12 Earth you are, earth you will control
Once I had found a suitable spot to train, I slipped silently between the bushes and looked around hoping there would be no hidden enemies waiting to ambush me. It was a fairly open area, which meant that monsters or any potential threats could find me easily, but, on the other hand, I would be able to see them coming just as easily. Obviously, I had to double check that there were no threats nearby before getting started with my training. After carefully inspecting the area and verifying that no suspicious noises could be heard, I got ready to start.
‘Ok, so, what should I go for first?’
It was clear which field I should be focusing on: magic. Helpy had mentioned a while ago that telekinesis fell under the category of neutral magic, but what exactly did magic mean?
‘Magic, huh? This brings back old memories.’
Memories of the old tabletop RPGs that I used to play when I was young came to my mind. The ones where mages and wizards could learn devastating spells… and rolling a 1 on the die would cause the spell to explode on their face and blow their companions up so the other playmates would end up throwing their die at the mage player's face whenever that happened. But that couldn’t happen with real magic… right? That aside, mages could conjure a vast amount of spells, ranging from an unimpressive ball of fire to unleashing terrible storms, hurricanes or even earthquakes. That was the magic I wanted.
‘Yes, I like that! I like that a lot!’
Of course, I had no intention of learning such cataclysmic spells from the get-go. One must start with the basics. Another important point of most role-playing games is to focus on something specific, or you end up with a useless character. A jack of all trades but good for nothing kind of character. I am speaking from my own experience… I shall not repeat the same error this time!
It was the same with magic, it’s not a good idea to try learning all the different branches of magic. The best approach is to focus on one or two branches at most, and only after having mastered them try learning a different one. The tricky part is choosing which one to start with. Maybe there’s some type of magic that’s not suitable for you. After all, it was difficult to imagine that a single person could learn each and every existing magic spell. There must always be limitations or the game becomes too unbalanced.
‘I wonder if there is such a thing as an affinity or something like that… Helpy, dear, tell me something about it.’
I had no idea what Helpy’s gender was. Heck, she was a skill, so it didn’t actually make a whole lot of sense that she would have a gender at all. Maybe the weird thing is that someone would actually be thinking about that in the first place… but I feel better this way, do you have an issue with that? If a skill was the only thing talking to you, would you prefer that it was a man or a woman, huh, huh?
[The vast majority of entities capable of using magic have an affinity with one or more specific types of magic. Learning a type of magic for which one has a high affinity is much easier than learning other types of magic.]
‘Just as I thought. Tell me what types of magic exist.’
[Neutral, fire, water, wind, earth, nature, lightning, ice, light, dark, shadow, time, space and mental.]
‘Oh shit, there are more than I thought… Well, how can I know which ones I have a high affinity for?’
[There are specific tools that can help you discover your magical affinities.]
‘Of course… Well, I guess that means that I will have to figure it out by myself.’
It was really useful having an entire manual at my disposal, too bad it did not have such specific information… although perhaps at higher levels it would. I could not lose the hope of having a super Helpy that knew absolutely everything.
‘Let’s see, what could my affinity be? Perhaps the mighty and unstoppable fire? The lightning would not be bad either. Both are fearsome and devastating elements. Ice wouldn’t be half bad either, and I can’t even begin to imagine how cool shooting beams of light like a laser would be. Heh, heh, I can’t decide which one I like the most…’
But I sighed and got a little depressed.
‘Whom am I trying to deceive, it is obvious what my affinity will be… Curse this mineral life…’
I scanned my surroundings one more time, making sure again that no monsters were nearby, and went a bit further into the area where vegetation wasn’t as thick.
‘Probably earth is needed to use earth.’
I already had good mana control. If my guess was correct, it wouldn’t take long for me to figure out how to use Earth Magic.
‘There I go.’
I channeled mana straight to the ground. I hadn’t used the mana control skill since I learned the other skills, but it was still fresh in my mind. The difficulty of controlling mana flowing outside one’s body could not be compared with controlling mana when it is confined inside it. My mana was draining within seconds.
‘Nothing, huh? Whatever, I feel like I’m on the right track… I know it’s going to be risky, but I’ll do it anyway…’
Even though it was dangerous, I decided to trust my sense of danger and empty my Mana Well. As had happened earlier with my MP, the mana I had stored in the well was gone in just a couple of minutes.
[Ability “Mana control” is now at level 2.]
And so, I was rewarded for taking a risk. My morale skyrocketed, and since I didn’t get tired or needed to sleep, I decided to go on for the entire day. In the end even my Mana Well reached level 2. The amount of mana I could store increased from 200 to 400 points. Increasing the level of the ‘Mana control’ skill had motivated me, but this I was completely hyped about.
[New magic acquired: Mold earth (Lvl 1).]
‘Finally! Here it is!’
It was a very simple spell that only allowed me to move earth from one place to another and change its shape, but it was definitely a promising start!
Status:
Name: Peter Gravel
Kind: Magic stone | Race: -
Level: 7 | Experience: 1901/3415
HP: 45/45 | MP: 54/90 | Mana well: 38/400
Stats:
Vitality: 0 | Strength: 0 | Agility: 0
Intellect: 10 | Magic power: 20
Abilities:
- Mana bomb: 1
- Mana cannon: 1
- Mana control: 2
- Roll: 4
Special abilities:
- Help: 3
- Mana well: 2
- Parasitize: 2
Magic:
- Earth:
-- Mold earth: 1
Titles:
- Inner aggressor
- Racist
- The bomb
- Thinking stone
- Wandering stone: 2
————————————————
A new category was added to my status. Apparently, the mana cannon and mana bomb weren’t really categorized as ‘magic’ despite being mana-based attacks.
‘Aren’t magic spells considered skills?’
[Magic is included in a category of its own, apart from abilities and special abilities.]
‘Oh, I see. Well, it’s a bit weird, but there must be a reason… I guess.’
The truth is that I was having a hard time understanding what the difference was between magic and skills. However, that didn’t matter to me at that moment. I was happy about having a new tool to deal with the challenges that awaited me in the dungeon.
‘And this is just the beginning. You’d do well to fear me, stupid dungeon. I’ll escape no matter the cost!’ I thought as I looked at the sky that peeked over the trees that prevented me from seeing the horizon.
Or so I wanted to believe, but… could I really escape the dungeon once I reached the last floor? The answer was not clear...
