After spending time to make sure his aim was actually reliable Ezekiel left the boundary to start hunting his first enemy.
Looking out at the field of slimes where only a few players could be seen he picked a lv1 as an easy target.
He aimed carefully and cast the spell with his mana control as it had actually become more comfortable than simply casting with the invocation.
The orb hit the slime in a glancing blow which made it jiggle violently, the chunk of slime missing from its body began to slowly smooth out until it had turned back into a smooth surface.
-5
With his mana control he could cast the spell faster since it did not require him to rely on speaking multiple times.
-5
-5
-5
-5
The slime could not move very quickly but after that final bolt he had defeated it.
Because of the number of orbs needed he estimated that the slimes had between 21 and 25 hp though he wasnt sure if it had any resistances.
Looking at his mana pool he saw that he could cast at least six more orbs.
Health and mana had not been given a numerical value but he could at least use basic math to figure out some of what he was seeing.
The slimes did not seem to be immediately hostile to others which made it easy to farm one at a time.
Choosing another lv1 slime he cast the orb over and over as before.
He was so focused that he did not notice those other players nearby who were watching him now.
They were laughing and occasionally made comments about how he was wasting his effort and mana by not targeting the core.
After killing the second slime Ezekiel chose to sit down and meditate to recover his mana, what surprised him was the fact that absorbing mana near the slimes was surprisingly fast.
After only a few seconds of meditation he had actually regained 90% of his mana before it began to slow.
Since he had enough mana now to kill two more slimes he chose to find two at once.
He couldnt find any lv1 slimes for a bit but he did see a lot of lv2 slimes so he attacked one.
-4
His spell was doing less damage which was worrying... and not only did it do less damage but it seemed that the slime had more hp.
-4
-4
-4
-4
-4...
Eventually after using basically all of his mana he managed to kill it... which allowed him to level up.
~~~~~~~~~~
Belial
Mage lv2. (Novice)
Infernal
Affinity: 10% fire, 10% shadow
Strength: 5
Vitality: 5
Agility: 5 ->7
Wisdom: 5 -> 9
Intelligence: 5 -> 9
Bloodline: child of the void.
Titles: n/a
Skills: Mana Control lv3 (N), Mana Sense lv3 (N), Mana Core lv1 (A), Spell Mastery (E)
Spells: Mana Orb lv1 (N)
~~~~~~~~~~
After the racial stats and free stats his new character stats looked much better than before.
Ezekiel approached a lv2 slime and cast again.
-8
It was twice as much damage but the defense of a lv2 was still there.
Killing slimes twice as fast made things much easier and everytime he continued the other players watched in astonishment.
One player, a green skinned goblinoid race, approached.
"Hey, mage. How ya getting ya mana back? You arent using potions."
Ezekiel turned to look at the goblin and saw that they wore leather armor with a pair of daggers at their hips.
"Oh im just meditating, why would i use potions?"
The other player seemed to pause before leaning in close.
"Hey listen, lets make a deal yeah? You tell me about meditation and how ya got it and ill show you where the core is in a slime."
Ezekiel was confused but nodded, he explained how the mana core skill worked and how he got it from the npcs in the training area of the village.
"Wait.... the npcs can teach you skills?!"
"Yeah? I figured thats why there were teachers advertising their school?"
The goblin looked like he had just been given the egg of golden goose.
He quickly pointed at the slime and said, "the core is at the top of their body like a brain, if you hit the core to kill it the npcs will reward ya when ya take their quests to harvest the cores."
The more he heard core the more an idea started to form in Ezekiel's mind until he used his mana sense.
A slime that was just barely within range suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree as veins moving through the slime's body appeared full of mana, all leading back to a glowing orb at the top.
Ending the skill and looking at the slime he cast a mana orb once again but this time aiming right at that glowing orb's location.
The orb ripped through the slime as usual but this time a clear ball covered in little filaments was left visible and cracked.
The slime died in a single blow leaving the core behind.
"I guess i should have figured that out before huh?"
The goblin had left by now but the remaining players were shocked.
Normally a player who is taught about the core takes a few tries to actually hit it because the core is still invisible within the body but this infernal player had found it immediately.
After this discovery Ezekiel was ecstatic, he could farm experience much easier now.