Looking at the white rat sent my way from the task I gave the earthen warrior and the tainted assassin with him I feel joy as finally my first purity weapon will be made using this as the basis, I begin the process of the bones along with blood to make the chakram but feel something is missing and decide to crush the skull up into powder to add to the blade.
I use the skull in my emblem spot as something about it just feels right though maybe my ability to see the future is helping me some here, I watch as the chakram changes to a see through color blade making me shocked as most my blades changed to fit the skin color of the creature and yet this one is now clear, I ignore the curiosity eating as I put the final touches and look at the now finished clear color chakram that's only color is the deep crimson color of my emblem.
Now that the thing is finished I need to name it then test it and the name for it is Sudarshana making it have a tie with time as well as purity.
-Sudarshana-
-This is a chakram using both the body and mind of creature but has been purified before completion, this chakram is bound to Amory Evans
-Durability 200/200
-strength 5
-speed 10
-sharpness 10
-mana enhancement 20
-mana type purity
-weight: .5 pounds
-evolution level 0
-Ability: duplicate, radiance, instinct drive
The abilities are something I was not expecting as the only ability I knew it would have is the duplicate one but apparently their is more to the white rat then originally known, and the instinct drive ability may be what helped me when making this chakram as it is by far my best creation to date right up with the armor.
With these two my road forward should be clear going as all I need to do now is advance myself and grow while helping the two people I am leading do the same.
My time slowly passes rapidly and everything seems to go by quickly and slowly as my first mass condensation of the ten cores I have made finally comes and passes without problem as they all seem to stack cleanly on top of each other naturally when I condense it making it clear this is how it is meant to be.
I am now working on my 14th core and the earthen warrior is almost on his second when an alert comes through the tower on me having achieved a feat of remaining in the tower for 300 years, 300 years is how long I have spent on the tutorial.
I feel both impressed with my own mental fortitude but also depressed I have only made it this far in my cultivation despite being as old as some of the others are when they achieve the grandmaster rank, it is clear just how unfair of a disadvantage we humans have as newly joined as I spent most this time gathering information to advance then on the advancements themselves.
Laying down on the ground for a break all I can think of is how little seems to matter to me beyond simply learning more and more, I have driven myself to go as far and as hard as I can and still am scrapping at the bottom of the tower.
I need more but here in the tutorial it is impossible, I begin to ponder on finally advancing but decide against it as although lacking I should be able to get everything here on the tutorial floor even if it will take slightly longer it will be worth it as the time dilation is simply worth to much for me to give it up due to me taking to long.
I look to my status screen hoping it will make me feel like I truly have gone far and indeed the amount on it fills me with a sense of pride, from trash to this is and incredible thing.
Status-
Strength-300
Speed-250
Agility-250
Intelligence-120
Regeneration-125
Detection-350
Health-120
Mana-1400
-your mana type is purifying, tainted energy resistance, master energy detection, grandmaster energy manipulation, master blacksmith, journeymen
I advanced in most my fields slightly but the tower only showed two of the advancements to enchanting weaver and my cultivation but any progress is something at this point.
He goes into the ring and kills through the goblins once more before starting on crafting mana type weapons and cultivating like he has been feeling a certain boredom for the first time in a while, he knows he should wait before learning anything new but he is starting to get bored and because the leatherworking he does is all involving armor for now it is seen as a part of the blacksmithing and therefore not added as it's own thing.
He decides he will start truly working on it as he wants to make some accessories and like dimensional bags and bone jewelry to increase stats.
He buys some bones on the market and begin to practice the most basic parts making small bracelets and other things that are inscribed with things to increase stats like speed or strength though it only increases by one or two if I am lucky but they sell for nearly 100 coins a piece due to the rarity of something like this that isn't cursed on the market.
I finally earn the animal user beginner title which just means I have earned the most basic ability to use animal remains, I hope it will advance smoothly with my large amount of experience to back it.
Time passes like nothing here draining through as people advance and grow slowly but surely making it difficult for him to realize just how much time and effort he is truly putting into to himself, every second is spent doing everything he can to advance and grow with little else beyond the need to sleep and eat every now and then.
He gets a message from the earthen warrior requesting a task and I ask him to get me another shite rat as I intend to gain the abilities of it and he does so, I send him the advancement book for the tainted energy.
Time passes and nothing seems to remain the same as the earthen warrior advances through the tower in a clean fashion reaching the tenth floor with ease due to it being made for those only at apprentice level not journeymen level that he ahs achieved thanks to my aide.
He kills as many and tells me of his blades advancement along with the boots as well but mine have still not advanced most likely due to it being two not one needing to grow.
I warn him of the slowed growth with two evolving weapons but he insists on having it anyway so I send him a earth based armor made to be heavy as his martial arts prefers, the little girl is sent a dual dagger set made from the twin cats monster on the tenth floor which she hunted herself despite them being journeymen level opponents and although she is at that level monster have better natural talent so to kill one of the same level is impressive.
I finally reach the 50 core grade with 5 stacks of cores in my mind and a mana count of 5000, I can feel the increase in traction for my ability to absorb time and space energy within the tutorial s despite everything saying it is a mana null zone it does have small amounts of it just so small it is impractical to feel or absorb it without being in a more advance grade.
I reach the 70 cores grade when earthen warrior is reaching the 20th floor and starting to slow down to cultivate more so as to advance the armor I gave him, my own armor advanced a evolution as well.
I can feel the my mana slow as I approach the 100 cores mark and once the last core is built it becomes like a sense of to much weighing me down like the mana suddenly gained weight, I know the point following this is body adjustment which is essentially just breaking yourself and letting it heal until the mana is naturally absorbed into the body which is said to take far longer then most do as their is no means to jump this all you can do is slowly break and repair yourself though it is advised to be injured in combat as it helps with the adjustment part slightly.
Now I can begin to go through the waves above fifty as they are all things above this level so I have been unable to even scratch them to this point, I know that earthen warrior finally made his 30th core and plans to advance to the 30th floor which should be a little to high level for him but he says he needs a challenge to truly grow and that the assassin with him is already caught up and advancing him.
Well I can't blame him trying to keep up with the companion he has chosen for himself, I find myself slowly breaking bones as I try and fight the monsters of the fifty first wave but each attack snaps something and I can't use healing energy to heal it or the purpose of the injury will be nothing.
Slowly I find how to barely last the time it takes my body to recover from the broken bone while dodging the evolved goblin called the half ogre goblin, after this point the goblins begin to almost become separate species.
I roll and dodge keeping track of the opponent that is both extremely strong snapping bones even through my armor and abilities along with quick healing, my armor is having to rapidly repair itself along with me and I am refining my barrier ability to condense it to a extremely small but precise block to bear the attacks.
I am able to block an attack for the first time but the second time the barrier breaks, I feel my bones snap back in my chest and know a lung has been punctured but those like me are harder to kill and my body will repair itself on it's own.
Slowly my body hardens along with my armor and the attacks although still hurt don't break but crack bones instead and the armor takes some of the damage not all like a damage reduction instead of complete blockage, and looking at it which evolved due to the constant strain and recovery like me shows the weapons made also need this type of training as even my chakrams that have been severely damaged from hitting something so hard over and over again also evolved.
The chakrams gained a serrated edge allowing it to rip through flesh better when it is used, a slightly red tinge along the serrated edge gives them more color.
I can tell I am almost at the master level in my cultivation just a large enough injure will be enough to push me over the edge but the half ogre goblin isn't powerful enough to do it, I finally kill it for the first time using the chakrams and all my energy in a mass attack that rends limbs from it allowing me to finish it off.
I sit on the ground as I wait for what is certain to be the next wave and it comes with a acid mana type mage which is just a mixture of fire, earth, and water to make.
Some are born naturally with complex mana types and others have to train for it truly the world is unfair.
I feel the burn of it in my armor as my armor is not water proof so some seeps through it and melts me even with it blocking it with a high resistance, I am sure this is what I need to finally advance myself to the next level and so I attack feeling as parts melt and burn and muscles seize to function.
Once I am nearly unable to continue I fall back and make a earth wall around me to bear the attacks while I slowly recover, the acid interferes slightly in my recovery making it take longer.
I can sense the repair and the less and less effect the acid is now having and soon I feel the energy in me flow easier and clearer then it had since I gained the 100th core, I know it means my advancement is finished but it said the more mana your body integrates before continuing the further ones potential can be so I continue again and again until the acid is only a small rash on me.
I go to the next wave after killing the acid one with red patches covering my skin but rapidly healing, the next one is a hidden one as it releases a energy surge to hide in but unlike with the assassin one it doesn't keep releasing mana as it released enough all at once to hide for a good while and will release more only when it begins to fade.
I know the easiest way to kill it is to wait for the next release and kill it but it is so fast that I will not be able to kill it before it has moved on and the energy detection to movements only works so well for low levels of mana in the air and unfortunately the amount released here is far more then that, he can only take attacks with a high defense and track it when he finds it to try and find a means to sense it.
He feels it rip his leg open as it is a non-protected area but I ignore it with practiced ease at this point, again and again injuries come and fade but the worst is the gash to the head that only dug in a little but still did a decent amount of damage.
My mana cores are in my head so it is far harder and recovers faster then the other areas but it is seen as a vital point in the creatures eyes and all the others are covered so it aims for it again and again, I can feel my hair being scalped as small brain matter is taken.
My skull gets harder and harder but the things doesn't seem all that concerned at me recovering so quickly as it only needs one good clean hit to kill me, and a clean hit it gets to my cranium but it doesn't kill me like one would think as my body remains functioning even with a gaping hole in my head proving that by all means I should be dead as even a ogre will die from a mass hole in the head though a troll is more resistant an needs it completely removed to die.
I can tell the thing is now worried as I remain standing and my other vitals are to well protected to hit, I wonder how far my recovery ability can go so decide to do something stupid and unequip my armor making openings to the thing.
I feel a stab to the heart and lungs but my mana in my brain keeps it running and pumping and as long as I have mana I can keep my body functioning, I feel a slice on my neck and let it as my head comes off in a single slash but I am still aware but the pain is horrific.
I use my tainted mana and control my body to put me back on top, I stand their while my head reattaches it self and wonder if I have made myself into a monster.
The attacks topped for a while as the thing seemed to realize none of the attacks work but that I can't touch it either leaving me and it stuck at an impasse in this fight, no one can do anything here and my mana brain makes it so even if my head is stabbed and detached my brain functions still work.
My mana will fill in for missing organs using the body control information it has gained from melding with my mind, essentially my mana acts like a all purpose organ that can only stop when it runs out.
This is the worth of using my mind as the melding point for the mana, a nearly unkillable cultivation method.
I can tell if anyone learned of this it would start riots in the tower as a method for one to be as nearly unkillable as a ghoul is horrific and for it to be a male purifier that is like this will make greed towards those like me worse, I will be seen as the best prized items of any being that can catch me.
I know I needed to reach at least legendary before climbing the tower but now I may need to just never enter the tower to begin with as entering the tower before I am completely untouchable will see me enslaved.
You may be thinking enslavement can only happen to those that break the rules or owe money, but the people will force a contract I can't keep on me and when I fail to meet the contracts demands I will be the slave of the person from that day on it is a common thing for slave traders to purposely use and abuse this rule.
More injuries, more healing more finding the limits of my healing as I start to not even use my armor for the fights taking the injuries and using only my martial arts and none of my abilities during the fights, I limit myself to see how far my body can be pushed before it can't handle more and it can do a lot as the acid no longer effects me even without my armor or energy to take the brunt of the damage and my brain having been partially melted by it.
I go from one to the next without hesitation as I want to see what happens when the mana runs out, and it does run out when I am fighting the assassin again after not taking a single break from start till now and being continuously injured.
I feel my head separate and no mana to keep it going, time slows as my body tries to instinctually survive.
I appear again on the platform before the ring and know that I will die when my mana runs out but before then as long as most of the body is intact enough I can continue to survive and even fight, though my pain threshold is now incredible from the test and injuries done over this period of time.
I am also now no longer injured by the blade of the assassin after a while making remaining in this level for my cultivation useless as I am unable to kill the goblin while on this level.
After the body adjusting period comes the mana imbuement period where one makes another core using another organ in their body, for me who only had one organ viable to even use as a core in the first place it is not a easy step as I now need to make the call on which organ to make into my extra core.
I can't decide no matter how I look through the book on core melding when I find a joke in it that one can use all their organs but it will rip them apart.
I know it is a joke and it will kill most people but I use my brain as my core despite it saying it killed people who did so and now I intend to do so again making each of my organs into a core, it will take a long time to even begin setting it up as the amount of mana needed will be astronomical to even progress but if done correctly means all my mana types can be expressed using this method.
I begin with my heart first forming a small core there using the mana in my body, it goes easily and swiftly but the dissonance and imbalance is clear immediately as the fire aspect of me increases but I do not let that effect me as I begin to focus on my kidneys next.
After that I can feel some balance return as the water dulls the fire element slightly, next is the stomach which bring my body back out of balance in the earths favor.
Wind and water both work in suppressing it and a core now lies in my lungs, my muscles are made to be the plant core.
I make the bones into my animal and bone marrow into the healing arts, tainted energy goes to his reproductive parts and his body is beginning to break down but his mana keeps it all together.
He adds the light to his skin and darkness to his blood, now only things left are time and space and he knows it will be tricky but time is naturally inclined to the thyroid making it a usable method and the spot his next core is formed in but space is tricky as many of it overlaps with others only one doesn't and it is the eyes.
The body is now in balance but is feeling stretched like everything has too much all at once, he knows the human body isn't meant for so many cores but his body can handle it he just can't fight like he does as his body will fail without mana now.
Well he is now more vulnerable then before, but also a chance to improve beyond what others are normally able to.
He knows he will be pushing it as he advances with each one needing one hundred mana to advance in each organ he will need a lot of mana to be even on the same level as the others but it will be worth it.
Unknown to him he just skipped many levels with this one action but he will only know that when all is said and done and his cores are all finished, he has made a way to cultivate that skips so many different steps that he will soar once this process is finished.
However that is only for the future for now he is dealing with a collapsing body and a over pulled mana, he is now in a extremely delicate situation to change the path to cultivation.
Sitting down meditating he eats the tainted meat and slowly integrates more and more mana as he needs to build a hundred cores in each of the organs he has chosen, 13 elements means thirteen cores but he already did one so now it is the journey of the other 12 all needing to get to the same level as his mind.
One by one time passes in miniscule but rapidly despite his best efforts to try and track it he watches as the earthen warrior finally begins to approach the 70 mark in his core forming process on the 40th floor but the girl with him has advanced rapidly and is nearing the 95th core formed soon to reach the body attunement point or the master level would be a better name to call it as that is what the tower has named it.
I know she will soon reach there to advance but it is also the stage where most stagnate as they can't just tank lethal blows and keep going like I can, this is the one realm that I can't help them with.
I tell earthen warrior this when he comes to me though I do give him energy crystals to help with the mana consumption coming, I am unsure how long I have been here so ask the earthen warrior how long he has been in the tower and the response has me freeze as the meaning sinks in.
I know time passes without little notice here but as of next week for him a entire year will have passed since the towers appearance in our world, a thousand years in the tower for me.
I know my mind has long stopped feeling the true flow of time but this is simply inconceivable as no matter what comes I have come to spend a thousand years in the tutorial, I know an announcement will come for this length but I feel a sense of dread to have it confirmed as finally my years in the tower begin to truly show their effect on my mind.
I sit there staring into nothing for a while and still can't seem to comprehend how that much time has passed, is this how other species in the tower feel when they speak of human lives that it is somehow so slow yet quick.
I can't focus on this as if I do I will make a rash decision and so I ignore it and continue on as though nothing has come and when the announcement for my time spent here comes I don't read it simply waving it away, I avoid it as I simply can't handle the rapid change in the true scope of how long I have spent here.
Passing the time cultivating and training again and again a means of ignoring the lack of means to keep track of time here, this is the cost of the tutorial it seems.
I am at the fifth core in all my organs and only continue on my path as to second guess it now is to fail as I would not be able to leave here even if I want to in my current state, I am already to far gone and can only change when everything is over and I am fully finished.