He is beginning to fall behind in his attributes, but the severe mana flood is having more negative than positive connotation in his body limiting the actual growth available even with 16,000 mana.
At this point he looks more like a dual organ person at their fifth core then someone with 16,000 mana with 12 organs each with 5 cores, I have simply stopped asking for the time passed by earthen soldier as he is now in the body adjustment stage though as I thought he is slow going, well they both are as they spend entire weeks just recovering from injuries sustained for this.
My focus is entirely on my own progress and only small looks to earthen soldier to make sure it is going well before returning to my own stuff, though the man is now at the 52nd floor he has come to a near stop in his climb of the tower.
Building one core after another is my sole focus at this point as I want to finish this step as soon as possible but I still need money so I forge some weapons every now and then but over all I ignore it, though the weapons of earthen warrior and the girl are growing steadily mine have stagnated due to not being used though they still gather mana in mass amounts from me they haven't evolved since the combat with the acid goblin.
Most would see my current equipment and stats as incredible but my mana amount versus physical stats leave a clear sign of problems, I can only wait for it all too be over to recover properly.
10 cores, then 20, as the two followers climb and slowly catch the attention of those higher in the tower but they haven't passed the 100 floor test and so only those in their level can fight and their weapons simply can't be matched on this floor leading to a mass advantage.
I continue to use the animal parts when I am not cultivating to enhance that feature and quickly catch it up to the rest of my things, I need more knowledge so I just buy the language books that I can get.
Dwarven, Elven, druid, snake men, cat people, the list of languages is long, and each have a little niche about them, but I want it to be so when I speak, I can do so with anyone within the tower without trouble, though my grammar may be off I can learn that to once the time comes.
40 and 50 cores and the two are nearing the 90th floor but I have warned them not to go much further until the can fight a legendary grade being, they agree to the order and remain heavily on the 90th floor while almost finished with the master stage cultivation.
I can feel the weight truly begin to affect me at 60 cores and when the 70 and 80 point I can hardly move anything in my body as it is simply to much energy for me to do more than lay there and eat my tainted meat, I am sure my body is that of a dying person despite me not actually dying due to my recovery ability but just eating is excruciating as my body nearly tears apart at the seams.
The one hundredth core is nearly my undoing, but I hold on even as it feels like my mind itself is collapsing from the weight of my mana, I move slightly then stop again and again hoping to get my body accustomed to the mana amount within it.
Tearing and ripping again and again as I simply move to try and gain enough strength to move my body from its position on the floor, I am able to sit up eventually and the tainted meat I eat is all grandmaster stuff bought on the tower store using the money stored by me selling items earlier.
I finally recover enough to stand and feel a sense of sadness as once more it is like I can hardly control my legs; I have had this with the prosthetic but now it was simply a hit to me who has recovered from it and is once more back there again.
The pain is dulled enough to fight and begin forging once more and so I do make each item with care not to overuse my mana or push my body to the breaking point, I finally return to the fiftieth round and the joy at returning to this level while having recovered was incredible.
I wait to go further as I need to heal more but soon, I will go on and kill more, I enter the 52nd round and the time energy lets me find the thing the second it appears killing it without mercy.
I look to my status and stop.
Status-
Strength-110,000
Speed-150,000
Agility-120,000
Intelligence-10,000
Regeneration-1,000,000
Detection-50,000
Health-1,000,000
Mana-130,000
-your mana type is purifying, master tainted energy resistance, master energy detection, grandmaster energy manipulation, master blacksmith, demi-god
He looked at the demi-god written on his status and realized he hadn't just formed more cores then he needed but rather had directly skipped from the master level to the demi-god level, this is the act of skipping 5 steps in the cultivation process and he wonders why that was as he had no clue how one even advanced after the grandmaster level so he couldn't be sure of it.
Beginner, apprentice, journeymen, master, grandmaster, epic, legendary, mythic, then demi-god is the normal steps but here he was at the demi-god step two levels above legendary that is the highest known level for a human to reach.
Sitting on the ground he ponders on how this was possible and can only assume that the cultivation steps up to the demigod step was the same of forming cores and adjusting one's body to them, but with him making so many cores at once he could skip all the building and adjusting by adjusting to all the cores at once.
Well, if anyone else did this it would literally rip their bodies apart and kill them, but he could survive solely thanks to his body's incredible resilience.
Now what he needs to do is find out how to grow from this stage as although he had just skipped the need to buy books for those five cultivation stages as he knew what was needed during them he still needed to find out how one became a god after this as clearly it isn't just building cores and adjusting to them or he would already be at that stage with the amount of cores he had.
He looked to try and find any book on it but none that can count as cultivation books where there only story books from the different races, groaning in frustration he looks to the store for any hints at his future cultivation, but nothing seemed to match what he needs.
Great now he can't even continue unless he figures out a method of advancing on his own, seems like he will be buying a lot of story books and doing a lot of experiments.
I suddenly get a message from earthen warrior and as I look through my messages I notice he had been sending many my way but because of the state of my body and mind I was to preoccupied with my own things, honestly I worry on how long the advancement has taken me as I know it must have been a long time as I often was not fully even aware and so even the little bit of sense of time I had left was now completely gone.
I finally respond to his message telling him I was dealing with an emergency on my side as something had come up unexpectedly, I ask him how long it has been for him and what his current floor is.
The response stops me cold in my thoughts, the response was it is year 10 for him inside the tower.
10,000 years within this floor and 9000 of those years where spent unconscious or completely out of my mind due to the lack of flowing time and my advancement method, it had been an incredible method that allowed me to skip levels unlike anyone before but it's cost is now clear as the levels I skipped hadn't saved me as much time as I had thought it simply made me unable to fully tell how much time had passed.
I wonder how my parents are doing now, in their eyes their son has been dead for 10 years since the day of the towers emergence.
I am shaking trying to process it but am forced to simply push it down and ask him over his current progress in cultivation and floor, he says his cultivation is nearing the epic level but he is having trouble with the body adjustment faze as he has come to learn that the human body is limited in the amount of mana it can adjust to.
The man was still only in the grandmaster stage after all this time due to the humans bodies slow healing and growth capability.
Well not surprising as even I took a long time to truly adjust my body and that is with a rapid healing ability to push the human body to it's limit, he knew without it he would not be much better off then this man as he would need to stop at the legendary level like him.
But now he had reached beyond the level a humans should be able to reach thanks to his near unkillable body, but he knew that it would be an uphill climb for any advancements now.
Well the good news is he is on the hundredth floor with the assassin and so have not entered the domain of the true power struggle between the different races and the gods they proxy, he needs to reach the legendary grade before he should even think of leaving that level but thankfully although he hadn't reached epic grade the dagger and armor had and where one upgrade away from the legendary status.
Soon he will be able to harm a dragon from the upper floors as long as he remains in the bottom 400 floors as the dragon will be forced to the legendary level from that floor on if they go down.
Sighing in relief I wonder if maybe my weapons can't be used to help them reach beyond the humans normal limit of legendary as they are tied to the soul of their wielder, they should be able to bear more mana than most and therefore act as an extra core fore each piece without the human needing to build a core in their body.
Actually it may just work, I will try with my weapons first and if it works then I have a means for a human to potentially advance to the demi-god stage.
Of course if it does prove possible then my weapons worth isn't something that can be achieved with any other forger above the legendary level as it doesn't just grow with the wielder but can let the wielder grow past their own limited potential, it's worth is incalculable for the lower races stuck to the lower cultivation levels due to poor body capability.
I need some time before the test to truly get used to my new body and fully control it as I want but soon I should pass the entire 100 waves of the tutorial as the tutorial floor wasn't meant for one at my level.
I begin to sweep through the waves as I increase the amount of waves I clear each time with it being far easier with each go as I adjust to my new stats and mana levels, I can now produce more time energy and therefore can stop time for more then a millisecond but it was still a strain as the longer he did it the more mana it cost to keep it up.
Finally clearing the 100th wave with 100 goblins of each floor and a goblin king capable of controlling goblins with it's high intelligence making it capable of strategizing.
Sitting on the floor with many more points and a wish to experiment I finally decide to test my core in weapon theory and decide the first on to have it done will be the armor that now just looks like a deep red with some gold pieces in it due to the evolution it has undergone from all my fighting and the increases in my own level.
-Geshtinanna-
-This armor was made using both the body and mind of creature but has been purified before completion, this armor is bound to Amory Evans
-Durability 10000/10000((can self repair amount of damage dictates time to repair)
-resistance 200
-toughness 400
-mana enhancement 400
-mana type purity
-weight 15 pounds
-evolution level 12
-Ability- iron skin, mana imbuement, mana barrier, damage reduction, corrosion resistance, energy adsorption, mana dispersion, suppression, mana redirection, mimic
His armor was impressive but the mimic option which is the newest one allows him to make it look how he wants from a normal shirt to a incredible armor piece.
Suppression just scared enemies with less mana then him making them have trouble properly using skills, mana dispersion also effects peoples ability to control their mana once it leaves their body in my vicinity because it begins to be pushed away from my body.
The chakram though also gained a good amount and the abilities were useful.
-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 4000/4000
-strength 200
-speed 300
-sharpness 300
-mana enhancement 400
-mana type purity
-weight: .1 pounds
-evolution level 12
-Ability: duplicate, radiance, instinct drive, flesh ripping, corrosion resistance, energy absorption, mana blocking, time ripple, return, mirage
Time ripple was an unexpected gain as it made it so the things speed could change mid flight so it can suddenly speed up or slow down depending on what the opponent does, it is the ability that proves the most that the things have a mind of their own as it is fully self operational not something I choose but something the chakram itself decides from what it can see from my mind.
They had both grown some from a mix of my mana and from fighting with me through the 100 waves, they had adapted to grow based on my abilities and fighting style.
Everything has changed since the start of this skip method and my abilities have grown beyond normal standards, but I can't help but feel a certain sadness as now even if I return to earth my life will never be able to be even semi-normal as my parents may be dead or even completely moved on in their lives.
I sit there after finishing the 100 waves as I look at the announcement saying I have completed all 100 waves of the tutorial would you like to start back at the first wave.
What should I do now, I have accomplished my goal for the tutorial floor by reaching the demi-god status but is it enough?
No the time spent in the tutorial has let me realize that things change rapidly within the tower as ten years ago people of earth where seen as trash but now are seen as any normal tower society, ten years in the tower was all it took for the world to adjust to the changes then if to advance further I need to take more time how much time would I loose by not being in the tutorial.
I had thought that the only true way to be safe is to leave the tower, well now I will do exactly that by becoming a primordial that could make a tower of my own if I want.
Getting up from my collapse I have a renewed goal, now the only thing left is to figure out how to reach it.