“Oh right, the shop!” Mark remarked, “We can just buy soap from there or buy an information packet that describes how to make it, but, with the orcs as a source of mana stones for the short term, buying some soap shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Let’s go to the river first, then we can buy some soap and I can finally start cultivating.”
That said, Noah and Mark strolled through the forest as they headed in the direction of the river. The earthy smell mixed with the scent of flowers tried hard to combat the absolutely horrid smell emanating from Mark but it truly wasn’t enough. So, Noah cast [Enhance] on himself and left Mark in the dust in a bid to stay ahead of the stench.
“Hey! Don’t be like that! You know I run faster than you!” Mark yelled at him but he wasn’t hearing it. All that was on his mind was to get away from the smell so he pumped half his mana into his skill and ran as fast as he could.
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As he neared the river, he momentarily paused and appreciated how beautiful everything was. From the flowers, to the trees, to even the small patches of moss growing on some of the trees, everything was so vibrant and full of life. “Wonder if trees have levels now too? I mean they are technically alive, right?” The thought couldn’t help but get stuck in his mind and he vowed to always be kind to trees, maybe even to animals.
A few minutes of running later he finally arrived at the river. There was a herd of deer formed into a circle while three of its members were drinking water. One of them looked him straight in the eye and actually glared, as if to warn him that they meant business. “I come in peace, I won’t hurt you” He uttered, and, like it understood him, the deer giving him the stink eye actually scoffed and looked away. “Guess deer are getting smarter now too. Truly a strange world”
Noah walked around the riverbank and found a spot a comfortable enough distance from the herd and sat down to wait for his cousin. And as he was waiting, his mind couldn’t help but wonder about the rest of the world. Especially the parts of the world where his friends were at. He couldn’t help but worry since they went on a vacation in the Philippines. All the way on the other side of the world. The only reason he didn’t go with them was because of the death of his grandfather and the inheritance he left him. “They’re all competent people, they should be fine.” He reassured himself.
After sighing to himself, he looked up at the sky and noticed that the moon was at its highest. “No wonder I’m getting sleepy” he yawned as he thought. After a few more minutes of waiting, Mark finally arrived with some of the black sludge gone but still plenty sticking to him. Noah stood up, took a step back, and directed his cousin to the river. “In you go!”
“Oh come on, I don’t smell THAT bad” Mark complained as he sniffed himself again to make sure.
“Yes, you do, now go!” Noah said with finality in his voice.
Mark looked at the ground sullenly and went into the river.
While his cousin was washing himself in the river, Noah brought up the shop and looked at the available kinds of soap. To his surprise, there was actually such a thing as tier-one soap. It apparently helped heal wounds and aching muscles but it cost one mana stone per bar. “Holy shit! One whole mana stone for a bar of soap!” Although he complained, Noah still bought one just so they could try it out.
“Catch!” Noah tossed the bar of soap to Mark, “That’s worth one mana stone so don’t lose it!” Mark almost fumbled and almost lost the bar of soap when he heard that. “Don’t just toss something so expensive while I’m in a literal river!” Noah just laughed at that, settled down on his spot and activated his level four support skill [Mana sense]. He then cast [Enhance] on himself and felt how the mana moved inside of him. Although the skill only made mana wrap around his cells, some of it seeped into the cell which explained why pumping more mana into the spell enhanced his stats more.
Then he had an epiphany, like how he made his spell with [Mana Manipulation] couldn’t he just forcefully make his mana seep into his cells bit by bit? So, he did just that. He pushed and pushed and finally, he felt something break. As if the floodgates were opened, his mana invaded his cells, strengthening them as much as possible before he felt another barrier. This time though he couldn’t forcefully break it down so he pulled back and stood up. He dove straight into the river and finally read the notification
You have successfully cultivated a [Body of Copper]
Physical stats +19%
“Huh?” He rubbed his eyes and gawked at the blue screen in front of him “That doesn’t look right?”
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“What doesn’t look right?”
“I got to the first stage of body cultivation like you but it says that my physical stats increased by 19%”
“Huh? Mine only says ten. How’d you do that?!” Mark was about to shake his cousin for the answer but then his nose caught his scent and he immediately took three steps back. “HOLY MARY MOTHER OF GOD! IS THAT WHAT I SMELL LIKE?!”
Finally seeing his cousin get a taste of his own medicine, Noah just laughed. “Now you know how I feel.” But then he noticed the bell icon in the corner of his vision moving.
Physical stats +18%↓
“Huh? It went down to eighteen percent.”
“Guess it’s not permanent. HA! Sucks for you!”
“Hmmm, wonder if I could just…” He cast [Enhance] and got what he was hoping for.
Physical stats +19%↑
“Cool! So I can top us both off each time before a fight and get an additional nine percent in physical stats!”
“Okay, that is pretty cool. I take back whatever I said about you being a cheat. You’re the best!”
“But you didn’t say that I was a cheat?” Noah said while he looked at his cousin dubiously.
Mark blinked and knew immediately that he slipped. So, he did what any sane human would do and continued furiously scrubbing his body and pretended that he didn’t hear anything.
Deciding to not pursue the issue, Noah continued on scrubbing as well with his own bar of soap as he decided that using the same bar of soap with all this gunk would be disgusting in its own right.
After aggressively scrubbing themselves down to their underwear. Noah and Mark eventually decided that they were clean enough and started heading back to the apartment building. But, as they were exiting the river, they heard a squeal and another one right after that. Noah immediately cast [Enhance] on Mark and told him to go ahead of him as he was faster and could potentially heal whatever made that squeal.
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Mark then ran ahead and made a beeline for the origin of the squeal and with an added nine percent on top of the normal ten percent bonus he got from [Body of Copper] his strength stat reached an effective forty-one points. That was four times faster than the average human. In shorter words, he could run FAST.
A few short minutes later Mark came upon the scene of the crime and what he saw angered him. He saw seven wolves surrounding a boar with another dead boar right beside it, and behind the boar were seven piglets. It looked like a scene out of a movie only, this was in real life and the characters were all animals.
“HEY YOU PIECES OF SHIT!”
Mark took action and shouted, drawing the wolves’ attention toward him. And it worked as the wolves all turned to look at him confusedly. Before the wolves could make sense of the situation, Mark charged and swung his axe at the closest wolf, cleaving its head cleanly in two. He then threw his axe at the next wolf before it could react and hit it on the body, the axe exited the other side and continued on before it was stopped by a rock.
Mark then switched hands with his other axe and ran up to the next wolf but it ended up dodging his swing. He then heard the largest wolf in the pack howl and a red light descended on the other wolves. This made them glow red and immediately charge at Mark with reckless abandon and jaws wide open. But Mark kept on charging. He let two wolves bite on his left hand, bringing them with him as he shouldered the other wolves out of his way.
Once he was a few feet away from the other wolves, he checked on his would-be passengers and found that although their teeth broke through his skin, they didn’t penetrate much deeper resulting in nothing but superficial wounds a single cast of [Mend Wounds] could heal. “Body of copper and all those points in constitution working their magic I see.”
Mark lazily swung his axe at the two wolves hanging from his hand and decapitated them. He then pried their heads off him and stared back at the rest of the wolves just in time to see the red glow emanating from them, fade away. They looked at Mark, then at their alpha, then back at Mark, and as if they practiced it, they all simultaneously turned around and ran with their tails between their legs. The alpha let out a howl and a green glow surrounded the remaining wolves as they ran faster than they did before.
Mark scoffed at that and turned to the mother boar and her piglets who were so scared that they couldn’t move. “Now what do I do with you?” While thinking about what to do, Mark decided to wait for Noah to arrive and they could decide together. He then went to pick up the axe he had thrown earlier and sat in front of the mother boar with his hand rubbing his chin.
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A few minutes later Noah finally arrived at the scene but was disappointed to see that everything was already finished. “I really need another spell that can make me move faster.” He looked at Mark sitting in front of a boar and her piglets and couldn’t help but say “Well looky what we have here. To think that we were so scared of you guys a couple of days ago. Now we end up saving you.”
“I saved them, you took your sweet time strolling through the woods.”
“Hey, I used half my mana to boost you, I wasn’t about to use up the rest before the fight.” Noah smiled and refuted.
“Anyway, what do we do with them? Killing them seems a bit too cruel for my taste.”
“OINK!” The mother boar oinked as she took a step back along with her kids
“Looks like it can understand your words somewhat. Hmmm, I agree we can’t just kill them. Can’t just leave them either, that would just be killing them but with extra steps.”
“Hmmm…”
“Hmmm…”
Both of them rubbed their chins while looking at the fatherless family of boars and couldn’t help but feel their hearts soften. They looked at each other and immediately knew what they were going to do.
“Pet boars don’t sound too bad.” Noah said as he smiled at the boars
“Oink?” The mother boar oinked with a look of confusion on its face.
“No, no it doesn’t.” Mark added as too, smiled
Mark looked the mother boar in the eyes and asked “Do you want to come with us?”
“Oink!” It oinked again as if to agree and rubbed its head on Mark’s hand.