Chapter 11: New Toys

The Battle Royale was winding down and I still hadn't seen any more opponents, which meant that most if not all of the remaining participants had likely eliminated an enemy from the proceedings. It had looked as if there were about a hundred of us in the hall to begin with and Akash and I had taken out just under 20 people by ourselves. At maximum, there would only be 30 people remaining in the rest of the tournament.

In the final 10 minutes of the tournament, I had decided to get some training in with my new abilities and using them was a rush.

With my basic manna construct ability, which let me create small objects comprised entirely out of manna, I had learned that I was actually able to create small projectiles that I could then control the direction and speed of, up to a limit. While my energy beams would still be great for taking out big and powerful foes like the Mannachoid, these would allow me to hit faster moving, smaller targets. They would have been perfect for the fight against Akash.

The limit on the size of the objects that I could construct seemed to be about the height and width of both my fists pushed together. It wasn't much, but travelling at near close to the speed of sound it would still pulverize almost anything that it made contact with.

The next ability I had tested was my Gravitic control. If I made the gravity field around myself weaker, and then used jets of my Manna propulsion, I was actually able to fly. Before this point I'd been using my manna propulsion to fall with style, it was hard to control and I frequently crashed into things. Now, on the other hand, I was able to use the gravitic control to cancel out my mass entirely, which meant all I needed to focus on with my propulsion was the direction I wanted to travel. I hadn't been able to test it out properly yet, because I wanted to stay on the mountain for safety's sake, but I had a feeling I'd be able to get some real speed on the go if I wanted to.

Alongside my new abilities, I'd also attained 3 new skills. The temporal acceleration was by far the most interesting of these, and it seemed to have no upper limits. In the brief moments that I allowed myself to test out my new gravitic control flight, no matter how fast I moved it felt like I was only moving as fast as a brisk walk. In a fight, this ability would be ridiculously powerful. I'd be able to keep moving at insane speeds, and thanks to that movement, think on a level that was way quicker than my enemies. It would seem as if they were moving through treacle.

Less interesting, but still incredibly cool, were my new skills with swords and knives. On the one hand, I was slightly concerned that the system had been able to literally download knowledge right into my brain as if I had learned it. That felt like it had some pretty heavy metaphysical connotations that I wasn't really ready to face. On the other hand, I could use swords and knives now.

I drew my sword and was almost disappointed at how basic it was. The handle of the sword was a basic leather, the blade was wide at the bottom and more narrow toward the top, and the handguard was just a simple strip of metal. What it lacked in looks, it made up for in power. As a test, I had swung the sword down as hard as I could, straight into the rock of the mountain. It cut through it like butter. While it may have looked like an average, normal sword it seemed as if it was much more powerful than something made from simple steel.

The knife was much more interesting. The blade of the thing twisted like a corkscrew and was around 10 inches long. The edges along the corkscrew twist were razor-sharp, and when I plunged it into the side of the mountain it bore straight through with no difficulties at all. If I were to stab something with this blade, there was no way that it would be walking away unscathed.

<Enjoying your new toys?> BB asked as it rose up from the synchro mode I had engaged so I could practice my new abilities.

"They're pretty fun, yeah," I responded as I gazed out at the simulated sun setting over the horizon of the battlefield. "You didn't tell me that choosing a job would be so… altering."

<Well, that's because it usually isn't.>

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked, surely my elevated levels of manna couldn't be the reason for these changes as well.

<You've got to remember that, while your manna reserves are already huge, you're only accessing the tiniest portion of your upper limits. A being that generates its own manna has never existed before, so this esoteric effect is just part and parcel of being who you are.>

I cracked my back and took a look at the timer as it ticked down. There was less than a minute left on the clock, I'd made it through the battle royale stage of the entry tournament, and it hadn't been easy.

I knew that the elimination rounds were next, a set of one on one battles that would determine whether one of the squadron leaders who had been watching the whole thing would be willing to take me on. I'd already proven to them that I had overwhelming strength, but I'd also proving that my technique was sorely lacking. If I wanted to get picked up by a good squadron then that was what I needed to try and show off first. I needed to prove that I also had the ability to use the great power that had been gifted to me.

And now, with the skills and abilities handed to me by the Red Mage job selection, I finally could.