《Legendary Traveler: By Earning Progress Points I will Become Supreme!》


 Chapter 5 Traveling Through the Flume (2)

    When I say the Flume came to life, I mean it in a literal sense. Right before Aoni''s very eyes, he watched the empty center of the stone ring, which was like a window that allowed one to see the other side of the Gym''s bleachers begin filling up. Within a few seconds, it was as if you were looking down an endless crystal tunnel.


    Once the center was filled and the transfer tunnel was attached to his destination, Aoni suddenly felt weightless, and when looking down, he was surprised to notice that his feet were no longer touching the ground.


    "Remember, no Terrian Technology will work on Genovia, so don''t panic when your phone won''t power on!" The Principal stated, but the ever-increasing humming in Aoni''s ears drowned the man''s words out.


    However, Aoni didn''t have the mental capacity to pay the Principal any attention, not that he said anything the Lad was unaware of, but because his body was being drawn into the crystalline tunnel by the mysterious artifact. Before he had a moment to look behind onest time to inquire about what the man had said, Aoni was on his way.


    From the outside looking in, the Ash-Blond Lad had been sucked into the Flume and rapidly elerated like a speeding train; however, from his perspective, it was quite pleasant and very unlike what Aoni had imagined.


    While it may appear like the Lad was on a rollercoaster ride, instead, it felt more like drifting along on an innertube down azy river. The slight bobbing his body was experiencing was also akin to floating in water.


    "Wow¡­" unable to contain his amazement at the beautiful shining walls around him as they flew by, Aoni eximed before easing his posture into afortable position.


    Unfortunately, there was no telling how long the trip would be, especially since it was his first time traveling to the new Territory; for all Aoni knew, it could be a couple minutes to a few hours.


    Luckily, he knew it couldn''t be longer than five hours, as the longest transfer recorded had been four hours and 59 minutes, so while Aoni believed it would be kind of awesome to say, "I hold the record for the longest transfer," he was really hoping that wasn''t the case.


    So, like the Lad had done many times before, whenever his family went on car trips, Aoni passed the time by looking at the sparkling multi-colored crystalline walls as they flew by.


    Much to his surprise, they truly appeared to be living organisms, thanks to the way the walls seemed to vibrate and move in time with his breathing.


    After around 20 minutes of being amazed at the view, the Lad finally was able to regain hisposure and run through the information that had been hammered into his head from a young age.


    "So long as the walls are cloudy and colorful, I am not close to my destination; however, as they begin to clear up, I will be drawing near, and when I am about to arrive, I will be able to see through them as if looking out a window."


    "Based on how dense the cloudiness of the Flume''s walls are, I know that I''m not remotely close to my destination," and so Aoni''s float down the winding crystal tunnel began.


    Now, some things need to be said about the transfer; for starters, the Flume does two things, the first being getting Travelers from point A to Point B.


    However, there is one massive issue that gets overlooked quite often, and that''s the fact that there''s a time dtion between Terra and Genovia of 72 hours, so One Terrian Day is equivalent to three on Genovia.


    Thus, during the transfer between worlds, the Flume elerates and limates travelers to the time differential.


    Although Aoni was aware of this, as he''d been prepared for it, the strange thing was this shift in speed waspletely unnoticeable.@@novelbin@@


    What Aoni DID feel, though, was a tangible sensation akin to being in the water surrounding him from head to toe. Still, even this was expected, as he knew it to be the heavy density of Energia within the Flume.


    "Ah, right, I can''t get distracted; however, putting knowledge into practice is a whole different story," suddenly remembering something important and grumbling to himself as Aoni floated along; he leaned back even further until basically lying down t and closed his eyes.


    ''Focus on the abnormal,'' He thought while slowing his breathing and calming down his torrential thoughts.


    ''It''s like being in an istion tank, warm,fortable, rxing; this is Energia,'' Unconsciously, Aoni''s head started slowly swaying from side to side, simr to a fishzily swimming along; only his head was the fishtail in this analogy.


    ''The moment I stepped into the world of Travelers, I tossed aside being a normal carbon-based lifeform, and my DNA shifted to that of a DNA Energia hybrid. This is part of me now, a normal sensation.'' Aoni mused when suddenly, as if something had been unlocked in his mind, the density dropped off, and it felt no different than just existing on Terra.


    Unseen to the naked eye, the ambient Energia that Aoni had been concentrating on had prated his body on a cellr level, merging with the Lad''s DNA and finalizing the Transformation into a Traveler; now, all that remained was setting up a Flume in his Territory to im his Lordship and Awaken the Dormant TD.


    However, what the Ash-Blond Lad didn''t realize was that he''d spent almost two hourspleting the process. By the time his emerald eyes fluttered open, the cloudiness of the Walls had drastically cleared up, revealing a ss-like appearance and signaling his first Flume trip wasing to an end.


    ''I wonder where my Territory is located; I hope it is somewhere hospitable yet isted. Thest thing I want is to be surrounded by other lords; hm, 200 miles should be decent, yeah, let''s hope for no other Travelers within 200 miles.'' Cupping his chin with his right hand, Aoni nodded silently while his eyes never left the crystalline walls.


    Finally, after having spent a little over three hours floating in the Flume, the world of Genovia came into view¡­ unfortunately, what reflected through those crystalline walls was quite unpleasant because, as far as Aoni could see¡­was endless White.

 Chapter 8 Making a Choice

    Huddled up and attempting to thaw out, Aoni sat staring down at the final Health Potion tube. It was one of the toughest decisions he had faced in his life so far, and Aoni''s hesitation to just go for it and hope for the best waspletely understandable.


    Not only had he been transported to a strangend, but with the altitude, terrain, and istion from civilization, plus the 35-day window before he could head back home, using the Potion seemed like a really bad idea.


    Anything could happen, and it was his literal only saving grace when it came to injuries.


    However, the longer he sat before the fire, the more the pain Aoni was feeling increased, along with the itching sensation brought about by the pins-and-needles effect.


    Even so, Aoni knew that this pain would only increase until he reached a mental breaking point, so after having weighed his options for several tens of minutes, he slithered his left arm out of the safety of the sleeping bag and emergency nket, snatched up the Potion, tore off the cap with his teeth and squeezed the jelly-like substance into his mouth.


    Like before, the effect of the Potion was practically instant, dulling the pain Aoni was feeling as the medication worked its way through his system.


    Generally, potionsst between 15-30 minutes, with more severe injuries taking up to an hour to resolve. This was especially true for Mundanes, which Aoni technically wasn''t; still, a basic healing potion could heal basic bone fractures at most, which was technically pretty good.


    Anyway, since Aoni was already on the mend thanks to the first Potion, the secondbined with it and hyper-elerated his ''healing factor'' or basic regeneration, and before the Cave had even had the opportunity to heat up to afortable temperature, the pain was gone.


    Unfortunately, that was when "buyer''s remorse" kicked in, and Aoni felt a sense of loss at what he''d done. Even if it was a matter of survival and movability, he''d burned the only life-saving trump card in his arsenal, meaning from this point onward, Aoni would be forced into a life of excessive caution for several days until he had a few summons who would be able to move in this climate.


    Letting out a sorrowful sigh and shaking his head to clear the dark thoughts, Aoni scooched like a caterpir closer to the fire, then, for the first time since his arrival, looked around the Cave, observing his surroundings.


    Thanks to the illumination provided by the fire, the entirety of the Cave was more or less visible, and to hisck of surprise, Aoni found a few things located around the 25x25 square foot cave.


    For starters, there was arge, rickety, empty bookcase on the far wall, opposite Aoni''s location, and beside it was a small chair and desk.


    Some distance away on what would technically be the back wall of the Cave was a single wooden bed made of some type of hide and what he guessed to be moss or something of the like.


    And much to his dismay, roughly six feet to his right, on the same wall Aoni had ced the fire in a hurry¡­was a small, empty firece.


    So basically, he''dpletely ignored this fact and started one in a stupid location.


    Closing his eyes, Aoni inhaled deeply and tried not to scream in annoyance at hisck of observation skills. Had thed been paying a little better attention, he could have heated this Cave SO much faster!


    Baring that thought in mind, Aoni pulled off the emergency nket and wrapped it around his hand. If the Tinder kit were to be relocated while lit, he would need the non-mmable properties of the emergency nket to do so, as he damn sure wasn''t about to put the fire out.


    The next couple of minutes involved thed testing out his body to ensure he was able to move properly before gently and carefully lifting the ming half-brick and migrating it to the firece before making his way over to the object faintly resembling a real bed and copsing onto it.


    Without an awakened Traveler''s disy, there was no telling how long it had been since Aoni made it here, so while he understood the immediate need to make a move on setting up the Flume, Aoni didn''t have the physical strength to do so.


    He was tired¡­so very tired, and the faint crackling of the fire wasn''t helping Aoni stay awake.


    Before long, since he was out of danger, his body healed, and he was bundled up warmly in the nket/sleeping bagbo; Aoni''s eyes fluttered onest time before he finally passed out.


    ---


    When he awoke an unknown number of hourster, the first thing Aoni noticed was that it was pitch ck outside the Cave and hot enough inside it that he was drenched from head to toe in sweat.


    "Putting the tinder kit into the firece was the best option for sure." He mused while shooting a nce at the crackling fire.


    ~Grooooolll~@@novelbin@@


    Hearing the rumblingsing from his abdomen, Aoni shrugged off the emergency nket and slinked out of the sleeping bag before falling onto the hard rocky floor with a thud and holding his stomach.


    "Hungry¡­.food first, then it''s time to set up my Flume and get this show on the road." Standing up, Aoni noticed that his body was free of all pain and stiffness. He took a second to acknowledge this fact and then walked over to where he had left the survival pack.


    Scooping it up with surprisingly little effort, Aoni made his way across the Cave back toward the bed before dumping out all its contents and organizing them by order of importance.


    Next, he tore open the box filled with rations and took stock of the packages. Although the box was norger than aptopputer, it housed 90 individual vacuum-sealed packages, each the size of a phone but incredibly thin, so after locating the packagebeled D-01, Aoni sighed and plucked it out.


    "I hate MRE''s *Meal Ready to Eat* but calories are calories, and these are packed with a lot more than the normal Mundane ones I would eat during survival training." Without further ado, Aoni ripped the package open and dumped the small bags onto the bed.


    The contents of the MRE included One heating pack, one water pouch equivalent to a single bottle of water, one full meal of beef stew, some crackers, and a fun-sized chocte bar.


    Using a small amount of water from the pouch, Aoni then activated the heating element, dumped the dehydrated stew into the heating bag, and "cooked" with a few shakes and some waiting; his meal was ready¡­to eat.

 Chapter 10 Theres Still Hope

    | 0.01 PP Earned |


    With one tiny notification window, everything Aoni had learned about the Traveler''s disy was tossed out the window.


    "This¡­is impossible; there''s no such thing as notifications or pop-ups associated with the TD outside of something like Instance Dungeons, and even those Temporarily override a Traveler''s TD," Aoni murmured while watching the small window fade into nothingness.


    No matter how much he wanted to continue examining the anomaly, it was gone before he could even contemte further, which posed an evenrger question:


    ''How can I replicate this fact?''


    But that wasn''t all either. Along with the notification, Aoni instantly noticed that his once static Status had changed ever so slightly.


    ______________________


    Aoni Thurston


    Age: 16


    Potential: One Star/G+ Rank (?)


    Rank: G-


    ______________________


    Attribute Grade: ¡î


    Attribute: Progression


    Progress Points: 0.01


    ______________________


    Statistics


    Attack: G- (?)


    Defense: G- (?)


    Speed: G- (?)


    Energia: G- (?)


    ______________________


    ''Now, I may not be the most intelligent person on either or the sharpest tool in the shed, but even I am smart enough to understand that the symbol eludes to having a dropdown of some kind.'' He mused while staring at the new additions@@novelbin@@


    ''But what it means and how to use it are two entirely different things.''


    For starters, apart from a few basicmands, there isn''t much interaction with the TD, if any at all; Aoni was well aware of this, and the more he focused on these little arrows, in tandem with the new line of dialog at the bottom, the more an idea began forming in his mind.


    "Since the numbers match up, that means the things in that notification, PP, are called Progress Points; adding that to the fact there are arrows next to each of my statistics¡­"


    As his words trailed off, it suddenly dawned on him, and the meaning behind the vague words describing his Attribute began to make sense.


    "It is my will to observe progress and mold it into what I desire. Through Progress Points, I bend the world to my image. The use of progress points is to strengthen myself¡­I understand that much¡­but how am I supposed to earn them, and what are the logistics behind it all?"


    Scratching his cheek, Aoni thought back to what he''d done before the notification had popped up and stared down at his leg, which was sore from how hard he had hit it earlier.


    THWAP


    Without putting more thought into it, Aoni went ahead and punched his thigh a second time, and just like before, a notification popped up.


    | 0.01 PP earned |


    THWAP


    | 0.01 PP earned |


    THWAP


    | 0.01 PP earned |


    "TSSSS fuck, thatst one hurt¡­I probably have a bruise now." Smacking his lips and ncing down, he began massaging his sore thigh while more questions appeared in his mind.


    "There''s got to be more to this¡­I can''t exactly beat myself to hell all day, every day¡­on second thought, isn''t that basically what working out is? You exert yourself to the point that your body is damaged and forced to repair, even if it''s on an extremely small scale. The injuries sustained stack up, and as such, you get stronger."


    | 0.05 PP earned |


    Lost in thought, Aoni didn''t even notice the new notification appeared and disappeared in less than a second.


    "Progress¡­Progression and progress points are all linked; progress can be so many different things, and it''s ever constantly changing. From building new technologies to conqueringnds, even something as simple as walking across the room could all be categorized as some form of progress.''


    | 0.1 PP earned |


    ncing up at his TD, his eyes widened as he just barely caught the notification as it was fading away.


    "What the¡­" That was when Aoni noticed that he didn''t have merely 0.04 PP any longer.


    Progress Points: 0.19


    He had unknowingly gained 0.14 points, the thought of which caused him to jump to his feet in excitement.


    "Everything can be progress, so long as I continue moving forward¡­one step at a time."


    | 0.01 PP earned |


    For some reason, the feeling of watching a numeral slowly tick up filled him with immense joy, leading him to his next idea.


    ''Increase My Grade Potential.'' On a whim, Aoni went ahead and tried interacting with the TD in the same manner he had earlier when setting up the Flume.


    | Insufficient Progress Points |


    "YES!" Upon Seeing he had elicited a response from the Traveler''s disy, thed pushed again, stating out anything that had an arrow beside it in his Status.


    ''Increase my Rank Potential.''


    | Insufficient Progress Points |


    Running down the line, he finished off his four Stats and frowned.


    "I only have 0.2 Progress Points, but I shouldn''t let that get me down; for now, the only thing I can do is save them and try again once I have more¡­but how many points do I need to increase something."


    Scanning through his TD, Aoni felt his good mood slowly dampen for a second time.


    The numerics were bad, like as bad as it could possibly be; however, that made him wonder about something. If his Attribute is so powerful that it allows him to increase his Stats and Ratings¡­why is it only evaluated at a single star?


    Then it hit him: it WAS powerful, and as such, a bnce needed to be created in the form of making his starting point the absolute minimum it could be.


    Bnce or not, strong Attribute or not, it didn''t matter at the moment because, as things stood, he was ROYALLY FUCKED! G- in everything, with only a G+ Potential, was horrendous and essentially meant he would be no better than a Mundane until he could earn himself more points.


    And to earn more points, Aoni had to explore what actions gave him the most. So far, taking minor damage appeared to provide him with 0.01, anding to conclusions of such scale had earned him arger chunk, so the question was, which was more efficient?


    This chain of thoughts proposed a puzzle for him because while Aoni technically COULD constantly beat himself up, the same couldn''t be said about sudden enlightenment.


    Leaning forward, he propped his hands on his knees and exhaled loudly while watching the me before him dwindle slowly as it burned through the Tinder.


    "All I''m doing is wasting valuable time; I can''t earn points by staying idle," and then it hit him: a way to hopefully a decent chunk of progress points.


    With that thought, his eyes flicked across the cave toward his Flume, and a thin smile crept onto his lips.


    "I wonder how many points I can earn by getting my first summon¡­"

 Chapter 13 What Now?

    ncing down at the sleeping creature using his chest as a hug pillow, Aoni couldn''t help but smile.


    ''If you took away the impressively sharp ws, it really is quite cute; however, being cute isn''t nearly enough to keep me motivated and living.''


    ''I need a partner if I''m going to get started on building up my territory; after all, I only have 30¡­scratch that, 29 more days left until the protection period ends, and whatever natural predators lived in this environment are given free rein to move back to their homes.'' Aoni thought while slowly petting his summon''s soft white fur.@@novelbin@@


    Sure, he had 13 more back-to-back summons remaining, but what happens if Aoni ends up summoning more babies like the one snoring away without a care in the world?


    Worse yet, what if the summons are totally useless junk, like paper waste or something to that extent?


    Try as he might, Aoni couldn''t curb the budding feeling of dread from welling up inside his heart.


    ''My first issue is going to ur at the end of my second day here, when I''ve sessfully burned through thest of the Tinder Kit¡­after that will be my food reserves, which, now that I had another mouth to feed, means I can effectively cut my 30 days worth of rations down to 15 or maybe less.''


    Luckily, with how much snow was outside and consistently falling from the sky, Aoni knew that water wouldn''t be much of an issue, which was good because that was an ABSOLUTE necessity. One could live for a considerable amount of time without food, yet the same couldn''t be said about water.


    ''I''ve already wasted too much time sitting around¡­I need a n, and fast¡­'' Bncing himself with one arm, Aoni slowly leaned over and deposited the sleeping creature onto the bed and watched as it stirred slightly before reaching out and grabbing his empty pack, which must have carried his scent or something because it became a stand in as a hug pillow.


    Next, with the grace of a cat, Aoni slipped off the bed and quietly walked over toward the firece before sitting down and staring into it as if he would gain the answers to his issues in that way.


    ''Survival ss taught me to create a checklist of the most important things in the immediate while leaving things that could be left to ater date, for ater date.''


    ''In an Arctic environment, the cold is your biggest enemy, so my first task needs to be securing a steady supply of firewood to keep the cave warm.''


    ''The issue with that is I am stuck here in a t-shirt and jeans, hell even my sneakers aren''t meant for this kind of climate, which means in the very best case scenario, I can only leave the cave in increments of 5-7 minutes never exceeding 8 minutes because frostbite will set in by that point.'' Cupping his face with a hand, Aoni stared deeper into the fire and continued that train of thought.


    | 0.01 PP earned |


    ''Although there are more than enough trees in the dense forests outside, being at the peak of the mountain is a detriment since it would take me that long to even make it down to the edge of the tree line, unless¡­'' Breaking down his situation further a sudden idea popped into thed''s head, causing him to turn his eyes toward the opened sleeping bag and emergency nket at the foot of the bed.


    | 0.05 PP earned |


    ''With the fire going, the cave''s internal temperature is SIGNIFICANTLY hotter than outside, probably in the high 60s and increasing. And given the size of the cave, it shouldn''t ever get hotter than that, given there is no door to keep the heat in.''


    | 0.01 PP earned |


    ''So it''s perfectly reasonable to give up thefort of a sleeping bag¡­'' With that said, Aoni quietly moved over to the sleeping bag, picked it up, and moved to the desk before unzipping it and picking up thebat knife.


    Once unzipped and syed out fully on the desk, he went to work cutting it up into two separate pieces. Since the head of the sleeping bag was meant to cover a person''s head, it was the perfect size to transform it into a coat, or at least that was Aoni''s idea.


    Unfortunately, things didn''t work out that way because while he was able to cut it into something wearable, it was by no means a jacket; instead, it turned out as a hooded and puffy vest.


    | 0.1 PP earned |


    Still, it was better than nothing, and because he had been careful to leave the zipper intact, once Aoni put it on, he was able to zip it up with ease.


    Yet, a vest wouldn''t be good enough. Sure, sure, it could help keep Aoni''s core and head warm, but the issue of his arms being bare and exposed was still a major problem.


    Unzipping the new vest, he took it off and leaned back in the chair while staring up at the cave''s ceiling.


    Feeling at a loss for what to do, Aoni''s eyes slowly drifted around the room, which resulted in him finally catching something in the corner of his vision: a fading notification.


    He had been so involved in the little project that he hadpletely missed any iing notifications rolling in, and that resulted in thed nearly having a heart attack the moment he pulled up the TD and saw just how high his Progress Points had climbed.


    ______________________


    Progress Points: 5.83


    ______________________


    ''WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK!'' Aoni screamed in his head upon seeing how high the numbers had climbed.


    Amazingly, it had somehow jumped from 0.20 PP to 5.83 in a little over an hour. Yet the worst part was, Aoni had no clue what all he''d done to earn that much; so while some of that number could be attributed to the Summoning, what about the rest, and for that matter, how much of the increase actually came from the Summoning?


    It was at that moment that Aoni tossed everything out of his mind because the realization that he hadpletely forgotten to check on his Summon''s Disy crashed into thed like a tidal wave.

 Chapter 16 Is it Worth it Right Now?

    Having put cia back to bed, Aoni found himself on the precipice of an important decision. In order to boost up two Stats, it had cost 3 Progress points, leaving him with only 4.35 remaining. With two of the four out of the way, he personally felt it was a safe assumption to say that he''d be able to increase both his Speed and Energia stats with the remaining points.


    However, the question he found himself musing over was, ''Is it really worth it right now.''


    Sure, as of this moment, it wasn''t exactly that difficult to earn PP, but who is to say that would be the caseter on down the line?


    ''Worse yet, what do I do in the event that the price of my upgrades bes so heavy that I won''t be able to continue moving forward?''


    ''That''s not even including the fact that I have confirmation about my Attribute and Potential being more than 7 points to upgrade.''


    Aoni felt a safe estimate would be to assume it would cost 10 points for each one; still, that would mean he would need to obtain 30 points, and if things progressed the way his stats were, that would mean Aoni could only increase it by a single step, instead of Stage.


    (Step = the plus or minus attached to Ranks, Stage represents the actual Letter. Together they = Rank)


    That would result in the lion''s share of Aoni''s Progress points being directed toward Increasing his Capacity instead of actually growing stronger, and that also excludes upgrading the Links, Summon amount, and the Grade of his Flume.


    ''It''s too much to think about¡­'' sighing for the millionth time in thest hour, Aoni leaned back on his hands and continued staring at the fire as it crackled away.


    Even though he wasining mentally, it still far outweighed the opposite end of the spectrum, wherein he was a total failure of a Traveler with bottom-of-the-barrel stats and a useless Attribute.


    At least the hand he was dealt allowed room for growth.


    ''The fact still stands that I need to buff up my Defense; while it would be nice to increase my speed and Energia, one will only aid in my flexibility and movement, while the other is practically unusable in the G Rank.''


    Making up his mind, Aoni went ahead and opened his TD again, only to realize his entire brainstorming session hadted another 0.37 Progress Points, bringing his total to 4.72 points.


    While on the topic of Stats, Aoni''s mind wandered back to what he''d experienced so far.


    ''From what I can tell, Attack targeted my muscles, while Defense targeted my bones, organs, and skin¡­by that margin, Speed should affect my Heart and Tendons. Increasing range of motion, flexibility, and stamina. Meanwhile, Energia would nourish everything.''


    | 0.55 PP earned |@@novelbin@@


    ''I''ll take that as a yes, but it also means I will be experiencing a lot more adversity while increasing my stats.'' ncing at the notification as it appeared and vanished, Aoni smirked before continuing his train of thought.


    ''Technically speaking, we learned multiple different ways to train our stats, all of which revolve around moving our body and repeating certain tasks; for example, lifting weights and working out can train not only your Attack but also your Speed.''


    ''Spending my Progress points and using my Attribute as a medium expedites that process and allows me to bypass the duration it takes to achieve the desired results.''


    | 1.0 PP earned |


    ''6.27 points, that should be enough; hopefully, it doesn''t cost 5 points or something to raise my Defense to G+¡­'' With that thought in mind, Aoni finally got up from the ground and made his way over to the bed. He climbed in beside cia and tried to get some sleep.


    Seeing as he didn''t want a repeat of what happened earlier in the night, Aoni figured it would be better to wait until the morning when she had gotten plenty of sleep before trying to exin the situation to the best of his ability and her understanding so as to keep her from biting the hell out of his stomach again in order to wake Aoni up a second time.


    Closing his eyes and focusing on the howling wind along with cia''s snoring, it didn''t take long for thed to drift off as he found an oddfort in the symphony they created together.


    ---


    Several hourster, as the sun peaked into the cave, the small furry infant was wide awake and trying her best to get fed; after all, she was a growing Girl and needed lots of food if she ever wanted to grow up big and strong¡­right?


    "Gaaaoooo"


    Nudge, nudge¡­


    "mmm, five more minutes, cia¡­I''m sleepy¡­ZzZz"


    "Gaoo gaoo OooOooo"


    SHOVE


    Feeling his entire body shift slightly and his leg slide off the twin-sized bed, Aoni was startled enough to respond as the dream state wore off and reality kicked back in, waking him up.


    "Okay, okay¡­I''m up, I''m up," sitting up with messy hair and tired eyes, Aoni looked down and noticed the small yeti looking up at him with sparkling eyes and a bit of drool dripping out the corner of her right cheek.


    "You hungry?" Aoni asked while rubbing the sleep from his eyes and watching in amusement as cia''s head bobbed up and down in understanding before darting off the bed like a furry white missile and climbing up the Bookshelves where he had left the MREs.


    "I''m not really a big breakfast person, so that''s all you. OKAY, OKAY, OKAY, jeeze, give me a second to pick the right one; HEY, GLACIA, DON''T JUST THROW ALL THE PACKAGES EVERYWHERE!" Jumping off the bed and rushing to the bookshelf, Aoni barely had enough time to catch several of the MREs from hitting the ground before scooping his summon up, tucking her under his right arm, and retrieving the onebeled B02 (Breakfast Day 2)


    Just like they had not long after her Summoning, cia, and Aoni sat on the bed while he prepared the food; this time, instead of pancakes, there was sausage, much to her dismay.


    Luckily, though, she wasn''t that picky of an eater and soon devoured the Eggs, sausage, and hashbrowns before gulping down her juice, while Aoni just had some water since he was used to skipping the first meal of the day.

 Chapter 18 Memory or Instinct

    At the peak of a certain mountain in the middle of an arctic wastnd sat a cave, and as a blizzard apanied the newly rising sun, things weren''t nearly as calm inside this cave as one would expect.


    Screams and howls of agony bounced off the rocky walls and out into the nothing, alling from the young man whose domicile it had be, and unable to sit back and watch any longer, a small ball of fur recently named cia took off without hesitation.


    She didn''t understand what was happening, even if the young man who had recently summoned her, Aoni, had shown and exined it multiple times. Her level of intelligence simply wasn''t up to par with that type of information.


    Sure, she was able to surmise bits and pieces, like when he acted as if he were choking and falling, the connection to the prior night''s events lined up, but she couldn''tprehend what he meant behind it.


    That is until he smiled up at her as she perched atop the bed and watched himy down before a terrifying presence descended from out of nowhere into the cave.


    This presence, in fact, was what had awoken her thest time something happened to her Lord.


    It was oppressive and unlike anything she had ever felt before, and the presence was nearly enough to cause her bowels to empty all over the makeshift bed.


    Yet as rapidly as it had descended on the cave, it vanished, and all that was left was her Lord, writhing about and screaming as cuts and gashes opened up all over his entire body.


    Through the recently established Link of Subordinance, she could feel mental anguish and, to a lesser extent, the physical pain he was experiencing. Honestly, it was simply too much for the not-even-year-old Infant Artic-GigantoUrsusPithecus to handle.


    Filled with panic and fright, cia jumped off the bed and circled Aoni multiple times. She even extended out one of her arms as if she wanted to nudge him, but she would stop when she remembered something her Lord had done earlier.


    During the exnation he had tried to give, Aoni had taken her paw multiple times and mimicked pushing on him while shaking his head and making other gestures; he even went so far as to make chomping motions while pointing at his belly and using a stern tone while saying not to do it again.


    So left without any other choice, little cia stepped back and watched in sadness as she was helpless to aid her Lord¡­her new Family.


    That was when a memory clicked into her small mind; in this memory, arge figure whom she felt a connection with plucked things off of some trees and rubbed them on a smaller figure''s body.


    From the vision, cia was able to see red motts of fur clinging to the smaller figure, but when the strange object was cracked open and its contents were pressed against the motts of red fur, they vanished.


    As quickly as the fragmented memory appeared, it vanished like a cloud of smoke, and cia was once again back in the cave, albeit extremely confused but feeling as if she knew what to do.


    Whether it truly was a memory of a past she didn''t remember or some form of instinct, only time will tell. Still, with renewed vigor, cia took off toward the mouth of the cave before stopping to look back at her Lord onest time, then vanishing into the snowstorm.


    ---


    The moment her feet and palms touched the fresh powdered snow, she felt nostalgic, as if she belonged, in contrast to the cave, where she felt slightly stifled and ufortable.@@novelbin@@


    Usually, it would have been unbearable for such a young creature to live in such an unnatural manner. Strangely enough, it was the Presence of Aoni, along with the LoS, that contrasted that natural feeling and turned the cave into what humans would describe a home.


    Still, that didn''t take away from the fact that once she was out in the snowy environment, cia thrived.


    On all fours and running as fast as her small legs and arms would carry, cia darted across the snow as if it were the most normal thing in the world.


    No matter how deep or loosely packed the fresh snow was, she seemed to glide over it as if it were solid ground while making her way down the Mountain''s peak and reaching the first of many tree lines.


    And even then, she didn''t stop; bouncing up, the ball of fluff was soon airborne, and then, using her powerful arms and ws, she scaled the first tree, which was of considerable height, and within a minute or two was at the top.


    From there, she could see everything, and so her hunt began. With the mental image of the exact nt she was looking for prevalent in her mind, cia set out, jumping from one tree to the next, looking for a very specific fruit.


    Unfortunately, as she ventured deeper into the mountainside forest and farther down the Mountain, she became more tired, yet the fruit was nowhere to be seen.


    And that''s when it happened.


    In the midst of her desperation to help Aoni, something triggered inside her very core, a spark of sorts, and it was this spark, this itch, which caused her small head to turn and look further down the Mountain.


    She was utterly unaware of what was happening, but for some reason, cia felt that if she moved just a little bit further down the Mountain, she would find what she was looking for.


    So she moved. Tired as she was, she lept from one tree to another, progressing slowly thanks to the density and closeness of the trees until finally, after an unknown amount of time, she spotted a small cluster of strange spikey objects at the very top of an odd-looking tree.


    "OOO!" Feeling recharged, having located the object of her search, cia shot forward, clearing a 20-foot gap between the trees, and caught hold of the strange tree with her ws before scaling it with ease and plucking one of the three fruits clustered at the top.


    With her prize secured, the long trek back began, and since she was both young and naive, she didn''t even notice the three pairs of glowing purple eyes ring at her as cia left them behind.


    It was totally unknown to her just how close to danger she had danced.

 Chapter 20 Minor Problems with Big Solutions

    If Aoni were more intelligent or wisened to the Traveler''s way, or hell, had been a schr or something, maybe he would have put more thought into the reasoning behind why cia was able to locate something so NICHE in the middle of a mountain bound forest, but with everything going on around him, and having felt like he''d been knocking on Death''s door not long ago, Aoni had other things taking up his attention.


    For example, the fact that he smelled like a dead animal or how his clothing and hair were caked with dried blood, hell, even the fire being out was a problem, so to say thed had bigger issues that demanded immediate attention would be an understatement.


    "You did good, cia, thank you." With that statement, Aoni realized for the first time how thankful she was his first summon he was and ignored the grime on his hand to give her some head pats, much to the joy of the infant yeti.


    "Now then," Aoni said, jumping to his feet and doing a few light stretches before catching a whiff of the stench permeating his body and frowning.


    "How am I gonna deal with this¡­" Looking around the small cave, the frown gracing his lips deepened because there wasn''t a single thing that could be used to bathe himself or, better yet, clean his clothing.


    "ooo¡­" Even cia took a step back and wrinkled her nose in disgust. She clearly had been too worried about her Lord''s condition to pay much attention to the smell, but now that it was clear he was fine, she couldn''t ignore it any longer.


    "Yeah¡­I know, I stink¡­but what are we going to do about it."


    "We have a few options here, none of which are pleasant and one of which is COMPLETELY random. For starters, I could do the obvious thing and rush outside and go roll around in the snow¡­on second thought, that''s a pretty miserable Idea¡­" Cupping his chin and thinking aloud, Aoni caught sight of cia trying her best to mimic his body posture, only failing because instead of fingers, she had ws and couldn''t find afortable way toplete the gesture.


    ''ws...'' the word floated around in Aoni''s head for a bit as a rudimentary n began forming in his mind.


    | 0.01 PP earned |


    ''If we can find a small tree and cut it down, between my knife and her ws, we may be able to carve out a small wooden basin or at the very least a few bowls¡­providing I canst long enough and have enough stamina to drag the wood back into the cave.''


    ''That will also solve our immediateck of fire materials as well. Since cia was able to climb a tree and get that weird fruit, I bet she could get some small branches for firewood.''


    ''The only issue is me¡­''


    Turning and facing the mouth of the cave, Aoni couldn''t help but shiver slightly as he noticed the snowstorm had picked up greatly and dropped visibility to near zero, blotting out the sun¡­then again, it could also be nighttime; he had no clue how long he''d been unconscious for.


    | 0.05 PP earned |


    ''Hm? Have I been earning Progress points this whole time?'' catching sight of the faint notification as it vanished, thed didn''t hesitate to open his TD, and once he did, Aoni felt the sudden need to sit down.


    ______________________


    Aoni Thurston


    Age: 16


    Potential: One Star/F- Rank (?) **


    Rank: G **


    ______________________


    Attribute Grade: ¡î


    Attribute: Progression


    Progress Points: 15.58


    ______________________


    Statistics


    Attack: G (?)


    Defense: G+ **


    Speed: G- (?)


    Energia: F- **@@novelbin@@


    ______________________


    Passives **


    Cold Resistance: F- **


    Pain Resistance: G+ (?) **


    ______________________


    "What¡­the¡­actual fuck happened while I was unconscious?" Copsing onto his butt and ignoring the dull pain froming in contact with the rocky surface, Aoni stared incredulously at the newly updated Traveler''s Disy.


    Unknowingly, he had gained Progress points, an astronomical amount at that, considering how before he had 6.72, yet now, it showed as 15.58, and Aoni wasing up empty on how it had skyrocketed so drastically.


    Unfortunately, he had no idea how many points were deducted when he increased his Defense to G+ because whatever losses Aoni had earned were immediately reced with these incredible gains.


    "Gaooo, Gaoo ooo," careful not to scratch her Lord with her ws, cia came up beside Aoni and tugged at his pants to draw attention and check on him.


    "It''s ok, Girl, I''m just surprised, is all, not hurt¡­."


    ''So much has changed, and I haven''t even had this Attribute for 48 hours yet¡­My Rank Potential increased a step¡­, and my Rank increased to G. Those two changes alone are enough to send me over Luna (Terra''s Moon)¡­but for my Energia to spike a full stage, along with the addition of not one but two Passives¡­this is too much.''


    No matter how he thought about it, there was only a single exnation as to what caused this change, and that was the fruit. This then brought Aoni back to the question of what had happened to its core.


    Snapping his head in cia''s direction, Aoni identally caused her to flinch away in fright. Still, after coaxing her back to his side withforting words, he began pressing for information, starting with pointing at the fruit.


    "cia, was there something inside that?" Aoni asked, pointing at the hollowed-out spikey fruit.


    But as usual, she looked confused, forcing Aoni to look around for a small rock or something to use as an example.


    A few minutes of searchingter, he found a rock on the ground, and after asking for the fruit from his summon, he began his light interrogation a second time.


    "Was there something this big inside of this?" Aoni questioned, cing the rock inside the fruit and causing cia''s eyes to fill with recognition, making the summon bob her head up and down as confirmation.


    "Ok¡­and where is it now?" making sure the rock never actually touched the fruit, Aoni extended his hand toward cia with the rock resting in his palm, which she quickly took and observed before ncing up at him and pointing at his face, more specifically Aoni''s mouth.

 Chapter 24 Increasing the Flumes Grade

    Huuummmmm


    While examining the fruits of hisbor with cia perched atop his head, Aoni soon noticed a faint humminging from the Flume, which quickly drew his attention.@@novelbin@@


    Physically, there were no changes, indicating it wasn''t actually doing anything and that it was more of an rm or notification of sorts, meaning¡­he had a new summon avable.


    ''Traveler''s Disy,'' uttering the mentalmand with the initial implication of checking what his present Progress Points were, he quickly sucked in a sharp breath of air.


    ______________________


    Aoni Thurston


    Age: 16


    Potential: One Star/F- Rank (?)


    Rank: G


    ______________________


    Attribute Grade: ¡î


    Attribute: Progression


    Progress Points: 50.61


    ______________________


    Statistics


    Attack: G (?)


    Defense: G+


    Speed: G- (?)


    Energia: F-


    ______________________


    Passives **


    Cold Resistance: F-


    Pain Resistance: G+ (?)


    ______________________


    Aoni wasn''t expecting the drastic change in the number of points, from 18.22 all the way up to 50.61, a fact which was as shocking as not, considering all he had been doing over thest several hours.


    ''For starters, it''s a safe assumption that by awakening my Energia Cell, on the first try too, I hadted quite a profit in the form of Progress points; however, it''s not like I stayed static after that either, which brings up a curious topic.'' Tapping his chin, Aoni''s eyes drifted away from the floating disy and up at his summon.


    ''Have cia''s actions been bringing in a steady stream of progress points this whole time? Better yet, is it even possible for me to get points from my Summons?''


    |0.01 PP earned|


    ''I''ll take that as a yes,'' noticing the sh of information appearing in a small text box to the right of his traveler''s disy, Aoni quickly swapped over to his Summon''s disy as a n began cooking in his mind.


    Summon''s Disy


    _______________________________


    Flume Grade: ¡î (?)


    Territory Climate: Artic/Mountainous


    Summon''s Avable: 1/1 (?)


    _______________________________


    Link''s of Subordination: 1/1 (?)


    _______________________________


    1: Infant Artic-GigantoUrsusPithecus


    cia


    Age: 1.5 Months


    Gender: ¡â


    Potential: One Star


    Grade: ¡î


    _______________________________


    ''Although I am not able to increase cia''s power, the same can''t be said about the Flume¡­with 50 points, it should be possible to increase the Grade, but I wonder if that increase will corrte with increasing my own Stars? If that''s the case, then it would be an important experiment which would gain me valuable information.''


    Reaching up with both arms, Aoni captured cia and gently put her down on the bed, much to her annoyance, before making his way over to stand in front of the Flume.


    ''It''s now or never¡­'' He thought with slight hesitation; there was a strong possibility that he''d lose all 50 points in this single endeavor, yet in contrast, it could also be the difference between summoning something stupid like an old toothbrush and a powerful Dragon.


    Well, he thinks that, but all a higher Grade Flume does for summons is slightly increase the rate of getting something good. This was also why he was somewhat jealous when Aoni saw that one kid from ss 1-A with a high-grade Flume stone in his pack.


    Not only would it have a higher rate of pulling something over 3-Stars, but it would also have a lower rate of getting something trashy, like, say, a no-Star summons, which was entirely possible.


    ''Increase the Grade of My Flume.'' He wasn''t entirely sure why he felt the need to, but as Aoni stated themand to the TD, he ced his hand against the surface of the artifact, maybe for good luck or maybe to appease his anxiety that it would suddenly disappear¡­who knows because thed sure didn''t.


    | Increasing the Grade of Territory Linked Flume to ? |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    For a faint moment, he noticed a ripple of something spread out from his hand toward the Flume, but just as suddenly as it appeared, it vanished again, and from a visual standpoint, nothing had changed with the artifact.


    ''That''s¡­not what I expected to happen¡­'' Aoni thought while removing his hand and quickly checking how many points had been deducted, only to realize it was a measly loss of 5 progress points.


    ''I thought for sure it would increase it to 2-Stars, but instead, the flume grew just like how Attributes or Summons are supposed to, by increasing steps instead of stages.''


    | 0.5 PP earned |


    ''46.11, Increase the Grade of My Flume.'' His eyes shifted away from the Flume upon noticing the added points. Without further hesitation, Aoni ced his hand back on the artifact a second time, this time focusing on the point of contact to see if he could notice the strange phenomenon again.


    | Increasing the Grade of Territory Linked Flume to ? |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 5.0 PP earned |


    As before, the Flume didn''t show any outward changes, but again, the strange visual instance where something seemed to transfer from his hand to the Flume reappeared and then vanished a second time.


    Blinking several times to see if it was just his dry eyes causing this hallucination, Aoni quickly checked his progress points but couldn''t help but scratch his head with his free hand upon seeing the numbers.


    ''So it was 5 for the first step increase along with an added 0.5, but this time, minus five points, it seems It only cost me 10 points to upgrade. Does that mean if I wanna bump it up to full star¡­it would be 20?'' Noticing that he had 41.11 points remaining, Aoni decided to throw caution to the wind and try to push the Flume to the Full Star Step.


    | Increasing the Grade of Territory Linked Flume to ¡ï |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | Territories Flume has reached its Current Limit |


    | 10 PP earned |


    ''There was quite a bit of information to take away from those few lines, but first and foremost, there''s a "Current" limit for how high the Grade of my Flume could reach.''


    ''Having a current limit means it should be able to increase at some point¡­but I have no clue how to do that. Then there''s the case of my losing and earning Progress points.''

 Chapter 27 End of the 2nd Day

    Even though Aoni had confirmed the existence of two more fruits, there was a slight hitch in moving forward with gathering them, and that came in the form of cia having ZERO idea where they were.


    He had tried everything he could to try to get her to understand what Aoni meant by ''let''s find them.'' Still, even after following her out of the cave on what he could only call a false g, the result was them standing outside in the storm for 15 minutes while she looked all around in confusion before finally turning to look at her Lord with disappointment in her eyes.


    But all wasn''t lost because as he stood out in the snow, Aoni felt FAR better than he had during the previous ventures outside, which wasn''t much of a surprise considering he was now sporting an F- Pain Resistance and Defense, in tandem with Cold Resistance.


    Please don''t get it messed up. The Lad still found it far too cold outside to befortable. Still, with his body''s resilience being way higher, Aoni could now withstand the harsh wind and bitter cold for a significantly longer period.


    If he had to estimate, Aoni believed, he could more than likelyst about an hour before having to worry about getting frostbite.


    Another thing he noticed was how much stronger he felt; lying around and not moving much masked just howrge his growth was, but now that Aoni was up and about, he could tell just how far he''de.


    For him, who had previously been a slightly malnourished and gangly fellow with a bit of a potbelly, it was a MASSIVE step in the right direction; overall, Aoni looked and felt way healthier and was finally filling out the frame he''d been gically gifted.


    Like a diamond in the rough, he went from a gangly, borderline homeless-looking fellow to a strapping youngd, but given the state of his skin and clothing, it truly wasn''t easy to tell.


    So, since Aoni was able to handle the cold better, he figured it was time to get some of this crud off his skin.


    Stripping down, the Lad spent about five minutes rolling around in the snow naked until he felt free and clear, and well¡­chilled to the bone, Aoni rushed back into the cave where it was nice and warm before sitting in front of the fire to warm back up.


    cia, on the other hand, was quite a sight because she treated the whole thing like a giant game, even swiping her Lord''s pants at one point and running around him in a circle.


    Regardless, once Aoni''s body was clean and warmed up, he was able to examine himself closer and was quite shocked by the results.


    He was by no means muscr or even sporting an athletic build or anything like that, but Aoni had definitely upgraded from scrawny to¡­average¡­or so he believed.


    There was a slight definition in his biceps, and he could see budding abs starting to poke through what used to be belly fat, so Aoni could only assume he''d reced about 15-20 pounds of fat with pure, lean muscle.


    All of it was the product of Energia, so while he needed nourishment to maintain this state, the initial foundation was due to the mystical source of power.


    Well¡­that and whatever hell his body was put through, thanks to his Attribute.


    Still, One thing Aoni noticed was that his nudity seemed to have ZERO effect on cia, and while he had been a bit self-conscious at first, it didn''t seem to matter anymore; thus, since his clothing was filthy and his body was both cleaned and warmed up, the Lad went ahead and began using the vines and some pliable branches to weave a basket.


    What for you might ask? Well¡­to hold water, of course. It wasn''t like he could stay outside and clean his clothing, unlike his skin, which had his core body temp to melt the snow long enough for him to rub off the gunk; the same couldn''t be said about Aoni''s cotton clothing, which would retain the moisture before freezing solid in a couple of minutes thanks to how cold it was outside.


    That said, he chose young branches that were filled with moisture and bendable, and in about an hour, Aoni had a decent-sized basket, yet another product of his survival sses in school.


    Of course, his newly increased stats helped out, and once finished, Aoni sent cia out to fill it to the brim with snow, yet another challenging task that he was able to ovee eventually.


    From there, it was simply a matter of holding the basket close enough to the fire to melt the snow but not damage the container, and 30 minutester¡­vo, he had a basket full of chilled water.


    By the time his stomach and the little gluttons were growling for dinner, Aoni had already made a small drying rack, cleaned his clothes, and hung them up so the fire could evaporate the moisture from them.


    Having skipped lunch, he was able to make a decent-sized meal for the two of them out of the Dinner and Lunch MREs for Day 2, and soon enough, Aoni was tucked in under the emergency nket, with cia lying on top of him while already snoring away.


    Although he may not have gotten much done in the grand scheme, the Lad understood that he had done quite a bit for his short-term growth. As such, when it came time to check his TD for the final time of the night, Aoni had earned a substantial amount of Progress points, with his total being 38.33.


    The sight alone was more than enough to bring a smile to his lips as Aoni closed both his TD and his eyes and began drifting off into the sweet embrace of sleep.


    However, as he was resting safely and warmly above the mountain, things further down could not be any more different.@@novelbin@@


    Some distance away, through the howling winds, cries of rage and snarls of defiance echoed through the night as arge-scale battle erupted.


    The reason was that the two remaining spikey fruits that cia had found, something else, was now fighting with their lives on the line to im them as their own, and it would no doubt be a night filled with death and bloodshed.


    One which neither Aoni nor cia woulde to find out tillter.

 Chapter 29 Solution for Breaking Through

    With stormy windsshing around outside, cia snoring away beside him on the bed, and the soft crackling of the fire, Aoni found himself lost again.


    It was the first time he had noticed his Attribute''s limitations, and that fact unsettled the Lad because he knew this would more than likely be a regr urrence.


    Progression Stalls happen in everything, from the human metabolism after a weight loss surgery to something as intricate as martial arts; there will always be a roadblock or Bottleneck that must be ovee if one wishes to continue moving forward, and from what he could tell Aoni had reached his first one.


    Ironically enough, this is the kind of thing that usually urs when someone is trying to break through from one stage to the next; meanwhile, he had an apparent cheat that would allow him to more or less surpass those limitations by only being subjected to some pain and anguish.


    Unlike other Travelers, his Bottleneck would more than likely always involve two things:ck of sufficient progress points and the limitations of his Attribute Grade.


    Closing his eyes, Aoni brainstormed on why this was happening in the first ce.


    ''If this were a video game, I could liken my Attribute Grade to a Quest with the reward being Step increases in my Grade¡­but what are the objectives of said quest.''


    ''The first step-up happened once all four of my Stats reached my Potential limit of F-, and the second urred with my increasing of my Potential to the "Current" limit.''


    ''Attributes work like a muscle; the more you use them, the stronger they be, and this is reflected in their grades, so the fact that im presently at the OF-Step means there should only be one more objective that would push me to Full-Star¡­but what then?''


    ''Will I automatically earn a Null-Star, as with every other Attribute, so long as the being''s Potential allows, or is there a fourth Objective which must be met to do so?''


    The dark recesses of Aoni''s mind slowly began to fill with his old friend anxiety, and he couldn''t help but feel he was forgetting something important as his thoughts spiraled out of control.


    hhhuuuummmm


    The faint humming of the Flume assaulted his ears and shook his brain like a mule kick to the skull as Aoni suddenly felt dumb as hell for not remembering what could be the key to this present issue.


    ''THE HOOK SWORD! Open my Summon''s Disy!'' carefully sitting up so as not to startle or wake up cia, the Lad broke into a wide grin and looked between the Flume and the top of the bookshelf where he had left his weapon.


    Summon''s Disy


    _______________________________


    Flume Grade: ¡ï


    Territory Climate: Artic/Mountainous


    Summon''s Avable: 1/1 (?)


    _______________________________


    Links of Subordination: 1/2 (?)


    _______________________________


    1: Infant Artic-GigantoUrsusPithecus


    cia


    Age: 1.5 Months


    Gender: ¡â


    Potential: One Star


    Grade: ¡î


    2: Hook de (L)


    Vestr


    Attack: G- (?)


    Durability: G- (?)


    Grade: ¡î (?)


    Effect: N/A


    _______________________________


    ''Damn it, Aoni, I swear you are dumb as shit sometimes, THERE''S STILL ARROWS AND SEVERAL THINGS I CAN UPGRADE!'' Chastising himself mentally, Aoni slowly slid off the bed and padded over to the bookshelf before retrieving the Hook Sword and cing it on the desk.


    ''Summons and LoS aside, the Hook de has Three Stats which can be increased¡­.but which one should I do first.'' Ignoring the fact that his Flume was ready for a third summon, Aoni carefully sat down at the desk and propped his chin atop steepled hands while examining his disy carefully.


    ''When ites to weapons, Attack and Durability are essentially the same as Attack and Defense, with thetter being nearly as important as it is for myself as it is for the weapon.''


    ''If its durability is too low, the weapon will wear out and eventually break too quickly. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Attack represents how much using it can add to my own strength.''


    ''All of these could be calcted with numbers, but that is in and of itself a massive annoying headache that I don''t feel like dealing with. Besides, there are machines on Terra to figure all that out.''


    ''Still, given the fact that I was subjected to a significant amount of pain when increasing my stats, I can assume that it would be a simr effect in the case of my weapon, meaning there''s a strong chance that if I am careless and increase its Grade or Attack first, the weapons durability will bottom out and it will shatter before ever finishing the upgrade.''


    ''Which means I should first increase its durability¡­but before that¡­I should probably give it a name. With how particr my Attribute is, I don''t doubt there will be an error message if I were to try upgrading it by calling it "Hook de,"'' Blinking several times, Aoni sat in rtive silence and tried to figure out a solid name for his new weapon.


    ''Vestr¡­I''ll name you Vestr for West because you are meant to be wielded in my Left hand.'' He didn''t remember where exactly he''d heard the word, but Aoni knew it was part of a deadnguage that he''d found online during ate-night deep dive into a random topic.


    ''Increase Vestr''s Durability.'' reaching down, Aoni lifted Vestr and held it parallel to the table while uttering themand.


    | Increasing Summon ''Vestr''s'' Durability from G- to G |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 1.0 PP earned |


    Soon, Aoni felt a subtle vibration run through the length of Vestr,sting only a second or two, along with a faint shimmer that settled down, revealing absolutely nothing visible.


    After examining it closely and double-checking that his Summon''s Disy indicated the correct information, the Lad jumped over to his Traveler''s Disy and nodded.


    ''The upgrade cost 2.5 points, which was expensive, but I also earned a single point back in return, meaning I am down 1.5 points.''


    Finding that within the realm of eptability, Aoni went ahead and pushed Vestr from G to G+¡­however, when he saw the cost of doing so, the Lad sucked in a cold breath¡­because instead of 2.5 points, it had doubled to 5, and he had still only earned a single point.


    ''Please don''t be 10 points, please don''t be 10 points¡­.'' As he went for the third upgrade, to bring its durability to F- Aoni couldn''t help but say a little chant¡­but s¡­.


    | 1.0 PP earned |


    Progress Points: 3.83@@novelbin@@


    He had indeed lost 10 points, and all Aoni had to show for it¡­was a weapon with an F- Durability and not even remotely close to enough Progress points to do anything substantial.

 Chapter 32 First Expedition (2)

    Crunch Crunch crunch


    Hiking down the mountain with the aid of his Hook des, Aoni slowly waded through the now waist-deep snow while noting that he had been on the move for 20 minutes or so.


    Looking back, he could easily spot the trench he had left in his wake, a walkway of sorts, which was both a blessing and a bit of a curse.


    I say a blessing for obvious reasons: Aoni''s return to the cave would be much easier since he had carved out a path; however, on the opposite end of the spectrum, the Lad was required to expend stamina in order to cut a path in the first ce, causing his legs to get colder and colder as time went on slowly.


    His Jeans were already drenched, and even with Aoni''s Def and Cold Resistance, he had to admit his legs were starting to go numb.


    With the sun peeking through the clouds, the Lad could feel that the temperature had risen significantly from thest time he was outside; still, was there really a difference between -40 and -20? It was still cold as hell and technically dangerous to be outside in.


    While Aoni was beginning to feel the bite of the frozen terrain, the same couldn''t be said for his Summon.


    Nope, cia was having the time of her life and had even left her Lord''s side more than once to y in the snow.


    That was how Aoni found out about her innate ability to traverse the top of the deep snow as if it were solid ground, a fact that he logistically couldn''t figure out.


    ''I mean, sure, she doesn''t weigh much, but the way she moves doesn''t fit thews of physics I know from Terra. It''s strange, but with the presence of Energia and the fact that she''s not a human, who knows what kind of weird stuff she can do as she gets stronger.'' he thought while keeping a careful eye on cia so as to make sure she didn''t wander too far away from him.


    Looking over his shoulder real quick, Aoni noticed they had ventured roughly a quarter of a mile down the sloping mountains, and yet, they still hadn''te to the tree line, which he could see off in the distance.


    Sure, some headway was made, but Aoni was beginning to realize that the trees weren''t really getting closer.


    CLINK


    ''Em, rock,'' while lost in thought and using his Hook des to keep steady on the uneven ground, Aoni suddenly hit something solid; the sound, being sharp and quite loud, shocked him for a moment and even caused a reaction from cia, who snapped her head in his direction.


    Rummmmmmble


    "Huh?" Looking around in confusion at the source of the sound, Aoni began feeling a slight disturbance through his feet, a vibration of sorts.


    Unfortunately, by the time his brain registered its cause and source, it was toote.


    The snow at the top of the mountain was shifting, and then¡­it started sliding down the slope; Aoni''s little moment of ignorance had caused an avnche, and he was right in the middle of its path of destruction.


    "SHIT! GLACIA GET OVER HERE!" Screaming at the top of his lungs, the Lad felt years of survival training kick in immediately.


    And that was when he noticed the world seemed to slow down around him. Whether it was an adrenaline rush or hyperfocus, Aoni had no clue, but time moved in slow motion for him, and he wasn''t about to waste this opportunity.


    There wasn''t much time, and with no idea of how far it would take him and a strong possibility that this avnche would drag Aoni out of the borders of his territory, the Lad''s mind arose with the fact that he definitely couldn''t ride this thing down the mountain, causing him to explode into motion.


    Dropping to his knees and spinning the Hook des, Aoni hacked and shed at the nearby snowbank as quickly as his stats allowed, clearing out a chunk of snowrge enough for cia and him tofortably sit, and went to work.


    With only a few seconds before the iing avnche washed them away, Aoni did his best groundhog impersonation and dug at a downward angle, using his weapons as shovels, until the rumbling felt like it was right over him.


    ''Shit!''


    "Gaooo!"


    With a whoop, cia flung her body into the small den her Lord had created just in time for the wave of snow to barrel into the channel Aoni had carved out by walking down the mountain.


    With his summon safe and at his side, the Lad leaned forward, crossed his des, and used them as a shield of sorts, plugging up the entrance to their little 5x5 foot hole in the snow bank.


    It wasn''t a perfect fix, but it did block enough of the snow from flooding in and burying them.@@novelbin@@


    Once the two of them were out of harm''s way, the only thing they could do was wait¡­as darkness descended and the rumbling continued overhead.


    Surprisingly, although Aoni couldn''t see anything, he could sense that cia was perfectly calm, as if the fact they were trapped under several feet of snow wasn''t a big deal for her.


    ''Must be instincts or something; then again, if her species is from mountainous regions like this, I suppose things like avnches would be prettymon¡­wait¡­why do I feel like she would have been totally fine.'' Thinking back to how cia seemed to skate across the snow without sinking in even an inch, Aoni couldn''t help but wonder if she could have easily surfed the avnche.


    ''Eh, that''s a test for another time, for now¡­it seems things have settled down.'' Shuffling a bit, he massaged his legs to make sure the blood was still flowing before addressing his summon.


    cia, who was wrapped around Aoni''s chest like a vest, ooed twice and was enjoying her Lord''sforting pets when he took her arm and began exining that he wanted her to dig a hole to the surface.


    One of the main issues they would soon face was theck of oxygen, so Aoni needed a vent to allow fresh air and some light in.

 Chapter 36 Discovery

    It took Aoni several iterations to heat his body in front of the fire. Still, after a couple of hours of busy work, he hadpleted the task of gutting and bleeding each of the carcasses¡­but there was one thing the Lad hadn''t ounted for¡­and honestly felt dumb for overlooking.


    Having spent an extensive amount of time crafting a method to collect the blood, it was all for naught because now, each of the make-shift basins he had created was filled with a solid crimson block.


    That''s right; his one-track mind had forgotten that he was living in an arctic environment with negative 30-degree temperatures.


    "Fantastic¡­what the hell am I supposed to do with all this," taking a deep breath through his nose, Aoni poked at one of the blocks of blood with his knife before eventually settling on dumping it all off the mountain.


    ''To do this, I first need to carve around the edges of the block, carry the hollowed-out log to the edge of the tform, and then¡­'' part way through that thought, a sudden idea popped up in his head.


    But Aoni quickly shook it away for a specific reason.


    "Making a sled would only work if cia was strong enough to pull my weight." Tapping his chin, Aoni knelt beside the basin and imagined himself gliding down the mountain.


    In fact, Aoni was so entranced by this thought that he didn''t even notice the small bundle of white padding along and sitting down beside him.


    "Gaoo?"@@novelbin@@


    "AHHH!!" Jumping up like a fool, Aoni spun away and took a fighting stance.


    "OOOOOooo GAO!" And much like himself, cia too freaked out thanks to the sudden outburst, however¡­


    "AHHh HAHhahahahha!" from screaming due to the sudden appearance of his summon to clutching his stomach, Aoni burst outughing because, in her fright, cia tumbled backward and sunk into the snow head first, leaving only her back legs poking out and ilingically.


    Feeling bad, and even though he couldn''t stopughing, Aoni still crouched down and helped the poor baby out. Unfortunately, all that did was make her pout because she clearly understood he was making fun of her.


    How could Aoni surmise this, you may ask? Well, it''s simple: she crossed her arms and faced away from him in a sign of defiance, making the Ladugh even harder.


    "Come on, cia, ha¡­ha¡­I''m sorry for startling you;e here, lemmie give you plenty of headpats and ear scratches."


    "Oo, MMPH!" Surprisingly, even the promise of headpats and ear scratches seemed not to be enough, and with a grunt, she refused to look at her Lord in protest, causing Aoni''s eyes to roll on their own as he went ahead and coaxed her with some ear scratches.


    It took a few minutes of apologies and attention before the little ball of fur was back to normal, and he could ask some basic questions.


    "Alrighty, were you able to find what you were looking for?" Aoni asked while looking over at cia, who was using his shoulder like a couch.


    "Gaooo, ooOooO Gaaaaaoo." Acting as if she believed her Lord to understand her wordspletely, cia began babbling and waving her left arm, simrly to how Aoni does when he talks, causing him to stare nkly at her as he tried to understand what she meant.


    "Gaoo gao ogao OoO GaooOo," she said, finishing up her statement with several head bobs. Although her babble meant absolutely nothing to him, cia''s bodynguage and excitement were enough for Aoni to confirm that she had indeed found something.


    When he reached this conclusion, Aoni was left wondering about where to go, what to do, and how much she had found¡ªthese were all the things that would influence his next move.


    In his heart, the Lad was hoping cia had stumbled upon some easily essible mineral deposits. Still, given how strange her tracking ability seemed to be, a variable Aoni had determined by the wide variety of prey she brought back, he wasn''t about to ignore the fact that it could be located underground or something.


    "Okay, I think I understand, so you found some of the stuff I showed you¡­"


    "ooOo," she replied with a nod.


    "Is it close by? Or far away." Using his hands, Aoni made a gesture indicating distance by bringing them close together and then farther apart.


    "Close¡­or Far."


    "Close¡­or Far." The third time he repeated the phrase and gesture, cia Ooed on Close and grabbed her Lord''s hands to stop Aoni from separating them.


    "Got it, next question¡­" Picking her up off his shoulder, Aoni ced cia down beside him and walked over to the basin before picking it up with ease, thanks to his increased Attack Stat.


    "Are you able to lift this?" cing the hollowed-out log back on the ground, he stepped aside and watched carefully as his summon walked up to the log, stared at it hard for a moment before winding up and punching the basin with such force that it rocketed off well over 20 feet away beforeing to a stop.


    "HOLY SHIT!" Too stunned at what just happened to bother scolding his summon for not simply lifting the log as he had done, Aoni looked at cia with a newfound curiosity.


    It was like everything kind of just clicked into ce, and he suddenly felt as if her bringing back almost forty kills wasn''t that big of a task anymore.


    Still, the question was, HOW?


    Staring at the ball of fluff as she struck a victory pose, Aoni quickly opened his Summon''s Disy to see if there were any changes to her information, and what he saw caused him to feel the urge to sit down.


    Summon''s Disy


    _______________________________


    Flume Grade: ¡ï


    Territory Climate: Artic/Mountainous


    Summon''s Avable: 0/1 (?)


    _______________________________


    Links of Subordination: 1/2 (?)


    _______________________________


    1: Infant Artic-GigantoUrsusPithecus


    cia


    Age: 1.5 Months


    Gender: ¡â


    Potential: One Star


    Grade: ¡ï


    Passives:


    Artic Movement: ?


    Artic Tracking: ?


    ------------------


    2: Hook de (L)


    Vestr


    ------------------


    3: Hook de (R)


    Austr


    ------------------


    Not only had cia''s Grade maxed out at a single Full Star¡­but she had also, at some point, obtained not one, but TWO Passives, which were already at the OF-Step and with little space left in the center of the Star, Aoni could tell they too were about to max out into the Full Star Step.


    It had to be said that unless a summon came out of the Flume with Passives, it was INCREDIBLY difficult for them to obtain any, so the fact that cia suddenly had two appearing on her Disy was more than enough for Aoni to look at her as if she was an otherworldly being...which TECHNICALLY she was.

 Chapter 38 Swordsmanship

    After Depositing his summon on the bed, where she soon immersed herself in another ydate with her favorite stick, Aoni made his way over to the desk and ced Austr down.


    ''Ignoring the excess points after the decimal, I have 88 points to work with here, and as experience has taught me, it costs 17.5 Progress Points in order to max out a single stat, which will then Yield me three free bonus Points.'' The Lad thought while running his fingertips along the broad side of his de.


    ''That amount is more than enough to upgrade five stats to their limit, meaning¡­I can max out both my des to F-¡­hold up¡­ won''t I be left with change again¡­is this my fate, destined to be a brokie?'' leaning back in his chair, Aoni fell into a dilemma.


    ''Logically speaking, the best course of action would, in fact, be to max out both. There''s a strong possibility I will see some growth from my Attribute in doing so as well¡­but for some reason, something is telling me it''s a bad idea.'' The longer he hesitated to follow through on the upgrades, the more Aoni began to feel ufortable in spending all of his Progress points.


    Looking at things objectively and from an outsider''s point of view, there were many reasons the Lad could be feeling this way; maybe having grown up without for so long had caused Aoni to be less of a spendthrift, or maybe there was something from beyond the realm of acknowledgment speaking to his subconscious.


    But no matter how much the Lad wished to speak out those simple words to increase the Ranks of his weapons, Stats, he simply couldn''t.


    ''Sigh¡­what is going on with me¡­'' Massaging his temples, Aoni took a deep breath and decided that, at the very least, he should upgrade the durability of Austr.


    | Increasing Summon ''Austr''s'' Durability from G- to G |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 1.0 PP earned |


    | Increasing Summon ''Austr''s'' Durability from G to G+ |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 1.0 PP earned |


    | Increasing Summon ''Austr''s'' Durability from G+ to F- |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |@@novelbin@@


    | 1.0 PP earned |


    ''17.5 points down, three up¡­just likest time. It seems I also don''t have to worry about not getting bonus points for duplicate achievements. Still, 1 point per rank is pretty light.'' Observing the change in color that his right-handed de had undergone and noting that the two des were practically identical now, Aoni sighed before standing up and cing both Vestr and Austr atop the bookshelf.


    ''74.12 points remaining, Open my Status,''


    Passives


    Cold Resistance: F-


    Pain Resistance: F-


    Swordsmanship: G- (?)


    Dual Swordsmanship: G- (?)


    ______________________


    Settling his eyes on the passives, more specifically, the two arrows beside the two newest additions, Aoni thought back to everything he had ever learned pertaining to them both. Contrary to popr fantasy, dual-wielding was quite popr with travelers, and the reason was actually quite basic.


    It had nothing to do with looking cool or being shy; instead, it revolved around the additional boosts and benefits that adding a second weapon brought about.


    The standard loadout of Sword and Board (Shield) had proven long ago that if someone was able to wield more than one weapon, they could effectively double theirbat prowess; however, the issue was the linked Passive Skill was notoriously impossible to master.


    Sure, unlocking it wasn''t terrible, but getting it to level up was another story entirely.


    Among the majority of known andmonly used Passives, there were a select few that had such a high proficiency required to be useful that they were considered useless.


    As luck would have it, Dual Swordsmanship happened to be one of them, or at least that''s how it was viewed until reaching B-Rank.


    The Passives, nicknamed "LBs or Late Bloomers," were extreme in their rank-up requirements and, more often than not, would require significant amounts of Time and Effort to train.


    Still, as with anything, there are exceptions to that rule, such as people who were naturally ambidextrous or something to that extent, or¡­if you had a certain attribute that lets you add points¡­


    ''Increase the Rank of my Dual Swordsmanship Passive,''


    | Error Requirements for Increase Not Met |


    ''Or not¡­'' confused for a second, Aoni''s eyes widened as he realized an important bit of information that he had overlooked.


    The Dual Swordsmanship Passive is innately linked to the Origin Passive, Swordsmanship.


    ''Increase the Rank of my Swordsmanship Passive,''


    | Increasing Passive ''Swordsmanship'' from G- to G |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 5 PP earned |


    The moment Aoni read those words, it felt like a horse had just kicked him in the head all of a sudden, and for a second, the world spun as dizziness washed over his being.


    As if that wasn''t enough, his muscles began tensing up, and a wave of fatigue hit him out of nowhere. It was all due to an overwhelming surge of information, almost like it was being ''Downloaded'' or imprinted into not only his brain but also his body.


    Unlike the other upgrades he had gone through in the previous days, this time was different. For all intents and purposes, every other upgrade he had experienced was a rapid destruction of his body followed by repeated cycles of rejuvenation.


    In contrast, by upgrading his passive, Aoni was essentially experiencing and learning the equivalent of multiple months'' worth of sword training in just a few minutes.


    By the time the ufortable sensations settled down, Aoni felt as if he had spent the better part of 4 or 5 months training and, as such, had umted quite a bit of theoretical experience handling a sword.


    Regaining his witts and noticing that his Summon waspletely oblivious to his plight, Aoni went ahead and looked at his avable Progress points.


    Although slightly expensive, 10 points, the fact that he had earned five points leveled out his expenditure and gave Aoni enough confidence to push his Swordsmanship Passive up to the next stage, even if he was a little gunshy thanks to what he just went through.

 Chapter 41 Sledding Training

    Seeing as it was already dark outside by the time Aoni finished building his little sled, and cia was happily snoring away using the said sled as a bed, Aoni gave up the idea of training her and got ready to call it a night.


    It had been a long day of busy work, and by his estimate, it was already around 1 or 2 in the morning, so walking over to the sled, thed scooped up his sleeping summon and went to sleep.


    ---


    Bright and early the next morning, as the sunlight bathed the cave in its glowing warmth, Aoni''s eyes cracked open only to be greeted by a pair of emerald eyes inches away from his face, and surprisingly enough, he didn''t react outwardly.


    ''FUCK, that scared me¡­'' thed mused internally while reaching up and petting cia''s head several times before gently picking the fluffy ball of white fur up and sitting up.


    ''I swear, she''s going to give me a heart attack one of these days; well¡­, at least she didn''t assault me like she did before¡­still, it''s quite unsettling waking up to the hungry face of a baby yeti.'' Shaking his head, thed and summon quickly unsealed an MRE, ate Breakfast, and soon were sitting beside the sled.


    In Aoni''s hands was the notebook, and he was back in preschool teacher mode as he drew out several pictures for cia.


    The first was of the sled, and more importantly, some vines were dangling off the front.


    Second was a poor rendition of cia walking over toward the vines.


    Third, cia picked up the vines and put them in her mouth.


    Fourth, cia goes outside dragging the sled.


    Lastly was a picture in which Aoni constantly drew circles, indicating he wanted her to run around dragging it outside.


    Each one of these pictures was drawn in a small box, almost like aic strip, and one by one, thed went picture by picture, forming a small story while narrating it for his summon.


    He did this several times until cia eventually got the hint and ran over to grab the vines and¡­


    CRUNCH


    Bit through them like a carrot.@@novelbin@@


    ''Oh, for fuck sake¡­'' Watching her innocently chewing away on the vines, Aoni facepalmed and realized the error in his ways.


    Much like how the vines wouldn''t be able to handle being pressed directly against the hook des, cia''s sharp teeth no doubt tore through them with ease.


    ''Now how am I going to solve this one¡­'' Sliding his fingers down his face, Aoni began rummaging around for something that wouldn''t hurt cia by being in her mouth, yet was strong enough to protect the vines, yet no matter how hard he looked, there wasn''t anything suitable.


    First off, there was no way he would get cia to bite down on wood; not only was Aoni worried about mouth splinters, but even getting her to try would be a task in and of itself.


    So, without any other options, he tried thinking outside of the box, and that''s when he thought of something quite decent.


    "Stop eating the vines, cia, ande with me¡­" Shaking his head, Aoni scooped up his jacket and headed outside to where he had stored all the corpses.


    ''I need to find a bone thick enough that she won''t bite through it in one chomp, yet long enough that both ends can have vines tied to it¡­the femur of those Fox-Mole things should work.'' Making his way outside of the cave, Aoni, with cia in tow, made his way over to two basins, one right side up and the other on top of it, like a box, and rummaged through the remains before pulling out a bone which met his description.


    "Now, cia, listen carefully. DO NOT BITE THROUGH THIS, okay!" spinning around, Aoni quickly cleaned off the bone, using some nearby snow, and opened his mouth wide.


    "I Wan you to goo lih dis.." Biting down on the bone, Aoni ignored the faint metallic taste of blood and held it in his mouth before spitting it out and having his summon open her mouth like him.


    "Gaaaaooooooo om," the moment the femur bone was in her mouth, cia''s eyes shot wide open with innocence, and Aoni could tell she wanted nothing more than to bite down with all her might and break it.


    "Genntllee, that''s a good girl; now you need to be gentle with it, okay?" kneeling down, Aoni petted her head several times, causing her to smile with crescent eyes, enjoying the head pats.


    With that issue down, Aoni had cia spit out the one-foot-long bone into his hands and walked back into the cave with the white ball of fluff hot on his heels.


    Upon arriving at the sled, thed then sat down and, using his knife, carved out two notches into the bone, one on each end.


    "Listen carefully, cia, you can''t chew through this; if you do, it will be bad, and you won''t get dinnerter." Looking over his shoulder, Aoni paused his carving and hid a smirk when he saw her expression.


    No matter what he said, there was only ever one topic that the little fur missle truly understood: FOOD!


    "GASSSPPP OoOOOoo Gao GAO OooOO!"


    And he wasn''t in the least bit disappointed.


    cia looked horrified; the prospect of no Dinner was a concept she had never once thought possible, and no matter how little she understood the wordsing from her Lord''s mouth, she FULLY understood that if she broke the thing Aoni was holding, she would be going to bed tonight with a grumbling and empty belly.


    "Good, d that you get how important this is." Fighting the urge to burst outughing, Aoni went ahead and began the process of securing his longest vine to each end of the bone, crafting some reigns for the sled and looping them through the holes he had carved in the hull of the sled so that they wouldn''t be ripped from his hands the moment cia pulled.


    Now, all that was left was the final step, rigging up his summon!

 Chapter 43 Nodes and Dungeon Instances

    Seeing as he hadplete faith that cia would get him where she had found something, Aoni gotfortable and focused on staying warm.


    He did this by wrapping his arms around his body and cupping both armpits; since there was no telling how long it would be until she REFOUND the desired location, thed found it would be a better use of his time to try and figure out what to do with hisnd.


    For starters, thanks to the wide-open terrain, although sloped, he figured that so long as he could clear out a decent amount of snow, Building some simple structures around the top of the mountain wouldn''t pose much of a challenge.


    Well, LOGISTICALLY, he probably would, but if Aoni could get his hands on a few special items upon his return to Terra, none of that would matter.


    These special items, in particr, were magical Artifacts called Nodes. Much like how the flumese neatly packaged in the form of a small stone, Nodes were no different; neither was their means of being acquired.


    Typically, there are two main sources of acquiring items. The first, of course, was by way of summoning. Although the chances of getting something like a Node or Flume Stone were about as low as you''d probably assume, they still popped up eventually.


    But the main source was Dungeon Instances.


    As the name describes, Dungeon Instances are unique pocket dimensions that manifest due to EXTREME amounts of Concentrated Energia where travelers can enter and attempt to gain rewards.


    There is some key information one must first understand, and that is there are two types of Dungeon Instances, permanent ones and Temporary; however, technically speaking, there isn''t much separating the two types, with the only difference being that temporary ones vanish upon being cleared, while Permanent ones¡­well Don''t.


    Furthermore, each Dungeon Instance will trigger a reaction with a person''s TD, in which its rating is observable in the form of a Rank and Grade, distinguished with a Letter Rank and Star Grade.


    For example, something like A Labyrinth would be categorized as a MINIMUM of D-Rank; however, depending on the traps and monsters inside, it could have 1 to 5 stars.@@novelbin@@


    So basically, the Rating of a Dungeon Instance can tell you a lot about what you will find inside.


    Let''s say that there was a bunch of cia''s inside of a Labyrinth; it would be ssified as a D-Rank, One Star Dungeon Instance.


    Now, typing and Ratings aside, unlike in the natural world, Dungeon Instances, being constructs formed from high Energia levels, defy the natural order of life, mainly in the way Monsters, Creatures, and beings are created within them.


    Unlike in the natural world, when something Dies within the Dungeon Instance, it bes food for the Dungeon itself, and as such, corpses don''t remain; instead, materials, items, or supplies are left in their ce.


    So, in a sense, they are Super Dangerous life or death-style video games¡­kind of.


    ANYWAY, this was all a drawn-out way of saying you can get Nodes and Instance stones as drops. Kill things,plete challenges, trials, or tasks, and you may get one of them.


    Now, I''m sure you''re wondering why I even bring up Dungeon Instances; well, that''s simple because, in a sense, the same mechanic, which is a Dungeon Instance, can be usedparatively to Nodes.


    Unlike Flume stones, where you need to do a whole ritual to get your Flume set up, Nodes are crushed and tossed onto the ground. By doing so, you trigger a mysterious phenomenon simr to the formation of a Dungeon Instance, and just like that, you have a new house.


    Or maybe a tower or machine; in a sense, just about any non-living structure or formation can be conjured by a Node, and until you got your hands on one and made a connection with it, you''d have no clue what was stored within the Node.


    So when Aoni was examining his territory and plotting out where to build things, he was obviously thinking about whether or not Node Structures could be used on the uneven ground.


    ''Eh, why am I even considering using Node Stones? Unless I stumble on a low-rated Dungeon Instance, the odds of me scrapping together enough money to buy some is out of the question.'' Heaving a sigh, Aoni felt helpless, given his financial situation.


    ''At best, I can get one or two basic nodes from my government stipend when I make it back to Terra, but with my low potential, I doubt I''d get any financial aid.'' At that thought, thed froze for a moment as he realized a massive problem.


    ''I have to record all my data upon my return¡­.so my Attribute will be revealed. Now that I think about it, THAT''S A BIG ISSUE!''


    Aoni was no stranger to the hundreds of news stories that crop up every month online about Newly Awoken Travelers getting kidnapped, or worse, Killed, because they showed too much potential at bing powerful in the future.


    The government would never admit to taking part in such things, even if they were low-key, limiting the growth so that the royal family could keep hold of their position.


    Like this, the stories about hopeful powerhouses rising to be well-known yet getting snubbed in one way or another were extremelymon. As Aoni sat there staring at his now-opened Traveler''s Disy, he felt a sense of foreboding wash over him.


    If it was leaked that he could potentially grow uninhibited by bottlenecks and endlessly¡­wouldn''t someonee after him before he even got to see his family onest time?


    Even if his territory was Trash and couldn''t provide useful resources by having a World Shattering Attribute, wasn''t he putting a target on his back by consciously revealing it to the government?


    | Third-party threats to users'' progress are not to be worried about. |


    | It will be handled in Due Time. |


    Just as Aoni was one step away from a full-blown panic attack, two sudden pop-ups shed by, just like whenever he earned points, drawing thed''s attention.

 Chapter 47 Hunting For Salt (3)

    Due to the size of the Cavern and the distance away from the entrance, in conjunction with cia''s short stature and pace, it took nearly half an hour for Aoni and his summon to reach their destination, which, in fact, was the glowingke.


    Upon reaching the shore, the fluff ball darted around side to side, with her arms spread wide as if trying to say, "LOOK! LOOK IT AT!" drawing a smirk from Aoni as he did one of the first things he was taught to.


    Walking forward and crouching by the water, he dipped a single finger into the chilly clear liquid before bringing it to his tongue and nodding.


    "It''s freshwater, but what is that?" he stated while wiping his finger on his pants and standing back up, observing the still waters as they pulsed with light simr to the Energia Crystals embedded all around the Cavern.


    From where he stood, Aoni noticed a clear drop off as the bottom of theke deepened and changed in color to a hazy blue.


    ''Either there''s a strong current down there¡­or,'' quickly looking around at the rocky floor for anything to confirm his theory, Aoni noticed several light grey crystalline minerals scattered everywhere.


    And upon picking one up and tasting it, thed''s eyes widened into crescents because¡­they were pure, naturally formed Salt.


    "So something must be filtering the water at the bottom of theke and removing the Salt, where it''s deposited on the shoreline. It must be the multitude of Energia Crystals all over the ce; even theke bottom is saturated in them." Shrugging off his pack, Aoni began filling it with whatever he could get his hands on, and soon enough, even cia joined in.


    "Grab as much as you can and bring it here, cia; once the pack is full, we can make a trip back home ande back for more." Looking over his shoulder as the furry missile darted all over the ce, Aoni thought about his next move.


    If he wanted to turn this rock salt into a usable form, he''d first have to crush it up into a fine powder; only then would he be able to coat the hides and begin the tanning process.


    And given how many hides he had waiting for him back at the cave, it didn''t take a genius to understand one backpack wouldn''t be nearly enough.


    ''This ce has basically all the necessities required for life, a water source, protection from the harsh environment outside, and most importantly, a metric fuck ton of Energia Crystals.'' Pausing his salt collection, Aoni gazed out toward the center of theke and frowned.


    ''It''s too perfect, almost as if it was created by something. This space is far toorge to be naturally urring; something made a den here, and that something must be huge.'' Taking a slow and steadying breath, thed slowly took in his surroundings, looking for anything that could represent lifeforms having nested here in the past, such as scattered bones or even literal nests. Still, as far as he could tell, there was nothing.


    ''It certainly wasn''t any humanoid lifeform; there would, at the very least, be cave drawings or dwellings; it''s truly as if this ce has been untouched by life, which is making me even more ufortable.''


    ''Once the barrier recedes, and it''s open season on my territory, there is a strong possibility something immensely powerful will return to im this space.'' Looking down upon seeing a happy fluff ball with arms filled with rock salt toddling her way toward him, Aoni quickly stored them away, gave her a few head pats, and stood up.


    ''I''ve already spotted at least half a dozen different mineral stones, and that''s only at a nce; I don''t know what they are because they can be practically anything, but they all have distinct colors whenpared to the cavern walls and floor.''


    ''Combine that with the Salt and water source, and only a single thing is missing; I need to know how many exits this ce has. If there are too many, it will be impossible to manage alone, and I''ll have to copse them first if I n on creating a settlement here.''


    "cia, I have a very important mission for you," looking down at his summon, who was also looking around the Cavern curiously, Aoni drew her attention and watched as the fur ball showed rare intelligence in her eyes.


    "I''m thinking about moving down here, but first, we need to make sure it''s safe. I need you¡­" pointing at her, Aoni continued to exin that he wanted her to search for any way out of the Cavern, apart from the tunnel they came in from.


    While it took some exining, cia caught on pretty quickly and was off, running as fast as her little legs would carry, leaving Aoni alone before he could even say another word.


    Watching as the blur of white ran around theke to the opposite end, Aoni noted that there appeared to be another path down, simr to the one behind him. He nodded before turning around and trekking back up the original way.


    His reasoning was simple: cia was heading in one direction, and since he had instructed her to travel along the walls going clockwise, he would do the opposite and eventually meet up with his summon.


    ---


    Two hours and a decent amount of explorationter, Aoni, after doing his best to decipher and understand cia, had a rough outline of the Cavern, including how many exits, what types of rock formations were present, and most importantly, whether or not it was feasible as an underground settlement.


    And, after finally getting a proper answer from the hyper ball of fluff, thed was left with a pensive expression as he tried plotting out his next course of action.


    ''I found three other exits to the cave, one below and two above, and if cia''s intel can be trusted, she found five more; that brings the total to eight, and I really only hoped to have two, maybe three max¡­shit.'' Clicking his tongue, Aoni calmed himself down and motioned for cia to follow him back toward the tunnel leading to the Sled.@@novelbin@@

 Chapter 50 Spending Spree

    ''Upgrade my¡­.wait,'' Just as he was about to begin adding points to his Links of Subordination, Aoni raised an eyebrow as a sudden memory pertaining to his LoS popped into his head.


    The only time he had added additional slots to his LoS count, he remembered the notification saying it was "Adding one" before deducting points.


    ''By that logic, it should be possible to apply multiple upgrades simultaneously¡­right? How about we try it this way.''


    ''''Increase my Links of Subordination by two,''


    | Increasing Links of Subordination by Two |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    ''Oh, that worked, NICE, alright then, Increase my Links of Subordination by 16.'' Wearing a cheeky grin, ignorant of how many points were about to be deducted, thed went ahead with his half-baked n.


    | Increasing Links of Subordination by Sixteen |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    Seeing thatst notification, Aoni felt slightly pleased by how smart he was and how much time he could save this way instead of going down the line one by one.


    That is¡­until the realization of what he had just done began setting in, and after a few seconds, when the notification had long since disappeared, only then did Aoni start freaking out.


    ''SHIT! I forgot I didn''t get any points when I upgraded my LoS Limitst time¡­'' resisting the urge to m his head on the cave''s rocky wall, Aoni quickly opened up his TD to check the damage done to his Progress points¡­and after seeing how much had been deducted, only then did he give up and ept his mistake.


    Eighteen upgrades had cost him 90 points, and without the usual bonus points attached with normal upgrades, he found himself with 138.73 progress points remaining from the original almost 300.


    Summon''s Disy


    _______________________________


    Flume Grade: ¡ï


    Territory Climate: Artic/Mountainous


    Summon''s Avable: 1/5 (?)


    _______________________________


    Links of Subordination: 1/20


    _______________________________


    As expected, the arrow vanished from beside his LoS count, but Aoni felt that was fine, considering, as things stand right now, he was a LONG way off from ever using that many, to begin with.


    ''Sigh, no point in crying over burned points; gotta keep moving forward. With my Flume upgrades out of the way, what else can I spend points on¡­OH YEAH! The attack and Grade of both my weapons¡­and, of course, my passives.'' Turning his head and looking at the overturned Sled resting by the mouth of the cave, Aoni thought about it for a moment before getting up and walking over to it.


    Since he hadn''t bothered to remove the des from the means of transportation during the evening, they were still attached to the base of the Sled. Still, seeing as they were easily essible, thed didn''t bother cutting the vines and went ahead with gripping the hilt of Vestr before stopping just shy of uttering the mentalmand for an upgrade.


    ''STOPPP, let''s think about this: Whatever I do to Vestr, I need to duplicate on Austr as well, or else their bnce will be out of whack, and wielding them simultaneously will end up lopsided.''


    Not wanting to get ahead of himself, a strange thought shoved its way to the forefront of his mind.


    ''Eh, this must be how those people who win the lottery feel when getting all that money after not having a pot to piss in their entire lives.'' Drawing theparison between his randomly appearing wealth and poor people striking it rich, thed knew he needed to learn how to adapt.


    Especially since Aoni was sure that the prices of upgrades would continue to increase as his Ratings grew.


    ''I need to get a grip on this feeling of greed. It''s one thing if I have a bunch of points, but I need to detach myself from the numbers on screen and the reality of my situation.'' Taking his time to think about his decision, Aoni gave a short nod, gripped Vestr''s hilt, and issued hismand.


    ''Increase the Rank of Vestr one Step.''


    | Increasing the Grade of Summon ''Vestr'' to ? |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 0.5 pp Earned |


    Seeing the notification that he had received 0.5 progress points and double checking that 5 points had been deducted, Aoni instantly knew the cost of upgrading his weapon''s Rank matched that of his Flume, so, without hesitation, he released Vestr and repeated the process with Austr, increasing it from Null Star to CF Star.


    Next, he burned another 40 points to bump both weapons to the Outer Fill step,ting him 20 points before moving on and finishing the upgrades to their Rank and bringing both Austr and Vestr to the Full Star Step.


    In total, it had cost him nearly as much as he spent on his Links, with the upside being the 31 bonus points.@@novelbin@@


    ''Spend 70, earn back 31, it''s not terrible¡­a difference of 39 points. Tsk, just shy of 100 points now, with 99.73,'' clicking his tongue, Aoni noticed a distinct shimmering from the entirety of both Austr and Vestr, causing him to crouch and look at them from different angles with clear admiration on his face.


    ''Even after all these years, people still don''t know the reason behind the specific glows inanimate objects get at the Full Star Step¡­'' Aoni mused while trying to muster up the courage to blow through the rest of his points, increasing the attack of each weapon.


    For the two hook des, 30 points each for a total of 60 points was all it took for them to break through to the next Stage and into F- Territory, bringing along 35 bonus points.


    Unfortunately, the instant Aoni finished upgrading his two Hook des; his attention shifted elsewhere because uponpletion of Austr reaching F-, a sound akin to shattering ss rang out in Aoni''s ears, and..


    Drip¡­drip¡­drip.


    "Huh?" the faint sound of liquid hitting wood sent a wave of confusion through thed, but when Aoni looked down to see what was causing it, he was greeted by several drops of crimson liquid falling from his face and onto the surface of the Sled.


    And then came a wave of dizziness, which prevented thed from registering up from down. Luckily, Aoni had enough mental capacity to lean backward because hisst thought, before the world went ck, was¡­


    ''Falling Forward equals DEATH!''


    THUD

 Chapter 52 Post Upgrade Changes (1)

    | The Attribute: Progression has been Increased by One Star |


    | User''s Soul has been strengthened and expanded by a factor of two |


    | New Abilities for Attribute: Progression have been Generated |


    | All Progress Points have been deducted |


    Uponpletion of his Attribute''s upgrade, four notifications shed in front of Aoni''s closed eyes. Still, unfortunately, with how quickly they appeared and disappeared, it would be a topic that the Lad would be forced into bumbling around like a fool until he figured it all out on his own. Not that it was going to be too difficult to surmise.


    However, it would be quite some time before he would even begin that process because, for now, both he and cia were down for the count, with him having been put through quite the ordeal and cia''s body practically shutting down due to the Aura.


    ---


    Day turned to night, then repeated two more times, making it three days before the unconsciousd and baby yeti began to show signs of life.


    First to recover was cia, who, upon opening her eyes, immediately scrunched up her nose due to the foul smelling from beside where she had copsed.


    Its source¡­was, of course, where the poor baby yeti had her ident during Aoni''s upgrade, and after several days, while it had long since dried, there were still lingering aftereffects due to how long it took for the cave to re-cool down.


    In fact, it was still fairly warm, around 73 degrees Fahrenheit, which was a testament to the effect the dense Aura had on its surroundings and also to how high the temperature had soared.


    Still, the small partially dissolved pile of waste beside the small ball of fluff couldn''t hold a candle to the stench emanating off her Lord.


    Unlike Aoni, cia didn''t necessarily sweat in the same way as a human and instead would pant more like a dog; however, the same couldn''t be said for the Lad, who was not only lying in his filth but also covered in three types of dried fluids, blood, sweat, and a strange grey crust which was unknown to the baby yeti.


    Using her paws to cover her snout cutely, cia nearly gagged due to the stench, but being the good girl she was, the ball of fluff still hopped off the bed and made her way to Aoni''s side.


    "gaoo¡­" whimpering softly, cia fought back the urge to hurl and nudged her Lord with her head a few times before putting on what could only be described as a frown.


    Several times, the ball of fluff pushed against her Lord, with the single response she earned being a soft groan from the Lad, but that was more than enough to know he was still alive.


    It was then that a certain memory popped up in her little head, one of Aoni cleaning not only her but also himself in the snow, so a sh of inspiration lighting up her emerald eyes, cia entered furry missile mode and darted out of the cave.


    However, the moment her feet left the familiar rocky terrain of her home and lept into the air¡­


    THUD, shended not on the soft cold she was used to but on hard stone.


    Shaking her head several times to clear the cobwebs, cia looked left and right before panicking slightly because she noticed something very different about the terrain outside of the cave.


    Having entered and exited dozens of times and watching her Lord struggle to walk outside, cia was ustomed to jumping up andnding atop the several feet of snow and gliding away; however, gone was the dense three to four feet of white precipitation and at best there was now only an inch or two of freshly fallen powder in its ce.


    Unbeknownst to her, the heat had long since melted everything on the tform outside the cave, and if it hadn''t snowed a few hours prior, she would have found a barren mountain instead of a dusted peak.


    Unsure of what was going on, cia pawed at the ground several times before finally understanding how shallow the snow was. She then decided to explore and figure out how far she would need to go in order to get an adequate amount of snow for cleaning.@@novelbin@@


    Unsurprisingly, the ball of fluff didn''t have to look far because the loss of snow only affected the immediate tform with which the cave resided; so long as she went a little further down, toward the edge, cia was able to see a clear barricade of snow, forming a bank or wall of sorts which would stop anything from moving further, unless of course you had a passive which allowed for easy navigation in Artic Environments.


    Nodding her head a couple of times, as she had witnessed Aoni doing when he agreed about something, cia darted back into the cave and arrived beside the still-unconscious Lad.


    Then, after turning her head and sucking in a few deep breaths of air, the small ball of fluff gently grabbed hold of Aoni''s left arm¡­and began pulling.


    At first, there was no change in the Lad''s position, yet after a few moments of no results due to the small amount of force she was exerting, Aoni''s body shifted a bit, then a bit more, until cia had sessfully turned him 90 degrees to the left and began dragging him out of the cave foot by foot.


    Since she didn''t want to hurt her Lord identally, cia was extremely careful when it came to pulling the Lad out of the cave and onto the tform, or at least she was, until the moment came when she was forced to exert some strength and then with a soft fwoosh¡­


    cia hurled Aoni into the snowbank at the edge of the tform, yielding INSTANT results as the Lad disappeared for a second before jumping up and screaming about being cold.


    "GAOOOO! OooOoO!" in response to seeing her Lord reactivated andining, the baby yeti jumped up and down, whooping in victory, as if she had single-handedly won some type of throwing championship.

 Chapter 56 Working with Pelts and Hide (1)

    ''Well, I never expected to turn it all into warm clothing to begin with. After all, there are plenty of other things I need rawhide for, like making sutures and using more durable binding materials.'' Pinching the brim of his nose, Aoni noticed the faint flicker of pop-ups out of the corner of his eye and knew they were merely notifications of progress points gained, so he ignored them and looked around the thawed-out tform.


    What was he looking for, you may ask? That''s simple: the viscera from his harvesting, more specifically, the basin he had used to store the Brains of each dead animal.


    Since he was out in the wilderness and didn''t have the optimal tools on hand for tanning hides, he, of course, had to use one of the oldest methods known to humankind: Braining.


    Now, don''t get it twisted, you perverts. Braining is simply a term for using brain matter as a preservative to aid in the sealing and tanning process.


    It was messy and, quite frankly, quite gruesome, considering Aoni would need to mash the brains into liquid, soak the hides and pelt in it, and then give it a good rinsing.


    It didn''t take the Lad long to locate the basin, and unfortunately, there was a slight¡­ok, massive issue. The instant Aoni drew close and removed the top half of the basin; he was assaulted by a stench far worse than he could smell in the Cave¡­because all the viscera and brains had turned to sludge.


    "Fuck¡­"


    For the next several minutes, the Lad resisted the urge to empty his stomach until finally deciding on his next course of action. Without Brain matter or, more specifically, the emulsified oils in the brains that would aid the tanning process, there weren''t a whole lot of other options other than supplementing it with different oils, such as egg yolks, bear fat, olive oil, fish oil,rd¡­


    ''Ok, think Aoni, think, ignoring theck of oils, what am I missing¡­.Calcium phosphate, in theory, I can make a solution of 1 part water, 1 part fish oil, and 1 part calcium phosphate,'' Snapping his head to the far side of the tform, the Lad noticed the pile of bones was still present.


    ''Crush the bones, mix them into water, add pressure and high temps, and extract what''s left, that''s calcium phosphate. That''s one part down, but I need to makerd¡­which is pretty easy; even if the meat spoiled, I should be able to boil it up and extract plenty.'' Wearing a frown and gazing cautiously at another basin used to store all the animal remains, Aoni''s mind ran through his options beforeing up with a suitable substitute for Brainmatter.


    As ingenious as the idea may seem, it wasn''t merely a matter of critical thinking for the Lad. Instead, it was more like conditioning, thanks to years of survival training.


    One of the biggest things the Academies taught was how to adapt to unfavorable situations and ovee them quickly. This was done by constantly reinforcing core aspects and flooding students with information and resources.@@novelbin@@


    Even if he wasn''t proficient in something, Aoni had more than enough knowledge stored in his mind about how to make clothing, gather materials, or craft enough items to suit his basic needs. With the wealth of information passed down by the Academy, it wasn''t just him who was like this.


    Practically every new traveler from his country follows the same thought process, almost as if following a checklist to meet his needs in any given situation.


    In that way, the country was able to ensure that the loss of new Travelers, a valuablemodity, wouldn''t be due to something as stupid as dying to their environment within the first couple of weeks.


    Mind you, at the same time, there was a finite point at which the training would be obsolete, but then again, the only purpose of the Academies was to get their students off the starting point.


    So, while cia slept with her belly full, Aoni went to work, beginning with something he wasn''t looking forward to: emptying out the Cave of everything he required.


    Logs needed to be dragged out, Vestr and Austr required to be removed from the sled, all the vines needed to be piled up outside, and on top of that, he needed a box of matches.


    So, while it took multiple trips and ack of oxygen, eventually, he was able to get all the materials necessary for his n stacked up in orderly piles outside of the Cave.


    From there came the start of a long process that involved crafting several key items, the first of which was a stone bowl. Unlike when he crushed up the salt, a more durable container was required since he would be exerting quite a bit more force than when crushing up the minerals.


    Thankfully, he had the foresight to upgrade both the durability and sharpness of his weapons because all it took was a few well-ced strikes, and a chunk of rock the size of his torso came off the outer wall of the Cave.


    From there came the annoying task of carving it into a bowl shape, which ended up resulting in him using his knife like a chisel and another rock like a hammer.


    Still, between his increased stats and resolve within 30 minutes, he had a decent-sized stone bowl ready to meet his needs. However, with one goal met, another was created, and that was crafting a container to hold the bone powder once made, which was remedied after another carving session with some wood, and thus, a new drawer three times the size of the ones used to dry the hides was born.


    From there, the next step was cleaning the bones off in some snow to free it of any gore and meat, then grinding it down, and soon enough, the entire newly crafted wooden drawer was filled to the brim with bone powder and covered with a log to keep it all from blowing away.

 Chapter 60 Figuring Things Out The Hard Way (3)

    Flumes, like summons or attributes, are ssified by their Grade but have a secondary means of identification.


    For starters, as with what happened when Aoni first upgraded his Flume to the full-star Step, it will glisten as if covered with stars, a testament to its mysterious nature, but beyond that is their color.


    For example, for the Young Master''s Emerald Flume, by merely seeing it for only a second, Aoni was able to determine not only its Grade but stage as well, solely based on its physical color, Emerald.


    Mind you; he could have very easily simplified it by saying, ''Hey, Green Rock,'' but that wouldn''t necessarily describe its Step, only its Rank.


    To understand the color system, one needs only look at the color wheel.


    Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple are the most known colors flumes can reach, but as exined, that''s merely a generalization because within each "Stage," the steps are based on gems.


    (Please take a look at thements for the Chart; I will be posting it there.)


    SO Two-Star goes through Ruby, Rhodolite Ga, Red spinel, and Blood Ga, and Three-Star goes through Fire Opal, Citrine, me, and Spessartite Ga. The list goes on and on, but basically, each Step has its own shade of the main color until it finishes the color spectrum and shines at the Full-Star Step.


    For Aoni, who had never heard of anyone ever strengthening their Flume, the process of watching it change colors was simply amazing, if not beautiful.


    There was plenty of spection about whether something like this was possible, yet no one has ever been able to find proof, mainly because the primary source of Flume stones is from actual flumes themselves.@@novelbin@@


    The only exception is the mass-produced Single Star ones handed out by the government, which are sourced from hidden Dungeon instances controlled solely by the Monarch.


    So while The Government can practically shit out One-Star Flume Stones, anything higheres from summoning before being sold off to the highest bidder.


    In this way, the Wealthy and Powerful families are able to give their children a leg up.


    Although all this information was running through Aoni''s mind as he inspected his newly upgraded Flume, that didn''t mean he had forgotten about the Point cost of the upgrade, nor to check on if the Chart had been updated.


    ''Hey, smart ass! Are you able to yback notifications? I need to know how many points I earned from upgrading my¡­'' before he could even finish his rudement, a duplicate notification popped up in front of him.


    | 15 pp Earned |


    "Tsssss¡­ahhh, not good." Those were the first words not spoken directly to cia, which Aoni muttered today, and of course, they were because the Lad understood a key piece of information without even needing to inquire further.


    If he had received a whopping 15 points, then his expenditure would have been at least double that. So, after preparing himself, Aoni requested to see the Chart again, and unfortunately, things were as bad as he expected.


    | Flume Grade:?:35 ?:50 ¡ï:60|


    While none of the other lines had been altered, the one pertaining to his Flume''s Grade was, and the numbers it was showing were more than enough to make Aoni double-check that he wasn''t bleeding from his eyes or ears.


    Thirty-five points, while expensive, made sense to him because that was the amount it cost to max out his First Star; however, 50, then 60 points, were two numbers the Lad was rueing the appearance of.


    ''110 points¡­.'' Pulling up his Traveler''s disy and seeing that he had 147.8 progress points remaining, Aoni seriously contemted giving up this venture for now because it would absolutely drain the bulk of the points he had spent thest day grinding.


    However, there was an underlying question bouncing around in the Lad''s head, and that was how many bonus points he could get bypleting the outer fill and full star steps.


    Providing he could quickly supplement the number of points expended, then it would be more manageable, yet that was precisely where his hang-up began. Without having a means of determining what his bonus would be, how could he make an informed decision about whether or not to continue with the upgrades?


    ''35 pointsted me an additional 15 points...where did that number evene from...'' he mused while looking for any semnce of a pattern, and that''s when he noticed a major inconsistency.


    ''Center fill one star got me 0.5, outer fill was 5, and full star was 10; and if you add that onto the 15 earned from my most recent upgrade, the inconsistency appears. One of these things is not like the other....and it''s the 0.5.''


    ''Apart from the starting points, it was 10 points for 5 and 20 points for 10, yet this time around, by expending 35 points, I only got 15 in return. It simply doesn''t make sense.''


    ''Unless...unless the center fills star''s bonus is merely a five-point continuation from the previous stage. If I look at it that way, then the outer fill and full star me exactly half the cost.''


    ''Which means I will get 25 and 30 points during the next two upgrades.'' Pinching the brim of his nose, Aoni winced as all this math hurt his head.


    ''15 for 35, 25 for 50, and 30 for 60, spending 145 to earn back 70; it''s not great, but definitely way more reasonable than simply dumping 145 points and calling it a day. Increase my Flume''s Grade to its Current Limit.'' Giving themand for multiple upgrades, Aoni ced his hand on the artifact and waited for the magic to happen.


    | Increasing the Grade of Territory Linked Flume |


    | Territory Linked Flume has been increased to ¡ï¡ï |


    | Territories Flume has reached its Current Limit |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 55 pp Earned |


    As before, Aoni and cia watched with bated breath as the ripple effect spread across his Flume, infusing it with an unknown source believed to be the Lad''s potential points, and as the color of his Flume deepened, a faint sparkle began appearing across every square inch of the mysterious artifact until the process finished leaving a stone object as dark as the color of blood and covered from top to bottom with an effect simr to stars shining in the night sky.

 Chapter 63 Magnificent Little Fluff 2.0

    Crouching down beside the nearest corpse, Aoni reached toward the dead creature''s neck and got some of the blood on his fingers before bringing it closer to his face for inspection.@@novelbin@@


    Staring at the smeared blood, Aoni rubbed it between his index finger and thumb a few times, testing its density before stretching the fingers apart and noticing that it seemed to string out, simr to saliva.


    Texture and viscosity aside, Aoni''s eyes narrowed as he noticed a faint tingling sensation in the tips of his two fingers.


    ''This feeling, it''s concentrated Energia,'' recognizing the sensation at a moment''s notice since he had spent a significant amount of time within the flume, along with in that cavern where the Energia density was particrly high, Aoni couldn''t help but feel slight amazement at what he was seeing.


    ''For its blood-Energia-content to be so high, either this creature was drugged by someone¡­which considering the locale is extremely unlikely, or it grew up in not only an extremely Energia Rich environment but had also spent its entire life devouring copious amounts of Energia Rich nutrition.''


    ''Hold on¡­she couldn''t have¡­right?'' raising an eyebrow and looking into the cave where cia was sleeping on the Sled, a strange thought came to Aoni''s mind.


    ''There''s no way she specifically went out looking for something that would be super tasty¡­on second thought, that''s very much on brand for that Magnificent Little Fluff.'' Wearing a smirk and Taking a sharp breath, thed quickly wrapped the creature around his shoulders into a fireman carry and lifted it off the ground before making his way over toward one of the gutting stations, which was free of ichor.


    However, when he got to thergest of his bleeding basins, Aoni was quick to realize he had made a massive oversight, even if it wasn''t entirely his fault.


    Due to the creature''s weight, the flimsy bleeding rack he had made to drain the small game animals cia had hunted the first time around could not hold the weight of the corpse; as such, after dumping it beside the basin, thed felt a bit frustrated.


    But who could he me other than himself? It wasn''t like he was going to scold cia for bringing back something as extravagant as these bodies, even if it were quite worrisome about where she found them.


    Feeling a creeping sense of anxiety invade his subconscious, Aoni quickly ced the creature down and did a full examination of the corpse, starting with its teeth.


    No matter if it were on Terra or Genovia, there is one key characteristic that can allow someone to determine how high something is on the food chain, and that is its teeth.


    Depending on the typical diet of something, there were generally three different arrangements of the teeth of a creature; if the creature only eats nts, you won''t find a single sharp tooth in its mouth; however, its front teeth act like saws to help tear leaves and such, while its tall mrs grind it into a paste for digestion.


    Carnivores will have long, sharp canines, along with sharp mrs, giving them an impressive bite that allows them to tear through meat with ease.


    Lastly, there are omnivores, who, since they eat both nts and meat, have abination of the above characteristics.


    Mind you, there are also bristle teeth creatures, but those mainly live in voids or the water.


    Apart from the teeth, things like defensive ting or thicker hides are also a good indication they don''t hunt meat, whereas carnivores tend to have muscr bodies meant for chasing down prey.


    But none of that would matter if they had a Developed Energia Cell because if they did, that would mean the creature was Ranked and SHOULDN''T BE WITHIN THE BARRIER.


    Hoping that this was just somerge harmless game animal like a deer or something, Aoni saved that anxiety-ridden thought for once he cut the corpse open and observed its other physical characteristics.


    Firmly grasping and lifting the corpse''s head, Aoni opened its mouth and got a good look before smirking and dropping the head back onto the ground.


    ''Herbivore, but these ws are pretty impressive. I gotta make sure to test their durability, and maybe I can make some tools out of them.''


    Next, he patted the creature down, pulling on its fur and checking its muscle density until he was sure that the beast was the lumbering, slow-moving kind, which would exin how cia was able to get the drop on it in the first ce.


    Odds are, she spotted them, thought they smelled good thanks to their Energia Concentrated blood and went on the prowl, or at least that''s what Aoni was trying to make himself believe.


    Standing up and walking back to the cave, Aoni spent roughly 15 minutes sorting through his resources and locating which of hisst remaining logs would work to erect arge, upside-down U-shaped structure.


    Of a few left over, he determined that only four logs could be used, of which only three were necessary.


    The issue was finding ones that could handle the couple hundred-pound body for the prolonged amount of time required not only to bleed but also to gut and skin the corpse.


    After picking out the ones that met his needs, Aoni gathered up the strongest of his vines and set to work crafting the wooden arch as tall as himself, a process which by itself took nearly an hour.


    Once finished, he hoisted his craft project onto his shoulder and set it up outside before pushing thergest basin underneath, only stopping when it came time to figure out how he was going to deal with the fielding *name for processing an animal*.


    ''Fielding a creature of this size isn''t going to be a simple task. First things first, I need to bleed it, so let''s get this fucker up on the rack and hope that cia didn''t waste all that valuable blood.''


    Although secretly hoping that it wasn''t entirely empty due to where cia had severed its neck with her ws, Aoni was fairly certain that more than 70% of its original life-giving fluid had been spilled out during the trek up the mountain.


    Still, that didn''t stop Aoni from trying to get as much of the Golden fluid out of the creature''s body as possible.

 Chapter 65 Benefits Of the Blood (2)

    For several seconds after having gotten her first taste of the Golden Blood, cia appeared to bepletely incoherent, and if he didn''t know better, Aoni could have easily mistaken her condition as what happens when cats get their hands on catnip, AKA high as Fuck.


    Thankfully, he had enough knowledge stored in that backlogged mind that the Lad understood what his beloved summon was going through; it was essentially creatures, beasts, or monsters'' way of getting stronger.


    After all, unlike humans or other humanoid beings, they didn''t progress through ranks due to effort and experience; instead, 99.99% of the growth of non-humanoid''s Grades came from devouring other beings.


    Think of it like in a video game: non-humanoids get XP for kills, whereas Humanoids only get it through effort and training and Dungeon Instances.


    Careful not to spill the bowl''s contents on the ground, Aoni ced it down and gently picked up his summon before cing her in hisp and giving her someforting pets.


    Eventually, with a shake of her head, cia''s eyes finally opened, and being the little glutton for attention she was, she instantly closed them right back, faking like she was sleeping.


    However, how could something like that work on her Lord, who not only could sense her thoughts and emotions but was also carefully watching over her just in case something happened?


    ''You''re a hundred years too young to try and pull a fast one on me like that kid,'' rolling his eyes and saying the same phrase his mother used to use on him whenever he faked being sick to stay home from school, Aoni lifted his summon off hisp and ced her down beside him, recing her position with the bowl of blood.


    Feeling her body move before theforting warmth of her Lord''s attention vanished and was reced by the cold, hard ground, cia popped up like she had been lit on fire and shot Aoni an offended look.


    "Fakers don''t get rewarded," turning his face to the sky with a hmph, the Lad peeked at his summon out of the corner of his eye and found her panicking before she noticed he was stifling augh.


    That did it in her book, so without a care in the world, cia ced her butt on the ground and her back pointing at Aoni in protest, causing the Lad to burst outughing.


    "Okay, Okay, I''m sorry, I didn''t mean it; look here, you can have another taste of the blood, see," against his better judgment, and dipping his finger in the blood a second time, Aoni offered it to cia, who in return, turned around so quickly that she nearly knocked the bowl out of her Lord''sp.


    That was how a strange trade-off began between the two; for every few minutes that Aoni spent studying the Golden Blood, cia was given a few drops.


    Falling into a rhythm and seeing there weren''t any adverse effects on his baby yeti, Aoni eventually worked up the courage to try some himself, and although bitter, he had to admit the Golden blood was quite tangy, almost like a sour candy of sorts mixed with the sensation of pop rocks.


    The instant it hit his tastebuds, it was like a thousand micro explosions crackled across his tongue. Although it onlysted a second at best before wearing off, it was more than enough for the Lad to try it a second, then a third time before eventually stopping and focusing on what was actually happening.


    ''Since my body has Energia mixed in on a molecr level, its presence isn''t noticeable; however, when I introduce a random influx of said Energia in the form of a consumable liquid, it''s almost like my body is hungrily devouring it¡­but that shouldn''t be possible.'' Squinting his eyes and trying the blood a fourth time, he couldn''t help but draw aparison between the sensation and what he had been told about when Someone absorbs an Energia Crystal.


    The strange thing was that it wasn''t supposed to work unless your external Energia level surpassed that of the object being consumed.


    For example, if Someone had an Energia rank of B-, they should have no problem drawing in the abundant Energia stored within a Three-Star Energia Crystal.


    However, if Someone like Aoni, whose Energia Rank was only at F- were to try absorbing the same Crystal, the case scenario would be that he couldn''t wrangle control of the mysterious resource, while the worst¡­well¡­BOOM.


    That''s right, he would inte like a balloon and pop fleshy gore all over the ce.


    In a sense, it was like trying to fill a water balloon from a garden hose at its lowest setting versus using a firehose at full st.


    So the fact that he was able to notice a faint transfer between the blood and his body upon consumption stumped him to no end.


    Meanwhile, cia, on the other hand, was an entirely different story altogether. Given her being a non-humanoid, she could probably down the entire bowl, and the worst thing that would happen was burping before falling asleep for a few days or weeks.


    Even so, Aoni knew that what he had was a GOLDEN opportunity, All the puns intended, because, on top of being able to consume and absorb the mass amount of Energia directly, it also was traceable as it went down.


    From the moment it hit his tongue to the instant it flowed down the back of his throat, Aoni was fully capable of following the bundle of condensed Energia as it flowed and traversed toward his stomach, then spread out toward his EC.@@novelbin@@


    By following this movement, obtaining the Maniption Passive was within his reach¡­the only question was how much blood he would need to consume, along with what kind of time frame it would take.


    *Inhale* *Exhale*


    As Aoni stared at the bowl, which had gradually cooled down as the temperature slowly dropped, he took a deep breath before exhaling loudly and nced over his shoulder to make sure that the bloodletting of the second carcass was going well.

 Chapter 68 Chimera Meat! Its better than Kobe Beef! (2)

    TSSSSS


    Having removed the meat while allowing the thin stone bowl to heat up, Aoni ced his butterflied cut onto the searing hot stone, and a loud hissing sound emanated from it, followed by the fragrant scent of cooking meat.


    *Starrrrrreeee*


    Feeling a strange presence beside him, Aoni noticed that cia had stood up on his shoulder and was watching the meat cook with such intensity that he believed if it suddenly vanished, she would never emotionally recover.


    "Uh¡­cia¡­watching it won''t make the meat cook any faster¡­" Rapidly flicking his eyes toward the ball of fluff, then away and back again, Aoni was bing uneasy. It almost seemed like she was frozen in time, not breathing, only¡­.staring.


    *STTTTAAARRREEEE*


    "O..kay¡­" carefully reaching down and retrieving his knife, thed wiped it on some fresh snow and plunged it into the meat once to flip it over; however, the instant he did, like a hungry cat, cia leaned forward, ready to pounce at a moments notice.


    But who could me her? It was the first time she had seen meat cooked over an open fire; up until now, every meal had been prepared inside a bag, so of course, she wouldn''t have any clue about what went into such a thing.


    Still, as he flipped over the tenderloin and inspected the searing, Aoni had to admit that it did smell really tasty, and although he knew his summon could eat it raw just fine, thed wanted to treat her to a special meal after a hard day''s hunt.


    "Sprinkle some salt, ssh some more golden blood, annnnd FLIP," Carefully monitoring the progression of his cooking, Aoni figured it was better to ignore cia and continue preparing the meal, especially since he understood there was ZERO chance of getting his hands on this first cut.


    Thus, having given up his opportunity, he diligently prepared the massive chunk of meat that, even by normal Terra Standards, was wayrger than a tomahawk steak.


    ''It''s a good thing I butterflied it because if not, it would take forever to cook through; hm, medium rare should be fine¡­alright, let''s see how it tastes.'' Flicking his eyes toward cia and seeing she was still immobile, Aoni swiftly sliced off two thumb-sized chunks of the tenderloin, causing the ball of fluff to flinch at the sudden attack on her food.


    "Rx, we are giving it a taste test; otherwise, how will we know if it''s good or not?"


    Instead of her usual response, cia bobbed her head up and down like a broken toy, then surprised Aoni with an open mouth and Gaoooooooo, finally getting the hang of saying ah.


    With a smirk, he took one of the chunks and flicked it into her mouth, and his ears were assaulted with¡­


    "OM NOM NOM NOM NOM!" cia''s eyes instantly turned into crescents as she enjoyed the vor and texture of the perfectly cooked piece of meat; however, being just a baby, the little yeti had no concept of savoring her food, and after a couple of seconds of chewing, she once again opened her mouth wide and said Gaoooo.


    "Sigh, fine, you can have mine too. I can''t wait to try it, but this is thest one till it''s done cooking," rolling his eyes and giving in to cia''s adorable act, Aoni offered up the second piece of cooked meat. After another wave of om nom, the ball of fluff nuzzled his shoulder in thanks before going back to staring at the stone bowl. Enjoy more content from My Virtual Library Empire


    ''Why do I suddenly feel like I didn''t cut off enough meat to feed this glutton of mine,'' with a smirk, thed went back to work, tending to therge chunk of meat. Before long, the inside was the perfect mix of light brown and pink, so with arge ssh of golden blood and another pinch of salt, he seared both sides and moved the tenderloin out of the bowl and onto a clean b of wood.


    "Ow¡­ws¡­ws, cia," unfortunately, either because she didn''t understand he was going to cut it into small pieces for her or because she thought he might be taking the food away, cia unconsciously dug her ws into Aoni''s shoulder while leaning forward.


    Thankfully, she wasn''t digging them in deep enough to draw blood, but thed still found it ufortable while exining his actions to her.


    "I know you''re hungry, but let me cut it into smaller pieces for you first, then you can have it." Chiding his impatient baby yeti, like a parent would their child, Aoni slipped a finger under her ws and gently forced them up so they wouldn''t tear his jacket, followed by expertly dicing up the b of cooked tenderloin into manageable bite sizes for cia.


    "OoO." Of course, after tasting what she did earlier, how could the little ball of fluff be patient? I mean, THIS WAS GLORIOUS, FRESH COOKED MEAT!


    "Two minutes, that''s it." Stopping his dicing, Aoni looked at cia on his shoulder, held up two fingers, and chided, causing the baby yeti to look down sadly.


    "...gao¡­." Although she said that with a partial whimper, she understood the meaning behind two minutes, as Aoni frequently used it as a measurement of time.


    As expected, before the full two minutes had expired, Aoni ced his knife down and began scooping the even-sized portions of meat onto a wooden te before scooting it to the side and saying.


    "It''s all yours."


    Without hesitation or waiting for Aoni to have a chance to take back his words, cia dove off his shoulders and was soon face-first into the te, sloppily munching away,pletely unaware of the sleight of hand used by her lord to swipe a piece for himself.


    ''Just a taste, she didn''t even notice, eh¡­why do I feel like a viin or something¡­'' Blinking twice, he shrugged his shoulders and tossed the squared piece of meat into his mouth.


    An explosion of vor was the first thing that came to Aoni''s mind the instant the golden tenderloin touched his tongue.@@novelbin@@


    "Holy shit¡­.this is a million times better than that Kobe Beef Dad bought to celebrate my birthday¡­"

 Chapter 70 Benefits Of The Chimera Meat (2)

    One of the most well-known and sought-after abilities that Travelers have ess to is the very thing that Aoni was just given a chance to obtain: Elementalized Energia.


    Throwing Fireballs, controlling Water, Manipting Lightning- all these were done by utilizing Elementalized Energia.


    However, the issue is not everyone gets it, and those that do generally have to be either surrounded by it, allowing their Energia Cell and Body to be baptized in it, or consume an EXTREMELY pricey and rare resource.


    Yet even if one of those two conditions is met, there is still one significant stopgap in ce, which was supposed to bew, and this is the Rank Restriction.


    Typically, It''s not until a being has a C-Rank Energia Stat that they can even consider attempting to obtain Elementalized Energia.


    But if the notification was to be believed, Aoni, who had a measly F- Ranked Energia Stat, was being given the opportunity to not only obtain an Element exceedingly early but also would get to skip over the other step altogether.


    Honestly, it was a bit too much to believe, even for thed who could seemingly break all the rules which for thousands of years had remained unchallenged.


    So, although he was extremely over-excited at the prospect, he didn''t allow his skepticism to go unnoticed.


    ''It can''t be as easy as saying Go ahead, nothing in the world is free¡­I am more than willing to bet everything on the fact that I will be subjected to some ungodly level of pain or a mindbreaking experience.


    Wiping the grease from his lips with his sleeve, Aoni stared long and hard at the two notifications.


    As much as he wanted to jump head first into things, it had been proven to him time and time again that if he did, only agony waited for him; thus, Aoni found himself sitting there, lost in thought and staring off into the horizon.


    ''Even if it is a free upgrade, I still need to consider what Element I would end up with¡­the obvious answer would be Ice, but that is ssified as a variant Element, and usually, one has to work up to it starting with Water.''


    ''If it''s something I get from consuming the Chimera, there''s a strong chance I could also get something like Earth or one of its Variants, Wood and Metal, and this is a mountain with trees, after all, not just an Arctic Tundra.''


    *inhale¡­.exhale*


    "Fuck it; I was already all in the day I found out about my Attribute being tied to my Personal Progress; convert the Overabundance of Energia into Elementalized Energia." Steeling his mind, Aoni flicked his wrist, tossed the knife away from him, and quickly fell onto his back on the ground, just in case something drastic urred.


    | Identifying the Type of Elementalized Energia |


    | Thrice Elementalized Energia Found |@@novelbin@@


    | 6 Units of Thrice Elementalized Energia located within the User''s Body |


    | Choosing the most optimized form of Elementalization |


    | Choice Confirmed |


    | Adapting User''s Energia Cell to Allow for Storage of Elementalized Energia |


    | Converting 6 Units of Thrice Elementalized Energia Into 1 Unit of Ice Energia |


    | Unlocking User''s Ability to Store and Utilize Ice Energia |


    | Conversion Complete |


    | 1% of User''s Energia Content is Elementalized into Ice Energia |


    | 100 pp Earned |


    No matter how many notifications shed in front of thed, the only thought running through his mind was¡­


    ''Cold, I am so cold,'' then¡­darkness.


    ---


    Roughly an hourter, after passing out, Aoni''s eyes fluttered slightly before opening, and he realized not only was he FREEZING like never before, but he was also lying on the ground staring up at the sky.


    ''Hahhh, hahhh, fuck,'' sitting up and immediately bringing his knees to his chest and wrapping himself with his arms, Aoni couldn''t stop himself from shivering.


    "Damn it, bad idea, bad idea," closing his eyes tightly and trying his best not to freak out, thed could feel his breath prating through theyers of his makeshift jacket with an icy chill.


    "We¡­well, ha¡­it¡­looks like I broke another record¡­." Half panting as he was struggling to breathe due to each inhale feeling like needles piercing into his throat and lungs, Aoni couldn''t help but chuckle in a self-deprecating manner.


    "16, newly¡­awakened, with an F- Energia Stat, and¡­hah¡­ I already have an Element; this is something unheard of¡­sure¡­those rich bastards¡­go into their territories with special resources, allowing for early ess to Elementalized Energia¡­but never in written history have they done it with a stat as low as mine¡­"


    Sitting there on the ground, balled up and praying the cold would subside, Aoni didn''t even bother checking on his meat or even figuring out how long he''d been unconscious; instead, he did the most logical thing he could think of and opened his Traveler''s disy.


    ______________________


    Aoni Thurston


    Age: 16


    Potential: Two Star/F- Rank (?)


    Rank: -F


    ______________________


    Attribute Grade: ¡ï¡î


    Attribute: Progression


    Progress Points: 209


    ______________________


    Statistics


    Attack: F- (?)


    Defense: F- (?)


    Speed: F- (?)


    Energia: F- (?)


    Experience more tales on My Virtual Library Empire


    Elementalized Energia: 1% Ice


    ______________________


    Passives


    Cold Resistance: F- (?)


    Pain Resistance: F- (?)


    Swordsmanship: G+ (?)


    Dual Swordsmanship: G- (?)


    Ice Maniption: G-


    ______________________


    "209 points, that''s hah, nuts¡­figures, the source of this¡­ chill is the fact that I now have 1% Ice Energia. It''s a shame¡­ that neither it nor my new Maniption¡­ Passive can be upgraded, but for some¡­ reason, I expected that." Upon further inspection, he also noticed that neither his Cold nor Pain resistance had increased, along with that of his Energia Rank, but that was to be expected since he had yet to upgrade his potential.


    "Come on¡­.it''s just a little chilly, right¡­ Aoni? Nothing you haven''t ¡­dealt with over the past week; stop being a baby." Still breathing shakily as he tried getting used to the sensation, thed exerted some effort to do so but eventually released his knees and body before standing up and moving around a bit.


    "Plot a course; my first move should be increasing my Rank Potential, followed by my Resistances, then I need to figure out how long I was unconscious; if it wasn''t too long, I don''t need to worry about cia right now, and can instead work on my situation first."

 Chapter 73 It Still Worked Doe!

    ''INCREASE MY MOTHER FUCKING RANK POTENTIAL!'' With his internal monologue echoing like thunder, Aoni, who was struggling to stay upright as he slid down the mountain further and further away from his cave, was suddenly frozen in ce, as if time had stopped thanks to the descent of a now familiar pressure bearing down on not only him but the surrounding terrain.


    | Increasing Rank Potential From F to F+ |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 22.5 pp Earned |


    Gritting his teeth and inherently fighting against the force pressing on his entire body, Aoni''s eyes flickered all around his surroundings as he noticed the exact phenomena he had been hoping would happen, happen.


    As the metaphorical Sr beam crashed into the side of the mountain from above, thick, white steam rose in an opposing manner as the snow nearby melted at an extremely fast and visible rate.


    Between the hazy heat, steam, and melting snow, the effect of the Ascending Pressure seemed to not only affect Aoni''s body but also confirm his theory that it was the cause of the snow on his tform disappearing.


    Clenching his fist and teeth as he sat up, Aoni continued his experimenting and closed his eyes to see if he could sense any changes within his body.


    Unfortunately, either due to the pressure being too high of a level for him to understand or his stats being too low to notice anything, thed was left stumped.


    So, by the time the intense pressure from above disappeared, he had only been able to gather minor, inconsequential information from the phenomenon.


    Heaving a sigh and slowly opening his eyes, the first thing Aoni noticed was that he no longer felt the chill caused by his increase in Elementalized Energia, and the second¡­was that a massive, perfect circle, roughly the size of his mountaintop tform (50-yard circle) was nowpletely free of snow.


    "With this¡­couldn''t I start working on the clearing of a decent-sized path¡­, eh? That''s crazy; the cavern is almost a mile away; still, I can chip out a decent-sized portion by repeating this process a few times." Standing up and shaking the warm water off his body like a dog, Aoni looked up and saw the path up the mountain, which was, for the most part, unobstructed.


    "That has to be the most insane thing I''ve ever attempted, hehe, but it worked, doe." Snickering to himself like a loonie-toon, Aoni, who was now free of all stiffness and feeling better than ever, checked his TD, saw the 236.5 points and that his Rank Potential was now set to F+, smiled, and ran up the mountain until he reached the only barrier separating him and an easy walk to his cave.


    Unfortunately, because he hadn''t been able to slow his slide down the mountain quickly enough, there was still a small wall of snow, roughly 10 feet in diameter and nearly five feet deep, between himself and the tform.


    However, after making light work of it with a few punches and kicks, he now had the concept of a decent path.


    Hopping up onto the stone tform and blowing warm air on his hands, which were a little stiff from hitting the snow, thed walked over to the stone where he''d left the remaining b of meat and thought long and hard about if he wanted to try that again.


    ''I don''t feel full, which is weird considering I ate something like 5 or 6 pounds of meat earlier, but do I really wanna try a second time, or should I just wait tillter.'' Holding the thawed tenderloin, he checked it from top to bottom, inspecting for any signs that the temperature increase had been hot enough to cook it, and what he found was quite strange.


    Apart from being thawed, it was still as fresh as if he had cut it off a living creature, with zero signs of ever being frozen.


    Keeping that in mind and carefully putting it back down on the stone, thed dashed across the tform to the other corpses and could feel a faint warmth from the bodies, as if they had only just died, confusing him further.


    ''Just what in the hell is that force? It''s hot enough to melt snow nearly instantly, but it didn''t do anything to the meat that had been carved while practically reviving a dead animal.'' Running his fingers through the soft snow-white fur, Aoni frowned because apart from indications the corpse wasn''t breathing and the fact it was perfectly still and well¡­that he had drained all its blood already, thed could have sworn it was only sleeping.


    "Well, at least I don''t have to worry about the brains rotting away like originally; then again, they probably wouldn''t have due to the high Energia density in the meat." Shrugging his shoulders, thed turned his line of sight to the folded-up pelt.


    "Instead of worrying about eating, I really should get back on task. The meat won''t spoil anytime soon; it''s better to get myself a decent fur coat before the temperature up here drops again." Tilting his neck to the side and releasing a loud pop, Aoni rolled out his shoulder, crouched in front of the hanging corpse, and, using his fingers to trace along the jawline, found the point of contact between the jaw and skull.


    His next action isn''t for the faint of heart because, with a loud CRACK, Aoni''s fingers dug into the head''s temples as if breaking through an eggshell.


    After creating a starting point, thed collected his knife and, using the temple holes as a guide, carefully carved in a counterclockwise motion, sheering through bone yet avoiding the valuable organ within.


    With agile movements, it took no time at all before the knife reached the second temple hole, so upon cing the knife down on the ground, and with a gross¡­


    POP-CRACK


    Sound, Aoni lifted the skull from the back and used the front like a hinge, exposing the corpse''s brain to the open air. Next, his fingers slithered into the open skull and, with a suction noise, removed the intact organ with ease.@@novelbin@@

 Chapter 76 Cross your Fingers, Do a lil Dance, and Pray (1)

    Standing before the Blood colored Artifact, Aoni nced down at cia before addressing her.


    "Cross your fingers, do a lil dance, and pray we get you some new friends, cia!"


    "GAOOOOOOOOO!!" Whether or not the ball of fluff fully understood the meaning behind his words was uncertain; however, based on her loud Gao followed by subsequent butt wiggles, Aoni knew his intentions had gotten through to her, causing him to smile.


    Thest five days'' worth of effort had been for this moment; some may think he was merely biding his time until his counter was full, but in truth, that wasn''t necessarily the case.


    In his mind, he couldn''t fathom having to deal with his daily chores and potential new bodies. That''s why he wanted some type of infrastructure in ce, even if it could only be seen as the bare minimum.


    For example, weren''t you supposed to "Baby-proof" your home after having a child? Well, the same conclusion could be made whenpared to what thed hadpleted around the mountain peak.


    Everything was in a specific location; all tools and harmful or, worse yet, fragile materials were stored away from potential small hands.


    And a perimeter had been established around the tform in the form of a three-foot-tall Rockwall, something which, unfortunately, had caused not only a significant amount of effort on both Aoni and cia''s part but had eaten up nearly two days'' worth of daylight.


    Mind you, it was more of a deterrent than an actual blockade, considering just about anything Aoni would summon from the Flume could easily jump over it, but hey, if a doggy gate works because it''s a physical object in the path of the dog, it should have the same effect on new summons¡­right?


    Even the interior of the Cave had changed drastically; while it may not be massive changes, like suddenly jumping from a roach motel to a five-star hotel, the Cave definitely felt more like a home than before.


    Notably, the presence of a mounted trophy hung above the firece, as it was a crown achievement for cia; after all, it was the Chimera with the most points on its antlers.


    The rocky walls of the Cave and floor had been covered with wooden nks, and Aoni had made ns to build a door or maybe a gate to cover the entrance.


    The bed was no longer out in the open either, since thed had extended out the wall and turned the space around the bed into a small, ok, TINY bedroom.


    Best of all was the fact that by adding the wooden walls and floor, the Cave was better insted against the cold, which had finally returned a couple of days ago.


    If you didn''t know any better, upon walking into the Cave, you wouldn''t believe you were walking into¡­well, a cave, but instead a normal log cabinish house, with the only difference being the tall rocky ceiling, which in time, Aoni had ns on changing.


    Five days of preparations and a wealth of progress points were nothing to scoff at, and seeing as it was mid-day, it was evident that Aoni had been running around all morning getting things finalized.


    So, while cia did an adorable happy dance, Aoni arranged his mental state because using a multi-summon was a bit different from regr single summons.


    The incantation and even execution were more akin to that of a literal gacha video game, where instead of the Flume spitting out a random thing, it would instead spit out 10 or more glowing orbs of light.


    These lights would float in front of the Flume until the Lord imed or crushed them, and only then did they reveal the contents of the summon.


    Taking a deep breath and using his knife to slice open the palm of his right hand, Aoni firmly ced it against the Flume and spoke out the incantation, which would, hopefully, yield something useful.


    "Iteem Sumano, drincat Teniso baleactum vescintat Jesahom, hetusim Multatium."


    *hhhhhhhuuuuuUUUMMMMM*


    Like with any other time the Flume was activated; it suddenly sprang to life as a film of light flowed out from the edges, then filled its open mouth, along with a faint humming sound that grew louder with each passing second.


    Watching the Blood Red Artifact carefully, Aoni didn''t get his hopes up but stayed optimistic as he scooped up cia and took several steps back in order to leave space for the appearance of the 10 orbs.


    Then¡­


    Pop


    The first orb of light shot out and hovered at eye level with thed, some 2 feet away from the Flume¡­


    ''First one is Grey¡­''


    Pop


    ''Second one greye on¡­''


    Pop


    ''Grey again,'' staring at the glowing orbs, which ironically enough followed the color chart of the Flumes Rank system, Aoni didn''t blink as the fourth pop urred.


    Pop


    ''YES, RED! RED IS GOOD,'' Furiously petting cia''s head out of excitement, as this red Summon would be, at the minimum, a natural 2-Star summon, Aoni felt ecstatic; meanwhile, cia was practically purring, having instantly lost interest in the strange, basketball sized floating orbs.


    Pop


    ''Grey, don''t mind, don''t mind, totally fine,''


    Pop


    ''Another Grey, we still got a Red; that''s all that matters,'' with only four summons remaining, Aoni could feel his heart rate elerating because tomorrow was hisst day of earning daily charges, and if he wanted to do another multi-summon, it would take almost a year¡­that is unless he burned points to get more.


    Pop


    Pop


    Within a few seconds of each other, two more Grey orbs appeared, and by now, thed had epted the fact that he was going to have shit luck; after all, even if there were a single red orb, that wouldn''t be the difference between heaven and Terra, but when the 9th pop, urred, a faint wind blew through the Cave, as it halted is momentum and lined up with the others. Continue reading on My Virtual Library Empire


    POP~~~


    "YES! ORANGE! THAT''S A NATURAL 3-STAR SUMMON!" Jumping in joy, Aoni tossed cia into the air, making her oOo in joy before catching and cradling her to his chest as the anticipation of his final summons mmed into him like a ton of bricks.


    "This is it; thest summon for a while; please be something good, please be something good, PLEASE!"@@novelbin@@


    "GAOOOO!" Matching her Lord''s intensity, cia chimed In while watching the glowing Flume charging up to spit out the 10th and final summon¡­and then.


    POP! FWOOOSHHH!~~~~~

 Chapter 78 Cross your Fingers, Do a lil Dance, and Pray (3)

    Discover stories at My Virtual Library Empire


    Seeing how excited his summon was by receiving such a simple gift, Aoni felt as if he had been neglecting her, but what could he do? He was barely making do with what he had; still, it was moments like these where the Lad knew he needed to do better.


    ''Maybe I should make her some toys, but what? It''s not like I can manifest chew toys or something like that; her teeth and bite force are too strong for something as simple as rubber,'' Standing up as he could hear cia hopping off the bed, Aoni bounced a few ideas around his head before reaching down and letting the furball climb his arm to rest on his shoulder like usual.


    "Did you get it settled in?" looking at cia, the Lad asked curiously, even though he knew she probably tucked the pillow in the corner of the bed near the wall where she likes to sleep.


    "Gao," giving a short nod and her form of a smile, cia turned her eyes to the remaining four grey orbs with a hopeful expression.


    Aoni didn''t need to be a mind reader to know she was probably thinking about getting more good stuff like the pillow, and that made him smile, so without further ado, he pulled one of the orbs to him and crushed it in his hand.


    One scattering of particles and a sh of lightter, and his fourth summon was revealed: a¡­


    "Monster truck tire?" Tilting his head to the side, Aoni scratched his head in confusion as he walked up and gave the 66-inch by 43-inch tire a swift kick, causing it to jiggle but remain unmoved.


    ''Uh¡­the hell am I supposed to do with this¡­I guess this can be a toy for cia; if it was a normal tire, I could make a swing or something out of it, but it''s huge; maybe after cleaning it up, it can be her chew toy or a workout tool,'' sliding his arm through the center, Aoni found it difficult to lift the tire, but that was to be expected; it should be around 800 to 900 pounds, and with his F- Strength that could be considered beyond his upper limit.


    Left without much in the way of options, he was forced to put his orb smashing on hold so that he could get therge tire out of the cave, a task which proved challenging due to its size and weight, but once he was able to get it moving, rolling therge object out of the cave wasn''t THAT difficult.


    The only question was where he should put it, and after a short yet one-sided conversation with cia, it was decided it would be left out of the way outside of the cave for now.


    ''Sheet metal, a yardstick, a pillow, and a monster truck tire, my luck is pretty shit; oh well, cia can use two of them, and that yardstick will help me when cutting the hide,'' with a shrug of his shoulders, Aoni crushed the fifth grey orb, and this time, he finally got something which could be considered useful.


    "YES! Scissors!" pumping his fist in the air, Aoni picked up the oversized scissors, which even came with a leather sheath, and examined them carefully.


    While they may not seem like much, one must not forget that he can upgrade his summons, so even if they were trash, they were still considered a 1-Star tool.


    On his shoulder, cia, who was confused as to why her Lord was so happy about getting the shiny object, didn''t pay much attention to it and shouted an OoO of her own as if cheering Aoni on.


    Racing outside, the Lad quickly stored his new Scissors on one of the tool racks inside the Crafting station before returning to crush the remaining two grey orbs.


    ''I don''t care if it''s something good, just be something useful,'' Crossing the fingers on his right hand, Aoni reached out and crushed the orb with his left, and once the light faded, a small, perfectly rounded stone appeared on the floor in front of the Flume.


    "Hm," walking over and picking it up, Aoni noticed that at a nce, it seemed no different from any other palm-sized, smooth river stone, that is, apart from the carving taking up the majority of its center.


    Turning the stone around in his hand several times, the Lad traced the shape of the carving with his index finger.


    The inscription itself appeared in the form of four connected wings, more like an airne''s wings instead of something you''d see on a bird, surrounded by a circle.


    If anything, it kind of resembled a ceiling fan turned on its side.


    "I know it''s a Node Stone, but¡­what is it?" as if reading his thoughts, three notifications suddenly appeared in Aoni''s line of sight, causing his eyes to widen before returning to a passive expression.


    | Scanning Node Stone |@@novelbin@@


    | The Node Stone has been Identified |


    | Node Stone of Building: Mill ¡î |


    "Eh? A Mill? Like the kind that processes grain and such¡­wait, this is actually a good thing; they generally grind, crush, or cut solid materials in order to process them into fine powder or something of the sort. That means I can use it on the bones or waste materials to recycle them," nodding his head, Aoni walked to his bookshelf, ced the Node stone up high so that small fur balls couldn''t have easy ess to it, and returned to his spot in front of the orbs.


    "Last grey orb, then onto the good stuff," Clutching his hand, Aoni reached for and crushed the final grey orb, and when the animation sequence faded, what was revealed was something that, had he gotten earlier, would have saved him a significant amount of time, and the durability of Austr and Vestr.


    "You have got to be fucking kidding me¡­"


    SMACK


    Palming his face, Aoni sagged his shoulders and walked over toward the metal object roughly half as tall as him and circr with hundreds of dulled, jagged teeth.


    The final item, which came from his grey orbs, was arge, industrial-sized circr saw de that was perfect for cutting nks, pylons, or any otherrge building materials.

 Chapter 81 The Flocks Fall

    "Shhh, it''s ok now; we are here for you," Aoni whispered as he felt the bird tremble and sob. From hisp, cia did her best tofort her new little sister¡­even if the bird was technically older, she had been summoned first and thus was the older one, or so she believed.


    Either way, cia wanted to be a firm support for the weeping bird, as while she couldn''t sense its emotions, the sorrowful chirps and chees partnered with the trembling were more than enough for the fluff ball to get what was going on.


    Aoni wasn''t about to try and tell her otherwise either; closing his eyes and calmly running his hand over the smooth white feathers, he simply sat there and let his new summon cry her heart out as a sh of images and emotions flooded his brain.


    It was like watching a muted video that skipped at random intervals; in the first scene, there was a flock filled with beautiful birds, simr yet different to the one he was holding. Some wererge enough to blot out the sky, while others were the size of a school bus, and from what he could understand, they lived a life free and unchained by mortal restraints.


    The sky was their domain, and even the icy tundra below wasn''t able to restrain their might; however, be it thend or air, these creatures were no doubt supremes of their terrain.


    Yet, even with their might unchallenged, for many generations, one day, that all changed. At first, it was storm cloudsing from the north, but then, from the south, emerged and filled with volcanos, and with their emergence came two new races, one born of fire and the other of lightning.


    Sandwiched between two new forces, the Flock''s peaceful days turned to chaos, as while the creatures born of lightning were manageable, the creatures born of mes were a natural predator and counter to the Flock.


    Day by day, Elementalized Energia flew as the wars scaled up, and with each explosion or beam of concentrated Energia, bodies fell, and thends were coated with the blood of the fallen.


    For years, this was the norm: friends, family, allies, the bloodshed never discriminated, and after nearly a thousand years of ceaseless battle, the first change urred, as humanoid creatures, unlike the three races, stepped into the Tri-Elementalized Lands.


    Through the images seen by Aoni, he could tell what these new beings were: humans, beast humans, draconian, all manners of humanoid beings emerged one by one, targeting one or more of the powerful races.


    Although things were difficult between the three elementalized races, they were powerful enough to fight to a standstill; however, with the new variable added into the mix, that bnce shifted dramatically.


    Since the creatures were considered valuable resources due to the high Energia content of their bodies, every ounce of them could garner vast wealth, and like that, nothing was safe.


    Be it born of mes, Lightning, or Ice, they were hunted, captured, mutted, and ripped away from their families.


    Read new chapters at My Virtual Library Empire


    One by one, the numbers of each Race dropped off, and with their bloodlines thinning, the once mighty creatures were in a steep decline.


    Ines the little one weeping into Aoni''s chest.@@novelbin@@


    Through the memories and emotions, a picture of devastation and sorrow was painted, one in which she was fleeing destruction with what little remained of her family before tragedy struck.


    Right before her young eyes, her parents were ughtered by beings Aoni couldn''t recognize due to their shadowy fa?ade.


    He could hear theirughter as they shredded and harvested materials from the once proud birdsrger than a city bus before turning their sights on his summon.


    Thest thing he saw of these figures was them holding a cage of some sort andughing manically as they captured the baby bird.


    After that scene, she changed hands many times, as the original group sold her off to some rich person, but her presence seemed to be coveted by many. Every time she appeared to be settled, the same instance would ur time and time again: his summon was kidnapped while her owners were killed.


    Rinse, wash, repeat.


    Some of her captures weren''t bad; they would treat her as well as a normal Terrian does their pets, but others abused her, beating and starving the small bird only to end up losing her.


    The longer Aoni immersed in these memories, the more his heart hurt for the little one continuously bawling her eyes out without reservation.


    ''She''s been through a lot, and at such a young age to boot.'' Thed could tell she desperately wanted to belong; it was clear in the actions she would take with the people who owned her in the past.


    She tried to be a good girl, obedient and smart as she was; she did her best to make them like her; at least if they did, she wouldn''t be beaten again like others had done.


    But no matter how hard she tried, things always ended up the same, with her on the move and the person who controlled her being ughtered.


    Until¡­


    "Tsss," resisting the urge to grunt aloud, Aoni was assaulted by a sharp pain in his temples as the images he was viewing shattered and vanished into the void.


    ''Damn, I thought I would have more time since she''s a Three-Star summon, but it looks like that is everything she remembers. It''s like there is a barrier separating her mind from them, but even so, they are traumatic enough to weigh on her conscious mind still, even though they''ve been wiped.


    Either because of the memories being sealed or because she had tired herself out from crying, the small bird''s chirps and tears slowed until, eventually, her breathing regted, and it was clear that she had fallen asleep.


    By this point, cia was now sitting beside him and no longer in Aoni''sp, so with a simple look and a flick of his head, Aoni signaled that he was going to bring her to the bedroom and that she should stay with the bird forfort.

 Chapter 86 Sapphire (2)

    As his body was flung away from where he initially stood, Aoni only had a split second to consider what had just happened to him, and then¡­


    FWOOOSHHH THUD


    His back smashed into the newly crafted wooden walls, and he was pinned by a powerful Energia wind that refused to let him move even an inch.


    | The Ambient Energia is Condensing and Refining around the User |


    Gritting his teeth and trying his best not to scream in pain, Aoni''s eyes flicked to the notification and nearly yelled, "NO SHIT" as a flood of heat surged through his body as if he were being injected with some type of poison, and the instant Aoni realized this, his panic truly began.


    | A surge of Refined Energia is attempting to merge with the User |


    ''Wh¡­ahhhhhh,'' afraid he would wake up his summons if he began yelling, Aoni fought against the wind to no avail, as the colorless Energia Wind''s color started to manifest in a stunning disy of bright ruby.


    Meanwhile, he noticed more notifications appearing like pop-ups on a virus-filledputer one after another, each one detailing the mysterious process he was in the midst of living through.


    | ¡ï Energia Particles have been Refined and are being administered to the User through Flume''s Summoning process. |


    | It has been detected that this phenomenon is not harmful to the User, and no actions will be taken. |


    From there, the light, in the form of motes or particles, shifted shades, slowly working its way through the full spectrum representing a Flume''s Grade.


    | ¡ï¡ï Energia Particles have been Refined and are being administered to the User through the Flume''s Summoning process. |


    | ¡ï¡ï¡ï Energia Particles have been Refined and are being administered to the User through the Flume''s Summoning process. |


    | ¡ï¡ï¡ï¡ï Energia Particles have been Refined and are being administered to the User through the Flume''s Summoning process. |


    | ¡ï¡ï¡ï¡ï¡ï Energia Particles have been Refined and are being administered to the User through the Flume''s Summoning process. |


    Ruby to Orange, to Gold, then Emerald, the motes of light evolved and merged into his body one wave after another. With each shade, more and more Energia injected itself into Aoni''s body, hitting him with the force of a sledgehammer time and time again until few motes of light remained, and only then did they transform into a beautiful shade of Sapphire.


    Had he had the presence of mind and wasn''t the one being assaulted by the cloud of light, Aoni would have probably been amazed at the sight of a giant, colorful firework cloud transforming through the color spectrum.


    Instead¡­


    ''Ahh¡­shit¡­.damn it,'' feeling a trickle of blood running down his nose, Aoni had no way of knowing what was happening to him apart from the notifications, and even then, hundreds of thoughts raced through his mind.


    ''Am I going to die?''


    ''Will I be so oversaturated with Pure Energia that I Explode?''


    ''The notification said I wasn''t being harmed, but why does it hurt so much?''


    After that, his thoughts turned a bit strange.


    ''Am I bing a summon?''


    ''Wait, what if im being refined into a Node?''


    ''Is something being changed within my DNA, or being?''


    ''I''ve never heard of anything like this happening; WHAT IS HAPPENING!''


    Unable to do anything but watch on in pain, the Lad observed them swirling around in a disy akin to fireflies dancing, and then¡­these Sapphire motes mmed into Aoni''s chest.


    | ¡ï¡ï¡ï¡ï¡ï¡ï Energia Particles have been Refined and are being administered to the User through the Flume''s Summoning process. |


    All of a sudden, all the heat he was experiencing vanished, and Aoni felt as if he were doused in an ice bath, causing a chill to run through his veins and making his vision tunnel for a split second.


    | A massive influx of Pure, Refined Energia has been applied to the User''s Body, triggering an Energia Baptism as a side effect |


    | The Energia Baptism has increased the User''s proficiency with moving, feeling, and sensing Energia |


    | Passive: Energia Maniption has been unlocked at G- |


    | Due to the Energia Baptism, the User''s Energia Stat has rapidly grown and broken through the limits of their Rank. |


    | A Passive has been Summoned and represents the 10th Summon from the Flume''s Multi-Summon Ritual |


    | This new Passive is observable in the User''s Traveler''s Disy |


    | 90 pp Earned |


    With thatst notification, the force pressing Aoni to the wall ceased, and he copsed onto the ground, panting as sweat drenched him from head to toe.


    Although he wasn''t exactly in pain, there was no doubt that the Lad''s body was sore, and he was fatigued beyond belief. As he struggled to sit up and leaned his back against the wall, Aoni''s mind raced at the information the notifications had fed him.


    Find adventures at My Virtual Library Empire


    ''I¡­Energia baptism, energia maniption, limits broken, a new passive as a summon¡­this¡­ it''s too much, today has just been too fucking much.'' Not knowing whether he wanted to burst out inughter or cry himself to sleep, Aoni closed his eyes and thumped his head against the wooden wall a few times before finally opening his TD.


    ______________________


    Aoni Thurston


    Age: 16


    Potential: Two Star/F+ Rank (?) **


    Rank: -F


    ______________________


    Attribute Grade: ¡ï¡î


    Attribute: Progression


    Progress Points: 791 **


    ______________________


    Statistics


    Attack: F- (?)


    Defense: F- (?)


    Speed: F- (?)


    Energia: D- **


    Elementalized Energia: 10 % Ice **


    ______________________


    Passives


    Cold Resistance: F (?) **


    Pain Resistance: F (?) **


    Swordsmanship: G+ (?)


    Dual Swordsmanship: G- (?)


    Ice Maniption: G-


    Energia Maniption: G- (?) **


    Pocket Dimension (Inventory): G- **


    ______________________


    Working up the courage, Aoni slowly opened his eyes and scanned through his Traveler''s Disy; however, what he saw there finally short-circuited the Lad''s brain, and with a slight dribble of drool running down the corner of his mouth, Aoni slumped over, unconscious.@@novelbin@@


    At the same time as his head thumped against the hardwood floor in the bedroom not far away, a worried cia continuously looked from the doorway, down at the sleeping bird using her as a pillow, and then back up.


    She could feel everything going through her Lord''s mind and wanted nothing more than to run and check on his condition, especially since she had been hearing the scary noisesing from the other side of the wall. Yet, the words Aoni had whispered in her ear earlier continued ringing in her head.

 Chapter 89 Dinner and Communication

    Since he himself wasn''t a picky eater, and cia DEFINITELY wasn''t, Aoni hadn''t ever put much thought into what type of food he was eating.


    In his mind, calories were calories, and if they tasted good, awesome; if not, well, he simply would suck it up because beggars can''t be choosers.


    Every day was a struggle for survival, and without putting forth the effort to make it happen, Aoni would starve; it was as simple as that.


    Now, with the newest edition to the family, thed actually found himself stumped as to what the young fledgling would eat.


    ''She wouldn''t survive off, like, nuts and berries or something like that, right? Considering the size of the monsters I saw in those memories, they should be meat eaters¡­'' Sitting out by the campfire and grilling up some rabbit meat from cia''s most recent hunt, Aoni kept looking over his shoulder as the floof showed her new sister around the tform.


    Of course, it was more like Nyria was along for a ride because she was perched on cia''s back, riding her while the furball padded around in a happy mood, pointing out her favorite things.


    Like the pile of rocks, she spent hours making into a formation or her favorite sticks. Moving around the tform from station to station, she would asionally point out things like how one container smelled different because it had all the meat in it or even the path she had dug through the snow, forming a tunnel.


    Moving in a clockwise direction, cia brought her new sister to the tanning station and showed off all the things she had collected while pointing out that Aoni was making stuff, not that she knew what those words meant but instead parroted thed''s words.


    All the while, Nyria seemed to be enjoying herself and listening to the gaos and oos as they adventured around the tform.


    ---


    Once lunch¡­or Dinner was ready, considering it was going to be dark soon, Aoni called over his summons to one of his more materialistic projects, a wooden table; as for chairs, well, it was low enough to the ground that Aoni and the summons could plop down on their butts and eat with no problems.


    Then again, it was a HUGE ask getting cia to eat from the table; even so, thed persisted and ced down three tes filled with salted and grilled meats.


    Since he wasn''t sure of her preferences, Aoni had mixed them up, using a bit of chimera meat, some rabbit, and a few other small creatures cia had been sniping out of boredomtely.


    "Dinner!" once the table was set, thed cupped his hands around his mouth and hollered to his summons, who were on the other side of the tform, out of sight thanks to the Cave.


    Half a minuteter, cia came trotting along with Nyria, picked a spot to sit, and waited to be served, as she had done thest couple of days after extensive training.


    In the beginning, Aoni felt like banging his head against the cave wall because no matter what he did, the second the te hit the table, cia would destroy what it held, but after several, and I mean SEVERAL picturebook lessons, he was able to get her to at least wait to eat until he gave the signal to.


    "Nyria, I wasn''t sure what you would like, so for right now, all we have is these different types of meat; if you don''t like them, I can go through some of the supplies I have and try to find something else." Pushing two tes forward, one for cia and one for Nyria, Aoni spoke with a gentle tone so as not to frighten the bird.


    He did have some reservations about Nyria''s level of intelligence, but after the few conversations he had with the young bird, he figured her to be roughly on par with a 7- or 8-year-old child.


    ''Fo..od?'' tilting her head cutely and hopping off her mounts back onto the table, Nyria examined the different types of cooked meat before pecking at the golden Chimera first, sniffing it a few times and with an etiquette unbefitting a certain someone, took her time eating.@@novelbin@@


    MEANWHILE


    "OM NOM NOM NOM NOM OM NOM!" cia was pigging out like a fucking slob, causing Aoni to facepalm and reprimand her.


    "cia! SLOWWW, one of these days you''ll end up choking with how fast you eat; look at your sister, see how well-behaved she''s being," pping his forehead, Aoni stared at the floof with dead eyes, causing her to freeze in ce with a mouth full of half-chewed food.


    "Yeah, im talking to you, floof, pfft," with a shake of his head, Aoni stabbed a piece of Chimera meat with his wooden fork and began eating slowly and as gracefully as someone raised without proper table manners could, almost as if trying to set an example for his little glutton.


    Yet, not even 30 secondster¡­


    "OM NOM NOM NOM," cia was right back at it again, face on the te nomming away like someone was going to take it away from her.


    "Sigh, I give up, Nyria, don''t follow her example, you''re a good girl,"


    Find more to read at My Virtual Library Empire


    "Chee?"


    "Un, good girl," Seeing the questioning gaze directed at him, Aoni smiled and nodded.


    "Chee, chee," causing the bird to nod in return and leaving cia utterly confused.


    She was minding her own business and became the target of bullying; the worst part was that she was too innocent and, thus, didn''t even realize it, so apart from getting scolded, the floof had no idea that she was being teased for eating too fast.


    Nyria, on the other hand,pletely understood everything her lord said, but that was partially due to her grade and partially because she had been around Humanoids long enough to understandmunication.


    That fact alone set her apart from cia. For Aoni, it was quite a joyous thing because while it was fun bantering with himself, *Conversing with cia*, having actual conversations where someone understood what you were saying, was the difference between night and day.

 Chapter 93 This Was A Bad Idea!

    Still, what truly separated Aoni from the rest of his peers, or those who came before him, was the existence of his Attribute and, by proxy, Progress Points.@@novelbin@@


    If earning a passive meant obtaining enough theory and experience, then increasing the rank of said passive, which would normally take a lifetime to see significant gains, would be a metaphorical mouse click away.


    Through this mechanism, not only could he do the unthinkable, rapidly increasing his proficiency with them, but he could theoretically master multiple passives, turning him into a Jack Of All Trades, yet master of All.


    Provided he could actually obtain enough points to do so, in the event he couldn''t, well, wouldn''t he merely be dipping his fingers into too many pots?


    The answer is yes. Stay updated via My Virtual Library Empire


    And he knew this fact, which is precisely why, as Aoniy on the ground in the fetal position, trying his best not to spew out the meat he''d eaten for dinner, he couldn''t help but stare intently at his Traveler''s Disy.


    ''If I had more time, I could consider spending days training my Maniption and getting used to it. Well, getting used to the feeling at the very least.''


    ''Techniques don''te naturally and generally take a lot of training to get them on the level they can be useful inbat or even daily life, but I only have two weeks before shit hits the fan.'' Sitting up and releasing a pained groan, Aoni crossed his legs and propped himself on his knees.


    ''The way I see it, there are multiple ways for me to get stronger fast, some are more optimal than others, but the main ones are, raising my Energia Maniption, Increasing my stats, ¡­'' looking off in the distance, the Lad could faintly hear a series of Gaos and Chees, causing his face to twitch slightly.


    | 0.02 PP earned |


    ''Or I can run the gambit and burn my points into summoning more potential subordinates. There is also the proven Turtle Strategy; if I can create a dome or some kind of covering that blocks off the mountain peak, I should be able to upgrade it to a level that can sustain high-level attacks or invasions.'' When he got to thatst point, Aoni gritted his teeth and pounded his fists on his thighs.


    | 0.02 PP earned |


    ''Fuck, thatst one has too many factors working against me; for starters, I don''t have a single fucking clue about the surrounding lifeforms, and it''s entirely BECAUSE I am too weak to survive outside of my territory.''


    | 0.02 PP earned |


    ''Sure, by increasing my Elementalized Energia to 10% Ice, I have a better shot, especially since both my resistances have reached F-Rank, but do I really want to risk getting stuck down the mountain in another avnche scenario.'' Unballing his fists, Aoni sighed and leaned back on his arms while looking out to the horizon.


    | 0.02 PP earned |


    ''Less than 16 days remain until my barrieres down, and my checklist is totally fucked right now. My Attribute is a double-edged sword of sorts; if I want to get stronger, I need to spend points, but to earn them, my attention is entirely shifted in the opposite direction of what it should be, and I end up wrapped up in multiple projects.''


    | 0.02 PP earned |


    ''Hm, I suppose there''s always that,'' finally noticing the rapidly shing and disappearing notifications in the corner of his vision, Aoni smirked because, after several days of it happening, the Lad had understood his actions weren''t actually generating them, and instead, it was being done by cia.


    If the first two-thirds of the reason Aoni gave into the whims of his floof were to burn energy and that it made her happy to use the shovel, the other 1/3rd of the reason he allowed cia to have her "y time" after each meal was because he''de to realize that in doing so, she would generate a minute amount of points through the action of clearing the snow.


    However, before this current session, she was only bringing in 0.01 points, but now¡­


    ''So it seems that works, with Nyria along for the ride, for one reason or another, she is effectively doubling the ie generated by cia,'' nodding his head and finding it to be an eptable exnation, Aoni turned his attention back toward his current issue.


    ''Something''s got to give; I for sure can''t quit building and doing things around the camp cold turkey; that''s a surefire way to end up stalling out, and if I were to do more summoning, I''d need a lot more points, so for now, my only option is¡­'' chewing on his bottom lip, Aoni reluctantly spoke out themand to upgrade his Energia Maniption.


    Knowing full well that he was more than likely about to puke everywhere, if not from the headache brought on due to the influx of knowledge than the forceful cirction and adaptation of Energia.


    | Increasing Passive ''Energia Maniption'' from G- to G |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 20 PP earned |


    "URRPP! FUCK!" Feeling as if he had been kicked in both the nuts and his chest simultaneously, Aoni grunted loudly before doubling over and resisting the intense urge to throw up.


    Yet the nausea wasn''t even the worst part; not only was his brain pounding, but his body began heating up as the counterforce he felt when using Energia for the first time flickered throughout his body as if someone were hitting the light switch at an unseen speed.


    ''AGAIN,'' Even through all that, the instant the effect of his upgrade wore off, he didn''t bother attempting to consolidate the gains or even pay attention to his expenditure; no, instead, the Lad''s recklessness reared its ugly head, as he pushed onward, from G to G+.


    | Increasing Passive ''Energia Maniption'' from G to G+ |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 30 PP earned |


    This time¡­things got messy.


    "BLARG, THIS, URRRPP, WAS GAKK A BAD IDEEA HOOOOAHH!" Spitting up a few mouths of saliva was only a precursor to the main event, as bile and chunks of meat jetted out of Aoni''s mouth and nose, staining the ground in front of the cave and even hitting the campfire.

 Chapter 97 Nightly Routine

    Turning his body and swinging a leg over the log so as to straddle it, Aoni looked on with an amused expression as his summons happily appeared while singing together.


    "It seems they''ve gotten closer; that''s good," the moment cia spotted Aoni, he shed a grin, then patted hisp and stretched his arms out, hugging the air, the universal sign to cia for cuddles, and as expected, much to the shock and dismay of Nyria, the floof elerated fast enough to send the poor fledgling pping.


    "GAooooOOoOoo!"


    THUMP


    Since he was ready to receive a full-blown tackle from his furry missile, Aoni easily caught cia and gave her plenty of scratches and pets while looking at Nyria as she gracefullynded on the ground not far away.


    "No need to be shy; you get cuddles, too," said Aoni, while tilting his head to the side and looking at the fledgling with tenderness andpassion


    Nyria,pletely unustomed to any sort of affection, hopped once in her lord''s direction before stopping and looking on with longing. After spending time with cia and hearing all her stories about Aoni and how kind he was, she truly wanted to believe it all, but her cautious nature wouldn''t allow it.


    Yet, as she stood there less than six or so feet away from the pair, she, too, wanted to enjoy being pet and having her feathers preened.@@novelbin@@


    "You''re one of us, Nyria, and nighttime is always cuddle time, so if you don''t get your spot quickly, cia will hog up all the attention; I mean, Look at this face. Does she seem like someonecking love?" Catching cia as she squirmed to getfortable, Aoni held the poor floof out on disy as if she were a lion cub being shown to a kingdom of animals.


    "GAOOOO!" earning the Lad a discontented gao, as cia huffed and tried to return to her favorite second favorite spot beside Aoni''s shoulder.


    Sure enough, the second he brought cia back to his embrace, Nyria spotted the content look on her sister''s face and the fledgling through caution to the wind and with a mighty¡­


    FLAPPP!


    Nyria shot straight into Aoni''s chest, just above where cia was resting, and began cooing and rubbing her head against him, causing the Lad to chuckle.


    "Did you girls have fun?"


    "OoO," releasing her happy sound, cia was easy to understand since Aoni had spent enough time around her.


    "Che" and Nyria wasn''t thatplicated to understand either, not because of her Chee''s or bodynguage, but because of her limitedmunication skills.


    ''Sis¡­ter¡­fun.'' She said in a childish voice into the Lad''s mind, causing him to smile and give her a little extra attention in the form of under-the-beak scratches, something she apparently loved, if her purring, YEP purring was an indicator.


    "Well, I''m d; it''s going to be dark soon, so that means it''s nearly bedtime," ncing around the camp, Aoni made sure there was nothing left behind due to his session of recklessness earlier, IE, vomit, and after about 30 minutes of cuddle time, he Stood up, and allowed cia to climb on his right shoulder while holding Nyria.


    Seeing her sister scrambling up and flopping down her belly so that her legs hung off the back of Aoni and her arms dangled off the front, Nyria thought it looked fun, but then she quickly surmised it wouldn''t work for her, given the difference in their physiques.


    The thought frustrated her slightly because she too wanted to be as rxed as cia, something that was picked up on by Aoni, who, without putting much thought into it, lifted the fledgling and ced her on his right shoulder like a pirate.


    Experience exclusive tales on My Virtual Library Empire


    "Your sister may have imed my right shoulder, but the left is all yours, Nyria; just be sure not to sink your Talons into me, and it''s yours." Looking up at her as she gotfortable on her new perch, Aoni stated with a calm tone and bright smile, causing Nyria to rub her head on his cheek in return.


    ''Spot¡­mine¡­''


    "Yep, all yours," with that, the trio made their way around the Camp while Aoni taught Nyria about his nightly chores and clean-ups. For example, he had to check the hides and make sure they were tended to; all the tools in the Crafting station needed to be put away and the benches cleaned, not to mention scanning the wall surrounding the tform for stability and ensuring the only gate was shut¡­ and then there was securing the storage containers¡­


    Stopping in front of the formerly perfect line of boxes, Aoni sighed heavily and crossed his arms while staring at the empty space due to his earlier fuck up.


    "Tomorrow, I''ll have to make a new one and upgrade the others,"


    "Gao?" (Gone?)


    "Yeah, I blew one up¡­"


    "Chee? Chee chee?"


    ''Exploded¡­Like¡­boom?''


    "Gaoooooo, oOooo gao gaoo," (So thatsss where it went,)


    "Mistakes happen, oh, I guess you don''t know about that, but I can power things up, myself and you guys included," looking at Nyria on his shoulder while narrating, Aoni jiggled the bone used to keep the containers closed.


    "Gao, chuff, GAO," she said, rolling her eyes and looking away from Aoni; cia seemed to be teasing him, making Nyria chee inughter.


    "Cheechee cheee."


    "Hey, I can make a new one; I made all the other ones right; the next ones gonna be even better, mark my words." Feeling wronged by cia''s apparent usation, Aoni booped her nose, causing the floof to sneeze and Nyria to continueughing.


    Upon finishing his checks of the containers, the final chore on the nightly list was to feed the campfire and ensure it had enough wood tost through the night, and once that wasplete, all that remained was the ACTUAL heading into the cave.


    ---


    "Alright, everyone hop off the Aoni-Taxi; I gotta get my gear off," the Lad said, which was the worst part of cia''s night; even so, she still obeyed like a good girl and, with a huff, leaped down onto the hardwood floor before looking up at Nyria as if saying e on little sister.''

 Chapter 100 Two Weeks In The Making (2)

    *Chapter 100, the first of many milestones, I want to thank everyone who has joined me so far on this Adventure; HERES TO OUR NEXT MILESTONE, 250 THEN, TO SKIESS~~*


    With the mention of a Tummy Ache, cia, who clearly understood THAT word, nced down at her fluffy belly and patted it a couple of times before looking back up at her Lord questioningly.


    "¡­you already ate¡­" staring at her with a calm expression, Aoni sighed before continuing to exin.


    "Right now, the two of you are considered to have One-Star strength," drawing a star in his picture book, The Lad pointed at both his summons and then the picture.


    "That means, by using my special ability, I can make you strong, all the way up to 2-Stars; not only that, but I can also make your special abilities, cia''s Artic Movement, and your Dynamic Vision, Nyria more powerful as well, as for what to call it¡­uh¡­how about we just call it Adding Points."


    "Gao Gao,"@@novelbin@@


    "Chee, Chee?" Find adventures on My Virtual Library Empire


    ''Po¡­int¡­Add?''


    "Yep, adding points, so in the future, if you hear me say im Adding Points to something, that will be our code word for powering up. With that said, I expect you both will feel super sleepy once I finish, so don''t worry, and don''t panic; everything will be okay, I promise."


    "Plus¡­" holding up a finger and shing a bright smile, Aoni dropped the metaphorical carrot in front of his adorable summons.


    "If you two are brave Girls, I will have a reward prepared for you when you wake up."


    "GAO!"


    "Chee?"


    ''Re¡­ward?''


    cia and Nyria''s reactions to the word reward were contrasting, but that was mainly due to Nyria not understanding the concept and cia thinking it was merely something fun; after all, thest time Aoni gave her a so-called Reward, it was the snow shovel.


    ''Eh¡­why do I feel like a bad guy scamming children¡­'' Scratching the back of his head, while the Lad had an idea for how to reward the two, it involved a bit of preparation, so although he had made a promise to them both, much like his Mom used to when he would go to the doctor as a little kid, he knew it was going to take some effort on his part.


    "Yep, Reward, it''s going to be something good too, now, cia, as the oldest, you are up first, soe here." ncing at his Summon''s Disy, Aoni knew the first thing he was going to need to upgrade was her Potential, and from there, it was just a matter of bringing everything else to 2-Star.


    In the case of Nyria, he would need to burn a lot more points. Since she already had a 3-star potential, and her section of the Summon''s Disy indicated she had 3-Null-Stars in everything, it was more a matter of bringing them all up to 2-Stars than generating new ones, like with cia.


    Following Aoni''s words, as she naturally knew he would never do something to hurt her, cia hopped into hisp and curled into a ball while looking up at him.


    "That''s a good girl. As I said, it may be a bit ufortable, but you need to stay strong," Aoni said, giving her some cuddles, more to calm his nerves than hers, before taking a deep breath and speaking out the mentalmand.


    ''Upgrade cia''s Potential.''


    | Increasing the Potential of Summon: "cia" from ¡ï to ¡ï¡ï |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | 10 pp Earned |


    Keeping a careful eye on cia, Aoni focused on any changes urring within his floof by way of his Energia Maniption in order to watch out for anything Strange, and sure enough, he witnessed something like small pulses of electricity coursing through his fingertips and into cia''s body.


    ''It''s like Energia, but different; this must be the physical Manifestation of Progress Points. I''ve sensed it before when upgrading the flume and my weapons, but since they aren''t living creatures, it''s different.''


    ''The closest thing I canpare it to is the theory of Absorbing Energia from a Crystal. To an extent, it''s like My Energia carries an extra radiation that is leaving my EC and flowing into her.''


    There was no pressure falling from the sky, no heating up of her body, and apart from shivering for a second and burping, cia didn''t seem to be bothered at all.


    ''Then again, all I did was add her second star; there''s a difference between that and increasing its steps.''


    "That''s the first part done; how do you feel?" petting her head, Aoni asked while examining her for any signs of pain or changes.


    "¡­gao?" Shaking her body and standing up for a second, cia appeared to be searching for something, looking at her ws and then fur. However, aftering up empty, she simply looked back at Aoni with confused eyes.


    "That''s fine. There is nothing to worry about; we are just getting started. Are you ready for the second one?"


    "Gao Gao!" Holding up a paw, cia used the same cadence as when she said "Add Points" earlier, causing Aoni to smile and settle her down before upgrading her a second time.


    ''Upgrade cia''s Grade.''


    | Increasing the Grade of Summon: "cia" |


    | Second Star manifesting |


    | Manifestationplete |


    | Summon: "cia''s" Grade has increased to ¡ï¡î|


    | Progress Points Have Been Deducted |


    | 17.5 pp Earned |


    Unlike when he had increased cia''s Potential, which showed no outward change, this time, a tremor ran the length of the floof''s body, and her hair stood on end like a panicked cat as the pulses of electricity grew in strength.


    Seeing this, Aoni immediately began whispering to her that everything was okay while rhythmically running his hands through her fur.


    "You''re okay, cia, you''re doing great,"


    Hearing his calming voice, she looked up at him, and Aoni could see the fear hidden in her eyes because she was experiencing something new, something Strange.


    From her perspective, a pulse had gone off in her chest, rumbling out from the core of her being and generating a ripple effect that ran the length of her skin. It was as if she randomly decided toy on top of a massive bass speaker, and for cia, it was scary.

 Chapter 103 Finishing A Project

    "Before I start¡­should I check my Progress points¡­can my heart even take it?" Sitting with his scissors in one hand and a crude chisel in the other, Aoni''s thoughts drifted off-topic as he felt a pang in his chest.


    There was no doubt he had burned the BULK of his nearly 800 points¡­but did he really want to know the exact number? I mean, sure, there had been shing Notifications indicating he was earning bonus points at a constant flow; however, based on the shing numbers he had barely seen, it wasn''t difficult to take note of the fact that Aoni wasn''t getting remotely close to the amount back by upgrading his Summons as he would have by upgrading himself.


    ''Foooo, you''re not a coward, Aoni, just look at it, no biggy¡­'' hyping himself up, Aoni ced his tools down before leaning back on the wooden stool he''d made a few days back and checked his TD.


    Progress Points: 81.5


    ''It hurts¡­.'' Feeling a tear slide down his cheek, Aoni fell back onto the floor while covering his head with his hands for protection.


    THUD


    "Fucking 700 points, gone, in a sh; wait, shouldn''t I have earned back enough topensate for the loss?" Sitting up and praying his AN would give him good news, Aoni soon copsed back onto the floor because of the pop-up that came next.


    | Negative, point gain by summons is halved |


    Reading his thoughts, the annoying AN appeared in front of Aoni''s face, causing him to punch at the air in an attempt to clear the ethereal window from his vision.


    "Half points¡­so if it were me, I would have ended up somewhere in the 300 range?"@@novelbin@@


    | Estimates show that if the User were to increase their Stats and Passives in such a manner, a total of 481.5 points would have remained |


    "Uuuuuuugghhhh," pulling at his hair in frustration, Aoni rolled around on the wooden floor of the Crafting station for several minutes until he collected his thoughts and halted his tantrum.


    "Ridiculous, it''s absolutely stupid; it''s bad enough that I have diminished returns on adding points, but even those are cut in half, at least I didn''t do something dumb like instantly increasing everything to its limit.


    | Negative Bnces are impossible, function would have failed |


    "WHO THE FUCK ASKED YOU!" iling his left hand around like he was swatting an annoying fly, Aoni huffed loudly before getting to work on the unfinished project he had spent thest few days working on.


    Spread out on the workbench was a poorly crafted shirt. Coat? Armored Jacket? Well, calling it one of those was generous at best, considering all the Lad had done was stitch some softer hide into the upper torso of a Chimera pelt.


    The idea was rtively simple: use the basic resources to create something wearable, such as the inner lining, for the sake offort.


    Realistically, what he ended up cobbling together was a two-size-too-big overcoat with a head-hood. Of course, Aoni had gone ahead and sewed the mouth and eyes closed; even so, when he tried it on for the first time, cia was so shocked that she almostunched herself at him, thinking he''d been eaten by one of the chimeras.


    Luckily, he had dropped the hood and revealed himself to the innocent floof, who wouldn''t stop checking in on him every few minutes to make sure it wasn''t an illusion. Your journey continues at My Virtual Library Empire


    Although Aoni had to admit, if anyone else saw him, they would definitely take him for a native or, worse yet, a wild beast.


    As for why he had chosen to make the Coat in this way, that''s simple: not only did the pristine white chimera fur work as perfect snow camouge, but it was also quite warm.


    When paired with his Passives, the Lad felt the winter chill vanish and get reced with a nice Spring temperature.


    With cia and Nyria in hibernation and nothing better to do, he went ahead and spent a solid 12 hours straight finishing up his Coat, mainly trimming and sizing it until it ACTUALLY fit his body, and onceplete, Aoni couldn''t resist the urge to check it out in his Crafter''s Disy.


    1: Crude Articus-CervusKumoni Fur-Armor-Coat


    Defense: G+ (?)


    Durability: G+ (?)


    Grade: ¡î(?)


    Effect: N/A


    "Again, with the weird names, Well, at least I know the Chimera''s are called¡­Articus CervusKumoni¡­.sigh, I liked it better when I was calling it a Chimera." Shrugging his shoulders, Aoni noted that he had indeed created the desired item, a Fur-Armor-Coat, which was something he had been aiming for.


    Then again, between his survival lessons and whatnot, he should have been able to create something more¡­useful or, at the very least, didn''t look like he ripped the skin off a beast and was wearing it.


    Still, given theck of resources and, well¡­points, he wasn''t too worried and figured after a few upgrades, it would be solid defensive equipment.


    "Still, the fact that my creation not only has G+ stats but also a Grade of One-Star is further proof of cia''s achievement." Having already scolded the floof for disobeying him and leaving the Barrier, Aoni had gotten over it, but seeing the stats of his new Coat, he could only sigh.


    cia, while clearly underpowered whenpared to a pack of Chimera¡­.Articus-whatevers was more than capable of taking them out.


    "I wish I could have seen that; I mean, I''ve been along for a few hunts now, but all I see is my adorable furball barreling through helpless prey; maybe it''s time to go after something bigger." Taking off his shitty sleeping bag jacket, Aoni reced it with his new Coat and began working on some leather pants and a shirt.


    After all, they were basically in tatters after having been worn every day for over two weeks.


    "I can''t keep coddling cia, or for that matter, Nyria, sure I have to be more gentle with thetter, trauma and all, but the fact still stands, we are up shits creek, and if neither one of them know how to fight properly¡­chasing rabbits and foxmoles will be the least of our worries."

 Chapter 107 The Hibernators Awaken (1)

    When the sun crested the horizon and bathed the Cave in what little warmth it could provide, considering the outside temperature, Aoni''s eyelids twitched.


    Still, seeing as he hadn''t slept nearly enough after two back-to-back long nights, he merely rolled over and faced the wall, putting the light to his back.


    Sure, the Lad knew he should probably get up; hell, even his grumbling stomach, having been abused for thest 30 or so hours, was screaming for nourishment; however, he had been in the middle of a pleasant dream, wherein he was flying through the air, shooting off lightning bolts, and ying hero to a damsel in distress.@@novelbin@@


    Shit, he was finally getting to the good part, the hanky panky with the damsel, yet right as they were about to do the deed, a MASSIVE EXPLOSION OF LIGHT threatened to burn his eyes.


    So he did what any reasonable teenager in his position would and rolled over.


    Unfortunately, no matter how hard Aoni tried to drift back off and enter that dream a second time, it proved a fruitless endeavor, and as a result, with quite a bit of grouchy grumbles, he sat up and stretched.


    "Tsk, how nice it would be to re-enter a dream, yet I''ve never been sessful," looking out the Cave into the distance with a wistful expression, Aoni got up and started his morning routine.


    ---


    Around two hourster, upon finishing his chores, he was back to work, stitching and sewing up a pair of hide pants. Unlike his shirt, which Aoni had stringent expectations for, the pants needed to be much tougher, and that being the case, were significantly more difficult to tailor.


    Especially given the fact that they needed to be not only protective but functional, things such as pockets and padded knees were a must-have. In a sense, he was technically creating two different articles of clothing and stitching them into one.


    The firstyer was made of thicker hide, while the inneryer was soft yet durable material, much like his shirt, so don''t get his end-goal confused with those tacky ck-leather pants rockers or celebrities wear; no, these were the genuine real deal.


    A versatilebination of not onlyfort but utility¡­and no, I''m not talking about jeans.


    Although unpleasant to look at because of his rough craftsmanship and looking more like a patchwork of different skins, they were functional¡­.and had taken him over a week''s worth of effort to make.


    Well, that was simply the processing of materials. It wasn''t until after his multi-summoning of a literal YARD STICK that Aoni could begin the actual tailoring part of the project, but that was that, and this is this.


    While he worked, the Lad asionally¡­alright, CONSTANTLY, checked the hibernation countdown, which had been left floating in the corner of his vision.


    By the time he got around to adding in thest few stitches and felt the pants could be considered finished, he noticed there were only 20 minutes left before Nyria woke up, so he quickly stripped down, rolled around in some snow to get as clean as possible, and changed into his fully handcrafted outfit.


    After some quick exercises to test the pant''s flexibility and break them in a bit, Aoni sprinted full speed into the Cave beforeing to a halt near the bedroom doorway.


    To say he was nervous about seeing how much his summons had changed in thest day would be aplete understatement.


    He had explicitly forgone checking in on the twost night or even this morning, as he kind of wanted to be surprised, so with a calming breath, Aoni sat down in front of the doorway and watched the timer tick down.


    5


    4


    3


    2


    1


    | Summon: "Nyria" haspleted the Hibernation Process and is Waking Up |


    From where he sat, Aoni could hear the faint rustling of movement in the bedroom, akin to sheets crinkling, followed by a soft chee of confusion, and with it came the questioning words of a young girl.


    ''Brother?'' the tender and cute voice asked, her tone tinged with worry and a hint of fright.


    "I''m out here, Nyria; I wanted to be surprised by how much you''ve grown, so I stayed out of the room while you and cia slept."


    ''Okay¡­I''ming out now¡­'' Clearly nervous after hearing what Aoni had said, Nyria, whose voice seemed to still have a childish nature to it, entered the Lad''s mind, causing him to smile warmly. Discover exclusive tales on My Virtual Library Empire


    ''Brother, hah, it looks like cia was babbling to her about what I said back then. That''s fine. It''s better to be an older brother than something like Papa; I''m only 16, for crying out loud. Anyway, it''s good to know her intelligence has improved to the point of more fluid speech.''


    p¡­.p¡­tap tap¡­


    With two soft ps, the sound of talons scratching wood gave away the fact that Nyria had jumped off the bed and was nning on walking out on her own two feet instead of flying.


    And then, after much anticipation, Nyria poked her head out of the bedroom cautiously, looking around for Aoni.


    The moment their shared Emerald eyes met, the first thing Aoni noticed was relief, followed by excitement¡­followed by a sh of something blue hurtling at him at a speed nearly too quick for him to see properly.


    FWAP


    ''BROTHER!'' Of course, the blue blur was Nyria, who was now the size of a teenage bald eagle ( 2ft 7inchs in height, with a little over six-foot wingspan.)


    Having expected a decent size increase in his fledgling, Aoni opened his arms and caught Nyria with rtive ease as she turned into a purring engine while rubbing her head on his chest.


    "Wo, so beautiful," those were the first words out of the Lad''s mouth as he hugged Nyria and began petting her muscr wings.


    Pristine white feathers covered the top half of her body, white as fresh snow; meanwhile, her bottom half was a royal blue; that much hadn''t changed a whole lot, but they definitely seemed more vibrant.


    Further observations showed Aoni that her tail feathers were now nearly the same length as her entire body, and then there was Nyria''s crest, which before only had a single long curled feather but now a collection of three long ones and two shorter ones.

 Chapter 109 First Reward Received

    Everyone is different when ites to getting or giving gifts, and in the case of cia, Aoni 100% knew, without a shadow of a doubt, how she would react; however, Nyria¡­was a different case altogether.


    There was no telling when thest time she had something that could be called her own, and even without that knowledge, the lingering feelings were no doubt still present in the young fledgling psyche.


    Because of this, the Lad stood awkwardly by the nest after cing it down. The way he saw it, she would likely be too stunned to react or straight-up confused at the act of getting a gift.


    That was why he''d originally called it a reward instead of something like a present because a reward is EARNED, and if Aoni needed to use some sophistry to ease the mind of his newest summon, so be it.


    There were many potential oues for what would happen when Nyria opened her eyes and spotted her nest, but Aoni wasn''t quite sure what to do with himself.


    The best he could think of was to either be ready to rush forward andfort his fledgling in the event that she had a mental breakdown or brace for impact since it was evident that Nyria, just like cia, had already developed a habit of tackling him. Enjoy exclusive chapters from My Virtual Library Empire


    As her eyelids slowly slid up, revealing her gemlike eyes, the Lad knew then and there that his decision to gift her something was the right decision.


    Tink¡­.tink¡­.tink¡­


    ''N¡­est¡­my¡­nest¡­mine¡­'' Blinking rapidly as the object entered her vision, Nyria''s eyes shed crystalline ice tears which shattered on the ground the moment they came in contact, as a mixture of sadness, happiness, and bewilderment could be traced in her tone.


    "Yes, it''s all yours; no one can ever take it away from you, and this nest, since I crafted it, we can add points and make it bigger as you grow. You will never have to worry about it being destroyed or stolen either, FOOOWAHH¡­." Before Aoni could finish the rest of his well-worded statement, a blue blur impacted his chest with such force that all the air left his lungs, and he fell back onto the hardwood floor.


    Winded as he may be, the Lad did nothing but wrap his arms around his summon, who had already buried her head in his chest and was sobbing with a mixture of pure adoration and thankfulness.@@novelbin@@


    "Che che cheee cheeee"


    ''You made¡­me a nest¡­'' This line was filled with innocent and pure gratefulness, something which Aoni quickly realized he''d never been subjected to¡­however, it didn''t end there because Nyria''s chee-sobs practically filled Aoni''s soul with the level of sorrow attached to them.


    ''My nest¡­ my home which no one can ever take from me¡­ it can''t be destroyed¡­I have a home...I finally have a home¡­''


    Holding his summon closely as she poured out everything she was feeling through not only her sobs but also mental transmissions, Aoni could feel the edge of his eyes itch.


    The images he had witnessed upon the LoS being formed between him and Nyria were still fresh in his mind, so although the fledgling had no clue about what she was saying or feeling as it was merely out of instinct, Aoni knew just how important this small token of affection was to her.


    From the moment he got the idea of crafting beds for them both, the Lad had a singr purpose: to give each of his summons something that was truly theirs; sure, by nature of their rtionship, it technically belonged to him, and the fact that he had handcrafted the beds gave a certain level of ownership, but in his mind, they were the belongings of his Summons, and as such, unless allowed, he wouldn''t meddle.


    "You''re wee, Nyria," fighting the tears threatening to spill down his cheeks, Aoni rested his chin against the top of Nyria''s head while petting her.


    ''Thank¡­thank you, big brother, thank you¡­''


    ---


    For several minutes, Nyria poured out her heart. If she hadn''t spent thest day and a half sleeping already, Aoni could have seen her falling asleep; luckily, that wasn''t the case, and after getting everything off her chest and having the Lad constantly reassuring her, Nyria finally turned her attention toward her new nest.


    "So, I didn''t know if you''d want to decorate it or anything like that with little trinkets, but I left you plenty of ces to do so, and if it''s too stiff or not fluffy enough, let me know, and I can do some touch ups for you." Sitting on the floor beside Nyria as she happily walked around the nest in a giant circle, examining every square inch of it, Aoni narrated his thoughts on the crafting process along with any changes.


    As he did so, Nyria finally gathered up her courage and, with a soft p of her wings, hopped over the wall and shimmied around the center of the nest.


    ''It''s perfect,'' shing the equivalent of a smile with her eyes; Aoni could hear the happiness in those two words and propped his chin on his hand, which was resting on his knee.


    ''It''s just the right size. I can move around freely, and you made the walls just the right height and style.'' Bobbing her head up and down like a cockatoo, Nyria was truly happy.


    ''But brother, I have a question.'' Pausing her happy dance, Nyria tilted her head and looked over at her lord from behind the nest''s barrier.


    "What''s up?'' Aoni responded, unsure of what she would say next.


    ''With how big my nest is, how is it going to fit in the room with yours and big sisters'' beds?'' Piecing together what she had been told earlier and surmising that Aoni had made a bed for cia as well, she posed an interesting dilemma, as it was very clear at that moment that she didn''t want to sleep apart from him or the floof.


    "Mmmm, that''s actually a really good question," lifting his head off his hand, Aoni spun around on his butt and looked toward the wall hiding his bed and the sleeping cia.

 Chapter 113 Findings From Above

    "Chee cheecchhheee,"


    ''Yepyep, it''s so pretty up there, and I found some stuff for my nest but had to leave them behind to return when you called.'' Nyria''s childish voice was at first filled with excitement before mellowing out at the loss of her trinkets.


    ''Che,chee cheee CLICK''


    However, just as quickly as the mellowing tone appeared, it vanished, and her next words were spoken matter-of-factly.


    ''But tis fine, I know where I left them and can just go pick em up,''


    ''The click at the end of her chees must have been prideful, hm, thankfully she canmunicate through other means, or else I would have to go off emotions and experience like with cia,'' Aoni thought while keeping his steady as a level perch while Nyria prepared to exin her findings.


    "So you mentioned a cavern with a bigke. Is it the same one your sister clears a path to, or have you not been in it yet?" He asked while stepping toward the campfire.


    "Cheeeeee,"


    ''Erm¡­ummm, not sure,'' opening and closing her beak a few times, Aoni could almost swear he heard the faint squeak of a hamster running on a wheel as his fledgling tried to figure things out.


    "You know what, it''s fine. I''ll take you down there really quickly. However, the path has gained some snow without your sister clearing it daily, so while there will be a few inches of fresh powder, it shouldn''t be much of an issue for me to get down. A brief look around the ce should be more than enough for you to figure out if it is the same ce; plus, since I already know there are multiple exits down there, we can explore them together. "


    "CLICK"


    ''Kay!''


    ''Wow, so clicks are added in, haha,'' smiling up at his summon, Aoni lifted her toward his shoulder so she could not only hop a ride in her spot but also save his arm, which was already beginning to feel a bit fatigued.


    After all, even if his body was stronger than a mundane, that didn''t mean he could easily hold up a 20-pound bird with his arm extended out forever.


    Forgoing his weapons, since there wouldn''t be any danger that Nyria couldn''t handle, Aoni began the trek toward the Cavern with a small hop off the tform and onto the steep sloping mountain top.


    "So, tell me everything you saw," curious about how things in his territory looked, he noticed a sh of excitement in Nyria''s eyes as she began narrating her adventures.


    ---


    After leaving the camp, her first course of action was fairly simple: figuring out how high up she was capable of going without encountering the Barrier.


    As Aoni had expected and confirmed by Nyria, the Barrier extended vertically a full mile. Still, she had been careful not to go past the 3 quarters mark before venturing to the edge and scoping things out.


    Stay updated with My Virtual Library Empire@@novelbin@@


    Sure, he had been told time and time again that the starting territory would be exactly one square mile away from the flume, forming a giant box, but hearing confirmation still eased a bit of tension.


    Given how strange things turned out with his Attribute, the Lad didn''t feel right unquestioningly believing everything he had been taught.


    For the most part, Nyria''s firstp around the mountain was fairly tame, with her only asionally spotting something that piqued her interest, such as tasty rabbits or other small game. However, when it came to her secondp, she began paying full attention to her surroundings.


    Starting by looking for the easiest of objects, Shiny things, the fledgling would asionally dip down to a mere 5 feet above the ground, only to realize it was just the sun glinting off a rock or something like that.


    Given the magnitude of her task, by the time her third and fourthps began, Nyria had divided up portions of the mountain into quadrants. When given a smaller area to search, along with her Dynamic Vision, that was when she finally caught sight of interesting things.


    A generalized exnation of her early findings would be as follows: Oddly shaped rocks on the eastern face, patchy snowless parts on the northern face, and, of course, arge forest that covered the west and southern sides of the mountain.


    The longer she circled the mountain, the clearer the picture of her new home was, as she began memorizing everything from the way certain portions of the mountain were shaped down to the fact there were four different species of trees in the forest, two of which seemed to be fruit-bearing ones too!


    ''AND THEY''RE SUPER TASTY! I picked one for you and big sister, but they''re with my pile next to the ce I entered the Cavern.'' Nyria chirped while wagging her head side to side as they approached the end of the trail leading to the Cavern.


    "Haha, well, I thank you in advance and can''t wait to try it out then," enjoying his bonding with Nyria, Aoni couldn''t help but realize that if they came upon the entrance to the cave and found a pile of trinkets Gathered up, it meant that she had located the tunnel he and cia used. Still, as luck would have it when they reached the Floof-Dug-Tunnel, there was no pile.


    That wasn''t all either; from what he could tell, it was an entirely new area to Nyria, who, although having ventured a good portion of the mountain, hadn''te up this high yet, and before being called out to by Aoni, was still exploring a bit closer to the Barrier.


    ''Hm, given herck of recollection, she''s found one of the many exits, and it''s further down the mountain, too; that''s not good. Once the barrier drops, the enemy will have near immediate ess to the Cavern, and unless we block those off or set up countermeasures, it will be our loss before we even know what hit us.'' Walking forward into the snow tunnel that had been forcefully widened to amodate his height, Aoni brought Nyria into the entrance he and cia had been using for over a week now.


    "Okay, now it''s up to you, get a good view from above and try to figure out if it''s the same ce you were in before; even if it is, don''t worry, that just means we have a bit more work to do, PLUS, you can totally go pick up your pile, and I can help carry it back home." Giving Nyria a couple of pats on her wing, Aoni gave her clear instructions and watched as she jumped off his shoulder and flew away with a happy CHEE.

 Chapter 116 The Second Reward Received (1)

    Lean yet powerful muscle packed into ces that were once baby fat, lustrous, thick fur the color of snow, razor-sharp extendable ws, teeth big enough to rip chunks out of flesh like a shark, and a massive size upgrade, those were the physical changes cia had experienced.


    And yes, one of the first things Aoni checked was whether or not his floof could extend and retract her ws, something which, after ying with her paw, pressing on the pads until she reacted, he was able to train her how to do.


    Her once cute, tiny snout had extended out slightly, causing her chimpish features to change drastically more down the path of a pr bear than an ape species.


    Overall, she had merely aged up, grown slightly, and had her features mature, or at least on a surface level, that is.


    Apart from getting a new passive, one shared with Nyria, Artic Stamina, Aoni could feel the Energia circting through both his summons, so much so that he was able topletely understand that in a fight, as he was, there was ZERO chance he could take either of them head-on.


    ---


    "Okay, okay, calm down, cia, get off me already, hahaha, unless you don''t want your reward!" covering his head with both arms as the roughhousing continued; Aoni begged for mercy.


    Unsurprisingly, his words actually got through to the floof because before the Lad could take his next breath, cia dashed away and sat all proper¡­er¡­as proper as she was capable of, in front of him and a stunned Nyria.


    "Chee¡­ck¡­"


    ''I think that worked¡­'' With a chee and cking sound from her beak, Nyria replied with a hint of nervousness in her voice, hopped to the side, and waited for her Lord to give themand.


    Whatmand, you may ask? Of course, it was the one to fetch cia''s bed; since she was leagues faster than him, it was a no-brainer that while Aoni would keep cia''s attention, it would be her job to fetch the bed.


    The two of them had discussed this situation multiple times, and no matter what scenario they came up with, it always ended with a hyper cia either flinging the bed around like a toy because she didn''t understand its purpose or diving face first and destroying it.


    Either option wasn''t exactly going to bode well because the instant the floof realized her little sister had a bed too and that it hadn''t been destroyed, well¡­one plus one = a depressed nestless Nyria.


    Ignoring his birb''s actions so as not to draw the floof''s attention to Nyria, Aoni scooted forward and sat in front of cia while speaking softly, "Now listen carefully, cia; you were a brave girl earlier, and now you need to be obedient too. I want you to close your eyes and keep them closed until you hear me tell you to open them, okay?"


    "Closee¡­open when I say to open; that way, you can get your reward, Closeeee¡­."


    Pointing to his face and emting the process he wanted the floof to execute, Aoni exined it slowly as per his habit and waspletely shocked when he opened his eyes and found a paw striking down into his face.@@novelbin@@


    Bap


    *Blink*


    In that instant, time seemed to stand still as shock spread across the Lad''s face, and a second paw descended.


    Bap


    *blink blink* Stay tuned with My Virtual Library Empire


    Then, a third.


    Bap


    "OI, WHY DO YOU KEEP HITTING ME!" Aoni cried while fighting back the tears brought about by catching another nose hit.


    Bap


    "Chee¡­."


    "Gao gaoo, GAOOO! HuFF!" getting one more bap in on her Lord before turning to look at her little Sister, cia spoke something in hernguage, causing Aoni, who, still shocked at how ruthless his floof was acting, to look to the birb for answers.


    ''She says *she no baby, she gets it*¡­.just like that,'' Nyria asked as she too looked on in surprise at the newfound intelligence of her sister.


    Mind you; even Nyria struggled a bit to understand what she was saying, considering it was broken and not really coherent; however, it was a far cry from what her conversations with the floof had been like some days ago.


    On an instinctual level, they were able to understand each other''s sounds and the cadences of their differentnguages, much like how if someone gestures a certain way, another person can follow along, but this time, there was literal meaning behind the Gaos, and not simple intent.


    From what Nyria could tell, the only difference between how she spoke to Aoni and her conversations with her big sister was the fact that cia still couldn''t use words properly or utilize the LoS in the way she did.


    "She WHAT NOW!" Looking between the haughty expression on his beloved floof''s face as she puffed out her chest to the stunned look in Nyria''s eyes, Aoni felt those tears that were triggered by getting bapped in the nose sting a bit more than they probably should.


    "They grow up so fast¡­.*Sniffle*," wanting nothing more than to scoop up his floof and cuddle her the way he always did, Aoni inhaled deeply and leaned forward to hug cia¡­only to¡­


    BAP!


    Get bapped again.


    "Gao, OoO GaOOOooOOOoo," Knowing that Nyria could act like a trantor of sorts, even though she didn''t fully understand the concept herself, cia, whose intelligence level was that of a 3-4-year-old child now, turned to look at her little sister while speaking for a second time.


    ''She wants to know why weird, act¡­uh¡­I think¡­'' Opening and closing her mouth a few times, Nyria did her best to decipher what was being said and trante it in a way that her Lord could understand.


    "My little cia has entered her rebellious phase already; my heart is breaking," taking note of what was said and reaching out to his LoS connection with the floof, Aoni instantly got an idea of her intelligence level, as now instead of vague shapes and colors, thoughts were beginning to form, much like what he understood happened with young children when they be cognizant of the world.

 Chapter 119 The Final 12 Days (2)

    -11 Days Until the Barrier Drops -


    There''s amon saying back on Terra that falling into a routine is a telltale sign of someone mediocre. Yet, ever since he arrived in Genovia, Aoni has proven that saying to be nothing but false.


    Then again, a lot of what he does could be considered training and habituation for his summons. If he keeps a schedule, they, too, will learn how to do it, and such is how productivity is built from the ground up.


    From the moment he could form coherent thoughts and found out about Traveler''s, the Lad had already made up his mind on how he would train and grow alongside his summons, treating them as family, which, in the eyes of many, was considered extremely ineffective.@@novelbin@@


    Sure, some cases proved that to be incorrect, as some of the most powerful and Highly Acimed Travelers were best friends or family with their summons; however, for every one of those that think that way, dozens upon dozens see whateveres out of the Flume as a means to achieve something, a tool, or worse yet, ves.


    As if that wasn''t bad enough, there were plenty of propaganda examples detailing each of the many different methods of training and growing summons.


    Anime showing newly awakened Travelers going on adventures with their summons and living heartwarming lives were just as abundant as ones where they practically abused the shit out of their subjects, running them until they break, or worse, die.


    Aoni, for one, abhorred the thought of something ever happening to his beloved floof and newly summoned birb, and that was why he treated them like little siblings.


    And¡­it was also why, even with only 11 days remaining until all hell breaks loose on the mountain and the barrier copses, he still hadn''t pushed them into a straightforward form ofbat training.


    Instead, he gave each of them little tasks toplete, all the way down to his structured routines, which revolved around critical thinking and active listening.


    Thest thing he wanted was to put either of them in a position where they would have zero idea how to react to a given situation.


    For example, sending Nyria out under the guise of exploration was a covert way of training her to be a scout. With her flight and Dynamic Vision, it would be extremely simple for the birb to notice movement and approaching enemies.


    Not to mention, her little habit of collecting trinkets would one day end up yielding real results in the form of valuable materials.


    However, with cia, things were a tad bit different.


    Due to herck of intelligence whenpared to her little sister, one of the most challenging things Aoni dealt with was keeping her on task.


    So the easiest way he''d found to do so was to send her out on hunts; in this way, although she''d be fighting off instinct alone and wouldn''t have any real skill in a fight, she would still obtain valuable experience that could potentially aid her in life or death situations.


    That being the case, using the carrot stick model, he''d essentially tricked the floof into training by using whatever she brought back as a reward, IE, food.


    Creakkkk creakkkk


    Read new adventures at My Virtual Library Empire


    Standing in the mouth of the cave and swinging the newly attached door back and forth to test its range of motion, Aoni considered the many different ways he could incorporate his knowledge into fun and intuitive forms of learning.


    ''While I would like to believe cia will be the harder one to convince, the more difficult of the two will be Nyria, given her trauma.'' He mused after setting up a simple hooktch locking mechanism to keep the door closed and seal off the cave from the elements.


    ''Both of them are 2-Starbat-oriented summons, so technically, they should be able to shred their way through a meat grinder of 1-Star or lower opponents, but between cia''s bubbly personality and the nervous, shy one of Nyria, I don''t really see either of them fighting tooth and nail.''


    Stepping away from the cave and massaging his temples, Aoni tried spotting Nyria as she flew around the mountain but came up empty.


    ''I really can''t see a bright side this time; she''s too scared to venture too close to the barrier, and as such, the type and strength of enemies waiting for us is still unknown. Then again, I can''t me her for that either.''


    ''Even so, what is my best course of action here¡­'' observing the situation of the camp, the Lad''s brain was running at maximum capacity because he knew that no matter what happened in his territory, his return to Terra in 15 days was a mandatory thing.


    Although he hadn''t thought about it much, there would be dire consequences if he didn''t immediately return the second it was allowed.


    The reason was the final step of connecting his Flume to the World of Terra, and if he didn''t do it as soon as possible, the very real threat had nothing to do with what would happen to his family; no, it was something much worse.


    Any traveler who didn''t return to Terra within a certain period would experience a set of symptoms that would inevitably result in their termination.


    Yeah, DEATH.


    How, you may ask? Well, that is not entirely certain; however, the running theory is that the first time someone enters the Flume, it''s considered a partial activation of their Artifact.


    As such, a one-way channel to the World of Genovia is formed, and the flow of Energia is centralized in one location; however, what happens if a river is suddenly dammed up? Surely, it will eventually burst, right?


    Well, it''s the same thing with Flumes; the return trip back is essentially a means to finalize the channel one takes when traveling; not only that, but the coordinates to a Lord''s territory be locked in at that point.


    Think of it as the final stamp on a document.


    As for the Symptoms mentioned, well, that''s easy; think of it as a nuclear reactor bursting; it floods out a shit ton of radiation, killing everything around it slowly, until finally the Flume is destroyed, along with killing off those attached to it.


    Mind you, this is also the only time that a Flume''s destruction results in the death of the Lord in control of it.


    Thus, it was vitally important that Aoni returned as soon as he could.

 Chapter 122 The Final 12 Days (5)

    - 4 Days Until the Barrier Drops ¨C


    Standing atop his newly minted 15-foot-tall, five-foot-deep Rampart, Aoni gazed out into the distance as a bitter wind swept past, jostling his hair and the fur of his coat, bringing along aforting chill and light dusting of snow.


    As his eyes scanned the horizon, an unmissable shimmer rippling across the material, constructing the Rampart was a clear indication of it having reached the Full-Star Step.


    Four more days had passed since he''d upgraded his wall to 2-Star, and given its current size, he could honestly say thatpared to its previous stature, it now stood as imposing as a castle wall in his eyes.


    Upon reaching the Full Star Step of the first Star, it had expanded inward, thickening the density of the wall by nearly 2 feet, along with changing the color from the standard stone he had gathered into something much harder to break through.


    Explore more stories with My Virtual Library Empire


    From Mountainstone to an offshoot of Marble, it hade quite a long way with the single addition of a Star, but after reaching the end of the Second Star, the once basic rock forming the construction of his Rampart had be true te.


    That wasn''t all either; the material change was but one of many changes that came along with the two Stage Upgrade¡­


    1: Colonial testone Rampart


    Defense: F+


    Durability: F+


    Grade: ¡ï¡ï


    Effect:


    1: Minor: Damage Reflection


    2: Minor: Energia Barrier of Warding


    Two new effects were generated, surprisingly enough, both of which were fairly self-exnatory. The first, Minor-Damage Reflection, was a shielding effect, wherein if something attacked the wall, there would be a slight amount of damage redirected toward the attacker in question.


    As great of an effect as that was, the second one was something Aoni had desperately required: Minor- Energia Barrier of Warding. Upon activation of this effect, a thin Energia membrane would cover the open area above the Rampart, sealing off the entirety of the camp like a roof.


    This barrier, which required an energy source or battery of sorts, had equal durability and defense to the Rampart itself. It would protectively enclose the camp, ensuring that attacks from above or intruders were stopped from entering the space Aoni and his summons called home.


    However, powering these two effects was far different from having them in the first ce. It had taken him nearly a full day to figure out how to activate them, but as it turns out, when the Rampart expanded inward, encroaching on the space of the camp, a small nodule appeared near the gate resembling a lidded box.


    All one had to do was pop the lid and dump some Energia Stones inside, then activate it by using a small burst of internalized Energia, and just like that, the two effects could be activated.


    Of course, given the Rampart''s low Grade, it wasn''t possible to activate the two effects separately, so all you could do was turn both on or both off by applying a light burst of Energia.


    Even so, it was more than enough, and given the fact that they had arge stock of Energia Crystals in the Cavern, the only thing that remained after learning how to turn it all on was figuring out the maintenance costs, IE, how long a single crystal would take to burn.


    Some testing proved that activating the effects would cost two crystals, then 1 per minute of activation after that fact.


    In other words, it was a money sink.


    Then again, since it was sustainable due to how many low-grade Crystals could be found in the Cavern, Aoni simply shrugged it off and started up a new "Game" with his summons.@@novelbin@@


    Every day, for 2-3 hours, the three of them would venture into the Cavern where Aoni and cia would gather Energia Crystals before handing them over to Delivery Lady Nyria, whose job it was to drop them off in arge chest back at camp.


    Like this, the group had amassed an astronomical supply of Low-Grade Crystals, enough to be considered a small fortune, but more importantly, enough to give his summons and self a fighting chance when the barrier dropped.


    For Four days, Aoni had toiled, trained not only his body but his Energia Maniption, and pushed himself to the absolute limit of exhaustion, crafting, building, mining, gathering materials, you name it, and he would only stop to rest for meals and sleep at the end of the day.


    Now, with time running thin and nearly all his preparationsplete, there was only one thing left to do.


    Turning his eyes towards his Traveler''s disy, Aoni knew there weren''t any other options left other than to increase his stats, and that thought sent a shiver several times colder than the brisk wind through his body.


    To say he was scared would be quite the understatement because the memories of his previous upgrades had left a mental scar on his psyche deeper than any other experience in his life.


    Sometimes,te at night, he would have nightmares about helplessly thrashing around on the ground, blood pouring out of him, and lightning coursing through every square inch of his body.


    It was damning, to say the least, yet even if this was the case, the Lad understood that ying turtle would only work for a short amount of time. He needed power, he needed the ability to fight back, and if he wanted to ensure the lives of his summons, there was no better option than adding points.


    With that thought in mind, Aoni waited for Nyria and cia to return to the camp before sitting them down by the fire and exining what was going to happen.


    At first, their reaction was as expected.


    cia had long since told her little sister about what happened whenever their Lord added points to himself, and as best as her intelligence allowed, she conveyed how bad things were going to be.


    Not because she wanted to frighten the birb but more because she wanted to prepare Nyria for what Aoni would be doing.


    So, the moment that Aoni called the little meeting and told them his n, both the summons were extremely nervous and scared for the safety of their beloved brother.

 Chapter 124 No Gain, without Pain (1)

    Traveler''s Disy


    ---


    Aoni Thurston


    Age: 16


    Potential: Two Star/F+ Rank (?)


    Rank: -F


    ---


    Attribute Grade: ¡ï?


    Attribute: Progression


    Progress Points: 442.78


    ---


    Statistics


    Attack: F- (?)


    Defense: F- (?)


    Speed: F- (?)


    Energia: D-


    Elementalized Energia: 10 % Ice


    ---


    Passives


    Cold Resistance: F+


    Pain Resistance: F+


    Swordsmanship: G+ (?)


    Dual Swordsmanship: G- (?)


    Ice Maniption: G


    Energia Maniption: F (?)


    Pocket Dimension (Inventory): G-


    Scanning his avable upgrades from top to bottom, Aoni couldn''t help but shudder.


    ''Both of my potentials, Attack, Defense, and Speed, setting aside the proven effect on my body caused by increasing my physical stats, my potential is a bit different.'' Thinking back to thest time he abused¡­ upgraded his Rank potential, Aoni fully understood that it would trigger the descent of that mysterious yet hot pressure.


    ''The only problem is, I don''t know if I have enough points left to boost up to E+; however, since the Grade of my Attribute seems to be directly tied to how high I can raise the stats of my Summons, it''s definitely not something I can neglect.''


    ''On the upside, I already know that increasing my stats isn''t too expensive, well, at leastpared to boosting something like my crafted items. It was costing me over a hundred points to get through the F-Rank, but I''ve never spent more than like 20 points on a singr stat upgrade.'' Tilting his head to the side, Aoni slowly opened his eyes and noticed that cia already had one of the fruits in her hand, and was sitting on the log, tensed up, ready to spring forward.


    That made him chuckle slightly, lightening the mood a bit before he nodded at them and gave a final warning.


    "The first thing I n on doing will most likely trigger the pressure. It''s going to heat up here, so you may want to get ready to move back a bit."


    "Gao,"


    "Chee,"


    ''Good luck, brother. Don''t worry, sister, and I know what to do.'' Although her mind was a storm of emotions, Nyria still offered her equivalent of a smile to the Lad, causing him to return it with one of his own and then take a deep breath in.


    *Inhale.*


    *Exhale.*


    ''Upgrade my Potential rank by one step.''


    | User''s potential Rank is at its current maximum |


    ''Huh?'' confused as hell by the sudden pop-up, Aoni''s face scrunched up before he remembered something. In the case of articles with two effects, just because something had an arrow beside it didn''t necessarily mean it could be upgraded.


    The only other example the Lad could draw from was in his Summon''s disy, the fact that even when he reached the stack max on his Avable summons, the Arrow hadn''t vanished because there was still the Total summons which could be added to.


    ''Fine, fine, increase the Potential of my Attribute.''


    | Increasing Attribute Potential From 2 Star to 3 Stars |


    | Progress Points have been Deducted |


    | Attribute Potential has reached its Current Maximum |


    | 50 pp Earned |


    As expected, along with the spam of notifications, a column of pressure descended from the sky, expanding out from Aoni''s body in a circle roughly 5 feet in diameter.


    Having gone through this several times now, the Lad knew what to expect, and instead of trying to fight against the force bearing down on his entire being, the Lad simply tilted his eyes up to observe his Summons.


    cia, although trembling immensely and with a wild look in her eyes, stood her ground, fruit in her mouth and poised, ready to rush forward.


    Meanwhile, Nyria, who was seeing this for the first time, had retreated practically to the opposite side of the camp and had her back pressed firmly against the wall.


    ''Br¡­brother¡­brother¡­.'' She whimpered, terrified at what she was seeing. She had fully believed that after being warned several times and having had things exined to her, she''d be able to stand on guard, just like her sister; however, Nyria was quickly proven wrong.


    When the pressure descended, a primal fear coursed through the birb''s mind, causing her instincts to scream "FLEE!" because she felt as if there were a giant monster staring directly through her, making her think that if she so much as moved a millimeter, she''d be killed on the spot.


    Luckily, and as it always had in the past, the pressure vanished just as quickly as it appeared, and with a loud HUFF, Aoni copsed forward like a marite whose strings had been cut.


    Catching himself by bracing his hands on his knees, the Lad sat there for about a minute, sweating and panting as if he''d just run a mile.


    "That shit never gets easier," thinking aloud and looking down at his hands, Aoni couldn''t quite figure out WHAT had changed, but this time, there was something different about his body.


    | A small portion of the User''s Attribute has been Unlocked, allowing for a partial awakening of 3rd Star Benefits. |


    | Current Potential Rank Maximum has been increased by One Stage |@@novelbin@@


    *Blink* *Blink* *Blink* *Blink*


    ''Abbababa, what now?'' blinking several times as he babbled mentally, Aoni''s eyes flicked between the words on his AN and his Traveler''s disy, and the first thing he noticed was that the Arrow, which should have vanished upon upgrading his Attribute''s potential, was still there.


    ''Hold¡­.what in the hell does that even mean? What the heck is a partial awakening of benefits? How is that possible?''


    Find your next adventure on My Virtual Library Empire


    | It shouldn''t be; however, it has been determined that the User''s Progress will be slowed immensely given the current restrictions presented by the User''s Attribute; as such, a one-time allotment has been allowed |


    ''THAT DOESN''T ANSWER MY FUCKING QUESTION YOU USELESS, UGHHHHHHHH!'' pping his thighs with a muted sound thanks to his hide pants, Aoni straightened his back while furiously inhaling through his nose and exhaling out his mouth.


    | All will be revealed in time; stop being impatient and continue progressing; only then will you obtain the answers you seek |


    ''Get that cryptic bullshit out of my face,'' swatting at the air as if the window was a bug, Aoni huffed one more time before checking his points and seeing the upgrade had cost him 100 points but yielded 50 in return.


    "ooOo, gao Oooo," *oh great, he''s doing it again.*


    "ck¡­." *uh-huh*


    "gaoo, gaooo?" *does that mean hes not hungry or hot?''


    "Che¡­eee." *I¡­think so?*


    "Hm? What are you two chattering about over there?" raising an eyebrow since they''d drawn his attention, Aoni asked shamelessly.


    ''Nothing, brother, we are just wondering if you are alright.'' Nyria replied, but the way her eyes darted side to side spoke another story altogether.

 Chapter 127 No Gain, Without Pain (4)

    "GAAHHHHh AHHHHHHHH Ahhh¡­hhh.., hah hah, hah,"


    The deafening roar released by Aoni echoed in the distant mountain range for an untold distance; however, the Lad in question, whoy covered in a mixture of unknown and known body fluids, was painted in grey, red, clear, and yellow.


    The Pain may have left; however, the mental anguish caused by this most traumatic incident was more than enough for him to roll over on his side and vomit whatever contents of his stomach remained, which, in this case, amounted to bile and acid.


    ''Horrible, this shit is horrible,'' retching time and time again until nothing remained, the Lad curled his knees to his chest and shivered, causing his summons to take it as a sign and rush to his aid.


    cia immediately patted his back, using a strange technique even though she had no idea where it came from, while Nyria gently nudged one of the turd-shaped nutrition bars toward her Lord''s mouth.


    "This¡­heh, sucks¡­so¡­much," Aoni said with a wry smile as he took small bites of the gross bar he''d made.


    "Gao, gao" *there there,*


    "cheeee..eee, click,"


    ''That was horrible, brother; this happens every time you add points to yourself?'' Hesitation and worry were evident in Nyria''s tone as she took some snow, allowed it to melt, and then used her beak like a cup to pour cold water over Aoni''s skin to try and clear it of gunk.


    "Yeah, foooooo," exhaling softly yet shakily, Aoni weakly nodded his head before continuing.


    "Defense is always the worst; thankfully, you guys only get sleepy and hibernate for a few days, but this is my burden to bear; speed and Attack are rough, but they mostly force my body to exert itself to the point that it simtes years of training in a short period." Feeling a little better, thanks to the pawing of cia on his back and the cool water trickling on his head and shoulders, Aoni found enough strength to sit up and speak.


    "As for defense, well, you guys saw, it''s like I''m being attacked on all sides with fatal blows and then healed." With some effort and stumbling around like a baby deer, Aoni meandered toward the open gate with the aid of his summons before finding arge snowbank to dive head-first into.


    Although the pain had subsided the moment his upgrade finished, he still felt like shit; everything was sore, but that was something a few minutes surrounded by snow easily fixed.


    Soon enough, Aoni was back on his feet and begrudgingly sitting down in the same spot as before, with his Traveler''s disy open in front of his face.


    ''Tsk, all that and not a single bump to my Pain Resistance, annoying. Hm, 18.5 points, yet I got 10 back; that''s not a bad deal for the shit I went through; regardless, if that''s the case, I should have no issue reaching, at the very least, E- in everything.


    "Let''s get this started up again, No Gain, without Pain," Saying that aloud drew a scared reaction from his summons, but Aoni didn''t have enough time to pay attention to them because the next wave of agony had already begun.


    | Increasing Defense from F to F+ |


    | 20 pp Earned |


    | Increasing Defense from F+ to E- |


    | 39.375 pp Earned |


    Going through Back-to-back upgrades was absolutely miserable, especially when Aoni realized that the duration of his torture seemed to extend with each Step, that is, until thest when he broke through into the E-Rank.


    Five hours of intense physical torture, which, instead of the usual abuse, caused his body to be subjected to simted acid baths and burn damage, was the worst thing imaginable.


    cia and Nyria, unable to watch at that point, both emptied their stomachs due to the immense stench emanating from Aoni''s body, resembling the worst kind of decay when the simted bath happened, followed by an atrocious foul burning smell when he hit the burning phase.


    It was simply too much for their poor tummies to handle, and although they wished to aid their Lord, subconsciously, they understood there wasn''t much they could do to ease his pain.@@novelbin@@


    Sure enough, when the E- upgrade concluded, cia was the first to make a move. Dashing forward with two fruits in hand, she bit into them with surprising dexterity before smearing the contents all over Aoni''s exposed flesh and shoving the pit down his mouth.


    Meanwhile, vaguely aware of the Floof''s actions, the Lad swallowed the hard-candy-sized fruit pit and was brought a small amount of relief.


    The only silver lining through this process was the fact that along with the new damage and previous torture sessions, Aoni''s Pain Resistance, which had been stuck at F+, broke into the E-Rank before skyrocketing to its current Maximum of E+.


    With this increase in his passive, the pain was EVER SO SLIGHTLY more tolerable. That is, if you could callparing getting a fingernail pulled off and having your whole hand ripped away from your wrist slightly more bearable.


    ---


    Having been at it all day and well into the night, Aoni decided to call it after reaching E-, and after a third snow bath, he half walked, half got dragged by cia, toward his bed and passed out for the night, leaving his summons to worry about their own dinner.


    "gao?" *food?*


    Enjoy exclusive adventures from My Virtual Library Empire


    Looking at her little sister questioningly, cia asked, but when she saw the look on Nyria''s face, the floof decided it was probably best to forgo dinner for the night; after all, they had tried eating lunch earlier in the day but lost it all when Aoni''s Defense broke through into the E-Rank.


    "Chee, chee ck," *We need to go clean up outside; brother appreciates small things like that.*


    Tossing a nce at her sleeping Lord, Nyria lightly clicked her beak before looking down at the ground and thinking, then turning to face the door to the cave.


    "Gao, gaoo," *True, he does,*


    With that said, the pair headed outside and, while holding their breath, used cia''s snow shovel to clear away the sludge left behind after the upgrade session.


    Then, since she was the only one who could get rid of it, Nyria reluctantly picked up one of the empty chests Aoni had crafted that they had filled with the sludge and took it to the edge of the barrier before throwing it outside.

 Chapter 131 Final Upgrades Before The Barrier Comes Down

    The process of rapidly strengthening his stats was somewhat grueling but also extremely time-consuming; with only a couple of days remaining, Aoni found himself hoping that all of the preparations he had made in the days following his Multi-Summon were going to be enough to survive what came next.


    When Aoni finished upgrading his Attack stat and bathed, he noticed that it was around mid-day, giving him plenty of time to move on to the next few sessions, which revolved around his Speed Stat. Much like how the pain was manageable with his Attack Stat, Speed wasn''t much different.


    Sure, it was agonizing to an extent. Still, the worst part about it was how itchy Aoni felt during the process, as not only were the parts of his brain that controlled fast actions, as well as reflexes, zapped by some type of electricity, but his joints and ligaments were strained beyond belief, twisting and snapping like he was made of stic.


    Then there were his lungs, heart, and other vital organs within his circtory system, everything that revolved around stamina and endurance.


    Overall, that process, like his attack stat,sted around nine and a half to 10 hours.


    ---


    Copsed on the floor, facing the starry sky and suffering asional spasms, Aoni only had a single eye open and focused on his Traveler''s Disy.


    Traveler''s Disy


    ---


    Aoni Thurston


    Age: 16


    Potential: Three Star/E+ Rank


    Rank: E-


    ---


    Attribute Grade: ¡ï?


    Attribute: Progression


    Progress Points: 72.9


    ---


    Statistics:


    Attack: E- (?)


    Defense: E- (?)


    Speed: E- (?)


    Energia: D-


    Elementalized Energia: 10 % Ice


    ---


    Passives:


    Cold Resistance: F+ (?)


    Pain Resistance: E+


    Swordsmanship: G+ (?)


    Dual Swordsmanship: G- (?)


    Ice Maniption: G


    Energia Maniption: F (?)


    Pocket Dimension (Inventory): G-


    ---


    All three of his Basic Stats had broken through to the E-Rank, and as the Lad''s eyes roamed around the floating ethereal pannel, he couldn''t stop his pupil from constricting upon seeing how few points he had remaining.


    From almost 1500 points down to a poor man''s 72, it was a radical drop off, and to be honest, Aoni felt like crying.


    ''All that work, all that effort, and I have barely anything to show for it,'' covering his face with a sweaty arm crusted with blood and other dried fluids, he tried not to let his disappointment show in front of the two sitting not far away.


    From start to finish, Nyria and cia had been by his side, being the perfect cross between attendants and medics as they applied herbs and fruit juice and force-fed him, so thest thing he wanted to do was make them believe they weren''t good enough.


    After all, the problem was his broken-ass Attribute, not his adorable floof and birb.


    To make matters worse, the fact that his stupid Progression Attribute had yet to reach the Outer-Fill Step was a problem as well.


    ''The quest must have changed; after boosting my stats and those of my Summons, along with all the crafting I''d done, I thought for sure I could have gotten to the point where I earned my Third Star¡­but no. I couldn''t even hit OF step.''


    Dropping his arm off his face and slowly sitting up, Aoni noticed that apart from the crackling fire in the pit and the stars above, it was pitch ck out, meaning well past midnight, since the NightCelest (Moon) was nowhere to be seen.


    **Authors Note: I haven''t mentioned this before, but the Sun, of which there are more than one, is named DayCelest, and the Moon is the NightCelest. They have individual names and colors, but that will be exined in future chapters**


    "Let''s get me cleaned up and then head to bed, guys; that''s everything for my Add Points session. I need one more cold bath¡­"


    "OOoooOO GAOOO~" Before Aoni could finish hisst statement, cia reacted like a cat whose tail was smashed by a book and, with fur sticking up, entered furry missile mode, disappearing from the camp and into the safety of her bed, leaving Aoni pinching the brim of his nose and Nyria sighing.


    "Whatever, I''m too tired to fight her this time," Aoni said with an exhausted expression.


    Earlier in the day, after hisst Attack Upgrade, he and Nyria had tried corralling cia and forcing her to take a bath, but all that did was rile the floof up, as she immediately thought it to be a game.


    After all, the Lad hadn''t explicitly said the B-word this time, so she had no clue at that moment what his n was.


    To her, it was ytime after a hard day''s work, and as it''s well known by now, cia LOVVVESSS ytime.


    Your next read awaits at My Virtual Library Empire


    Running around the camp for over an hour, the pair of Lord and Birb finally cornered the floof and dragged her dumb self outside the Rampart before burying the dork in snow and scrubbing all the grime and leftover fruit juice off her fur.


    Needless to say, it didn''t go over well, and now, after every upgrade wasplete, cia would be extremely skittish, as if sensing she was about to be dragged off for another bath.


    ---


    Twenty minutester, a tired Nyria and Aoni closed the cave door, locked up, added more wood to the firece, and copsed into their respective Bed/Nests.@@novelbin@@


    It had been a long couple of days, and they were far more exhausted than a certain floof who refused to skip nap time ever.


    "Goodnight, cia, and Nyria. Sleep well, you two," Aoni said with a big yawn as he pulled his hide skin nket up to his chin and closed his eyes.


    "gaooooo,"


    "chhhheee, click,"


    ''Goodnight, brother, rest well.''


    The two summons wishing him goodnight in their unique ways brought a smile to Aoni''s lips as he tried his best not to think about theing chaos.


    With only two more days remaining, his final upgrades areplete. All that is left is to gather enough food tost them some time, set some traps up around the base of the tform, and go through his final checklist.


    While it may seem simple, there was far too much for Aoni to remember everything, and as such, he''d made a full two-page checklist of what remained.


    The Novel will be updated first on this website. Come back and


    continue reading tomorrow, everyone!