All done

But Kai frowned after that thought left his mind.

The new knowledge part was slightly confusing. He didn't really feel all that different considering that his soul was now C rank. Was there meant to be some important change in his understanding of souls?

Still, it's not like all knowledge came in a mental form. There had to be plenty of people who had instinctual knowledge of things, not even having to properly think before knowing something. Maybe that's what the system meant.

But an in depth amount of knowledge to the working of souls that can be applied in various fields of expertise? Now the system was definitely just making stuff up.

Kai felt like there was absolutely nothing that had changed about him. He nearly the exact same, the only minor change being that he felt stronger with everything he had gained.

But even if he was still suffering some minor backlash from allowing Failure to posses him, he was still the same Kai.

At least, there was a minor change, just Kai hadn't realised it.

Umbra shifted slightly from her slumber and looked up at Kai, letting out a small whine. Kai had come to learn that she done this whenever she wanted him to set up a telepathic connection.

"Master, your eyes look cool now."

Kai frowned slightly.

"My eyes? Why, are they different?"

Kai was stumped. It's not like he could check considering that there was no mirror in the white room.

Actually, that was a lie, after all that time spent in the white room previously Kai had gotten used to using other things to look at himself, be it water or what he was about to do.

Leaning down towards Umbra, Kai looked at himself through the reflection in her eyes and let out a:

"Huh..."

In both of Kai's eyes, inside his iris, were a single dot, one in each eye.

Sadly, even though he could see the dot, he could not make out what colour it actually was.

Is this because of my bloodline?

It did seem a little random that a dot appeared in his eyes after awakening his bloodline, but it's not like it was the most far fetched thing Kai had seen or heard.

As for what the dot meant, Kai would have to wait to find out, preferably after he looked at it through a mirror.

So with that sorted out, Kai got back to his previous train of thought.

What areas of expertise in souls even was there?

His original creation, Statshifting, could definitely be classified as one, a rare one at that considering he was the only one who could do it.

Wait...

Actually, now that Kai thought about it, maybe that's what the system meant by an in depth knowledge to the working of souls.

Many had attempted to Statshift before Kai, yet none were able to succeed, why was that?

For starters, Statshifting could also just be part of the unknown power that had been mentioned in the description of his bloodline, so maybe it was a mix of Statshifting and his dodgy future sight.

Or, the knowledge that Kai innately knew was far more valuable than he originally imagined it was. If it was able to pull through and create an all original class, then imagine the possibilities of what he could accomplish if he applied himself to something else.

Statshifting was just one thing he could do with his soul. What if he were to delve deeper, to find his very being and alter what his skills did or even what his innate ability or bloodline did.

Of course, there was absolutely no way that the current Kai would be able to do that, even he knew how crazy that idea sounded considering that no one was even able to Statshift before him.

But still... It was a thought for the distant future, but it wasn't one that Kai would forget.

And the final aspect of his new bloodline was a twenty percent boost to all soul related abilities.

If Kai were to look at it, he had four soul related skills. Soul Sense, Soul Flame, Soulcery and Soul Link. If each of these were to get a twenty percent boost whenever used, then just imagine all the possibilities.

If he could boost his Soul Sense by twenty percent, then he would inadvertently be boosting his strange future sight by some degree. Twenty percent was not a small multiplier after all.

Soul Link was an enigma as Kai had only just received the skill and wasn't really sure how it worked or if a twenty percent boost could even affect it, considering the way the skill worked was by sharing stats and skills between two beings.

Soulcery, that one was fairly obvious. It just increased Kai's mastery of souls and would make it easier to repair or tinker with his soul.

And Soul Flame...

Oh.

It was then that Kai realised how exactly the twenty percent boost worked for Soul Flame.

Thirty seemed like a bit of a random number to boost all of his stats by after the skill evolved, and it was, considering that wasn't how much the skill was meant to boost them by.

No, in reality, the skill only boosted each stat by twenty-five, which was by no means a small upgrade, but the twenty percent boost pushed that number up to thirty per stat.

But there was another idea that popped into Kai's mind.

Since whenever Kai upgraded his soul the amount of Mana it gave got bigger, does that mean that Mana and ones soul are linked together?

If so, since Kai's innate ability was focused on Mana and allowed him to borrow the power of otherworldly creatures, would the twenty percent boost affect his innate ability?

There was a high possibility that it would, but what exactly would it boost by twenty percent.

The stats he gained upon transformation? The amount of time he could stay fused for? How strong the fusion was in general? Or maybe even all of those combined?

Of course, Kai could obviously just test it by fusing with Umbra, but the pitch black wolf was slumbering softly by his side, so he would feel guilty if he woke his precious familiar up just for that.

Sighing, Kai leaned back onto the mattress beside Umbra and wrapped an arm around the much larger wolf like he was holding an oversized teddy bear.

Using her soft and silky fur as a pillow, Kai stared blankly at the wall across from him and blinked.

What now?

Indeed, what now was the question to be asking.

Kai still had roughly five days to himself in the white room, meaning he had five more days before his life could potentially change for better or for worse.

He would sleep a lot, obviously, considering that he had been using a tree root and a pile of grass as a makeshift pillow and bed for the last month.

Statshifting was another must, Kai wanted himself to be fully prepared for whatever was to come, so he had to adjust his stats to do that.

He also wanted to experiment with Soulcery a little. He inwardly knew that he wasn't using the skill to its full abilities. He wasn't sure if he knew that because of a gut feeling or it was something to do with the apparent on knowledge on souls he had, but Kai knew he had to tweak the way he was using that skill.

Kai also wanted to examine Life Eater, that hideous blade he had received for killing that ant like abomination. He knew that he definitely wasn't going crazy when he thought he felt it tremble in his hands after killing that second invisible wendigo, so he was curious as to why that was.

And last but definitely not least, Kai had to play arou- experiment with his upgraded innate ability and bloodline. Fusing with Umbra was a must, as he had to figure out how exactly it was boosted and how the new addition of being able to take the form of those he's fused with would work.

Being a wolf definitely sounded cool, especially now, considering Kai would also get Umbra's skills whenever they fused. That was more than a little useful, considering that Kai didn't exactly want to go around using Bite of Umbra on any beasts or humans while still looking like a humanoid, they would just think he was a crazy hairy guy with rabies.

Kai sighed once more as he relished in the feeling of Umbra's soft fur acting as a pillow for his head.

He had a lot to do in these five days, but he would gladly take a few hours off to rest before he began doing anything extreme.

That was just the way he was after all, a lethargic at heart.

*********

John woke up with a groan.

The last thing he remembered happening was him giving a small wave to Kai with his one remaining arm before choosing to leave the tutorial.

He obviously felt a little guilty about leaving that boy behind, but what would he have been able to do? His body was on the brink of collapse after enduring the never ending onslaught of abominations, and that had only gotten worse after getting his arm cut off by some mantis like abomination that had completetly slipped under his radar. Even now the pain was still constantly attacking him, never letting up. It was a phantom pain, even though his arm was gone it still hurt.

Then, for whatever reason, John had gotten sick. The journey after leaving the tutorial had been... less than pleasant. It felt like his very being was actively being split apart and put back together millions of times in the same millisecond, and that feeling persisted for the five or so seconds that he was leaving the tutorial.

Then, just as he entered the safe confines of the white room, John passed out of exhaustion.

He was better than Kai anyway, at least he had gotten to somewhere safe before passing out.

However, just when John started to come to his senses, he smelt something strange.

Something charred, kind of burnt, like something had just been forged.

Opening his eyes, John saw the same white room he had gotten familiar with before his time in the forest, only now there was a new addition to it.

Standing in the centre was a man about half the size of John. A dwarf, most certainly, only he didn't look like any sort of dwarf John had ever seen.

The dwarfs muscles rolled under the dirty apron it was wearing, the leather piece of cloth covered with what looked like ashes and burns.

He had a thick beard that reached down to the middle of his chest, but anyone would be able to see the massive yet slightly cocky grin that was hidden behind it.

"Great, you're awake, need a hand?"

The dwarfs voice was gruff and rough, like sandpaper, but there was a sort of fatherly feel to it.

However, it was then that John realised that he was still missing an arm. He had hoped that it would be automatically healed after the tutorial, but sadly it seemed that is wasn't the case. At least the system had been kind enough to bandage up the stump, or maybe it was the dwarf who done that.

The dwarf chuckled and waved a hand towards John, shaking his head softly.

"Of course you do, but I can just make you one at some point. As long as you agree to work with me, that is."

John looked... up at the dwarf incredulously, wondering what the hell was going on.

"Um, sorry but... Who are you?"

The dwarf just laughed heartily before shaking his head once more.

"I'm the guy that's going to turn you into a one man army... or maybe a one armie man considering I'm yet to make a new one for you."