Everlasting Journey 7 Magical Times

The carriage was pretty dark at this time of night, only a little moonlight shone through the window. However, when Aithen removed a ring and a small vile that contained a green glowing liquid, the s.p.a.ce around him was illuminated by an eerie glow. Aithen returned the glowing vile to his pocket because he had no immediate use for it and didn't want to attract any attention from the people who had recently exited. He held the ring in his hand in the moonlight and examined it. The ring was made of a black material that felt just like any other simple metal like iron or silver, but it also had hundreds of extremely thin gold lines that ran around it like a complicated circuit board. He had to admit that it looked pretty complex and stylish, thinking he would've bought such a ring just for its looks even if it had no uses. He soon slid it on his ring finger, noticing that the system had made it fit absolutely perfectly. Immediately after settling the ring on his finger, Aithen became unnaturally aware of his surroundings and how they felt. He could nearly sense what the wood in front of him was made of, how it would feel under his touch, and couldn't describe the sensation in any way besides a strong, almost emotional, connection. It wasn't like he could see everything around him even without looking, but he could definitely focus on what was around him on a much deeper level.

During this time, Aithen had an idea. He walked towards his bag and retrieved the simple silver ring he had found in the river. Because the ring was quite large and didn't fit, he had left it in his bag. Now though, Aithen simply put on the Silver ring, and then slid the black ring on top of it, hoping that the gold-lined ring would keep the silver one in place, and it did. He swore to himself if the intelligence stat actually represented the capabilities of his brain it would've doubled right then because that s.h.i.+t was brilliant.

Anyways, now that Aithen had finished styling his hands with rings, he began to truly sift through the knowledge he now had about magic in this world. The manual must have been more like a book considering all the basic and historical information it contained on top of the intricate techniques for meditation and magical essence control that were provided. While he had known there was magic, he really had not been provided with any other information regarding it before this event. Thankfully, the manual had gone into great detail describing exactly what it was, so that learning the techniques would be easier.

At its most basic composition, magic was really a form of energy that people termed magical essence because of its unique effects and mystical powers. This magical essence, however, came in many different forms. For example, it is most noticeable in forms that follow aspects similar to that of basic elements such as water and fire, yet in reality, magical essence takes much more specific forms such as natural plant essence or rock essence, not just earth. Ice essence is similar to water essence but not the same. Lightning essence is similar to fire essence but much less common and harder to control. There are hundreds of different types of essence in the world and they are birthed from the natural release of power from these ent.i.ties. Even things such as time and s.p.a.ce give off essence although it is much less common. This essence exists everywhere and obviously in higher concentrations in some places than others.

After explaining what essence was, the book began to describe how this essence is used by the creatures of the world. Many beasts, especially the stronger ones, are born with the ability to naturally absorb essence from the world, however, they are often built to absorb only certain types of essence, and it usually shapes them physically. This type of scenario can be seen clearly when looking at two similar but very different species of monkeys. The Stone Monkey and the Forest Monkey are both descended from an ape-like heritage, but the Stone Monkey is often larger, grey, slower, has rough, hardened skin, and stronger; whereas the Forest Monkey is green, faster, much lighter, and more flexible. These two different monkey breeds developed in much different environments, and, as a result, evolved in clearly different ways. Noticing these sorts of animals, humans determined that there had to be some sort of strengthening natural force in the world. With this in mind as a hypothesis, people began to search for such a force with their eyes but to no avail. At last, through using the mind to search for this force, humans discovered essence and soon learned to adapt this magical essence to their advantage. To do this, humans learned to absorb the magical essence from their surroundings but struggled at first for many reasons. First of all, the essence in the environment around humans cannot be directly absorbed. Magical essence in its natural state would slowly create a large amount of waste in the body and would hurt the human body in dangerous ways. Fire essence would burn you until it was released and similarly other essences could not be absorbed into the body. One day though, humans learned of a way to refine this essence into a purer form that would help them grow in strength. One interesting discovery was that some people were better at refining and absorbing certain types of the essence than others. Regardless of that fact, this essence that people collected could be released in waves of power. With time, humans also discovered that in the same way that essence could be refined, it could also be reverted to its original form on ejection. By this time, people who were talented at absorbing this magical essence were already much stronger than those around them. This essence would strengthen the body and mind, even extending a person's life span by hundreds of years. With further study, people found that magical essence could be released in magical patterns, increasing their strength and power. These patterns, called spell formations, seemed to connect the power to its original form but were also capable of altering the power to make it have different effects. The book didn't provide any example of these spell formations, which wasn't a surprise as it mainly included introductory and background knowledge.
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Having explained a large portion of the general background on magic, the manual moved onto essential information about sensing, refining, and absorbing magic into the body. Aithen's body seemed to instinctively know how to do this, giving him a reason to appreciate the power of the System once again. He laid down and closed his eyes, doing his best to relax. Following what he knew from the book, Aithen calmed his breathing and tried to sense abnormal waves of energy in the air. Although this instruction sounded extremely vague to him, the system must have allowed him to perfectly understand what was provided by the book because he was able to perfectly picture what he was looking for and even had an idea about what it would feel like. As he laid there, he eventually began seeing these waves of magical essence in his mind more and more often. Feeling a tug coming from the black ring on his finger, Aithen realized the ring was a.s.sisting him in drawing magical essence towards his body. He smiled and continued like this, eventually moved on to the refining process, which came naturally to him as well. He felt like he was condensing the energy types and letting the elemental aspect of each type wither away. The first wave he began to absorb had been a wave of fire essence. After its purification, Aithen brought the stream into his body and let it follow a path throughout his body. It traveled around him, seemingly following its own course and helping energize his body. Eventually, Aithen corralled the wisp of essence into the center of his body where a whirlpool that seemed to be born from his own thought had appeared. The system had obviously made this process much easier. The essence wisp stayed there in a cycle and Aithen continued to bring more and more inside.

After a period of a couple of hours where Aithen was lost in cultivation, his whirlpool seemed to be coming to its limit. According to the manual, at this point, Aithen was supposed to release the energy, and his small whirlpool would have grown slightly. This energy could be released in magical forms if he knew any, but it could also be released and spread throughout his body, strengthening his muscles, organs, and even his mind. Aithen completed this part of the process and felt incredibly rejuvenated. The manual stated that this cultivation could replace sleep because of its healing and strengthening of the body, but at such a low level, he would still need to sleep a couple of hours to allow his brain to rest.

Aithen stopped momentarily because of a notification from the system.

[Congradulations on that amazing start to your magical journey! I promise you those recommended buys won't do you wrong! Anyways, as your whirlpool grows bigger you'll see that your ability to control and absorb this world's magical essence increases. I'm telling you information that the manual already taught you because I've got a new quest for you that I know you'd want to see.]

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//Quests//

*Dumbledore Type Beat* Raise your intelligence stat to three before getting to the academy. This won't be easy, but with the Absorption Ring and constant effort, it's doable. This will help you immensely when you arrive at the academy because from what it sounds like, it'll be compet.i.tive. You want the instructors there to have high hopes for you and not only keep you safe but provide you with great resources. So work hard to achieve this!

Time Limit: Arrival at the magical academy

Rewards: 250 points on top of the points gained from increasing a stat

*Out of This World s.e.x*: They might think you're a loser, but that does not mean you can't finesse. Go out there and make some moves. You'll be getting points for every s.e.xual activity performed, but this quest is a bonus for your first time in this world.

Time Limit: One year (307 days left)

Rewards: 250 points added to whatever points you would've received from it normally.

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Looking at this quest, Aithen's excitement grew. With the Recovery Liquid stimulating his physical training to the maximum and the magical practice improving his stats Aithen couldn't wait to begin training these next few weeks and having his progress soar.

At that thought, Aithen brought up his stats one more time before he went back to cultivating, just to see what he would be starting with and to picture where he would be.

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//STATUS//

Name: Aithen Valore

Race: Human

Strength: 1.1

Agility: 1.2

Const.i.tution: 1.1

Intelligence: 1.3 (+0.1)

Skills:

Spells: none

System Points: 10

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