fired an arrow. He was glad that his aim was seeming to get better, but he wasn't glad when the arrow just bounced off.

Uh, Uh-oh?

He didn't have any abilities to enhance the power of an arrow, it was a cheap bow, and he had relatively low strength. He didn't know what he was expecting.

Then how was it even possible for me to hurt that bear at all?

The Enkki didn't waste time to return fire and both pierced through his shield and into his right forearm. Thankfully the adrenaline was rushing now so he didn't pay the pain much attention. Still hurt though. He dropped his bow and drew his sword which he almost also dropped.

Shoot, my right hand is down for now. I'm not ambidextrous but it'll have to do.

A bit reluctantly, Jackson switched sword hands. At the same time he tried to add more layers to his shield. As he did so, he shield began to stagnate. It didn't ebb and flow like it had before. Eventually he decided it would just be a waste of his mana and stopped supplying it. Instead he did what you should never do and pulled out the quills.

Manipulating his blood, he coagulated it atop his wound.

He couldn't lay spikes around him to stop the approach of the Enkki because it wouldn't approach him. He couldn't get close to attack it because he would get fired at without protection from penetration. He couldn't run because... 

Wait, why would I stay to fight this? I'm no hero. This Enkki is probably only half heartedly fighting me anyways. It's only gotten me twice even though it definitely had some chances. Maybe it's territorial? 

It was time to use the greatest ability. Running away!

Jackson immediately turned tail and ran to the river, as he thought, the Enkki pursued for about a minute or so before it gave up. Once he got to the river he tried to slow his heartbeat down. Too much adrenaline can't be good for you after all. Enhancement or not.

That was certainly less complicated than I thought. Let me deal with these first though.

He began to heal his puncture wounds, it shouldn't take to long, but he'd probably end up eating all his rations. 

Not much of a problem though, I'm only staying one night.

After a brief moment of silence he got up and walked towards camp, his wounds still healing.

Puncture wounds huh? 

...I think I have an Idea for my next spell. No, the next two spells!

He began running to camp, a skip in his step despite the injuries on his side. Once he got there he began right away.

"If I can summon keratin... Can I....?"

He began forming a spell in his mind, directing his mana to his forearm. He was a bit nervous, he wasn't used to how things that weren't human were structured.

It can't kill me so I'm good there.... I hope.

Slowly, his skin began to ripple, and a hard structure began to emerge. Before Jackson knew it, he began to scream and fell to the ground.

His skin burned. It was being pulled apart. The skin itself wasn't suffering too much damage but he could still feel it. It was easily the worst pain Jackson had felt in his life. He could hear it creaking as it protruded from his arm. After the pain stopped he stopped he just laid there. He could still feel the phantom pain of it growing.

Scales... Are NOT a good idea.

He looked down at his arm, the singular malformed "scale" still there. His skin was red, and the skin that got pushed apart seemed intact.

So it works... But god... I need to learn how to block pain. It shouldn't be too hard but nuerons are complicated. I think I'll put this off. I'll put it off a LONG time. God that hurt. Now I have to get it off as well. Great.

To his surprise, it just popped out. No pain, no nothing. His skin underneath was perfectly normal too. He picked up the scale and looked at it. The bottom where it grew from was completely straight and clean. He had forgotten to keep it connected to him on the inside.

To do: study other animals anatomy.

He poketed the scale and then went on to something that would hopefully be useful in a short time frame

"If my mana sheild is bad against piercing attacks, and I can't make scales, the next best thing would be actual armor. Too bad I'm poor... But that smithing skill isn't just for show."

Even though Jackson was- used to be the cashier for their blacksmith shop, he learned to smith from his dad. Tainted as the memory was, it was useful and Jackson actually enjoyed the process. He had no ability for it as it was a slow to level skill, but it would still be useful, no doubt.

Smithing was hard, the metal was exhausting to shape and forged properly to avoid breaking. Thankfully the material Jackson would use was way more flexible, it was Mana.

While learning Mana Shield, Jackson took note of how Mana would harden like metal would once it was heavily condensed, this made it resistant to blunt attacks and piercing attacks. It was definitely stronger protecting against piercing, but it still was a good option for blunt attacks.

Jackson's Mana Shield was fragile mostly because Jackson was a novice and despite being a sphere, didn't have a lot in means of structural support. It was a hollow sphere with thin walls. The reason Jackson didn't make it thicker was because he plain old didn't have the Mana for it. He didn't make it a primary focus in his thoughts, but he was near empty on mana in most situations. His head ached, but as any mage would, he had gotten used to it long ago. So although he really wanted to jump into learning Mana Armor, he hesitated.

There was no way to increase his mana capacity quickly, and there was no way to learn Mana Armor in a short enough time frame to use it next week. With all his healing, practicing, and making bloodspikes and what-not that he always ended up low in Mana. So he took a risk. He put up his status page and tried to look away from all the other stats he was tempted to invest in.

Mana is such a hard stat to train anyways... This'll be good for me. Right? I won't have the points looming over my head anymore, right?

He hesitated, until he forced himself to add points into Mana Regeneration and Mana Capacity.

I hope this wasn't a bad choice.

Phew! That took longer than expected, hope you enjoyed the chapter! I know I enjoyed writing it. I try my best to make sure Jackson doesn't develop too fast. In universe this is fast for your average person but I think this makes sense for Jacksons abilities. I'm always open for criticism on the speed of his growth though. It's a very minor spoiler but you can probably guess it.

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