Chương 30

You have acquired a new Skill: Mana Sense Yes! Finally! Something that I had been searching for all this while had happened at last. I dismissed the screen, noting absentmindedly that it was an Uncommon Skill, and excitedly switched it on. My worldview immediately changed. Multi-coloured swirls of a smoke-like substance were drifting about in the air. Some were barely there, about as large as a fingernail, while others were much larger; about the size of a baseball bat. It was otherworldly!

I tried grasping at a few, but they always slipped past my hand and through my fingers with no effort at all. I then noticed that the swirls were in an ongoing battle royale of sorts with each other. They were constantly merging with each other and at the same time separating from others, changing their hues slightly each time this happened. Some of the swirls looked and felt denser, while others were barely present and disappeared without a trace.

New swirls kept appearing at random places and at random times, and I honestly couldn't understand what was happening. There was no rhyme nor reason for whatever was happening, or at least it didn't make sense to me at the moment. What I did know was that it was beautiful, and I sat there mesmerized staring at the new world that had opened up for me for who knows how long. A headache started, but I dismissed it in favour of continuing to watch the amazing show in front of me.

The headache kept growing, and soon it was too much to ignore. I snapped back to reality at a particularly sharp flash of pain, and realized what was going on. I immediately cancelled Mana Sense, and closed my eyes, my head throbbing with pain. A quick check of the status revealed that I had just 3 mana remaining! No wonder my head was throbbing so intensely. I wondered a bit at what would happen if I reached 0 mana, but dismissed that line of thought for now.

Even with the pain, my excitement level was still at an all-time high. I was sensing mana! There was nothing else I could focus on at the moment, and I impatiently waited for my mana to regenerate. I almost put some stat point in Wisdom to speed up the process, but managed to control myself. As I waited, my mind went in a surprising direction. I'm changing. It was a fact that I had subdued emotions throughout my life.

I knew it quite clearly, and others who were close to me had probably been aware of it to some extent as well. But here, just now, the level of excitement I had just felt, to the point that I had almost made the questionable decision of adding stat points to Wisdom, was unnatural for me. Just this morning, instead of going off on an adventure of my own, levelling up further and trying out my new ability, I had instead chosen to go back and inform the group about the new information.

Being here really was affecting me, and I wondered how many further changes were in store for me as the days passed by. Assuming we are able to face the goblins, that is. That made me think about whether I was actually changing, or if the scale of the goblin threat had made me change temporarily. I hoped that it was the former, as I was enjoying working actively towards something, and achieving small victories on the way.

My headache had receded by now, and a quick check of the status revealed that my mana was almost full. I waited a couple more minutes till it was full, and activated the skill again. This time, my status screen was open, and I was able to see that the activation cost a mere 4 mana; however, it had a steep price to sustain it at 1 mana per 6 seconds, more than twice as high as Concealed Presence.

Closing down the status screen, and this time being mindful to keep track of time passing, I closed my eyes and this time used Mana Sense to focus within my body. It was the reason the skill had been unlocked in the first place, and I wanted to see what I would be able to sense. I could immediately get a vague sense of a highly complex network of veins, through which highly dense and compact swirls of electric-blue mana sped through.

They all seemed to be congregating at a central hub of sorts, which was the brightest thing I could sense. I opened my eyes and looked downward, and I could somehow see through my clothes, and my body, at the hub located at the center of my chest. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. Is that the mana core? I stared in wonder as the surface of the core constantly shifted, while the midst stayed rooted in place, absolutely dense with mana.

The network of veins I had sensed with my eyes closed was also barely visible through my body, though they looked extremely dim in comparison to the core. One problem I was facing now that my eyes were open was that I was constantly getting distracted by mana swirls between my eyes and my body. I tried filtering them out and asking the skill to only show me the mana within my body, and surprisingly, it instantly worked!

My vision cleared as all the mana swirls vanished, and at the same time the mana veins and the core within my body got brighter, as if it had suddenly been thrown into focus. That's convenient! With renewed focus, I observed the veins and the core in as much detail as possible. I noticed that the mana always left the core from the left side and circled its way around the body to enter the core back from the right side.

There were numerous veins both on the left side and the right side, and each vein branched out to smaller veins the closer they got to extremities. There was a large concentration of veins going towards and coming from my head, but I couldn't see further than my collar bones so I couldn't quite follow the track completely. I also noticed there was a large collection of veins going to and from both my hands. I wonder if… I tried to see if I could somehow affect the mana in some way.

I wanted to see if I could converge the mana on my palm somehow, so I started with the smallest sliver of mana I could sense. Clamping on it with all my mental force, I tried to stop its continuous cycle and instead follow what I was commanding it to do. It felt like it was mocking me, as it didn't even acknowledge my presence and instead continued on its merry way through the never-ending cycle.

I kept trying, and as time passed, I could feel like I was getting close to doing something, but that may have been wishful thinking as so far, nothing had happened. One thing I had noticed was that the mana was decreasing with the passing of time, and both the veins and core were now much dimmer in my vision. I realized that this was my mana decreasing due to the mana sense skill, and I immediately turned it off before my head started throbbing again.

Giving myself a mental break, I shut my eyes and relaxed till my mana was full again, taking this time to actually relax and not think about anything. My mind still drifted a bit, errant thoughts kept coming, and I was thankful for that as a brilliant idea came to mind. Not wanting to waste much time, I ensured that my mana level was sufficiently high, and activated Mana Sense again. The veins and core lit up, and I again filtered the surrounding mana from my vision.

Then, I used my Subtle Influence ability to nudge the mana to do what I wanted. This time, something stirred. Omar POV"Slash at its legs!" shouted Marcus from beside me. Sara obliged and struck one of the wolves in its legs, and I immediately hit it with a mana bolt when it crashed to the ground, ending its existence. One hit, one kill baby! I was on a roll, and I felt unstoppable. I aimed at another of the wolves harassing the group, and released my spell, ending yet another one. Wooohoooo!

"They've got nothing on us! Keep 'em coming I say!" I hollered while striking yet another one, this time straight in the face! The addition of the slight homing function to my mana bolts had been amazing. All thanks to my awesome class. People always spoke about Alex's smartness, and I agreed, but he didn't have a spell that would always strike its target now, did he? I really wished he was here so I could boast in front of him! Alas, he was doing his own thing as usual.

No matter, I'll be sure to rub it in the next time I saw him! I was quite fond of the guy, but I was of the opinion that he needed to be more involved, though he was coming around more often now. Hope that continues. We had been fighting for a couple hours, and had just come across this wolf pack. I had already levelled up to nine, and was anticipating my next level.

"The alpha is coming!" shouted out Marcus. He had become quite good at keeping track of the surroundings and calling things out for the group. Lucas immediately turned and taunted the beast, taking its massive paw strike without moving an inch. Sara came in from the side to strike it, but the alpha was not a simple opponent, and it quickly turned and almost bit Sara in a flash! A quick backstep from her was the only thing that saved her, and Lucas immediately placed himself in between the two.

Madelline then hexed it while Ben and Sara kept the surrounding wolves busy. I then focused and super-charged my spell, adding heat into it as well as making it rotate, my class allowing me the flexibility. A wide grin came over me as I added the final touch – the homing function. Releasing it, I watched with immense satisfaction and pride as the massive spell absolutely smashed the alpha.

"Yeah baby!" I shouted, jubilant. Once again Omar saves the day! The remaining wolves turned tail and ran. I fired off one last mana bolt, the spell homing in and killing one more wolf, before the rest managed to scurry away. Everyone stopped and caught their breath as Marcus moved about healing the front-liners. I was just about to open up my Inventory to see what loot had dropped, when an exciting system screen lit up! Ding! You have levelled up! Class stats distributed.

You have successfully reached level 10, and you are now eligible to advance to E Grade. Prepare yourself for the advancement.