Somewhere amid the Ash Heaps

Yaltan Beruvoid, Outrider of Granath, Captain of the Dread Legions, and a proud member of the Elven race, was perplexed. He and a crack team of powerful soldiers had been dispatched ahead of the main bulk of the army to search for Jonathan Harlowe and his companion. Yaltan was one of the most powerful beings in this realm, just below the threshold where existence outside of Granath’s mana condensation field was untenable. Only three beings were more powerful than him in this world. Granath himself, the mysterious leader of the Crimson Sect, and the Grand Commander of the Dread Legions, a man by the name of Chakran. Nobody knew his last name, but everyone could recognize him just by his first name.

Because of his strength, Yaltan was perplexed that he was still yet to find his target. His skill set enabled him to track down almost anyone, but it was like there was a field of destructive energy erasing every trace of Jonathan’s presence. All that was left were a few footsteps here and there, and all days, or even weeks old. It was a uniquely frustrating experience for the man who normally knew no limits within this world. He was beginning to think that there was more to his quarry than met the eye. Some time later, he spotted something in the distance.

“Halt!” He barked out, raising one fist. The rotting remnants of a titanic monster lay in the path of his unit, with the wounds on it matching those left by Jonathan on other enemies. Yaltan smiled. He had a path to follow now.

In the cave

About a day later, the cave was far more homely than it had been before. Jonathan had gone off into the wastes to hunt down a few of the Ash Prowlers that roamed the area, and had returned with their skins and turned them into rudimentary blankets. Neither of the men really needed them, as their natural strength and durability was enough to insulate them from any of the natural problems caused by sitting on a hard cave floor.

However, half of the benefit of such a thing was psychological, and it provided a sense of comfort that helped to alleviate their situation. Although they had each other to banish the boredom, they were still living within a tiny cave, at least compared to the cities that most of the people of this realm lived in, with only blank cave walls for a distraction. That and gaining power of course, which made it all worth it.

Jonathan had been intermittently working on his fighting style, which, while it did not improve overmuch in the safety of the cave, still improved. As he progressed through the ranks, his knowledge of the pathway skill in question would have to grow more comprehensive. It would become harder and harder to rank up the skills, even for ones like mana manipulation which simply needed one to master a sufficiently advanced skill in that area. For something as ephemeral as a fighting style, who ever determined what was advanced or not? Was it efficacy? Was it power? Jonathan certainly did not know, but he still went through the motions nonetheless, seeking greater understanding.

Edgar did the same thing for his own skills, spurred on by the fact that Jonathan had achieved Journeyman Rank in the skill that he was supposed to specialize in before he could do so. Eventually he suspected that a breakthrough would come of its own accord, but that would never happen without him trying to achieve it.

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“How’s it going in there?” Edgar asked, shouting from the other room.

Jonathan paused his gyrations and wiped a single drop of sweat off of his brow. His armor stood in the corner of the room, next to his gauntlets. In order to reach a greater understanding of his body, it needed to be mostly unencumbered.

“Well enough.”

Jonathan meant it too. He was sinking into the mindset of a being with hundreds, or even thousands of years of life before him. Initially, it had filled him with a vague existential dread, but as his mind progressed, aided by his levels, he gradually grew to be able to exert great control over his emotions. He no longer grew bored any more to the same extent that he had used to, and the thought of immortality only brought him pleasure. He was a far cry from the man that he had once been.

Jonathan could not see Edgar, but he could tell that the man had nodded in response. At this point, his senses were acute enough to pick up on things that were happening in other rooms. The bulk of his sensory increase came about from his thresholds, but some of it came from leveling up as well, a small part to be frank, but still noticeable over dozens of levels. He could read the air currents to a small degree, at least if he was inside, where it was sheltered. It was a useful ability in battle, but one that there was no real way to train. It was more of an instinctive thing than anything else, and he did not have a corresponding skill for the ability.

Jonathan started back up on his training, moving through his various stances and attacks as he pranced around the small antechamber that had been made for this purpose. It was slow going, but it would eventually pay off.

After about another hour of this, Jonathan stopped, and went to training a different ability, his mana abilities. Using his Mana Rocket skills, he practiced siphoning off bits of his mana, using them as small projectiles. The attacks glanced off the walls, only dealing a minuscule amount of damage, but Jonathan could sense the potential that they contained. Because of the nature of the skill, he was unable to blend in his Void mana yet, seeing as the entire purpose of his skill was to use excess mana, unconnected to his element, but he knew that he could find a way eventually. Unused to projectile skills, he had to lean upon his monstrous Dexterity to aim the attacks, and even then it was quite strange to do so.

His fists felt like an extension of himself, and he had no trouble aiming them towards his enemies, but this was very different. He had to line up the attack with his target, and account for all sorts of things like movement in order to land the hit. At this point, he could have been hard pressed to strike a target more than a hundred feet away. It was not like throwing something, which was as easy as breathing for him with his high stats. He had been able to strike the glyphs back in the catacombs underneath the ruined city with perfect accuracy from hundreds of feet away with a rock, but this was different. He had to channel the mana through himself in a way that would allow it to come out in the right spot. Because of the way that skills worked within this world, there was no extra guidance beyond the means to use it. It could come out of his hand at any angle or towards any direction, if he did not concentrate, which would cause the skill to go wide.

Normally, it wasn't a problem, but in the thick of battle, it would be harder to monitor the way that he was using his mana. At this point, it hardly mattered, but if he ever managed to upgrade the skill, and was able to use it more, it would be very annoying to miss half of his attacks. However, Jonathan was not a man to give up, and with his superior stats rendering it unnecessary to eat, sleep or drink, he was able to devote all of his time to training.