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Rapt felt a sudden drowsiness come over him as all the mana in his body was drained. His mana flowed out of his body and wrapped around him until it covered him completely. The mana began to harden into what seemed to by a blue chrysalis that seldomly pulsated with electricity wrapping around the exterior. It slowly creeped up his body, filling his mind with panic before it closed completely. That panic was instantly overridden by euphoria as his remaining mana began to circulate inside the chrysalis creating a pulling force to draw the natural mana in the air. The natural mana was pulled through the walls of the chrysalis drawing in the lightning mana and separating it from the rest of the elements. The mana leftover from this process was purified then used to permeate the cells of the outermost layer of his skin. The mana forced its way into the cells destroying those that could not contain the new purified mana, instantly 95% of his skin cells were destroyed during this process.
Though most of the cells were destroyed, the few that survived would replicate at a rapid rate producing a new skin. This new skin would not be able to withstand the new purity as well, recreating the process of destruction and regeneration all over again. The waves continued the repeat causing the chrysalis to pulse, drawing in more mana before separating, absorbing and purifying the lightning mana.
During his time in the Chrysalis, Rapt began to have visions that showed him the same thing, Death. Through the eyes of Dinosaurs killed during the extinction event, he lived their final moments one by one, feeling their pain, desperation, anguish, and more. These scenes were so vivid and at times he lost himself in them as they went on. Yet after an unfathomable amount had passed, one scene stirred a different feeling from him. This one he had seen before, seeing as he was looking at where he had died in his first life. This was a new point of view as it was from the view of his dying mother.
In the scene, he saw and felt her agonizing death as starvation and malnutrition had severely weakened her. He shared her mind, her thought, and her wants during his time reliving her end.
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The others were shocked as the Chrysalis suddenly wrapped around Rapt sealing him off from the rest of the world. They began to search for enemies thinking that it might be an enemy attack before moving towards the cocoon to inspect it. Surrounding the Chrysalis, they tried to reach Rapt's mind through their [Tribal telepathy]. The instant they touched his mind they were bombarding with the random scenes of death. This heavily strained their connection as it couldn't handle the amount of information being sent. While most of it was mangled scenes, noises, and emotion, a scene in its entirety would be seen ever so often. They each struggled to fully grasp what they were seeing as they tried shut off the link.
They continued to try cut off the connection, however this proved to be an impossible task as the mental strain was too much to bear. The last scene carried the strongest of Rapt's focus and emotions as his anger, longing, and desires were brought forth affecting them. The experience was awakening their suppressed primal instincts forcing them to remain in control of themselves. Though they had all killed others and had personal been in life and death situations. A new hungry was invading them as their personalities were being heavily influenced by Rapt's mental state.
The ending of the visions left them feeling mentally weak, yet they knew what they had to do. Making their way closer to Rapt was a slow task that took them a couple of minutes to complete due to them having to stop because they felt faint. Upon reaching the cocoon, they proceeded to try to understand what was happening to him.
"What was that?" Sorc asked.
Blum and Orn looked at each other before they both responded," I don't know".
"Did you notice that the last beast looked similar to Rapt" Blum said.
Both Sorc and Orn nodded.
Even though they only saw a few beasts, the beast themselves were strange and unlike any they had seen before. Actually, they have seen a beat that resembled them, Rapt.
"So, what should we do?" Sorc asked the elders, though he didn't expect a real answer since even they were left speechless.
"I don't know, I've never seen anything like this before. Even our evolutions don't create something like this. Blum, what are your guesses?" Orn replied choosing to focus on a different issue before turning to ask Blum.
"Hmmmm, it would seem that this is most likely connected to the new system rather than some attack from an unknown enemy. I would suggest we each take turns looking through our shops and obtain better skills to get stronger before whatever is happening to him finishes." Saying his peace on the matter Blum decided to be the first to use the shop.
Orn and Sorc stood guard over the two, while thinking of different way that the new system could improve their current skill set. Blum took a look at the amount in his mana well before beginning to contemplate about which purchases to start with.
'500 mana units', Blum thought as he looked at the amount of mana units he had. He had no clue whether it was a lot or not. so, he decided to continue to focus on the task at hand.
It was a decision between his skills that could be upgraded or buying skills that costed less. Maybe because of his tier, the shop showed him many different skills that were sorted based on different categories. First, was the tier the skill belonged to, followed by the type of skill, and lastly the cost of the skill which determines the order of the skill.
The skill shop showed 4 different categories: mobility, offensive, defensive, and support. those were the main categories, which could be divided into different subcategories, such as power, endurance, and speed-based skills in offensives section. With the amount of mana units, he had Blum could see a vast assortment of skills that were created.
Continuing on, Blum noticed that as he scrolled to view the high-tiered skills, the shorter the list became. The different categories disappeared by the time he made it to the 3rd tier range. Something that intrigued him the most was that some of the 1st tier skills had similar names to higher tiered skills.
'Maybe I should upgrade my skills first to get a better understand of how the system works.', he thought.
It was a part of the system that Rapt hadn't explored yet. Looking at the list even as a 3rd tier beast he noticed that most his current skills were tier 1 with the rest being tier 2. Thinking of which skill would bring the most benefit to his tribe and himself, Blum chose the [Shadow lock] skill.
{skill chosen for upgrade: Shadow lock. Is this correct?}
'Yes'
{Upgrade initiated. Breaking skill down in basic components}
{skill deconstructed. Select one component to emphasize: Shadow, snare, knowledge}
'Emphasize?' Blum thought blankly, wondering what it meant.
{Emphasize: Gives a component prominence over the other changing the balance of the skill to create a new one}
Blum looked at his options again for a while. He considered seeing how knowledge would affect the skill before making his decision,' Snare'.
{Snare has been selected. Choose two traits to be added: Offensive, Defensive, Mana-cost reduction, Mana absorption, Health absorption}
Blum was shocked by the new list of 'traits' he had to choose from. Thinking about how he used this skill, Blum thought that the perfect way to enhance this skill was to choose offensive and Mana absorption. This would help him with his mana consumption issues and help the tribe by causing additional damage to the enemy before the others arrive. Feeling confident in his decision, Blum solidified his choices and confirmed them in the system.
{Skill component has been emphasized and traits have been added. Modifying the Skill [Shadow Lock]. New skill has been created, [Mana-Consuming Shadow snare].}
Instantly, Blum inspected the skill to check out the new improvements. He didn't even bother to think about the Intellect check that Rapt had describe to them earlier. Luckily, it seemed that one was not required for skill upgrades.
[Mana shadow lock]: an upgraded version of Shadow lock that forcibly drains mana from the targets body slightly damaging them in the process. Drain and damage are based on the host and targets stat differences.
'Wow, this is perfect. This is the power of the new system. I should get started on upgrading the rest of my skillset.', Blum thought before looking at his other 5 skills.
[Shadow Ball]
[Shadow Claw]
[Shadow Control]
[Shadow Charge]
[Shadow Regeneration]
An hour passed by, and Blum was still in the middle of upgrading his skills. Only two were left, being [Shadow control] and [Shadow charge]. These were the two that gave him the most hassle, having the highest mana consumption rate and lowest controllability respectively.
While Blum was finishing his skill upgrades, Sorc was using [seismic pulse] every 5 minutes. A skill that sent small vibrations in a 20-meter radius to relay information back to the user. This allowed him to locate enemies before their arrival. A skill his father taught him before he evolved into his current form allowing him to start at a higher tier in the skill while leveling it up faster than if he had learnt it himself.
After checking his immediate surroundings, Sorc thought 'It's time to check again'. A pulse erupted from his body entering the ground and bouncing back to him when it hit an object.
'What's happening to Rapt' Sorc thought, rushing towards the chrysalis after the pulse returned. It showed an unusual amount of activity based on what his skill showed him.
Alerted by Sorc's sudden movement, Orn begin searching for a hint of an enemy through his use of Ki by boosting his senses. Yet he was left confused since he couldn't sense any disturbances. Glancing at Sorc for a moment, Orn doubled down on guarding Blum.
-Sorc, what's going on? - Orn asked using telepathy, still feeling some pain caused by the strain.
-I'm not entirely sure, but I'm sense an abundant amount of activity coming from the chrysalis. - Sorc responded as he made it to the chrysalis and began to check around for potential dangers. Seeing that there was no danger he walked closer to the chrysalis, making sure that he wouldn't touch it. Afraid of disturbing it since he didn't know how such an act would affect Rapt.
After watching the chrysalis for a few minutes, Sorc noticed that the pulsations had stopped. While watching closely, he noticed the chrysalis trembled slightly making Sorc watch it even closer. Over a half an hour span, the chrysalis continued to tremble intermittently with the time interval between tremble become slightly shorter than the last. The trembles sped up increasing before settling into a heartbeat-like rhythm. After 45 minutes from the start of the trembles, a change had occurred when a crack formed on the chrysalis.
As if following the state of the chrysalis, the air in the area started to become electrified along with clouds starting to slowly move in. Just like with the chrysalis, a strong change happened to the night sky when the first crack appeared as the clouds converged on the location of Rapt dramatically increased. Along with the clouds converging, a loud thunderclap echoed through the territory. This wasn't the strangest detail of the event though as a shockwave of mana was released into the territory.
All in the territory began to notice to unusual weather as the thunderclap ringed out, yet only the tier 1 beasts seemed to be affected by the shockwave. They would occasionally feel minute traces of their mana being drained from their bodies. Though what they didn't realize was that they only felt the drain when it reached a certain amount due to their low tier and skills. Following the trembles of the chrysalis, an insignificantly small amount of mana was taken from every tier 1 beast in the territory before converging into the clouds above Rapt.
Though it might not seem as if that would correlate to a significant amount of mana. Yet due to the amount of tier 1 beasts living in the territory ranging in the 100,000's, it became a pretty hefty amount. This absorption continued until the second crack formed on this chrysalis, by this about 10 percent of mana from all tier 1 beasts had been gathered into the clouds.
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With this amount of mana gathering in the sky, Raza and the other elder beasts along with King Halyard were stirred from their slumbers. They all quickly converged on the epicenter of the phenomenon, while preparing from battle assuming that this was an enemy attack. Soaring through the sky, Raza used his superior vison to search for the cause of the event before finding Sorc, Blum, and Orn in the area.
In similar fashion, King Halyard was soaring through the sky before gravity returned dragged him down to the ground as he jumped over massive distances. These two were the first to arrive at the location, with Raza circling around the location in the sky while King halyard raised a pillar of earth to give him a wide field of view. Shortly after the other 4 Elders arrived on the scene, surrounding the area sealing off any escape routes that could be taken.
With the strongest in the territory here, Sorc, Blum, and Orn couldn't help but feel overwhelmed by the sheer pressure that they were releasing. All the while the mana clouds continued to absorb mana.