The refugees were ecstatic the next morning as he rode in on the two horses and presented them with the grain. The women immediately got to work grinding it into flour. Will was pretty sure there was more that went into making anything edible out of flour, but he trusted they had it handled. As soon as he handed off the grain, the men crowded around Will clamoring for his help. It wasn’t until Arnold spoke up to quiet the other men that Will recognized him.

The man hadn’t really changed, not really. However it looked like decades had fallen off the man overnight he looked to be in his mid thirties now rather than whatever he actually was. The other men all wanted Will to do the same to them that he had done to Arnold. Will was willing, but it was far from as simple as they wanted it to be. Will had spent hours channeling energy in order to get Arnold to full capacity, and it had exhausted him. He still needed to actually try to give Arnold a concept. On top of that, Will had stayed up all night to try to get them food. Will sighed as he foresaw a long day ahead of him.

Will started with Arnold. He needed to see if the full plan would work with one person before investing in the rest, even if it seemed sure at this point. And so after speaking with Arnold, they sat down and Will pulled on his concept of the Unbroken Stone. He let it fill him, and then passed some of that energy into Arnold. His own mana tried to resist, but Will was undeterred, carefully pushing aside all resistance as he surrounded one of Arnolds nodes with the mana. He then sent a vibration through the mana, allowing the resonance to pass there and back. Will had to be careful at this stage. It would be easy to tear apart Arnold’s spirit at this point, something the other man was unaware of.

“Think about the earth, and what it means to you.” Will said. “The closer the thoughts are to your heart, the easier the concept will take hold. They don’t have to be all good thoughts either, simply anything that connects you to the earth.”

They had talked about this beforehand. Arnold, as a farmer, unsurprisingly felt a great connection to the earth. He had spent his whole life learning to grow things, and felt it only right to have a concept that would help him when he returned to his home one day. Will hadn’t told him how unlikely that would be, but he felt the man already knew.

As Will continued to resonate his concept within Arnold, an echo sounded within the other man. Will slowly increased the intensity of the vibrations within the mana, searching for what was resonating within the man. It took him a few minutes, but he found it. A nascent concept related to the soil. He sent a tendril of mana into the man’s very soul where he felt the resonance, and let the man’s concept change it. He then led the tendril of mana to the node. Will fed energy into the node as it too started to resonate. Slowly, bit by bit, the node began to change. And then with a rush, everything fell into place. A new resonance shattered the mana Will was controlling, dispersing and realigning it to Arnold’s new concept.

Arnold jumped to his feet, staring at his own hands and body.

“I feel…” He said articulately, “I feel…”

“It’s a lot.” Will said. “I remember when I got my second concept. It was quite the experience.”

“Yeah… wait, what about your first concept?” Arnold asked.

“I was falling asleep due to cold exposure, so I didn’t really get to experience it properly.” Will said. “But the second time more than made up for it.”

Will could tell that Arnold had already tuned him out to focus on his new concept, and so he left, fending off the excited men who wanted their turn. He went into the castle, greeted his fellow adventurers, and went up to bed. It was getting close to noon now, and he was more than exhausted. He fell on his bed and immediately fell asleep.

Surprisingly, Will woke up to morning sunlight coming through his bedroom window that he had failed to close the day before. Morning sunlight. It meant that he had slept for, what, sixteen hours? More? Will jumped up and got himself dressed and headed down for breakfast. He entered the kitchen from the servant’s staircase to find most of the party in attendance. A cheer went up.

“He lives!” Emerys yelled, lifting a tankard of water above his head. “The sleeping man sleeps no longer!”

Will was confused.

“How long did I sleep?” He asked.

“Three days.” Amalise said. “Your little stunt with Arnold took a lot more out of you than you realized. You should have done it in sessions and properly rested. Arnold told me what happened, and so I have some idea. Controlling that much energy for that long strains the soul, a lot like spell strain, only worse and more difficult to detect. You are lucky you didn’t do permanent damage.”

Will rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly, but sat down to where a plate of meat was served. A large slice of homemade bread was put on his plate as well, and Will excitedly dug in. it had been so long since he had eaten bread. It wasn’t even good bread. It was hard and dry, and took several drinks of water to get down, but it was bread. Not bear meat. Will gloried in the flavor. It was bland and overly salty, and it was amazing. It was then that he noticed someone new at the table.

“Arnold!” Will said, “How long have you been here?”

“The whole time. Some of your colleagues decided that I needed some training.” Will looked around to see several of the followers nodding.

“On that note,” Amalise saId. “How could you leave a new mage alone with his concept without telling anyone?”

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Again, Will was confused.

“Mage? I was going for a body concept.”

“Well, Arnold has a mind concept. He was trying to turn new ground with his innate earth manipulation, and nearly injured himself and several onlookers. That is why he is being trained.” Amalise said. “I advised that he go to Aetherglow, but he seems set on staying with his people despite the fact that he could take care of them far better at Aetherglow.”

“I am staying with Will.” Arnold said. “He has done far more than I ever could have asked of him, and I will not be repaying that with disloyalty.”

Will was taken aback by the statement. The man had very nearly sworn fealty in that statement, and Will didn’t know what to say. Everyone else seemed to take it in stride however.

“Ahh, thinking of becoming a noble then?” Emerys asked, too mocking boos around the table.

“It really is a good thing.” Amalise said seriously. “You can both go to Aetherglow…”

“Stop right there.” Will said. “I am not going to Aetherglow.”

“You would stop his chances of progressing by staying here?” Amalise demanded.

“Not. Going.” Will glared at Amalise who finally backed down. She huffed when she saw that their argument had not dropped the mood whatsoever.

Will finished breakfast and retreated back to his room. His people had food for the moment, and there would be more time later to get them some new concepts. Besides, he didn’t want to overload his party with new trainees. He needed to talk to them about that, make sure they were willing to help before he continued. For now though, Will needed to focus on his own progression.

That faint resonance he had felt within his own soul when he thought about needing all stats had not been forgotten. In fact Will had been anxious to get back to it, but duty had called. He sat on his bed and closed his eyes as he thought about his stat situation. He felt that resonance again and started to explore different ideas. First he thought about each stat individually, but none of those thoughts gave any sort of resonance. He then started to think about his stats in pairs, starting with strength and dexterity. It seemed like there was the tiniest amount of resonance, but far less than when thinking of all the stats together.

It wasn’t until he thought about strength and intelligence together that the resonance spiked. It worked with strength and wisdom as well, and strength and charisma. It wasn’t long until Will realized that the concept resonated with the idea of all the physical stats boosting the mental stats, and vice versa. The concept held a synergy between the body and the mind, using one to enhance the other. But it was still more than just that. Will turned to figuring out exactly how that would be accomplished. The concept emphasized harmony between aspects, Will could feel that quite clearly.

How could the mind enhance the body? Well, training of course. Finding the best ways to move, the most efficient methods to attack. But there was more. It was smart to think about your movements. It was wise to seek from those who already knew. There was a sense of time to the concept, form perfected over centuries and handed down, working to bring the body to perfection.

Ancient Physique

The words permeated Will’s mind as one half of the concept was realized. Not stopping, he turned to the next logical question.

How does the body enhance the mind? Health was a big answer, but it felt wrong. But then Will realized. Experience. Not the energy he got from a slain monster, but actual experience. The body is the medium through which the mind learns, and as it gets better, the mind perceives more, learns quicker, adapts faster. The body is then trained to be stronger and faster, which then allows the mind to perceive more.

Unyielding Intellect

Will felt his soul vibrate as he could see fully within himself for the first time.

Congratulations, you have gained a concept!

Concept: Unyielding Intellect begets Ancient Physique

Type: Physique, Intellect

Subtype: Harmony, Perception

This is a Soul concept.

Will could see his soul clearly for the first time. A glowing point, both smaller than his nodes, but more massive than a continent. It was a paradox that couldn’t be contained within three dimensional space. For now, Will would simply call it bigger on the inside. As he stared he perceived hundreds of tiny filaments emanating from his soul. One went to each node in his spirit map, and then continued to each one of his gates, tying his whole being together in a lattice. He felt soul energy pulsing out along the filaments to energize his entire being, enabling him to regain mana, stamina and health. He realized that Amalise had been wrong about one thing. Health was not a form of soul energy, but rather a form of supercharged mana. It explained how mana could be used to heal, but why a person’s own health pool was always more efficient. He watched the filaments closer, finding that his soul, from what he could see, was a massive bundle of these filaments. Multiple filaments seemed to reach off into nowhere. Will followed them and at their ends found what seemed to be nascent concepts.

Except they were not simply nascent concepts. One was his skill Regal Bearing. He could see how the soul energy fed the aura, allowing it to billow out as strong as it did. The odd part was that the filament he had followed had seemed to turn back on itself, connecting back with his soul in a different place wholly unconnected from the part of his soul he could usually see, but still the same thing. It was odd. He thought he could see a room as if through frosted glass. A room? Within his soul? Will looked harder, pressing his consciousness into that spot on his soul.

Will was in a library. Large bookshelves rose up on every side of him, absolutely crammed with books. He picked one up to find it blank. Somehow he knew it would be. He wandered between the shelves to find that the center of the library was open. All in all the library was fairly small, but still contained thousands of mostly empty tomes. Will could feel that not all of the books were empty. Those could be found here. He could tell that some of the bookshelves closest to the center had some writing. One book for each one he had used the system to copy. However in the center there were pedestals surrounding a drafting table. Each pedestal held a book, and each book held power.

He examined the first one he came to. It was farthest from the drafting table, and was the most plain. The title was embossed haphazardly on the cover, and read Inspect. He moved farther into a book with a solid leather cover and a good feel. The cover read Animal Companion. It wasn’t long before he realized that most of the books contained his skills. Most, but not all. The ones closest to the center had strong magical auras around them. And Will knew without looking that they were his concepts. He went to one and picked it up. The book immediately lit on fire as waves of heat attempted to incinerate Will. Nothing happened. Will was just fine. He opened the book titled Inferno of the Tumultuous Mind. But he did not see text, instead he saw an array of mind boggling complexity.