The first book was very dry, Mana-Morph’s it turned out could be almost anything. Most common were melee weapons that changed between a range of melee choices, or specific combinations with clear partnering such as a bow that can shift into a sword to allow a user to shift between ranged and melee combat.
Dual ranged mana weapon types were a bit less common, and spoken about as being rarely used as they required a high compatibility for the weapon type as difficulty scaled hard for mana-morphs due to needing to learn two weapons, on top of them not being seen by most as actually practical. Why train a skill split over two types of ranged weapons when you could specialise in just one to gain skill faster or split it into melee and ranged to increase your versatility.
There were some good bits of information, such as mana-morph weapons required you to obtain enough practice with each form the current weapon has in order to level the skill for it. Also that unlike when you changed swords, where you skill itself remained the same and it expressed better as you became familiar, mana-morphs always started with two forms but any that weren’t system generated would grow with the user once their level in the skill reached rank 3 and above, gaining either additional abilities or new forms to use. When you move to a new mana-morph weapon it will instead take time to assimilate into your skill level and grow into it in its own way.
The other book though was very useful in an entirely different way. It turned out challenges were made available in a group per tier, and until all of the current cycle were completed for a tier a new set wouldn’t be made available.
Each challenge wasn’t set in stone either, they would shift and adjust to provide the correct difficulty level to the person challenging it. This meant in theory every cycle was finishable, however in reality often there were at least a few challenges per cycle for each person that they wouldn’t have a hope in beating. This was usually because the premise itself was anathema to them, such as requiring you to be able to hear a certain range as the monster it was themed around hunting only made noise in that range.
For mana-morph’s though this became interesting because often they would be put into situations that normally required two people instead, as a challenge would consider their weapon capability as more than a singular persons, although a failsafe meant that unless you had a really strong record of beating challenges you couldn’t be considered as more than 1.5 people in weight value for setting a challenge. It did also mean higher reward access however, as the reward pool only considered the individual's soul strength compared to the challenge, as long as you could actually beat the challenge.
Ignut didn’t end up coming by after dinner was done, and in the spirit of I literally died recently so I deserve some self love, I had eaten steak with steak cut fries for both lunch and dinner as well as my breakfast again. Eventually that would get tiring, but perfectly cooked steak, gravy, and steak cut chips was hard to beat as a go to meal if you didn’t have to cook it yourself.
After finishing off the second book I decided it was time to lay in the shower and enjoy that it was a literal rain room but with pressure controls, and ended up making my way to bed only after I nearly fell asleep the third time on the floor under the gentle warm rain I had the shower set to.
----------------------------------------
Waking up the next day and making another breakfast of, you guessed it, steak with steak cut fries and gravy though I went with pepper this time. After I was mostly done eating Ignut showed up to get a start on the day's training.
“Sorry the Morph user I was thinking of seeing recently got a new trainee as well so it was harder to get some time to talk then I thought it would be. But we have a training plan to gain some useful skills that are learnable.” Sitting down on the couch as well, I needed to get a good seat that wasn’t just this single couch soon, and placed a single page onto the table.
“Now this is your training plan for the next few days, once each of these goals has been achieved we can get you into a challenge with Eterna’s approval and start earning some useful rewards. So going through the list, you need a weapon skill to rank 2, which we will set up the training system for today. You also need Mana Manipulation at least to rank 1, and puzzle solving to rank 1. Eterna isn’t a huge combat god, so he ideally wants to nudge you towards more monster hunts and ruins delving or puzzle room type challenges as he enjoys those more. Anyway, the training room? Let me load up that allowance and the training simulations.”
Making our way through Ignut went over how the allowance would work, being limited to twelve hours per day total usage with the idea being I was then to spend the other twelve hours eating, showering, sleeping, and studying as I start collecting books as most of the starter info books were within my ability to pay for mana wise.
As soon as Ignut had set up the training allowance and simulations he was leaving, although he did teach me how to touch the pink cube on the transport platform to send a message to someone and how to check my own messages. This way once I was done I could send him a message to come by, and he promised to visit in a few days if he hadn’t heard from me anyway in case I needed a hand.
Once he was done I looked at the blue cube for a bit, before deciding to try to spend my four hours per training simulation evenly until I reach one of my skill goals. Starting with the most fun, I reached out to the cube and loaded up the ranged mana-morph weapon training simulator.
The cube configured how it had for testing weapons yesterday, however it already had the Mana-Morph from yesterday on it. Reaching over for the gun I read through the prompt I was given to see what this would entail fully.
Mana-Morph Skill level 1 obtain training: Please aim to hit each target as they appear, changing the form of the mana-morph at the same time. Accuracy, fast morphing, and consistent refilling of mana storage for ammunition are the goals of this training session.
Looking out I could see a few standard targets like last time in rough humanoid shapes standing up, so I started with the close range ones and got to work.
In the end it ended up throwing cubes up into the air, having rotating discs like clay shooting fly across the room, Quickly I had to get used to having a mental finger on the toggle switch to change forms immediately, as a flying disk would appear at the further point just out of the handgun range, then the moment it was shot five cubes would appear very close range and need taken down so I had to swap back.
By the end of the first four hours I felt wrung out, but it was clearly worthwhile with the prompts I had gotten during the training.
Skill obtained: Mana-Morph weapon proficiency (Ranged Short arms, Ranged Long arms) Rank 1
Skill rank up: Mana-Morph weapon proficiency is now rank 2
Mana-Morph weapon proficiency (Ranged Short arms, Ranged Long arms): Provides more innate comprehension on usage of weapons related to skill, and helps improve comprehension gained during practice and usage of related weapons.
Practising for so long had left me feeling like my mana had burned a path down my right arm into my palm feeding the morph so I decided lunch was in order. In the interest of not ruining steak for myself long term I decided to go with something a bit lighter and got some chicken corn soup. Eating a small bread roll with it I took some time to read back over the Morph book again to see if there was some advice about hitting level three with the skill, but as far as I could see the third level was dramatically harder as with most skills each level gets progressively harder to obtain.
With the additional skill levels I definitely felt I understood the morph weapon better, and it felt more comfortable to use, but at the same time it was more like a limiter had been removed rather than the skill itself providing improvement to me.
Getting up I went back out into the training space to decide on which to do next, flexing my arm though I decided that puzzle solving sounded better than anything mana related right now.
This time instead of setting up a large space the cube simply created a light from its top and projected a small maze. With my hand still on it I could manipulate the puzzle, and the rules were provided via the strange link that touching the cube granted. With a bit of focus I could move the orb that was sitting at the start of the maze around, and once it reached the other exit a new maze was formed. After completing the fifth maze, one where the walls would rotate each time I passed an intersection if it had more then two paths available from it, the puzzles changed to something new.
Now I had a cube made up of lengths of wood that were interlocked and I had to find the right one to pull out in order in order to dismantle the cube. After only three of those the puzzles changed again.
This time, I heard a voice asking a question. The box had returned to its normal state, except for a small blue orb floating on top instead of the puzzle display. I was reminded of the riddles I used to enjoy as a kid when reading them in school.
“I speak without a mouth and hear without ears. I have no body, but I come alive with wind. What am I?”.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Oh so we aren't even going to be tricky at the start at least. “You are an Echo.” Immediately a small voice chanted echo before fading away, mildly creepy, before the next riddle started.
I have cities, but no houses. I have mountains, but no trees. I have water, but no fish. What am I?
“You are a map.” Again the voice copied my answer, but it must have been correct as we moved onto the next question.
Albert is the brother of Bacchus. Bacchus is the brother of Cameron. Cameron is the father of Dax. So how is Dax related to Albert?
“Albert is Dax’s uncle.” Yet again more echoes of my final word, but at least the riddles weren’t too hard.
What belongs to you, yet everyone else uses it?
“Your name.”
Full of holes, yet strong as steel, what am I?
“A chain, made of steel or greater material presumably”
“A test from your own world then. Answer this question”
Wait from my world? This wasn’t just some automated process like the others then or was it this well designed?
“Yamaoka Tesshu, as a young student of Zen, visited one master after another. He called upon Dokuon of Shokoku.
Desiring to show his attainment, he said: "The mind, Buddha, and sentient beings, after all, do not exist. The true nature of phenomena is emptiness. There is no realization, no delusion, no sage, no mediocrity. There is no giving and nothing to be received."
Dokuon, who was smoking quietly, said nothing. Suddenly he whacked Yamaoka with his bamboo pipe. This made the youth quite angry.
"If nothing exists," inquired Dokuon, "where did this anger come from?" “
“I don’t know, his mind? Wait, how did you know this from my world if I hadn’t heard it before? Are there others from my world here now?” Realising there was mild panic in my voice I was hoping this way I could at least find some additional stability in this maelstrom I was currently surfing emotionally.
“No, apologies young lesser soul. I am Kmitukater, and fate has found her way to suggest your training to myself. I did not wish to grow your hope, only nudge you towards expansion and growth. You will find my name available to reach when you communicate now, and as a sincere apology when you find an answer to my question contact me, and I shall give you a gift.”
Immediately I went to go call Ignut, as if my cube was speaking to me when apparently no one but Eterna or Ingut could contact me without my or their consent first. I wanted clarification before something went wrong. After all Ingut and Eterna had a vested interest in my growth and survival, who knows if this person does.
Touching the pink crystal I focused on the idea of contacting Ignut, and composed a message stating someone called Kmitukater was providing riddles in my puzzle training and asked me to contact them when I solved it. I think a lot of my panic bleed in, but I had already started becoming attached to this space as a point of safety amidst everything happening.
Almost immediately I got a response that Ignut would come visit me to discuss, and within a minute of stepping off the platform he showed up. “So first things, you sounded panicked so let's settle that. Kmitukater is known as the god of sand and stone, a god of enlightenment and as such rarely answers questions directly so there is no point asking him, but he's never been known to interact with someone in any way you could consider harmful to them. So I didn’t expect to even need to touch on this until after a few challenges, maybe your first if it went really well, but let's go grab a seat in your living space and go over what has happened and the most likely reason why.” Following along I had to admit it was a large relief to hear Ignut was unconcerned, as this at the least implied it wasn’t a sabotage situation or anything like that.
Sitting down next to Ignut he first went ahead and ordered more of those strange beers he was fond of, this time they were green with red swirls in them and tasted like coconut but savoury. “So, first of all your training simulations. These are all based on training gods and trainers have in the past provided all fed into a single system. Apparently before any technological deities appeared this system was a lot more personal, and it's why even now trainers aren’t allowed to have more than three lesser souls under them at a time still. So one major problem with this system for training purposes is its impersonal, like its really really good, but it will miss things or won’t find a good turning point to give you a better challenge, until it gets feedback from seeing a trainer get involved after. To alleviate this as long as they are willing to enter the binding agreement of the system any trainer or sponsor is able to provide direct training via the system to any lesser soul provided they themselves willining engage in that training. This agreement doesn’t do a lot, it's more just to ensure anything they do must be non-harmful to you, not against your wishes or your sponsors wishes, and must be done with the intention of improving your abilities or related skill to the training happening.”
“What this means normally is you do well in a challenge, one of the gods watching decides you have a talent or attribute or trait related to their domain they want to foster so they either contact you, or more often your trainer, then they organise to provide training either in person or via the system to encourage growth in this area. In theory they can simply choose to provide this via the system without our approval, the system prevents them from doing any harm after all, it's just odd because well. No one should really know who you are.”
“Usually this isn’t done just to provide growth either, it’s because they expect you to eventually reach demigod status, or high enough tier to be useful as a trainer either way, and want to trade it back in for you to train one of their lesser souls later. However Kmitukater is known for picking souls he decides he will help by using an innate ability he has that allows him to find souls that will experience the most growth from it. If you solve his question then I would suggest contacting him to provide the answer, he is not known to be anything other then generous when offering gifts, but also if this happens again definitely let us know as it does create a kind of debt for you”
This was a lot to take in, but at least overall it seemed that it wasn’t bad, just like not great to have a debt. Although that sounded like a Koan, and from what Ignut described this was simply someone who would help whoever would gain the most from it, which logically should pay out reasonably well as if this did lead to anything helpful I would be happy to help the same in return I guess.
“Check your notifications, if your emotional state is high like this they will be suppressed right now so you will need to manually let the system know you're ready to see them. If Kmitukater was assisting you I would be very surprised if you didn’t get a skill level in whatever you were training.”
On his directions I focused and realised I could feel a very gentle pulse from where the system seemed to usually interact with my mind, and when I focused onto it I got a new pop up.
Skill obtained: Enlightening puzzle resolvement Rank 1
This wasn’t the skill I was meant to be training exactly, and thankfully the system helpfully gave me a pop up explaining it further.
Enlightening puzzle resolvement Rank 1: A skill that allows the user to peer into the metaphysical of a puzzle to resolve it by comprehending the puzzle itself. Part of the Enlightenment set of skills.
“Hey Ignut, quick question. What does an enlightenment skill mean? Like this puzzle skill looks odd, and it says it's part of the enlightenment set of skills.” Looking over I wasn’t sure if Ignut was about to kiss me or slap me, he just looked to be in a bit of shock.
“Okay well that explains Kmitukater’s involvement. Basically there are some advances to skills that lead down particular paths. In this case what it means is levelling one enlightenment skill can improve others. You almost never can obtain a new skill that way, but you could evolve an existing skill into an enlightenment variant of it. It will make sense as you use it, but it's nothing other than a moderate perk so I wouldn’t give it too much mind. Those kinds of skills are just Kmitukater’s whole thing, he loves trying to get as many of them as possible for any lesser souls he's sponsoring, and seeing you get that one might help him refine his training of his own people to try to get it on purpose. On the upside, seeing as you did obtain the skill in the variant he wants to take advantage of most, it would be reasonable to assume he won’t consider there any type of debt for that training, though I will ask Eterna if he can confirm that for you to put you at ease. Anyway, I would suggest taking the day off, then trying to get your weapon skill tomorrow and we can go from there.”
“Oh sorry I forgot to mention, I got that to rank two this morning. So it's just the mana skill to go.” Again Ignut looked happy but in a frustrated manner, it was really confusing and a big part of why I didn’t go all in on this social interaction thing where I could dodge it.
“That’s good right? It's just one skill left to earn and then I can get into some challenges which is what we want right?”
“No no, sorry yes it's a good thing Fenris I just wasn’t expecting it all things considered. Usually the weapons skill takes a full day to get to the second level for the first time, as it's considered a core base skill so the system helps bump you along a bit. So I hadn’t grabbed your weapon yet, so I guess I need to get that organised now for you. Alright new plan, I will go organise your new weapon and you if you feel up to it do your mana training. However you also need to put together some clothing that will be suitable for the challenge, as once I bring your weapon, depending on Eterna’s thoughts we will either try to get you into a small challenge tomorrow or if not in the coming days. So at a minimum use the training cube to purchase some clothing like boots and maybe something more comfortable then the robe for outdoors environments?” With his parting statement just very casually ramping up the timeline I was expecting for challenges Ignut waved and made his way out to travel back to wherever he worked that wasn’t here.
On the upside he did mention clothes shopping, and I was full up on mana for the most part, so I should take my trainers' important words to heart. Bounce back in my step I made my way off to the training cube, hopefully I could find something that actually had sleeves.