[Affirmative. Now leaving the dungeon. You will be transported to the reward room where you will be able to choose your rewards.]

Almost instantaneously I was in another location, with only a very brief moment of time where everything seemed to stop. But then, as soon as I was transported to the reward room, I felt my exhaustion hit me like a wave. I was reminded that my body wasn’t in the best condition at the moment, and I needed to take care of it before I could do anything like receiving rewards or messing with the system. So I gathered my mana and casted a few healing spells. Then, after my wounds were closed, I started to convert my mana into vitality energy, helping my body to heal naturally, assisted by my misty ice-steel ring.

Before I got my hands on the misty ice-steel ring I had only been able to use healing magic, but the low level healing spells I could use were like first aid, it stopped the problems from worsening and helped facilitate the natural healing process, but it wasn’t true healing. The misty ice-steel ring on the other hand, just improved natural healing, it didn’t stop wounds from bleeding or injuries from crippling, but it did help my natural healing work better. The one problem with the misty ice-steel ring was that it couldn’t help what wasn’t there, meaning that its usefulness was limited by its source. So the misty ice-steel ring would help my body take advantage of the vitality energy to heal faster.

As I built up the vitality energy within me I thought back across all the events that had taken place. So much had happened within only a month’s time. Normally life wasn’t this chaotic, but when it ignites it explodes, that’s what the immortals always say anyways. It was almost too much for me to handle, but I had made it, I had accomplished almost everything I set out to do. Now the only thing left was to receive my rewards and get out of here, but that could wait for a bit longer.

I felt my body relax as the vitality energy flowed through it, and I struggled to keep my eyes open as System messages started to appear before me. However my lack of real sleep was catching up to me, and I couldn’t stave off my exhaustion any longer now that I was safe and free from worry. So I let myself go and quickly fell asleep.

-Break-

My body’s mind looked around me with idle curiosity, taking in the sights of the grandiose city around me, but I took in the same scene and noted the distance of the guards and the mayhem of the streets. This city had recently conquered a dungeon, and so the market was engorged with buyers as they swarmed around trying to find good deals.

My body was about to walk forward in order to get closer to my bodyguards, which were being swept into the crowd as they tried to prioritize the spatial mages, who were here for transporting large amounts of goods back through my portal. However my body stopped and refused to move forward against its wishes. This greatly confused and alarmed my body, which was about to call out to the guards in order to seek their help, thinking that it was under attack, but once again my body refused to obey and its mouth closed tight and refused to make a sound.

Although my body was confused, I wasn’t. I had been waiting for an opportunity like this for years, decades, and although there had been a few possible chances over the years, none of them were as golden as the one before me. I took in everything around me, and concluded that now was the best time to make my escape. So I hijacked control from my ignorant main mind and shut it in its own black box where it wouldn’t be able to interfere with the coming events.

I took control of my body, and my whole outward demeanor shifted from cheerful to closed off and desperate. The one guard left by my side was slow to react to this change, and was too slow to react as I assaulted his mind, quickly leaving him unconscious. I didn’t stick around, and fled back through the market towards the portal I had come here with.

I had expected to have to fight off my bodyguards as I made my way back to my portal, but I made it back to the secluded area my portal was located in and returned through it without complications. I was also expecting to meet a pack of guards on the other side of the portal entrance, but once again I was left confused when I was met by an empty room. I closed the portal behind me, and trapped everyone on the other side, leaving them stranded in another country.

Everything had gone way too smoothly at this point, and I almost started to break down as I started to wonder if this was all just another mental manipulation, a fake reality presented to try and trap me. I started to nervously laugh as I frantically went through every possible mental check I could think of, cycling through them like a madman checking to see if everything was real or fake.

But all of them came back positive. This was really happening. This was all real. I started to shake uncontrollably, as I knew I had just wasted precious seconds that I could’ve been using to escape, but I didn’t allow myself to waste any more time, and I focused my energy towards my (Fractured Space Channel) and shattered the surrounding space. At the same time, I was pushing the pure mana in my core into a spell that my body had never attempted before.

Although my body had never practiced this spell, I had practiced and learned about it within The Ever Present Archives. The spell formed perfectly, but as I went to push my mana through it I felt like I was trying to wield a spoon with an infant’s arms. The spatial spell did what it was supposed to and ripped open a portal in front of me, but the effect was the same as what the infant wielding the spoon would do, the spatial tears spilled all over the place, filling the surrounding fractured space with varying sizes of spatial tunnels.

I didn’t have the luxury of waiting for a better travel option, so I picked the largest spatial tear and jumped into it.

-Break-

I woke up a bit groggily, and when I sat up I felt a slight ache in my shoulder. I started to wonder why going through the spatial tear had made me fall asleep, but then I fully awoke and realization swept through me. That had been a dream. Although it was more like a memory, the memory of my first escape.

Back then I didn’t have as clear of a mind as I did in my dream, and that was saying something. The curse put on my mind would put me in so much pain if I disobeyed its compulsions, to the point that I had to rip out that part of my mind and shut it away during my escape. The rest of my dream was fairly accurate, except that it had all been much more intense, especially the part where I had almost gone mad trying to check if everything was real or fake.

I woke up before the real stuff had gone down though, but ultimately I had made my escape and successfully evaded capture. However, the reality of it all was still something that was hard for me to believe. I mean, I grew up on Earth, where there was no such thing as magic or time travel or mental manipulation; everything that had happened to me after my death on Earth had played out like a surreal dream, and it was only after the time I had escaped in that memory when it all became real to me.

But that was all in the past now, I had come to grips with reality and was in a much better mental space now, especially because I was able to do what I hadn’t been able to do back then. Back then I had wanted to leave behind a provocation when I escaped, I wanted to rub my escape in their noses, mock their incompetence and crush their pride, but I wasn’t able to accomplish that back then. However I was able to do so this time, and it filled me with endless satisfaction, even now, as I thought about it.

As I stopped recalling the past I took in my surroundings. I was inside a white room, although calling it white wasn’t 100% accurate, a better description of the room I was in would be [], that is to say blank, empty, without detail. Although my eyes interpreted it as white, it wasn’t really. So I stopped my meaningless observations and focused on something more useful, pulling up the System messages that I had received before I had gone to sleep.

[You have completed 5 levels of the Dungeon of Tribulation with 10 challenges active]

[Rewards are increased by +25 levels due to the different challenges]

[Less Starting Information +1, No System Loot +1, Hostile Environment +2, Time Requirement +1, Forced Task +1, Hostile Entities +1, Wider Difficulty Range +10, Champion Level Entity +4, Outside Time Sync +1, Solo +3]

[levels 1-4 rewards will be equal to level 26-29 rewards, and the level 5 reward will be equal to a level 30 reward.]

This was all well and good, but there was one more notification that I was currently more interested in.

[Your Trait (Ornate Chains of Talent) has fulfilled all the necessary conditions, and can now change into Trait (Unshackled Ornate Talent)]

[Do you want to change your trait (Ornate Chains of Talent) into the trait (Unshackled Ornate Talent)?] [Accept | Deny]

I bubbled with excitement as I recalled the last time I had received this message. Back then I wasn’t able to make my own choice, but this time I’m free.

“I Accept.”

As soon as I said that, I felt something (something I had lost when I went back in time) heat up and shake within me. Then my Ornate Chains of Talent manifested themselves and unfurled from within me and enclosed my body in a cage. The ethereal chains then started to snap and shatter, with a sound that I felt more than heard, and after they had all shattered and fallen to the floor, they started to turn into molten light and rush into my body.

When the light entered my body I felt the rush of leveling up. It was a feeling not unlike the rush one felt after a good exercise session, and with the level ups came the System messages.

[You have leveled up]x12

[You now have 390 available points available to modify your Status]

“Wow, level 12 right off the bat. Nice. Considering my sedentary lifestyle up to this point, I’d say that’s pretty good.”

[Your Trait (Unshackled Talent) allows you to choose a Talent to awaken from the 3 available options.]

[Globetrotting Shopper]: Having reaped the benefits of a god’s blessing without any cost, and having purchased things most will never be able to, you can now access and purchase things with an ease that most would die of envy from. You will have the ability to set up portals to any location, but only if you have the ability to buy something at that location(opening a portal to a place you have been to before is significantly easier). There are also other benefits given while away in one of your gates.

Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

This is the Talent I had in my past, I guess my connection to it is too deep to have replaced this with a different choice. It’s not a bad Talent by any means, but without the resources of a large organization like the Tallen government behind me it’s mostly just wasted potential. I didn’t want to take this one in the past either, but it was out of my control at the time. But now, unless the other options suck, this one is off the table. I want something I choose for myself.

[Collected Potential]: You have collected potential power for so long but never had the opportunity to show it, but now that will no longer be a problem. Over time, and through many means, Potential Points are collected and saved to use later. Potential Points are Omnipotent… with enough of them, but they can currently only be used on yourself or things with a strong enough connection to you. (WARNING: This Talent is very weak at the beginning.)

A warning? The system doesn’t often give warnings, maybe disclaimers sometimes, but not warnings. This warning must mean it’s extremely, extremely weak at the beginning. I’m not opposed to this option just because of that, but I should take a look at the last option.

[Anonymous & Access]: You have 2 Legendary Titles that help you remain anonymous and fool others as to your true identity, and you have access to things you should not logically have access to. With this Talent you gain the ability to interact with the [Anonymous & Access Shop]. This shop has many functions, for example you can purchase another body/self or another identity along with everything else that identity could need to be real (for a price); you can also buy access to anything (for a price).

Now this sounds interesting. Wouldn’t this completely solve my government problems? I wouldn’t have to pay taxes! But more seriously, I can think of a lot of potential uses for a Talent like this, especially in my current circumstances. The only problem is that (for a price) disclaimer, what kind of price? Would I be paying in cash? Talent specific Points? There’s no way to know for sure, but I’ll get some initial benefits just for awakening the Talent at least, so I can always find out the specifics over time.

I pondered over the three choices for a bit, but I delayed actually making a choice for now. If my past experience with Globetrotting Shopper, a Tier 9 Talent, was any indication, then the other two choices would have jaw dropping effects no doubt.

Globetrotting Shopper could potentially open up a gate to Anywhere, even other dimensions, although it had been very costly to do so. If that was the kind of power I could expect from all Tier 9 Talents, then the other two choices were definitely more powerful than they sounded. But for now I would postpone my decision and take a look at my Status, which I hadn’t looked at in depth for quite a while.

[Status] Level: 12 | General Tier: (Peak)Tier 9 | Age Physical (Soul): 22(222) | Points: 390

[Ancestry]

(Human; Evolutions: 0) (TechnicMorph; Evolutions: 0)

[Titles]

Common (Researcher) (Solitary)

Uncommon

(Low Profile)

Rare

(Stats Controller) Very Rare

(Social Morph)

Superlative

Extraordinary

(Conqueror of Mana) (Tribulation Challenger) (Artificial Youth)

Epic

Legendary

(Dimensional Traveler) (Time Traveler)

Ancient/Primordial/Peak/Unique [Stats]

Mana Nebula

Strength: Tier 9

Dexterity: Tier 9

Endurance: Tier 9

Stamina: Tier 9

General: Tier 9

Mana Cells

Strength: Tier 9

Dexterity: Tier 9

Endurance: Tier 9

Stamina: Tier 9

General: Tier 9

Magic Control

Strength: Tier 9

Dexterity: Tier 9

Endurance: Tier 9

Stamina: Tier 9

General: Tier 9

Constitution

Strength: Tier 9

Dexterity: Tier 9

Endurance: Tier 9

Stamina: Tier 9

General: Tier 9

Senses

Strength: Tier 9

Dexterity: Tier 9

Endurance: Tier 9

Stamina: Tier 9

General: Tier 9

Mind

Strength: Tier 9

Dexterity: Tier 9

Endurance: Tier 9

Stamina: Tier 9

General: Tier 9

[Unique Talent] Tier 7→Tier 9 (Not Awakened) [Magic Core]

(Color: None) (Characteristic: Mana Cell Enhancement)

[Metaphysical Organs] (Core) (Adaptive Mind) (Fractured Space Channel)

[Metaphysical Physique] (Body of Artifacts) [Magical Physique] (Selective Mana Superconductor) [Traits]

(Ornate Chains of Talent)→(Unshackled Ornate Talent) (Enchanting Aptitude)

[Blessings/Curses]

(The Ever Present Archives Level 1 Infinite Pass)

[Active Skills/Powers 3/3]

(Power: Breadth Accelerated Cloud Mental Operator; Evolution:0 Level: 1)

(Skill: Tireless Mana II; Level: 55)

(Skill: Physical Recovery II; Level: 43)

[Inactive Skills/Powers 12]

(Skill: Mana Maintenance II; Level: 67)

(Skill: Foreign Analysis; Level: 81)

(Skill: Deceive; Level: 65)

(Skill: Sense Mana II; Level: 61)

(Skill: Pain Tolerance; Level: 53)

(Skill: Physical Augmentation; Level: 68)

(Skill: Space-Time Sense; Level: 63)

(Skill: Mana Conversion; Level: 60)

(Skill: Selective Transformation II; Level: 10)

(Skill: Basic Space Control; Level: 82)

(Skill: Mana Crystallization II; Level: 25)

(Skill: Efficient Crystallization; Level: 60)

Everything was looking good, but there were a few things I decided to check in further detail now that I had some peace.

[Title: Tribulation Challenger]: Congratulations! You have survived a Tribulation with overwhelming difficulty (due to your own choices), and even thrived in its difficulty.

: Rewards from Tribulations will be moderately increased.

[Trait: Unshackled Ornate Talent]

: Allows you to awaken your Unique Talent from 3 possible choices.

: Increases the base Tier of your Unique Talent by 1.

: Your Unique Talent will greatly minimize the effects of outside forces that attempt to resist it.

As expected, there’s no changes to these two Titles from the past, but this Artificial Youth Title is new.

[Title: Artificial Youth]: Congratulations! You have lived longer than what your Ancestry’s natural lifespan would conclude, and yet somehow you have managed to retain a youthful body.

: Things that damage your lifespan or appearance can now be recovered from through the use of this title.

Nice, it doesn’t say how long it would take to recover, but I’m guessing that, at the very least, this Title could completely stop the aging process with some help. It might even be all I need to have eternal youth. In any case it’ll be one more tool to stave off the erosion of time.

Everything else on my Status was pretty self evident. I had quite a few Points I could use, but there were a few more things to do before I used my Points. Namely, Rewards and Priorities. Unless I had the full perspective, I wouldn’t be able to make the best choices.