I engage Sneaking and approach the stairs cautiously. The way up is positioned right by the entrance I've been using. It's built in a U shape; going up one way to a small corridor then going the rest of the way up in the other direction.
The stairs feel empty to my Mana Sense. So, I slowly make my way up, conjuring my swarm armor and the usual pair of Magico Disks along the way. The second floor is separated into four rooms, including the entrance room in the middle, which is where the stairs exit, and is where I am at now. This room has a cashier table and leads to three other rooms, one right by the stairs to the left that holds stationery. The other two are on the right, one right past the cashier, while the last room is through a small hallway, its door facing towards the cashier.
The whiff of foreign mana I felt earlier emanates from the biggest room which is the first one on the right, it holds a wide variety of things for sale, like clothing, kitchen gadgets and kids toys. Looking in from outside the door, this room has several windows running along its left wall, most of them covered by plastic curtains, then a small aisle followed by rows of clothing racks and glass displays. Another aisle runs down the middle, positioned just straight from the door. Then rows and rows of shelves, another aisle, and finally more rack lining the right wall. None of the lightbulbs are turned on, this creates shadows deeper inside due to the tall shelves.
I cautiously approach the door. Guessing from memory, the room is maybe ten by twenty meters, if I remember right. While the mana source seems to be coming from the corner deeper inside, among the dark shadows between the shelves. Looking at the shadows gives me an eerie feeling, like something is looking at me from within… Please no ghosts, I have half a thought to turn back now, but the other half has thoughts of getting more experience and that gave me the bravery to stay.
Light! A tennis ball sized sphere of light manifests above the palm of my left hand. Not all that bright compared to modern led and very much immoble, staying afloat right there in the air, shining light for about five meters. I did a quick Inspect on the spell, noting that using more mana will increase luminosity. But this spell kinda sucks doesn't it, at least have the sphere follow its caster or something!
Turning my attention back to the shadows, I think I see them flicker with distaste, my brain making guesses from the way it shifts between various shades of black. Is that real or my imagination?
Keeping an eye out for anything suspicious, I once again cast Light, but with plans to do better this time. Unlike earlier where my connection with the sphere of light ended after it manifested. I gently maintained the connection and invested more mana into the spell. By the time about four times the cost of the spell has been added, the light shines out for about ten meters. I then used a little bit more mana to push it forward, but kept it under control and managed to draw it back into my pool. The released light flies forward and hits the ceiling above the middle aisle, right where the rows of shelves start. 25 mana for maybe ten meters of light, and I can only do this about thirteen more times, have I mentioned the spell sucks.
** DING **
I decided to spend around 200 mana to light up the place as best as I can, leaving the rest for offensive spells. I was on my third cast when it occurred to me that I could just spend ten mana instead, but shoot the light at both the floor and the ceiling, this uses up twenty mana instead of twentyfive. I figured out that it's because the light's increased intensity from extra mana seems to lose efficiency as more mana is used, because the area that needs to be covered grows exponentially.
So I had three of the ten-ish meter lights and twelve of the seven-ish meter lights.
These lights are lined up every five meters along the middle aisle and at the areas above the shelves and closer to the door.
This left the right wall shelves and an aisle still shrouded in shadows, which is an area of maybe, two by seven meter, that is still covered by shadows. Which has got to have a touch of magic. I also noted that the light bulbs, it turns out, were broken, not turned off.
After lighting up the area, I decided to unwind for a moment and quickly check my updates… 'Updates'.
** DING **
Skill level up, Mana Sense 4 > 5
Skill level up, Sneaking 4 > 5
Spell mastery rank up, Light Basic > Intermediate
Those skills are pretty slow to level, maybe I need to use them more often. It does feel as if Mana Sense is getting easier to leave on for extended periods of time with each level up. While sneaking a giving me a better feel of where and why a place is good to peek from, or to hide from, sometimes where something seems a little off and needs observation, and various other things that assists the act.
As for the spell masteries, the free Info pack is telling me that it goes from Early > Basic > Intermediate > Advanced > Peak. Each mastery is about understanding and discovering more of the spell and its function, learning about how the mana does and may be guided to do what they need to do. Even knowing what the spells are supposed to be capable of doesn't make it easy, as you need to understand how it achieves that, sometimes to even know why it could. Though spells never really feel all that complicated for me, I sometimes get this feeling that a spell is supposed to do this, or I need to guide it as such. Though, once in a while I prefer to brute force the solution with my trait.
While half my mind ponders the newest update, the other half keeps an eye on the shadows. Kinda like how you can play your phone and watch TV both at the same time. So, the part of my mind keeping watch saw the shadows shift a slight bit, beyond level nine thousand on the eerie scale. But, once again nothing happened. It's like the moment my attention focuses on whatever is in there, they instinctively hide away. Reminds me of insects… well shit!
The Light spell only has an effective time of several undetermined minutes, which means I can't afford to delay much longer. Casting an unempowered Light spell, I shoot it right into the middle of the shadows. The sphere flies true, and as it lights up more than half of the remaining shadows, I can see a lot of small elongated egg-shaped blobs of glossy dark… creatures? Are those chitins?
Very slowly, it dawned on me as the blobs started twitching, and I caught notice of antennas. All these insects, because they are insects, suddenly scattered away in all directions, some scurrying further into what remains of the shadows, the rest running in various directions. Which sadly also means that some, just a minor few really, decided to freaking run straight at me!
I've never regretted my choiced as much as I did at this moment, finding the place infested by the undead might've been the better option here. Still the roaches, uncaring about how I felt, are rapidly closing in.
"UAARGHH!!
BURN! I instantly gather about 80% of the mana I have left and send them out in the shape of a cone. Burn those roaches, latch on to them, slay each and every single one of them, fast! Eat their mana as fuel and grow.
If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
While they live, so too will you BURN!
** DING **
I watch four of the cockroaches that are running towards me turn to ashes, the last one safe on account of being further away, and that too, only temporarily. The flames are a darker color, mostly flickering with licks of gray and black and the occasional shades of orange. After the initial cone of fire, the flames took on the forms of two different tiny flaming creatures, each about the size of a tennis ball. Some of them run along the floor in the form of charcoal furred panthers, while the air is dominated by a swarm of flame feathered ravens.
They would seep into a cockroach, and the roach would dry up and turn into ashes after a while, leaving behind more of the tiny creature. Sometimes I would see more than one of the fiery animals seep into a cockroach, turning it into ashes even faster. The herd of panthers and flock of ravens scattered around the room, preying on all the disgusting insects.
Calmer now that they're no longer running at me, I managed to inspect a few of them. Making use of the opportunity to train an important skill.
** DING **
AbyssRoach lv 8
ShadowRoach lv 5
ShadowRoach lv 5
DarkRoach lv 6
ShadowRoach lv 5
.
.
.
DarkRoach lv 6
ShadowRoach lv 5
Unlike my earlier guess of them all being the same creature, they turn out to be three different roaches. Abyss, shadow and dark is it, feels like there's a theme going on.
Time flies by as I ponder the difference between the three, observe how the spell affects the enemies, how the spell conjures moving animals, as well as Inspect any creature, magical or mutated, that got within reach. Soon enough Mana Sense confirms that all the roaches are dead, which is when the ravens and panthers dissolve into a large amount of ambient mana, leaving behind a room covered in ashes and a thick mist of mana. What a waste, so much mana.
Guess there are no cores left behind. This new spell may be powerful but it sure comes at a cost. The last monster core I got was given to Henry, at his request, for research purposes he said. I gave it to him, even though I know that they are multiversally on demand, the system buys rank one monster cores, which means cores of any monsters below level twenty for the monster's level multiplied, again, by its level. I can always get more cores.
Knowing the room is clear, for now. I move around and loot items like clothes, kids toys, kitchen knives and various tools that might be useful for the territory, nearly filling up my repository. Would need to drop these off before I actually go. I also can't help noticing that most of the items would slightly break into dust upon being touched, like they've been here for half a hundred years instead of five days.
Done with the second floor, I make my way downstairs and continue filling up my repository with various foodstuffs, might as well fill it up since I'll be dropping things off at the Hospital anyways.
Checking the time on my phone, there are still a few hours till noon. Soon enough, the items are all unceremoniously given to the hospital and I'm now once again sitting on the security post to take care of the new spell before heading back out. 'Updates please'.
**DING **
Slayed ShadowRoach lv 5
5 syscred and 50 exp awarded
Slayed ShadowRoach lv 6
5 syscred and 50 exp awarded
Slayed DarkRoach lv 6
6 syscred and 72 exp awarded
.
.
Slayed AbbysRoach lv 8
8 syscred and 128 exp awarded
I stopped looking and internally requested the system to please summarize the kills instead. The blue system box flickers for a nanosecond before showing new results.
** DING **
Combat summary
Enemies slain:
ShadowRoach lv 5 x 11
DarkRoach lv 6 x 7
AbbysRoach lv 8 x 2
113 syscred and 1,310 exp awarded
Congratulations. You have created a new Novice rank spell. As its creator, the spell will grow with you as your understanding of it grows.
Please name the spell…
Skill level up, Inspect 7 > 8
'Will-o'-Woe...'
For it acts upon our will to bring Woe onto our foes... I snapped out of a slight daze, not quite remembering how I came up with that name. Though I got to say that is quite a fitting name for a spell I made to cremate every single targeted enemy in an area.
Would you like to make Will-o'-Woe available on the CredStore?
'No.'
Wasn't Thinking quite right when I stumbled into making the spell, I would need to experiment on it first before making it accessible to everyone in the multiverse.
Spell logged
'Thanks.'
With that done and only needing less than 200 exp to reach level three. I finally make my way along the road opposite of where Henry and his team went. The usual combination of Sneaking and Mana Sense is actively giving me hints of how to move and awareness of the various fluctuations of mana.
The road and buildings around it are empty of any creatures. Though there are signs of dried blood and the occasional bone or two from a small creature, probably rats. Curious and rather suspicious. Unpopulated areas closer to the hospital, I can understand as they are actively hunting any creatures that come close. But, even after traveling upwards of 200 meters?
Soon enough. I see a familiar four way crossroad from my spot near a fence covered in overgrowth. From frequent use of a map app back during the normal days, I can remember the side I'm approaching from to be east. The north and south road has a flyover running down its middle, and as most flyovers do, both directions also have a U-turn, not to mention all four roads each have their own traffic lights.
Observable from where I am, the flyover itself has completely collapsed into ruins, only leaving behind several concrete pillars still standing. Obvious to anyone looking at the scene, the debris are definitely too small in size, mostly only slightly larger than a motorbike, some of them even seem to have been hammered into pebble sized debris. Most metal bars that broke are also snapped off rather than merely getting bent.
Shouldn't there be bigger pieces? Are they weaker?
"Me hunger"
"Hunger eat!"
"No food"
"Hyahyahya"
"No food, go hunt!!"
At the first sound of a conversation. I instinctively hide deeper, while slowly looking around to locate its source. The voices are quite further away from where I am, judging by how faint they are, the only reason I can hear them might be on account of how loud they are, and how silent the world currently is.
I had to cautiously maneuver by hiding behind abandoned cars and broken walls into a nearby random building made out of concrete and peek out its second floor window before spotting three Goblins, definitely too far for Mana Sense. They are sitting in a small clearing among the concrete ruins, around a campfire of sorts at the north U-turn. It was also hard to miss how one of the bigger pillars seems to have been dug to create a small shallow cave.
'Inspect.' X3
** DING **
Goblin lv 6
Goblin lv 5
Goblin lg 6
Ohh~, Goblins… That can't be all of them right.