Chương 440: Chapter 439 – More Options

A week passed, then a second and Damion continued to train. He focused nonstop to push his magic power higher. Taking a break only when he was on the verge of mana exhaustion and then working on his new idea for a magic spell until he was too tired to think straight. While he slept off both forms of exhaustion, Nyx would prowl silently around the S Rank safe zone. When Damion first arrived on the S Rank floor he had expected to see a few other A Rankers training in the safe area.

Doing as he was, utilizing the zone to take in the higher density mana to train. However, there was no one there and no one ever came to the floor. It took a few days, but after he began to run low on B Rank Demonic Beast carcasses for Nyx to eat, Damion realized why no one was coming up to train.

There was no profit in just training and even if a group could spare a member to train while the rest hunted Demonic Beasts and rare materials, there were few people who could train as long, as hard, or as efficiently as Damion. For most, combat was the best training method. It forced them to use their magic that then needed to be replenished, as well as put demands on their mind and body.

With Damion's excessive mana regeneration, he could cast spells endlessly without running low on magic and if he did cast powerful spells that drained him, recovery took only a minute. This let him exercise his core far more than any normal mage could, thus sitting and focusing on expending magic and bringing in higher density mana to boost his magic power was more efficient than fighting Demonic Beasts. During his rest periods, Damion was able to make great progress on his new spell.

Unfortunately, he was not able to fully grasp how to complete his spell. The greatest drawback of his companions was taking them to or through places that were not suitable for them, such as Phil having to walk through the Fire Cave floors or the catacomb floors of the labyrinth. It slowed him down and left his familiar vulnerable. What Damion wanted was a pet storage space. The problem was, how to make one that a pet could live indefinitely in.

He first had the idea when he transported the Heavenly Spatial Enhancement Fruit Tree out of the Realm Breach and set it free on Nerotath. But that had only been possible because of their shared Spatial affinity. Phil would not be able to survive, even for a short time, inside his personal storage space. Still, the Spatial Storage spell was a starting point. Another point of knowledge that helped him along the way was the method to create spatial artifacts.

With his EX Rank Spatial affinity, understanding how to make a high Rank spatial artifact was easy for him, even if he had no need for one. Nyx also provided a piece of the puzzle. The Shadow Cat's ability to not just vanish in a shadow but become a part of one was fascinating. Unfortunately, it was an innate ability of the Demonic Beast and not a spell he could have the Magic System instantly memorize. Towards the end of one of his training breaks, Damion was browsing through the Magic System Shop.

The words of Visneer and Visault were playing through his head. The magic seal required a true mage because it needed mana of certain affinities pushed into it in a certain sequence to unlock. The Iblis had not been specific on which affinities or the order, and Damion was not sure they knew, so he had no way of knowing if he had the right affinities. Damion doubted extremely rare affinities would be used, but he could easily see the most common affinities being used. Earth, Fire, Water, and Wind.

But he had not yet acquired the Wind affinity. What if he needed it, what if it was a different set of affinities entirely, or it required all the affinities? Playing what ifs was a dangerous pastime. It was simply too easy to be caught up in a world of doubts. With a bit of effort, Damion cleared his mind. Guessing games would not help him now. The best he could do was prepare a bit, and the best way he could do that would be to enlarge his arsenal. The narrative has been taken without permission.

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'System, purchase Awaken a new Magic Affinity.' {Affirmative.} {Awaken a new Magic Affinity purchased for 850 Credits.} {Generating affinity…} {Magic Affinity generated. Congratulations host you have obtained Light affinity.} Seeing the Light affinity left a bit of a bitter taste in his mouth. He already had the Holy affinity. There was little he could do with Light that he could not already do with Holy, not that he used any Holy affinity spells much as it was.

'System, let's go again.' {Affirmative.} {Awaken a new Magic Affinity purchased for 1, 275 Credits.} {Generating affinity…} {Magic Affinity generated. Congratulations host you have obtained Wood affinity.} This was at least progress. He managed to get an affinity that he did not already have something in the same family of affinities.

'System, one more time.' {Affirmative.} {Awaken a new Magic Affinity purchased for 1, 912 Credits.} {Generating affinity…} {Magic Affinity generated. Congratulations host you have obtained Wind affinity.} After spending a little over four thousand credits, he now had each of the basic family of affinities. He did not know if the magic seal would require more affinities, but he had a strong feeling that he would at least need something in the basics.

Looking in the store, Damion saw that the next time he purchased an affinity it would cost him 2, 868 credits. And that number was sure to just keep going up the more he purchased. Still, he was not entirely sure if it would reach the maximum purchase price for store upgrades of 100, 000 credits. Were there that many affinities out there? He knew of about thirty affinities, and it was not guaranteed that those were the only ones.

By his calculations, it would take twenty-one total purchases to reach the limit, but he was not prepared today to blindly continue to purchase affinities. Instead, he made a few rough calculations and decided to make sure to hang on to two million credits. That would be enough to make sure he could keep buying affinities until he got the right one, should he be lacking at the magic seal. After checking the Ranks of his new affinities, Light and Wind both came through as E Rank with Wood being D Rank.

Damion pulled out from his personal spatial storage the Heavenly Wind Enhancement Fruit and Heavenly Wood Enhancement Fruit that he had been saving. Ding [Spell Spatial Storage mastery increased to A Rank] Ding {Quest Completed} [Quest: Increase a Magic Spell in Rank – Status: Complete – Reward: 100 Experience, 500 Store Credit.] Having Spatial Storage Rank up from taking out these couple of long stored fruits was a surprise to him. But it did not make much difference to him anymore.

With the Rank up it would cost one less mana per kilogram to store items. Now the spell had reduced the cost to 5 mana. However, since he had so much mana and such high mana regeneration, the cost to store items in his personal spatial storage was fairly inconsequential. Ding {Host has consumed an affinity enhancing item. Current affected affinity E Rank. Would host like to maximize the effect of the enhancing item for 500 credits?}'Yes.' {Confirmed. Maximizing effect of affinity enhancing item.} Ding {Enhancement complete. Congratulations host on achieving A Rank Wind affinity.} Damion did not hesitate and immediately popped the Heavenly Wood Enhancement Fruit into his mouth. Ding {Host has consumed an affinity enhancing item. Current affected affinity D Rank. Would host like to maximize the effect of the enhancing item for 500 credits?}'Yes.' {Confirmed. Maximizing effect of affinity enhancing item.} Ding {Enhancement complete. Congratulations host on achieving A Rank Wood affinity.} Being able to raise two affinities to A Rank for only 1, 000 credits was extremely satisfying. He was tempted to raise them from A Rank to EX, but he hesitated. Purchasing four upgrades for each would cost him nearly a million credits.

If he had an amazing spell for either of the affinities he might do it, but aside from a few Wind affinity spells he had picked up over the years, he really did not have any spells that would justify the expense or even the use of the affinities until he needed them for the Mother World.