18 Transformation

Stanis was kicked out of the tutorial space and returned back to the temple.

[Stanis Volkov

Age: 18 years

Mana capacity: 18 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour)

Level 9 (Progress to the next level is 17%)

Strength: 18 [15]

Dexterity: 18 [15]

Constitution: 18[15]

Intelligence: 12[12]

Wisdom: 12[10]

Tenacity: 16[14]

Skills: Layman's Rush]

Funnily enough, Stanis couldn't see any difference in his status screen whatsoever. If he wasn't in the temple right now, he would have doubted the integrity of all that had just happened. And then the thought struck him: what if there was actually more to the Status-screen than just his stats?

And so he willed his mind to expand Status.

[Many functions are still locked to the user. However, Allegiances and Missions has recently been unlocked. Does the user wish to view these?]

Finally, so that was where the changes were hiding. Stanis said yes to Allegiances.

[Allegiances

Hu – Allegiance was placed when the system was first set up. This allegiance was enforced when the Tutorial ended, effectively making it impossible for the user to change.

Zelaro – Allegiance was recently set by both parties agreeing to a representative relationship.]

Stanis expanded the Zelaro section.

[Traits granted from allegiance to Zelaro:

Basic dark vision

Basic transformation

Basic darkness manipulation]

Finally finding the fruit of his labour, Stanis expanded each of his new traits.

[Basic dark vision- Your vision in the dark is far better than before. Vision is no longer clouded by odinary darkness.

Basic transformation- To be a representative of Zelaro, you must be one of them. Activating basic transformation allows your body to change based on how much Intelligence and Wisdom one has.

Basic darkness manipulation – To be a representative of Zelaro, you must have the basic skill shared by every Zelaro, the ability to manipulate darkness. You are able to control darkness to your will. The power and complexity of use will increase based on how much Intelligence and Wisdom one has.]

Despite his macabre surroundings, Stanis became giddy with excitement as he read through the traits. Not only was he now able to transform his body into the one of an able man, he was also able to control darkness itself. There was also the added benefit of being able to see within that darkness.

Unable to suppress his excitement of leaving disability, Stanis immediately tried to transform.

<Activate Basic transformation>

He could feel his body burning up, the last sound he heard being his body creating a thud as it collapsed onto the temple floor. It only got weirder as Stanis realised he wasn't actually unconscious, rather he was only blocked from all his senses. Instead, the only thing he could feel was a pseudo-type of blue liquid that flowed inside of his body. Was this mana?

Unable to directly manipulate the mana, Stanis eventually tried to focus its movement into his left arm. It was hard at first, but after a few gruelling hours, all the mana he had was concentrated within his left arm. A few minutes later, Stanis finally understood that he had just wasted hours. All he had done was transport his mana from across his whole body to just his arm, which in turn hadn't caused anything.

Lost for ideas, Stanis turned his mind towards the system.

[Activate Transformation?]

Ahh, so that was what he was meant to do…

[Focus on what part of your body you want to transform.]

Stanis focused on his left arm, to which he could feel the mana inside of him quickly draining. Within seconds, all the mana he had was gone. Having completed the transformation, Stanis willed himself back to reality, to which the system brought him back to consciousness.

The first thought that crossed Stanis's mind as he woke up was just how painful his left arm was. It felt like it was being scorched as a burning, blistering pain continued to run down his arm. In shock Stanis dropped to the floor and clenched his left arm, only to notice the pain slowly fading away. He took off his Cuirass armour and his Matilsa coat, before peering down at his left arm.

It wasn't a human arm…

In fact, Stanis had been wrong in thinking that he would be able to transform his body into that of an able man. When transformed, his body would be beyond able but certainly not that of a man's…

Not only was his slightly tanned skin nowhere to be seen on his arm, his arm was not even that of a Human's. It still consisted of the upper arm, forearm and hand, but all three were also physically different in shape compared to normal.

His upper arm was twice as muscular as before and also longer, his forearm was thicker and his hand… Well, his hand was long and elongated, with fierce, red claws coming out of each finger. In addition to all of this, his arm was covered in a dark orange, almost black covering. It was thick, about 2cm wide, and felt like smooth leather.

Stanis's left arm was about 5cm longer than his right arm, and quite a bit thicker due to the muscles and thick skin. He was completely lost for thought as he continued to stare dumb-founded at his arm; it was his as he could control it, but it wasn't his because it wasn't his fucking arm.

Eventually, Stanis stood up and began moving his left arm around, to which he noticed that his left arm was both faster and had smoother motion than his right. Perhaps others would be frightened of their humanity if they had such an arm, but it was the opposite for Stanis. He felt overjoyed at a working arm, needless to say about an arm that was more powerful than his old one. The fact that the arm was fit for a monster, and not a human didn't dampen his spirits one bit after he realised the potential in it.

It wasn't like receiving the monster arm had elevated him to euphoria, rather that he was over the moon as all of the doubts and worries he had earlier left him. No longer was he disabled, no longer was he handicapped, no longer was he on a path to certain death!

After a quick celebration over his new arm, Stanis turned his attention towards the second mysterious skill: darkness manipulation. He tried to use it in the temple, only to have his attempts thwarted due to the unilateral light coming from the purple gemstones. Remembering that the tunnel he had come through, Stanis ran down the stairs towards it. Inside it was pure darkness with no light whatsoever, and so Stanis tried his skill once again there.

He focused his mind onto the darkness, trying to get it to move. It only took a few moments for him to realise that his method was ineffective. He then tried activating the trait through the system, only for that to also fail. Stuck for ideas, he sat there and tried to think up ways to use this new power.

Quite a bit of time passed before he finally got an idea. It was connected to his previous experience with the transformation.

Stanis stood up and held his arms in the darkness. He then imagined the sensation he had felt when he had manipulated the mana in his body, and instead tried to do the same in the darkness instead. He stood there for minutes, forcing his mind to come back to the task at hand every time it drifted away.

A short while later, Stanis once again began feeling the fluid sensation around his arm. However unlike when he had manipulated the mana during the transformation, this time it also caused feelings of fatigue as he began moving the darkness. Soon enough, small amounts of darkness began flowing out of the tunnel and into the light.

The only way of describing the sensation of controlling darkness was akin to controlling water with your mind: it heavily fatigued your mind, but you were able to make it flow into the air and spread out. In fact what he was really doing was actually creating boundaries in the air where the darkness could and couldn't go, which allowed him to control its flow.

Feeling his mind close to a migraine, Stanis decided to finish it up by trying to make the darkness tangible. He forced the darkness into a shroud-like cloth, which he attached to his left shoulder. He then ironed the veil of darkness hanging off into his left arm, getting rid of all creases as his left arm became just a block of black. And finally, he attempted to make the boundaries of the cloth even smaller as he pushed it inwards, causing the darkness to constrict his arm.

Following this, he snacked on his food and water before falling asleep. After he woke up, he did the same thing to his right arm. The only difference was that he didn't force the boundaries in. This gave the illusion that his left and right arms were the same size and length, despite the opposite being true.

And thus now Stanis could no longer see his arms, instead they were both covered in veils of tangible darkness. It was surprising that he couldn't see through the veils considering the fact that he now had dark vision, but this suggested quality differences between the darkness.

[Mana capacity temporarily lowered from 18 to 14. Release the darkness to reinstate 18 as the limit.]

Having the system confirm his work, Stanis felt pleased and decided it was time to leave the cave.

He had come in as a crippled young man, prey waiting to be eaten by the predators in this world. Now he left as a young man who had potential to become one of those very predators.