I Reincarnated As A Stick

Chapter 196: The Road to Power

XXXX Continent, outside the Tempest Cliff.

“Haah…is this what the original body felt while he was wandering throughout this world alone?” A being made out of pure green energy could not help but mutter to itself as it dashed through the terrain at its maximum speed, startling those who were lucky enough to get near the being. This being took on the shape of a human but it did not have facial features…yet for some reason, it emulated a part that was not even needed for its existence level, being covered up with two large leaves wrapped around its waist.

This being was none other than Argentum, who already felt bored after only leaving the Tempest Cliff for around 20 minutes. Nonetheless, he continued to run towards Verdant Breeze Town since that’s what he promised to his original body, Aurus.

At the moment, he was recalling the plan he had in mind which composed of the things he would do while on his way to Verdant Breeze Town. Concurrently, he was also wondering how his original body was able to withstand such boredom for a long amount of time before meeting Herellia and the others. Surprisingly, rather than focus on the plan he had in mind, he decided to look through the shared memories of both him and Aurus, specifically searching for the things Aurus had done while he was still alone.

“…” After looking at what his original body had done to stave off boredom in the start, Argentum was left at a loss for words, wondering if there was a part of his original body that had already gone insane thanks to it. It was then that he made a promise to himself that he would not lose his mind like his original body while traveling to Verdant Breeze Town…no matter how boring it may be.

“But how am I going to do that…” Just as Argentum asked himself this question, the other thought that was simultaneously going on in his mind a while ago had surfaced as if it was the answer to his question, which Argentum was surprisingly happy to remember.

“Right! Unlike my original body, I have multiple skills I could grind while I’m on my way to Verdant Breeze Town,” Argentum said to himself in glee as he added, “Not only that, I also have to obtain some skills from the areas I have to pass through as well!”

As he said the last statement, an aura of seriousness emanated from him as he placed his index finger and thumb under his chin while running, going over through his memories as he muttered, “I know how to obtain those skills when I’m an Inanimate or an Animate. How am I going to obtain that as a Pseudo-Animate though?”

Eventually, he stopped thinking about this question as he let out a light chuckle before saying, “I’m far from that area so I shouldn’t think about it for now. I should do what I can currently do, which is to grind my skills like crazy!”

“System, open up the skill list,” Argentum commanded the system in his mind, to which system promptly responded by showing a small holographic screen in front of Argentum, taking into consideration that he was currently running.

Ding!

________

Active Skills:

[Lesser Wind Magic Lv. 1], [Hundred Facade Polymorph Lv. 1], [Grand Breeze Rejuvenation Lv. 1], [Mana Barrier Lv. 1], [Great Mana Domain Lv. 1], [Mana Awakening Lv. 1]

Passive Skills:

[Blessing of the Great Wind Lv. 1], [Lesser Mana Affinity Lv. 1], [Clouded Mana Core Lv. 1], [Boundless Potential Lv. 1], [Spirit Resonance Lv. MAX]

________

As he looked at the skills on the screen that had appeared in front of his field of vision, he would command the system to show its description, allowing him to formulate a plan that would let him improve his skills at an insanely fast rate. Of course, calling it the formulation of a plan was more or less an exaggeration, in actuality, he was organizing the skills on his list, prioritizing those that had a lower grade first before those with the higher grades.

“By the looks of it, the lowest skill grade on my list is the C-grade Mortal level, which consists of a single active skill, and three passive skills. As for the highest skill grade on my list, that would be the A-grade Mortal level, which consists of all of the remaining skills on my list, except for [Spirit Resonance], which has no grade and level whatsoever,” Argentum muttered as he thought out loud while running, sparing some of his consciousness towards the terrain in front of him.

“C-grade Mortal level skills have a maximum level of 10 for a Pseudo-Animate, which is 7 levels higher than on the Inanimate existence level. As for A-grade Mortal level skills, they have a maximum level of 30, which is 20 levels higher than on the Inanimate existence level. From that…I have no problems with what I’m going to prioritize then,” Argentum continued to mutter before a grin appeared on his featureless face, raising his left arm as a ball of mana manifested a few centimeters away from his palm as he continued to run.

He then threw this mana ball towards a nearby tree as he shouted, “[Lesser Wind Magic]!”

“[Wind Ball]!”

Whoosh! Bang!

Just as the mana ball was about to collide with the tree, the ball had undergone an abrupt change, instantly radiating an intense aura of Wind before truly hitting the tree, creating a large crater on its trunk as it made multiple lacerations on it as well.

Ding!

“[Lesser Wind Magic] has leveled up.”

“[Clouded Mana Core] has leveled up.”

“[Blessing of the Great Wind] has leveled up.”

As a notification sound resounded throughout his mind, the system went ahead and announced the notifications he had gotten from that attack, slightly shocking him as he expected only the first skill, [Lesser Wind Magic], to level up. But then, relying on the shared memories he had, he eventually realized why three skills had leveled up instead of one, prompting Argentum to stop in his place as he pondered over something.

In his mind were multiple thoughts related to the skills he currently had. At this moment, he was pondering over what he could do to increase the speed of improvement of his skills after remembering this fact, and not only rely on the original body’s absorption of the Transcending Comprehension Leaf to increase his speed of improvement.

After a few minutes of pondering over what combination of skills could be used to improve as many skills as possible with one move, an optimal combination was soon realized in Argentum’s mind, making him let out a sigh as he chuckled at the same time.

“By doing this, am I considered a masochist?” He could not help but ask himself this question as he looked at the terrain in front of him before continuing to run once more. He then went over the optimal combination of skills in his mind before taking a deep breath of air as he prepared himself for what he was going to do.

“If only I had as much energy to use just like the original body,” Argentum muttered before adding, “Making sure that all skills activate with the least amount of energy is quite hard. Nonetheless, by doing this, I’ll be able to increase my maximum energy capacity.”

“First off…”

“[Great Mana Domain]…”

“[Bare-bones]!”

Whoosh!

At the instant he muttered the name of this skill, a faint blue light had covered his body, increasing the regeneration rate of his energy while increasing the maximum amount of energy he could hold well. Unfortunately, due to the method of activation Argentum had used, only a small boost had been applied to Argentum. Nevertheless, after seeing that it was successful, Argentum chuckled as two notifications resounded in his mind, telling him that [Great Mana Domain] and [Clouded Mana Core] had both leveled up.

“If the ‘Legendary Tinkerer’ knew that [Bare-bones] could actually work with any skill one had, he’d surely be at the Divinity existence level by now,” Argentum said as a certain memory surfaced in his mind while he was about to activate another skill.

…

In this memory was Aurus, who was a well-renowned peak Animate level player in ISE, and in front of him was a person that had a reputation far greater than Aurus’s, only being known with the nickname of ‘Legendary Tinkerer’ due to the countless experiments he had done in ISE to maximize the efficiency of his resources.

“Hey, Aurus. Since we’ve known each other for a long time and you’ve even helped me out on some stuff, I’ll teach you a skill I’ve created that would allow you to attack with your skills, no matter how small your mana is,” the Legendary Tinkerer said to Aurus, to which Aurus became eager in an instant, telling the Legendary Tinkerer to hurry up and teach him what the skill was.

In response, the Legendary Tinkerer could not help but chuckle as he looked at the eager expression on Aurus’s face for a second before extending out his right arm, manifesting a fireball the size of a bowling ball not long after.

“You know very well that the main stat mages focus on is the MP stat,” the Legendary Tinkerer said to Aurus as he waved the bowling ball-sized fireball around before continuing, “The more MP a mage has, the more spells they can dish out, the more damage they can deal.”

“Well, I don’t know if this is a feature of the game or not, but if you control the amount of mana you put into the spell that’s currently activated…” As the Legendary Tinkerer said these words, the bowling ball-sized fireball hovering on his right palm gradually shrunk…eventually reaching a size that was akin to a small grape.

“You could either exert a great amount of power by overloading your spell with mana…or conserve the amount of mana you have by reducing the power output of your spell. Almost all of the famous mages in this server have heard of the former, but only I have found a way that would make the latter not inferior in any way to the former.”

“By relying on active buffs, that could have its output reduced as well, one could fight against an army of a million without ever worrying about their amount of mana. Instead of fighting against numbers with one large attack that could easily decimate a giant piece of land, why not use multiple small-scale spells that have enough energy to kill the enemies in front of you?” the Legendary Tinkerer continued explaining before throwing the grape-sized fireball towards a nearby tree. At the instant the fireball had collided with the tree, the tree was instantly turned into charred ash.

“It could be said as the pinnacle of a mage’s control, accurately controlling the amount of mana needed for a spell to execute an enemy.”

“I call those variant spells…”

“[Bare-bones].”

…

After activating [Great Mana Domain: Bare-bones], Argentum then went ahead and activated [Mana Barrier] in [Bare-bones] form, obtaining a level-up on both [Mana Barrier] and [Clouded Mana Core]. Not long after that, he then extended his left arm as a ball of mana manifested on top of his left palm before aiming it towards his body.

“[Lesser Wind Magic: Wind Ball]!”

Bang!

Thanks to the barrier that was covering all parts of his body, Argentum was more or less unscathed after hitting himself with the spell he had just conjured. Just as he thought that he was safe from the attack he fired onto himself, he noticed that a certain part on his torso was glowing weakly when compared to the surrounding areas, making Argentum lightly chuckle as he placed his right hand over the weakly glowing area before muttering, “[Grand Breeze Rejuvenation: Bare-bones].”

Whoosh!

Since the wound he had received from the attack was not that serious, the amount of mana that he had imbued on the healing skill he had was enough to return the weakly glowing area to its original form, obtaining notifications not long after that [Lesser Wind Magic], [Grand Breeze Rejuvenation], [Blessing of the Great Wind], and [Clouded Mana Core] had leveled up, with the latter leveling up twice.

After going through all of that, Argentum stopped where he was before he laughed and said, “[Great Mana Domain], [Grand Breeze Rejuvenation], and [Mana Barrier] are all A-grade Mortal level skills, so their requirements for MP is multiple notches higher than [Lesser Wind Magic] by a long shot, which only needs 1 MP to fire a [Wind Ball].”

“Fortunately, that guy taught me on how to make spells [Bare-bones], allowing me to do the combination I had just done on myself,” Argentum continued to think out loud as he added, “This combination would allow me to more or less level up six skills at the same time, with immensely great focus on [Clouded Mana Core]. The faster I level it up, the more MP I can work with.”

“Now that I think about it, did the original body think about using [Bare-bones] while grinding his skills?” Argentum pondered as this thought came to mind, before concluding that the original body did not even consider the idea as he had too much energy to work with.

“Oh well,” Argentum shrugged before letting out a short chuckle. “Since he doesn’t know about this, the more he’ll be shocked by how much I’ve improved.”

Ding!

Just as he was about to go over that combination of skills once more, he had obtained a notification from the system, which made radiate an aura of confusion as this notification was too abrupt. He then listened to the system’s voice as it read through the notification, hastily activating a skill not long after.

“[Reward Sharing] has been enabled between the two bodies.”

“Due to [Reward Sharing], the skill [Wind Barrier] has been shared with you by Aurus. Unfortunately, due to the difference in existence level, the efficacy of said skill has been diminished.”

“Due to the resonance between [Wind Barrier] and [Mana Barrier], the two skills have combined, forming [Wind Mana Barrier].”

After going through all of the notifications, he then sent a message through the system, establishing a connection with the only one he knew that would do such a thing, his original body.

“Hello?” Argentum said to initiate the conversation, to which the original body, Aurus, replied, “Oh? If it isn’t Argentum. Missed me after you just left the Tempest Cliff?”

“To be honest, I was grinding all of the skills on my list, including the ones you transferred to me before I left the Tempest Cliff,” Argentum responded to Aurus’s question, before letting out a sigh. Not long after, he continued, “But…what’s this [Reward Sharing] thing? And how are you sharing so many skills with me?”

“[Reward Sharing] is something I’ve unlocked after you became my clone,” Aurus answered Argentum’s query through an explanation before adding, “You also have access to this.”

He then continued, “As for the skills…do you remember the Tempest Cliff Inheritance?”

“Tempest Cliff Inheritance…” Argentum repeated Aurus’s last words as a shocked expression soon appeared on his featureless face. With no way to let this shock out through other means, he asked Aurus, “You mean…the skill room?”

“Bingo,” Aurus replied with a chuckle. He then added, “Don’t you think I’m kind? Boosting your abilities and specialties even further before you reach Verdant Breeze Town?”

“Not gonna lie, I just think you’re adding more burden onto me,” Argentum responded to his question before letting out a slightly exasperated sigh. But then, a drive to make Aurus shocked covered his whole body, adding onto his words with a chuckle, “But…if I complained early on, I wouldn’t become the strongest Super Animate in existence, right?”

“Keep those skills coming, Aurus. Once I come back from this trip, I’ll show you how much I’ve improved!” Argentum said not long after in a confident tone, to which Aurus let out a short chuckle before responding, “I’ll be an X-grade Inanimate by then, but sure! I’ll be glad to fight against my clone!”

After that, the connection between the two had been cut off, with Argentum’s motivation being kindled even further with what Aurus was doing right now. Unfortunately for Argentum, just as he was about to go through the combination of skills to start his extreme skill grind, a voice resounded in his mind all of a sudden.

“Oi, Argentum. Give me back the unused experience points.”

“…”

“…”

“Haah…give me a few seconds.”