Felix awoke in his bed, with a faint headache. Holding his head, he looked around in confusion, before understanding he was within his room, in the real world.

Taking a second to remember what had happened, he went for his phone, and was relieved to discover only a couple of hours had passed since the fight.

However, Felix felt a little strange. He could hardly feel it, and it was hard to put it into words, but he felt like everything seemed clearer. Not simply his vision, but everything about him felt clearer. What did it mean, Felix wasn’t sure. For all he knew, it was simply an aftereffect of overusing his mind.

Rubbing his temples, Felix decided to immediately go back to the game, despite still having somewhat of a headache.

The moment he appeared, Felix was glad to spot Zed and Zara sitting on top of the corpse of the Chieftain Ocumini, looking a little bored.

Seeing Felix appear, their expression quickly changed as Zara asked quickly, "Are you okay?! You went offline the moment the fight was over!"

Felix’s headache felt a little better in the game, something he was glad for.

"I’m fine, I just got a little tired. Why are you still here? And where’s Drakon? What about the loot?"

Faced with the rapid questions, Zed replied equally as fast, "We found something, and Drakon is over there. As for the loot, Euron dropped a few things, while the Ocuminis only have one good thing about them."

Looting in Epoch was different from most games. In most games, monsters would drop all kinds of equipment and money, while NPCs and Players would only drop some of their inventory at death.

In Epoch though, there wasn’t any real loot per se. Instead, the player would have to find what was valuable about a monster, and take it themselves. As for an NPC or a Player, if they died, they would drop everything they had on them.

Of course, Players would get resurrected, albeit while losing a level, but since there were no Inventories, everything on their person would become loot.

Zara patted the Ocumini under her and said, "The Ocuminis’ eye is a rather precious alchemical ingredient. Unfortunately, this big boy’s eye was destroyed to kill it. But we got four Elite Rank eyes in perfect condition, so it’s quite the good haul."

Zed nodded and asked, "Will you be using them? Because our Guild is interested in them, so if you aren’t interested in them, we would be willing to pay you for them. It would save you the trouble of finding an alchemist to sell them to, and we offer more than fair price."

Felix shrugged and asked, "How much?"

Zara replied, "Considering there are four of us and there are four eyes, we get one each. So one Ocumini Eye is worth 5 Silvers, because of their scarcity."

Felix raised an eyebrow and replied, "Fine, I’ll take the silver. I will be looking at its price later though, I better not find out you cheated me."

Zara smiled charmingly as she took out exactly six silver coins, "We wouldn’t dare to cheat such an expert. Also, Euron had five silver coins on himself, hence the additional one."

Felix looked at the six pieces, and pocketed them before asking, "What about his loot?"

Zara pointed at her feet and said, "Euron only had two interesting pieces of equipment. Uncommon Rank boots, which I am wearing, and a pair of gloves. Considering your immense contribution, risk taken and overall loot, we decided to split it as such: Drakon and Zed take 2.5 Silver each, I get the boots, and you get the gloves as well as 1 Silver. Of course, if you aren’t satisfied with the gloves, we can find something else."

As she said that, Zara threw a pair of dark gloves towards Felix. They looked unassuming, but Felix could both feel and see the dark Runes on the gloves.

[Sombre Gloves, Fine, Level 20]

[Defense: +36]

[Intelligence: +2]

[Requirements: 25 Intelligence]

[Dark Bolt: Fires a projectile of Dark Mana that deals 35 Damage to the target. Cooldown: 15 seconds.]

Felix felt surprised by the equipment, it was stronger than he would have expected. The skill was quite good too, as it provided Felix a steady way to deal damage without depleting his Mana instantly.

Skera, Felix’s spear, had a skill that expended Felix’s Mana, but that was actually rare for an Enchantment to do that as most were like the Sombre Gloves, which channeled the ambient Mana through the Runes on the glove for an effect.

Putting on the gloves, Felix nodded to Zara and said, "That is more than good enough to me. So, where did Drakon go?"

Zara signaled towards the interior of the fortress as she said, "We found something interesting. Come, it will be easier to explain when we’re there."

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Felix nodded and followed along, using the opportunity to glance at his Status.

Name: Odin

Level: 10

Title: Runefather, Otherworlder

Class: Runic Mage

Profession: N/A

HP: 170/170

MP: 900/900

Vitality: 17

Spirit: 90

Strength: 16

Agility: 16

Intelligence: 100 (104)

Faith: 5

Free AP: 10

Skills: [Expand]

Equipment: [Expand]

Felix had gained two levels from the Chieftain Ocumini kill, which was quite something as the XP had been shared between the four of them.

His Intelligence value also had a slight change to it, as the value in between parentheses was the current real value of his Intelligence. Going by his Title’s description, Felix thought it would only increase his Stat outside of parentheses, but instead it even doubled the AP brought by equipment, which was good news.

Since he had 10 AP to place, Felix only needed to think for a moment before deciding himself. He placed 5 AP into his Spirit, his Title doubling that to give him a total of 100 Spirit. He added another 4 into his Agility, bringing it to 20, and finally the last AP went to Strength.

Physically, Felix did not feel much of a change, but he did feel an increase in his MP, which brought him to another gain from this battle. His Mana felt clearer than ever, and the reason for that was one of his skills.

[‘Inner Mastery (B)’→ ‘Inner Perfection (S)’]

His highest ranked skill had not only leveled up, it had even skipped a Rank.

[Inner Perfection]

[Rating: S]

[Effect: Completely opens up the Inner World, and grants the user complete control over it. Mana Regeneration increased by 100%.]

Felix did not know much about the higher realms of Epoch, but he didn’t need to know about them to understand that having an S Rank Skill at Level 10 was abnormal. The Skill itself was absurdly strong too, as although passive, Felix’s Mana Manipulation had reached the same level as within his Inner World.

This meant he would be able to form Runes with the same ease as he would within his Inner World. His Mana Regeneration had also significantly increased. With it being 100% more efficient, Felix was now able to regenerate his entire MP in an hour instead of two.

So the calculation for MP per second was MP/3600 instead of MP/7200, and in Felix’s case, 1000/3600, so 0.278. In other words, he could now recover 1 MP every 3.5 seconds. Which was insane.

This all made Felix feel conflicted about his Curse though. For sure, it was very annoying, and according to Chris, would stop him from leveling up beyond Level 50, but at the same time it was undoubtedly what had allowed him to learn such a high leveled skill so quickly.

Moreover, Felix could already feel the way forward for the skill. Although he had been barely conscious at the time, Felix still felt the state he had been. His connection to his Mana hadn’t simply been perfect as it was now, but it had gone a step beyond, and extended out of his body.

So to him, the next step was undoubtedly to manage to extend his Mana out of his body, to form a kind of zone around himself. Well, that would be for later.

For now, he had other questions on his mind.

"What’s up with the door?"

Within the fortress, Drakon was standing still in front of a large metal door, which looked unassuming. Drakon, who remained still, replied, "We went through the entire fortress, and this was the only door we couldn’t open. Moreover, the protection placed on it is much greater than something near a beginner village should have."

Felix approached the door, and placed his hand on it. As he did, he felt a massive amount of Mana within the door, set into many Runes. There were more than a hundred of them, at least.

Cocking his head to the side, Felix asked, "It is quite strange indeed… but how did you know about it? From out talks, none of you seem attuned enough with Mana to sense it."

Zed and Zara both remained silent, looking at Drakon. The latter did not say anything for a couple of seconds, until he decided himself.

"You may have noticed I have a special charging skill."

"I’m not blind."

Drakon let out a dry chuckle as he explained, "My Innate Skill is called Divine Charge, and it allows me to charge through anything. Well, it’s a little more complicated than that, but basically, the larger the difference between my Stats and the durability of the thing I want to charge in, the longer the preparation time."

Enlightened, Felix said, "That’s quite the powerful Innate Skill. There is no upper limit?"

Drakon replied, "Not that I know of. But if something is too strong, I would have to literally stand in place for days, so while technically possible, I can’t smash into anything just yet."

Felix nodded, before glancing at the door. A grin quickly appeared on Felix’s face as he asked, "This door… how long have you been charging for?"

Drakon smiled back, "Two hours."

"And how long will you have to wait?"

"Around one more hour, I would say. While I get a sense of how long I have to wait, it isn’t the most precise of feelings."

Felix turned to look at the twins, and said, "That’s quite the powerful Innate Skill. Why tell me?"

Zara crossed her arms, ‘coincidentally’ pushing up her chest as she replied with her familiar charming smile, "I’d like to re-propose my earlier offer. But even if you still want to remain an independent player, it doesn’t mean we can’t cooperate."

Raising an eyebrow, Felix asserted, "I’m listening."

"The conflicts between Guilds in Epoch have barely started, and it is already more intense than anything we have ever seen before. And as strong as we are, we aren’t the strongest guild in the world. So we may sometimes need help. Like that, both sides would be happy. You won’t be tied down to our Guild, but you can still help us in times of need. It would be remunerated, of course."

Scratching his cheek, Felix concurred, "An ally, then?"

"Exactly. Unless you wish to join our Guild. If so, considering your more than impressive performance, not only would you be able to join the main team, you-"

Felix cut her off with a wave of his hand, "Thank you, but no thank you. I will happily help in time of need, but I wouldn’t be suited for a Guild."

Zara shrugged, "Can’t blame me for trying."

Felix smiled, and announced, "Since we will still have to wait for an hour, I will be training on my own."

The two nodded, and Felix sat down against a wall, entering his Inner World.

Although his Mana Manipulation had reached the level of his Inner World in the outside world, training would still expend Mana. Meanwhile, in his Inner World, Felix could play with his Mana for as long as he wanted, it wouldn’t deplete in the slightest.