Low-Fantasy Occultist Isekai

Nick had expected to absorb the ritual's power into his coils, but that wasn't what happened.

It responded to his call, eager and quick now that he had proven himself. Instead of flowing through his coils like most mana, the rolling mass of now-purified souls and emotions took a much more direct route.

Where Nick's third eye had once first opened and gave him a glimpse of the System, something pulsed, echoing off the storm's signature and calling to it.

The lightning gate opened the moment he fully accepted the ritual's purpose. His soul cracked open like an overripe fruit, yet nothing spilled out. Instead, a strong suction began, eerily similar to what he had seen his father do during his rank-up to Prestige, yet obviously different in purpose.

Whereas that had been a direct increase in power, a remolding of a soul guided by the perfect hand of the System, what Nick was currently experiencing was more like a purging.

The torrent of power surged through him, filling every empty space in his soul and then pushing beyond. It left a part of itself behind—something he could sense would make him greater, but not enough to fundamentally change his level of existence.

But that was fine. He was nowhere near ready for that kind of jump yet. No, what the Blessed Hunt's power was doing to him was different. It was cleansing what he already was, removing the dirt of two lives, freeing him from impurities he hadn't even realized he had, which blinded him to parts of his own power.

Nick didn't know exactly how long it lasted. It could have been a minute or a day, but he endured because he could feel the end nearing. The storm's power was beginning to disperse into the ether, unbound by its purpose, and when the last of it finally flew through him, he felt his soul snap closed, the lightning gate falling silent once again, if greater and more resilient than it had been.

He still took a few moments before forcing himself back into the material world. The changes he'd experienced were so profound that he felt the need to reconnect with his own soul, and so he floated there, in the mists of the ether.

Several things were immediately noticeable. First, he was no longer just an observer of the immaterial. He could feel it bend beneath his thoughts, responsive like a trained animal.

It was a significant upgrade from what he could do before, but it still wasn't everything.

During his trial, he hadn't been able to pay attention to it, but now he could feel that the mana within his body was different. Smoother, in a way, yet more responsive to his will.

That has to be [Parsimonia], right? If before, I could control every drop of my mana without wasting any, now I barely need to imbue it with purpose to cast.

He held off on messing with it for now, still busy noting all the changes.

The third thing he noticed was that his spiritual sight, which had previously been limited to emotions, now appeared more comprehensive. With nothing specific to focus on, he would have to wait to test it, but even just observing the ether's eddies was enough to show him that his previous understanding had been limited.

Yes, spiritual magic was emotion given form, but it didn't end there. There were subtleties that complex layers of it could reach that he hadn't been able to grasp before.

And finally, though less immediately noticeable than the other changes, he could feel his soul now had a new elemental quality. There was wind, as before. There was lightning, which he had suspected would be the case. But also something else. Interestingly, that last element seemed to have brought the two other elements together, giving them a new purpose.

It was to be expected. One couldn't go through such a major ritual without it leaving a trace behind, and the thunderbird, though artificial, was still a divine creation. A reflection of the collective faith in nature's wrath of countless people.

Its passage through Nick had seemingly given him a greater affinity. Something that encompassed who he had been, who he was, and who he would become.

Opening his eyes, Nick was greeted by the first rays of sunlight while lying spread-eagled in a puddle of mud.

He laughed, the sound bright and joyful, because he had not only overcome a trial of immense difficulty, or gathered the materials needed to sell for real wealth, but also completed a Greater Ritual on his own.

He, Nicholas Crowley, Occultist, had done it alone! Such a feat would have been impossible in his mind if he hadn't personally seen Marthas do the same, and the old priest had the advantage of knowledge, immense power, and the blessing of a goddess.

Nick was alone. He had done it on his own power.

Without even bothering to rise from the mud, he summoned the System notifications pressing against the back of his mind.

The jump in both quantity and quality was so significant that Nick had to read the wall of text several times to fully understand it.

He had felt it all happen, of course. He had known the changes were taking place since the rain started carving grooves into his soul. Still, seeing it all written down made it somehow more real.

Greater Rituals were a big deal exactly for this reason. They were fundamentally different from the minor modifications he'd made through elemental bestowals and sacrifices earlier.

Those had added to his soul, essentially grafting new pieces that over time became part of him.

The Blessed Hunt had gone far beyond that. It had taken almost every trait of his and flipped them around, shaping and blending until something greater than the sum of its parts remained.

Nick could also feel that he was very close to reaching the next level. The last rank up, [Parsimonia]'s, hadn't been enough to push him over the edge, but he was so close he could almost taste it. If most of the herd's Exp hadn't been used up by the ritual, he probably would have jumped several more levels, but considering the benefits he'd received, he couldn't complain.

I should get out of here soon. I doubt that such a large amount of mana went unnoticed.

Just out of curiosity, Nick reached out with a tiny drop of mana, shaping it into [Telekinetic Field], and was amazed by how efficiently he was able to lift himself up in the air.

It wasn't even a fraction of what he was capable of now. [One with the Storm] promised to be so much more powerful, but it was the ease of casting even such a basic spell—something he had once considered mastered—that showed he had made a huge qualitative leap.

What if I just…

It took some fiddling, but with his new level of control, Nick removed most of the auxiliary parts of the spell, turning it into something he would have once been unable to use, but now found perfectly reasonable given his new trait and overall control.

[Telekinetic Field] expanded into a smooth area of control, and it only took a moment to grasp all the mud covering him and remove it.

There you go. That wasn't too hard.

His mind was already filling with the countless possibilities of what [One with the Storm] could let him accomplish, given its much higher rank, but he held back.

"I'm already pushing it. I should leave now before someone comes snooping around," he muttered. With a gesture, Nick gathered the half-buried remains of the last thunderhoofs, briefly touched them to bring them into his ring space, and took one last look around.

The grassland was silent, as the few critters that had survived the storm he had unleashed knew better than to make a sound while he was still there.

Nick breathed in the fresh air one last time before twisting his mana and casting [Air Step].

In just moments, he soared high into the sky, leaving the ritual site behind. Rather than staying at a safe height of a few hundred feet, Nick decided to challenge himself this time.

He could already feel how his new trait let him control the winds much better than before, reducing air drag to nearly nothing and making sustained flight much more comfortable.

Higher and higher he ascended, until the oxygen started to thin and the cold bit at him. It took only a moment to solve both problems by wrapping himself in a blanket of warm currents.

Though fire wasn't among his affinities, lightning allowed for very fascinating effects he wouldn't have believed possible. In his hands, it had been a rough tool, mainly used for blunt strikes, but now he could better sense the flow of its mana and realized it could be just as refined as wind mana.

By the time he stopped climbing, he was floating at three thousand feet above the ground, to the point that he could no longer sense the surface beneath him.

But from that height, a large part of the grassland unfolded before him, revealing its majestic beauty. Bright green grass swayed in the wind, painted with the colors of dawn into orange and gold.

In the far distance, the massive river he knew would lead him to Alluria reflected the light, shimmering like a precious stone.

Nick smiled, adjusted his course, and sped toward it.

A new chapter was waiting for him.