I'm a Stingray?

Chapter 21 - Mana/Voltage conversion rate!

Tim 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.