Prologue 5

A couple of hours later while walking through the woods, Victor got the sudden impression that he should lean back and so he did. As he did so a steel quill passed through where his head used to be. The gate of the senses was already paying dividends.

Victor turned his head and looked at his newest challenger. It was a two-meter-tall porcupine covered in metallic quills. he sent his shadow rushing towards the porcupine. The shadow had to be material to block the quills from reaching him which led to it being a different kind of porcupine by the time the shadow reached it. The shadow could not maintain its integrity with so many objects inside of it. The shadow fulfilled its purpose though by buying him enough time to build up a large electrical charge.

Turns out being covered in conductive metal is a bad choice when being stuck by lightning. The porcupine was extra crispy the second after the shadow dissolved. Unluckily the porcupine had the time to launch the last quill of its life, it ended up in Victor's lung as he was unable to control the shadow, lightning mana weave, and be prepared to dodge attacks or strengthen Bodi's Armor all at the same time.

His physique made a metal spike in the lung only a slight problem. He was able to easy fix his lungs and chest with Biological Thread.

After he patched himself up, he created the first of what he termed Heart Jars out of the corpse. They resembled black Egyptian canopic jars and strengthened the source of the heart's magic. The jars floated around him waiting to be used.

The Metallic Porcupine Heart Jar had a porcupine head as a lid and golden accents. The resulting artifact was tier two.

The porcupine's soul power and flaws were the last needed to fully develop his first flaw fruit and soul fruit.

He ate the resulting pale blue fruit and split open the black one. He then integrated the black liquid that fell out into his magic. His strengthen soul also empowered his mana.

The buzzing was his only sign hours later of an attack. He barely got an earthen wall up in time to defend against the attack. It appeared his opponent was a bluish green blur buzzing around the woods. It kept using guerrilla tactics not giving him any time to kill it as it was too fast for earth to kill.

It would rush towards him, he created an earthen wall at the last possible second, then it would flee. This battle would end in a single strike, either the blur would tear open his throat or he would strike it to the ground as organisms were usually either fast or tough.

The blur was dumb enough to not recognize what was happening around him as Victor never took down any of the walls. The walls were steadily slowing the blur down by putting obstacles in its path. It took but a single moment of knowing where it would be to finish it.

It practically drove the spike that suddenly jutted from the wall into its own heart with its speed. Turns out he was fighting a hummingbird with sharp blades for feathers.

He constructed the Air Hummingbird Heart Jar out of its corpse and reserve of air essence. It was a tier two artifact with a bird lid and azure accents.

After that battle Victor decided to settle in for the night. He started a fire by gathering the surrounding fire mana using mana weaving. He then took the jerky he previously created by extracting the water from his game meat while it was cooking.

After his unseasoned dinner, Victor created a web hammock, set up some traps in his surroundings, then went to bed.

While walking through the woods the next day he was intercepted by a troop of white monkeys. They led him to a clearing filled with even more monkeys. In the center there was a huge monkey covered in scars and drinking what he guessed was wine from a beast skull.

When the leader saw him, it put down its "cup" and approached him. It let out a series of screeches, which judging from the fluctuations in its soul was meant as a challenge. The gestures afterwards were a little hard to discern, but I had a pretty good guess.

It seems like the challenge was meant to be without armor or weapons and if he refused the surrounding monkeys would swarm him. While he typically would not bar knuckle brawl due to his weak physique, especially with the fact that all damage would have to be manually healed afterwards. He quite simply wanted to as it seemed like a new and novel experience, fist fighting a monkey. So, he put away the artifacts he was carrying, all of them except his glasses for obvious reasons, and took off the clothes on his upper body along with his shoes.

"Well let's this over with." stated Victor.

*Screeches*

"Sorry big guy, but the glasses stay." Replied Victor

*Grunt*

" 'preciate it." Victor responded.

The monkey was in his face almost immediately. Victor ducked under its sucker punch and went for a counter. A golden translucent armor set covered his entire arm up to the shoulder when he went for the blow. He felt the rib break under his fist. The monkey grunted then drove its elbow into his jaw in response. Victor was lucky that the armor was not grounds for a swarming.

Victor spat out the blood in his mouth, then got back in there. The white furred fist met a golden one. While the encounter seemed like a draw, bone broke where metal did not even bend. The monkey shook his broken fist. He was not prepared for the side kick that broke some of his ribs to match its.

The simple fact of the matter was this, while he was trained for combat due to his affiliation, he was a non-combat member and thus not very well trained or experienced. On the other hand, the monkey was a master of combat, instinctive as it may be, at least to his undeveloped eye for stuff like that. He was confronted with a choice: either fully deploy his armor and bulldoze his opponent or learn from it.

After a little more time, both Victor and the monkey were laying on the ground injured and exhausted. Victor used Biological Stitch to patch himself up and the monkey who accepted when offered.

They then sat down, and the monkey took a huge gulp of its wine, then offered it to him. While Victor would normally refuse to share a cup with another, something tells him that refusing would be bad form and thus an insult. That insult would then lead to a you guessed it, a swarm.

So, he took a sip and drained the liquid in his mouth of its essences. This resulted in him gaining a new special elemental essence in his Records, Monkey Wine. It also contained some disease essence, so his policy on shared drinks was spot on.

The essence was a wine-red liquid that relieved muscle tension and fatigue. It also helps with body training, which would be very helpful in training others and the first half of his purity body training. It also offered minimal healing, but it was distributed over the entire body. This patched up one of the annoyances of his new physique, patching up all the little scrapes and bruises he acquires in the course of the day. Now he could just down a shot of Monkey wine at the end of the day and be down with his daily healing.

***

Monkey Wine

'The secret to the monkey king's strength'

A poison essence that empowers those who consume it while also relieving their pain and stress

Provides weak universal physical healing

***

Victor spent the next couple of days training and gaining experience with The Monkey King. It was a blast while it lasted, but it finally came the time to continue his journey.

The next day after leaving the monkey clearing, he ran into a light floating in the air in front of him.

Victor could not pull his attention away from the light. In fact, the only reason he was aware of his surroundings and the danger he was in was due to The Fortress Gate of The Mind. He quickly launched a Heartstring imbued with metal at the lantern with the objective of removing it from the playing field. The only sight that it hit was a tiny cut left on the lantern letting him know that it was not a viable strategy.

He knew that trying to directly attack the creature the lantern was attached to was a lost cause. So, Victor did not even try. Instead, he launched a heartstring in a horizontal circular pattern undirected around him. Blood jetted out to the side, which told him that the creature's body was directly behind the lantern and thus protected by it. His next move incorporated this data, and he launched a vertical strike at it. the resulting cut on its belly disemboweled the creature.

After the creature was dead, Victor was able to take it in for the first time. It was a gray wrinkly anglerfish looking creature with four tree trunk like legs.

He then proceeded to extract a wisp of the special elemental essence, Mesmerizing Light.

It was a prismatic light that drew attention and made others forget their surroundings.

***

Mesmerizing Light

'The last light many lives have seen'

A light essence that forcefully draws its victim's attention

***

He also turned its biological lantern and the reserve of Mesmerizing Light contained in the corpse into two magic artifacts. The first, the Lantern Mace, was made of the biological lantern, thus embodying the fish's light talent and the biological lantern's durability.

***

Lantern Mace

Tier 2

'Blinded by the light'

Enhances all light-based concepts

***

The second, Mesmerizing Hook, was made of the Mesmerizing Light Reserve.

***

Mesmerizing Hook

Tier 2

'Blinded by the light'

Enhances all usages of the special element Mesmerizing Light

***

These were his newest Heartstrings. a greenish blue metal chain bracelet with a lantern charm and a rainbow fluorescent fishing hook and line appeared on his wrist.

He then turned the creature's hide into a light grey sweatshirt imbued with the creature's stealth.

***

Hider's Hood

Tier 1

'Shielded from the light'

Enhances the user's stealth capabilities

***

He then continued on his way afterwards.

Several days later while walking through the woods, Victor came across a large green wolf with matching sparks coming off it. Small bolts of green lightning bounced between the alpha and its two subordinates.

This gave him the chance to utilize one of his favorite tools, bouncing brains. They were cheap to make and quite effective. They involved explosive essence wrapped in bouncing essence. These would be fairly low level due to world suppression and the low-level essences he got from a rubber tree and modifying fire essence.

Victor opened a gap in space above his hand and had three drop into his hand. He then proceeded to throw them at the pack. The pack was apparently not experienced with explosives as they moved just enough to dodge the balls. When the balls went off, the wolves did not even see it coming. The left subordinates head gained a huge hole in it. The right subordinate gained a matching one in its side. Both were down for the count.

The alpha meanwhile just suffered mild burns that only served to anger it. The wolf proceeded to rush him while creating a coat of lightning. Victor created stone spikes jutting out of the ground that the wolf just bulldozed through. Victor had to think on his feet and come up with a plan B.

He swung the Lantern Mace, empowered it with light essence, and it flew through the wolf's skull leaving only salsa in its place.

After the battle concluded, Victor extracted the wolf's special elemental essence, Vitality Lightning. The essence was a vibrant green energy that represented the spark of life that all lives were graced with.

***

Vitality lightning

'The spark of life'

A lightning essence that empowers those who are imbued with it, sometimes to the point of an evolution

***

Victor constructed a tattoo, The Pulse Ring, out of the reserve of vitality lightning contained in the corpse. This tattoo served two purposes one was that it allowed him to shapeshift and gave him an ability he named ever increasing peak. The ability allowed him to always return to his peak, no matter how high or short-lived. This ability granted a healing factor and prevented his purity from back-sliding.

***

The Pulse Ring

'The tattoo is connected to the heart and thus controls it'

Allows the user to control his physical form and improve it

***

The tattoo was a red pulse line wrapped around his left ring finger.

After he was done all the lionesses bowed to him. After that Victor felt a mantle fall on him. Mantles were funny since while you could try to get one or avoid one, you only ever get the mantle you deserve. Mantles were the world's recognition of an identity. The mantle he just obtained was the mantle of Pride Leader, which he promptly turned into the last of his fable tattoos. This tattoo granted him the ability to guide and strengthen his subordinates.

***

Solaris' Scepter

'Where I walk, Legions Follow'

Strengthens subordinate creatures and increasing the user's ability to guide them

***

The last of the fable tattoos was a circular tattoo with a scepter silhouette on it. The tattoo also resonated with the other fable tattoos and as a result strengthened them.

This fight had shown him something that he already semi-realized a while ago, he had outgrown this world. While he could continue to explore and pick up more special elemental essences, there was nothing more to learn from his fights here. While they were semi challenging in the beginning due to his new abilities, they now were virtually over before they start.

He created a space gap the size of his body and walked through it.