“You don’t seem to rest much. Is that a trait of your species as a whole or is it just you?”

“Hey now, I’ve kind of got a lot to do here.”

“Just you then. It seems exhausting.”

“What can I say, working yourself to the point of collapse is classy. Maybe even just a little sexy. It gives me this broad, tired appeal that everyone loves.”

In the nine days since his imprisonment began, Ben hadn’t been able to sleep much, a fact picked up on by his watching neighbour. He was staying up as long as he could to work and without a higher realm to shove his mind to, when he did fall unconscious every couple of days, it was only for two or three hours till his dreams played havoc with him and ruined his rest.

“But that doesn’t even matter,” Ben went on. “If I can’t die in here then I can’t work myself to death. This is really the perfect environment, if I ever get the chance I’m going to have to see if I can recreate it to any extent myself.”

“Mmh, do as you will.”

It was clear enough that Tenth was more than content to watch whatever Ben did from the side, viewing it as a cheap amusement from someone who was probably saner than most others around them, and Ben was fine to let the other think what he wanted while he instead put his new level of balance enhancement to the test, carefully raising one hand from the ground and leaving his full body weight to be carried by the other as he continued to push up and down, feeling a satisfying level of strain with the added challenge.

While he did that, marbles passed from a bag behind him to one in front of him to check over if the things he thought he’d been feeling had been correct, finding his comfort with that particular skill growing as well, leaving him to consider how to train it from there.

He could keep the bag of marbles at the other end of his cell, forcing him to see how well he could still sense the makeup of each material at a greater range or he could instead reduce the size of each one to give him a similar effect. If neither was enough he could instead alter each marble, turning them into alloys and compounds of differing ratios to force him to try and find particular mixes instead to up the challenge.

Ah, what the heck, why not both? I have the time.

And I no longer have the time.

The ninth level of soul production had taken him longer to get than any other but that was still a relative comparison to so much else in his status, with the rapid leveling briefly making him wonder if any of his other potential jobs might secretly be ones that would give him third tier bonuses as well before focusing back on the matter at hand.

At that level of skill, he could create souls that would each contain half of his total mana volume, deeply shifting how much power he’d be able to hold, especially once he began creating more.

With that just becoming a question of how many. He’d be using them for his escape, both trying to break the cell that held him as well as fighting his way out, but at what point would they instead just weigh him down, slowing his flight through the horde and leaving him more open to be attacked?

It was a question he needed to consider but he was left once more looking out where his salvation hopefully lied, with another barrier hanging around the gates trapping the mysterious black mass he was going to place his bets on.

I can’t just make something strong enough that would let me break down the wall in front of me, I need to make enough that I’ll be able to kill my way to the front and break that next one too. Okay, screw it, I can’t risk being thrifty, I’ll make as much as I can and then work on figuring out how I’ll manage the weight after, which means first I’ll need to figure out the best way of carrying it all.

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…Mmh, screw it, that will work. Myriad will probably be fine with this, right?

Before anything else, Ben tested to see if he could reduce the size of the mana crystal that would be holding each soul, finding that it had gone down slightly compared to where he first started at before going forth with his idea as he took off his jacket, the first church of Myriad, and began materializing on it.

What he made was a bead around the inner lining, locked in place by the threads it was created around that he immediately filled with a soul.

At his newest level, combined with where he currently stood with his soul inclination, he was able to create fifteen souls at one time, even without stealing mana from any of the ones warped around his wrist, leaving the bits of matter as his biggest investment, requiring a small few seconds after the first one was finished before he moved onto the next.

But that wasn’t going to last long. With each new bead he made, he’d be able to steal mana from the ones he’d already created, leaving him with more and more power at his fingertips as the lining was slowly filled up with crystals and souls as the day wore on into the night until that one bit was finally complete.

Sixty thousand. In this jacket alone I’ve shoved sixty thousand souls. God, I really didn’t think about it at the time but if I get back I’m definitely going to be hearing some comments about this, aren’t I? Feel like there’s a chance Yuzu’s going to react poorly, she can shake me a little too hard sometimes, but let’s leave that as a future problem. For now, I should also check…

“Oh man, I am so fucking good,” He muttered to himself, drawing the eye of Tenth but not noticing it from how his gaze was fixed on what he’d just made.

There wasn’t a huge amount of difference for any normal person to see, with the more knowledgeable on that matter perhaps getting the shock of how much rainbow mana crystal had gone into it, but in the eyes of a master craftsman, it was different.

Upper legendary. With the modification he’d spent the last few hours carefully applying to his jacket, he’d broken into the highest realm that any mortal craftsman could manage.

It may not have come with a level like he would have hoped for such a thing and the ranking on that particular item may have been for something that would have many of the divine from his world looking at him like he was some sort of mad apostle for an evil god, but he’d just managed an achievement like no other for what really had been nothing more than a bit of patient work in his eyes.

Patient work but well deserved. He’d had to do what many would have viewed as impossible to break that final boundary, only achieving so much by transgressing past the limits of what any mortal should have been capable of when he’d first created a soul, letting his cross that barrier in the end.

But as incredible as that was, it hadn’t been the point of making it, with his mind doing some quick calculations after his initial joy had passed.

The math works in my favour pretty damn well. He thought, leaving a smile to touch his lips that was threatening to break into a wide grin. sixty thousand souls, each with half my max mana capacity translates to just shy of sixty million mana, all in one place.

It was a volume that could only have been described as overwhelming. Each great spirit only had a million mana in comparison, making it as though Ben was wrapped in a small army of them. It was the sort of power that could reshape a world, leaving the only question being how much of it he’d be able to access at once.

A question he sought to answer as he began pulling an ocean of power into him, feeling it stretch out his soul beyond its limits with the pain that always came with such a thing, screaming at him from a place beyond his flesh as he held onto all he could until he reached a limit of agony that wouldn’t let him do more, each of his minds struggling to keep their reason as a number filled his head.

One and a half million. It was an insane volume for any mortal to wield at once but he didn’t think it would be possible for him to push beyond it unless he finally got the pain resistance he so desperately craved, and with that number he moved to ease that burden, converting all of that mana into souls at once and watched as they flashed in and out of existence, letting him feel significantly better in the process as he slumped down.

Okay, that sucked and what I’ve done to my jacket is officially overkill if that’s as much as I can make myself hold at once, which at least means there’s no need to make an undershirt of the stuff too, which leads me to what I’m going to do next.

He wanted to test it immediately, to put his power against the barrier that held him and see which would come out on top, but he held off for the time being.

This was it, if dumping over a million mana into trying to break the barrier wasn’t going to work then he didn’t think anything would, which meant he needed to be as prepared as he could be. That meant he not only needed to create everything else he’d require for his prison break, he’d have to figure out everything else he’d need as well.

That meant one thing for him as he stared out at the demons beyond. Spending time on patience and observation. He’d watched them as he’d been there but he was going to do it longer, intending to take in all he could in the hope he’d find some pattern in their movement or strategies that would improve his odds, and only once he was confident that he either had everything he could or that there was nothing he could do would he put himself to the test to see if he could claim his freedom.

Sitting in front of the barrier, making hundreds of souls a second to keep getting the job experience he could, Ben watched as everything moved past him, feeling freedom at the edge of his fingertips.