As I took to the skies, I noticed that it was getting rather late in the day, I had likely spent hours growing those trees. I realized belatedly that I was lucky it hadn't been longer. It was likely that my fellow adventurers had made it to the road quite some time ago, even if they took it slow.

The air mana that was helping me fly beckoned me to join with it, but after a thought I declined to do so. I was mentally exhausted, and I felt like I had just finished making a potentially disastrous use of life mana.

I couldn't help but think that I had dodged a bullet, what was I thinking? One of my very first interactions with life mana created Thorn. What would I have done if I found out that I had accidentally created 100 more of them?

My experience of successfully following my instincts for which cores to use in combat must have made me forget that there were dangers to playing with new Aspects. Not for me, but for the world around me.

As I glided above the forest towards the road, I worked through my worries. I eventually concluded that I was being too hard on myself, it worked out. The trees were just trees, they looked fancy, that was all. But I would remember this when choosing what element I should use to accomplish my goals in the future. I would also make sure to return to the trees that had spawned because of me every so often, just to be sure.

I still didn't switch my core to air. It wouldn't take me long to reach the road, since I could fly above the trees. I'd be caught up to them in no time since, even without channeling the core I was much faster in flight than the men would be walking.

I was proven correct soon enough, as I saw the men slowly trudging along. The effects of the air mana that I had used to boost their energy had obviously been worn away in however many hours it had been.

I wasn't physically tired in the slightest, my life core was still low, but it was filling quickly enough. So I decided to come in for a landing ahead of them, and do the men a favor by shifting to my ram form again.

I trotted up to them as Ivo waved at me.

Pierce surprised me by being the one to talk. "Thanks Angel, I wasn't looking forward to the walk back. I think one of those damn monkeys had some sort of energy drain that we didn't notice."

I looked at their exhausted postures, and it made me wonder if that was true. Neither of the two cores I had consumed had a Concept that would do that, both of them had similar powers, but they had been slightly different. It made me want to see if I could get some insight into a new concept from the core in Ivo's pouch. For some reason I didn't sense it anymore.

I looked at Ivo. "Before we get going, can I see the crystal that you are holding for me?"

The man let out a breath, and nodded. "This thing's been a pain to carry, it's so cold."

I didn't feel particularly cold air around them, but perhaps it was the snow cat form's permanent influence. When Ivo unwrapped the core I was stunned to see that the Concepts that it had been glowing with were almost completely absent. I sighed, realizing that the state the two men were in was entirely my fault. The core seemed to be leaking the Concepts it contained.

They hadn't lost their power entirely, I could still see that the core was exuding Exhausting, and Disorienting in addition to its ice related Chilling. I wondered why I only sensed three, when I channeled an Aspect it was always five.

I doubted the core contained enough power to cause me problems if I consumed it, from the looks of it, the Concepts that it held would be entirely spent in less than an hour. I understood why the mana crystals that I had encountered in town hadn't seemed that special. I almost wanted to see what happened at the point where they lost power entirely.

The crystals that I had seen had been leaky, but they held mana, and that mana held the potential for so very many Concepts. The ones that the core exuded probably had something to do with the powers the monster had, I waited for a moment for some enlightenment from the System. I expected it to answer my questions with information. I was disappointed to receive no such thing, for whatever reason it didn't seem like that was going to happen.

I took the crystalline core from Ivo's hand like a sugar cube, and held it in my mouth. I knew I would be quite distracted as soon as I swallowed it, so I told Ivo to hop on, and make sure I didn't stray from the road. Looking in his tired eyes, I realized that I was asking a lot.

It was a miracle that the two of them had made it to the road safely. With how Disorienting clung to them, they must have been using everything they had to fight off the effect and stay on course for home.

They mounted up, I faced the direction we needed to go, and swallowed the core that was just starting to make me feel dizzy. I allowed my instincts to keep me on the path as I put the last of my mental stamina into deconstructing the remains of the Concepts and using them as food.

I barely noticed when we got to the gates, I didn't even think about changing forms. I just walked up, carrying my adventuring partners on my back, and let them explain to the guards what was going on.

I let out a sigh of relief when we reached the guild gates, I had not broken down the Concepts as cleanly as I would have liked. I was tired, and felt slightly nauseous from the dizzy spells I had endured during the trip. But the core was taken care of, and I knew that I would probably recover quickly.

Torill ran up to me as we passed through the gates. I took a moment to nuzzle her briefly before telling her that I wanted to make sure that the two men got to their rooms okay. They weren't getting much better, I owed them both an apology for having them carry the monster core for those hours. I did wonder if I could consume the remains of the slowly dissolving Concepts that were causing their problems to persist. I couldn't figure out how to do it outside my body, if such a thing was even possible. My instincts told me no after I persisted in trying for a little while.

Torill kept a hand on my shoulder as we walked, which was nice, it gave me something to focus on.

She opened the doors to the apartment building for me and directed me to the room that the men shared. I stood still while she helped them dismount and enter their room. I knew they would be fine in time, but I cringed a little when I noticed that Ivo managed to miss the unlocking runes when he first reached out for the door.

After the men were safely inside their room, the lovely lady at my side lead me into my own room. As soon as I locked my door, I shifted to my true form and allowed myself to sprawl out on the floor, I wanted a nap something fierce.

So of course, the System started pinging me. I groaned, but didn't try to put it off.

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Level up × 10

Strength + 40

Constitution + 50

Agility + 40

Dexterity + 30

Intelligence + 20

Wisdom + 10

Perception + 10

Free stats + 50

I was immediately reminded by the way that the levels affected me that I had hit another milestone. The System definitely did something special with my muscles and ligaments, it touched my bones and joints as well. But the part that stole all my attention was something it did to my head.

I felt like the world was spinning around me, for seconds that stretched on for an eternity I lost all comprehension of which direction was up. When the disorientation passed, the leveling process was complete.

I was still exhausted, but whatever the System did had eradicated the lingering nausea I had been dealing with. I tried to get a handle on exactly what had happened. Thankfully the System didn't leave me hanging. The agility milestone I had received was all about balance, and awareness of my body's position. That would definitely be useful in the future, I bet it would be a big help while flying.

When the System asked me for my choices, I sighed and decided to work towards my last two milestones for a while, unless I ended up deciding to spend two hundred points on charisma.

My senses shut down entirely. For a moment I felt like I had been drawn into the void space once more, but I had no awareness of my own form. I held myself back from panicking because I knew that it was temporary.

When my senses returned I was overwhelmed by them, my mind could barely process everything. I was immensely grateful that the ward on my room cut off the sounds and smells from the outside world, because I could hear the blood flowing in my and Torill's veins. I could smell traces of things I hadn't even noticed walking past on myself. It was horrible, I wanted it to stop. I wanted to go back to the senses I had before, and all of a sudden, I did.

The perception milestone was control, it allowed me to tune my senses. I would have to experiment with that later, for the moment I was glad to be able to turn things down.

I pulled up my stats.

Name Angel

Race : Spirit Beast

Level : 100

Class : Adventurer (Bestial Mana Shifter)

Str 293 Con 352

Agi 264 Dex 205

Int 380 Wis 260

Per 250 Cha 53

I blinked at the numbers, that was odd, Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, and Agility were slightly higher than they should be. It was the cores. I knew that breaking down the Concepts had enhanced me somehow, but I hadn't really understood how until I looked at the System's information.

It wasn't much, and I obviously couldn't eat them willy nilly, eating that last core on the trip home had been a bad idea. But gaining attributes from something outside of levels seemed like it would be a pretty big deal.

My thoughts were interrupted by a hand stroking my mane. I hadn't even noticed that Torill was sitting on the floor behind me, proving that no matter how good my senses were, they were useless if I wasn't paying attention to them. I hadn't warned her that I was going to level up either, perhaps I had been more hampered by the clinging scraps of the Concepts that I failed to digest properly than I thought. Thankfully they were gone, the System's work leveling me seemed to have had the side effect of eradicating them.

"I'm sorry that I leveled without warning you, I wasn't thinking."

Torill leaned over me putting her arm across my neck, I was shocked by how small she felt.

"You sure grew a lot this time, I'm glad you're okay. You shouldn't eat fresh mana crystals like candy, you know. From what I know, one is safe enough, every once in a while. Your own Concepts can only keep you safe from having the monster's attach to you if you don't overwhelm them. I'm shocked that you got away with only a temporary issue after eating so many." Torill grabbed a fistful of my mane. "Don't do that again! I can't protect you from that kind of thing."

"I'll admit that eating the last one was a mistake, digesting the Concepts that are in those cores takes concentration. I thought I could do it while walking home since I don't really have to put much thought into following a road. I was wrong."

"You.. what? You mean taking the empowerment from the Concept, right? You definitely didn't imply that you consumed the idea itself. That would be… I want to say impossible, but you are an impossible sort of creature aren't you? All my identification ability tells me is that you are a Spirit Beast but your body is more than just some tiger that formed a core isn't it?"

"I thought you knew? I'm a Mana Beast."

"I thought Mana Beasts were all connected to giant mana crystals. Where is yours?"

I blinked. It occurred to me that if someone who had lived many lives as I guessed Torill had thought that was the case, it had to be very rare for Mana Beasts to live long enough to fully absorb their mother crystals. That made me feel a bit safer. If people just thought I was a tiger spirit beast with a weird class, then I wouldn't be quite as tempting of a target as I feared. But I figured that there were probably people around who would be able to sense exactly how full of mana my body was either way.

I took the time to explain in detail to Torill everything I knew about Mana Beasts.

"That… tears in reality? I had no idea. The fact that you say your host came from a different reality makes me wonder if other things did too."

"From the information I was granted they can't survive here with their original forms. When they come through they lose everything that they are."

"So you said, but that doesn't mean that there aren't other ways things could come from different realities. Us for instance. I don't know about you, but my original world didn't seem to follow the same rules as the ones that we get reincarnated into."

"My original world didn't have magic at all, well at least there wasn't any evidence of it." I tried to send an image from Angela's memories of Earth, but the sending bounced back into my own head. I flinched at the feeling of negation that the System sent with it. Apparently there were limits to what I could say even to another Contractor.

"Did you just try to tell me more? We aren't allowed to be very specific about our home worlds. I never really understood why. But if we come from a whole different reality, maybe that's the reason. Maybe they want to control the introduction of Concepts from places that are so different?"

"Maybe, but why would they bring us here then? Don't we leak them just by being here and thinking?"

"Well yes, and no. It takes a whole lot of people thinking the same thing to have any power."

"There are a lot of contractors aren't there?"

"From what I understand, even a minimalist god has hundreds of us working for them at any given time, but who knows how many of us are from the same place and time."

"How many worlds are there?"

"I have no idea. But I get your point, there are definitely enough of us to add Concepts from our origin to the things that exist in nearly every world." I heard her sigh. "Well as interesting as this is, we gain nothing by making guesses. It's not like it matters anyway. If you're feeling up to it, we should go find Krassus. He needs to level, and helping you practice is just about the only way he can get them while the decree to stay in town stands."

I rolled onto my feet, I couldn't just let that poor man wait for the wendigo to be dealt with. Not when I could help him by letting him help me.