Desmond decided to observe his surroundings more closely. Since the glass shards represented his memories, it only made sense to him that the other objects in this space were related to himself in some way as well. His attention was drawn to the large glowing yellow and blue sphere below his feet. Now that he was closer to the star-like object, he could see a faint light blue haze around the surface of the sphere. It almost looked like the sun had an atmosphere around it. Below the haze, the surface of the star was moving slightly and seemed to be sending out small flickering tendrils of light into the surrounding space. It looked a lot like the sun from pictures he had seen in his past life, so the star-like metaphor was quite apt.

“So, is this sun my life force? But then, why the colors?” Desmond said as he thought out loud.

The tether of energy from his chest connected him to this star after traveling through the various glass shards. This indicated to Desmond that it was some sort of core to his being, and life force seemed to fit the bill. What else could it even be, mana? Desmond considered this for a moment and something clicked. Yellow and blue mana did match his natural magic affinities.

Yellow was generally associated with earth mana and blue with water mana. Desmond had been tested when he first joined the Lodge and found he had mid-earth and low-water affinities. So, the colors did fit. Did that mean the glowing 7-story tall ball of energy was his mana then?

“Ok, so my body or my spiritual body is connected through my memories to my mana,” Desmond says as he follows the tether’s path with his eyes. “Now, how does that help me get out?”

Desmond couldn’t see a way to get at his mana since there was an invisible floor of some sort between him and it. Instead, he decided to try to bring the mana to him. Desmond slowly started to use the strength-based Empower technique. As he used his magic, he could see a stream of yellow and blue energy travel along the tether and into his body.

“Well, that confirms that it’s mana. Now, what happens if I try using more?”

Desmond used all three of the Empower techniques at the same time, one for each physical stat. The mana that traveled through the tether more than tripled and quickly started to cause him to feel lightheaded. Outside of this space, he could use all three techniques together for more than 20 minutes before he started running out of mana. So, getting the lightheaded feeling so soon was something different. As he continued using the 3 Empower techniques, the lightheaded feeling became a full-on headache.

As the headache worsened, Desmond decided to stop using his magic. He had come into this space by falling unconscious. It was, therefore, reasonable to him that if he kept using magic until he passed out, he could go back. But he still had a few things to do here, and more importantly, what if he was wrong? Passing out here might have some unforeseen consequences.

Desmond finally turned his attention to the three small glowing orbs of light that were hovering above the glass shards that made up his memories. For some reason, when he looked upon the orbs, he got a full sensation, almost like they were at capacity. He was unsure what it meant as it was hard to understand this feeling. Each orb had a small tether of energy, or mana, that would disperse out and travel through the glass shards and connect to the sun, just like the one from his chest but slightly dimmer.

“Now, how do these tie into all this,” Desmond stated as he approached the nearest orb.

The orb was a light blue color and about the size of a golf ball. It hovered in the air at about about 2 meters above the floor, so it was well within Desmond’s reach. Not being able to make any other observations of the orb, Desmond reached out and touched it. His mind was suddenly inundated with knowledge.

[Greater Strength](Rare): +96 Strength.

“What the!” Desmond yelled as he pulled his hand back. The information in his mind disappeared as soon as his hand left contact with the orb. “What was that?”

Desmond, with his past memories as Allan, had more than once looked at this world through the lens of an RPG. He had spent many days in the Lodge’s library reading books so he could better understand how to get stronger in this new world. But nowhere in the world had he ever come across a specific increase to a stat like this. There certainly were enchanted weapons and items that, when used, would make you stronger, but it was always a blind guess on how much. There had never been a specific number associated with it.

The RPG-like power system Desmond had created in his head to explain this world was relatively simple. You would kill monsters and gain experience from them. Though most of the literature in the Lodge called this essence, Desmond preferred to stick to his RPG framework and just called it exp. So when you gained exp, it would build up in some sort of exp bank. You would then have to train or perform specific actions to assign this exp from the bank to a particular stat, therefore improving that stat. Stats took more exp to enhance the higher they got. This led to hunters going after stronger and stronger game to keep seeing improvement. As more powerful monsters would offer significantly more exp.

The literature he had read was a little divided but generally broke it up into five main stats. The first was Strength, which was straightforward enough. This was Desmond’s primary stat and what he focused the most on. Training this stat was easy, as all you had to do was lift weights when you had exp banked up. Doing so would slowly apply your exp to the stat, improving it. However, at this point, Desmond did have to use an expensive set of enchanted equipment to burden himself before he could train this stat.

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The second stat was more confusing as it was often called Endurance but also referred to as Toughness and Regeneration interchangeably. It was well known you could raise this stat through running or intensive physical exercise. This meant it was almost impossible to train your Strength without training your Endurance at least a little bit. So this was by far Desmond’s second most powerful stat. If you wanted to target this stat, it was also common knowledge you could train it by getting the shit kicked out of yourself. A method Desmond had tried but was most unpleasant.

The next stat was a strange one, often called Reflex in the Lodge, but many of the mage books he read called it Mental Acuity. Desmond found that this was probably the hardest stat to train. Luckily, the Lodge had specific training courses and lessons set up for those wishing to target this stat. The mage books he read through even taught him several unsolvable mental puzzles that he found could be used to raise the stat just as well as any obstacle courses. Though Desmond knew the importance of this stat, it had always been the slowest one for him to train, and often got left by the wayside in favor of strength training.

Next came Intellect, which was generally viewed as the Mage stat. This stat was known to improve magic potency and memory. Improving the stat was as easy as increasing one’s knowledge base. All you would have to do was read to improve it, but most Mages chose to increase it by studying magic. Desmond improved this stat s bit when he was younger by ensuring he had some exp banked whenever he was researching in the library. But he had pretty much not touched it since, and had no plans on doing so in the future.

The last stat was just called Mana and was pretty self-explanatory. It controlled the size of your mana pool and was improved by using mana in any way while you had exp banked. Desmond had to use enchanted gear to train his Strength, which he needed to supply with mana. So he was always unintentionally training this stat a little. Desmond had not yet found a way around this, so he treated it as a necessary evil.

Desmond got most of this knowledge from a variety of different books found in the Lodge. The Lodge facilities always had a filled library for those seeking to raise their Intellect stat, and Desmond had used this to great effect. The literature had been anything but consistent about stats, and many wild theories were put forward. Some didn’t even agree that there were only 5, stating that Endurance and Toughness should be broken up or that things like Agility or Memory were their own stat. Since each stat seemed to have its own independent experience bar, it was generally accepted in the Lodge that diversifying your training, at least somewhat, was important to getting stronger.

But nowhere in any book he had ever read was there a mention of a specific number when talking about a stat. It was always a vague increase or decrease. Lost in thought, Desmond reached out again and touched the blue orb, feeling his mind fill with knowledge.

[Strength of the Mountain](Rare): +96 Strength.

This upended much of Desmond’s understanding of the world. That a stat could be represented in a physical number like this meant he should be able to quantify his own Strength in a number as well. This also made his RPG framework for the world seem a little more reasonable. But he would have to look into quantifying his Strength another time. He had no idea where to even start and still had pressing matters to attend to. However, this orb could very well be why he possessed so much strength since birth. It wouldn’t quite explain everything, but it was close.

Desmond still needed more information before he could be sure of anything, so he walked over and looked at the red orb. It was the same golf ball-sized floating sphere as the blue orb, but the red light it was giving off seemed more intense. The tether of mana connecting the orb to the sun was dyed in a slight red light. Desmond gently placed his hand on the orb.

[Mirror to the Soul](Divine): Allows the holder to exit their soul and interact with the Soul Realm.

Now that, might just explain where he was. Had he entered the Soul Realm somehow? It was the only thing that made sense to him. But if he had these orbs with him since birth, then why had he never entered this realm before? Desmond thought back to what he had been doing right before he entered this so-called Soul Realm.

If Desmond made a single assumption, then things started to fall into place. That assumption was simple: eating a beast core can give you one of these orbs. It didn’t explain why he had one since birth, but it would explain where [Mirror to the Soul] came from. It might even explain Ben’s fanatical obsession with that particular beast core. Had Ben known he could get this power from consuming it?

Under this assumption, he acquired the ability to enter the Soul Realm after he consumed the panther’s beast core. Then he was somehow forced here, or maybe he had just activated this ability unintentionally. Either way, if an entrance existed, there would be an exit. Desmond approached the finally floating orb of golden light. Slowly reaching out, he lightly placed his hand on its surface.

[Giant’s Blood](Legendary): +300% increase to Strength, +300% increase to Constitution, 80% reduction to all external mana use.

Desmond was momentarily stunned as he comprehended this information.

“Well fuck! That explains my whole damn life right there.” Desmond cursed.

Now that was definitely something he had since birth. It would explain his unnatural Strength, Toughness, and even why he had always been crap with magic. The Constitution stat was most likely what he thought of as the Endurance stat but incorporated with Toughness and Regeneration. Since those were the other things he had always been blessed with.

Coming face to face with this information felt comforting. Desmond had more or less figured all this stuff out during his life, but it was nice to have it confirmed. Training his Strength and Constitution had always come easy to him, whereas training in magic had felt pointless.

Desmond lets out a long sigh. That was the last thing he could inspect in his soul, and he still had yet to find an exit. He was of course, assuming that the star, glass, and orbs were what made up his soul. Desmond looked around once again at the absolutely stunning starry expanse surrounding him.

“So if this is the Soul Realm and that’s my soul there, then does that mean each star is another soul?” Desmond considered. It was an interesting thought, but Desmond didn’t see how that would help him out of his current predicament. So far, the only thing he could think of that might get him out was to use mana until he knocked himself unconscious. But there was still one thing he wanted to try before he resorted to that.