Upon entering the pillar of the Mana Geyser, Blake could feel a sensation of being filled up. Like water in a bucket, all sorts of elements seemed to enter their stone body. Even more particles just seemed to pass right through without stopping. Using a combination of Inspection and Magic Vision, Blake was able to deduce that the elements of fire and earth more easily entered their body than the rest.
"Perhaps becoming familiar with an element allows it to be stored more readily in the body. I'm a rock, so earth makes sense. And my Basic Elemental Manipulation covers both fire and earth. With all these different colors present, this is the best time to gain some rare elements practice."
Getting the basics done first would help open up the more complex elements. Metal elements would be more easily learned after learning fire. This was true for ice, wood, and lightning as well with their respective base elements. For the other elements, it was more of a matter of luck to grasp their principles and use them effectively. But with so much pouring out of the Geyser, and all the time in the world to practice, it was only a matter of time.
The first one Blake tried was water. This turned out to be a lot more difficult than they imagined. Of course, this was due to the lack of water on the planet to begin with. Where it took Blake just a day to figure out earth and fire, water took weeks before obtaining the basic skill. The next element was a windfall. Air elemental magic was very prevalent so high up in the sky. Just an afternoon went by to gain the skill.
As for the rest, an entire year went by without rest manipulating the elements for their respective skills. While this may not have seemed impressive at first glance, totaled almost 9,000 hours of practice. For an average human, dedicating 12 hours a day for practice would only total a little over 4,000 hours of practice.
There was also another advantage that Blake had over regular magic users for training. Magic Vision gave pinpoint accuracy of where elements existed to be manipulated. If a normal mage's perception and accuracy was like a net, Magic Vision allowed Blake to choose elements with tweezers. This, coupled with the practice of Telekinesis, gave them unparalleled efficiency in their training. With the Magic Geyser spouting all the elements there also wasn't a need to go to different environments with a heavier saturation of a single element for practice.
As each basic elemental skill was earned, more and more of the elements would be absorbed into Blake's form. Just having the basics down couldn't be enough though. For training the levels higher, the first practice regimen was forming shapes. Starting with simple two-dimensional ones, gradually the practices evolved with more complex three dimensional ones. When Blake reached a bottleneck, they decided to start making art. Line art with different elements to bring in colors was the beginning of this experiment. After several decades, entire animated episodes from Blake's favorite shows were played out in front of them. They even added special effects like making the area change in temperature, water splashing on the ground, and even having characters touch the audience. By the time that Blake had leveled up, upgraded, and maxed out the skills, their evenings rewatching nostalgic shows from memory were better than modern immersive theme park rides.
What's more, all these skills were free to upgrade! The hard work and effort to organically gain the skills paid off. Blake could confidently say that, aside from Telekinesis, their magic truly was their own. Satisfied with the foundation they had built; it was time to get some attack skills. Wanting to build on the luck that they had experienced over the past few decades, there were some local residents that knew attack skills. The Lava Snakes hadn't managed to grow legs yet, so they hadn't been seen in some time. Since they knew attack skills like Fireball, perhaps through battle some incite on attack skills could be gleaned. The lack of a body left Blake with experimentation to learn magic, whereas the lack of points prevented Blake from buying a reference library on magic techniques. The wheel would have to be reinvented for the time being.
With a thought, Blake flung themselves out the window. Free falling, the past few decades had not changed the landscape. Black obsidian jutted out of the magma sea, its waves of molten rock mostly still save for the occasional ripple from escaping gases. Within their vision, not a single elemental beast could be seen. Combining wind, fire, and gravity elements the free fall became more of a gentle glide. Occasional updrafts would ensure that Blake didn't fall into the slag below, not that it would do much damage anyway. After drifting around for about an hour, something large appeared towards the edge of Magic Vision. Then another. And another. A total of five familiar tubes of concentrated fire elements were heading towards Blake. Apparently, a change had occurred over the decades. As the Inspection module identified the enemies the Lava Snakes had become Magma Serpents.
Magma Serpents
Species: Greater Fire Elemental
Level: 50
HP: 5,000/5,000
Mana: 1,000/1,000
Strength (STR): 35
Intelligence (INT): 12
Wisdom (WIZ): 10
Dexterity (DEX): 27
Constitution (CON): 30
Charisma (CAR): 15
Luck (LUK): 110
Current Perks: Elemental Body, Extreme Heat Resistance (Lv.1), Swift Swim
Skills: Advanced Fire Elemental Manipulation (Lv. 20) (Racial), Crunch (Lv. 1), Fireball (Lv.75), Lava Plume (Lv. 35),
"A type of elemental, Magma Serpents are considered intelligent and strong enough to be considered proper magic beasts. As such, cores may be formed inside the body, giving a higher mastery of the fire elements to control."
"Such lazy creatures. All this time has passed and you haven't even gotten to the upper levels of your elemental manipulation? Perhaps you spent all that time just swimming around doing nothing. Let this master of the elements show you what- "
Cutting themselves off from the bragging session they were having, Blake realized that the foes approaching were getting bigger. Where once the Lava Snakes would just be 10 meters long and be like a living tree of fire, the Magma Serpents were 25 meters (82 feet) long and as thick as a minivan! And there were 5 of them! Even blue whales, the largest creature on earth would tremble in fear of these behemoths. Rising out of the sea of fire, the Magma Serpents looked at Blake and started to hiss and growl at one another. Surrounded, Blake quietly started grabbing elements from everywhere. Wind, fire, earth, even light and darkness slowly started forming balls of various colors while the lava hardened just below the surface to create a platform.
---
The five Magma Serpents each felt the pulsating presence at the same time in each of their domains. Over the decades, the Mana Geyser that prevented their home from turning into rock started having a weak, second pulse alongside of the main massive wave of elements. Out of the several dozen creatures living in the lake, these five were the luck ones who managed to coalesce enough fire elements in their body to evolve into a higher species. Having no history nor civilization, the creatures of the sea of fire attacked, ate, bred, and slept their entire lives. It was truly a survival of the fittest competition.
Having no concept of a name, each of the five strongest monsters simply differentiated from one another by their strength. Thankfully, the handsome jerk and a few other Magma Serpent's domain were too close to the shore to sense when the weak pulse left the black rock into the sea. Thus, the luck of who would be the first to consume this powerful entity to grow even stronger was for whoever arrived first. Yet, the other serpents had also sensed the pulse and rushed over to eat whatever it was. If the Mana Geyser, with its powerful waves of mana washing over the planet kept the denizens of the lava sea alive, how much would a small piece of it change their lives?
Coming close to the spot, each of the five rose out of the surface to spy something strange. A floating rock! How it was floating was a mystery, but as creatures of flame they could each sense the fire elements stored and manipulated by it. Such a rare stone would surely strengthen their cores. If they were lucky, one of them could evolve and rule the area without competition! Mates, the best resting places, even the places with the highest concentration of fire elements would be theirs. Glancing at one another while they were surrounding the stone, it was clear what the rules were for the battle.
An all-out, battle royal. Winner takes the stone; the rest would have to submit. Nothing would be off the table, and death was almost certainly assured.