Chapter 426 - A lot to do

I leave Dennis and Aaron so they can decide. It is still 2 weeks until it becomes necessary to know, so they can think about it. It’s not an easy decision, so it will probably take a while.

(Yo, we accept,) I get the message from Dennis through the connection group 4 has set up.

(We know the training will be hellish, and we will trash you behind your back because of it, but we don’t want to be left behind,) Aaron adds.

(We have some pride of our own as well and like some of these things. We know it was probably also partially Tess’s idea, but still, thank you.)

(Yeah, thanks. We’ll show you we aren’t as weak as you think.)

(Do you think he called us weak on purpose to fire us up? Comparing us to Izzy and stuff?)

(It could be, we…)

(Okay then, no taking back. If you are weak, you will switch to Hard even if I have to force you to it.) I send through the link and then disconnect from the conversation.

Weirdos, at least take some time to think about it. But well, they’re also in Hell difficulty, so I probably could expect such a reaction. It’s not like they’re weak.

Sitting in my room, as a true leech, I let extroverts deal with outside stuff and finally crush the mana stone containing the Restrictive Training Emblem. The one Cockroach made for me. Back then, she said it’s something some new Champion with powerful mana made so she could train her body while still investing into the mana stat.

A kindred spirit. A genius. I would love to meet her as a fellow mana enjoyer and shake her hand.

The result of breaking the stone from Cocroach Sandra is a web of inscriptions seeping into my body and covering it nearly entirely. It’s extremely dense and delicate. At some points, it’s nearly microscopic, difficult to even observe, even as I try to do so with my eye trait.

A nice reminder that there is still a long way to go. As if I needed one.

There is also something I knew would happen.

Immediately after the web covers my body, an emblem reminding me of a tattoo etches itself on my chest, right over my heart. It’s a dense web of circuits that create some sort of circular and nice-looking yet functional design.

Checking it a bit more, it seems like there is an option to strengthen it and make it grow and with it its effect. And of course, the effect is as expected: an instant backlash that sends spasms though my muscles. Very painful ones.

I’m glad I didn’t use it in Beyond.

A decent chunk of my mana gets pulled away, nearly 50% of my currently generated one, seeping into that emblem covering my heart and behind it through the web that is covering my body. The effect is immediate, immense pressure appearing everywhere on my body.

Unlike Burden Enhancement Inscriptions that made it possible for me to move only with kinetic energy, this one does multiple things.

It makes my body feel much heavier while putting a lot of strain on it. It’s akin to Active Tempering but on a lower level and running constantly. A strain forcing my body to adapt to it, get damaged, heal, and in the process become stronger.

The extremely delicate and microscopic web of inscriptions connected to the emblem just constantly makes my body fight against me, putting strain on it and doing it all while powered by my mana. There is even a “switch” that I can decide how much mana I want to use to power the Emblem.

Examining it more, I think of the difference between inscriptions and emblems. So far, the emblem seems to be more permanent when it comes to the body, while inscriptions always felt temporary. The emblem is connected to it on a deeper level.

Maybe it’s also wrong. The emblem might be a higher level of inscriptions, or inscriptions are just for items while emblems work best with the body.

I still remember the Emblems Nevan had, the ones allowing him to create his amazing flames - a gift from his Absolute. It’s something I totally want to dabble in in the future, and I think that my constructs might be the first step towards an emblem. Or maybe it is all constructs, emblems and inscriptions included. I don’t know, and the system won’t tell me. And who cares anyways.

I wait for a bit, but there are no notifications miraculously telling me more.

Well, fine, I will learn it on my own.

For now, I let it set on 50% of usage of my mana, even though I notice my body starts to hurt already as if after a long workout. Just a few minutes in. What a crazy thing, but I bet it’s effective and I take note of my current stats to compare them later.

Lvl 258
Strength: 123
Dexterity: 116
Constitution: 274
Mana (Stage 1/3 - Vast Mana): 1078 + 1078

I lovingly examine the emblem currently torturing me. The Champion who made it was truly a kindred spirit.

Next, I have three mana exercises. I name them as follows:

Evil orb - an orb with constantly changing requirements on frequencies and the amount of mana to not pop or disappear. I already have three floating nearby.

Another one is the infinity orb, an orb with another orb inside and within that orb another one, and within that another one, continuing for as far as you can. Each of the orbs is smaller. It’s an exercise serving for control and more delicate manipulation, to see how microscopic your creating can be while keeping its shape. The third one is Spinning Orbs. All three have fancy names given by me. I can't be bothered to remember their original names.

The last exercise is to make two orbs spin with two different orbits, both orbits intersecting each other. So the intention is to make them both spin as quickly as possible without clashing. At some point, even the slightest mistake makes them clash, and I think multiple more orbs can be added, all with orbits connecting at one point, which would increase the difficulty by a lot.

For a moment, I stop checking mana shaping exercises and close my eyes.

Holy hell, that emblem is evil. I feel like I can barely breathe, and it’s been a long time since I felt my muscles burn so much. Even lifting my arm up is pretty tough, and the Restrictive Training Emblem, or RTE for short, isn’t even working to its fullest.

Just out of curiosity, I change the setting, and it starts using more of my generated mana.

Yup, totally evil.

Just that short time before I switched it back tore a few of my muscles.

I kind of like it. Of course, it’s not like I’m a masochist, but it uses plenty of mana that I don’t have to cycle now and spends it inside of my body. It’s partially like some sort of limiter, a weight I can throw away to reveal my true power level. Or something like that. Maybe I’m just a tiny bit childish when it comes to these things.

After a long while, I decide to check my quests too.

Floor Quest: Escape Astral Prison

Rewards:

???

Epic grade passive skill

5000 Shards

Communication with your disciple for 10 minutes

Send single item to your disciple (up to rare rarity)

Increased daily Community limit

From the conversation with Tess, I already know that escaping this place won’t be that simple. The moon we are on has some sort of protections against just that, stuff like not allowing spatial skills teleport out of here. Even flying too high is not recommended because of other protections that are rumored to be able to kill level 400s with ease.

Building an array to try to connect it to somewhere outside also doesn’t work.

We don’t know that much more, to be honest. Apparently, we are in rural areas of this prison, which fits with how the system works, with the floors gradually increasing in difficulty. Central regions have more stronger people who know more.

So far, it’s an interesting thing that people here are from multiple planets, all thrown in at certain times. It looks like there is a schedule for throwing prisoners in.

There is also some talk about a coalition, powerful monsters, and remains of some ancient civilization or something. It almost feels like fairy tales.

What interested me more is that there are regions where no one dares to enter with powerful sleeping monsters. The word Calamity is also used sometimes.

As much as I complain about dealing with other people, Tess was able to collect quite some information, and she plans to get a bit into the central region in the next two weeks, force some answers from a few more groups, and then we will go our way. It’s something I don’t mind doing.

Coming back to side quests, there are also some new ones.

Side quest: Get all skills over level 40

Reward: Beyond 1 day stay token

Side quest: Get all skills over level 50

Reward: Trait strengthening token (1st stage)

Side quest: Reach level 275

Reward: Beyond 1 day stay token

Side quest: Defeat 1000 monsters over level 200

Reward: Beyond 1 day stay token

And they go on. Unlike before when I almost ran out of side quests, there are now close to two dozen of them. Some offer food and water, others epic passive or epic items. Plenty of them offer beyond stay tokens too, but for now only for 1 day.

None of the quests is something too simple, well, maybe other than killing 1000 monsters over level 200. Kaboom, right?

It just seems like access to Beyond is purposefully limited, at least currently, almost as if forcing us to continue to climb these floors here in hell difficulty.

Is there more the system wants to show us?

While examining the effect RTE has on me, I stand up and nearly fall, barely catching myself. The inscriptions from before didn’t allow me to move at all. It’s like they turned off my body and only kinetic energy could make it move.

This emblem feels like I got weights all over me, the weights that at the same time continue to damage my body with a single objective: to make it adapt to it and grow stronger in the process.

Curious, I use kinetic energy to support my movement, but the moment I do, the emblem stops working.

Well, that’s straight-up evil. Nice one, Cockroach Sandra.

I stop using kinetic energy and let part of my mind think of the inscriptions Lissandra used back then. I can mimic them and use them to train my kinetic energy, switching between that training and RTE.

Plus three mana shaping exercises. Plus stuff Miwa left for me in order to work on damaged arcane items. Plus body modifications with Lily. Plus improving my current constructs. Plus leveling my other skills. Plus using twins' skills to improve mine. Plus… more, just more.

But first, I want to see Noodle, and heading towards where I sense him, I grab a few pieces of bones I have. One from the Bone Fortress here on the 6th floor and the other one from the snake skeleton that rested against the pyramid.

***

Now in the smaller room, Izzy crosses her arms on her chest, “You won’t be feeding Noodle weird stuff!”

Noodle is next to her, curiously looking between her, me, and Biscuit who is on my lap.

Sophie ignores all of us and has some weird mana construct floating in front of her as she practices. I notice myself starting to examine it, but I force myself to stop and turn back to Izzy.

“Look, it was him who kept drooling and staring at it. I’m just curious. Also, why the hell is he still the same size?” I ask.

“Noodle can’t drool! And he is this size because I asked him; he is cuter that way.”

In answer, I lift a piece of bone from the 5th floor and wave it.

Noodle follows the bone from side to side as if hypnotized.

“That doesn’t prove anything,” Izzy nods seriously.

I move it up and down, and Noodle continues to track it perfectly. He does it even as I start zig-zagging.

At this point, I start getting curious if I could make that pearl-white snake dizzy and start moving faster and in the circles.

“Okay, okay, I got it,” Izzy sighs.

It might be me, but Noodle seems to perk up and turn to her, for the first time ignoring the piece of bone. He slithers closer, lovingly coiling around her arm and then licking her cheek.

What a tricky little creature. Snakes use their tongues to smell as far as I know. They do not lick. It must be something he saw Biscuit doing.

Indeed, our future overlord is great to already affect others like that.

I reach down and pet Biscuit who looks up to me and yawns slightly. Using that opportunity, I put a finger into his open mouth, and when he closes it, he bites on my finger gently.

His expression is confused, as always when I do it, but he then pulls away and licks my hand before laying back down on my leg, his eyes smartly looking at the duo in front of us.

***

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