Chương 236: Chapter 227

"So, everyone knows what they're doing?" Sam asked as his friends sat down around the clearing. Clarissa was leaning against a tree, trying to make a comfortable seat out of her outer robe while Dan found the only flat stone and was sitting on it, with his legs crossed, chest glistening in the sun. Isabella and Katie just flopped down somewhere randomly, sitting while leaning on their hands behind them.

Their multitude of familiars and pets were patrolling around and above the clearing, making sure nothing surprised them. Naturally, Sam had set up some wards, plus his mana senses were stretched to their limits to make sure nobody interfered or even spied on them.

'Ugh, soon I need to deal with divination…joy…' he mused before refocusing on his eagerly listening friends.

"Katie, just… listen to the voices. I have no idea how eldritch beings from the great unknown work…" Sam told the eager young woman as she raised her hand. Then Puffball jumped into her lap, demanding to be petted through its body language, and Sam knew the crazy berserker was in safe-ish hands. Or tentacles. Then he turned to Isabella.

"Yes?"

"Can we fail?"

"Well, based on my very limited sample size of one… probably…" Her face instantly fell so Sam hurried to continue.

"But with your Mana Control level and general talent I don't believe you – or any of you – are going to fail."

"If you say so…"

"I do, indeed, say so…" He replied with a small smirk, which Katie's friend returned somewhat hesitantly.

"Any other question?"

"No question," started Clarissa, "but if this gimps our characters, you're going to be responsible!"

"Don't worry, there will be no gimping here!" He tried to placate the dour healer while ignoring how Dan was chortling in the background. He clapped his hands together and all sounds in the clearing vanished, his friends's eyes on him.

"Alright, if there are no questions, then please start. Remember, let the process flow and only 'interfere' when you feel it would work. There will be some feedback from the process, so you won't miss it!" All of them gave Sam a determined nod before closing their eyes and settling into a meditative state.

"See you guys on the other side!" As his friends began to wrestle with their mana, he also sat down, one hand near his sword, and began to browse the net leisurely. Might as well do something moderately useful while guarding his team. For now, it would suffice to withdraw to a semi-private space and do the 'ritual' there, but as the game progressed and more and more people joined – some more important than others – when they were doing this ascension ritual it was a prime opportunity for some shenanigans.

Summoning demons, doing some stabby-stabby, releasing virulent poisons, manufacturing uprisings, crashing local markets, summoning even more demons… Thus, people would do them in complete secrecy or behind an army of protectors. Most of the local gaming news was filled with the regional reach to the top event final results and how the actual level to upgrade characters wasn't a hundred but one hundred and one. Some people found it funny, some raged very hard against the developers.

Intermixed with drama queens, influencers, and trolls, the battle raged on the forums over the issue. Then naturally, the fact that at one hundred and one, the person's mana gets upgraded into a core was revealed and everybody went bananas again. Sam saw that enterprising people were already collecting information about the process, compiling the accumulated knowledge in specific posts.

It seemed most people who tried the process now that a moderate amount of them reached the necessary level, reported that they got a simple Mana Core, which was what Sam expected. It was like that in his memories too… Though, by the time the other Sam joined, there were rumors about higher-tier cores and some convoluted ways – read expensive – to achieve them.

Some poor shmuck was on the forums crying about their Fractured Mana Core as they were attacked by a monster during the process and had to interrupt it to defend themselves. He also read over the political happenings of the region. To see which guild had beef with which other guilds, who was the current hero with the fifteen minutes of fame, and who was the big bad that everybody seemed to be hating.

"Huh…" Apparently, it was him.

"Well, I'll be…" It seems, his meteoric rise through the levels had caught people's interest, which led to the players and forum dwellers (and trolls, paid shills, and shit stirrers) to do some research on him. The fact he was high-leveled, rich (in the game) and the owner of a guild and a company that actually made a profit caused some emotions to emerge amongst the populace.

Frowning, he quickly composed a message to customer support, referencing and linking several posts that demanded his arrest, death, or worse, and asked them to deal with it. Calling him a cheater was one thing, but the other stuff was way beyond the line. Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators! Surprisingly, he almost instantly received a response from the company.

"Let's see… We apologize…bla bla bla… immediate action… please be reassured it shouldn't happen again… against company policy…" he quickly read the boilerplate email.

"Sure, but you only act when I call you out… bleh…" he spoke, his voice heavy with sarcasm. Thankfully, they weren't just blowing hot air, as the offending forum posts had already vanished with a note of warning about doing it again. As he refreshed the site, he could already see several posts complaining about the company stifling the freedom of speech… The rest of his time was spent looking for nuggets of information he could make use of or could confirm things about his future knowledge.

There were people soon starting that would make it big despite their later introduction to the game. He wanted to poach a few of them. Just a few of them because he knew that a lot of them only reached the heights they reached because of the giant complex logistical machine behind them. Either via guilds that nurtured them or companies that sponsored them. Some were simply egotistical or psychopaths that were impossible to work with. But here and there, Sam would be able to find a few diamonds in the rough…

He was about to switch to the meme part of the forums when he received a message on the account that most of his friends used. Looking up at the clearing, he smirked at Clarissa, then began to outline the answer to her sister's question.

"Anything to support the next generation…" Closing the game screen in front of him, Sam looked up and focused his mana senses on his friends.

'They're close…' He stood up and put his hand on his sword. If anybody attacked, he was pretty sure that the universe would choose this exact moment for them to strike. Alas, as he felt the mana settle down around his teammates, no attacks came from anywhere. Not even a small attack by underground mole people…

'Heh…can't wait until 1 st of April…' he chuckled to himself before turning his attention to his friends. They slowly opened their eyes, blinking away whatever they saw while they were closed, and let out varied noises. Katie's demented laughter echoed around the clearing, soon joined by Isabella. Dan let out an enormous roar while flexing all his muscles. Clarissa just pumped her fist and let out a 'Yes!'.

"So, what did you guys get?" Clarissa answered first.

"Regenerating Mana Core. Less upfront mana, but my mana regeneration got… I think it's called logarithmic growth with personal level."

"Useful for a healer…"

"Indeed!"

"Dan?"

"Er, it's called Tempered Mana Core because of the fire and ice mana… It increases my resistance against both and allows me to strengthen one by weakening the other."

"Fun stuff…"

"Yeah, can't wait to experiment with it…"

"Girls?" he finally asked as Isabella and Katie seemed to calm down.

"Behold!" Isabella called out, striking a pose.

"Resonating Mana Core! My core vibrates with the same frequency as my music, increasing its effectiveness, area of effect and adding an echo to my spells!"

"Mine is better!" came from Katie. Then she faltered as she tried to pronounce something her mouth trying to say it but not finding the proper sound. Then she shrugged and shared the screen.

"I can't pronounce it. Don't even know which language it is from. [Syha'h Mana Core: Level 0 (0%) (Passive) Mana is indestructible. You have touched upon this aspect a little, thus your mana had taken up the same property. Decreases the cost of mana skills by 33%, and increases mana regeneration by 1% per skill level. Grants you 1% magic and physical resistance per skill level. Grants you 0, 1% true damage resistance per skill level. When you enhance your body with mana, the mana from beyond leaks into and gives you a small cognito hazard aura. You cannot control this aura, but the more mana you use and the longer, the greater this aura grows. May cause blindness, insanity, spontaneous combustion, angry outbursts, and mindless rage in those who look upon you. Gives a flat increase of +25 STR, END, and AGI.] Sam and the rest of the team just stared at the skill, then as one they glanced at the smugly looking 'cat' who was now sitting on a branch and licking its paws with self-satisfaction radiating from every hair on its body and as one shuddered.

"Look! I'm sparkly!" Katie exclaimed as she began to move through some sword exercises as the universe around her body began to convulse and just straight up decided to give up. It looked like she was slowly being surrounded by the bastard child of a desert mirage and a cloud of dust of every Holi festival ever performed. As Sam stared in horrified amazement he thought he heard something breaking in the distance, and then he saw a notification pop up. [Perception Filter is now Level 25!] [Why did you keep looking?] [You gained the skill, Unknown Sight!] [Unknown Sight: Level 0/50 (0%) (Passive) You gaze upon what is not meant to be seen and you rejoice. Things that would visually impair or debilitate you are less effective. Please stop looking!] Sam just shook his head and bade the others to follow him. Time waited for nobody. Now that they all reached level 101, it was time for the next step. The familiars…

The team returned to Ironwood in a great mood and once again separated to do their own thing, which was mostly preparing or doing the ritual to evolve their familiars. Sam made sure he inscribed the ritual circle several times in the company ritual rooms, ready to be used any time, but left the choosing of reagents and catalysts to the others.

The other Sam only had tangential knowledge of the evolution rituals, mostly what he gathered from online forums which were not the most trustworthy sources, so Sam was mostly basing his decision on his feelings and the knowledge he gathered from the Nowhere library. For example, most people, at least those who talked about it in the forums, mentioned that they always looked for stronger and stronger items and catalysts for the rituals.

But his loyal and adorable Lucky, was pretty strong, thus, Sam decided to reinforce a few things and try to move toward his eventual goals with his skills. He took a small detour toward the Auction House to see if he could find something even better than what he planned to use. It would work perfectly – or at least he hoped so – but it never hurt to check… Entering the Auction House, in his disguise, he quickly found a seat and looked around.

It was pretty funny to see a lot of people trying to act nonchalant but still keeping an eye on the guy with the AFK company symbol on his clothes. A dupe placed there to distract people with weird purchases or odd product movements. So far, it was one of the most devious moves Lucy had made. Opening the screen, he quickly navigated toward the armor section. Scrolling down, he quickly found something that he really liked.

'Metal-lined shadow-fur coat…' he read the name of the item.

'As if it was made for me…Yoink!' Without a thought, he paid the asking price and soon, he was holding a very nice coat. Then Sam hurried back to one of the workshops at the company HQ, carefully pulled out the metal plates in the coat, and began to carefully inscribe them with a runic ward, paying extra attention to the Heart Rune.

"This is going to be great!"