22

Because of the circumstances I had no way of knowing how many wisps actually spawned but outside the array the others were working furiously to capture exactly thirteen. Gryn was already struggling to contain three with his magic and the others could barely contain one or two with the help of their own wisps. All I had to do was snap my fingers to produce a magic resonating sound that dimmed every wisp in earshot.

Even those bound to the others were forced to settle on the ground with a sudden loss of 'consciousness'. A split second later, though, the wisps bound to my brother and his friends acquired enough 'food' through their connection to awaken and rise up again. Their prompt and instinctive response to the situation was to float into the torsos of my companions where they would be safe.

Mentally exhausted from the excessive manipulation of energies and my own mana, I simply sweep a hand lightly through the air to generate a mana breeze that picks up the wisps and brings them to me when I draw my arm back in. Even in the wind, though, these incorporeal entities drifted with a frustrating slowness.

However, it allowed me time to appreciate the vast collection of wisps before me. Not only were all of them some form of darkened wisp, exactly two of them were entirely black. However, the two of them were completely different. While one was a deep and expansive black like looking into space at night with a vague mistiness about its body the other was superficially course and black like coal with flame-like wisps of darkness radiating about its body.

Holding out my hands to both of these wisps, I reach out raw mana with a faint tinge of their dark and death elements from my hands to either of them. Awakened by the transfusion of energy, the wisps hungrily follow the mana back to my hands where they continue to absorb whatever I put out. Not only did they return to their original vibrant selves like a small sun and growing black hole, they grew from roughly the size of baseballs to grapefruits.

Finding them both more than compliant, I simply push them into my own body where neither of the resist or retreat. In fact, of their own volition, they sought their way into the core of my being. My heart.

[All stats raised by 5]

Appeared before my eyes once they were done making their homes in me. I had expected to have my physical stats raised by about as much from one of them, but having all of my stats raised by two of them was both a surprise and a disappointment. I wanted heavier physical stats for my training.

Because I had acquired two types of the darkness I wanted, I left the others to take their picks from the remains. All of the others were then stored in small baby food jars to bring home. If anyone in their families had enough magic to feed a wisp then they could bind one, but most of these would probably be sold.

Most likely to the same place that Gryn planned to sell the location of the basilisk nest.

Despite being dog tired from spending most of the day on edge waiting for the appearance of echoes and then the final attack, having been rejuvenated by my attack meant I would not be able to sleep any time soon. So, while the others hesitantly went to sleep with their wisps, I stayed up to watch the array. Somehow, though, I had overlooked yet another complication from the concentrated mana of the array.

There were things in this forestry that lived on mana and were attracted to it like bugs to sweets. Namely among them were critters we had already faced the other day which should have been most of them belonging to this area. However, not long after midnight, a hunting party of arnids showed up.

Like our first camp, there was just under a dozen giant spiders creeping up to the array from every direction above and below the falls. There were four of them waiting in a nearby treetop watching our camp as if waiting for an opportune moment. Wisps now spawned at a consistent two or three an hour and were intangible to these creatures unable to use magic.

If they happened to enter the array, get trapped, and be killed around the pool then it would encourage both life and death energies to once again propagate. However, this time, there would be no echoes after the amount of holy element used was enough to make this place hallowed ground for several years. The only issue was that we already had a bottle full of darkened elemental stardust and I did not want more.

The array needed to stay clean and neutral so only simple and profitable stardust could come out. The darkened dust was probably worth more, but I planned on keeping that for myself now that the array spit out pure wisps. Roughly three of them an hour was enough to fill almost two small jam jars in one day.

After that, I honestly wanted to be gone from this place so I could set to experimenting at home and report the findings of my array to my mom. She would probably be furious, but this was all in the name of science.

Magic science.

Once the arnids everywhere else worked up the courage to break into the array in search of magically rich food that did not exist, I jumped up from my seat and turned toward the arnids in the nearby tree. Their response was just as swift and more decisive, leaping from the tree and into camp too attack. I had merely meant to start them and had no idea they would be so ruthless.

However, a quick flick of my wrist bisected two of them in midair with cutting winds before the other two landed on the opposite side of the fire from me. Being close to the fire was the worst thing they could have done against me, but was probably smart for dealing with mundane enemies. Behind the fire, they were somewhat hidden from view.

Against me, they were simply in easy reach of small whips of fire to lash out and curl about their legs. Arnids even of this size had a strength of ten or more, which meant they could carry off a large child like me.

Except my whips had my own Strength stat supporting them and were more than enough to drag the spiders into the burning branches.

Once the nearest threats were gone, I threw my consciousness out into the array and used the array itself to buffet the spiders with small gales. Once the spiders above the fall were falling in and around the pool, I used simply earth element and my wind to turn the rocks and pebbles into small pillars and hillocks. These mounds of rock formed so quickly and harshly that they threw the arnids up into the air.

In the air, another wave of my hand swept the arnids out of the array and into a pile of boulders nearby. Once the were ground, I snapped my fingers for another infrasonic stun before piercing the spiders' underbellies with the rocks they were crippled on.

Despite the scraping and scrabbling of the spiders that were dragged into the fire, it was not until their carapaces finally started to melt long after the skirmish had ended that the others began awakening.

Coughing and gagging from the stench of burning keratin nearby, the others hurried cried out in shock and horror at the gelatinous burning lumps in the fire. The smell and scene combined was enough to make poor Hilda and Layla turn away and empty the contents of their stomachs. I, on the other hand, was busy prizing the whole carapaces from the other arnids.

My overall haul in experience from this confrontation actually awarded me over two thousand more points. I did not know the worth of a level, but in most games the first ten or so levels were only like ten or so thousand points. It was after that when things began to get grinding.

However, the experience I had gotten while hunting echoes was even greater than the arnids. Whenever I finally matured for real and unlocked levels, it was entirely likely that I would start at level fifty because of my future hunting. However, once I could start raising my stats with points like that, raising my stats naturally would became harder and harder.

If my strength was one hundred then I would need to work out with a thousand pounds to continue increasing it. If my Endurance was three hundred, I would need to run for five hours in order to increase it. Increasing my agility was harder than my other physical stats, it involved a combination of fine tuning my reaction times, what I react with, and the overall maneuverability of my body.

Naturally, the hardest stats to train like Intelligence and Agility were the ones I would feed most of my points.

However, what was the point of being able to watch a bullet travel with enhanced kinetic vision if my Strength was too low to move out of the way? Only when I could increase my stats at will could I experiment to find the proper synergy between them. In order to do that, though, I needed a lot of points.

Once the others settled down after taking turns pouring energy into Gryn to incinerate the contents of the campfire, I was done picking apart the arnids for their venom glands and upper carapaces. This batch was actually a little bigger than the last, but the overall durability of their carapaces were the same. If their queens had been magical, though, these guys would have been much tougher to deal with.

Even though we would be leaving after the next night here, I hoped to see some arnids of the magical variety. After having considered the idea of a shield from their bodies the other day, the idea of using them for materials had stuck with me and I really wanted to see what I could do.

With carapaces that were already magic for greater conductivity.

Even if I could turn this current stack into an imbued shield that would withstand most attacks and then augment it with enchanting, it would not even meet the requirements for the my mother's Conduction enchantment.

A shield like that was honestly what I would give to kids like Gryn and his friends for while they were playing around hunting. Even if it would not be able to withstand combat between people and magic, it would still be able to match the Strength requirements of an echo's freak-out. That alone could raise their hunting efficiency by levels.

As the night wore on, I could not help but continue musing on the idea of outfitting Gryn and his friends. If I supplied them with weapons and equipment, they would undoubtedly be indebted to me and I could use their greater freedom in the forest as trade. Even if I would not be allowed to go out and acquire goods myself, they still did so on a regular basis.

By the time the sun had started rising again to bring the faint traces of pink and purple dawn to the clouds, I had just put away a filled jar of stardust. The others would probably be sleeping late after the excitement from last night. Hell, it would not be for another few hours before they normally awoke.

Waiting until after the next wisp spawning to take a break from my duties, I use a small tendril of my stretched awareness to radar around the falls for almost a full hundred yards to make sure the area was relatively safe. Then, increasing my stats by enhancing my body, I dash off into the forestry in search of edible plants I could actually tolerate.

Today would be another day of stew, but this time I was going to make it and use the sweeter meat from the arnids to set the flavor for the stew. This required a bit of effort in searching for herbs used for cooking, but the ever present iramana plants produced nectar which sweetened the leaves.

Considering Gryn's friends would probably be playing with magic more than ever before, it was probably good to put them on a diet of these plants.

To this end, I ended up using most of my remaining storage containers gathering roots and pedals from the plants. The rest of the shrubbery I carried with me in another grass sack. It would be the perfect unaligned addition to further strengthen the array- even though I knew I should stop playing with it.

After several trips in and out of camp, it was time to set to work on the alchemical stew I had planned. The base for which was water taken from upstream of the fall. Even though it was upstream of the enrichment center, the mana in the water was still strengthened by the array.

For this cooking project I even transmuted a small cauldron from granite, half filled with water, I unceremoniously dumped all of the cleaned edible parts of plants I had collected into the cauldron. Most of this was flavorful herbs and some wild peppers I had found dried and ground with magic, but of course there were the plentiful tubers. If there was ever a potato famine, people would simply move higher up the slopes to replace them with the roots of these taro plant relatives.

Finishing the stew some of the roasted meats the others had hunted yesterday, I simply lidded the cauldron and telekinetically carried it over to the fire. As long as something did not exceed my Strength and could not move too much, I could psychic anything in the world. The amount of stew being made was more than enough for all of us to stay full all day, which was intentional.

Similar to some medicines, the longer it is taken the stronger its affects in the body. There was enough stew for us to eat modestly all the way back home, which would leave lingering magical enhancement and regeneration with Gryn's friends for a few weeks.

With my current stock and the advise on how to use it, I could have these kids training in magic as much as they wanted with little fear of mana burn for months. As much as I liked them, I also wanted to use them, and having the best tools helps getting the best results. This was basically my down payment on their future services.

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