The Path of Ascension 3: A LitRPG Adventure

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Matt tried to think of how he could use that to his and his team’s advantage, and spent the next two hours reviewing various functions. In the end, he didn’t see any way to exploit his mana regeneration. The easiest way would be to create a rift where iron was present in the ground, as there were two Tier 5 rifts being delved for that purpose. A team went in with miners who, after it was safe, started mining the rift over and over. The rifts had a limited number of instances, so they could expertly mine the ore and leave.

He was pretty sure that he could make a rift like that, but how he would own it would be a separate problem. If he said he made it, he didn’t know what would happen, but the questions he imagined being asked would be less than ideal for his continued anonymity. He also didn’t know how he would be able to claim a rift at all. He was pretty sure that they were considered a part of the planet, unless you were a guild or noble family.

It wasn’t like he needed the money, but he did want to increase his point generation. The two weeks of forced downtime sucked, and he was anxious to earn enough points to buy the [Cracked Breach] skill. He half suspected that it was placed there explicitly for him. It was just too perfect of a coincidence, otherwise considering that the skill could accept an absurd amount of mana with a relatively low upfront cost. But he could cover upfront cost with the help of a mana stone next Tier.

Some of the upgrades just felt weird. Why spend points on a moat when you could just dig one out? After some consideration, Matt figured that this actually was the army’s intent. You could spend an absurd amount of points, or you could build whatever you needed yourself.

Things like the teleporter setup for large forts seemed impossible to build on one’s own, but considering the strategic value of something like that, it seemed kind for the army to provide them at all.

That didn’t change the fact that the kingdom was raking in points like they were hotcakes. A single small fort generated ten points an hour, and there were tens of thousands of them. The medium forts generated one hundred, and the large forts were worth five hundred points an hour. A city generated ten thousand points an hour.

If he decided to become a mana battery, he could make 6,912,000 mana a day.

Matt paused as the realization sank in. That was worth 691,200 kingdom level points per day. If he sold his secret right here and now, he could buy everything he could ever want out of the reward shop. All it would take was a few days of sitting back and relaxing. He was sure that the conversion wasn’t one for one, but that hardly mattered when he never ran out of mana.

I could change the course of the war with a few days’ worth of giving mana. That’s enough to redirect points into upgrading a fort or two.

Matt was almost tempted to try and work out a deal.

No. f**k that. I’ll earn more points than that by fighting. I’ll carve out a deeper impact through my actions, not my mana. I will not and will never be reduced to just a mana battery. I’ll kick down a city’s walls solo if I have to, but I won’t devolve into nothing more than my Talent.

Still, the scale of points was mind boggling.

He received a call from Liz as he was idly scrolling through the numbers. Since it was the first contact he had had in five boring hours, he quickly picked up. “Check to see if 54°21’56.0”S 36°34’45.6”W is a bad spot to send a team.”

Matt found the spot and saw that it was a cold and mountainous region near the pole of the planet. There was a single medium fort defending a palladium mine. The fort was distinctly far away from cities, and acted more as a beachhead for the queendom, located on the southernmost continent. It was half-covered in ice caps, with a large fort built at the center, with a small ring of forts around it. The continent and fort were both otherwise isolated from the main forces of both vassals.

After thinking it over himself and having his AI simulate the situation, he responded, “Seems clear enough.”

After a long moment, Liz finally asked, “Okay, good. How are things down there?”

Matt shrugged, even though she couldn’t see it. “Fine, I guess. Mostly boring since there isn’t much for me to do other than observe. From the lack of communication so far, I guess you can handle everything from your end?”

Liz seemed apologetic when she said, “We got set up with a full office, and it has most of the capabilities I thought we would need someone down there for. Sorry. I didn’t think it was worth your time.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Matt tried to reassure Liz, who he could tell was genuinely remorseful about leaving him out.

“I thought we’d need a lot of oversight, but the kingdom has been super helpful and hasn’t tried to double-cross us or anything.”

“So, do you need me here?” He tried to keep the eagerness out of his voice. While he had not minded this little break, and had learned quite a few things, he’d much rather be doing something else.

“For now, yes. I’ve got a replacement on their way. If nothing else, we at least have a face down there, so that should keep anyone from getting ideas about changing orders or something. Sorry I have to go. Someone’s at my door.”

Matt almost reluctantly disconnected and spent the last hour of his shift planning out his next steps. He started on his idea for posting a reward for unique mana aspects. He would offer 10 points per person who had an aspect he lacked.

He wasn’t sure if it was enough to attract people, but he felt it was more than fair for someone spending a few points of mana to charge his ring a bit.

That was an hour’s worth of standing guard but for a few minutes of effort.

To his surprise, by the time his shift ended, and a young woman came to replace him, he had half a dozen pings responding to his posting.

He eagerly sent them each a message to meet up with him at a public park and hurried his way over to find six people milling around.

“If you can line up, I just need to input mana into my refilling mana stones.”

That was Matt’s answer to hiding his growth ring. He bought two dozen small and inefficient mana stones that could be recharged, and intended to simply have the people add their mana into one, then move on.