Hunt for Nirvana

When Alex awoke the next morning he went through his morning ritual, Light stretches, breakfast, a quick work-out then a shower.

Though not necessarily in that order.

'Damn I miss my shower that drains away, it feels weird standing in the pooling water while showering' he thought while staring at the puddle forming on the rock.

He was so used to all the self made comforts of his other cave that he was becoming picky.

He could easily transform this new cave, but knew that his search would lead him into the heart of the Worth Wood-Sea.

The forest was so vast that it would be incredibly inefficient to make a camp near the border.

Thinking his hunt for the lost city would indeed take him a while, he decided he needed to set up a semi-permanent base within or near the center of the forest.

'Hopefully I can even find the center, this forest his huge' he mused internally, before jumping skyward.

He again headed west into the vast forest, from the air it would be difficult to get his directions mixed up, the mountain range to the north kept everything pretty simple.

Upon reaching an altitude in which he could monitor the majority of the forest, even though he couldn't make out too many details, he set about trying to gauge roughly the center.

A couple hours of hovering in the sky and mentally marking landmarks, he was finally confident in being very close to the center of the forest.

'Heck! I might even be in its perfect bullseye!' He thought, with a somewhat narcissistic edge.

Landing in the area he guessed was the forest center, he began looking for a place to set a base.

'The most important parts of survival are shelter, food and water. I got plenty of food and water in my {Inventory} so all that's left is my new mansion' he thought with a big smile.

He enjoyed creating things with his magic, it always felt so very satisfying.

"I should figure out how enchanting works, I could make my own items and even recreate the full comforts of my previous life" He said aloud as his excitement was taking over his thoughts.

"Hot tubs with the jets..." he trailed off.

'I could just recreate all that stuff with my magic at the time I need it, but its not really luxury if I still have to do the work right?' he asked himself.

Searching around the area for a suitable area to set up his camp, he found a nice little clearing near a bunch of massive boulders.

There wasn't a convenient cave for him to use this time but it didn't really matter.

He could make his own cave if he really wanted too.

Deciding it would probably be quicker to just make something out of earth this time instead of carving it out of stone, he raised an earth dome from the ground.

It backed onto the boulders and was tall enough that he could stand up fully on the inside.

At the back of his earth tent he raised a platform about 4' wide by 7' long and off the ground about 18 inches.

It would serve as a makeshift bed once he put all his furs and bedroll on it.

The door on his tent wasn't very big, but he could still easily fit through the opening.

Leaving his tent he walked just outside the clearing, but still in view and created a decent sized earth latrine.

His shower was the easiest of all, he just hardened the soil in a small area near the rock face and made it slightly grade away from his camp.

He didn't need any walls, he was alone in this vast area.

'Nothing to hide anyway' he thought as he finished up.

Finishing up the "necessities" he created a small fire pit and built a fire.

He had gotten carried away on creative mode and missed lunch.

After lunch he started exploring the area directly around his camp, he hadn't bothered hiding his aura while he was creating his camp as he didn't want any interruptions.

He wasn't surprised anymore to see and feel the area completely devoid of animals and rodents and activated his aura suppression again.

It wouldn't be an adventure through the woods if he didn't run into some type of wildlife.

As he was hanging out by his campfire eating lunch, he decided to check his progress.

'I keep forgetting my status panel is a thing haha' he mused as he pulled up said panel.

'I wont even be shocked if I just one day forget/stop using it all together' he chuckled lightly.

Name: Alexander Black

Age: 18

Class: Fire Demon Slayer

Mage Rank: A+

Warrior Rank: A+

Skills: {Metamorphosis} (take-over magic)(lvl:28)

{Inventory} (re-quip magic) (lvl:18)

{Fel-Fire} (lvl:13)

{Mana Manipulation} (lvl:16)

{Stealth} (lvl:35)

{Rapid Regeneration} (lvl:10)

The first thing that jumped out at him was his {Stealth} had broken past his "bottleneck".

"Just like I suspected" he said aloud.

"To raise my skill levels past a certain point I have to breakdown all the different components of the skill and practice them individually".

The implanted memories of his skills gave him the knowledge to use the skills, but unless he broke them down and made the skill "his own" he would have to rely on what the skill could do in its base form.

Once he made the skill his own, he could use it as if it was second nature and even in specialized ways. (an example is his aura suppression he can use without the full {Stealth} skill)

Aside from {Stealth} the other skills he used on a daily basis showed slight improvement, but nothing that jumped out at him as "noteworthy".

Having gone through his skill page and finished lunch Alex decided it was time to start the hunt for his hidden target.

He didn't know its exact location as it never actually mentioned precisely.

He did know that it was hidden under a giant tree that acted as both its tombstone and controller to activate it.

While there was no shortage of giant trees in the Worth Wood-Sea, he should be able to know if he was at the right one by the strange rock outcropping surrounding it, and hopefully he could feel its strange magic too.

Even in its dormant state he was confident that it would have a magical "scent" or signature he could use to identify it.

'Not getting anywhere just thinking about it, lets put these theories to the test shall we' he thought, trying to motivate himself.

Leaping up into the sky, he scanned the surrounding tree tops for any that stood above the rest.

He would start there as he needed to start somewhere.

It did not take him long to find his first victim and he quickly made his way toward it.

Landing at its base, he quickly looked around to see if he could recognize anything from his memories of the anime.

Not finding anything familiar and also not seeing the strange rock growths he figured he was at the wrong tree.

Not wanting to miss this opportunity to mark the tree so he wouldn't find himself checking the same tree twice, he did just that.

'Might as well analyze its magical signature so I can have a reference' He thought as he was marking it.

Sending his own magic into the tree via {Mana Manipulation} he felt an abundance of nature energy coursing through the giant tree.

Watching how the tree pulled mana in from the air, earth and sun was enchanting for Alex.

He could actually see the process of the tree pulling in, storing, consuming and finally releasing the Ethernano.

So fascinated was he by the whole process, that he wanted to learn it himself.

'This ability to change the energy at its base should help massively when I try re-creating other peoples magic' he thought as he studied the cycle of mana in the ancient tree.

When he was confident he could recreate the process to at least a passable degree, he pulled himself out of his "mana sight" as he was calling it.

Looking around at the darkening sky he sighed. 'Looks like I lost track of time' he thought as he headed back to his camp.

He could carry on in the morning. He still was not pressed for time and honestly didn't mind wasting it on things that interested him.

In a world filled with magic with abilities to create and destroy on a whim, he would do as he pleased.

He was not violent by nature despite his odd choice of magic and learning other magics was in itself an adventure.

'Adventure is what I am here for after all' he thought as he made it back to camp.

"That and I also want to destroy an entire city without becoming a mass murder" he said as his pyromaniac side made an appearance.

The next day he went out into the forest again to search, scan and mark the trees that towered above the others.

This routine went on for about a week before he started doubting his methods.

Using his camp as a starting point he circled out further and further keeping in at the center.

He had ventured out far enough he was considering changing his campsite.

Continuing this routine while also looking for another suitable spot for a camp, he finally noticed one of the weird rock formations from the series.

A quick look around the area told him there where 3 trees that could fit the description '3 down from about a million, not bad' he thought as he descended to the first one.

It was a normal tree, as was the second one but the third... was strange.

On the outside it looked like a very normal tree, he couldn't even feel a difference in the mana standing near it, but the feeling it gave off is what was strange.

It was like there was a compulsion to leave the area, as if what he was searching for was not here.

Ignoring the compulsion and placing his hand on the tree, his mana sight "exploded".

There was no other way to describe it.

"I finally found you eh?" He said out loud.