As the monster died, Jonathan began to see just what this meant for him. Granath himself would have been almost impossible to evade for any meaningful amount of time, but the weaker fighters that the worm would be forced to send after Jonathan and Edgar would be easier to deal with. They would likely still be too powerful to defeat, but at least they would be possible to run from. If Granath had been able to leave his palace, he would have been able to catch up to them in a matter of seconds with his incredible speed. The worm was too physically, let alone magically, powerful for them to deal with in their current state, and any fight against him in any sort of serious capacity would quickly end in their deaths.
Jonathan would be able to hold his own for a few seconds if he pulled out all the stops in terms of his abilities, but he would simply die as soon as they wore off, either from Granath himself, or from their aftereffects. It was a bleak state of affairs, but as Jonathan finished off the monsters, he saw that he was working as hard as he could to rectify them. There was nothing else that he could do except train and get stronger. When the fateful day came when he would have to fight Granath then he would be as ready as he could be, ready to liberate this land. Although he was not a man who would consider himself a hero, he knew that his tendencies sometimes blended with that of a hero. He was not one of those edgy fictional characters who refused to acknowledge the fact that they were heroic in nature. He did not feel dismayed at the thought of being seen in such a way. However, it was not really who he was. Power motivated him more than justice or saving people, but usually in this world, those things came hand in hand.
Of course, he could get the same amount of, or perhaps more, power by killing the people that he tried to save, but at least he knew that was just pure evil.
As he left the corpses behind him, he began to sense the beginning of a breakthrough in his Mana Rocket skill. As Edgar headed back up towards the cave, Jonathan closed his eyes and began to feel for his mana core, and its connection to his Void energy. Although they were seemingly intertwined, they were still separated slightly in reality, and as he peered into their depths, he realized that he could use the Void energy to subtly taint his mana even more than normal, in order to create a small layer of foreign mana that he could skim off and use for his skill. The next time he cast his Mana Rocket skill, it was purple, and when it hit the ground, it left a sizable crater. Jonathan smiled as the notifications poured in. Now he had a solid base to work from.
Elemental Mastery has reached 8 percent!
After that was a skill notification, which Jonathan quickly opened.
You have upgraded one of your skills!
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Mana Rocket:Rare->Void Rocket;Epic
In using your Void energy to accentuate your mana, you have learned to peel off part of your mana pool and send it outwards, creating a powerful projectile attack. The destructive energy of the Void imbues this skill with power beyond the norm, allowing you, a melee fighter, to create powerful ranged attacks, on par with most average mages at or around your level. As this skill is upgraded, it will grow even more powerful.
Jonathan closed the notification and smiled, racing back up the mountain. He had done it. This skill would be actually useful in a battle. From the damage that it had dealt, it seemed to possess a power beyond its level. Eventually, it would grow into something terrifying, but he was content for now. With this new tool under his arsenal, it was time to level up some more.
He was a scant few levels away from Tier 2 now, and while he did not know what happened when someone reached that vaunted level, it was something that he needed to do in order to continue on his path. With a few more powerful monster kills, he would be able to reach it eventually.
The next week went by with a blend of training and hunting lower level monsters. Jonathan only gained a single level for his trouble from the weaker monsters, but he gained more than a few skill levels. All of them improved by at least one point, with Runecrafting increasing by 2 as a result of him upgrading the defenses around the cave. They had been tested for the first time during that week, and had performed admirably.
A few Fetid Oozes had somehow made their way up the rock and had blundered into the first ring of runes, which had cooked them alive. Those that had survived had been reduced to shriveled piles of desiccated flesh by the Rune of Consumption. Apparently that was what happened when the rune’s mana draw was greater than the amount of mana available within a being.
By the end of the week, Jonathan found himself hungering for more. He wanted to level up faster, the consequences of that be damned. Eventually, he grew so tired of simply waiting for a monster to come to him that he decided to go and find one for himself.
“This is starting to get annoying,” Jonathan said as he stormed out of the training chamber.
"What is?” Edgar replied, not opening his eyes from his meditation.
“Not getting anywhere with my power! I have leveled up less in the last week than any time before this. It’s time for things to change, I think.”
“So you wish to go and fight a monster rather than letting it come to us? Is that what you mean?”
Jonathan nodded in response.
“Are you up for that? If you still wish to train, I can always go alone.”
“No, I will come with you. Although I am used to long periods with a dearth of power growth, it does not mean that I enjoy them. Tier 2 is still beckoning strongly to me, and I am eager to find out what power it entails.”
A few minutes later, the two men were striding out into the ash, having left the cave far behind them. Even from here, the faintly glowing runes were visible, marking the space as a place not to be trifled with. Hopefully it would safeguard their abode, although there were no valuables left within the cave in any case. In any case, there was no reason that any monsters would be interested in the cave. No, it was the people that Jonathan was wary about.