In desperate situations, people tend to be a lot more creative than their usual selves. Maxwell was no exception, but he also had a mind a lot faster than that of normal people. He contemplated using the rune he had learned just before, but he was not sure how he could survive the aftermath of something that could kill this tiger.

  In his contemplation, he realized he still didn’t know something. The rune he knew probably meant something, but he didn’t know what it was. The thing it did was to expand a space, though. What would happen if he infused the rune with some other mana type, he wondered?

  A single rune could expand the space of a satchel by 20 times without any signs of destabilization. The important part was that the said space already existed before the expansion. Maxwell never managed to create an element from nothing until now, apart from small sparks and such. Even those were just some microscopic particles, igniting due to heat.

  He prepared himself to take a gamble. He focused on the ground in front of him, or rather, the ground he focused on the roots of nearby trees. For his plan to work, he would need fire.

  He imagined fire mana gathering and making the heat increase. In slow motion, he could see the mana gather as the tiger slowly approached him. He was slow like the tiger, but his mana seemed to work at the same speed as his mind. It gathered and gathered, and soon he could see a spark on the ground originating from the roots.

  Now the hard part was left. He imagined the expansion rune he learned in the fire as he focused and imagined the fire mana rushing into it. This time, he was not very careful as he was in a tight spot. He just madly infused more and more mana into the rune. If this would cause a volatile reaction, it was even better.

  He could see that the tiger was getting closer. When the tiger was near the rune, he let go of his concentration and let the mana in the rune do whatever it was supposed to do.

  As a last effort of self-preservation, he expelled most of his remaining mana from his feet, launching himself backwards like a ragdoll. He could feel some of his blood vessels in his feet burst, but that was the smallest of his concerns.

  What followed was a brilliant flash as the unstable rune expanded everything, matching the mana inside it. Maxwell watched in fascination as the little flame spark he created on the root started to grow in his slowed-down world before it reached a critical point.

  The small ball of fire suddenly expanded as the rune was not given any directions to preserve itself. All of the energy was spent in expanding the flame, and the flame soon turned into a blinding storm of fire.

  The unfortunate tiger was immediately consumed by the storm, but the flames didn’t stop just there. The surrounding space of around ten meters was swallowed by a small sun.

  Maxwell thanked himself for leaving the immediate area of the blast. If he stayed where he was, he would be cooked quite well.

  He watched as flames suddenly disappeared, signifying the complete destabilization of the rune. All that remained from the tiger was a charred skeleton still standing. It caught up to reality soon and tumbled to the ground in a heap.

  The spark’s lifespan was very short, as Maxwell could only now feel the heat created by the fire. He felt his eyebrows and the front of his clothes disappear as he was consumed by the heat wave. Luckily, this was as short as the spark itself in duration, but for Maxwell’s senses, it felt a lot longer.

  Maxwell checked his health to see that he had only 98 remaining. This has been a very close battle. Maxwell knew he could live this life without battles like this, but he found them quite exciting. He couldn’t fight properly for his whole life. Now he could, and it was stimulating in a way that he had never experienced.

  His mana was almost completely gone, but he infused whatever remained as vitality.

  Vitality increased by 10 for 5 minutes.

  Maxwell was not sure what the deciding factor was for the length of time, but he guessed it was connected to the injuries he had. Also, as he was awake this time, he could clearly feel that this felt a lot more than a simple 10 vitality buff. He gazed at his status for a second before coming to a realization.

  Half of my soul and half of my vitality equals 98.5. When I buff myself, I pass the 100 threshold. He was a bit curious if he would face a separate vitality tutorial termination when he reached that stat level naturally, but he guessed he would see that soon as he heard notifications coming.

  The important thing was that the stats became stronger when they reached 100. That was probably why he healed that well in the 2 minutes after he passed out. It was probably why he was healing so well right now, too. The system seemed to not just give progressively more points to you as you level up but the effect of every point increased as you went higher in level.

  Now that he knew about this effect, he could see on hindsight that his mana constructs were using less mana than they should have for a long time. A single mana bolt used to take 10 mana when he first acquired the skill. He felt that if he had the basic skill now, it would cost a lot less. This fact made their hunt even more unrealistic, as they shouldn’t be able to hunt beasts 12 levels higher than them with the high stats these beasts had.

  Well, those beasts definitely don’t have broken skills, though, they were in a normal forest in a backwater world after all. He was a bit concerned about Bob, as the kid was like him, fighting a beast by himself. He quickly searched for the boy and he could see two shapes clashing repeatedly in the distance. He could also see a smaller shape draving circles in the air. That was probably Blueberry.

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  He got up with a grunt and started walking towards the battleground. As he was passing by the tiger his eyes were drawn by a glint among the bones. He quickly picked a small stone up from the ground as he continued on his way. He used observation on the thing as he walked.

  Beast Core - Tier-2

  The core of a beast with an affinity of savagery. The beast core contains a trace of fire mana as the beast was exposed to extraordinary amounts of fire before death. It could be used in many professions.

  So, even concepts can be affinities? Maxwell commented mentally. This world was way too complicated. He could feel a headache coming as he imagined a future where he was trying to remember hundreds of different affinities.

  He reached the battlefield where Bob was fighting soon enough. He could see that the boy was once again drenched in blood, but he seemed more alive than ever. His eyes had a glint of excitement as he and the tiger clashed again and again, exchanging injuries.

  Bob seemed not to care about appearing as a human as he clawed and bit like animals when he could. He silently watched as the clashes continued. He would try to intervene if things started to go really bad, but otherwise he would just watch. He promised the boy he wouldn’t intervene after all. The tiger was certainly not in better state than Bob anyway.

  It was covered in blood, similarly to Bob but it clearly didn’t have a skill to make it stronger when it gained injuries. He used Observation on the beast as he doubted that it would notice it in a high-intensity battle like this.

  Shadow Tiger - Lvl-25

  This was a bit weaker than his tiger, but it was still eight levels higher than Bob. He could see from the animal’s movements that once upon a time the beast was a lot faster than Bob, but that was clearly not the case anymore as two of it’s legs were mangled quite bad.

  As he watched, Bob managed to catch an opening and jumped on the tiger. The tiger should have been able lift a small human with ease but it was pushed to the ground like the boy weighed a lot more than he should have. Maxwell wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case.

  Soon, Bob was punching the beast’s head repeatedly while sitting on the animal’s back, making Maxwell remember the time with the scrax’s. Only thing missing was Gendor staring at the scene tiredly.

  Soon the beast stopped moving, as life left its body and Bob being not consumed with anger this time stopped his onslaught, shattering the illusion that this was similar to the last time.

  Maxwell needed to admit that this kid was smarter than he was letting on. It was apparent with his shenanigans before, and he could see it clearly from how he fought, too. The boy who threw him that mole back then looked anything but stupid.

  The boy got up and stretched before realizing that he was being watched. He waved his hand towards him, smiling like an idiot.

  “You done with your’s too? I could really use one of your boosts,” the boy shouted towards him. If he didn’t know the boy, Maxwell would think that he had been doing this kind of things all his life.

  He infused a part of his mana into the boy, probably managing to improve it beyond 100 as the boy started healing visibly. Though boys vitality might have already exceeded that number without his interference.

  “Ah, this is amazing,” the boy said as he cracked his neck. Maxwell picked another core from the shadow tiger. This core was, unsurprisingly, shadow affinity. He threw it inside his satchel. He also started infusing his clothes with his mana regeneration as he didn’t like going around half naked.

  “Chirp, chirp.” Blueberry congratulated them, and they started walking towards home. Of course, Blueberry once again took his place on Maxwell’s head.

  Maxwell summoned his notifications to see what he had gained from the battle while they walked.

  Guide Mana Leveled Up Lvl-59→61

  Prima Sense Leveled Up Lvl-47→49

  Soul’s Voice Leveled Up Lvl-46→48

  Mana Infusion Leveled Up Lvl-48→50

  Infused Mana Burst Leveled Up Lvl-12→30

  Myriad Mana Constructs Leveled Up Lvl-30→42

  Magic Theory Leveled Up Lvl-41→46

  Meditation Leveled Up Lvl-46→48

  Runic Formations Leveled Up Lvl-7→15

  Visualization Leveled Up Lvl-32→36

  Parallel Thoughts Leveled Up Lvl-10→12

  Subskill for the Skill “Runic Formations” Acquired.

  Rune Of Amplification: A versatile rune used to perform various acts by amplifying a desired element. The used mana affinity needs to be compatible with the target of amplification.

  Skill “Slashing Resistance” Acquired.

  Skills Slashing Resistance, Blunt Trauma Resistance and Piercing Damage Resistance can be fused. Proceed?

  Y/N

  Maxwell slowly read through all the notifications. There were a lot of level-ups for sure, but most of them seemed small increases, apart from infused mana burst and myriad mana projectiles. The new subskill for Runic Formations made him really happy, though. It also corrected him by helpfully giving the name of the rune he was using.

  He gazed at he last notification in surprise. He didn’t know the system had a function like this. He pressed yes as he didn’t see anything to lose with the fusion.

  Skill fusion completed.

  Skill “Physical Damage Resistance” Acquired

  Physical Damage Resistance Lvl-8: A common skill among warriors. You seem to be confused about your class, as you survived all types of damage, attaining this skill like them.

  Gives resistance to all types of physical damage.

  Once again the system was a bit too sarcastic with a resistance skill but Maxwell couldn’t say he disliked it. He would get any humor he could find as he was living in a forest without much interaction anyway he continued onwards to the best part of the notifications.

  Bloodstained Tiger - Lvl-27 Killed

  Level Up. Stats Distrubuted.(4x)

  Maxwell could feel his stats increasing in ecstasy. This would never get old. He also quickly put the rest of his stats into soul, making it reach 251. It looked ridiculously high, but Maxwell didn’t really feel like it was after fighting many high-level beasts. If anything, it was too low. His eyes widened with surprise as he saw a new notification.

  Threshold Reached For Skill Selection

  Please select one skill from the options.