Mana Training (2)

With only ten minutes of meditation, Luke lost all his irritation and sense of urgency. He exhaled deeply and stood up straight.

Ready, Luke was about to proceed to apply mana to his quarterstaff, but Rin stopped him, handing him a dagger.

"Try with this," Ulysses said. "Length, depth, and weight seemed to matter much on applying mana."

Since Ulysses felt the mana in the game, he hadn't stopped experimenting with how to apply mana. So far, all his experiments had led him to conclude that it was hard to discharge mana out of the body, but having a tool—no matter what kind—helped a lot in that direction.

Still, after trying out tools of different shapes and sizes, Ulysses figured shorter and narrower tools were easier to wield with mana.

Rin mumbled little instructions on how he did it, but the way Luke was going, it seemed he didn't need any more reminders.

Luke followed the instructions. Revolving mana in his circulatory system, he felt the energy within him, the warmth flowing quietly. It was just as addicting as any morphine, but it also gave him the feeling that he was in control.

He led the mana to his dagger. He felt quite restricted in transferring energy to the weapon. After a couple of minutes of organised visualisation, he finally succeeded.

"It's still shaking," Rin commented. "But for the first time, it is more than promising. You made your master proud."

Luke didn't reply to his word jab as his entire focus was on the dagger. Without more consideration, he plunged the dagger into the tree, the blade digging into the thick bark way easier than before. But being a newbie at this, Luke felt the obstruction pretty soon as a frown appeared on his brow.

Next, the connection between the dagger and his mana broke, the weapon losing the white sheen of light and the extraordinariness.

"This is harder than it looks," Luke commented.

"That's because you have to constantly provide mana to the weapon, which, from what I reckon, you haven't."

"I guess I have to put more training into it, don't I?"

Rin agreed, but shortly after a question arose in his mind. They stopped before a vacant space surrounded by tall trees, as Ulysses regarded Luke, who was going for more practise with the dagger.

"Aren't you still planning to become a mage?" Ulysses asked. Luke wasn't a fighter in a physical sense. His skills were barely marginal with any kind of weapon, and as far as Rin was aware, his friend hated close encounters. And that hadn't changed from what he had seen so far.

As for the Mage Class, that was where Luke shined. Luke had a higher mental capacity than most people and was nerdily smart in many things. The way the game approached things, Mage seemed like the best path for him, even if he was a better fighter.

"I do," Luke answered, resting his dagger. "However, this game clearly seems different from the norm. For example, players have to grow all or at least four of their attributes to advance to the next rank. I already have Physique, Mind, and Spirit; among them, Physique is the easiest attribute to grow, and from what I'm hearing more than 95% of players have that attribute."

It was pretty easy to guess what Luke was talking about. Apotheosis Online was going to be more physical, even if spell-casting and long-range beam attacks were a thing.

"From what I've heard, there are two main systems in Apotheosis," Luke said. "The first is the Origin abilities and skills that can be used in the short or long range, depending on the ability. The other is more like spell casting and elemental powers, which require a far higher level of comprehension. We haven't been introduced to that part yet."

"So you're going to dive into both of the systems," Rin said, concluding.

"That seems like the only way for me."

***

The next day, there was still no sign of Elise. Luke and Rin travelled on, fighting beasts and searching for rarer gems. They were mostly disappointed as all they could find were gems for enhancing Physique, Agility, and Recovery.

Those three seemed to be the most common attributes, with Physique being the most frequent. Both of them had a share of hundreds of them after distributing their loot from the rat dungeon.

"Maybe we should dive back into that dungeon again," Luke said. "I was able to awaken my Spirit from there and got a few rare gems. Who knows--"

"Luke, I'm not having this conversation with you anymore," Rin cut him off. "Why do you think Elise hasn't logged back in after leaving the dungeon?"

And Luke would lose him, too, if he still urged him to go back to that disgusting dungeon again.

"Anyway, I don't see any of the plants you were mentioning that give Spirit gems as a reward," Rin said as they walked.

The sun was in the mid-sky, and Luke had practised enough of mana infusion to learn the rudimentary Armament skill, although no tabs appeared on his or Rin's status page with the skill name.

Abruptly, a few howls sounded only a few hundred yards away. Rin knitted his brow as he hadn't noticed. He gripped the hilt of his short sword and was about to leave when he heard Luke:

"Let me do this."

"Are you sure about this, dear Disciple?" Ulysses asked.

Luke's eyes were fixed on the direction of the howls, waiting for the rabid wolves to arrive.

"Even though you've learned much about mana infusion possible in just one day, you're still a..."

Rin couldn't find a good term that would express his feelings and also wouldn't hurt Luke. Apparently, being blunt, he was pretty bad at that.

"Terrible in physical fights?" Luke asked, arching an eyebrow. "That is the very reason I need to do this."

Ulysses narrowed his eyes at Luke, finding something odd about his friend's behaviour. Luke was never this intense.

Well, he could understand that Luke needed to take every small and broad step to get stronger for Heaven's Virtue, as his team was in a tight spot, in Luke's words.

Then again, Luke planned on testing something else as well.

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