Dry Plains - Lizard

Osirus slowly walked through the Dry Plains, every now and then a Stone Lizard would attack him, but {Threat Detection} would warn him beforehand, and {Quick Slice} would easily kill them.

After strolling around for about 2 hours he had killed and skinned 14 Stone Lizards, realising he wouldn't be able to fight and carry all the skins, he ended up picking a spot that bordered the forest and Dry Plains and stored all the skins in a semi-hidden spot.

'{Quick Slice}.'

After killing another Stone Lizard, he was about to skin it and went through the thick grass he noticed something he hadn't seen before, a cave.

Its entrance was circular with a diameter of about 2m, easily large enough for him to enter and declined down rather steeply with walls covered with blue vines that emitted a light glow , however the caves curves and bends made it impossible to see deeper than 10m.

Interested, Osirus walked towards the cave however as soon as he entered within 5m of it, a piercing pain assaulted his mind causing him to groan, causing him to hurriedly jump back thinking he was being attacked, however even after waiting for 30 seconds nothing happened.

'What was that? I've never had a warning that strong before.'

He continued to look around, but he couldn't find anything, which left only one possibility for that immense threat, the cave.

Slowly walking closer once again, a similar thing happened, as soon as he was within just over 5m of its entrance, a violent warning would attack his mind, forcing him to move away.

However this only caused his interest to grow, just why was this cave so dangerous, unfortunately he would be able to find out yet as he was just too weak, but it was that feeling of weakness stopping him from experiencing this world that ignited his urge to grow stronger.

With his newly named Dark Armour and Dark Sword, he continued his slaughter of the Stone Lizards.

4 hours later.

Night had almost fallen when Osirus returned to the spot he had hidden the Stone Lizard skin, making a small fire and cooking one of the Stone Lizards he had killed, he checked the notifications he got from his massacre.

{User Killed 34x Stone Lizard - 64SP Gained}

And.

{SP : 89}

With a decent amount of SP he was given a few different avenues to go down, after thinking for a while, he came to a decision.

{Body Cultivation:Lv.4~Lv.5(0/50SP}

{SP : 89~49}

The familiar feeling of his strength filled his body again, but this time, without his emotions being suppressed, it felt 10x better.

Eventually the feeling dissipated, and, after finishing his food and putting out the fire, he closed his eyes to rest, eventually falling into a light sleep, his {Threat Detection} being able to wake him up at any moment.

The next morning.

The warmth of the sun surrounded his body, pleasantly waking him up, feeling refreshed he continued his hunt, travelling further into the Dry Plains, killing any Stone Lizard he came across.

Slowly walking through the grass, a sharp pain assaulted his sense with much greater ferocity than it had before, at the same time a loud rustle sounded behind him, he was barely able to block with his sword before the giant lizard collided into him, its sharp claw grating against his sword, shooting sparks into his face.

Unlike the others, this lizard's skin was much darker, resembling his armour more than stone, furthermore its length was double, easily reaching 2m from head to tail, and with that size came weight and momentum.

Placing a foot behind him, Osirus had used all of his strength to resist from collapsing under its weight, "Aghh.", with a groan his muscles contracted before pushing with everything he had, shoving the lizard onto its back.

Stepping forward and activating {Quick Slice}, a green hue covered his sword as slashed onwards towards its belly, as the softest part of its body, the sword swiftly cut it open, its jagged edges causing even more damage.

As much as it attempted to fight back, there was little it could do with so much blood leaving its body, its movements started to slow before eventually stopping as a message appeared in his mind.

{User Killed 1x Metal Lizard - 11SP Gained}

'So it's some sort of more powerful version of the Stone Lizard, maybe this is the next step in their evolution.'

With much more difficulty, Osirus was able to skin the Metal Lizard, he was impressed by the fact it was so flexible while also being incredibly tough and durable, he realised it would be very useful for creating warrior clothes and bags.

Thus he stored it with the rest, planning to sell it for a pretty penny back at Invon, before heading back into the depths of the Dry Plains.

This continued for 2 more days, when he finally reached his target amount of SP, sitting in front of the fire, enjoying the succulent lizard meat, he looked at his messages and {Status}.

{User Killed 12x Metal Lizard - 72SP Gained}

{User Killed 46x Stone Lizard - 48SP Gained}

{Status}

{Name:Osirus}

{Age:16}

{Race:Human}

{SP:180}

{Body Cultivation:Lv.5(0/50SP)}

{Mana Cultivation:Lv.1(0/10SP)}

{Active Skills: {Quick Slice Lv.5 (12/50 Proficiency) - Beginner}}

{Passive Skills: {Threat Detection Lv.4 (6% Proficiency) - Beginner}}

Although he had gained a lot the last couple of days, he also realised that the more of one creature he killed, the less SP he would get for killing it, making killing Stone Lizards and Metal Lizards only useful for another day or 2.

However it had still been bountiful as he continuously trained his combat ability as well as his Skills, furthermore the biggest gain was his SP that now stood at a pleasant 180, which should be enough for what he wanted, to become a mage!

He first started by pouring 100SP into {Mana Cultivation}, raising it to {Mana Cultivation:Lv.1~Lv.5(0/50SP)}, equal to his {Body Cultivation}.

Instantly he felt a change, it was similar to when levelling up {Body Cultivation} as he felt a refreshing feeling surround his body, which he now realised was something entering it, but instead of spread throughout his body, increasing its strength, it travelled through hidden pathways in his body, slowly expanding them, before of pooling in his centre, condensing into a tiny ball of that solid refreshing stuff which he understood was Mana.

As the ball began to grow he felt his senses improving immensely, his sense of touch, smell, sound, sight and even taste improved immensely, reaching heights he thought was impossible.

Sensing his Mana Core he discovered that it didn't take up a physical place, moving his flesh out of the way, but instead was ghost-like, existing and not at the same time, it didn't affect reality until it wanted to, meaning he could store as much as he wanted without damaging his body.

After a while his body stopped absorbing Mana and his core stopped growing, its size had reached about that of a golf ball, the moment he stored absorbing through some unknown means of the System, he realised he had also gained the ability to manipulate Mana and absorb it into his body.

Focusing he began to sense Mana in the surroundings and began to slowly guide it into his body and to his core through the Mana Pathways that had been opened, he also noticed he could spread it throughout his body so that it could be absorbed by his cells and strengthen them, however it was painstakingly slow, completely incomparable to levelling up.

For the most part it would be much quicker to spend his time killing to gain SP rather than slowly absorbing it from the surroundings.

However something else confused him, even with his {Mana Cultivation} at the 5th Level, he wasn't able to use create fire as Elisa had and he didn't even know how to start, thus he just put it to the back of his mind as he thought about the next step in his plan to become a Mage.

However it would take a while to design and tinker with the Skill so that it would be perfect, so instead of sitting here and designing, he decided it would be best to kill more Lizards and gain more SP so that the eventual Skill would be even more powerful.

While creating the Skill using his mind, he ventured out into the Dry Plains, using his incredible hearing and sight to discover Stone Lizards and Metal Lizards before they even acted.

3 hours later.

In the forest just outside the Dry Plains, a single scarred figure stood within the foliage, watching Osirus travelled deeper into the grasslands, a sinister smile spread across his face.