[Extraction complete]
[A new upgrade path has been found. Updating subsystems.]
[New stat, MP has been added to character stats. MP corresponds to the units of Mysterious energy that the character can control.]
[Comparing and evaluating data.]
[A mysterious energy circulation path is formed inside the character to facilitate the use of MPs according to the extracted data. Upgrading energy circulation path to improve performance.]
[New function, Asynchronous energy circulation is added.]
[Improving farm to facilitate the use of MPs.]
[Update complete.]
After reading a long list of notifications. Alex finally regained his ability to move. But before he could think, a chill went up his spine.
He literally felt like a popsicle.
"Wha!" Opening his mouth, he tried to take a breath. It was a reflexive action that he had no control over. Yet, never could he have expected to drown in cold freezing water.
He flailed his arms wildly trying to balance himself while coughing.
'Why is there water? Did the ice melt around me?' Alex who didn't know that he was transported into a pond thought.
It didn't take too long for him to understand his situation. Quickly standing up, he looked around. The pond water was only up to his knee. It was impossible for him to drown in that.
Just as he stood up, Mani who was nearby came towards him to give him dry clothes. Alex who felt the cold piercing into his skin got off the water and took the clothes.
"Thanks, Uncle Mani." He said with gratitude.
Only then did he notice, the three kids shivering nearby. They were drying themselves sitting near a freshly lit bonfire. Alex who saw this quickly went and sat near the fire.
Normally, he would have avoided any and all social contacts. But now that he was in this situation. He chose to go with the flow.
"Can I sit here?" He asked one of the three kids. And the only girl among them replied coldly.
"If you want, sit." She said.
"We thought you were mute. How can you talk now?" The tall muscular kid said.
"Stop it Poka. Be polite towards others." The slender kid next to him reproached.
"Who are the others? Isn't he from our own tribe?"
"That's not the point dumbass. Sorry Meru, he is a little slow. Please bare with it. You can sit next to me. As one of the people who awakened the fastest. We will be one of the best warriors in the future. So, let's be friends." The slender kid said kindly.
'Who are these brats? Friends without even knowing names. If you want to be friends, Brats! You should introduce yourself.' Alex wanted to say this directly to the kids. But he chose to be an adult and be polite.
"Who are you?" He asked, politely. Alex who was clueless thought it was okay to be direct.
"Look who is polite now. He doesn't even remember our name." The Brawny kid, Poka said sarcastically.
"Ah! Ignore him Meru. He is Poka, a hammer weilder. I am Thee a spear weilder and she is Kanal a sword weilder."
"And I am Charam, an Axe weilder." Another shivering kid came from the side and introduced himself.
"We four are the best of the younger generation." Thee smiled and said. "Now that you beat Charam in awakening. We can say that we five are the best of our generation." He said proudly.
Thee had an aura of a leader. From just a glance, Alex could notice it.
It also meant, he was the strongest among the four. It was given considering that this was a tribal society.
'Usually, leaders are a**holes.' In his past life, every leader he knew was an a**hole. So, it was reasonable to believe that this smiling kid called Thee might be a *******.
'Commencing believe no word but act as if you agree with everything jutsu.' He thought. Alex activated his survival mechanism.
He nodded affirmatively to everything that Thee said while completely ignoring it.
And as a side effect, he got new friends and became part of the group.
Meanwhile, he looked through the interdimensional farm notification once again.
—----------
[Data stream found]
[Extracting data]
These were the first notification he had seen from the interdimensional farm. Alex had thought that there was no notification system for the farm. But now, it is proven that it was a false assumption.
There was a notification system and it only activated on rare occasions.
And the more important question. How did the farm interact with his hallucination?
As far as he knew, The farm suddenly activated when he gazed at the swirling sea of smoke. Alex was mesmerized and almost became enchanted by the smoke at that moment. It was a dangerous situation.
And then, the farm acted like a protective mechanism preventing an unknown entity from interacting with his consciousness. After that, instead of Alex, it interacted with the entity that it named as a data stream.
And finally, after ingesting the new data, a change was triggered providing him with new functions like MP and asynchronous energy circulation.
That was the summarised version of the incident.
But Alex had many unanswered questions.
Awakening was a mystical ritual that helps youngsters of the stone head tribe awaken an ability inside their bloodline. It had nothing to do with the interdimensional farm.
And the pill made it possible to go into a deep enough trance to interact with an unknown entity. Somehow the farm, hijacked this process to interact with unknown entities and acquired new knowledge.
And the body modification stage to make new energy circulation pathways might be the cause for increasing the body temperature.
Now, the pieces were beginning to fall into their place. But he still felt that something was missing.
—-----------------
"I saw stone giants—all around me. As far as I could see, there were giant stone figures quietly standing. Then I remembered Mupan saying, to not look at their eyes. So, I quickly looked down. It was then that they began moving towards me. And it became very crowded really fast. I couldn't move an inch. It almost felt like I would die being squished between them. Then I woke up. This was my experience…" Thee said.
Everyone looked at him awed. Most of the kids had only seen a couple of stone giants in their vision. But he had seen a sea of stone giants. They became envious of his talent. It was said that the more giants you see, the better your talent was.
Everyone wanted to be talented.
Most of the kids have now awakened and it was almost time to finish the ritual.
But Alex who heard the experience described by the kids was perplexed.
'Why was I the only one who saw a smokey figure?' he thought.