Proud of his creation, he put it in his Ring and sat down beside the fire to begin to mediate. He was happy with his progress, but the [Bone Creation] Spell was quite costly. But it had leveled up twice with its use.

[Bone Crafting

Level 3: 42%

Ability to mold bone as if clay

Mana Cost: 8/min]

When Alaster's mana had recovered, he began to experiment with his mana. As was expected for any mage, trying to use mana outside of casting a Spell, proved to be unwieldy. Alaster's mana fought against him, trying to get out. For a Novice Mage, Alaster did well in keeping it under control, but he wasn't perfect.

Anytime, a strand of his mana got loose, it would either shoot out like a small [Necrotic Bolt] and either crash into snow, sending it flying, or dissipate harmlessly against a tree. Or the mana would seem to ooze out like tree sap, slowly dissipating when it touched anything. Alaster was not quite sure what the second one did.

Alaster continued to try to manipulate his mana into different forms and shapes, and after roughly an hour, and two meditation sessions, he got the ability he wanted.

[Ability Learned: Mana Manipulation

Level 1: 0%

Control better, what builds and destroys]

'Wow, how descriptive.'

One of the most common complaints about the system, for everyone, was that its descriptions were very weak.

Now that he had [Mana Manipulation], he could create spells of his own. Doing so was extremely difficult as you had to force your mana to do a specific thing multiple times, until it recognized it as a spell. Like muscle memory.

Alaster wondered what spell he should create first.

The young man's mana seemed to naturally target living tissue, so it would be easier to create a spell that used that aspect.

'What about the Bugbear hide? I need to scrape off all the remaining skin and fat from the underside. What if I just melted it off?'

Grinning to himself, Alaster took out the hide, noting that it was much easier after learning how to manipulate mana. Though it still was not instant.

'Lets start small.'

As much as it pained him, Alaster grabbed the hatchet and cut off a small portion. He was somewhat mollified by the sheer size of the hide.

Alaster set the small part down flat in the snow, and raised his finger. Breathing deeply, he focused his mana into his finger. He could feel the mana oozing around his finger, but could not see it. Tentatively, Alaster brushed his finger against the skin side of the hide. It only touched for a moment, but it instantly melted a small finger sized hole in the hide.

Growling in irritation, he lowered the concentration of mana, something that proved much more difficult than he thought it would, and tried again.

It once again burned a hole, but a much smaller hole, and much slower.

'Progress, I guess.'

Slowly, Alaster managed to find the perfect amount of mana to use. Once he did, he grew confident enough to use his entire hand, or more specifically, his palm. If he had to use a single finger to melt off all the fat from the hide, it would take days.

Alaster cut off another small portion to experiment with. There were a few failed attempts, but Alaster had already gotten a feeling for it and was soon able to get it right. Once it did, Alaster received a notification from his Class.

[Spell Learned: Death Touch]

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[Death Touch

Level 1: 0%

Imbue your body with Necrotic Mana

Mana Cost: 5/sec]

The moment he learned the spell, the mana cost of his practice increased, but so did his ability to control it. In his mind, he could see melting the hand of whoever attacked him. Alaster knew he could, if his INT was high enough to combat their CON and any possible enchantments they had. But he also knew that he could now easily prepare the rest of the Bugbear Hide.

Alaster stretched the hide across the snow, furry side down. After recovering all his mana, Alaster cast [Death Touch] and got to work. Despite using his entire hand, it was slow work. He was forced to stop and meditate three times.

As it was, his [Meditation] ability was leveling quite nicely.

[Mediation

Level 4: 5%

Clearing the Mind to see what is concealed

Mana Regeneration increased to 8/min during use]

It was currently his highest level ability or spell.

'Wonder what will happen when it reaches level five.'

Alaster was just finishing the Hide when the sun began to set. Smiling to himself, he took out the shelter parts and set them up. He was a bit unhappy that he hadn't spotted another animal to skin and use as the curtain over the doorway, but he decided to simply close the door after entering, leaving only a small part open to allow in air.

Once it was set up, Alaster noticed that he had not built a fire place, or a chimney to get the smoke out. Using some more bones pulled from his Ring, he soon remedied this.

The fireplace was fashioned as a bowl. Alaster thought doing it like that would allow the wood to fall to stay in the middle as the wood already in the middle began to burn to ash. Then, as a chimney, Alaster simply fashioned a funnel that would sit a little above the bowl. The funnel was the same size as the fire bowl, allowing it to catch the majority of the smoke. The funnel turned into a five centimeter wide pipe that was fused with the ceiling, allowing the smoke to exit the shelter.

Once finished, it was turning dark, but Alaster was extremely proud of himself. There was a certain joy to be had about creating something yourself.

Alaster ordered Gobi to carry sticks into the shelter. He had to supply a mental image of how and where after the Skeleton just dropped the sticks into a pile. As Gobi was doing that, Alaster piled snow against the sides of the shelter. Both to further insulate it, and to conceal it. In the end, it still stuck out, but the edges weren't as sharp.

Alaster had Gobi lay against the hill of snow Alaster had created and told it to conceal itself. Alaster was quite impressed that instead of just laying there as he had suspected. Gobi actually buried itself under the snow, leaving only a part of its skull exposed to see the area, but then dimmed its Necrotic Eyes.

Impressed, Alaster entered the shelter and closed the door, leaving only a small hole for air. Alaster used his [Bone Crafting] to stick one of his test pieces of hide to the hole, leaving the bottom with a gap. That way, air could still get in, but much less light would get out.

Finished, the young man sat down at the fire and relaxed. The fire was warm and filled the room with light. It was a small room, only a little larger than Alaster was tall, but that was intentional. The Ring of Holding was only two by two meters large, so none of the pieces for the shelter could be larger than that.

He would have preferred to make a type of raised platform that he could sit and sleep on, but he was running out of bone. As it was, he would have run out a while ago, if the Bugbear bones weren't denser than normal bone. With his remaining bone, Alaster tried to make a helmet. If he had more bone, he would have wanted to create more armor, but he was already using the majority for the helmet, leaving only a few scraps.

A helmet was the most important part of any armor, as the head was the most important part of any body. The fight with the Bugbear was a perfect example. Alaster was not able to significantly damage the body of the Bugbear, but he was able to do enough damage to the head to hit the brain, at least after numerous attacks, and only when targeting a soft part like an eye.

So Alaster created a bone helmet. He made it as dense as he could and fashioned the helmet after a T faced Barbute. After trying it on and adjusting it several times, Alaster made it fit on his head quite well, but not too uncomfortable. He had decided on this helmet as it would provide the most protection, while also having no moving parts and being simple to make, and would not impact his breathing while only slightly impairing his vision at the very edges.

The young man had personally seen some new recruits for the Onigas city guard train in a closed face helmet and begin to panic as they couldn't breathe. Their trainers had then gone on to explain that closed face helmets, while they provided excellent protection, required practice to get used to. A helmet was meant to be snug and with a closed face helmet, it covered everything leaving only small slots to see out of and small drill holes to breathe out of. Very few didn't panic after exerting themselves inside these helmets.

Alaster, was not practiced in their use. Nor did he really have the time to practice with them right now. So he decided to forgo them. With a T faced Barbute. It would cover his entire head, except his eyes, nose, and the middle of his mouth.

Satisfied with his newest creation, Alaster laid out the Bugbear hide, furry side up, and laid down to sleep. Almost immediately, the young man promised himself that the next stream he finds, he would stop to thoroughly wash the hide and dry it next to a fire. It stunk. However, the hide, being used as a mattress and blanket, combined with the fire in the corner, it was the warmest Alaster had been since leaving Onigas.

It was perhaps even comfortable. But as his mind left the world of the wakeful, he once again saw the mangled bodies of his parents.