2024-11-25 17:56:53Tim woke up feeling like a sack of shit. It wasn't the brightest idea to handle five upgrades all together, and quite frankly, it was stupid to handle five of practically anything! It was too much, and in this case, the upgrades have beaten on his body relentlessly, to the point where he may have been halfway close to death! It had not been an easy process.
Tim woke up in the middle of the night, which meant that he had been knocked out cold for seven hours at least, and yet, his skin still burned a little bit. The reason behind this mild pain was obvious, some of the upgrade's after effects have stuck with him, apparently, which further vouched the intensity of the upgrades! The pain was overwhelming, but yet again, he was happy that he hadn't been awake to experience most of it. Now, he even joked around. "Fucking hell, I feel like I've been put through the ringer. If I was back on earth, a massage like this would do me good, but today I feel like I lost my virginity, that was beyond a massage. I remember my friend Steve talking about butt-sex… erg, what I went through earlier is probably rougher than that." [Hello, Timothy.] The system suddenly interrupted his train of thought. Tim squealed, as much as a stingray could squeal, and then also exclaimed. "You scared the shit out of me! Damn it, system!" [You've defecated prior to waking up, so don't blame me for that.] She argued, and then asked. [What was that butt-sex you were talking about? It's unheard of in the animal kingdom, you especially, shouldn't think about it, as you are both a kid and a stingray.] "My body may be that of a puny little stingray's, but my soul is still that of a middle-aged human's, system. Also, forget about the butt stuff, it's nothing to worry about." Tim followed along. For a moment, he had forgotten that there was a literal lady (system) living in his head, so he was a bit embarrassed right now. For that matter, he tried to skip that questionable topic as a whole! With that train of thought, he then hastily asked. "What kinda upgrades did I buy, system? I can't really remember anything you told me about them, I just remember that they were really expensive. Tell me more." [Well, they were expensive.] She followed along. Afterwards, throughout the next couple of minutes, she explained each of the five upgrades, how much they cost him, and what the main highlights of this upgrade session were. There were two highlighted upgrades, which were the most important out of the bunch; One was the extingus breath magical ability, and the other was the mana accumulation pool, which he unlocked! The extingus breath ability was a form of deflective magic, which a great majority of stingrays had, regardless of their branch of species. Stingrays were an evasive species, who depended on their hiding skills to survive, and likewise, they depended on deflective magic if they were in any tight, and dangerous situations! Tim was to use this spell, perhaps for an eternity, as it would be useful regardless if he was a stingray, baboon or a human, in whatever point of his life. It was always handy to have an ability, which would deflect dangerous magical spells from an opponent! He needed it. Anyway, as for the mana pool, it was equally useful. He could use it to accumulate mana, and with said mana, he could power up spells that he stole from dead or injured opponents. For example, he could start shooting thunderous bolts out of his barb again, and those tiny fireballs too! Those powers weren't lost. Originally, he accumulated said powers in voltages, for example, from fallen creatures. But now and onwards, he didn’t need to munch on another thunderous eel, in order to harvest its powers, no. He could summon those thunderous bolts, regardless of how he had run out of them a couple of days ago! The voltages were to be converted into mana from now on, and although the lighting bolts were to be less than original, and therefore less dangerous, they were still offensive powers! Tim's low quality mana wasn't strong enough to challenge a shark, but as far as details were concerned, he could endlessly power up every magical ability he stole from enemies, as long as he had enough mana to do so. Even the flaming fins he bore weren't just temporary anymore, no, as he could power them himself from now on! Anyway, with these massive benefits, came an equally large challenge. Tim had multiple powers to his advantage, and most of them were stolen, yes, but he still had to power them all by himself from now on. It may not be easy to use magic, when his own, accumulated mana was on the line! The system described that since his newly bought mana was of the lowest quality, he'd need to put double the amount of mana, on a simple, magical ability, in order for it to work. For example, if he wanted to shoot out ten volts of thunder, he'd need to use twenty points of mana for it to work! The entire process was expensive, and he wasn’t looking forward to that part of the journey. Worse yet, his body couldn't produce enough mana to support a steady use of his powers, which was a very demotivating thing to discover. The system described that he could only produce ten points of mana an hour. This demotivated him. Specifically, he could only produce two-hundred and forty points of low quality mana a day. In hindsight, that sum sounded like a lot, but in any hazardous situation, he'd waste every single one of those points within a minute! It wasn’t enough. Tim couldn't produce enough mana, not naturally at least, and with that said, he started paying attention to a little task which he had avoided for a few hours; It was the one about mana roots! The system promised a reward, if Tim could find some mana roots within the ocean, and now, from the looks of it, he needed those roots more than ever. He wanted to hunt down a bundle of them, as soon as the sun arose! It may take a while, but he was ready for it. The system could read his thoughts thoroughly, so she was quick to make a little offer. It was an offer which may motivate Tim even more. She casually introduced, [Timothy, hello again. I can see that mana points and their accumulation are proving themselves to be a challenge to you a lot, at least in comparison to the average stingray, so I have a recommendation for you. Since you bought everything a few hours ago, you've unlocked five more new upgrades, and one of them promises to deepen your mana pool by 700 points! I recommend you buy it, as it's a painless upgrade, inherently painless, and you can afford it as well.] "Fucking hell… that's exactly what I need. A thousand points of mana does sound better, a lot better, hehe." He said.
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[Congratulations, Timothy, you found mana roots.] The system announced, [This means that you successfully completed your fifth, system given task, and won 100 points as a reward! In total, you’ve accumulated 670 system points.] “Nice,” He thought, though he wasn’t as excited about the points this time around. He was still depressed over the death of so many stingrays, as in a weird way, he considered them human, and such deaths shouldn't be taken lightly. Overall though, regardless of how he had been sandwiches between fireballs earlier on, this had been a pretty decent day. Tim got what he wanted. They found a cluster of mana roots, and although the roots were mostly depleted now, there was still enough mana for him and Ortana to share. They were to play nice about these remaining properties. Him and Ortana were the only remaining survivors within that group of stingrays, and although this part was depressing, it served a
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[Congratulations, your mana quality is now at level three! This level is otherwise known as Pit Mana, and it too has a very descriptive name, because now you have a far bigger mana pool to fill, hence it being a pit.] The system beeped, she was very efficient at explaining the levels that he was on.“Let me guess, I need 400,000 mana points to fill this one?” He asked, and he was getting nervous.Instantly, the system answered. [520,000 mana points, actually. This pool is big, it’s way beyond what the common mage is used to. Hence, it's labeled as a pit.]“Well, fuck me! That's a lot.” He sighed, “I guess we won't be getting out of this mana realm anytime soon.”[The pit is massive yes, but still, either of you can accumulate that mana in a month, you can naturally regenerate it, assuming that you won't go through any expensive battles throughout the month.] The system beeped.Timothy did not want to wait for a month or more for another level-up, and he certainly didn't want to endure
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Timothy was absolutely baffled by the fact that he leveled up his mana quality, in mere seconds, without suffering the immense pain that typically came with these upgrades! He didn’t know what to think about it, he did have a flash-upgrade upgrade before, at the library of Rempegana and it too was amazing, but getting flash upgrades at these higher levels was priceless! He was beyond happy.The system noticed his accelerating heartbeat, so after a moment, she described. [Flash upgrades like this are inevitable, on the occasion where your mana pool receives such great quantities. Your mana pool adjusts itself, so as to not to disrupt this ongoing flow of mana that you're receiving, it's very useful. This is mother nature's part of making up for the ‘punishment’ that the average ascending mage goes through, so relax, and let the mana roots do their thing. Please do not tighten your anus any more than you already have, because that can disrupt the flow.]“Right,” He muttered, and did as
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Chapter 175 - Dinosaurs?
The team jumped through the portal, and their dragons followed suit! They were very excited to harvest the benefits of the needle universe in front of them, they wanted to get as many mana points per hour as they could!However, once they passed through the portal, they were stunned by the multiple shades of blue that immediately pierced through their pupils. This shade was unexpected, because this universe was as red as a rose the last time they were here. They hadn't seen a single spec of blue within it before, but now, it was all they could see!“What the hell?” Tim blurted, and the rest followed suit with their curses.There was a sea of sorts in front of them, and this was very perplexing, because a one-kilometer wide universe wasn't supposed to have a sea. It was too small, it wouldn't be able to sustain it, nonetheless create it under natural circumstances!“I guess that's why the portal had ‘Aqus’ in its name. This is as watery as things can get.” He muttered, but no one under
Chapter 174 - Boar Meat
Timothy couldn't ignore the sensation he was feeling, he couldn’t turn a blind eye to it. He felt capable of summoning a portal that would lead him to the needle universe of Purpureus Mundi, and moments later, he decided that this was exactly what he wanted to do!Arvena was close to him, slicing through the boar meat, so he had to step away from her, for the sake of not compromising their meat supply with a random portal. It was best to be safe.“Let’s hope that the gods aren't playing tricks on me,” He mumbled.The following steps were purely instinctive, they were natural, and he felt as if he had lived with this ability for a hundred years now! It was a weird feeling. First he put his arms in front of his stomach, and then he got his hands very close to each other, but he didn’t lock his fingers together, he kept them an inch apart. “Purposes Mundi Aqus,” He whispered, partially against his own will.As a result, a tiny, black cloud appeared in between his hands! Its shade was as
Chapter 173 - Gread, Golden Mana
Three hours after midnight, Timothy successfully improved the quality of his mana. He now had the honor to identify himself as a bearer of Great, Golden Mana, and he was very excited about it! Despite the name, this didn’t mean that his mana had a golden color now, it was still as blue as the ocean, but it still was a great level to attain. This sort of mana quality was also known as level seven, and as of now, he only had to pass through another level, the eighth one, and then he'd have the opportunity to escape the God's Punishment Realm of mana once and for good!“Oh… my god.” He grunted, as his spine cracked tens of times while he tried to straighten up, and then he muttered. “Whatever it is like to get chewed up and swallowed by a Demon Beetle, I understand it, this has to be a similar feeling.”Timothy felt like all sorts of things. He felt like he was hit by a big truck, by an airplane too, or any other vehicles really. He felt like he was run down by all of them, and rightful
Chapter 172 - The Tar
Timothy, Skendus, Ortana, Arvena, and Gustav explored Valporovus together. Their target was clear, they wanted to get to the Ruins of Aqumus, with the hopes of accumulating great amounts of mana there! The team has been on the air for a couple of days now, their dragons really came in handy in terms of proper transportation, so it wouldn't take long until they finally reached the ruins, it may take them a couple more weeks. They were very enthusiastic to reach the ruins, though one couldn't say that their progress, regarding mana quality improvement, has been slow. The team was doing fine, and with minimal trouble throughout their flight, their mana had mostly been accumulating!Since their mana accumulated, the weakest members of the team could upgrade their mana quality soon! They could either choose to initiate an upgrade, or spend the mana over a period of time, they had those couple of options. The latter option would be less than ideal, because a better mana quality would do th
