My plan to upgrade my mana manipulation skill was pretty simple in concept. Ever since I had gained my mana conversion skill, I had used to to boost the power of just about every other spell in my arsenal. It was similar to my mana manipulation skill in that while it could be used directly in many ways, it really shined in supporting other skills and spells.

I wanted to take advantage of that fact. I used them both primarily as supportive skills, and that gave me high hopes for possibly combining the two of them. I had done something similar way back when I had combined mana shield and mana barrier into arcane fortification. This would be a bit different though. Instead of a mutual combination, my much more valuable mana manipulation skill would be cannibalizing mana conversion and integrating parts of it.

One of the reasons that I wanted to do this was due to the time investment it would take to upgrade the skill any other way. Sure I could probably practice controlling my mana until it upgraded to a higher rarity, but that would take far longer and would only work to lessen the time I had to complete the champion floors. Now that I was actively working towards that goal, my 180 days within the tutorial turned from a generous time limit into a rapidly approaching deadline.

Mana conversion itself is only at epic rarity at the moment, and the first step to having this combination properly work is going to be upgrading that to special rarity. It has yet to be upgraded since I obtained it, mostly because I have absolutely no idea how to upgrade it. I still don’t. That means that the time to experiment with it has come.

I’ve already spent a good amount of time messing around with the skill and testing some of its limits, of which there really aren’t that many. I can turn my mana into kinetic energy, light energy, concussive energy, and just about every other kind of energy I can think of. One of the few that I can’t really recreate is magnetic energy. I can make a decent electrical current required to make an electro-magnet, but if I want to make one I need some kind of medium to push that electricity through in a coil. I tried using a coil made from my mana, but that unfortunately hadn’t worked.

I’d considered getting some kind of metal wires wrapped around the fingers of my gloves to use as magnets, but I have yet to be in a scenario where I think that would truly be useful. Overall it just didn’t seem worth the time and effort.

Another limitation of the skill is that I can’t go back and forth on the conversion. Once my mana is converted to something else, I can’t get it back or convert it to a different kind of energy. That is the limitation that I would most like to get rid of. Hell, perhaps I could even find a way to soak up energy to restore a bit of my mana. I could be my own thermal generator if I ever wound up fighting a dragon in a volcano or something along those lines.

So, that is exactly what I start to work on. I head to the 13th floor to practice, as being completely surrounded by water would provide some minor assistance in keeping my mana from dissipating into the environment.

I start by simply converting some of my mana into heat energy, boiling the water just outside of my mana barrier. I had chosen this specific kind of energy due to the fact that it stuck around longer than most others. Kinetic energy was gone the second an object stopped moving, and keeping up with light was a tad unrealistic.

I keep doing this for a while, boiling the water around me to try and really feel the heat. I needed to be able to sense it in a manner similar to my mana if I wanted to be able to convert it back. After what felt like hours of doing this, I started to feel some of the energy. At first I almost thought it was in my head. It was such a faint feeling that I nearly chalked it up to boredom. A bit longer though and I was confident that I had a feel for the energy.

It took even longer to really be able to sense it properly. Knowing it was there and really understanding that it had a presence were two different things. Now I could faintly feel the way it moved as it spread out evenly through the water.

I begin working from there to convert the energy back into mana. After an hour of absolutely zero progress I take a break and grab a meal at the great city. With the speed I can travel at now it is not a very long trip, and only two hours later I return to the water to continue working on the skill.

It takes a while.

Okay, that is a bit of an understatement. It takes a lot of time. I didn’t even get my first drop of mana back until about 3 hours into the process. Obviously that wasn’t going to be enough to warrant a skill upgrade, so I took the win and worked to improve the efficiency.

After nearly an entire day I manage to get the skill to the point of upgrading it. I’m glad that it is enough, because I felt like I’d hit a wall in terms of efficiency. No matter how hard I tried I struggled to recover more than 20% of the spent mana. Thankfully that was enough to break through to special rarity, because I did not want to spend the time to break through that threshold.

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Mana conversion (Epic) has been upgraded to Energetic Conversion (Special)

Energetic Conversion (Special)

Using your will and skill, convert mana into various forms of energy, and convert said energy back into mana. Efficiency of this conversion is determined by your mind stat and your proficiency with this skill.

Now that I have that done I can start the next step of the process, actually combining the two skills. Last time it had been as simple as trying to use mana shield and mana barrier at the same time, but I had a feeling it wouldn’t be as simple this time.

I couldn’t have been more right about that.

Hours later I was hyping myself up as my mana was almost done regenerating. Each attempt at this was quite costly. It used nearly my entire mana pool each time I wanted to do it. I’d left the 13th floor in favor of doing this particular step of the process back in Talus’ domain. He could give me a few pointers where needed, but really I just didn’t want to risk anybody intruding on my practice and getting hurt. As far as I knew only I could enter this place, and Talus was in no danger of being accidentally injured by somebody so much weaker than himself.

My dimensional anchor was sunk into the ground nearby, which had helped quite a bit with these attempts so far.

“I think this is the one.” I say to Talus once my mana fully regenerates.

“You’ve said that a few times now.” He responds, though he doesn’t sound like he doubts my words. “Just be prepared to evolve as soon as you upgrade the skill, as I am quite sure it will be enough of an accomplishment to grant you the two levels you need.”

“Hopefully it is. Otherwise I am going to have to go kill a few monsters and probably evolve in the middle of a floor.”

I take a deep breath and begin the exercise I’d been doing to try and merge the skills. I needed to integrate the skills with one another, which meant using them simultaneously as if they were already one in the same. To accomplish that, I was making elaborate patterns with my mana and moving it all around at once. Parts of the pattern were made up of beams of light that stretched for small sections, being converted back into mana after a few meters of travel.

Converting light wasn’t as nearly easy as converting heat, and had taken a lot more practice to figure out. Even then, I didn’t get even close to the same kind of efficiency when converting from light back to mana. I didn’t even get 10% of the initial investment back.

I did get some back though, which meant that I could essentially make my mana move almost instantly anywhere as long as I was willing to sacrifice the extra mana. That sounded like it could have great applications in combat, but it would mean that every single spell I cast would be about ten times more expensive. I could already accomplish the same thing with my trait and at a lower mana cost.

The point of this exercise wasn’t about practicality though, it was about using my mana in a unique way that heavily relied on both of the skills I wanted to merge.

Each section where the mana converted to light and then back to mana was a spot where 90% of the mana would be lost. That is what made this particular use of my mana so expensive. It was inefficient as hell.

With one last burst of mana, each section shines brightly for a second before a blast of mana erupts forward. The radius of the blast is about 10 meters in every direction except for the one towards me, and the air shudders from the force as the boom of the explosion reaches my ears.

The pattern of mana quickly falls apart and my reserves are instantly emptied. I feel light headed and sit down, avoiding reading my notifications quite yet. If I had just gained the levels necessary to level up, I knew that until I read the notification informing me of that fact that my evolution wouldn’t actually begin.

Almost instinctivley, I knew that my plan had finally worked. I don’t know how exactly I knew, but I just had a feeling that the two skills had turned into one. Maybe it was the presence of another legendary skill in my arsenal that made it easy to feel. When my aura manipulation skill had been upgraded to legendary rarity it had left a feeling of power in my very being, a feeling that I once more felt.

“I did it.” I say, smiling and giving Talus a thumbs up.

“Congratulations.” The god nods. “Now I suggest you get on with your evolution. No point in wasting any time.”

“I guess that’s true. I’ll just read over the skill description first, then get it over with.”

I check my notifications, confirming that the skills had successfully merged.

Mana Conversion (Special) and Omni-Mana Manipulation (Special) have merged to become Omni-Energetic Mana Manipulation (Legendary)

Omni-Energetic Mana Manipulation (Legendary)

Manipulate the mana within your body and aura to perform various tasks. Provides an increase to mana control within your aura. Allows you to convert all aligned mana into various forms of energy and convert all aligned energy back into mana. Efficiency of conversions is determined by proficiency with this skill and your mind stat. Increases the effect of your mind stat while manipulating your mana. Slightly increases the size and potency of your aura.

You are now level 99

You are now level 100

Prepare for evolution...

And just like that, as has happened two times before, I am dragged into the deepest parts of my soul to undergo some major upgrades in power. Unlike the past two times it has happened, I am greeted by a notification before ever fully entering the liminal space.

You have met the requirements for 3 new races.