“Wow!” Lucas said after reading through his achievements on the second floor. He had earned way more points than he expected, even considering the three thousand the System took away from him for taking something off the floor.
The points he earned from killing Sultan weren’t much of a surprise, considering how hard it was to accomplish, but what came afterward made his eyebrows raise.
“I could actually ask for help?” Lucas asked out loud.
The thought had never crossed his mind the entire time he was on the floor, but now in hindsight, there really were a few indications that this was possible. Not from Faruk, who really was an odd character on the whole floor and had nothing to do with the quest, but from the people who lived in the kingdom.
Those guys from the bar… Lucas remembered one of them saying he would face Sultan himself if the king gave him enough money or something. The way to ask for help was probably to offer to split the rewards from the King when the mission was completed, a reward that disappeared the second he entered the waiting room, costing him essentially nothing.
Lucas felt kind of bad for not having thought this was a possibility, but on the bright side, the reward he received for not asking for help was incredible and paid for his staff all by itself, so it was totally worth it.
The next thing that caught his attention was the glaringly obvious extra weight on his body; his arm was back, and his clothes were intact. Lucas closed his fist with relief. Thankfully, his injuries healed immediately after he finished the floor, or he would have to wait—who knows how long—for his arm to grow back.
Inspecting his surroundings after moving his arm for a bit, Lucas realized the room had changed. The bed, bathroom, TV and VCR were still there, but the room was much bigger this time around and had a table and chair that weren’t there before. Also, after walking around, Lucas discovered a door that opened to some sort of training room. There wasn’t much there, apart from a target on the wall, but he could now practice more dangerous stuff without risking burning down the entire room.
After looking through every corner of the room, Lucas decided to take a shower, and while he did so, he began to think. He had much more to think about now compared to the first time he entered the waiting room. Checking to see how much time he had left, he saw that his time in the waiting room had increased by twelve hours, which meant he now had 36 hours to spare.
“I have to make this time count,” Lucas muttered.
His last fight had been won by a very thin margin; he could see it going either way, and he couldn’t let this happen again. So he had three thoughts on his mind about how to improve himself. First, there was the matter of his life aura.
He had tried to find the source of his life aura on the second floor and didn’t succeed; however, that was something that could drastically increase his resistance during fights, so he wasn’t willing to give up on it just yet.
If he could heal himself from wounds without having to use a potion, that meant he could keep going forever as long as he had enough stamina, and it would help to solve his low Toughness issue. The only problem was that he had no clue about what he should do, but he still had some time to figure it out, so he wasn’t overly concerned.
Secondly, he wanted to explore ways in which he could defend himself using magic. He had seen Elliot do it, and he believed that wasn’t the only way, so he had a lot to learn in that regard, and he hoped Faruk’s journal would help him out.
Last but not least, he intended to watch his fight with Sultan and his two arms on the VCR and see if he could get any insight from it. A lot had happened during that time, and he expected to gain something from watching it.
Apart from things that could increase his strength, he also wanted to study dark magic and the splitting mana technique Faruk had taught him.
Lucas sighed. There was simply too much to be done and too little time, as always. As he lay in the bathtub, his mind began to get cloudy. He was only able to drag himself to the bed, and the last thing he knew before falling asleep was that the softness of the bed was unparalleled.
Lucas woke up four hours later, feeling refreshed. It would be nice if the system recovered his mental capabilities in the waiting room as well, so he didn’t have to sleep and waste so much time, but he already received a training space, so he decided not to be too demanding.
Right after waking up, Lucas started his activities. The thing he was more anxious to do was find his life aura; he had postponed that for too long, and if he wasn’t able to do it on his own, he would have to think carefully about whether he should pick the skill in his next skill selection.
However, considering that would mean giving up on a potentially even better skill related to his unique class, he better be sure he couldn’t do it any other way. Sitting in the lotus position, Lucas restarted the process of searching through his body.
It took him only around five minutes to notice something he hadn’t seen before; it was almost like an electric pulse running through his entire body, but even after a while, he could barely feel it. His brow furrowed, trying to understand how he had missed that electric pulse before and why he couldn’t get a hold of it, barely feeling it even now.
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Interrupting his meditation, Lucas began to think. What changed from the time I tried to find the aura until now? Could it be because I’m not as pressed for time as I was then, allowing me to be more careful?
Lucas considered the possibility for a while before discarding it. He had always worked fairly well under pressure. Sure, he became nervous just before a test, but when he was studying, it was hard to take his mind off his object of study, so that couldn’t be it.
After going through the fight with Sultan and his arms in his mind once more, he still couldn’t figure it out, so he decided to actually watch the tape and see if he could learn something.
Like before, he found a tape with his name on it, and when he placed it on the VCR, images of him in the kingdom appeared on the screen. The recording seemed to be made from the air itself, considering he was out in the open. That or there was a drone following him the entire time.
Lucas took the controller and started to speed up the tape to the parts that he wanted to see. His first stop was in the training room, where he was trying to find his life aura, but after a couple of minutes of him just sitting still, Lucas got bored and fast-forwarded the tape. He watched the entire fight with both of Sultan’s arms at twice the regular speed and only stopped when he reached his fight with Sultan, specifically the part where Sultan’s skin started to glow, and Lucas stood still for a few seconds.
Could that be it? The increase in perception thanks to my level up? Lucas wondered, remembering that at that point during the fight, he had chosen to place all his distributable points in perception to increase his chance of properly seeing Sultan through his weird illusionary movement.
I never considered that perception could be used inside as well as outside the body, but in hindsight, it seems logical.
Turning off the TV, Lucas once again focused on his inner self. After a few minutes, he again felt that weird pulse of electricity in his body. Could that be it?
The death aura in him had some sort of source, which made him think the life aura should have one too, but this electric pulse he felt was completely different from what he was expecting. If that was indeed the life aura, then he had been looking in the wrong place this entire time.
Convinced it was worth investigating, Lucas tried long and hard to catch hold of that mysterious pulse, but he simply couldn’t. He was almost giving up, when he remembered he still hadn’t checked his status after killing Sultan. A bump increase in perception could prove useful once again, but he was disappointed when he saw he hadn’t leveled up. Perhaps he was expecting too much; he had just leveled up when he fought him, even if he was three levels above him.
Sighing, Lucas began to consider his options. He could do the other things he needed to do, but he felt unwilling to give up just yet. Then he remembered something: Elixirs! He had learned to make a Perception elixir during his time spent with Hilda, and he had brought the required ingredients with him, just in case he needed them. He couldn’t thank his past self more as he began to work on his elixir.
The time it took for him to make the elixir was shorter compared to his first attempts, but it still took some time. However, as he identified the finished product, he couldn’t be happier.
Percepetion Elixir (Low-Quality)
Gives +5 points in Perception for an hour.
After the euphoria died down and he started to consider his next steps, Lucas’ brow furrowed. There were two aspects of his plan he hadn’t considered. First, he wasn’t sure if 5 more points in perception would be enough for what he needed to do, and second, would one hour really suffice?
Lucas remembered that it took him three full days to be granted his Death Aura Manipulation. Of course, at that time, Lucas had no idea what to do with his aura and had to explore blindly, but even if he had his previous experience to help him this time, one hour seemed too little.
“I’ll try for an hour; if it doesn’t work out, I can still make another,” Lucas muttered to himself. The cooldown period of the elixir was one hour, so while this time passed, he could be making another elixir if necessary. The problem was, he only had ingredients for one more. If he still didn’t manage to get his skill by then, he would have to wait until he leveled up at least two more times before he could try again.
Feeling the pressure pile up, Lucas decided to blow off steam with other things before he started his attempt. That’s when he remembered his staff. He still hadn’t used it for anything, and he had a training room waiting just a few steps away.
Happy to find a distraction, Lucas took his staff and entered the training room. His staff was especially made to work with dark magic, but that didn’t mean it could conduct other sorts of magic.
The first thing Lucas tried out after reaching the room was his fire shot. Feeling the fire run through his arms, Lucas skillfully conducted the spell through his staff, just as he had been taught in the tutorial. The results were incredible. Fire darted out of the staff at an incredible speed, leaving Lucas barely able to see its trajectory, even with his improved perception from the level up.
However, the speed wasn’t the most impressive thing, it was the power from the spell that struck the wall, creating a huge hole in it, missing the target by a few inches, and sending debris flying everywhere.
Shocked, Lucas walked toward the concrete wall to assess the damage but was surprised to find the wall apparently repairing itself, piece by piece flying back to its original place.
By now, Lucas had already gotten used to magic things happening, but this especially fascinated him. It was like watching a video in reverse. “Is this time-reversing?” Lucas considered it out loud but heard no reply back.
Taking his mind off the details of how the training room worked, Lucas spent the next half an hour improving his aim and trying out different things, but didn’t have much success apart from his fire-shot. It was enough for him to distract himself, however, and he felt ready to start his next attempt at finding his life aura. Returning to the main room, Lucas sat in the chair and, without hesitation, drank the entire contents of the elixir.
He looked around, surprised. The whole room seemed clearer, and he felt like he could capture details he hadn’t noticed before, like the sweat on the bed from where he had slept earlier or the drops of water on the floor from when he came from his bath.
He was positively surprised by the effectiveness of the elixir but decided to waste no more time looking at the waiting room. Instead, he focused his attention solely on the electric pulse inside his body.