I led the three alphas directly to my two hunting partners. I didn't even pause as I leapt over them using the air to help propel me. I glanced back as I continued to run. The creatures were very angry with me, and I saw that they intended to push right past the men.

Pierce had come up with this plan after I had hypothesized about what my death mana core would do to the group of primates. It had worked far better than I imagined, even if the alphas were too strong to be harmed by the poisonous mist. Getting them alone, and away from their snow covered territory was what mattered.

Ivo would select two, and redirect their anger. The third would be allowed to continue chasing me. By the time I got the planned distance away from the duo, my air core was running on fumes.

I decided to start by fighting fire with fire. Or rather ice with my wintery predator form. I continued to run as I shifted my core, the air mana that I had been controlling continued to move with me on its own, it was still my friend after all. I began to strain to keep up my speed, both because I was no longer actively powering the air's attempts to aid my motion, and because my body was gaining a heavy coat of ice and snow.

I stopped, and spun to see the alpha primate hot on my heels. He was a bit bigger than me, and entirely enraged. I was able to take in the fact that he had shed the bulk of the ice from his long fur during the chase at a glance.

He launched himself at me with his mouth wide open, his fangs ready to tear into me. I had no time to dodge, the best I could manage was turning enough so his mouth found my ice covered shoulder, while I pushed mana out of myself aiming to make the snow on my shoulder turn to a solid layer of icy armor.

I heard a crack, and I felt the ice break and fall away from my shoulder as I whipped my head around in an attempt to go for the creature's throat. It managed to put its arm in the way, so I latched onto that instead.

The alpha primate shrieked and tried to yank his arm away, I clamped down harder. The taste of his blood woke my hunger. I was a predator, and this large monkey was nothing but prey.

Having failed to pull his arm from my mouth the creature desperately bashed at me with his other arm. It felt like being hit with a hammer, the magical snow coating me flew off of me, filling the air. I enhanced the effect before releasing my hold, and allowing him to pull away from me. I needed a more lethal place to grip. I also wasn't sure why he hadn't already bitten me again, I had lost most of my protective coat.

I kept my eyes on the creature as he fled and disappeared into the magical snowstorm I had created. He made himself exceptionally easy to keep track of even without my ability to sense him through the snow that was being held by my aura. He was shrieking and howling so loudly that he could probably be heard for miles. Neither of us could see one another.

I felt something trying to take control of the snow. I had predicted that the monkey could do that, but I was surprised at how strong his magical ability was. I struggled to keep the snowstorm out of his control, throwing mana from my large water core into my aura. Even with the mana I was pumping into it, I felt my control wavering under its assault, I wouldn't be able to keep it from the beast for long.

I circled around the primate while he raged at the snow that refused to obey him. I moved slowly, and deliberately, even though I was running through my core's reserves.

As long as I controlled the snow, I knew exactly where the creature was. I crept away from the alpha primate, who was crouched down screaming his head off while emanating an aura of his own in an attempt to seize my snow.

Once I was some distance away I shifted my mana use convert the snow into a weapon. Working without the ability to directly observe, I closed my eyes and opened my mana sense to try to get an idea of what I was doing. I blew through almost all of the mana in my core to quickly gather the snow, and compress it into an ice spike, then send it flying at the confused monkey.

I heard it shriek in anger as it threw itself out of the way but did not quite manage to get clear of the flying ice. It wasn't an exceptional hit, I wasn't used to trying to aim things using mana sense alone, the spike only managed to graze its hip. I used the last of the mana in my water core to dispel the spike so the creature could not gain control of it.

As the water mana's influence faded, I switched my core to darkness. Even in the middle of the day the dense forest would make a lovely playground for that element.

As it was in the arena with Zeke, I started out feeling horrified by how exposed I was, even with trees between me and my opponent.

I began to release my aura. The existing shadows exploded spreading an inky blackness I could feel contained Concepts I knew were both Terrorizing and Disorienting.

The monster's shrieks changed in tone from ones of anger, to pure terror. The sound bounced strangely in the magical field of darkness, seeming to come from random directions. The situation filled me with glee.

I could sense the creature as it tried to run and collided with trees it had no way of knowing existed. Each collision turned it around, keeping trapped in my aura, unable to make any distance.

Its fear tasted like fine wine, I couldn't help but pause and enjoy the sensations brought on by the mana's influence. It wasn't until it stopped moving and seemed to be starting to use its mana to fight off the influence of the Concepts assaulting it that I took any action.

My mostly incorporeal form slid silently through the shadows behind the crouched primate, it was regaining its composure enough that that the flavor of its fear was fading, and a layer of frost was beginning to reform in its fur. That would not do. I slashed its hindquarters with temporarily oversized razor sharp claws made of pure shadow, then retreated before it could react.

It shrieked. spun and slammed its fists down on the area it felt I had to have attacked from. I eagerly anticipated the terror that an attack out of nowhere would bring.

I received no more of the decadent flavor, instead it seemed to find itself in a state of pure rage. I sensed it gathering its mana, and put some trees between us. I sank into the ground below me, I knew that even lacking a physical form, an attack composed of magic could still harm me.

My precautions proved necessary as the waves of magical ice shards blasted through the surrounding area with astounding force. I was not unharmed even hiding in the dirt as I was. The attack even managed to completely disrupt my aura. The shadows retreated to their proper places, and the rebound caused my own mind to be partly afflicted by the negative Concepts that it contained. I had to fight against a sudden onslaught of terror, and disorientation.

I was lucky that it charged past my hiding spot. The cost of maintaining the aura had not been small, with the mana I had invested in it dissipated from the attack, I realized that my darkness core was running low, I could not stay hidden much longer. I stayed hidden as long as I could, trying to center my fear filled mind enough to come up with a plan of action.

The beast stood on its injured hind legs and hooted out a challenge that made my terrorized instincts turn vicious I was eager to follow their lead as they helped me turn terror into rage. I still felt off-kilter, but I was able to orient myself enough by the monkey's noise to go for the kill.

I sprang into action, taking advantage of its desire to sit still and scream out challenges, I moved through the remaining wisps of shadow left behind from my shattered aura. As I moved I felt my form solidify, I required more darkness to remain insubstantial, but that was fine, as was in position by the time I was fully corporeal. I leapt onto the primate's back, my teeth found the beast's neck, and all four sets of claws latched onto him.

The primate didn't like that one bit, and lifted itself up with me on its back. With wounds on its hips and one of its arms, and after having used what must have been an exhausting attack, I could feel how my weight strained it. But it somehow still managed to lurch itself towards a nearby tree, seeing what was coming I made the decision to relinquish my nearly empty shadow core.

I shifted to my earth core, I was aiming for the angry, crushing earth I had channeled in the arena against Zeke before my class evolution, before I knew what Concepts were.

My mind filled with the rage I had called upon, it was overwhelming, the last shreds of fear from the shadow form vanished. I accepted the rage and gave it a target, the baboon-like creatures needed to die, I would crush them all. I would start with the beast that was staggering under the newly increased weight on its back.

Taking out the monkey became as simple as using my aura to connect to the ground below, and increasing my connection to it. The unfortunate beast was thoroughly crushed. I could tell it was dead, because I was suddenly able to tear off the portion I had been gripping in my mouth.

In my rage I made quite a mess of the creature, I tore it apart with teeth and claws. I even managed to dig out its malformed core. If I was in my right mind, I would have been interested in seeing it. In the clouded mental state I was in, I found out that it was tasty.

With the malformed core of the monster in my belly, icy water mana flooded into me. I was thankful that my ability to convert any mana type to that of my current core could handle it. I felt my core fill till it was straining. Unlike my mana conversion which I supposed was somewhat innate, my ability to divert mana to my other cores was not able to keep up. I had to expel my mana into my aura in vast quantities to stop my core from rupturing.

I needed a more active target for my rage, and thankfully I could hear that at least one of Ivo and Pierce's targets was still active.

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I released my connection to the earth below, and began a lumbering charge towards my next prey.

When I stomped up to the area where my two partners were fighting, I saw that they had removed one alpha from the equation while I was fighting my own. The second one seemed to be giving them some trouble. It was the largest of the three, and it seemed to have regenerated its icy armor. It pleased me to see that some of the ice was red, and it was covered in cracks.

Ivo's shield had several massive dents in it, and Pierce had the broken end of an ice spear sticking out of his shoulder. Both of them had a layer of frost forming on their armor.

Pierce was swinging his mace with his off hand. From what I could tell, he had plenty of anger built up, but the monkey was apparently smart enough to have figured out that it needed to keep itself between Ivo and the enraged Tyrant.

I saw no evidence of the weapon aura Pierce had used in his duel with me. It was evidence of his self control that even with his supernatural levels of anger, he wasn't taking the risk of having a shockwave hit Ivo.

I unfortunately did not have his level of control. I was already sending out dense clouds of earth mana from my core, creating a powerful aura. The monster core in my belly was feeding me enough mana that my earth core remained full to the point of strain, even while emptying it as fast as I was able. My aura held the Crushing concept I was channeling, it manifested as something akin to increased gravity.

The aura radiated out from me and affected everything it touched, friend, foe, plantlife, the closer things were, the stronger the crushing force. My aura was capable of stretching seventy feet out, I had halved that to double the intensity. Within five feet, nearly everything was flattened to the ground, crushed under the force of its own increased weight, the mana informed me that it was a fifteen fold increase.

The effect was lower the further from me my aura spread. When I moved within range of my two friends, and their opponent, I was not able to adequately warn them. All three individuals staggered under the rapidly increasing crushing force.

I kept approaching, heedless of what I was doing to my partners. I only had eyes for the monkey, I directed the mana in my aura to it. I roared loudly, it sounded like an avalanche. Pierce was able move around the weighed down monkey to grab Ivo, and stagger away.

The alpha was my primary target, it crumpled to the ground. My near infinite mana allowed me to send many cores worth out of myself to break through the creature's magical defenses like tissue paper. I sauntered up, relishing its death, when I reached its body, I tore it apart like I had the last one.

I tore its core out, and ate it without thinking.

More mana flooded into me, my insides began to feel chilled, my instincts pushed me to switch to my full Mana Beast form. I could no longer release enough mana to keep my earth core intact unless I did something else, it was bad enough that my survival instincts overrode the Aspect I was channeling.

I followed my instincts, and switched my core to pure. As a mana beast, in my true form, I was able to do something with all the mana from the cores in my belly. I didn't know what, but whatever it was, my instincts made me freeze in place.

Every muscle in my body tensed up, and I followed the prompts of my instincts. I gazed inward, and knew what needed to be done. First I used the mana filling my pure core to reinforce the elastic shells of all nine of my cores. My earth core required special attention since I had been too lost in the raging earth Aspect to really understand how much strain the core had been under. I saw where it had grown weak from the constant overfilling without appropriate reinforcement, and almost cracked in places. My instincts told me that if that had happened, it would have meant disaster, and not just for myself.

While reinforced, they would be able to grow from the excess mana that was flowing into them, instead of breaking. I was still receiving more mana than they could take, the System helpfully beamed the knowledge into my head that a normal spirit beast could eat a monster core from something around their level, once every month or so. They would be able to do what I was doing, but only if the monster's element matched their own, it was a natural part of their advancement.

Monster cores didn't just contain mana, but also a slew of elemental Concepts that had driven a monster to madness. As the System, and my instincts fed me information, I learned that my body was originally formed of Primarily Air, Life, Water, and pure mana. Light and Darkness, and Earth had also both been a part of my making, but to a much lesser degree. Fire and Death were not a part of me. It explained my innate affinities, I had already guessed something like that was the case, but it was nice to have confirmation.

The monster cores were icy water, and well within the type of concepts my body was built from. My instincts surprised me by letting me feel that I had a choice to make, it was one I had to make consciously.

I could consume the cores like I did any mana, I would break down the Concepts, and turn them into food to fuel my growth. I would likely grow larger and stronger in my true form, much like I did whenever I leveled, there might also be other benefits, but I was given no inkling of what those would be.

Or, I could take the Concepts from the cores into myself. It would make all my forms turn cold like the snowy mountain prowler, it would also likely make me even less able to use my fire mana core. It might even cause it to shrink, and it was already my second smallest core.

It would also definitely increase the power of one of my largest cores.

I forced myself to take a moment to think, my instincts screamed at me to take the Concepts into my body. They sang of the power that permanently incorporating the Concepts that were bound in the monster's crystaline core would bring. I almost followed their desires.

But I was able to, just barely push away the instincts desires and think about what I wanted. I didn't want to be a constant source of cold, it would be very bad for my ability to interact with people. Focusing on one person in particular, and how she likely wouldn't like a cold version of me caused my instincts to turn their advice around.

Once I cemented the decision, I learned how to purposefully break down the Concepts. It was something I did every time I ate mana, but with the cores I needed to focus on the act.

I wasn't completely oblivious to the outside world while I worked. On some level I was aware that Ivo and Pierce had returned, and were talking to each other. It wasn't something that needed my reply, so I didn't pay attention beyond ascertaining that they planned to watch over me with whatever I was doing.

It took over an hour, during which all nine of my cores grew slightly. I knew my true form had grown a little as well, the broken down Concepts were a more potent source of fuel for it than what I usually received from eating mana, but I could hardly tell the difference. When it was done, I felt mentally exhausted, and physically energized.

I eyed the corpse of the third primate, I found that I could smell the core inside it. But it was not my kill, so I made no move for it. Besides, I only felt a small instinctive pull to crack it open for the candy inside. I couldn't eat another core of that level so soon without risk, I was far too mentally exhausted to break down more Concepts like I had just done.

When I came out of my focused state, I noticed how worn and beat up Ivo and Pierce were. I felt terrible for thoughtlessly relying on them. Particularly since I could have made their wait much less painful with the simple act of crushing a few mana crystals, a single one couldn't heal much, certainly not the hole Pierce had covered up on his shoulder. But four of them would, and life crystals took less than a day to return to me, with all the life mana that I ate.

I walked over to the man, he looked up at me and said. "Ahh look who's awake, what was that all about?"

I didn't answer him and merely sent "Remove your bandage." I mentally packaged the words with my intent to try to heal his wound. I was too mentally exhausted to say more.

He grumbled something I pretended not to hear about waiting long enough, that made me lower my tail guiltily. He removed the bandage, displaying an ugly still partly frozen wound.

I closed my eyes, focusing intently on what I wanted to have happen, and broke one fire crystal, and six life crystals. Pierce grunted as the fire mana defrosted his wound, it bled, but the life mana was visibly healing it, so neither man commented, or moved to do anything.

As I watched the mana work, I saw some of the ambient life mana move to join it all on its own. When it was done, there wasn't any evidence that there had been a wound there, other than the hole in the padded shirt Pierce wore under his armor. The alpha hadn't managed to penetrate his plate armor, but had managed to wedge its spike in the small unarmored area between his chest plate and arm guard.

"You never mentioned the fact that you could heal, that's an important skill to tell people about." Ivo scolded me, he sounded tired.

"Must be a reason he didn't mention it, right kitty? Thanks for that, by the way, I wasn't looking forward to hunting the rest with an injured arm." Pierce moved his arm around, testing it.

I cocked my head to the side, I had quite simply not thought to tell them, I had healed both of them before, but I supposed that neither man had been in any state to realize what I'd done at the time.

I sent them both a message about how my healing of others was currently rather limited. I asked them if they'd be willing to help me figure out how to heal more later. I did not try to explain how I needed to find the right Aspect to accomplish that, since talking about Concepts mentally had hurt Ivo before.

"I'm not sure we'll be able to do that tonight Angel. We're already tired, and I don't know about you, but I'm still feeling the pull to hunt the remaining frost tainted primates." Ivo definitely sounded tired, and it didn't escape my attention that he wasn't his normal, understanding self.

I butted him lightly with my head, and experimentally crushed an air crystal, asking it to energize the man. I knew it was something air was capable of.

I heard him gasp. "Did you just do that? Thank you. We'll need to have a long talk about what you're capable of later."

"Too much to list, but too little knowledge to use it well."

I replied, honestly assessing myself. I shook my head, I felt like this life had handed me a giant complex toolkit. But put the instructions in small print, in a language I barely understood, and then only allowed me to read them when I reached in blindly to grab a tool and tried to use it. I felt incompetent most of the time, and the levels I was gaining were only making me feel worse.

Ivo reached over and scratched my neck. "It's okay, you'll learn."

"So what did the cat do?" Pierce asked.

I turned to look at him, being called "the cat" was beginning to irritate me.

I huffed, and crushed an air crystal. Something must have gone somewhat wrong with my visualization because instead of just nicely energizing the man, a strong gust of wind manifested out of nowhere and knocked him on his ass. I sensed that it was mostly wild mana that had been responsible for the assault. I could tell it also energized him like I wanted, but it was a reminder that I didn't fully control the mana I was using.

Pierce laughed. "Damn cat, that's some strong stuff!"

I flicked my tail. "I have a name."

"Sure sure, but it's kind of fun to tweak your whiskers, and I'm just getting used to being able to have fun. So, I'm sure you'll live, and you got me back." I could hear the suppressed laughter in Pierce's voice, and when he put it that way, I had a hard time holding it against him.

I huffed again, and swished my tail, then ignored him and began trotting towards the remaining primates. I shifted back to my smaller, but more cold tolerant cat form, this time I intentionally allowed it to diverge from the perfect snowy mountain prowler I had been using. I wanted my true form's strengths, it felt right to shift that way. I had my horns, and my venom glands. I didn't have to look to know I had my stripes, and I was larger than I had been before as the snow cat.

I wasn't sure how channeling while in this slightly mixed form would be different from what it was when I shifted perfectly. I felt it would be, but I suddenly felt like that was okay. I had just experimented with Aspects a few times in quick succession, and it had gone very well. I felt like I really might be getting the hang of controlling myself.