*Ding!
[Level Up: Tenacious Mind
This thing is going to kill him. Just because you can't feel it doesn't mean it's not there. How pitiful would it be if he died because he had overworked his brain to the point that it became mush? This skill made that so much easier to accomplish. Thanks to the accursed thing, he could go past his limits as if they weren't there.
As if.
It showed him that the entity behind it had no qualms about giving him something detrimental. At least he had gained a lot over this past 5 of days.
When he killed the hog, his level increased.
[You killed Mud Hog (II) Level 18]
[Levelled Up to 1|+2 stats to distribute freely]
[Levelled Up to 2|+2 stats to distribute freely]
…
…
…
[Levelled Up to 10|+2 stats to distribute freely| Choose evolution path]
[Levelled Up to 10(Baron)|+5 stats to distribute freely| Choose evolution path]
[Levelled Up to 10(Count)|+5 stats to distribute freely| Choose evolution path]
He had no idea what levelling up meant and he had no intention of changing his race. The mentioning of stats brought to mind the Intelligence and Perception points he had gained as he progressed with his skills, accomplished feats, and gained titles. He had done that a lot ever since he came here and from what he gathered, the Intelligence points made his mind clear and increased his mana pool. He had gained a few Perception points from Mana Sense and Mana Radar, his observational capabilities seemed to increase thanks to them, but he hadn't gained enough to see if they did anything else. He had reached some sort of threshold with the Intelligence back when he was at the temple and unlocked a skill. The distribute meant that there should be other things like the Intelligence and Perception, but he couldn't figure out how to access that. Even if he could he doubted that he would be able to intentionally rely on this entity to make himself stronger.
[Unlocked Stealth]
[Unlocked Ambush]
[Unlocked Assassination]
Stealth was about not being found. He had unlocked it by avoiding creatures when coming to this cave. He had unlocked Ambush when killing the hog. Testing had shown that the skill guided him in how to silently approach the enemy and launch debilitating attack before slowly finishing the foe off. Assassination was similar to Ambush, but it wasn't about immobilizing the enemy but about killing the enemy before they knew he was there.
All these skills activated by themself whenever he did related actions. As a result, Ambush and Assassination would sometimes clash. One would tell him how to best immobilize and the other would keep kindly pointing out that if he did it this way, the enemy would die.
Triggering Assassination was difficult but if triggered it would forcefully draw a portion of his mana to boost the attack power. At first that disrupted his concentration and could potentially disrupt his stealth.
He hadn't progressed much in the skills as he hadn't hunted that much in these five days. The only reason he would take a break from his seclusion to hunt was to try to make his master level up. Progress seemed much slower, he guessed that it was because the creatures were much weaker than the hog and it might be because he was helping his master. The beasts he had hunted all had a I after their species while the hog had II.
He also discovered that his master could see the messages directed to him, but he couldn't see those directed to her. He knew this because whenever they killed an enemy, they would get a message confirming that. She would attack something in front of her before attacking the box in front of him. He wasn't sure if she could see the box because of the enslavement, or if the reason he couldn't see her box was because of the enslavement and if so, was the box visible to everyone?
He really hoped that wasn't the case but even if it was it wouldn't affect him much since the boxes no longer showed up unless it was a kill, new skill, a feat, or a gained title. The level up box was yet to be determined since he hadn't done so since the box.
He had gotten much closer to his master due to hunting together and he now didn't have to fear she would run away the instant he isn't paying attention.
[Unlocked Dagger Mastery]
He also gained this during the hunts. It was his first weapon mastery, and he was pretty sure there were others since it explicitly said dagger mastery. He was a blades-master in in the cultivation world, so he was good with sharp things. He unlocked the skill because he found the dagger to be better at not accidentally killing weak enemies. His master was a small cat. To help her level up he had to find creatures small enough that she could kill them with her claws and teeth. She didn't even use mana when hunting so going after anything large was pointless.
At least he had managed to level her up to 10 and possibly beyond. He could only judge that she had levelled by a sudden increase in her speed and perception, and he had counted such occurrences to be about 13 times. This also meant she knew how to distribute those stats. It was possibly an instinctual thing for the natives of this place. He believed that she had a few skills as well, most likely Stealth and something that guided her when she bit. The second skill was most likely highly developed, probably because of playtime with his siblings. When he was wrestling her with his hand it activated a few times and her proficiency would sometimes increase slightly, most likely because it levelled up.
For the past 17 or so hours she had been in egg form, possibly the general form taken during evolution. Evolution was probably a delicate matter since she had made sure he stays away during her own. He couldn't use magical senses because of the enslavement but he felt that the mana density had increased slightly.
He had spent the time trying to progress in his skills as he had done for five days. The mana related skills including Ice Magic had all slowed down to a crawl. As the level increased, the difference between mana and qi became greater. From his experience, there was no comprehension threshold at Apprentice level. There was a threshold when ranking up to Intermediate. At Intermediate and Adept level there was a threshold every twenty levels and at Master level every five levels. You had to comprehend something about the skill to pass a threshold, but judging from the many feats he had accomplished, you could also use skill points. In-between thresholds repetitive practice was sufficient, but comprehension would push you forward faster.
[Level Up: Mana Radar
[Level Up: Mana Sense
[Level Up: Mana Manipulation
[Level Up: Ice Magic
Mana Radar flatlined pretty quickly because he had never used qi in such a fashion, he had always used spiritual energy to do so. It was only Mana Sense and Mana Manipulation that pushed the skill so far. By crossing each threshold, he gained insight into mana, and he used that insight to push the skill forward.
The other three skills flatlined when he reached the level where he didn't understand enough to translate his experience from qi to mana. It was also possible that translating between the two would become impossible and he was now close to that level. Mana and qi are similar, but they are different at the fundamental level. They are so different that none of the rune schools and formation schools he knew worked on mana. He had used the best meditation technique coupled with a breathing technique to try and comprehend even the simplest rune under ice.
All he got was a headache.
He was now resting, once his master is done with her evolution, he would investigate the results and then head deeper into cave. It was unusual for a female hog to be alone and yet; nothing had struck the ice wall even once and nothing had tried to enter from the front.