[ Avatar Quest: Raise your Class to Tier 1 ]
[ Reward: Teleport to the mainland ]
Whatâs an Avatar Quest?
[ I have no idea ]
But I thought you knew everything about the System!
[ This is not part of the System. There is nothing about this in my database. My only assumption is that a god or goddess must have interfered somehow ]
A god or goddess? Those are real?
[ Yes ]
Cool! So if a god or goddess is giving me a quest like this to teleport me off the island, that must mean that they like me, right?
[ I wouldnât be so sure about- ]
It also means theyâve been watching me. Maybe they were the one that sent me to this world in the first place! And that would mean that it wasnât just a coincidence or an accident. I was chosen!
[ Well, old souls canât take new bodies without assistance, so itâs true that someone helped you reincarnate. Whether that person and the one that gave you this Quest are the same remains to be seen. ]
I knew it! I am the Chosen One!
[ There is no âChosen Oneâ ]
Yeah there is, and itâs me.
[ No thereâs- you know what, nevermind. We donât have time for this. Whatever gets sent after you next might be more than you can handle. You need to work on getting your Class to Tier 1 ]
How do I do that if there are no more monsters to kill?
[ Class experience works slightly differently compared to Species experience. Species experience is based purely on kills and age, but Class experience is somewhat related to Skills as well. Improving with Skills wonât gain you immediate levels, but if you upgrade, or simply improve the Proficiency of a skill from your Class, and then you use that Skill in combat, youâll gain more Class experience. If you donât use your Class Skills though, you will hardly gain any Class experience. The reason youâve already leveled your Class three times is that you used your Class skills to replenish your mana before killing the Octopoid ]
But doesnât that mean I still canât level up unless I kill something?
[ Correct, but if you work hard on your Class Skills, then your next kill might give you enough experience to jump straight to level 10 and earn your Tier 1 upgrade, at which point, you can run away, make a quick decision, and be teleported off the island. Itâs a bit risky, but itâs the only plan youâve got. ]
Ah, I see. Makes sense. I guess that means I need to Meditate more though. Boring, but whatever. Iâd rather not die again.
I run back toward my tree at the center of the island, and after listening for more monsters trying to infiltrate my safe space, I start Meditating. I have no idea how Iâll upgrade Meditate, so Iâll just work on External Mana Manipulation instead.
Now that I can sense the mana again, I move some of it out of my body and form it into a spoon again. I eat mana until my stomach is full again, then start idly spinning the spoon while I think of what else I can do. I think that just keeping the spoon manifested is probably increasing my Proficiency, since it does take mental effort, but I doubt itâs much. Iâll try making something else and see if that helps. There is one thing that Iâve been kind of missing as a catâ¦
It takes about fifteen minutes of difficult thinking, but eventually, the spoon turns into a hand. Well, most of a hand. Itâs only got two fingers and a thumb, and itâs kind of lumpy, but itâs definitely a hand. And with a bit of mental effort, I can bend the fingers. Now, time to do the things that hands were always meant to do. Pet cats!
I lower the hand down on my back and try to rub my fur, but I can barely feel it. My fur rustles like thereâs a light wind, but thatâs it. Thatâs not good. I try to make the hand denser by adding more mana from my body while keeping it the same size. At first, it only kind of works. I make it twice as dense, and when I try to pet myself, the it feels like wind thatâs twice as strong. Then, while Iâm packing more mana into it, suddenly, it becomes much easier.
I crack my eye open to confirm that External Mana Manipulationâs Proficiency has indeed leveled up to Late. Perfect! I bet I could add the missing fingers to my hand now! But not yet. I need to pet myself first.
I empty almost my entire mana reserve into the hand, making it almost ten times as dense as it started, and when I pet myself, I can almost feel it properly. Itâs kind of like a hand is petting me, but if that hand was made of the lightest, fluffiest marshmallow in existence. Still not good enough. Maybeâ¦
Stolen story; please report.
With my newfound control of my mana handâs density, I try to move some of the mana from the center to the edges. It works surprisingly well, and soon, the hand is mostly hollow, and the edges are twice as dense as they were before. This time, when I pet myself, it feels almost like a real hand. Not quite perfect, but very close. A few minutes of tweaking later, and itâs there. I have my very own solid mana hand!
I stroke my own back for a minute or ten, then absorb the mana back in and check the skill. Itâs still at Late Proficiency. Not upgradeable yet. Thereâs also a message from everyoneâs favorite Annoying Blue Box.
[ Youâre actually pretty talented at manipulating mana. ]
Of course I am! Thatâs why I am the Chosen One!
[ Regardless, good work. Between External Mana Manipulation and Meditation, you might already have enough Skill upgrades to push yourself to Tier 1 with your next kill ]
Meditation?
I check Meditationâs description, and to my surprise, it is also at Late proficiency. Howâd that happen?
[ Meditation is about focus and mana absorption. You focused hard, and by absorbing mana at a significantly faster rate by eating it, the skill naturally upgraded. You might not have noticed, but your mana digestion is more efficient than it was earlier. ]
I go to enter Meditation again, but before I start, I notice that I can actually sense the mana digestion without even Meditating. In fact, I can get a vague sense of the mana around without Meditating. The sensation is very gradually fading, but itâs there. I bet that soon, Iâll just be able to sense the mana without Meditation.
[ Yes, thatâs how itâs supposed to go. With Meditation heightening your senses, your sixth sense, mana, finally got used a bit, and the more you use it, the better it will get. Itâs similar to eating lots of different foods to improve your sense of taste, or listening to music to improve your sense of pitch and tone ]
You know, for an Annoying Blue Box who only knows about the System, you seem to know an awful lot about other things.
[ I was also given a database with information from your old world so that I could understand your words properly and communicate with you without issues ]
A database from Earth? Does that have any videos?
[ Some ]
Can I watch MeTube on you?
[ No ]
Aww, dangit. Well, anyway, since you said Iâm good on Skill upgrades, I think that means itâs time for a nap.
[ What if more enemies appear? ]
I will just wake up and kill them then. Alright, good night.
If Abby sends me any more messages, I do not see them because my eyes are closed. After a few seconds, I fall asleep. When I wake up, it is past sunrise already. Looks like nothing attacked while I was sleeping. Thatâs good. Abby doesnât seem to have anything to say either, which is also good.
I stretch, then eat, then go on a quick patrol around the island, using Food Sense to check to see if any more octodudes infiltrated while I was asleep. There donât seem to be any. However, the Food Sense does seem to be a bit fuzzy. The objects in it are a bit clear, but itâs like it considers the air itself edible now. Wait, no, not the air. The mana! Interesting.
After my patrol, I lay down for another quick nap after ignoring Abbyâs message. When I wake up, itâs still waiting for me. I eat again before reading it.
[ You might have gotten to the threshold, but that doesnât mean you should be slacking off ]
Why not? You said it yourself. I already did enough. Now I just need to wait for another monster to come by so I can kill them.
[ Youâre very close to upgrades for both your Class Skills. You actually also increased your Proficiency in both Snatch and Blink to Middle last night while fighting. You could work on any of those skills and aim for an upgrade. ]
I guessâ¦
[ If you Meditate more, youâll also be able to sense mana passively without doing it, which means youâll be able to use External Mana Manipulation without Meditating. ]
Nnnngh. Alright fine. Iâll Meditate some more. Itâs not like I have anything better to do. And being able to pet myself without going into full Meditation does sound nice.
I Meditate and immediately get working on creating a mana hand. This time, Iâm not gonna half-ass it. Iâm going for a full, five-fingered, slender, delicate lady hand. Not some ugly alien hand like last time.
It takes me a full fifteen minutes just to get the shape right, and then since Iâve already gone that far, I decide to go even further. Right now, I can kind of use it like a hand, but it takes forever to bend it into shape, and also, I can bend it completely the wrong way if I want, because itâs not actually a hand. Itâs basically a piece of mana rubber shaped like a hand. So to make it a real hand, it needs to be able to move like a hand, which means it needs proper joints and stuff.
Making even a single joint turns out to be tougher than I thought it would be. It takes five minutes just to decide how to do it, and then I even lose a finger while trying to get it to bend properly. I meant to just separate it from my mana hand so I could make a joint between, but as soon as it separated, I lost control and it disintegrated into atmospheric mana. After five more minutes of fiddling, I give up on the full hand idea, and scale it back.
I absorb most of the mana back into my body, leaving me with just a single fingertip. After that, I try to form the joint separately. Since I donât actually understand the anatomy of the musculature well enough to recreate it, Iâve decided to just make a ball and socket joint, so really, this is just a ball. Still, making a second thing while I already have one manifested turns out to be a challenge, even for something as simple as a ball. It takes a quarter hour of struggling and a minor headache, something clicks though, and the ball and fingertip both hover in front of me.
Yes! Iâm pretty sure thatâs the final upgrade to Peak Proficiency, but Iâm not done yet. Now that I can make multiple things, Operation Real Fake Hand is a go!
I stick the ball and fingertip together, and Iâm about to start working on the next segment when I realize that the two existing parts arenât actually connected. Theyâre just touching. I forgot the string! There needs to be a string connecting the two so that they donât fall apart!
The string ends up being just as hard as the other two things though. Making it thin enough to be actually string instead of a stick of mana takes a quarter hour, and adding slits to the segment and ball and tying it in takes another quarter hour. The next segment and string takes another quarter hour combined though, and the one after that takes even less time. The nice thing about this External Mana Manipulation upgrade is that it looks like as long as Iâm not doing anything complicated with the existing parts, they can just kind of exist on the side and I can put most of my full focus into the part Iâm actively working on. The not nice thing is that this all is costing me a lot of mana. Iâm also hungry.
I absorb my mana back into my body, then summon some octodude to chow down on. While I eat, I notice that I can sense the mana in the air pretty easily now. I can also sense mana in the octodude meat. Itâs denser than the mana in the air. Can I just replenish my mana by eating then? Thatâs super nice!
Once I finish eating, I get right back to Operation Real Fake Hand. Now that Iâve already figured out what I need to do, itâs much faster to get to the point I stopped at last time, and then every new piece after that comes even faster. Still, with how complicated hands are, it takes me a full two hours to make a mostly correct hand. Itâs not as pretty as my rubbery fake hand, but it moves similarly. Kinda. Itâs not perfect, and controlling all the fingers at once is hard, but it works! And since I made the pieces all hollow and dense, I can touch it.
I give myself some very slow and satisfying ear scratches, then absorb the mana back into my body and open my eyes. I check External Mana Manipulation and see that it has indeed gone to Peak. Meditation is still only Late, but I think itâs only a matter of time. Now, upgrade External Mana Manipulation!