[NR] Crystal Clear - Chapter 747

The reason the System defaults to not transferring pain to you from body parts that have been morphed away by some form of transformation is simple enough. While not a perfect fix, that sort of transformation tends not to transfer damage from the removed part to the rest of the body.

Sure, if you morph the part back too soon, the part will still be damaged. But you don’t have to unless you’re still in the same fight . It is clear though, that Jason’s body fixing a broken bone works fundamentally different from that model. All while still qualifying for it.

Jason’s best guess at the mechanics behind the difference is to view his body like an elemental’s body instead of a human body. A fire elemental’s hand being absorbed back into the beings main body simply reincorporates the energy. The part never actually vanishes, no matter how the System handles it for pain. And in all likelihood, this setting has a different default for players who manage to change into elemental forms.

Though the question is, what would the default be? So, Jason does the straightforward thing to test that. He goes through another round of training and then slowly cranks the sensitivity up until it feels right, 37%. Then he cranks it to 100% just to see and yep, that sucks.

While there was none of the sharp pain you’d have with a broken bone. It did manage to feel like he had managed to bruise the entirety of his body. Skin, muscles, bones, organs, and even his hair felt painful. Though that last one was likely just the roots of his hair feeling the weight of the attached hair. He slams the setting right back down to 37% and locks the setting in.

At that percentage, he could still feel the ache in his major muscles. However, stuff like his hair and organs hardly felt like anything. Even the muscles on his face weren’t yelling at him. Well, besides the jaw. Whatever the case, this was a matter of setting it and forgetting it.

Which was easy enough as he ended up needing three more days of bone breakingly hard training. It technically didn’t need to actually break bones, but them breaking didn’t hurt as long as you could heal them fast enough to continue your training. A thing Jason had no trouble with.

{

Talent Acquired

• Crystal Bones - Your bones are significantly harder to break, your blood forms with crystalline purity, and with every level your Stamina and Energy flows better and provides more reinforcement

}

Jason shares this with the others and asks them, “So why Crystal Bones? I was expecting metal or stone as that tends to be the norm.”

Courtney shrugs, “Maybe it has something to do with you using Energy? While I know Magic loves using crystals for stuff, it is actually Energy that comes most naturally to them. Mana works best through wood and silk, while Qi is better with bone and leather.”

Rosha laughs, “You’re both missing the obvious!”

Jason raises an eyebrow, “And what might that be?”

Rosha shrugs, “Well, you have a literal amber skeleton. And yes, I know amber isn’t actually a crystal. However, people treat it as such and so I figure that is what the System reaches for when granting the talent.”

Jason nods at that, “Yeah, I can see it. Though the talent says my blood now forms with crystalline purity. Does that mean it isn’t thick sap anymore? Because having my wounds seal up so easily does a lot of work for me.”

Rosha shrugs, “How should I know? Prick yourself and find out.”

Jason shrugs, she isn’t wrong. So with one of his throwing daggers, he pricks his finger and squeezes out a drop of blood. Which to Jason’s relief, is still syrupy.

The difference is that the color has changed. What has become “crystal” is how clear the blood is. Oh, and it is now a nice light orange. Though how lightly colored it is might have more to do with the clarity.

Courtney frowns, “Clear blood isn’t exactly biologically sound. You need all the stuff in it to live. I wonder how the System is making it work?”

Jason shrugs, “Does it even have to? If we’re honest, at this point my blood is less blood and more an indicator of damage.”

Courtney nods, “I can see that. Though if your blood is literally your vitality? I’d be careful about any alchemist getting their hands on a sample.

“One limiter on the high-end health potion industry is finding sources of vitality. Sure, everyone has it, but that is like how there is gold in seawater. Both are true and equally frustrating to extract.”

Rosha, “But aren’t health potions just healing magic bottled? Well, you know, made with herbs, but like, not vitality.”

Courtney, “Regular health potions are. It is only things like potions to cure someone with a high-level that is near death or regenerate a limb. Because at the high end, you need vitality to replace what is missing. Which healing magic can do, but at a much higher cost.

“If all you want to do is seal a wound or put a bone back together? Easy enough. The magic only needs to create a little to fill in the gaps. A missing limb or the kind of damage a high-level person would need to take to get low? Well, either the person about to be healed needs to down a meal or have some other source of mass to fill in.”

Rosha, “But I know there are higher-order healing spells! You see them in highlight reels all the time. Some high-level healers will stream themselves going through notorious newb traps and use them. Whole limbs regrown! I even once saw someone who managed to survive losing half their body long enough for the healer to get to them, and their entire lower body was regrown!”

Courtney shrugs, “Yeah, newb traps. A high-level healer has enough Mana to force heal them, no matter how inefficient it is. The higher your level, the more powerful your body is, even if it isn’t all that strong.

“High-level combat healing is about prevention, temporary patch jobs, and special potions. It is only once you have time that proper healing takes place. A potion to regenerate an arm takes minutes and that’s the faster version for out in the field. Getting an arm regrown in a safe environment will involve multiple potions over a week or longer depending on how much flesh needs regrown.

“There is a reason monsters like trolls aren’t more common. Rapid regeneration is an expensive ability and requires a lot from the user.”