The night passed by quickly and uneventfully which was certainly lucky for Ark since he didn't know if he had the mental fortitude to deal with even more trouble right now, taking multiple lives, experiencing reincarnation, and being in a wolfs body was a bit too much to accept in a single day. Waking up and feeling quite refreshed Ark couldn't contain his excitement much longer, he really wanted to experiment more with the mysterious power called magic. But before that, he still had to drink some water and clean up.
Right now he was really happy of the fact that he had chosen such a good spot as his camp since he had water about 200 meters away from him, he had also spotted a pretty desolate clearing half a kilometer away which was the perfect spot to train and study his new skills. He also made up his mind to go hunting for food after he had confirmed the uses for his new skills as well as adjusted to his new stats.
Having thought it all through Ark arrived at the clearing after the sun had risen completely in the sky, thinking about the fact that he no longer had to care about how long he slept and waking up in the morning to go to work made Ark's mood even better than it was before. Standing in the middle of the clearing Ark thought that the most logical choice was to use his [Mana perception] fist since he couldn't really manipulate something he couldn't see right?
Chanting it silently in his head Ark's silver pupils suddenly started to shine even brighter, even though it was light outside you could still see them shining brightly. Even though the change in his pupils wasn't that noticeable if you didn't see them before, the change for Ark was huge. It seemed like he had come to a different world, everything around him seemed to shine and glitter in the sunlight, some more than others, which was probably due to the difference in Mana density or maybe even purity.
That wasn't the only change though, because now Ark could see small round dots in various different colours that were dancing around the sky, though most of them were very blurry or had just a faint outline they were definitely there. A particular thing about these particles that Ark noticed was that most of them were coloured after the four main elements, water, fire, earth, and wind. But that didn't mean those were the only colours, there was black ones, white ones, yellow ones, and cyan coloured ones. They all also seemed to have different tempers corresponding to their element.
The blue coloured ones that Ark was pretty sure was the water Mana seemed to all be slightly attracted to him which Ark attributed to the fact that he was able to use water magic, the water particles that had approached him all seemed to have a gentle and nice temper, some of them even entered his body, even though it was barely noticeable Ark was pretty sure they revitalized his spirit a little bit. It was amazing how much he had gained from just this skill alone! This confirmed some of his thoughts regarding Mana as well as which elements existed.
Feeling quite satisfied Ark decided to use the other skill that he had gotten, [Mana manipulation] was a pretty straightforward name since it did exactly what its name implied, allowed Ark to manipulate Mana. Ark didn't know if he could do much with the different attributes of Mana except water Mana since he thought that he had some sort of connection to water, so he decided to attract as much water mana into his body for the time being since it seemed to be quite beneficial to him.
After using the skill all the targeted water particles that were flowing around Ark suddenly turned towards him and slowly but surely made their way into his body. After having laid down on the ground and absorbing water Mana for around 15 minutes Ark suddenly felt as though something deep within him had suddenly broken free, gushing forth and giving his body infinite strength. Unfortunately, this only lasted for a fleeting moment before disappearing, to instead be replaced by a monotone voice.
[Due to host deepening his connections to the water spirits host has obtained "Minor Water Affinity"]
After hearing this Ark wasn't quite sure how he was supposed to react since he didn't know what it meant. He still instantly used "Inspect" on this newfound affinity of his to figure out what it signified.
[Minor Water Affinity (upgrade-able)]
Grants host more affinity towards water magic, making it more powerful and easy to use
Makes water magic 20% more powerful
Makes water magic 20% easier to handle
Seeing this brought Ark a bright smile, even though it looked a bit creepy when a wolf did it. His trump card right now was actually his water magic so he was really happy to get a power-up for it, even though 20% might not seem like much it actually does a pretty big difference. The fact that it made it easier to handle would also imply that his casting speed, that mind you was already quite fast got even faster. It was also a really easy skill to get if you could even call it a skill.
It also seemed that it might get powered up in the future if he just kept absorbing water Mana and refining his affinity towards it. He also kind of wanted to try it with the other elements but he didn't know if it would work, it might even be harmful. The reason he could do it with water was because of his connection to it, but he still wanted to give it a try. But before that, though he wanted to try using his water bullet one more time since he had gotten quite a few power-ups since last time.
This time he also found a pretty big tree at the edge of the clearing and turned to face it head-on. After chanting "Water Bullet" silently in his head he could feel a soothing power bursting out from the depths of his marrow where it then traveled to his forehead before leaving his body, since he now had [Mana perception] he could now see the water Mana coming out from within him that then proceeded to converge with some of the water Mana in the air before finally condensing into something a bit similar in shape to a bullet before taking off.
A second later Ark heard a big bang as smoke covered the tree, and to Ark's surprise, when it finally cleared he could see that the hole he had created this time in the tree had the same width as the other time. What was different this time though was that the penetrative power seemed to have bumped up a lot since the "water bullet" had nearly gone all the way through the tree. Ark stood and watched the hole dumbfounded for a couple of seconds before a huge grin spread on his face.