[CYA] Chapter 100: Choices and Progress

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https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jg14vny598FfOYDEG-XNkM4jXb00O5w_MOX5uhvNDCM/edit?usp=drivesdk

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<Alex, Real - Endure, High School Main Hall>

Alex eagerly pulled up the first notification that he earned from his practice with Stephen. As it turned out, it was a short one, even if it was anything but simple in implication.

Choice Required:
Class Skill Basic Internal Life Manipulation (Simple) and Class Spell Basic Life Transfusion (Uncommon) have been used in tandem to great effect and with good resonance.

Do you wish to combine these skills?
Y/N

Since it wasn’t the only notification, something made him feel like he really needed to check the other.

Choice Required:
Class Skills, Basic Internal Life Manipulation (Simple) has been used to great effect. As such, your competency rating is ready to advance.

Do you wish to advance this skill?
Y/N

Note:
The advancement of a skill could affect other options pertaining to the skill.

That’s odd. It normally doesn’t ask… Alex grunted, prompting a raised eyebrow from Stephen. That, in turn, reminded Alex that the Death Mage was still there. He briefly described what was happening, and Stephen shrugged. “That seems pretty obvious to me.”

It was Alex’s turn to cock an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“Of course. Advance the skill, then combine them. That has to give a better result. There is no way it will advance after it combines as it won’t be the same skill that you were using, and it will likely still combine after it advances. Worst cast, we can do this again, and you use the skills in tandem again.”

Alex frowned. “Then… why would the System give them to me in this order?”

Stephen shrugged again. “Because that’s the order you earned them? I have no idea. That might even be why the rarity advancement is a question, rather than just automatic. The other one being pending might have necessitated it. They are your skills, so do as you wish. That was just my two cents.”

Alex grunted. “Yeah…”

Still, what the other man said made sense. So, he selected to have the skill advance.

Basic Internal Life Manipulation (Simple)

→

Basic Internal Life Manipulation (Common)
Life is required to live, but for most, it is simply something that exists within them, never to be directly manipulated.

Not you, you have earned the ability to actually interact with it.

You can now specifically direct your Life within your body to accomplish tasks others will see as magic.
Impairments may be directly addressed with an accompanying expenditure of Life energy.
Mental Power and Agility have a minimally greater effect when you are trying to manipulate Life within yourself.

Your understanding of your own Life now gives you greater facility with other spells and abilities that use or interact with your own Life.

It took Alex a moment to notice the changes, minor though they were. His Mental Power and Agility now had a ‘minimal’ improvement, rather than a miniscule one, and the last sentence had been added, giving him an unspecified boost for all spells and skills dealing with his own Life.

With trepidation, he looked to see if the other notification was still available. It was, changed as appropriate.

Choice Required:
Class Skills, Basic Internal Life Manipulation (Common) and Basic Life Transfusion (Uncommon), have been used in tandem to great effect and with good resonance.

Do you wish to combine these skills?
Y/N

Alex grinned. “Yes.”

Basic Internal Life Manipulation (Common) and Basic Life Transfusion (Uncommon)

→

Life Manipulation (Common)

Life Manipulation (Common)
It is good to have something that you believe in, something to fight for. In this case, you’ve taken ‘I will give my life for the cause’ quite literally. While Life is required to live, most will never realize it can be directly manipulated.

You are among the few who see the truth. As such you can now specifically direct your Life within your body or through use of a contained medium in order to accomplish tasks others will see as magic.
Additionally, you may transfer your HP and/or Life between yourself and a target.

 Damage or Healing at the user’s discretion.
Damage or healing done is equal to the user’s Health Points (HP) sent. Life sent may either act as HP or otherwise, depending on the user’s intent upon sending

Impairments may be directly addressed with an accompanying expenditure of Life energy.

At the user’s discretion, this can be used externally as a skill or as a spell. As a spell, it costs half that amount of Magic Points (MP) to transfer a given amount of HP or Life. As a skill, it costs HP equivalent to ten percent (10%) of the Life or HP otherwise transferred.

Repairing dead matter will take 4x energy, damaging the dead matter ¼.
Repairing that which was never alive—such as mundane metals—will take 4x greater than that, damaging takes ¼ as much.

Mental Power and Agility have a minimally greater effect when you are trying to manipulate Life within yourself.

Alex rocked backward as he regarded the wall of text that appeared before him, showing the now combined skill… or was it a spell? It seemed like it was both, or rather it was either depending on what he wanted it to be. At least it could be either while external. Internal seemed to just… be?

That’s… huh.

From what he could tell, it was basically a direct combination with no real difference. It did specify his ability to spend HP to do the transfer instead of MP, which was huge, and so he was grateful for that if nothing else.

Wait… There!

Near the middle was a mention of using ‘contained mediums’ for the movement. He got the impression that doing so would increase the cost, as well as reducing the Life or HP that got to the destination—basically increasing the cost in two different ways—but it would work.

He should be able to send his HP and Life through his dadao now, and that was huge.

“Care to share?” Stephen was watching him with a small smile. “It seems like it turned out well?”

“It did.” Alex excitedly conveyed the gist of things, and Stephen joined him in his excitement.

“Let’s try something else!”

Alex was about to agree when the meal bell rang, and he grimaced. “Right… I have other things to do, other things to practice too.”

Stephen sighed and nodded. “Again tomorrow, then?”

Alex grinned, glad that the other man was unhappy with the delay, while also not seeming to be truly upset. “Absolutely.”

The next morning, Alex returned to his study of Natasha’s spearhead. When comparing its present state to the picture he’d taken, it was clear that the spear had healed a bit, the Life still in the spear pulling back, compacting, and seemingly speeding up the repair process.

And that’s exactly what it was: a repair process. That’s what I wanted it to do. I commanded the Life to repair the damage.

There was so much he didn’t understand, so he decided to use a small bit of time each day to observe the ongoing changes. That determined, he moved on.

As interesting as this was, there was too much to do to sit still.

That afternoon, he was in a ‘non-fighting’ block once more, this time with an eye on circulating his mana.

After he was comfortable—his mind and breathing under tight control—he once again built the tornado in his torso, almost immediately throwing mana down the length of his right arm as part of the action. This time, however, before any issue or pressure could build up, he grabbed the rebounding mana that was within his right hand and—with his tornado fresh in mind—he spun the energy, sending it in a spiral for its return trip up the outside of his arm. He again spun it counter clockwise—when looking down the length of his arm—and when it reached his shoulder, it spat out with greater force than the expulsion from the day before, again disrupting the tornado.

He took a deep breath, putting his frustration within the box of his meditation and focused. He compressed the coils of the returning mana spiral, changing where the mana was in its spiral at each point in his arm and forcing it to exit his arm—through his shoulder—at the top of the circuit, and that spat the mana in the correct direction, adding to the force and stability of the torso tornado.

At that moment, a notification popped up, almost causing him to lose focus and drop the whole thing.

Notice:
Beginnings of an advanced mana circulation technique detected:
Vortices of Power

Vortices of Power
This advanced mana circulation technique readies your mana, scours your body, and purifies the core of your being.

You have completed 2/6ths of this technique.

System assistance is available to complete the establishment of this technique, but the benefits will be commensurately reduced and detractions increased as reflected below.

Pros:
Your technique will be self-sustaining.
Mana regeneration rate is tripled.
All long range castings through your right arm are amplified by 10%.
All close range abilities used though any other portion of your body are 10% more effective.
Reduction of impurities from the core of your body will increase your Physical Fortitude by 5%

Cons:
Built up impurities around your exterior will reduce your Physical Agility and your Physical Power by 10%.

Sometimes it is better to accept a portion of something good rather than failing to achieve something greater.

Do you wish to accept System assistance to adopt this circulation technique?
Y/N

Apology Tutorial Addendum:
If the System assists with establishing this technique, you will not be able to reestablish it on your own in order to gain the full benefits.

Alex sucked in a longer than usual breath in wonder, only slightly disrupting his box breathing before falling back into the pattern.

That was… That was incredible.

He opened his eyes to gain a moment to think and found food sitting beside him. Clearly someone had brought it while he meditated.

Jacob was gone, and Leanne stood a bit away, book in hand.

That made him smile. They’d changed who was watching him again, and he had to say that he was actually grateful that they’d kept anyone from disturbing him.

It did mean that he had spent longer than he’d realized in the process. It had felt like bare minutes, but it had clearly been nearly—if not more than—two hours.

He ate distractedly as he continued his work to keep the mana circulation technique going manually. He didn’t even really register the food until it was gone.

When he considered things, he almost accepted the assistance. After all, there was so much else that he needed to do. Even so, in the end, he just couldn’t do it. It felt like taking the easy way out when he was just starting to understand things.

Moreover, the idea that he was 2/6th of the way there—not 1/3rd—meant that he had a pretty good idea of what he had left to do.

“No.”

The prompt vanished, and he stood. He wanted to continue. He wanted to push onward.

…But he needed a break, and he still had a lot which he had to do.

His head hurt, and his brain felt like it had gone through a pasta press.

He had quite a ways to go before he could complete his whole body on his own.

It was still slightly tempting to get the assistance, but something deep within him rebelled against leaving power on the table, especially when it seemed like all it would take is a bit more hard work. There was also the fact that this wasn’t actually a game. His life was on the line, and so every little bit would help him stay alive, help him to protect others. “I’m sure I can do it. It’ll just take some time.”

He let the technique fall away, realizing he couldn’t hope to keep it up in the short term. He needed to rest that part of him… whatever part his Basic Mana Manipulation skill allowed to interact with the resource.

As he stretched, he noticed something odd. His torso felt… stuck to his clothing?

At the same time, something caught the corner of his eye, and he glanced at his right arm, noticing that the hairs looked thicker. They were odd, especially when compared to those on his left.

He tapped his forearm with his left pointer finger and found that the hair wasn’t thicker, it was just coated in yuck.

As if disturbing it had released the smell, Alex was almost overwhelmed by a scent like moldy vomit, fermented in a locker room for years.

Leanne jerked, looking his way before retching and covering her nose and mouth. “What the moldy sausage? You, shower, now!”

Alex couldn’t have agreed more. If he hurried, he could keep to his training schedule as well.

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