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Liz rolled her eyes. “I don’t know everyone, Matt.” Seeing his expression she added. “Really, I don’t. We can check with Aunt Helen, though. Possibly Travis and Keith, but Aunt Helen is the best bet. She knows everyone.”
Matt shrugged. Really, he didn’t care. They were messaging him, and he couldn’t fault them. They had been right. He needed to advance on his own, or he would have felt that none of his achievements were his own, not after being informed about how he was watched due to his detrimental Talent. They had a better read on his mental state than he did back then.
He had been just one setback away from shattering back at Benny’s. He had never even looked into alternative ways to make money. He had simply found the first way out and pushed for it. Things had worked out in the end, but a million things could have broken that precarious balance.
Standing, Matt felt reinvigorated. “Come on, let’s spar a bit. I want to test my Concept.”
The two of them hurried to the training room and found Travis and Keith. They were lightly sparring at incredibly slow speeds. Which meant that Matt could only see blurs.
The couple stopped when they entered, and Travis called out, “The newly Concepted pair! How does it feel?”
Keith spoke over Travis and asked, “What images did you settle on?”
Matt and Liz looked to each other, and when they both gestured for the other to go, Liz rolled her eyes and went first.
“I did what I wanted and got myself into my rebirth through blood image. It should let me get all of the increased power of an internal Concept, with none of the drawbacks. Since I use blood externally, I should get the best of both worlds.”
Matt picked up where Liz left off, “I made a white hole image.”
Keith c****d an eyebrow, but Travis nodded.
“I have no idea what it will do, though.”
“Well, let’s test it, then.” Travis rubbed his hands together at the suggestion.
Matt focused inward to his new sense, and with something that wasn’t his mana, activated his Concept. He knew it was his will, but it wasn’t like mana or essence he could feel. This was more ethereal.
The energy surged forward, and his willpower quickly drained. Worried that something was wrong, he stopped.
Travis and Keith both looked surprised, and Liz looked confused. So, Matt asked, “What? What happened?”
Keith said, “Huh, I got a boost to my Mana Regeneration. I’m not sure if it was flat or percentage based, though.”
He looked to his husband, and they clearly began sharing information with their AIs.
Travis spoke next. “We both got different amounts of mana regen. We aren’t sure if it’s because of our differing cultivation or different amounts of our missing mana.”
Keith added, “Or distance from you.”
“Or your own mana generation.”
Matt thought that over and didn’t get any answers from his Concept. He did get the feeling that there was more that he could do.
“I think there’s something else. Let me try something.”
Matt activated his Concept a second time but focused on the other feeling it gave him. His vision sharpened like usual, but he also saw white light seeping out of himself. The light was tinged blue at the base and, following his instincts from the Concept, he pushed it out with a surge of will. A sphere of bluish white light surrounded him.
Keith flicked something at him, but it slowed constantly, until it eventually reversed its direction as if Matt had thrown it back at him.
Matt coughed and felt something wet in it.
Wiping his mouth, he found his hand covered in blood.
Before he could start to worry Keith and Travis, both touched him, sending healing energy through him. Matt instantly felt better, but the world seemed to have the colors drained out of it like a washed-out painting. He also found that his thoughts were hard to form. They floated just out of his mental hand.
Keith snapped in front of his face and, after a moment, his words came through. “You used too much will. Meditate. Think inward and clear your mind. It’ll help.”
It took what seemed like years, but he focused into his cores and entered the area where his Concept resided. The mental space that once felt full of energy was drained, and his image was dim in his mind. It wasn’t fragile, but it seemed to have no energy.
Clearly, that last bit with the repulsion had overdone it.
Matt did find that his presence inside his Concept area was greatly speeding up the production of that energy. Once he didn’t feel light-headed, Matt exited and found that his peripherals lacked the proper colors.
Liz hovered over him, so he smiled at her. The movement cracked the dried blood on his face.
The look on her face showed that while she appreciated the attempt, it wasn’t very reassuring.
“You better, Matt?”
The concern put him at ease.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
That had taken far more energy than he expected.
Keith looked sorry, and when he opened his mouth, Matt spoke faster. “Really, it’s fine. Better to push my limits here.”
Travis laid a hand on Keith’s shoulder and said, “When you said white hole, I was afraid of this. Your image is what’s considered…larger. Huge, really, but that’s not an official designation.”
Matt knew about the designations but hadn’t put two and two together. His Concept’s image was massive. His mental image of it was on a cosmic scale. Powering it was draining to his will.
With the size of the image in his spirit, he figured he had made the image small. That would have given him a greater efficiency, at the cost of some oomph.
Having a larger image meant he had more room to grow than most, as he improved with usage and strain. But lasting only seconds was something Matt hadn’t even read about.
Sighing, he shrugged. “Nothing I can do about it. In the end, this is an advantage. Well, it will be in the long run. But I thought I made the image small. Whoops.”
Keith added what Matt didn’t. “Getting there will be quite hard.”
He looked at Liz. “Well, let’s see your Concept.”
She looked at him weirdly but nodded.
The blood mage summoned a small sphere of blood that hovered over her hand. She looked at it, but Matt didn’t see anything change but the woman’s smile.
Travis poked it. “I can’t tell. Did you do anything?”
Liz kicked at his shin. “Yes! It’s stronger. I also feel like I can use my Concept to improve the healing that comes with my Tier 3 Talent.”
She lashed out at her brother’s wall. The blood didn’t even scratch the Tier 15 materials that the house was made from, but there was a noticeable thump she hadn’t produced before.
“It also seems to make my blood denser, harder, and less prone to splatter.”
Matt remembered that he had a skill he wanted to test. The fogginess still present in his head shouldn’t affect his skills, so he filled a mana crystal. When it was topped off at two hundred mana, he quickly drained it. Before his AI could eat too far into his mana pool, he cast [Hail].
It was a new feeling for him. All his skills up until now were only channels. This one grabbed a chunk of his mana, and instantly twisted it into the shape of the skill structure that resided in his spirit. He was instinctively aware that the skill would be cast where he intended, but also found that its range could only be extended about ten feet from his current position.
When he let the skill go, a rain of small chunks of ice pattered down in the center of the training room. With a bit of effort, he sent more mana into the skill, and the size and volume of the falling ice increased.
Keith walked in and commented, “Seems to be working like normal. The skill is trying to slow me down. Also, congrats on having your first non-channeled skill.”
He walked out of the mini storm, and Matt tried to move the skill to follow the Tier 17 but found it immobile.
All in all, he was happy with it. It would help in a fight, sure, but more importantly, it was a source of free ice for his bond. She could save a lot of mana with him covering the cost of creating ice. Manipulation of the ice was cheap in comparison.
While they were playing with their Concepts and Matt was exploring his new skill and its abilities, Aunt Helen came in with a weary Aster.
With that, Matt and Liz returned to his room, and they gave the worn-out fox the attention she needed.
Liz looked at the exhausted ball of fluff in between them and rubbed her back. “Mom always said that Tier 5 was the worst. The others won’t be great, but nothing in comparison. Sorry, I would have said something, but the worrying just makes it worse. It’s almost as if you try to resist the changes.”
Matt nodded. “Aunt Helen said it would get better, so now we just wait.”
They quietly turned on a movie and soon joined Aster in dreamland.
- Writer
