The offer to help had caught me completely off guard. There I had thought that I was on my own. A one-man vigilante team, trying to save the world, or, at the very least, Annie. Only to realize that, in fact, I wasn’t alone, that there were other people around that cared. Good people.

For a little while, I was quite emotional, sitting in my chair, unable to talk coherently.

And then we talked about what to do, how to move forward. I was still planning on doing most of the dangerous stuff on my own, simply because I felt I was the person for the job, with my stealth skills, and my more extensive fighting experience, not to mention the willingness to be ruthless if needed. But it was nice to see that I had support, that someone was going to have my back.

And they’d chip in with trying to gather information about the bikers and help me train if needed. And they were ready to provide some back-up when I was going to go in, just in case things went South.

For the remainder of the day, I decided that I needed to work on my physical stats some more. To my surprise, Sue decided to join me, which I was actually quite happy about, despite her being sometimes aggravating. It just might give me that extra jolt of motivation that I needed… I felt that I was close to reaching my pre-accident physical levels, which would enable me to finally spend all those characteristic points I had accumulated over the last couple of weeks and realize my full potential.

Throughout the afternoon, I could feel Sue’s eyes on me, measuring, evaluating. And it pushed me harder than ever. And, not that it should have mattered, but it was immensely satisfying to see how I was getting closer to Sue’s level of fitness every minute. And she noticed it too, which pushed her to work harder as well, just to try to stay ahead. It became a bit of a race, which was exactly what I needed.

After about five hours, I was absolutely beat and decided to take a break. Sue was sitting next to me, drenched in sweat and with a heaving chest from the set of suicide sprints she had just finished a moment earlier. To be honest, it was a bit distracting, especially because she hadn’t done too much to piss me off for the last few hours… in fact, now that I thought about it, she had been uncharacteristically quiet.

But overall, this had been a great session. I just wished that I could somehow invigorate myself by using mana, without hindering my progress… As I had already determined, amber mana couldn’t help, because lactic acid wasn’t an injury, and healing the tears in the muscles would simply undo all the work I had put in previously.

My mind was mulling over the problem as I was mechanically chewing through yet another cereal bar. There was something there, at the back of my mind. Why did people eat cereal bars or brown bananas at sports? Energy…

So… how about circumventing the process of eating to obtain energy and, instead, providing the power directly? And of all the mana types I had experience with so far, red mana seemed the one that was most directly aligned with energy.

Could I then, perhaps, use red mana to invigorate muscles? I remembered that when I had almost died in the dungeon, my body, or perhaps divine intervention, had operated essential organs with energy provided by red mana. So, in principle, it should be possible for me to replicate that. In fact, that should be more effective than removing lactic acid anyway. After all, I wasn’t so much worried about the pain or discomfort of the lactic acid. What mattered was my ability to keep pushing, for which I needed reinvigorated muscles.

For that matter, from what I remembered, lactic acid was a byproduct of breaking down glucose for energy if there isn’t enough oxygen. If instead of burning glucose, I burned red mana, I’d avoid creating lactic acid in the first place.

Suddenly excited, I jumped up from the floor, causing Sue to shoot me an alarmed look. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, sorry, I just had an idea about mana…,” I said while pacing around deep in thought.

How the heck did the body transform food into energy? How did that actually work? If I wanted to experiment with fire inside of my body, I had to make darn sure that I got it right. I needed to get my hands on some biology books.

“Sue, I think we are done for now… I need to read up on something for a little bit. Will you be alright getting back to the hotel on your own?”

Sue breathed a deep sigh of relief. “About fucking time! I thought you’d keep torturing me for the rest of the evening!”

“Hey, I didn’t force you to do anything,” I protested, before continuing with a smirk. “But if you can’t keep up… I can understand. Must be tough.”

“Fuck you, Daniel!” Sue grumbled, before lifting herself off the floor with a grimace. “I can still kick your ass, you know?”

I just laughed and shrugged my shoulders. “I am sure. I’ll see all of you then later at the hotel.”

Sue just grunted, before leaving the gym in her sweat-soaked clothes.

Shaking my head, I changed into a fresh, oversized t-shirt and made my way over to the local library. The building felt abandoned and somewhat eerie without any lights inside and no librarians busily shelving books or checking things out.

A few minutes later, I sat down at a table with a small stack of books about human biology. It took me a while to find the correct pages, but eventually, I found a section that provided a reasonably detailed explanation of the process of how the body used the energy obtained from food intake. The way I understood it, breaking down glucose into water and carbon dioxide released energy that then was used to bond inorganic phosphate to adenosine diphosphate to form adenosine triphosphate, kind of like charging a battery. Breaking this bond later released the stored energy, which then was used by the muscles. So, if I was able to provide energy, then the best place to set in was to replace the role of glucose and directly fuel the bonding of phosphate to adenosine diphosphate.

And if I could manage that… this had huge implications. Not only could I extend any workout indefinitely, or at least as long as my red mana lasted, and all without the side effect of lactic acid, but this also implied that I’d be much less reliant on oxygen in the future and food, for that matter. I still needed some of that for vitamins and other stuff, but at least I could, in a pinch, jump in with red mana and fuel my body for brief periods.

Giddy with excitement, I fell into a meditative trance, trying to trace those microscopic processes. It took a long while for my mind to be able to focus sufficiently to go down to that level. Still, eventually, I became aware of the cell-level processes – a truly alien world, that caused me to gaze around in wonder and amazement. Focusing again on the task at hand, I flexed my biceps and carefully observed what was going on. And while reality looked much different from the abstract models I could see in the textbook, I was, ultimately, able to track down the actual process, not on the molecular level, but close enough to be able to direct my red mana meaningfully.

Slightly shaking with a sudden bout of nervousness, I infused some energy into a tiny area, willing it to charge the inert phosphate molecules and then nudged them with some additional red mana toward the adenosine diphosphate molecules. Almost immediately, I could… not precisely see, but feel a bloom of energy that burned the surrounding tissue, melting cells in the process. It was on the microscopic level, but I could still feel a tiny prick of pain shoot through my body.

Fuck. Too much.

Holding my breath, I redid the experiment with a lot less energy, but this time there was no movement whatsoever. It took a few more attempts before I got it right. But finally, I managed to link a bunch of the two molecules, creating new structures that felt, to my inexperienced eye, more energy-rich, and hopefully were adenosine triphosphate molecules.

Success!

Now to replicate this process… I spread my awareness and willed the red mana to copy the steps I had taken previously to multiple molecules at once. I had a clear, incredibly detailed image in my mind, I had the intent, and the willpower to push.

For a moment, there was an almost sluggish resistance, as if there was some inertia that I had to overcome. But I paid no heed and just pushed through. And then things were suddenly moving. A flood of red mana rushed into the muscle I was targeting, and in front of my eyes, millions of molecules began to rearrange themselves.

For a split second, I got scared, fearing that maybe, the spell had gone haywire and was going to burn me from the inside out. But when nothing bad happened for a few moments, I began to relax. Curious, I cast Mana Vision and observed the spell at work inside the muscle. A complex structure of runes raced through the blood, guiding the mana to where it was supposed to go. And, at a glance, it seemed that there were some similarities to the Minor Healing Spell that I had studied earlier… something that might be quite useful for learning more about how spells worked.

But what about this spell… did it have the results I was hoping for?

Time to try it out.

I bent down, grabbed one of the heavy chairs the library was using and proceeded to do a few biceps curls. And the change was nothing short of miraculous. Where I had felt exhausted and weak before, I was almost vibrating with energy. At least in my biceps. The rest of the muscles felt still weak and protested loudly against the additional abuse, but that was something that I could change quickly.

Grinning like an idiot, I repeated the spell for the rest of my body and was almost shaking with the amount of energy I suddenly had available.

Ready for some more reps, I sprinted back to the gym like a man possessed, causing bemusement in some people I passed, whereas others clearly were alarmed. Once I was back there, I packed the workout of half a day into two highly intense hours of punishing strength and speed exercises.

And I still didn’t feel exhausted!

But I slowly was running out of red mana. While each usage of the spell wasn’t too mana intensive, I had to use the spell more and more frequently, and the effect seemed to be diminishing after each application. So other things were at play. But overall, this had been an enormous success.

Flush with the feeling of accomplishment, I made my way back to the hotel through streets painted red by the magnificent sunset. As I entered the hotel, the five others were sitting around in their armchairs, sipping on some iced drinks. With an exhausted grunt, I plopped myself into one of the empty chairs and reached for a can of coke, only to find that it was lukewarm.

With a snort of disgust, I handed the can to Jimmy. “Ice, please!”

“What? Am I your servant now?” Jimmy complained, but then put his hands around the can for a few seconds, before handing it back. It was cold, covered in condensation, and absolutely mind-numbingly delicious.

And unhealthy as hell, but who cared about that.

Soon enough, there wasn’t going to be any more coke, ever. I had to savor it while I could. Luckily, I had never really gotten into coffee or hot chocolate or any of that stuff, so I wasn’t going to miss those drinks. But coke… yeah, it would be a sad day when we ran out of it.

“So, Daniel, how did the day go?” Ben asked. “Sue mentioned that you worked out like a maniac… Did you get any results from all that?”

“It went alright, I guess,” I said and moved up my sleeves to flex my biceps. “At least, I am starting to see some definition now.”

“Holy hell,” Jimmy burst out. “How the heck have you gotten so ripped in like three days?”

“Ripped?” Sue chortled. “Perhaps ripped in comparison to you, Jimmy. But I give you that he is not the skinny dude from a few days ago any longer.”

“Yeah,” I mused. “I have never been the bodybuilder type. But that means I am close to reaching my pre-accident levels.”

“And then what?” Betsy asked. “Will you just continue to keep working out? What is the end-goal?”

“Not sure… I haven’t really thought about it to be honest. The main objective was to reach my previous level because that is fairly low-hanging fruit. And then I am going to spend points on… well, some of my stats. Not sure yet which. I have to figure out what I will need the most.”

“Strength,” Sue said.

“Na, agility,” Betsy argued. “How strong do you have to be to stick a sword into something? What you need is agility for evasion and to actually manage to position yourself.”

“I think, speed and intelligence,” Jimmy said after a moment.

“And why is that, Jimmy boy?” Sue demanded in her infuriatingly, condescending tone.

“Well, speed to run away and intelligence to know when to run!” Jimmy stated matter of fact.

“Ah, but intelligence isn’t really that good for that, right?” Betsy argued. “That’d be more wisdom, which isn’t something the system assesses.”

“Well, you might be right on that,” Jimmy had to admit. “But still, I like intelligence. It’s good to be able to understand this new world. We’ll need to uncover the laws guiding things.”

That was my keyword. “Speaking of… I’d like to request your help during the coming days on something. I’m trying to understand how spells work by comparing the differences in spell structure across mana types and spells.”

“Sure thing, buster,” Sue said while leaning back into her chair with her eyes closed.

The others just nodded their heads, not even bothering to respond further and, instead, enjoyed the calm evening.

-------------------------------------------

After an uneventful night, I tried to get up early in the morning, but was barely able to even lift my legs, not to speak of my arms, or really any part of my body - I had the most intense muscle pain I could have ever imagined.

In some sense, that was a good pain, because it showed that I had really done my workout right. But it was too much. I really wanted to just stay in bed and do nothing.

Until Sue waltzed into my room and shouted: “Rise and shine, sleepyhead!”

“What the fuck, Sue,” I shouted, trying desperately to pull a bedsheet over myself.

“Look at that,” Sue whistled. “You really put on some muscle in the last few days! Maybe I should reconsider things!”

“Uhm,” was all I managed to say at first, too embarrassed by her rather blatant staring and the veiled reference. But then I realized that she had absolutely no intention of leaving. “Do you mind, like fucking getting out of the room?”

Sue pouted her lips. “But why? I like what I am seeing.”

“Sue! Get. The. Fuck. Out.”

With her trademark pearly laughter, she finally turned around and walked out of the room, but not without giving me another wink.

“What a bitch,” I grumbled to myself. If she were really attracted to me, it’d be a different story, then I might even like the attention. But I was sure that she was toying with me, and that annoyed the heck out of me. At least, it had gotten me to move, so there was something good about it. Without her coming in, I might have just stayed in bed for another hour or two.

Walking like a robot, with stiff arms and legs, I wolfed down a quick breakfast, mostly consisting of some crackers with jam, and dry cereal, before heading off to the gym once more.

I was getting fucking sick of that place. But this was the last visit, for the time being, I swore to myself. And the prospect of finally getting done even gave a little hop to my steps.

A few hours of a red-mana-fueled, intense workout later, I felt that I had achieved what I could. I wasn’t exactly buff, but I felt strong. Certainly, stronger than my looks, which was probably due to the strength-enhancing title. I looked like a reasonably athletic guy with some muscle, but nothing huge. Just in line with your average college kid that is seriously engaged in a sport. And then, somehow, the system made my effective strength a lot higher.

Which also begged the question of where I should put my points. Strength gave me the most bang for the buck because of the twenty-five percent bonus. It was a given that I’d put a few points in there just because I had already experienced first-hand how hard it was to injure high-leveled creatures without some serious strength behind the strikes.

That said, with the power behind some of my potential adversaries, a good defense was paramount as well, which included the ability to tank a few hits or to dodge the strikes in the first place. I was already good at anticipating attacks, but I lacked the agility to get away from what I saw coming…

Fuck, this was hard.

Slowly, I made my way back to the hotel, greeted the others briefly in the foyer, and then locked myself into my room to finally spend some points.

First, I took another look at my current stats. I could see solid but unspectacular gains for most physical stats, just as I had expected, with strength, agility, and speed increasing by two points each and endurance and vitality by one. There was no change in dexterity, which wasn’t surprising because I hadn’t worked on that all that much.

Given the sheer intensity of the workout, the modest increase also reinforced my belief that it was time to spend a few points.

In the end, I decided to put three points into strength, agility, and vitality each and bringing perception up by two points as well. The remaining points I wanted to preserve for the time being, until I could figure out how important intelligence, for instance, was in comparison to even higher physical stats.

Needless to say, the process was torture. My body was wracked by spasms and cramps, and at times all I could do was to stuff a rag into my mouth to prevent myself from screaming myself hoarse. But eventually, many hours later, it was over, and I felt absolutely ravenous.

Quickly, I grabbed a huge pile of food from my bag of holding and began to stuff myself while looking at my new stats.

Name

Daniel Hollander

Rank

Initiate 9

Title:

Mental Bastion (Mental Defense x2)

First Initiate (Mana Recovery x2)

Army of One (V +20%)

Against the Mighty II (St +25%)

Transformer (1:5)

Droghul’s Disciple (+Healing/Kill)

Strength:

18.75 [+5]

Intuitive Reasoning:

15

Mana

Free

Current

Potential

Agility:

15 [+5]

Complex Reasoning:

19

Silver

0

94

94

Speed:

11 [+2]

Emotional Intelligence:

9

Black

0

125

125

Dexterity:

9

Perception:

21 [+2]

Amber

0

94

94

Endurance:

13 [+1]

Spatial Awareness:

22

Red

0

50

97

Vitality:

16.8 [+4]

Willpower:

23

Yellow

3

0

0

Available characteristic points: 9 [-11]

Spells

Mana Vision

Level 14

Twilight Vision

Level 2

Minor Healing

Level 10

Shadow Skin

Level 6

Shadow Sense

Level 1

Midnight Skin

Level 3

Partial Incorporeality

Level 2

Aura of Droghul

Level 3

Higrom’s Touch

Level 3

Heliod’s Minor Heat Shield

Level 0

Scorching Flames

Level 1

Rush of Energy

Level 1 [+1]

Available spell points: 26

Skills

Mental Ward

Level 8

Mental Fortitude

Level 12

Multitasking

Level 6

Internal Mana Manipulation

Level 10 [+2]

Meditation

Level 7 [+1]

External Mana Manipulation

Level 7

Enhanced Mana Recovery

Level 2

Sword Fighting

Level 10

Shadow Affinity

Level 1

Available skill points: 10

It looked good. And I felt the changes.

Looking at my arms, I could see corded muscles, a striking change in comparison to the previous moderate definition. It wasn’t bodybuilder-like, but I looked sharp, and healthy – with nice, unblemished skin, clear nasal passages, and a body that practically vibrated with energy.

It was time to bring some pain to the bikers.

----------------------------------------------

“What is he doing for that long,” Sue asked no one in particular while chewing on her nails. “He should have been done hours ago!”

Ben looked up from his book. “Relax, Sue, maybe he took a nap afterward. It is an exhausting process, as you remember.”

“Yeah, I know. But still. He is level 9… so he should have had around nine points. And he said before that he already had spent a few on mental stats. So, it could be at most… what, five points? Maybe six?”

“We’ll see soon enough,” Betsy said from the side.

“Unless he ended up putting it into intelligence, as I proposed,” Jimmy added.

“I sure hope that he didn’t,” Sue groused. “He is already plenty smart. Did you know that he was studying physics?”

Jimmy scrutinized Sue’s face for a moment. “Guys, you know what I think? Sue actually likes Daniel!”

Sue glared at him. “Shut up, Jimmy! You kno-”

“He is coming down,” Tom interrupted her.

And, indeed, Daniel was stepping down the stairs, moving gingerly, as if he was somewhat unsure of his body.

“Hey, guys, I am done for now. I’ll go and scout the bikers a bit more. Anyone care to join?”

Jimmy handed a cold coke to Daniel. “Congratulations, Daniel. It seems like things worked out well. You are looking good. What did you end up boosting, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“Not at all. I boosted strength, agility, vitality, and perception. I figured those were the most essential ones for the short term.”

“Are you sure that spreading things out that much is the best strategy? A single point more or less doesn’t make a huge difference for any one stat.”

“I thought about it… but since I was able to spend more than one point into each, I figured it was worthwhile to improve my overall capabilities. No glass cannon approach for me!”

“I can’t believe it…” Sue grumbled. “How many points did you spent?”

“Eleven points.”

Sue couldn’t believe her ears. That was a huge number. How the fuck did he do that? He had come out of nowhere, a skinny, weak dude, slightly awkward. And days later… Sue couldn’t take her eyes off the way his t-shirt stretched over his chest and the shredded physique.

But then she had to chuckle. He was still awkward, though.