Greg placed the two vials before the Town-head. On the left, was an emerald green potion, and on the right, a fiery red one. “The red one is called the cloak of strength. Pick it and you will look to everyone as if you are just as powerful as you’ve ever been. It, however, will all be a façade. The potion doesn’t grant you any actual power, just the mask of it. Should anyone challenge you, you should either intimidate them into backing down or talk your way out of it. Otherwise, it won’t end well for you. But while this potion won’t offer you any actual power, it will also be trivially easy for you to recover from its aftereffects. Within a week, you should be back on your feet and able to operate normally,” Greg explained with the tip of his index finger on the lid of the red vial.

His finger moved to the lid of the green vial and Greg continued. “This one is called the last stand. If you take it, then for the next eight to twelve hours, you will be able to burst with as much power as you’ve ever had. It’s almost a berserking potion but without all the blinding rage. But while it grants a lot of power, it also exacts a steep price. Once its effects run out, you’ll be weaker than a baby and will probably be bedridden for up to a month. That’s where its name comes from. If you survive whatever caused you to take the portion, then well and good for you. But if you don’t, then the weakness that follows is almost certain to make it your last stand in this life,” Greg explained.

Greg had barely been home for more than a few minutes when a carriage from the Town-head arrived with the Town-head’s wife inside. The reason for the visit hadn’t been anything amorous or even concern for Greg’s well-being. Deep in the winter, the Town-head’s wife had approached Greg about the problem of her husband’s declining power and the fact that they would have to hold a ceremony to celebrate the conception of their newest child. Since then, she had been hoping and waiting for a solution from Greg. But Greg seemed to have vanished. Usually, Olivia would have taken his place and pretended to be Greg while he was out of commission. But other than occasionally appearing at his home in the guise of Roka to reassure his mother and sister, Olivia had stuck by Greg’s side all through the month and a half that he’d been out. As such, the Town-head’s wife had grown increasingly anxious with each passing day. The party was now just a few days away and the woman had been unable to keep from coming over to once again plead for his help. That’s how Greg found himself seated across from the Town-head at the same table they first had dinner at.

The man hadn’t at all been happy that his wife had come to him with the matter of his weakness if the look in his eyes had been anything to go by. He, however, didn’t have the luxury of turning up his nose at any help they could get, and his wife had communicated as much to him. When the man had made to argue, his wife had been quick to remind him that it wasn’t just his ego on the line but his life and that of his wife and daughter. That had immediately shut the man up. Whatever his reservations, Greg could see that he would never put his ego above the safety of his family. “Think very carefully before you go one way or the other,” Greg said pushing both vials forward before getting up from the table ready to walk away. “Just don’t mix the two, not even I can tell what the effects of that will be,” he said moving toward the door to the room. The Town-head already felt that his weakness had been exposed to Greg, there was no need to further drive the knife in by waiting to figure out whether he would be pretending to be strong the day following or not. It didn’t even matter all that much to Greg one way or the other. He had his own troubles to deal with.

“What do you get out of this?” The Town-head’s voice reached him just as he was about to move past the door. More than the question itself, it was the suspicion in the man’s voice that caused Greg to pause in his steps. “Forgive me if I’m being a bit too direct, but you are no longer a child Roka. I won’t treat you as a naïve child and I’d ask not to be treated as a fool. We can both see that I am not going to be able to hold on to power for that much longer. And I know that the other three families have approached you to try and win you over to their side,” He said then looked down at the two vials before him. “How do I even know that these vials don’t contain poison? And even if they do what you claim they do, what’s to stop you from having my enemies come for me when I am weakened?” he posed.

Greg didn’t get upset at the man’s questions. Looking at him, Greg could see the fear that the man was trying to hide. He wasn’t panicking, but Greg could see the concern in the man’s eyes for himself and his family. In the situation he found himself in, the man didn’t have the luxury of flattery, instead, he was trying to figure out if Greg was actually on his side or just playing a part. “I may not be willing to marry your daughter, but over the last year, I have come to consider her a friend. I wouldn’t be able to explain to her why I didn’t do anything to help her father when he needed it,” He answered the man. “Besides,” Continued Greg in a flat tone that made it clear that this wasn’t a threat. “If I wanted to kill you, I’d just do it,” He stated, and without further explanation walked out.

Greg walked out through the front door of the Town-head’s house to a strange sight. Out on the green grass that carpeted the Town-head’s compound, a large rotund panda in beige pants was jumping around, doing flips, and throwing punches at invisible enemies in what was clearly a training montage. Greg had to suppress the urge to sigh. Even if the being that was now connected to his mind could directly feel his frustration, he wasn’t willing to give him the satisfaction of dragging the sigh out of him. It had just been a few hours since Greg woke up and he was already beyond fed up with this new occupant of his mind. Not that there was anything he could do about it.

Of course, the first thing that Greg did after the old man sitting on the sigil had shushed him, was to tell both Olivia and his familiar what it was he was seeing. This being had already made one attempt at his life, and Greg wasn’t about to go along with anything it wanted him to do. Greg had expected the being to try and keep him from revealing his presence. From the carefree smile that had remained plastered on his face even as Greg revealed what it was he was seeing, however, the being didn’t care in the least who was told about his presence. In fact, the only faux attempt at resistance that it put up was more annoying than anything else.

When Greg uttered the words ‘old man' in trying to describe what it was he was seeing, the figure immediately changed into a little girl. The change wasn’t gradual. Instead, in the space of a blink, where there had been an old man, there was now a small blonde girl, about seven years of age by Greg’s estimation. When he amended his description to the new appearance, it changed again. Now, instead of a little girl, there was a teenage boy going through a goth phase given the black outfit, several piercings, and heavy black makeup on his face. Greg had gone quiet at this point as something immediately clicked in his mind. Unless there was some goth culture somewhere in this world, which he highly doubted, the being had access to his memories from his previous life on Earth. This was almost immediately confirmed as his next attempt to describe the being was countered by the goth teen turning into an actual stop sign! Not a living version of it, but an actual stop sign.

In the end, Greg was forced to say that what he was seeing changed every time he described it, not willing to reveal anything about his former life. Both Olivia and his teacher had already gone on high alert as they looked around what to them was an empty cave apart from the three of them. Olivia had asked if the being was threatening him in any way. His teacher, on the other hand, had asked what, if anything, the being wanted. As Greg found himself looking at the stereotypical depiction of a UFO hovering over the sigil, Greg was left unsure how to answer either question.

In the end, unsurprisingly, there was very little that either his teacher or familiar could do about the being. Forget even contending with it, they couldn’t even see it or detect it through any of their senses, magical or otherwise. Greg might as well have been hallucinating. If not for the fact that they’d felt this being’s presence during his ascension to the first tier, then Greg suspected that they would have thought that something was wrong with him. Now, they were just on edge but powerless to do anything about it. Greg was certain that Olivia had communicated this new development to her true self. Her true self, however, had so far avoided revealing herself to Roka, and this continued to be the case as there was no descent. The current strategy seemed to be a wait-and-see approach. If anything changed, he was to immediately communicate this to Olivia.

Kung Fu Panda had been one of Greg’s favorite animations as a kid. The being had clearly found this memory, picked the character of Po, the protagonist, and was now playing with it. Greg got the feeling of a child who’d just gotten a trove of new toys and was randomly jumping from one to the next trying to play with them all. He couldn’t help but think back to a conversation he once had with Olivia. The familiar had told him that people tend to project their views of what deities should be, onto them. In truth, however, deities were whimsical beings that did whatever they wanted and damn whoever had a problem with it. The truth of those words was now all too clear to be seen. Whether this being was usually this chaotic in its actual behavior or was just doing this to get on Greg’s nerves, he didn’t know. But as things stood, there was very little Greg could do to stop him.

Of course, Greg had tried to communicate with the being. He, however, had just gone ignored as if he wasn’t saying anything. Whether it was questions that he asked, or even attempts at self-introduction that Greg made, they all went unanswered. Greg had even tried to ask what the being wanted, and if he could help, but other than another creepy smile, this time on the face of a Starbucks barista, there was no reply. Greg knew that the being could communicate as the very first thing it had done was shush him when Greg first caught sight of it. So, it wasn’t like it didn’t understand that Greg was trying to communicate. Instead, it was just purposely ignoring him.

As soon as Greg stepped off the wooden floor of the Town-head’s house, he started gliding forward on the ground using earth step. Before he ascended to the first tier, Greg never really pushed this skill. Instead, he’d just let it activate naturally as it used less mana and would strain his incomplete mana pathways least that way. Now that he no longer needed to worry about using too much mana or straining his mana pathways, however, he was pushing the skill to the limit. He was gliding forward faster and further with each step so that a mundane person would have to jog relatively fast to keep up with him. But fast as this was, Greg had the feeling that the skill could go much faster than this if he really pushed it. Greg’s thinking was that he needed a way to move faster, both on the battlefield and when trying to escape it. Especially the latter as it more than likely would be saving his life. He was certain that the earth step was powerful enough to do both. If it could help a several-ton creature run faster than a car, then it probably could do even more for him, he just needed to figure out the secret behind it. Whether that was just endless practice or something more, Greg wouldn’t stop until he got it.

Greg had to stop at the gate and wait for the guard there to pull them open for him. The man at the gate was the same one who had led him and Olivia to the house the first time they came for dinner. From the way he glanced at Greg’s feet before rushing to pull open the gate for Greg, it was clear that he’d noticed Greg’s approach using earth step. Not that Greg was bothered. This was a world of magic and everyone knew about it. That Greg had developed some ability in the same after almost a complete year of learning under the healer wasn’t that unexpected. Greg had already gained a lot of respect in the village by learning the healing arts from his teacher. That he was now also a user of magic in other ways, would only further bolster his image in the minds of the townspeople. As evidenced by the rather speedy way the man at the gate opened the gate for him and then offered a slight bow as Greg walked past.

A month and a half of inactivity had eroded a lot of the gains that Greg had made with the CONDITIONING BRACELET. Because of this, he had gone back down to a low-grade tier-one bracelet that made it just twice as hard to move. Still, it had been less than three hours since he woke up in the healer’s cave and his body was still struggling a bit. Though he didn’t let it show, just moving with the bracelet on was a bit of a struggle, and the short sprint to the gate, despite using earth step, had winded him. To keep from pushing himself too hard and possibly harming himself in the process, Greg planned to walk a short distance before using earth step again. However, it was this choice to move slowly that let him pick up on it.

The soil was screaming.

Greg’s earth connection didn’t exactly speak in clear sentences. Instead, it’s a strong feeling, something akin to an epiphany that invades his mind in those moments when he syncs up with the earth beneath him. This time, the feeling was so strong that Greg is stopped cold just a few steps away from the gate to the Town-head’s compound. How it was possible, given that the earth under his feet was no living entity, Greg didn’t know. But if the earth could be tortured to its breaking point, Greg was certain that it would transmit the feeling he’d just gotten from the ground below him just now. With the gradual increase in the strength of his earth connection after assimilating several cores, Greg had been able to garner bits of information from the earth below him. Months back, he’d occasionally get the feeling that there was something wrong with the soil below him. Greg, however, had been unsure what it meant as his earth connection wasn’t the easiest of senses to understand. Whatever it was, however, it clearly had gotten a lot worse in the month and a half that Greg had been indisposed.

Back when he was still a half-step first-tier mage, Greg would have been stumped at what to do as he couldn’t push his mana pathways too hard because they were incomplete. Now, however, there was barely a moment of doubt before Greg raised his leg the stomped down hard on the ground. Greg hadn’t actually been taught any earth-aligned spells. Being a healer, his teacher didn’t know much about earth element spells. This was part of the reason why Greg would have to strike out on his own after helping to awaken the healer. He’d need to find a proper earth element mage academy or teacher to guide him on how to grow in his particular element. But while Greg hadn’t been taught any actual spells, Greg had lived through the lives of several earth-element beasts and had gained an almost instinctual understanding of how they connected to and manipulated the earth around them. As such, even without a spell, Greg was confident that he could raise a pillar of earth.

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The earth resisted him. His use of mana might not exactly have been a spell in the strictest sense of the word, but Greg was certain that it should have worked. The earth wasn’t fighting him because it didn’t understand what he wanted to do, instead, it was almost as if it had forgotten that it was earth. Half the time, Greg wasn’t sure what it was his earth connection communicated to him, but this time he got the distinct feeling that the ground under him was slowly transforming into something it shouldn’t. Something twisted, something horrific, something that shouldn’t be on this plane! The transformation, however, wasn’t complete. Some parts were still earth, and it was to these parts that his mana clung to as he poured more mana and willpower into forcing the pillar up from the ground. When Greg was done, a nine-foot pole towered over him. Greg’s gaze, however, was fixed on the bottom three feet of the pillar.

“‘Shit!’”

The curse left Greg’s lips at the same time as Olivia who was still in his mental space. Greg knew that if they weren’t smack dab in the middle of town, his familiar would probably have come out, even without his prompting. Greg, himself had cursed because he’d immediately recognized why the earth seemed to be screaming to his earth connection even as it was twisted into something it was never meant to be. The nine-foot pillar was a cross-section of the ground below them, and while the top six feet looked and felt like normal earth, the bottom three feet looked like it had been infected by some disease. Rather than the normal reddish-brown color of the mountain soil, the base of the pillar was a sickish grey hue that had turned a completely dead black in some parts, or at least that’s what it felt like. Greg might not know a lot about the magic world, but as his first life and death fight in this world, Greg doubted he’d ever forget what the aura of abyssal mana felt like!

‘Summon the healer! Now!’ Rarely, if ever, would Olivia use a commanding tone with him. Whenever she had, however, it had always been in serious situations that didn’t allow for any delays. As such, Greg didn’t waste any time before reaching into his pocket. Picking the star-shaped token that his teacher had given him, Greg sent some mana into it before throwing it a short distance away.

It only took five seconds before his teacher appeared above the token, mana flowing off her in waves as she readied herself for a fight. Her gaze which had been scanning the area around seeking out any threats, quickly found the pillar Greg was standing before. The confusion that had started creeping onto her face at the lack of enemies around immediately vanished when she caught sight of the base of the pillar. The healer muttered something under her breath and though Greg couldn’t hear it, he suspected that she had just cursed the same way he and Olivia had when they saw the pillar and felt the aura coming off it. The mana that she had been exuding became muted even as she approached the pillar.

“This is bad!” she said as she came to a stop beside Greg. The statement was rather obvious but Greg could tell that they were spoken more out of worry than as an actual observation.

“Do you recognize this?” Greg asked when he noted the certainty in her words. His teacher didn’t at all seem like she was confused about what she was looking at. Even her tone of voice had the ring of someone who recognized what they were seeing as opposed to one who didn’t know what they were looking at.

“I really, really hope that I am wrong about this, otherwise what we are looking at is a convergence!” She relayed.

There was a second round of cursing from Olivia, inside his mind space. It’s almost as if she’d been in denial and the healer’s words had just confirmed something that she’d been trying to convince herself wasn’t true. On his part, Greg didn’t curse at his teacher’s declaration, but that’s only because he didn’t have even the faintest clue what she meant by convergence.

“What’s a convergence?” Greg naturally followed up.

“No one knows the exact number, but there are several different realms out there. Some say that it’s just a high number, others claim that they just keep going into infinity. Whether it be one or the other, sometimes, the boundary between two or more realms may come into contact with each other causing a sort of bridge to be formed allowing beings and items from both realms to be able to crossover from one realm to the other. Depending on which two realms are connected, a convergence may range from an absolute blessing and treasure trove to a complete nightmare. I’ve only ever seen one other convergence with the abyssal realm. The earth for miles around the site of convergence had this same sickly grey and black look to it,” She said indicating the bottom of the pillar, before turning to look him straight in the eye. “I can tell you right now, this is not even remotely a blessing,” she added gravely.

“Is the town in danger?” Greg couldn’t help but ask.

A snort involuntarily escaped the healer’s lips. “Forget this town, if we don’t find the site of the convergence and break the connection, then there won’t be a town anywhere within a cycle’s travel of this mountain!” The healer relayed.

“By foot or by mount?” Greg found himself asking. It was a stupid question, he knew, but he just simply couldn’t wrap his mind around the kind of devastation his teacher seemed to be describing. Even if it was on foot, if one kept moving for all the four seasons that made up a cycle, just what kind of distance could they cover?

A wry smile crossed the healer’s lips. She seemed to recognize the fact that the question was one borne of fear and anxiety. “There are such things as mounts in the abyssal realm, Roka. And they are much faster than most of what can be found on this end,” She informed him.

Greg didn’t need to hear anymore. “Olivia,” He called out loud, summoning the familiar despite being out in public. Noting the clear note of urgency in his voice, Olivia didn’t waste any time emerging from his glabella. Greg heard the gasp from the man standing guard at the gate when Olivia seemed to appear from thin air. He, however, didn’t care, there were more urgent things that he needed to deal with right now. Greg had to look through his pockets to find the particular token that allowed him access to the teleportation room to the healer’s abode. Handing it to Olivia, he instructed. “Take my mother and sister through the teleportation room to the cave. You can use a spell to put them in a daze while they walk and immediately put them to sleep immediately after you get there. I don’t want them remembering any of this,” He said commandingly. Without wasting time, Olivia shot off towards the house.

Recognizing that she had been a bit presumptuous in using his master’s secret abode as a getaway route, Greg turned to apologize to her. His attempt, however, was met with a raised hand from his teacher, forestalling it. “You don’t need to explain the desire to save one’s kin to me, Roka,” She said to him placidly. “Just keep in mind that if this convergence isn’t resolved, then even my lair will still be within the range of what the beings from the abyssal realm can get to,” She informed him in a cautionary tone.

Greg quietly nodded in both gratitude for her generosity and acknowledgment of her warning. “It’s as great a head-start as I can give them at the moment. If things don’t go our way and we need to escape, I’ll have the peace of mind of knowing that they aren’t at the epicenter of this debacle,” He replied, before turning his gaze back to the pillar. Greg was about to squat down to get a closer look at the pillar, but a figure on his left, however, beat him to the punch. Greg turned to his right to see who it was seeing as the healer was on his right. A bowler hat, a trench coat, a pipe hanging off the side of their mouth, and a magnifying glass in his right hand. It seemed his newest mental guest had tired of the Po from Kung Fu Panda image and was now looking every bit the stereotypical image of an old-time detective. Leaning comically close to the pillar, the man’s face was barely an inch from the pillar before he somehow slipped the magnifying glass between his eye and the pillar.

Not willing to waste any time with the being's antics, Greg turned back to the healer. “So, how do we find out where this convergence is taking place,” He asked turning back to the healer.

“A connection to another world might, in principle, sound like something that should be easy to find. However, not all convergences are the same. With some, the formation of the connection is loud and flashy enough to be heard and seen from miles around. Others, however, are so quiet and hidden that until the day they are fully open, you’ll never be able to tell what’s going on. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, the signs of a convergence taking place can vary so widely depending on which realms you are connecting to, that it’s next to impossible to tell when it’s happening based on signs alone. That I can even recognize the signs of this connection forming is incredibly fortunate for us as it gives us time to prepare and perhaps even stop it. The only good thing about convergences is that they are not a single-day affair. The fastest-ever record of a convergence opening took about two years, some have taken centuries to fully form. Chances that this convergence will beat the record for fastest convergence to form are rather low, we are likely to still have ample time,” She reassured.

Not when fate has it out for you!

That had been the thought that immediately crossed Greg’s mind. It was only at the very last second that he caught himself and managed not to verbalize it. It was information that he should have no way of knowing given that he should have been passed out at the time that his teacher had been discussing with Olivia’s true self. Of course, Greg had known this even before they talked about it as he had learned it from the deity-level being that had reincarnated him. His connection to that being, however, was an even bigger secret than the fact that he hadn’t been passed out when his teacher and Olivia’s true self were talking. As such, Greg didn’t say anything.

Greg was perfectly aware that he was probably being paranoid. Not everything bad that happened to him necessarily had the hand of fate behind it. Bad things sometimes did happen. That was just a simple truth of life. However, Given that fate seemed to be out for his blood, Greg thought it more prudent to be paranoid and be wrong rather than be optimistic and find oneself unprepared. However this played out, Greg had no plans of getting caught with his pants down. A thought that caused Greg to look at the first and briefest page of the system.

———

WELCOME TO THE SIXTH SCHOOL!

NAME: Roka.

RANK: Acolyte Of Lust (13/100).

MAGIC POINTS: 15.3M.

LUST POINTS: 19.4M.

———

Even with his new role as healer, Greg had only managed to bed eleven of the women that frequently visited him add on the Town-head’s wife and daughter, and that came to a total of thirteen. Also, his little tryst with his teacher over the ascension manual had netted him almost six million lust points primarily due to the number of times they’d made each other cum. With their sensitivity amplified beyond what was normal, they’d both managed to reach orgasm a ridiculous number of times, thirty-three for the healer and forty-seven for himself. He even got a new feat for making the healer cum ten times in one session. He didn’t get one for twenty or thirty, so Greg suspected that the next feat would be at the next zero which would be a hundred. A figure that, with magic introduced into the picture as the healer had done during their last tryst, suddenly didn’t seem so ridiculous.

Greg’s interest, however, wasn’t on either his rank mission or the number of lust points he’d thus far earned. Instead, his focus was on the number of magic points he had. They were what would determine what he could bring to bear on what he suspected would be a life-or-death struggle. Greg had to school his features to hide his surprise from his teacher when he read the figure. Greg was certain that this number had been at around seven or so million when he last checked it. This, however, was before his dramatic rise to the first tier. The seven million had been accumulated from months of using the sigil, as his system would leech off any excess mana left behind after the process was done

It would seem, however, that the being that had taken him over during his ascension to the first tier wasn’t the only one who had benefitted from the purple mana crystal. Looking at the new figure, it would seem that his system had also drained roughly eight or so million magic points from the crystal as well! Greg was certain that the number would have been in the high hundreds of millions if his system had managed to get everything from the crystal. That’s how powerful the purple crystal had been. The pull from the being, however, had been far too strong. The eight million that his system got was just the spare crumbs. Greg, however, wasn’t complaining. Eight million magic points was no paltry amount for him at the moment and would come in very handy in whatever they were about to face.

The even greater surprise that Greg got when looking at the number was the fact that it was gradually ticking upwards. By Greg’s estimation when looking at the pace of the increase, he'd gain between one and two thousand points every hour. Not a ridiculous amount by any stretch of the imagination, but it was constant. For a brief moment, Greg closed his eyes and focused inwards as he suspected he knew what was going on. And sure enough, while he didn’t have a central core, Greg could feel that his body was full to the brim with mana. Whatever excess mana was being generated within him, was being siphoned off by the system. Greg couldn’t help the excitement that welled up within him at the implications of this. The more he grew in power, the more mana he’d be able to generate, meaning he’d be able to accrue magic points much faster the more powerful he became. The only caveat to this, Greg suspected would be that he’d first need to be topped off on mana. Otherwise whatever mana he generated would first go to replenishing his own reserves.

With increased confidence, Greg turned back to the healer. “So where do we start?” He asked.

“With your uncle,” his teacher calmly replied with the last thing Greg had been expecting to hear. Noting his confusion the healer explained herself. “I’ve been in this town for the past six years, and in all that time the only magical items of any kind that I’ve encountered, other than my own, are those that I’ve seen with you! Just where exactly would your uncle come across a magical staff of any kind, let alone one that was powerful enough to make him a tier-zero mage? And as if that wasn’t bad enough, it also allowed him to summon dark crawlers, creatures found only in the abyssal realm!” She laid out her reasoning.

Greg had gone completely still, his eyes wide as it now struck him just how odd it was that his uncle had become a tier-zero mage in a town so barren of magic. Since they were events that had taken place before he’d come to this world, Greg had never put that much thought into where the staff came from. Hearing his teacher’s reasoning, however, it suddenly struck him just how big of an oversight that had been! Greg’s expression couldn’t help but turn even uglier when he remembered that they had wiped the memories of his cousin, the only other person who might have had a clue as to where his uncle might have gotten the staff!

“Fuck!” he couldn’t help but curse…