A huge, only about 2 typical floors high building but widely spread on the ground and taking in a huge amount of space. Surrounded by a long to the ground trampled wire fence, footprints of beings that I would bet my left testicle on were not human. Surrounded by abandoned fork-lift trucks.

From afar large bodies of mighty creatures were easily distinguished, more than the reports stated. We did not even know what was going inside the long opened warehouse and how many more of them could be waiting for us in there.

Ogres and Trolls, two kinds of creatures that resided in two opposite sides of the huge building and somehow coexisted together without bashing each others skulls in.

Large, barely a human head smaller than an average ogre, the hairy white giants all held weapons in their hands. Where they lived, a thin layer of ice surrounded their home which signaled me their use of magic. Of the top of my head I can also guess their insane regeneration abilities, strength that is only inferior to Ogres. Their levels in the thirties, their raw attributes far superior to mine and everyone here. Overall, a dangerous enemy I would not dare to underestimate.

We decided to lay down in a building nearby while some of ours scouted better and properly, maybe even formulated a plan for us to follow. Maybe I was qualified for such a task, but people did not want to give me a serious task with my lower level and treated me as a tag along.

As for what I was doing right now? I thought it was a good time to try that out which Olga told me to do to improve my powers, training.

I closed my eyes and sat down in a for me comfortable position. There I concentrated on my aura and started to shift the amounts in which I coated specific body parts as fast as possible while also trying to maintain as much aura on my body as it was possible.

Shortly after my whole body started to sweat like I had to run a marathon. Beth asked me if something was wrong, worried obviously but I only told her I was training.

If at the beginning of my journey it felt like my soul could provide nigh endless amounts of raw energy for me to use in theory and only my body limited me as to how much of it I could actually use, a fraction so small that I could barely even express it in a number, then now I progressed quite a bit. It was still a number unbelievably tiny, but it was still something. A feeling of me progressing thousands of kilometers when I needed to walk the distance to the sun.

Its both good and sucks. If you see how far you could possibly come and imagine what heights you might possibly reach, but also know how long that road will be for you. I can not even imagine how many years, centuries I would need to reach even half of it with that speed.

There ought to be something that I am still missing. This right here can not just be it.

Hours passed and my body was still surrounded by my aura, not much progress was being made with just one sitting like this, but I did feel some improvements. Obviously I did not previously take the time to actually in a quiet environment to look carefully into it, which makes me look like a big fat fucking retard now that I think about it. Like a muscle that I only recently discovered, it was still mostly awkward and not very precise, but I was on the right way.

* * * * *

While Andrew was surrounded by his own aura like a thin layer of energy, Gem sat across him and too meditated on his own. Everyone else left to close their eyes inside a comfortable bed or wanted to have some peace of their own. His eyes closed, he was concentrated on gathering the energy of heaven and earth and guiding it trough his body, trough his meridians and in a pure form into his dantian. He was 70% trough finishing the second realm and enter the next one, that would once more strengthen his physical body and make him even scarier with a speed that most humans deemed scary upon comparing with their own.

By comparison, Padre who is still in the body of a human, a super human by standards of only a month ago but a human nonetheless and had no kinds of advantages from a superior race, even forced to stop his advancement as his level was stuck at 20, yet he still had a superior body if they both were to be compared.

Gem might be a higher level, but because Padre had already long started cultivating the bones and to a smaller degree his body as a whole, his physical body was superior in many aspects just because of that.

In theory if he was able to cultivate to the highest realm with Qi alone, then he would still be a fearsome opponent even with his limited level. Of course this was theory only and not all of them are truthful.

Time passed and the already bored of his own meditation, with an attention span of a slightly more intelligent gold fish, Gem was walking around the room and waiting for anything fun to happen.

At some point, Gem looked towards Andrew and a dangerous glint went trough his eyes. He walked few meters n front of Andrew and waved his hands around to try and see how deep Andrew was sunken in his meditation.

His hands went trough many different motions, one middle finger was stretched out and one hand was shaken right in front of his own groin, followed by a motion that would imply something spurting out. To his childish amusement and satisfaction he got his most desired result: nothing.

With a devilish grin his eyes scanned trough the random room they chose to be in for now and he found a coin lying on a table.

Quickly he went for it and readied himself.

“Am I a bad friend?” His hand that was about to throw that same coin with a power he was not so sure would not damage his friend at least to a small degree went down. “Nah!” Once more he raised said hand and threw the coin from a distance of about 5 meters at his friend, aiming it at in the space in between his eyes.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

With a whistle that signaled the sound barrier was broken with ease, the coin flew in a straight line.

Before Gem could even begin to regret his action, something happened that he would not have expected.

* * * * *

My eyes opened, I stared somewhat confused at Gem not far away from me. With round eyes and an open mouth, he stared at me.

A coin caught in between my fingers and only 4 millimeters away from the skin on my forehead, I did not know what to think.

“You fucking!” I called out in anger but quickly changed my attention to the coin. “Did I just...” Once again I wanted to strangle the man before me. “You piece of shit, why would you even?” My hand went down and I once more looked at the coin and that which went down in far less than a second played itself once more in my head. “Holy!”

Immersed in my training and wholly concentrating on my aura, out of nowhere I felt a foreign object enter my aura. Having already experienced something similar, I was at least aware to some degree of such a functionality, but had not yet experimented with it.

Instantly my mind reacted accordingly and the perception of time slowed to its absolute maximum and my hand also semi automatically reached out for it, then I opened my eyes and well.

Gem started clapping with his hands furiously. “Daaamn! Impressive, how did you did that?”

“You!” Annoyed and baffled I called out to him. “Why are you even throwing shit at me, you...” I could not even come with an insult for how angry I was at him.

Nonchalant and almost disinterested, with a finger inside of his nose he answered. “Dunno, was bored.”

I flipped him of and once more thought about what even happened. Within my aura, I can feel everything that is happening. Strangely my brain does not feel overwhelmed by the flood of information that storms its way when I do so and it is also. I do not have much control over it and most likely block unnecessary things out, but I can feel that which can be dangerous.

I could use that in battle, like an all seeing eye, three additional heads on my shoulders that can look in all directions. This could be something that could be essential for my survival, the lack of a blind spot and the ability to protect my own back.

My aura, its range is still small which still limits that ability greatly, but I can imagine in the future this will not be the case.

“Was that a special skill?” Gem asked me curiously. “Now that I think about it, I did not really ask you, but what skills and techniques do you have?”

“Skills?” I thought about it and a blue screen popped up before me.

Identify.

Gather information from living beings and objects by observing them and gather new information depending on your understanding.

Blade mastery intermediate 1

12% more damage

Identify does not have any levels or anything, does that mean this skill is already complete? For that it is still far to... normal. It barely offered me a few advantages, but that's about it. I wonder if there is something else to it.

“Well, I got my identify, which is similar to your observe and my blade mastery passive.”

“Yes and what else?” He asked me, totally expecting it only to be the beginning.

“No.. that's it.”

“Wow, that sucks. I spent over 10 gold on all kinds of skillbooks back in the prison, got 6 of then fuckers. Some passive, many techniques for active use. They are really cool actually. Like the one where I have to gather my Qi and prepare a strong attack for few seconds that should really get things done.

They can even level up and all. Well, it is mostly a representation of how good I am with it and not a power up in that kind of sense, but its still cool.

By the way, did you know that I even have a special tab in my status that shows which Qi realm I am and all? This is something only you yourself can see, but I was told that later on we would be able to feel the QI or mana inside one another to feel ones power.”

I could not believe it. Once more the system fucks me over. It often feels like I have one different system of my own. One that hates my guts and wants me to suffer.

Fuck you system.

I thought back on my very first day here. The way I had to identify the zombie to get further information. More than I could get in any other form actually. Now that I think about it, I never bothered to identify a human. A living one directly.

From my knowledge, the dantian is in the area under the navel, the place where Qi is gathered and the most important part of the body for a cultivator. Once destroyed, the consequences could be fatal.

“Gem, are you homophobic?” I asked seriously.

“No, why are you asking so suspiciously? Look man, you are cool and all, but..”

“Ahh, shut up. I just need to do something which involves physical contact and it would be great if you would not call me a faggot because of that. We are just two dudes and I need to touch your belly. Nothing wrong with that, right?”

Wordlessly we agreed to that and I was allowed to test that out which I had in mind.

Like that time I got the skill, I used my aura to scan the place called his dantian. It was a spherical room, very small and filled with an odd energy. Odd because it had qualities that I could not understand. I could not even compare it to my aura, it was a harmonious energy that seemed to belong to nature itself, yet also had traces of something dark in it. That darkness being something that I had already came in contact with. 

Along with that, my far more powerful aura than previously also scanned his whole body just because.

Only his soul was not touched by me as I had some qualms about that after that which happened last time. It was not a fear like in PTSD, nothing irrational, I just.. let's say: wanted to test it out on people that I would not be afraid to harm.

Jeremy Huen lvl 21 Demi Titan

Class: Juggernaut

Realm: Qi Foundation establishment

Title: Mad

Not someone you would like as your enemy.

A half human half titan hybrid, first of its kind. In excellent physical condition, growth centered around raw physical strength and vitality. Shows clear traces of [Corruption] within him, dormant.

Warning! Lifeforms danger level: Black. Extermination upon sight.

Well, maybe the skill does have some uses.

This is a lot of information to take in.

“So, did it work?”

Startled, I looked back at him. With an awkward smile, he looked down to me. “Yes.” Should I tell him? What exactly should I tell him? I myself am not even sure of what I just got to know.

Before he could ask me what it was about, we were called by the others. Apparently they were done and we would go out there.

Well, this will have to wait.

AN: For those confused, Identification has two parts. First is normal observation that gives general data like level and nonspecific information.

Second, Identification can identify that for which you are searching for and of which you have at least some understanding of.

Kind of like that. In short, it is a convenient tool when I need it to be.