Chapter 12 - Contribution & Final crash course
I breathed in as the same horn that began this wave sounded once more. I went and leaned back on a crenelation, slowly sinking down to the ground, exhausted. The dome the system put in place slowly faded away as I watched in relief. Slowly the smell of burnt carcasses and offal of the decimated horde was replaced by the pungent smell of the healers incense, caressing my body in gentle nourishment I even felt in my meridians. Cursing this entire situation I got to my feet, my mind felt considerably clearer then it had any right to be. Upon consideration I spread the rest of my stat points out to get it out of the way, nice and even.
Name: Cildarian
Level: 3
Race: Unrefined Human
Core: (-Nascent- Legendary, Rare)
Natural Affinity: Air
Lesser Affinities: Fire, (Error), (Error), (Error)
Bloodline: Unknown (Affinity Related)
STR - 11 (+2) (Strength)
STA - 11 (+2) (Stamina)
DEX - 12 (+2) (Dexterity)
WIS - 12 (+2) (Wisdom)
INT - 16 (+2) (Intelligence)
CHA - 5 (Charisma)
LCK - 2 (Luck)
Free Points: 0
Achievements: N/A
Resources: 1284 Contribution
The familiar intoxicating rush filled me, and this time I felt my skin tighten, my muscles becoming noticeably denser and more reactive.
“Hope you’re happy with your choices, stat-wise. You won’t be getting a lot of those in the near future. Anyhoo, congratulations are in order. You’re alive! How nice is that?” Smiling cheerfully, A'dal looked down the walls as the spellblades arrived. No doubt speaking mentally with all of them. I just shook my head at his antics, too tired to argue except for one question.
“And why do you say I won’t get many stats going forward?”
“Can’t really say!” He responded with a stupid grin, on his stupid wood elf face. He nodded merrily as all the spellblades arrived, “good job kids! Glad you all survived and may I say, very mediocre job. Barely passable in the extreme. We’ll work on that in the future, but for now, training awaits!” A collective groan followed his words as he waved his hand, “you’ll like this one, promise! Before we go to the contribution screen, and don’t do it! I see you over there! You have one more training regimen today after midday break, so hop too! And no peeking! Meet me in the arena after your meal.”
Hearing that, we stopped grumbling and started moving towards our mess hall inside the coliseum, if anything this world we were thrown into had excellent food. We started at a leisurely pace until A’dal’s voice rung in our minds as one “Faster you… what are they called? Oh yeah! Slackers! Cycle that energy! We haven't got all day!” As I was in front of the small host of fellow spellblades, I set the pace.
Curious to see if my compatriots advanced as well since the chaperoned wave yesterday, the amount of power I pulled was similar to what I did before my nascent core was formed, thimble-full amounts rushed through all my meridians at once as my pace grew past normal human boundaries. Looking back I smirked as I thought how olympians would be envious at the passing streets flying by. Taking a small detour I led them to a long stretch and I doubled my power output. Exhilarating was the only way I could describe it, the few people in the streets barely had time to dive out of the way as we swept through. Looking back I saw the dust cloud behind us, everyone was still with me.
We were moving at around 32mph (51kmph). I looked to either side of me and saw the exultant grins on their faces, our new and improved capacities finally providing a brief joy that had been lacking in the constant struggle. Forward we strove, stretching our legs as buildings passed in our peripherals. This was our power. Looking to the buildings coming up I had a wild idea to run across the rooftops when A’dal sounded in my mind. “Enough, though it is good you took this upon yourselves. There are a few slightly behind.” At the flashback to reality I grimaced and took the turn towards the coliseum, our little foray across the inner city circle almost bringing us back to where we started.
I said fuck it and cycled more energy through my meridians, jumped onto a railing which my foot found without effort and propelled myself to the roof. Half my body reaching above the roof, I slapped my hand down and shot up and forwards, hell I even did a little flip onto the roof itself and launched myself backwards without even looking at the road yelling “PARKOUR!” My body responded almost as if my subconscious thoughts were working overtime, my muscles moving at unprecedented speeds, making connections my conscious mind would never allow. Onto another building I bounced off and landed in a superhero landing for pure showmanship.
Before the group of spellblades slowed down I burst my essence and my speed matched them, returning to the front of the pack. The wind blowing through my hair, everything passing by, my every step correct without conscious effort. I just smiled as we entered the coliseum, finding the silver lining to this madness. We all grabbed plates and dug in, and the burgers tasted like a certain place only available in western america, which was a pleasant surprise, since we were in and out of there so quickly.
Gathered in the arena in front of A’dal we were curious as robed wood elf magi drew lines in the sand, glowing a neon green. When the wind shifted the sands, the lines stayed static, almost looking like a series of ritual circles all interlinked and resulting in multiple human sized circles inside a large one with squiggles all over the place. Some dude in robes just appeared out of absolutely nowhere. One moment there was only our asshole instructor, then next another wood elf in blue robes more intricate than previously seen before, in a white geometric pattern that seemed to move slightly. He was taller than A’dal and his presence was slightly more.. Robust is all that came to mind.
“Attention humans! I brought a special guest today!” Gesturing to the man on his right, A'dal waved towards us, “all for you! He is my equivalent robed magi stationed here at your tutorial! All the other elves you see are his minions!” At a glare from said guest he continued, “ah well not minions, per say? Junior members that have to do exactly as he says or they get in heaps of trouble! Much better no? Anywhoo, this is High Magus Fier’dal and he’s going to teach you stuff!” And with that, A’dal zipped away without another word.
A heavy sigh from the high magus signaled a kindred spirit in my hate for the outspoken spellblade. He didn’t have a beard per say but he did have a goatee with jewels strung throughout. “Stuff,” he said the word with distaste that could only reflect on A’dal and I immediately warmed to him. “Yes well, this ‘stuff’ I’ll be teaching you will be gathering, replenishing your essence actively. Please take a seat in whatever position you prefer to meditate in, inside a circle. My fellow magi will come around and ask your affinities so they can make the proper adjustments for you.”
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As we all started moving and taking our own spots he continued, “this is also how you actively improve your core as you advance, there are multiple stages to each that we won’t get into at the moment, but suffice to say expanding and deepening your foundations will only be beneficial. It’s much slower then your core formation, but no less important to refine what was done. In many cases those who have failed to achieve an acceptable core have spent the time to break into the next stage before the next major step in their cultivation journey, lengthening how far they can travel down this perilous road. I don’t know if you were told, but the stronger your core is now, in the beginning, the further you will be able to progress.” He let us stew in that as we told the magi making the rounds to make adjustments. When I told the young magi woman that came up to me, she only nodded, focusing for a moment and my circle took on a wavy appearance with soft swirls within.
“While having a core that's rare is all to the good, I caution you that the requirements to advance such cores are incredibly high, and the cost is steep. With that being said, those of you who have common, or even inferior cores will hit a bottleneck once it’s full. I urge you to start pushing forward and build your foundations sturdier. If you are stuck in inferior, you will go no further. Though, I doubt that any are considering the resources the system has provided during your core formation.” He then sat ahead of us in a lotus position, “breathe and focus yourselves, I will be sending common quality gathering techniques based on your affinities. And if you open any more elements to access, your gathering technique must be changed as soon as possible.” With that being said he closed his eyes and we followed suit. “Look inside yourself and I can follow suit.” Putting action to his words I delved within and stopped above my core, strange how it was so dim, roughly just more than half my reserves gone from the short day. As I roamed around my core I felt the Magus’s presence in full force arrive, I felt his eyes upon my core like a squirming sensation. “Interesting,” then I had information start to appear in my mind. They seemed like simple spiral patterns that created a vortex. As I constructed the design as shown, I had a bit of trouble visualizing it.
Concentrating on the patterns, I created them just outside my core, letting the wisps of essence go in a rotation. Guiding the trajectories I kept them moving faster and they started lengthening, tendrils reaching out into the world, flailing around with no purpose. Onward I continued feeding the gathering guide I was given, making small modifications as prompted to suit my specific needs. Soon it felt as though I had two little whirlpools on my back, slowly coming into focus. When the ends reached my core, suddenly everything snapped together in focus, like a conduit reaching from the outside, energy suffused patterns started pulling in small amounts of essence.
There were a few problems however, the quality of the essence entering my core from the world was diffuse and loose. Much like what I began with. Frowning, the answer lay in the impromptu manual I was given through telepathy. As it filtered in I had to condense it to match my current well of energy, as it was the vapor just kind of hung around the thick center of my natural wellspring. Mentally grabbing a handful I squeezed, successfully aligning it closer to my natural state, not quite done, I pushed upon it again and a drop of the familiar liquid-like energy felt right. Second problem, since my core was indeed quite large, the final amount from that first was only a drop, the systems ‘reward’ requiring even higher quality.
Suffice to say, I would be here all fucking night just to fill up a bit more than half my core. Onward I pushed and condensed what was filtering through my spirals into a harmonious balance within. Keeping my focus I continued as the diffuse essence started losing room to spread around eventually, a few hours later my draw from the environment slowed to a trickle as it had nowhere to go. Not knowing what else to do I just continued as I was until the Magus’ voice entered my mind.
“Everyone that is enough for today, congratulations to the few who managed to take steps forward. Your future is that much brighter.” Opening my eyes my focus fell from gathering, the energy fading into nothing. The lines around our meditative forms lost their gentle glow and faded as well, leaving nothing behind. Looking at my fellows I saw nine people to the side of everyone else, sweat covering their bodies, the ones who managed to push forward smiling a bit as we all got to our feet and stretched our still muscles.
I saw A’dal conversing with the mysterious magus ahead, and then he shimmered and was gone, just like that. “Well come on people! Lets hop over to the armory outside, it's the closest place to check out the contribution store!” My feelings partially uplifted, I put my lackluster performance from gathering to the back of my mind as I stepped forward in excitement. It was time to see what our efforts this afternoon had netted us. We left the coliseum and just outside the armory tucked towards the back, was a pillar engraved with scrollwork, a simple statement written across it ~Contribution Store~.
Stepping up with the others all I had to do was be in range and a window entered my vision listing various sections.
Basic Body Tempering Manuals
Multi-level Technique trees
Armor
Weapons
Healing elixirs
Gathering pills
Dao treasures
Affinity awareness pills
Training sessions
The list went on into various professions as well. What caught my eye most was that everything was labeled from inferior to rare once you went into a subsection. The amount of information in front of me left me confused as to what to do. And to the right my current amount blinked in blue, 1,284. The prices were staggering, a simple common healing elixir going for fifty points. What caught my glance were the affinity awareness pills, but they started at a staggering five hundred points at inferior quality labeled in only a few different types. Stage one elements, stage two elements, and Meta elements, the price sharply rising into each tier. Drawing away from that I perused different lists.
Stopping on the training sessions there was no rarity, but just elements listed with a teacher next to them. The prices varied but some were as cheap as one hundred points, one such was labeled Understanding the world around you, giving almost no indication of what it was about. On the other hand you had other more straightforward listings such as Basic Fire theory, as well as its respective elements having the same description and price. However on the other side of that for a whopping four hundred points was Ambient Essence Manipulation, another for the same amount, Magical Tactics. A sprinkling of others in between including what I found most interesting: two lessons for two hundred and fifty points each, Offensive & Defensive Air Techniques - Level 1 as well as its fire counterpart.
Wavering I went back and selected what was mentioned before to me, body tempering. I caught my breath as I saw the most basic and inferior rarity body tempering manual cost one thousand contribution points. And that's not all, it rose sharply in price to common rarity at two thousand five hundred points, where it actually started to include elemental affinities into the process, describing a body tempering more suited to a specific path, all the way up to something that staggered my mind to comprehend. Beyond the insanely complex legendary manuals which shortly described processes that promised the absolute pinnacle of body tempering, for a body made to suit you best for your path. By the way, that shit was in the hundred thousands, though it did have the caveat of not restraining any divergence from your current path. Also, it should be mentioned that for anything above common rarity, all your latent affinities must be unlocked.
Custom System-made body tempering manual - Mythical
1,000,000 Contribution points
Mythical tier. There was a tier after legendary and it was right there. A million points. Just no way. I had three latent affinities and just to purchase the affinity pills for that.. Going back to the section I saw descriptions with a clear warning that a breakthrough was not guaranteed, but the chance to breakthrough increased by rarity, something to do with the purity of dao. It was still a gamble, no matter what. Going back with a heavy sigh I continued window shopping.
Upgraded gathering techniques grabbed my eye for a moment, but the prices were high, and the requirements incredibly specific. Seeing the common gathering technique I was gifted was labeled for five hundred contribution points I was grateful we at least got that much for free. Everything after common started including more affinities and I guessed that my path forward was extremely limited by the power locked away inside of me.
Gritting my teeth, I purchased a few healing elixirs and common gathering pills, which thankfully were both cheap in comparison. Bringing my contribution down accordingly. Not wanting to spend anymore, I withdrew from the screen and saw my contribution down to 1,084.
Stepping back from the crowd of people steadily becoming more congested around the pillar I went to the coliseum and assumed a lotus position, condensing the diffuse energy in my core in preparation for tomorrow making sure I was topped off. I needed to be filled to bursting if I wanted to even start to advance, already planning on holding nothing back.