Ceaseless Horizons [A LitRPG Progression Fantasy]

"What now?" Lev asked after several minutes of silently staring at the spreading fire, which was also dimming rapidly.

"Now, I'll drop you in your room and continue the round by myself."

Huh. I see, he thought and gazed at the result of his attack. Similar to the Grand Forest, the forest fire couldn't take hold, and was snuffed out quickly after the mana powering the attack was fully consumed. Only natural flames remained for a bit, except this time, Lev could actually see what was happening.

The fucking trees ate up his flames. They didn't even burn!

Creepy ass region.

"I would rather not stay here any longer like this," he glanced at Sherron with puppy eyes. "Can you take control of the bubble, please?"

"Sure," she did as she was asked, and then picked him up in a princess carry.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Bullying you," Sherron replied with a grin. "Also, jerky movements will be very painful. Stay still while we fly."

"Speaking from experience?"

"Mhm," she nodded. "My class also does very well when I use all of my mana at once. I'm sure you understand."

"More than you can imagine," he replied easily and shifted himself with some barrier hands. His right moved over her shoulders, draped over her neck, and he also pulled himself higher until he was leaning against shoulder. "That's better."

"Anything else, Your Highness?"

"I'm feeling very frail," Lev sent, imbuing his voice with a world of tiredness and sorrow. "Sing this dying man some soothing melody, would you?"

She slowly turned her head, and stared into his eyes.

"Do not drop me."

She continued to stare.

"Do NOT drop me."

The staredown lasted for a few more seconds. Then the moment passed, and they both chuckled. It was a good thing Windkeep was a few hours away, because Lev seriously didn't want to be carried all the way, especially in front of his team.

"Say," Lev began once Windkeep was in sight. "Why was the backlash so bad?"

"Because it's not related to just the mind."

"Meaning?"

"Where does the consciousness reside?" she asked expectantly.

"The mind? Or in the brain, to be precise."

"And where does it all stem from?"

"The soul."

"Or so we believe," she nodded. "And where does the soul reside?"

"In the body, I guess."

"So, all three of them were taxed by that stupid move. Your mind struggled to completely evolve the element, which in turn utilizes the soul to control willpower, similar to skills. Your body was just caught in the crossfire. The worst offender was definitely the large amount you used, so blame yourself."

"Great," he sighed and started channeling some restoration mana into his body. It still hurt, though much less than before. Jumping out of her arms, he checked himself over and smoothed out his clothes. "I can walk now."

He could also think properly now, so he brought up his notifications.

[

You have slain [Dreadwolf - Level 410]

Arcane Maelstrom has reached Level 262

Self-Taught Beginner Glaive Mastery has reached 2nd Level 4

]

Oh. That's it? No title or skill evolutions?

With a shrug, he dismissed the notifications. It wasn't like he had mastered the blue flames or felled some great beast. Progress was bound to take time.

The level in his glaive mastery skill was pretty nice, though.

Before they landed in front of Windkeep's gates, Sherron moved a bit further away and deposited the bubble on the ground. Walking out of an opening formed by Lev, she summoned the direwolf's corpse from a storage artifact.

It was still hot and smelled extremely bad, but the core was intact. She also summoned a… spider, of sorts. Unfurling its long, sharp legs, the shining silver construct quickly crawled into one of the bigger wounds and dug out the core after a few seconds.

"… Woah. Where can I buy one for myself?"

"Jimmy made these for all the Exalted, so," she replied casually and tossed him the core once back inside the bubble.

Guess I'm not getting one, he shrugged to himself and Identified the core.

[

Dreadwolf Core

Possesses excellent Mana Conductivity and Mana Capacity.

Useful in crafting.

If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

]

"Isn't this pretty good?" he asked, impressed.

"It is," she answered and took control of the bubble, the corpse already back in her storage. "Dread monsters always drop valuable cores and sometimes even materials, though this one was rather weak overall. You also burned anything useful."

"Totally my fault," Lev nodded sagely. "If only there was someone to warn me that the monster should've been left intact."

"Meh," she waved him off. "I couldn't care less. There are plenty of materials in our vaults already, but not nearly enough skilled crafters."

"Really?" he raised a brow. "What type of crafters?"

"While enchanting is the most difficult field, it is also the most practicable and unbothered by boundaries. Things like leatherworking take a lot of time, especially when valuable materials are involved. Those people rarely see a level, and we only have a handful of Masters in that field."

Lev nodded slowly, enlightened. That made sense. Even his level gains, despite fighting an evolution higher sometimes, had been extremely slow. It was no wonder that crafters took ages to level.

"What now?"

"Take the bubble and go rest. It may not feel like much, but the moment you start using mana for more than just flying in your bubble, the pain will get a lot worse."

She didn't stay to say more, flying away in a burst of speed that made Lev cover his ears.

Well, then. How do I explain this one to my team?

He decided honesty was the best policy. They were swiftly approaching the evolution threshold, and he wanted them to know that their Master teammate partook in a lot of dumb shit, such as the recent experience. It may soften the blow. He wasn't sure.

Landing in front of the city, he made sure to show his face to the guards and then jumped back into the bubble. It was parked on Golden Basilisk's wide roof, along with his secondary bubbles, before he made his way to the suites.

"Hey," he sent to Amelia and Kayla's crystals.

"You're back?" Kayla asked, though it didn't seem Amelia had her crystal on her person right now. "Is everything alright? Do you need healing?"

"Nope. Come to my room with the other two in ten minutes."

"Okay. You better have a good reason for returning early."

Lev wanted to think that her subtle threat wasn't scary, but it was. Only slightly, yet he still felt a bit nervous, because a healer's words carried a lot of weight. He wasn't looking to piss off his own.

Showering was a unique experience. Every step felt heavy, and each twitch of his muscles sent a spasm of pain up his spine. The pain wasn't that bad, all things considered. He could still do without it.

"I'm done," Lev sent to Kayla, and there was a knock on his door in the next five seconds. "Sup."

Kayla marched in first, casually grabbing his wrist and dragging him until he was seated on his bed. She pulled out a chair and sat in front of him, her skills already assessing his situation.

"Mana poisoning, muscle tears, and… something? The hell did you do?"

"Ah, nothing to worry about," Lev waved her off, unable to hold back a smile for several reasons. It was gratifying to see he hadn't botched their relationship from day 1 and that she could treat him so freely. "Just a bit of soul strain."

"A bit of soul strain," she repeated in a drawl. "Soul Strain. In our resident Wisdom Boost owner. Will you start talking, or does it need to be forced out of you?"

If I wasn't surrounded by my own teammates, I might've just fell for the threat, he mused, ignoring the mostly curious looks from the other two. "Alright, settle down."

Two more chairs were summoned as he started talking. "Sherron and I didn't find anything truly dangerous, though she made me fight a new type of monster after a few hours of flying inwards."

He could see the interest on their faces, especially on Amelia's. Her brain worked much like his own.

"Also, you're gonna have to keep it to yourself. The Dreadwoods are called that because of dread monsters. They're… ugly. And scary. I only had to face a single one…"

And so he explained about the encounter and the fight, the mental attacks, and his eventual stupid testing.

"Wait, hold on. That single move was enough to paralyze you?" Amelia asked, immediately latching onto the detail.

Lev observed the ceiling, not meeting their exasperated stares. "Weeelll… I didn't quite realize that I had used all of Stargazer's mana. Combined with half of my own pool, I used like… 150% of my total mana in a single move? That didn't turn out well."

Nobody talked. He risked a glance, and met with deadpan looks that transcended words. Kayla was looking at him like he had thoroughly disappointed her. Jack and Amelia's reactions were more subdued, though they still silently chided him for the recklessness.

"Okay, I get it," Lev spoke, only to fill in the embarrassing silence. They still didn't talk. "I… ah fuck it," he lay down and summoned a comfortable, enchanted blanket over himself. "I'll see you guys after I wake up."

That was spoken mostly in jest, though Lev didn't even realize when he drifted off, especially because of how draining Kayla's healing was. He had refrained from using his own healing mana to let her experience the new type of injury, and now it had lulled him to sleep.

****

When he woke up about… he looked outside and found that the sun was close to setting. Three hours had passed, and that was enough sleep for the next few days.

Surprisingly, he wasn't alone. Amelia sat on a rocking chair and was also sound asleep, a book about footwork and sword forms resting in her lap.

Hmm, was she looking over me while I slept? Lev mused, not sure how to deal with the fuzzy feelings. Summoning another pillow for himself, he set it against the bed rest and leaned against it, shifting until he was comfortable.

There was plenty he could do without going out, so he started with that. A barrier plate formed under Amelia's chair and covered her in a sound ward.

That done, he formed another plate for himself and started carving A simple conversion formation, by using supportive runes from Drakys' collection, formed, and he connected it to the stone enhancement runes from stone snakes. The purpose was to test the extent of the conversion rune.

Another layer formed on the plate, and on this one, he formed the porous constitution formation. Fortunately, after diving deep into his armor's enhancement formation, Lev could tell how to deal with internal durability. It had several supportive runes that made the enchantment denser, amplifying the toughness of the whole construct.

Porous constitution was still quite complex, though the repeated carving made his willpower take the brunt of the load. It followed whims with only small mistakes here and there, but Lev ensured that none of the errors remained with a few mental flexes.

When it was all connected, he created a small wand. It served no purpose except to channel lightning mana, which he gave it in small amounts. Guiding it out of the tip connected to the enchanted plate, he watched with all his focus as the absorption enchantments reacted.

Lightning mana seeped inside the plate, pulled in by porous constitution, and was overtaken with marginal ease. Lev hadn't used much of it for that reason. The conversion took place seamlessly, converting the blue mana into pure mana. Then it was unceremoniously dumped into the hardening runes, increasing the construct's durability.

Interestingly enough, the lightning mana on its surface became more difficult to absorb. Porous constitution seemed to be incompatible with hardening, which was good to realize early instead of in combat.

"What time is it?" a bleary Amelia asked, quickly fixing her messed-up hair.

"Sunset," Lev answered distractedly. "Where did the other two go?"

"Don't know," she shrugged and made for the door. "Probably doing couple things."

He snorted at the deadpan delivery as the door closed shut. It was also funny to see her hide the nervousness in her steps.

Now alone, he upped the lightning input after covering everything in his room with a barrier. No point in harming perfectly good furniture.

A large portion of the destructive mana was absorbed by his plate, which in turn made it even more resilient. His earlier suspcisions were proven correct when the absorbed amount steadily lowered, until only a small stream was entering the runes, all because the hardening formation was counteracting porous constitution.

Interesting, he let the plate dissolve and created a new one. It was enchanted with the durability runes from his armor's formation, before a second layer finished the full conversion formation.

This time, his lightning was absorbed more greedily. Conversion was working at the same rate, except the input was higher, all because the current durability runes supported porous constitution. Instead of hindering the absorption, they allowed for even more by keeping the lightning mana in check, giving birth to the first specialized shield.

[

Barrier Shield - Uncommon

Enchantments: Durability, Lightning Absorption.

]

[

Barrier Carving has evolved.

]

Oh?