Chapter 56: Arrival of an old friend
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STATUS
NAME: Shingi Maki
CLASS: None
PROFESSION: Scholar Master
RACE: Blessed Human
HP: 88/88
SP: 45/45
MP: 42/42
STR: 12
AGI: 14
END: 16
INT: 16
CHA: 3
Mana Pool: Earth and Light Element
Skills: VISUALIZATION (Master Rank), MANA MANIPULATION (Master Rank), MANA SENSE (Master Rank), PERCEPTION (Master Rank), STEALTH (Base Rank), IMPROVISED THROW WEAPON (Master Rank), SMITHING (Master Rank), ACCELERATION (Master Rank), MARTIAL ART (Base Rank), GLASSBLOWING (Master Rank)
Spells: MANA HAND (Low Grade), FILTH EATER (Ungraded), MINOR ILLUSION (Ungraded), LIGHT (Ungraded), ROCK THROW (Low Grade), CAMOUFLAGE (Low Grade), INVISIBILITY(Base Grade), DOME OF SILENCE (Base Grade), MANA DOUBLE - LIGHT ELEMENT (Base Grade), MANA DOUBLE - EARTH ELEMENT (Base Grade)
Blessings: Blessing of Beliss, Blessing of Dlog, Angel's Boon
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It seemed his HP, SP and MP had improved even if his stats didn't change. His crafting abilities have reached another level as his GLASSBLOWING was now at Master Rank, but he could feel that even his SMITHING had improved, even if it was already at Master Rank.
But the most significant change on him was his mana control.
Before, he felt some restriction when he was manipulating mana, but it wasn't that great to restrict him, or so he thought.
His manipulation was four times faster than before, but this didn't mean his casting time was four times faster as there were other factors. He felt the mana of his without using his MANA SENSE circling in him and could tell how much he had without the System's help.
When he used, his now officially counted as Master Rank, MANA SENSE at first, he didn't notice much difference until he saw some writing on each type of mana source.
It had written the element(s) of each one source he could find with his Skill and gave him a percent number. He did some tests, and it didn't take him long to discover what that number was about. It seemed to be how compatible the mana was with his Mana Tree, so the ones with the highest tree would help grow his Mana Tree faster and safer as if one kept feeding incompatible mana to his Mana Tree would cause damage to it at some point.
Even his STEALTH and MARTIAL ART, he could feel them getting strengthened somewhat. It was like something clicked in his mind, and he started using his skills in a different way, a better and more potent form.
He even felt like he could handle his Breaking-Limit state better now than before but wouldn't know the difference until he gave it a try.
But for now, he left it to test it later as he stored his Class Crystal to his Spatial Ring that fortunately still had with him. He wasn't going to use it yet as he wanted to learn more Spells. Of course, if he used it now and got a Mage Class, it would make learning new Spells easier, but he wanted to get the best class he could with using the crystal, so he had to improve himself as much as he could before using it. That way, the possible class being a rare one should be better.
He stood up and stretched a little to get his body ready to move on. He felt little pain by moving, but he noticed the herbs and elixirs had decreased it to almost nothing.
He headed towards the kitchen, where he found three individuals drinking tea.
Of course, two of them were Aneta and Keremon, while the other figure was a big fellow.
He was close to two and a half meters tall if he stood, but he was currently sitting to fit in the house and not hit the ceiling as the ceiling wasn't that high. He was wearing that had a hood that would cover his face, but he didn't have it up now—no facial hairs or even hair on his face, which was somewhat white-grey. His eyes were of an utterly dark color.
This was a Half-Giant, more specifically, a Half-Stone Giant.
When Shingi entered the room, all three turned towards him, welcomed him, and offered to sit with them for some tea, which Shingi accepted.
There was some silence as they seemed to enjoy the tea, but then the first one to speak was Karemon. But he didn't speak towards Shingi but towards the Half-Giant.
"So now that he is awake, are you gonna introduce yourself?" [Karemon]
The Half-Giant turned towards Karemon and then towards Shingi like waiting for something.
Shingi sighed as he put his tea glass down.
"Well, I guess it is time to give you a name. Let's go with Volig. Not so different than before, but enough to be considered as a new one." [Shingi]
The Half-Giant, who was now known as Volig, was nobody else but the reincarnated Varic. It was a surprise for both of them when he turned into a Half-Giant but didn't ruin their plans. It was a suitable one as the Half-Giant one had control of Earth Mana by default and had access to a mana pool producing Earth Element mana like Half Demons had access to demon-like mana. Earth one was useful during crafting as it could be used to strengthen metals and other materials coming from mining and such.
He hadn't given him back then a name as he wanted to consider it and wasn't needed to be decided right at that point.
Volig had traveled in a somewhat similar fashion as Wild Tycoon and Little Phoenix but had to use more Teleportation stations to be safer so that none was following him and keep his tracks clear from others. Of course, this took more time and resources to spend, but he had quite a bit of saving as a Master Blacksmith. Of course, he had everything in Spatial Rings and similar trinkets.
Volig ran his hand through his beard but then realized he didn't have one; some habits are hard to forget. He tended to do this movement when thinking or approved something, and in this case, he seemed to like his new name.
Shingi then got a notification from the System that Volig was now one of his students.
"Well, I guess it is nice meeting you... Volig. But can you say what you are doing here?" [Karemon]
Volig explained as he had gone through the story they were going to use, which wasn't far from the truth. He didn't mention being a reincarnated Dwarf but had met the Blessed One who helped Shingi and suggested getting in this town to help around. He said that this Blessed One had helped him a lot in the past, and it was the least he could do.
Shingi gathered that he came in town almost a week ago, and these past days he had helped manage the shop and its order, which was easy for him even at his new body as nothing big was ordered.
His skills were reset, but it wouldn't be too long to rank them up as they used to and even higher possible with his experience.
Aneta seems impressed as she knew that Half-Giants were a rare sight, but not a rare as Half-Demons but close. Giants are considered monsters from the System, but there were cases where they were similar to NPCs, but they kept a distance from the outside world. A Giant like that to have a child with one of another race wasn't an ordinary event.
At that point, some more people joined them at the kitchen and were none other than the Player students of Shingi. They joined them at having some tea as Aneta and Karemon left as there wasn't much space for everyone, and they had things to take care of. They wished though to Shingi to be back in full health soon.
So in the house were only Shingi and his students as Garry seemed to have left.
Silence returned to the room as none seemed to know what to ask. But Shingi was the one to speak first.
"I am sure you all are curious about what happened, but what you need to know is we have a new enemy. He is stronger than what we can face now, but we will beat him and get back Annoue."[Shingi]
As he said that, he cast a MINOR ILLUSION to create a small figure of Mikhail for everyone to see. The spell could work with his VISUALIZATION Skill, so it was a quite detailed one.
"He had used magic more powerful than what I have heard about, and I don't think even Master will be able to face him and have a chance to win or even survive. I was lucky that he underestimated me and had shown some interest in me. Although I am still not sure why he came here, it seems to have something to do with Aella." [Shingi]
Volig seemed to be surprised by the mention of the Goddess's name, but the players didn't seem to respond to it, which was typical since they probably weren't interested in the different Gods of the Game.
Shingi explained who Aella was and the task she gave him without mentioning that it was part of a Quest. He then went into more descriptions of the meeting he had with Mikhail and everything he learned over his time researching his memories.
He asked them how their training went while he was away. All of them were close to level 20. Mizuneko, even if he didn't have the help of the Egroeg cause he wasn't listening to him, had progressed to Air Mana manipulation quite well but wasn't yet at the point to make it one of his Elements. Wild Tycoon had raised her Rage Skill to 41, making it considered barely being Master Rank.
Hineko had mostly raised his level and POTION MAKING skill as he was the one who made the elixirs that used on Shingi. Aneta had helped on it as she was an Alchemist herself.
But Little Phoenix had the most significant progress of them all, as not only was she level 19, but she also had earned the first element of her Mana Tree.
Now her Mana Tree was of Dark Element and even had ten Mana Seeds but no Mana Fruits.
Shingi was impressed as he hadn't given her all the steps on how to do it, so her making by herself, especially since she was a beginner in these games, was impressive.
Shingi was happy with their progress, but he was ready to speed things up.
"Well, then I think at four days, we are gonna be ready for our next operation." [Shingi]
Everyone turned towards him, waiting to hear what he was referring to.
"It is time to deal with our Dungeon Boss." [Shingi]