Chương 94: Perseverance

94. Perseverence [Between Two Lives]: Time remaining: 43 days, 4 hours, 15 minutes Several days after Jordan had nearly given up on it, the [Loop] finally broke from its established pattern. Because today was harvest day. Which meant even harder work than usual at the garden. As Jordan finally unearthed the carrots, radishes, and napa cabbages from the soil he'd been tending to for a whole month, he felt an intense rush of release.

He recalled how Pewter had described the whole garden as one giant Vessel—and the Gym Rats' month-long labor as the mana accumulating upon its basin. Well, Jordan now held full-fledged spells in his hands, cast in their dirtiest, humblest, and most beautiful form. Soon, the spells moved from the hands and into the gullet, as the newest additions to Antiquity's forever stew. The stew had been by far the best part of the current [Loop], but even that had grown stale over 31 days of repetition.

Tonight, though, there was something undeniably extra. Not just freshness, but also a kind of solemnity that added weight to the occasion. Here were the fruits of Jordan's labor, literally, passing from hands to gullet to then become him in another form. It was gratifying. It was humbling. It moved Jordan to tears, incomparable to any he'd shed in the past. Because this really had been an experience like no other. And to think he'd almost thrown it away because he couldn't be bothered to wait a few extra days!

And here, Master Antiquity spoke again, knowing exactly when and how to deploy his wisdom for maximum effect.

"Remember this moment, Disciple, and reflect on it. One's past can take many forms, yet none need be wasted. How one moves on from here—how he shapes the future of his envisaging—is what separates the great spellcasters from the merely good." Jordan obeyed, as only a good disciple should. Tonight, he settled into his meditation with a peace of mind—the vision, care, and patience he'd sorely lacked when he'd first arrived in this [Loop]. No more belittling his past self. No more substitutions or alternate histories.

He treated Earthling Jordan with the respect he or anyone trying to live an honest life deserved. He cast an honest and caring lens on all his triumphs and disappointments, from birth all the way up to this moment as he spoke to his own past—a constant dialogue with the universe's memories. Which was how he saw his evolution into a Mountain Man for what it was. All the signs that had pointed here since the beginning.

All the forces, impulses, and decisions that had tied this top knot, grown this beard, and sculpted these muscles. His self was and always would be inside every atom of him. He didn't need to insert the Mountain Man into his memories. Not when the Mountain Man had been there all along. He understood now. That he didn't need to learn how to persevere or prove to anyone that he could do it. That he had been persevering all his life, in one form or another. That it was the biggest reason he was here at all.

Current VR: 64, 54 1 /100, 000 cc (64. 5% partial, 0. 0064541% total) Target VR: 1, 000, 000, 000/1, 000, 000, 000 cc (100%) [Hoarding Mode] remains in effect. The system notification nearly took Jordan out of his meditative state. If he weren't mistaken, his VR had just ticked up by 1. A single cc. A small step and giant leap rolled into one. He very nearly lost his concentration, but he persevered … and was soon rewarded for his stoicism with: New Feat unlocked.

[Make Room for Mana]: The great spellcasters of the ancient world were said to be adept at cultivation—the lost art of creating magic out of nothing. Though, if you ever get the chance to speak to one of these adepts, they'll probably tell you that the true source of their magic couldn't be further from 'nothing'. A character with the [Make Room for Mana] Feat has the ability to enter [Cultivation Mode].

While in [Cultivation Mode], you will passively generate mana at a rate based on your current spellcaster level, attributes, and VR efficiency. [Cultivation Mode] decays on a twelve-hour cycle and must be refreshed using an ancient technique since lost to mortals. Yeah, the ancient technique of'looking back on your life and forgiving your younger self for being a dweeb'. Jordan couldn't resist a snide aside or two. Good thing he got it in before the system bombarded him with more information.

[Cultivation Mode] activated. Current mana generation rate: 0. 65 cc per minute At what frequency would you like to be notified of mana gained via [Cultivation Mode]: per-minute, per-hour, or per-day? Oh, that's cool. It was a rare thing indeed for the system to let Jordan make a choice on a QoL feature. Except… it turned out it wasn't a choice at all! Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. [Dexterity v s Constitution v s Wisdom] Per-minute, per-hour, or per-day?

[For/Against Dexterity: DEX modifier (+4). You like dopamine hits, no? Well, you get to have them every minute, who wouldn't want that? (-2).] [For/Against Constitution: CON modifier (+6). This just seems like the reasonable middle ground (+2).] [For/Against Wisdom: WIS modifier (+8). If this [Loop] has taught you anything, it's the value of patience; let the mana percolate for longer, so the dopamine hit at the end of the day is that much juicier! (+4).] [Dexterity v s Constitution v s Wisdom] [Dexterity] roll: 8 [Constitution] roll: 14 [Wisdom] roll: 19 Final: 10 vs 22 vs 31 Result: [Wisdom] wins! Oh, thank god. Jordan sighed inwardly in relief. I don't know what I would've done if it ended up on per-minute! That was when Jordan decided to chance it. Put the newly acquired Feat to the test. He opened his eyes, officially hitting pause on his current meditation session. [Cultivation Mode] remains in effect. Good, good, good.

So, as long as he meditated at least once every twelve hours (and didn't half-ass it like he'd been doing for the first few weeks of this [Loop]), he could keep up the mana generation as a permanent passive effect. Jordan allowed himself a small smile. Only a small one, though, because he'd been burned before. Celebrated good news a little too enthusiastically only to then understand the true extent of his reality. So, he spent the next minute or so doing some mental arithmetic.

There are, what, 1, 440 minutes in a single day? So then, at 0. 65 cc per minute, I'll generate… somewhere around 950 cc per day? Which is about… oh man, I need a calculator for this. He didn't have a calculator. So, he decided to take his time with it, leaning once more on that patience he'd been cultivating all [Loop]. He got up quietly and snuck outside, whereupon he used the dirt to do some multiplications and long divisions by lantern light. In the end, the numbers worked out to be: 936 cc per day.

336, 960 cc in a Stormvaster year (360 days). 999, 935, 459 cc still needed to fill the Heavenly Cauldron. Which is equal to 2, 967 years, 6 months, and 8 days of passive mana generation. Jordan sat down on the dirt, tempering his smile into a contemplative frown. See, he knew it was too early to celebrate! Even accounting for the eventual increases in the mana generation rate as well as all the usual sources from quests and monster-hunting, reaching one billion cc would be a looong and arduous task.

Jordan did temper his excitement, but he didn't let the sobering reality break his spirit. If this [Loop] had taught him anything, it was the value of patience. So, he had every mind to keep chugging along—keep persevering like he had been all his life. Just gotta be incremental about it. Break the task up into smaller chunks. Take it one day at a time, one foot in front of the other. Thankfully, at least in this regard, Jordan's Vessel was on the same page as him.

For the Heavenly Cauldron had already broken up the task for him, gating his progress at every VC upgrade. And right now, his partial goal was eminently achievable within the allotted [Time].

[Between Two Lives]: Time remaining: 4 days, 7 hours, 46 minutes Another day, another evening spent in the company of an ancient master and a stalwart brother-disciple. But this was to be the last day, the last evening, and the last bowl of forever stew. Because… Current VR: 100, 000/100, 000 cc (100% partial, 0. 01% total) Target VR: 1, 000, 000, 000/1, 000, 000, 000 cc (100%) [Hoarding Mode] remains in effect. Jordan had done it. Filled his Vessel up to its current VC.

Achieved via a rare form of 'self-sufficiency' in mana, helped on by heaping doses of humility and patience. Pewter Sapling, on the other hand, had long filled up his Gourd of Tenacity despite a much lower generation rate compared to Jordan's. With nowhere to spend his mana and no means of storing it in the form of crystals, the Tetherer had exercised some real patience in waiting for his friend to catch up.

Through it all, he didn't miss a single evening of meditation, maintaining his [Cultivation Mode] even while it had no practical use. No practical use, perhaps, but it was the furthest thing from useless. Jordan understood that now. And that, perhaps more than anything, was his most important takeaway from the second [Loop].

"Normally, I would say that this is only the beginning." Master Antiquity had left them with some choice parting words.

"That there's still much for you both to learn from me, before I could truly call myself your master. But… I also understand that the future is a different world from the one I know. Yours is a world that waits for no one, especially two of its brood cast aside in time's purgatory. And so, I bid you return to your lives and continue your learning there, under new masters as varied as each day is from the next. In other words, Disciple Sapling and Disciple Yu, you may proceed." And they did.

But not before honoring Antiquity with palm-over-fist salutes and the deepest bows humanly possible. Then they turned and walked, side by side and down the larch-lined footpath, until the yellow leaves made way for a rosy iridescence.