Chapter 20: Chapter 22: The valuable things in life.

The dark mana that was floating around the room stilled, hearing my call to gather. For a moment, the specks of dark mana resembled the stars that were visible at night, my [Dark sight] passive skill making them visible to me. A moment later, the little orbs flew at me and entered my body by piercing my skin painlessly. They followed my veins and entered the small thin mana streams that my [Dark Form] had created, only this time the streams of mana all gathered near the centre of my chest. They were about to fill the empty void that my destroyed core had left behind.

The mana spiralled in from all directions and gathered into small rings, which attached to one another to form a chain of black circles. Once the chain was finished, the circles became bigger and bigger until they melded into one another. It reminded me a little of the woven baskets that I would see in the market stalls, sometimes.

Once one large ring had been formed, it expanded horizontally, forming a small bland marble, that looked almost exactly the same as my tier 1 [Simple dark core]. I was about to be disappointed when a second wave of mana appeared in my surroundings. Only this time, I couldn't actually see the mana with my [Dark sight]. The only reason that I was noticing a difference, was because my unfinished core was drawing in something and creating dark mana from it. I supposed this was because of its ability to absorb outside mana and turn it into dark mana. Not much mana was created, yet it still made up about 10% of my total mana input at the moment. A single thousandth of all the ambient mana made up for 10%? That meant that there were many different mana types that were hidden from me until now. It made sense though. Even in this small, dark room, earth mana would be prevalent, not to mention any more specialised mana types.

The second wave didn't create any drastic changes, but covered my small ebony core. As the core was nearing completion, it started spinning. All of the mana in my surroundings and my body gathered one final time into the centre of my body, spinning rapidly as the core compressed itself further and further.

 

A few seconds later, it was over. I could feel mana coursing through my body again, originating from my core. My [Dark Form] was greedily appropriating any mana introduced into my body and recreating its small streams, which quickly became bigger and bigger.

My core was now no longer a pure black colour. It looked like a gemstone that was shining in many colours, instead, though black was still the encompassing theme. Despite its mana absorption being ridiculously high, the core itself was actually very small, as big as a dress-shirt button.

I sat still for about half an hour, waiting patiently as my dark form passive charged itself up. It would prevent mana inside of my body from dissipating or being expelled through skill usage, so as long as I charged it up once, it would become permanent, unless my mana was poisoned again.

In the end, the small streams had become raging rivers, forming a connecting loop throughout my entire body. My augment was returned to full power, and I felt as strong as I had ever felt without overloading.

Speaking of overloading, was that still possible? I imagined so, a smaller core and no augment to slowly charge up would simply mean that I could start overloading more quickly! Perhaps the most overpowered trait of my unique skill was the fact that it became immune to overloading damage, which eliminated a large part of the risk of overloading in the first place. Now, if I could just get a skill that made my body immune to it too.

Humming in satisfaction, I opened my stat screen to take a final look.

 

---