1 A New World

Bright gentle lights slowly entered the Carl's sight as he opened his eyes. There was a large yellow fireball illuminating the azure blue sky populated with several fluffy clouds. A slightly smaller purple celestial body hang on the sky and he could see large creatures floating high up in the sky. The air was laden with colorful streams of gentle flowing mana. Carl lay on the ground taking in the new sights for the first time. Although this was the first time he saw most of these stuff he strangely knew their names, the bright flaming body was the sun and the lesser body was the moon. He was clearly in a new world.

Lifting his arm, Carl observed his hand and noticed he was black now. He had these black disk like objects floating close to his skin. Unlike the past, right now he felt an intrinsic connection with the black disks like they were part of him. He tried releasing mana and a stream of white mana slowly exuded out of his palm forming a white mana ball above his hand. After confirming that he can still use mana he dispersed the mana ball. He also noticed that his field of vision was gradually increasing.

Slowly getting up his gaze wondered across the unfamiliar landscape that enveloped him. A pristine white floor stretched beneath his feet, encircled by eight majestic pillars that were overgrown with verdant green vines. Beyond the pillars were trees that towered towards the heavens as it seems he was in the midst of a forest. Weirdly he could see behind himself and closing his eyes didn't help, touching his face he found that he had a third beady eye that was smooth and hard to the touch. Closing it with his palms made his 360° vision darken.

Carl closed his eyes and proceeded to stand still unmoving like a statue. The sun set rose set and rose again. Carl had remained still for five days, even some small birds had perched on his shoulders. Opening his eyes, Carl had a determined glint in them, he will forge a brighter and greater future. The birds were startled by his movement and flew away towards the east. Carl marveled at his new body, he wasn't hungry even after five days without food, and despite standing still for long his muscles remained fluid with no sign of fatigue nor stiffness. It is simply remarkable if not miraculous.

Looking at how he was still naked Carl had a thought. The black disks floating close to his body combined and morphed forming a simple black robe that covered him.

"What! I… I can do that." Carl exclaimed in surprise and excitement.

With another thought the black disk in his forearms morphed into two black blades. Rushing to the trees in the distance he swung the blades leaving a deep gash in the tree's thick trunk. Increasing the length of the blades he swung it again and cleanly cut the tree.

Crash! The tree crashed through the branches of other trees and fell with a loud sound. Retracting the blades Carl proceeded to test his physical strength on another tree. He directly punched the tree splintering its bark and leaving a small dent on the freshly exposed trunk.

Carl was pleasantly surprised as he had used just a fraction of his strength. Looking at his hand it was still pristine and undamaged. Increasing his strength a little more he swung his fist towards the tree. Boom! The fist directly blew a large hole in the trunk, the tree creaked as it tilted landing on other trees next to it.

Carl examined himself again wondering what more secrets his body had. Looking towards the east he decided to move in that direction. By observing the ruins where he woke up he concluded that it must have been made by a civilized species, he just hoped that they still exist. Hmm how will they look like? Will they accept an alien like him? What if they are hostile to him? Crazy thoughts wandered in Carl's mind as he strode towards an unknown destination.

Suddenly Carl took a step back, a spear-shaped rock whizzed past him, lodging itself in the tree trunk beside him. He turned to see a towering four meter tall scaled beast slowly making its way towards him. Unsure if the creature was the source of the projectile, Carl watched as purple mana with a brown halo begun to gather above the beast's head. Carl's eyes widen in astonishment as a rock formed from the mana and is hurtled towards him at incredible speeds. With quick movement, Carl dodged the rock projectile which crashed into the ground with muffled thud. It was a sight like none other, as Carl had never seen anyone use mana to materialize substances before.

The beast broke into a charge dashing crazily towards Carl. Carl created a white mana bullet in the palm of his hand he launched it at the beast that was already few meters away. But to his astonishment, the very earth surged creating an earthen wall that intercepted his attack. The earth wall exploded into bits but managed to stop the mana bullet from advancing any further. Carl realized that not only can it conjure rocks but it can also manipulate the environment.

The beast lunged forward its front limbs outstretched, claws glinting in the light and its gaping jaws wide in anticipation of its next meal. With a swift back flip Carl evaded the beast's claws and quickly launched a mana bullet hitting the beast square on the head. With a deafening crack the impact flung the beast through the air like a ragdoll. It collided with the trees behind it, a cacophony of splintering wood echoing through the air. However to Carl's astonishment it stood back up shacking it head and shrugging the blow as if it were a mere nuisance. Carl was taken aback, normally someone taking his mana bullet in a close range like the beast will at least loose his head.

The beast let out a roar as mana begun gathering behind it forming a volley of sharp rock shards. With a swish the rocks were sent hurtling towards Carl who quickly morphed his sleeves into a shield protecting him from the torrential barrage of attacks. Carl noticed the distinct purple mana gathering below him, without time to react rocky spikes jutted forward from the soil with intent to skewer him. The force of the spikes pushed Carl upwards into the air but miraculously none of the spikes pierced through him.

Carl's gaze met with the beast's midair, it was in disbelief as Carl hadn't been skewered by the spikes it had conjured. Carl followed his gut and morphed the shield into a bullet shape, whoosh, with a thought the black bullet was hurled and plunged into the beasts head. It made its exit behind the creature's skull with bits of flesh and blood. The creature fell limply onto the ground with a vacant gaze staring ahead, it couldn't be any deader. A grey mist rose from the beast's corps and before slowly dissipating. The mist gave Carl a strange feeling he couldn't quite describe. The black disk he had launched floated back and merged with his robe forming the right sleeve.

Taking a deep breath, Carl slumped against the rough bark of a tree nearby as he released the tension he had. Replaying the battle with the beast in his mind, he reached out and grabbed one of the stone shards that littered the ground. In the sunlight the shard shone with an uncanny sharpness. Slitting his palm with the sharp edge of the stone, Carl beheld in amazement as his skin remained unbroken, unscathed from any damage. Gasping in disbelief he muttered to himself, "Huh, my skin seems to be impenetrable." Without this trait he might have lost the battle.

He remembered right before the mana bullet hit the beast, its body was flooded in mana. Would that have allowed it to survive the hit, he wondered. He carefully sensed the mana in his body, unlike the beast who seemed to have a central mana core, Carl's whole body was filled with mana. Also his body didn't leak mana like the beast. With an idea, he mobilized his mana he made it flow into the dark robe. Suddenly he could feel a vast space open up within his consciousness.

Feeling it carefully he formed a channel from the space to the outside world, slowly inserting his hand into his robe the hand seamlessly passed into it and entered the space. Grabbing a nearby rock he placed it into the space and watched it as it floated about. 'Hmm, I'll call this space the dimensional pocket.'

The beasts could conjure rocks and manipulate the earth, does this have to do with the type of mana it had? Carl's mana was white while the beast had purple mana with a brown halo. He moved to the corpse of the beast, forming a short knife he easily sliced through the creature's chest exposing a large purple crystal like orb.

'So this is where it stores the mana'.

Removing the orb, he found that it was rather soft unlike its appearance. It had a purple sheen with streaks of brown and the trace amount of purple mana exuding from its surface, for some reason it seemed so enticing.

Carl gave it a little lick and suddenly an explosion of flavor burst in his mouth. Opening his mouth he took a small bite of the mana core.

"Oooh."

The amazing taste was he experienced was simply out of the world.Carl looked at his empty hands with disbelief, he seemed to have entered a trance and ate it all. Carl turned his head as he heard a sound. Several large wolves emerged from the foliage eyeing Carl and the drake's corpse.

******

Carl looked at fifty three deep blue orbs and a purple orb that were rotating in a spiral pattern in the dimensional pocket with satisfaction. The wolves had the ability to control and move within shadows, unlike the drake simple mana bullets were lethal to them. It is also noted that the rest of the pack chose to retreat after he killed one of the wolves that had purple mana. He assumed that that was one of their leader. Although he had engaged in slaughter his robe and skin were still spotless without a stain of blood since the blood just rolled off his body and robes.

It was already dusk, the sun was below the tree line and the sky had an orange hue. Back in his home world, the sky only had two hues, one blue and another red. There was also no sun nor a moon and therefore no night, the day was divided into blue and red cycles when the sky was blue and red respectively.

He turned to look at the purple moon, his vision zoomed in and he was able to see plant like structures on the moon. 'A new trait,' he wasn't really surprised at this point. He wondered if there was a creature that could fly from the world to the moon. As the darkness set in Carl decided to continue on his original journey. The darkness didn't offer any problem as he could see just fine.