The amount of Aether being drawn away with each pump of his blood was so minuscule that I barely noticed it at first. It was like his blood was siphoning water from a pond one drop at a time. No wonder this process took so much time. It sped up after a while, but even then it would be hours before the first step in the unlocking process was complete. I removed my mana cords and returned to my Ascended Human Form.
“Now come,” Shamash said the moment my perceptions had returned.
I followed him to the edge of the flattened hill on which the vein stood and looked back at Travis. We’d left him sitting down and leaning against a smooth outcropping of rocks. His armor would keep him more comfortable than if he were sitting against the rocks alone. Both his helmet and gauntlets were removed and lying at his feet. It was rather cold in this dungeon, which his armor would also help with. I didn’t see anything I could do at the moment to make it easier for him.
“Have you thought of what you will do while you wait?” the lich said.
“Yes,” I replied. “There are numerous things I want to work on at the moment. Too many things.”
“I recommend that you focus everything on advancing your core first. It’s fundamental to your future, and right now it’s nothing but untapped potential. I know you want to advance some of your new Blue Magic and Forms, but they won’t have nearly the impact of being able to refine your mana.”
“Understood.”
And I did, but my mind was currently still focused on what he’d said before. If I played the long game I could one day rival the Head Mistress and save my friends. The problem was that he said it would take centuries. Did he really think my friends would survive that long without me? Even if they did, if I abandoned them that long, once I returned, wouldn’t they think I was as much of a monster as Lilith?
I sat at the top of the stairs. Queen Degima, my Embar, and three golems were at the base of it guarding the Metal Dragon’s body. They would warn us if anything attacked. If its level was low enough, I wouldn’t even have to bother with it. It was about time I utilized them and let them do the fighting for me.
Shamash had recommended I focus “everything” on advancing my core. His definition of everything had become very clear to me the last couple of days. It wasn’t time to tinker or play it safe. I needed to go all out and finally get some use out of the orb inside of me. Up until now, it had practically been useless. Creating Minor Light Orbs to absorb later was far more effective. The main thing holding me back was Succubi’s Caress. It was nearing its next rank, so that would be an easy first step. But what was the best way to power level it?
An idea came to me. A potentially bad idea. Still, it could possibly work. I cast Tail Equilibrium and my standard spine-linked, skeletal tail shot out from my tailbone. I curled it up beside me and cast my Slime Form on just my tail. It changed to the green, gelatin-like consistency and then I manipulated its shape until it looked like a large bird’s nest. I began by filling it with every Light Orb I owned. It ended up being 47 Minor ones and 17 Intermediate. When they were stacked there, I channeled more mana into my tail and concentrated on creating more slime so that it filled in the gaps and eventually enclosed the orbs all together and seeped into every crack between them. Succubi’s Caress worked better when I had a larger surface area to deal with. Doing it this way would allow me full contact with all of them at once. Here goes nothing.
I felt the surge of mana almost immediately, but with so many orbs, it should have been more. They were just too small to get much of a draw from each individual orb. Succubi’s Caress had no mana cost. That didn’t mean it should be impossible to increase the force by empowering the ability with mana. It wasn’t something I was comfortable doing on the orb inside me, but the ones resting inside my Slime-tail were a different story.
Everything… I prepared 1,000,000 MP, took a deep breath, and funneled it into Succubi’s Caress. There seemed to be a moment of delay, and then it was as if I’d been on a rollercoaster going up a steep incline and had suddenly plunged off the edge. Succubi’s Caress wasn’t able to refine mana yet because of its low rank, so instead, it filled me like a balloon with boiling water. In less than a second, I felt like I was going to explode from the inside.
I cut off my mana with only 247,000 MP spent and jumped to my feet like I’d been bitten on the tush by a pit viper. It wasn’t a spell that rushed through my arms and out my palms, but excess mana. The pressure driving it out of me made the Light Mana flow like dual fire hydrants. It only took a few seconds to stabilize my internal mana, and the outpouring ceased. The damage was already done.
Queen Degima who’d been at the base of the stairs had hit the floor like I’d been aiming at her. My Embar had had even worse of a fright. It had flown like an animal possessed toward the side of the room and plowed into the wall, creating a large crevasse in hopes of escape.
“Sorry!” I called out. As if betraying me, a puff of Light Mana escaped from my palms like a burp after a satisfying meal.
“Are we under attack?!” Travis called from behind me.
I turned and shook my head. His eyes had been aware momentarily, but he nodded his head and began to refocus.
“You need to be careful,” Shamash responded.
I looked at him like I’d been smacked by an old lady and didn’t know what I’d done wrong. Who was the one telling me to give it everything? I glared at him momentarily but stopped after realizing he was bound to glare back. The creepy feeling his gaze gave me was enough to keep my complaints to myself.
It hadn’t been a total disaster. Pulling up my popup, I saw that Succubi’s Caress had finally ranked up.
Chapter 30 – Advancing
Intermediate Succubi’s Caress nearly doubled the amount of mana I could leech from my core, making it much more useful in the middle of a fight. It was still many times slower than using Vampire’s Might to just absorb an entire orb though. I was still at least a rank away from the ability’s true potential, leeching Refined Mana. Once my mana was refined, or condensed, it would replace the mana inside my body and greatly multiply the amount of mana I possessed. I wasn’t sure yet how long it would take to fully replace all of the mana in my body with the condensed mana, but once I did, I’d have access to many times the MP that I currently possessed. As I used it up, I’d have to refine more, but it would give me an advantage when facing higher level monsters like the vampires.
Succubi’s Caress wasn’t the only thing holding me back. My Intermediate Core didn’t compress mana to a liquified state. It only stored more MP than a Minor Core did.
As Shamash had recommended, I threw all of my focus into advancing my core. That included power leveling Vampire’s Might, Core Creation, and Succubi’s Caress. The next four days became a blur.
Vampire’s Might had reached its Advanced Rank before I’d even begun, but there was no way I was going to stop there. Advanced had unlocked the ability for me to absorb orbs from foreign alignments. Instead of turning to my stash of Fire and Dark Orbs, I took the opportunity to try to create orbs of different elements.
I began by trying to create a Minor Fire Orb. It was the school of magic that I was the most familiar with other than Light. Converting my mana from Light to Fire was easy enough. It was even easier when transformed into my Crimson Incubus Form. The process after that was identical to creating a Minor Light Orb. So much so that I skipped creating a Minor Orb all together and went straight to Intermediate.
Core Creation leveled quickly once I was making different elemental orbs. It neared the Advanced Rank by the end of the first day. I’d expected Vampire’s Might to gain bonus experience from draining different elemental orbs because it was the spell’s new ability at the Advanced rank, and it didn’t disappoint, but Succubi’s Caress surprised me by leveling quickly as well when drawing from different elemental orbs.
I first focused on creating Intermediate Fire Orbs, then drained their mana storage with Succubi’s Caress, and finally used Vampire�
��s Might to deconstruct them and absorb what was left. It wasn’t exactly the same process as what happened in my core when I cycled my own mana through it and then drew mana from it with Succubi’s Caress, but it created a power leveling loop that only required me to change to other elements once my abilities no longer seemed to be gaining experience quickly with Minor and Intermediate Orbs.
Ice was the second element I worked on, then I moved to Water, Earth, Metal, and Magma. Only when I’d exhausted them did I try creating Dark Orbs. They cost me ten times the MP as a Light Orb, but the process also helped me advance my Dark Magic faster. And by faster, that meant Shadow Bolt reached level 7. It was far slower than any other thing I’d tried to level besides my Master Light Magic. I’d also already absorbed several Advanced Dark Orbs with Vampire’s Might, so I doubted it would get as much benefit as my other two abilities.
Early in the morning of the second day, I ran into a bottleneck. My Core Creation spell was stuck at level 99 of the Intermediate rank. The only thing I hadn’t tried was creating an Advanced Orb. When I’d first created an Intermediate Orb, I’d tightened the threads of mana when spiraling, forcing them to fit firmer against the core’s border. I had my theories on how to create an Advanced Orb—I was pretty sure I’d figured it out. The only other way I could think to wind a spiral tighter was to start in the middle and work my way out instead of starting on the outside.
Activating Core Creation, I pulled on my Light Mana’s thread and went against the spell’s innate directions. As if holding the end of the thread with magic fingers, I held it tight and began moving my gathered mana around it. I wound it as tight as I could while keeping the spiral from spinning out of control. It took more effort than creating an Intermediate or Minor Orb ever had, even when I’d just started out. That was the difference between orb ranks. The spell guided me in the creation of a Minor Orb, but from there I had to figure out the rest. I could’ve asked Shamash. Trying out my theory would cost me little though, and if I figured it out, I was sure I’d gain greater experience through the process than if I’d had someone else help me.
When I reached my orb’s outer border, I wasn’t exactly sure where to stop. It was a guessing game, but at least I’d absorbed Advanced Dark Orbs often enough to make an educated guess. After the spiral had reached its vaguely appropriate size, I let the spell take over and it began to form the storage compartments on the top and bottom of the orb. After a few minutes, my first Advanced Light Orb was completed.
Core Creation has reached the Advanced Rank!
It wasn’t perfect. I could see the orb’s flaws and it cost me more MP than it should have because of them, but now that I had a starting point, all I had to do was work out where I’d gone wrong.
***
“That should be sufficient,” Shamash said.
It had been a few days since he’d approached, so hearing him startled me. “What?”
“It’s time you create your Master Core. Your friend is about a day away from merging with Metal. If you work fast you’ll have enough time to get Metal Dragon Form to its Adolescent Rank.”
Was he crazy? It had been four days since I started, and I’d only just created my first Master Orb a few hours ago. I’d made what, five of them altogether? Master Core Creation, Level 1 didn’t make the process easier either. Now he wanted me to try to do it inside my body and without looking? So, of course, I agreed…
The lich saw my apprehension. “It helps if you form a condensed mana halo around the area where you’re going to form your core. Then while you spin your thread you can keep your mana spinning along the same path and you won’t have to focus on that part of the process as much.”
Seriously? That—might work. Maybe I should have asked for his advice instead of trying to figure it out all by myself. It had taken me a day, but I’d even figured out how to create a Master Orb on my own without ever seeing one. The key was compressing my mana before I’d even begun the spiraling process.
I nodded to him many seconds later. There was one other step that came before I could start. I located my Intermediate Light Core immediately, for I was still churning my mana around it like a miniature hurricane.
I hadn’t upgraded my orb yet because doing so wouldn’t provide me any solid benefit. As if turning a key with my mind, Vampire’s Might activated inside of me. The threads of Light Mana that it pulled from my Core were absorbed by my body immediately. In moments, the orb that had been lodged there for days was gone.
The mana I’d gained from it wasn’t much, but I gathered it with my body’s mana and began to compress it in the open space where my core had been. Even using all my might, I couldn’t compress mana through Mana Manipulation into a liquid state, but I could draw it together in its gaseous state and remove any trace mana from other alignments. It became dense enough that the space where my core had existed remained open. Only after I’d gathered enough did I begin creating more room. I didn’t need much, for a Master Orb was even smaller than a Minor one, but if I was going to utilize a halo or a small mana track as Shamash had suggested, then I needed extra room.
My sense of my internal self had grown just from the constant spinning of mana around my old core. Instead of using my already gathered Mana, I summoned more to create the loop. Compressing it first, I began by letting it skirt around the ball-shaped compressed mana I’d already prepared. Like a satellite, it encircled the ball, slowly creating more physical space in my gut to work with. When it had reached a size I felt comfortable with, I began to stretch the satellite out until it created a loop. The loop grew until its orbit was the size of the compressed mana ball in its center. It was then that I knew I was ready.
I pulled extra mana through Advanced Vampire’s Might from the numerous Minor Light Orbs I had engulfed in my Slime-Tail. The creation of a Master Core took more mana than I possessed even with Master Mind Buff, so this step was essential.
Here we go. I cast Master Core Creation.
The compressed thread shone metallic with its own internal light. The first part was the most difficult. I held on to its end just as I would with an Advanced Orb. The compressed mana I’d gathered began to spin in a slow orbit with my guidance, but I kept it tighter than the loop I’d created, not letting it join its orbit. I drew the internal spiral as tight as I could, making sure that I wasn’t a nanometer off if possible. After the internal core was complete, my compressed ball of mana joined with my mana loop. The trick had been to not let my ball of mana reach the loop’s orbit too quickly. Once they’d joined together, it spun with machine precision. As my Core grew, the ball of mana shrunk. The moment it was spent, I flooded the spiral with mana. It took over and filled in the rest of its form without any direction from me.
I felt the tug of my newly established Master Core and absorbed more Minor Light Orbs to fill it to capacity. When it was finally completed, the orb inside of me was a little smaller than a marble and contained 4,000,000 MP. Even without using it to refine my mana, the maximum mana available to me had nearly doubled. Succubi’s Caress wasn’t strong enough to give me instant access to all of it, but it had reached its Master Rank even before Core Creation had and should now be capable of exactly what I needed it for.
Drawing from my Master Light Core for the first time, there was a resistance that I’d never felt before. Normally, I’d feel mana filling me immediately even if it wasn’t as big of a surge as I’d get from Vampire’s Might. Drawing from the Master Orb took effort. It wasn’t exactly exhausting, but it took focus. I supplied it with a small amount of mana, and only then did the process ease. Figuring out how much excess mana I’d need to be as efficient as possible was something I’d have to work out. Just over a minute later, I pulled the first drop of refined mana from my core.
Checking my maximum mana, I saw that it had gone up by 1,007 MP. It had been a complete success. Thankfully, I found out that the process sped up after the first drop was pulled. Still, I could only manage about two drops per minute, and
I had no idea how many drops I could hold.
“Congratulations,” Shamash said from over my shoulder.
I was still sitting on the top of the stairs, which I found more comfortable than sitting Indian style. “It takes so much effort,” I replied.
“At first, but that is just because a core isn’t natural to you. It will become easier with time.”
“How many Refined Mana drops can I hold?”
“That depends on your Intelligence stat. As it improves, your body will become better at storing mana, which is obvious enough with your normal mana, but the same principle applies here. And remember that every drop of Refined Mana will take up some of the space where your mana is normally stored. When casting a spell, try not to tap into your Refined Mana unless you have to. You now know that it will take you time to collect enough drops to make use of its full potential.”
I understood what he meant. At this rate, it would take a little more than eight hours to collect 1,000 drops. That 1,000 drops would be worth 1,007,000 MP though. It wasn’t hard to see that with enough refinement my maximum MP would skyrocket. Managing it was even more important than before because it would take me days, maybe weeks, to replenish it. I could only imagine what I could do with 10,000,000 MP—perhaps even more.
“Now it’s time that you begin working on other things while continuing to refine your mana through your core. It will be good practice for the coming battles.” Shamash left me to it.
Chapter 31 – Trust…
The mobs that had been entering the recently cleared Metal Dungeon didn’t seem interested in attacking us. Just as the Illuminated Cathedral had periodically sent people to mine by the entrance, these creatures also seemed to be used to doing the same. They hadn’t dared challenge the Adolescent Metal Dragon, and they wouldn’t challenge the creatures that had been powerful enough to turn it into a corpse.
Underworld - Vampire Gate: A LitRPG Series Page 25