"What about evolutions? You know anything else about that? We were F tier race until 25, then I evolved? Now I'm E tier? I heard someone mention changes at evolutions?"

"Yeah, we talked about this a bit, most races start at E tier within the multiverse. For us humans living in a universe without an abundance of mana or energy we start at F tier. Really F tier is just us acclimatizing to the new environment. At level 25 our race goes through a minor evolution to E tier. All it means is that your race or body is ready now and small things will change based on how you want to be seen. Some people get a little more symmetrical, some scars disappear, body hair if you didn't want it. At level 100, the evolution is much more impactful."

"Oh huh, I didn't even notice. Did I change? What changed?"

"Uh, a little bit. Amelia and I were trying to figure it out but we think your eyes are a little bluer and maybe your freckles are slightly more visible? Honestly, that could just be the lighting and exposure to sun though. You didn't notice any other changes to your body overall? Less fat, tighter muscles, slightly taller anything like that?"

"I think I'm a little bigger than when the tutorial started but that might just be the strength and constitution increases? I don't think my height changed but honestly, I wouldn't know unless I measured."

"What changed for you?"

"Taller, bigger muscles, less fat, more symmetrical, cleaner skin, and the best part, none of those little hairs on the back of my neck."

Felix reached back and felt at the back of his neck.

"Huh, I should get rid of that too next evolution. Never really paid attention to them. Wait can you choose what to change?"

"Sort of. You change based on the race you choose, some changes are mandatory to accommodate racial traits. Otherwise it's just about what you want changed and how you see yourself. If you really hate a particular mole or something, it will likely disappear."

"Huh, good to know. So everyone in the multiverse is gonna be super hot?"

Noah snorted, "Maybe, I kind of suspect the definitions of ‘hot' and ‘beauty' are gonna vary wildly based on race, planet, universe etc."

"Yeah, probably."

"What about earrings and piercings? Do they constantly heal over with vitality?"

"I had the same question for Amelia, since my ears aren't pierced. The answer is yes until the minor evolution where the piercings become permanent for most people who had and wanted them."

"Ah, that makes sense."

Felix proceeded to ask Noah every other minor question he's had that he felt like he should be able to answer but couldn't. Noah was able to answer about half of them just from the explanation pre-tutorial. The rest he had no idea so Felix figured they likely weren't important.

"I think that's all for now. I'll go deal with the crowd of people likely freaking out about where to find the specific books they were reading."

"Good luck. And uh… Thanks for dealing with all that stuff. The city and the people in it, stuff like that."

Noah shrugged, "It's fine. Most of it results in my leveling so I can't complain. Amelia's been a huge help. Plus, I'm pretty sure you would hate that stuff, considering you seem to always be hiding or running away from people."

"What's she been up to? Haven't had any reason to go talk to her."

Noah snorted and shook his head, "You don't need a reason. She's good though, she manages the builders guild, they do everything from building construction to furniture and repairs. She still gets to go on projects which is what she really enjoys, doesn't do much management really. She's more of a figure head, even found herself someone to manage the minutiae for her. If you want to fill this place with some furniture though, I could send her up. Seems like a decent excuse to me."

"Yeah sure. Maybe send a designer or something with her, I have no idea what I want to put in here."

"Sure thing. Alright, have fun exploring."

"Thanks, good luck with the mob."

Noah shook his head once again as he left the tower.

Felix continued exploring the floors above the kitchens, feast and servants quarter floor. The next floor above that appeared to be a lounge or sitting area around a large fireplace embedded into a wall. There were more side rooms on the floor but they appeared to be empty. Following that were two empty floors with not a single room or other distinguishing feature between them. Past that there was a library, which was currently empty but otherwise cozy. There were empty shelves but otherwise no pieces of furniture. Lastly was what Felix assumed was a bedroom due to what he was guessing were closets as well as shutters to darken the room at night.

The hell am I gonna do with a physical library? Also why do I need a tower, I kind of just run around and do whatever, I didn't feel the pressing urge to find a house at all. I have an odd feeling that this tower is going to mostly go unused. I just have too many things to do with way too much traveling around.

Finally, Felix ascended the stairs to the final floor, the roof. The walls of the tower rose an extra meter forming a lip around the outside of this floor, acting as a railing. Other than the stairway back downwards, it was entirely empty. Standing in the middle of the floor, Felix looked out at the rocky peaks around him, Tri-Peak city below him, the plains to the south and the ocean beyond the mountain range. With the wind buffeting against him and the sunlight pouring over him, Felix found it rather peaceful and beautiful.

I guess I wouldn't mind coming up here to meditate every once in a while. Not that I would get to enjoy it much, unless… Can I bring the scenery into my meditation? Like replicate it in my soul space? Hmmm, another thing to add to the todo list.

Well, now that I'm alone, time to finally check out that charm, whatever that is. Felix finally pulled the legendary item out of his inventory. In his hand, appeared a tiny black metal skull with horns and fangs pierced by an equally tiny longsword. There was a tiny chain loop, like one used for jewelry, hanging off the pommel of the sword. The sword was made of a light silver almost white metal with a black handle. Looking closely, Felix noted that the eyes of the skull were empty and seemingly endless, even when he shined a light into them.

[E - Legendary] Charm of the Boss Conqueror

[Sould Bound]

This charm is made to absorb part of the souls of tutorial world bosses when they are killed. It will absorb a portion equal to your overall contribution towards the kill.

Note Charms: Charms are pieces of equipment that typically grow alongside their wielder. The benefits gained from a charm are completely unique and more than one charm may not be equipped at once.

Note Bond: Some magical items, particular ones that grow alongside you, must be bonded. To bond to an item to yourself, flood it with mana or energy for a few minutes to imprint your soul into the item. To un-bond an item that either you or another has bonded with, keep the item away from it's wielder for an extended period of time.

Current Bonuses:

None

Ok, I'm not sure what the value of that is honestly, it's a little weird. It is legendary though, so I guess it has to have some kind of value, right?

Felix squeezed the charm in his hand and flooded it with as much mana as it would take, which was about a single point for a few moments. He held on and squeezed it for 10 minutes before opening his hand, unsure if the bonding process was complete or not. The skull lying in his hand was largely the same with one particular difference, the eyes glowed with an ominous red color.

Ok, where do I put it? Hopefully I can find somewhere out of sight, this thing is a little too… halloween for me.

Felix eventually just decided to just hang it off the same chain as the Amulet of the Wild. The loop from the charm was long enough that it hung freely a few fingers below the amulet itself. That also made it hang, with his amulet, beneath his shirt and cloak so that it wasn't visible. He figured if the swinging around got too annoying, he could tie to his belt or something like that.

Alright, with that done I have a whole slew of things to do and I'd like to get them done as fast as possible. First thing's first, I think I need to read through the spell form primer. I doubt it will, but there is a chance it contains relevant information for designing mana channels and a core and more. More knowledge definitely won't hurt… unless it's just wrong and misleads me, or intentionally and maliciously wrong. Guess I'm kind of just banking that The System wouldn't give it to me if it was.

Felix sat down and pulled out [D - Epic] Odamoran's Spell Formation Primer and held it in his hands for 8 and a half seconds before stowing it back into his inventory. He sat down and entered a soul space meditation then spent a few minutes trying to get his surroundings to be reflected inside his soul space. He eventually figured it out by isolating and remembering the feeling of entering a meditation then replicating that feeling with his eyes open. He wasn't sure it was working at first until he accidentally turned off one of his senses creating an eerie silence.

With that task complete, he pulled on his memory skill and retrieved a mental copy of [D - Epic] Odamoran's Spell Formation Primer. He realized pretty quickly that he could close his eyes again and the environment remained. He guessed it was because the environment was simulated by his mind, like a waking dream rather than being completely accurate. That suited Felix just find as he just found the wind, clouds and solitude comforting.

Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.

He could have also just read the book in the real world, but he wanted to practice with and get to know all of his skills as much as possible for when he eventually tried to upgrade them.

This book is designed to provide as much information as possible while remaining in the D tier, which is why it's rarity remains at the peak of the regular rarities in the D tier at the time of writing this. Should you have further inquiries I encourage you to visit ??? and ???.

"More redactions? Seems dates and names of people or places are not allowed for some reason, annoying."

This book is also written under the assumption that the reader has no prior knowledge or experience with spell formation. Even if you may be able to cast spells, spell formation is completely unrelated. The extent of the similarities end at the common word, and the fact that mana is involved somehow. The System enables us to cast spells by inserting them into a spell list, the question becomes, where do new spells come from?

Some theories state that all of the spells are created by The System, however these people are lunatics and this is a childish notion. There are many cases of spells being created from nothing, though some would argue that all combinations have been created in the past and are simply rediscoveries. This is also foolish as there are simply too many combinations for that to be the case.

"This author is quite… opinionated."

The basics of spell formation are simple, the intricacies however, are endless. A spell is something that, when formed with sufficient mana and willed to cast will create some effect. While this definition is broad and may seem overly vague, it is the only one I have come across that truly encompasses all spells. The vast majority of spells consist of at least two components, a stabilizing ring and a node. The stabilizing ring is what contains the influx of mana and acts as a buffer from which mana flows into the spell. An excess of mana in one section of a spell will be distributed along the ring to other parts of the spell. This may seem unnecessary with simple spells that have singular effects, and it is, but it does help and becomes essential in more complex spells that have a multitude of functions. The ring should also grow increasingly complex alongside the complexity of the rest of the spell.

Nodes simply transform mana into something. Typically this is energy in the form of heat, cold, light, kinetic and so on. It is also possible to transform mana directly into matter, though the mana required to do so is typically absurd. Take for instance any basic fire spell, converting mana directly into fire would require somewhere in the neighborhood of a few billion points of mana. It is far more efficient to either heat up and burn something that already exists or transmute something into something else and burn that. The majority of all fire based spells will burn something that already exists, the question is, what is being burned. The most accepted answer, is mana itself, though I have not encountered any acceptable explanation as to how. Magically or chemically.

While it is theoretically improbable for anyone to run around creating boulders from mana, as it would be terribly inefficient, you may encounter someone that appears to be doing so. It is more likely that they are transmuting existing material into boulders, in this case, likely air around them. This requires a lot of mana, but not nearly as much as raw conjuration and is very easy to interfere with. Transmutation requires copious amounts of mana, time and precision. If you are being attacked by someone who appears to be conjuring boulders, try peppering them with Mana Bolts or something else to disrupt the area around them. More often than not, it will become impossible for them to transmute a boulder from the air if a Mana Bolt hits it. If they are capable of that, you are likely dead and I would love to meet them.

Many of you may rightly have asked the question, "What gives? I can't make a spell from a circle and a fire node?" Correct, you cannot. I said that there are only two required components for a spell, there is another that the even more astute among you will have identified. While not technically a component in the spell, you need to somehow connect a node to the ring. This sounds easy, just draw a line and you have a spell, right? Wrong. You could do that, and if you do, please try and cast the spell as it will be quite the sight to see. Nodes are not so simple or diverse as to be able to take mana from anywhere. Nodes have specific inlets for mana and to confuse things further, some have multiple inlets with only some of them required in most spells, and others in a different spells. Some also have outlets, for more complicated nodes we will see later on.

Here is a basic stabilizing ring and some basic nodes with their inlets labeled. More complex rings and nodes, with outlets, will be discussed further on.

On the following pages Felix flipped through there were diagrams. The first was a circle, making Felix wonder why it was drawn out at all. After that, there were nodes. Felix recognized the ones for fire, cold, light and force among them. While Felix had seen the nodes before, he had never seen them labeled like they were in the book with inlets and descriptions. He pulled himself into his Mind Palace and began copying and cataloguing all of the node diagrams in the book, including the ring, for posterities sake. He replaced his own separations, in favor of the more accurate diagrams from the book, on the bookshelves and continued reading.

Connecting the inlets of any of these nodes with the stabilizing ring above will create a simple spell. You are welcome to draw them out and add them to your spell list, though they have minimal effect and you likely don't want to replace any of your spells with these. Nodes are typically seen as tiny complex spells that we have yet to properly understand. It is possible to create a node, a task you will likely undertake with large complex spells, but in general, these are widely considered to be the most efficient at what they do.

Creating your own node is typically reserved for when you desire a function or transformation that does not exist yet. While these can transform mana into energy, there is no direction so they simply act around themselves, which can be problematic if you use a fire node right next to your hand. The solution to this, is what we refer to as a targeting node. While it is called ‘node' it is considered an accessory node, not a spell node. The naming is awful, but unfortunately it is much too late to complain about now.

Accessory nodes are like adjectives, they complement and add to a spell node. However, they can also act on each-other. A targeting node simply directs the effect of a node in some way. Simple targeting nodes include forwards, backwards, left, right. However, these can be combined into forwards and left. More complicated targeting nodes include things like the caster themselves, an anchor of sorts or absolute positions. These can then be modified to left from an anchor or up from an absolute position. This enables essentially infinite combinations, however too many accessory nodes will add inefficiency.

There are also quantity accessory nodes, which can define how much a targeting node affects the spell such as 1 meter to the left vs 2 meters to the left. Typically these will simply reduce or increase the amount of mana or size of the node they act upon. They are also not quite so precise as to be measured in meters. A skilled spell shaper may opt to simply perform this action themselves and skip the accessory node all together.

Combinations of these can result in specifying anything as your target, but often there are multiple ways of targeting the same thing so keep efficiency in mind. Other accessory nodes include shapes, these are self explanatory and are typically placed before the targeting node, such that mana is transformed into a shape at a location rather than at a location into a shape. The latter is less efficient and prone to spell dissolution as controlling and shaping energy is exponentially harder than controlling and shaping mana, even for The System.

The basic components discussed above as well as the more complex but useful, such as caster targeting node, are listed and labeled below.

Once again Felix flipped through the pages making mental permanent copies then filing, categorizing and organizing them into their own shelves, replacing his own where applicable.

Spells are typically more complicated than transforming mana at a target in a shape though, what about having effects chain together, or delayed effects? This is where intermediary nodes exist. These can store mana and delay it's release, transform the flow of mana, distribute input mana evenly and create spell effect chains where one node is only activated when the first is complete. Typically these are placed on the connecting lines between nodes, or between the outer ring and nodes. These can also be chained together.

The book went on to list these nodes with well labeled diagrams that Felix continued to copy and permanently file away. It also listed more complex rings and some tips and tricks for spell formation. Following that, it looked at specific patterns that recur in spell formation for specific tasks as well as multiple methods of accomplishing them. Typically, it showed inefficient variations, explained why, then showed the generally accepted versions that were equivalent in function, but more efficient.

These patterns included how Fire Bolt worked by chaining a fire node with sphere and forwards into a forwards pushing force node. It also discussed other common spells and functions that were deceptively hard to achieve.

You might be wondering, why work on or study this at all if it's so useless compared to spell lists? The answer is rituals and scrolls. A ritual is essentially a ward, it's a drawn spell form using a mana conductive material that a caster pumps mana into to cast a spell effect. A scroll is the same thing but almost always single use and portable. There have been famous mages in the past that walk around with spells inlayed into stone tiles that they kept in their pockets. They can simply pull one out and pump mana into it to cast any spell they have on them. It is slower than normally casting, but the versatility is much greater.

Finally, it listed some complex nodes including solid mana and a very interesting addition, ionization. Ionization allowed atoms to be marked for transporting electricity. To create something like a lightning bolt, the spell would ionize the atoms in a path from the caster to the target, then create sparks with a ton of mana to travel along the path. Sparks alone were not overly useful as the mana required was inefficient compared to Fire Bolt or any other, simpler spell. It was an enticing idea though to be launching lightning bolts at a target.

Apparently, spark was one of the most mana efficient ways of killing someone. However, it required the spell be cast within another person's body which was difficult due to natural a soul resistance that fought against and scrambled spells. Given that mana control was exponentially higher closer to one's body and soul, this method of killing was essentially impossible. The further away you were from the target, the more mana was required for the sparks to travel the distance. Without ionizing the path ahead of time, the mana cost would be exponential.

Solid Mana was an oddly complex node with many inlets and outlets that each contributed in weird ways to the final result. Unfortunately, specific effects required specific combinations of mana in different ratios across the inlets. Meaning, solid mana at a specific density or with specific traits required specific amounts of mana and was typically just retrieved from a table and memorized. The table was created through trial and error and apparently no one understood why certain combinations did what they did. So the table just had to be memorized, instead of it being possible to come up with a combination on the fly. Solid mana from a spell also wasn't the same as solid mana. Apparently solid mana spells were something else entirely, though no further explanation was provided.

The last section of the book was on effect rings, which were stabilization rings that had integrated nodes, such as the one used in Fire Bolt. By combining the nodes, the overall spell was more efficient.

Felix spent the rest of the daylight reading and taking notes on the spell formation primer. When he was done, he returned to the real world to find the sky above had given way to twinkling stars. Felix headed back down into the tower and placed his bed in the bedroom. He was getting pretty tired having been up for almost two days now so he laid down and fell asleep very quickly. . . . . .