"Congratulations," she called as the mana around me calmed down. "Now, you belong to a new tier. How does it feel?"

I killed another beast and realized that my movements were noticeably smoother. For a moment, I thought that it was my increased Dexterity, but her reaction suggested that there was another reason. "Smooth, like I weigh much less," I said.

"That's because stepping over the threshold makes you get more aligned with your stats. It's very helpful," she said. "You'll notice the difference even more as you push yourself," she said.

"Certainly a welcome change," I answered even as I moved on to the next monster. "It feels amazing."

I wanted nothing more than to sit down and absorb mana now that I actually had the ability to do so. However, I ignored that temptation, for one simple reason. The moment I gained Essence, the world had shifted slightly, giving me the ability to perceive mana. Meaning, that Maria would notice easily if I tried to absorb any.

It was almost visual, though it didn't suddenly distort the world with a blanket of blue or something equally annoying. I could just … perceive it. The quick way I could dismiss developing a completely new sense was a good indicator of just how ridiculous the System was. Miracles lost their quality of wonder once they became commonplace.

I killed another beast, focusing on other changes. Compared to other things, the slight increase in my Dexterity was less notable, but certainly welcome. A lot of complicated forge work required fine motor control and timing. Dexterity helped with both.

However, the real surprise was the sudden appearance of the new skill: meditation. The Skill mages used to collect mana.

I wondered if the appearance of it meant that it qualified as a class skill, or it was just an external skill. I would have questioned Maria about it, but I had already asked too many questions about some potentially sensitive topics. I didn't want to alert her.

Especially since I just needed to raise my meditate to level ten to figure that out. No inconvenient questions were necessary. I just needed to show a little patience. I killed another wounded monster instead of using the skill I wanted to use.

[Level 25 - 26]

[+2 Vitality, +2 Strength, +2 Dexterity]

Double points in Dexterity, which was less impressive than getting a point in Essence. It looked like these points arrived in an alternating pattern. Not a particularly useful information, but it was always better to know more.

Speaking of knowing more, I had one more thing I needed to learn: how Identify worked. Previously, the only thing that I felt was a subtle whisper. I wanted to see if anything would be different now that I had the ability to perceive mana.

"Look at my level," I declared to Maria proudly, almost smugly.

"Another upgrade, congratulations," she responded, but I was more interested in the line of mana that stretched from her to me, tickling as it touched me … and nothing. There were no complicated mana structures that appeared whenever she cast it. Just a touch.

Then, maybe it made sense. After all, it was a skill, so it made sense it worked similarly to my Inspect perk. That didn't require any mana either. Mana just being there to create remote contact while the skill handled the rest was an easy assumption to make.

Whether that assumption was true, I didn't know yet, but it was how science worked. Make assumptions, design experiments, and then validate.

"Level twenty-six. Impressive," Maria said, easily checking my level without any further mana fluctuations inside me. Still, it was good that I could detect if someone used it on me. Well, unless my assumption was correct. Then, I would need to be careful when touching anyone. "We might bring you to somewhere around thirty-five as long as we work hard."

"Well, I'm a hard worker, not to mention I have endless stamina," I declared proudly, mostly to play off her enthusiasm. It might have been the biggest benefit of the System. I hadn't been a fan of exercising before the Cataclysm, so getting some external help was certainly welcome.

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"You do?" she said, but I noticed a blush on her face. Maybe it was due to exhaustion. She must have been pushing herself harder than I had realized.

"C3," I called, once again starting a chess game. Since she was getting exhausted, I better provide her with some entertainment to keep her going.

More levels meant more safety. We changed locations multiple times, moving once the monster density had decreased, but as the place was starting to get dark, I reached level thirty-two. Not exactly as high as Maria wished, but more than incredible for my purposes.

But, before leaving, I wanted to try one more thing. "Hey, do you mind letting one go without wounding it? I want to see if I can take it down unassisted. And, a little combat practice with my new abilities wouldn't be amiss."

"Good idea. Skills improve faster when you fight directly," she said as she looked at the horizon. "And, we can still stay around ten minutes until it starts to get dangerous." Then, she frowned. "I'm not ready to listen to another lecture from Eleanor."

I chuckled, amused that she cared more about Eleanor's words than the significantly increased danger factor from monster attacks. I had to admit, being strong had its advantages.

"Thanks," I said. "Do you mind letting go of something strong but slow?"

"I have just the monster," she answered as she adjusted her spells, and soon, one that looked like an animated tree stump lumbered toward me.

"Excellent choice," I said as I moved toward it. Slow with incredible endurance, the target was truly a good choice. Especially since I had misled her about the aim of my practice a bit. While I wanted to practice, the aim was the opposite of what Maria had thought.

I had two objectives. First, I wanted to get used to holding back. Bringing any skill to even twenties was supposed to be a significant hurdle. Bringing it above fifty in less than a day was flat-out suspicious. So, I wanted to get used to sandbagging my physical prowess. And, as an added bonus, if I had to reveal it, I could mention that I had been working hard during my leveling trips.

It would make a good cover story for anyone but Eleanor. I doubted that anyone but her would go to Maria and ask for the exact time I spent working on my skill rather than leveling.

"Come on, buddy," I said even as I circled around the beast, my hammer raised high. It lashed against me with one of its branches, but was met with a blow of my hammer. The beast was strong, but I was stronger, easily parrying the attack. "Wow, it feels good not to be thrown away," I said. Blacksmith might not match most Warrior classes in Strength, but we weren't too far behind them. Double stat points were still respectable.

But, Strength didn't exactly translate to combat capability. An Olympic Weightlifter could lift more than a heavyweight boxer, but that wouldn't have prevented them from being demolished in the ring. Skills were that important.

And, now, that was not a problem for me anymore. I swung my hammer with a perfect, eerie accuracy, parrying the next two attacks, before I reflexively took a step forward and smashed the trunk twice. Hammer of Might showed its name, demolishing the tree.

"Damn," I muttered in frustration. I wasn't planning to take it down that easily, but I wasn't able to hold the skill back. The sudden improvement had affected me more than I had expected. I looked at Maria, expecting a suspicious gaze.

"Very good," she just said instead. "All that killing really improved your skill, right?"

"Yes," I said, more than happy to be underestimated. "How about if you let out something slightly faster?"

"One large bear, coming up," she said cheerily as she allowed it to pass.

I chuckled at her callous attitude, like she wasn't letting forward a beast that would have killed me easily in several blows before my little discovery with the hammer skill. I dodged and parried its attacks easily.

Multiple times, the skill pushed me to lunge forward to take down the bear. Just as the name suggested, Hammer of Might was a very aggressive style that focused on leveraging the benefits of the Strength to the max.

Luckily, thanks to controlling my Repair skills for three years, I was familiar with how to ignore the suggestions from the skills selectively. It was harder to apply during a combat scenario, but as I practiced against the bear, I was getting the hang of it. I managed to stretch it to one minute before I killed it.

However, I did receive a nasty blow while doing my best to keep back. Recovering from it took quite a bit.

[-42 Health]

"Careful," she warned. "Do you want to stop, or…"

"Nothing more than a flesh wound," I said, ignoring the fact that, without Health to help me recover, it would have likely killed me from internal bleeding. "We only have a few minutes. Let's not waste too much time."

"Good point," she said. A few more fights, and I was having a much easier time controlling it against active targets. From here, all I had to do was to practice alone for a while, and it would give me what I needed. "I think that's enough for the day," I called. "It has been another amazing day. Thank you very much. You're amazing," I said, leaning a bit heavily on the compliments.

But, she certainly deserved it, helping me progress that much.

"My … pleasure," she said, her voice surprisingly stilted.

She must have been really tired of stammering like that. I made a note to find an appropriate gift for her. She deserved it.