Once I chose the Mana Cannon Rune Pattern Blueprint from the C-rank Treasury, I was once again taken into an illusory world, and given the materials needed to construct the cannon.

“Cannon” was, apparently, a misleading name. This wasn’t a long, tube-shaped device on wheels that I was making.

The C-rank Mana Cannon was actually more of a defensive turret. It was about the size of a phone booth, with a hollow interior space that you could stand inside to operate it.

From what I could make sense of using the blueprints, the Mana Cannon had dozens of levers, knobs, and settings in order to adjust the range, density of attacks, and so on.

As if the space inside a telephone booth wasn’t already cramped enough, the inside walls held shelves that locked in place Mana Beads, Shards, Mana Crystals, or Compressed Mana Orbs, all of various affinities.

All it needed was a pair of wheels, and it would basically be a tank.

Since Rune Masters were not actually expected to shape rare metals, I was already provided the telephone booth, and I just had to form runes around it.

Of course, nothing was as simple as that.

Samantha walked me through, step by step, what I needed to do. The walls around me were several inches thick, and every cubic inch would eventually be covered in runes.

It would have been a somewhat calming experience, if I didn’t have to listen to Samantha’s constant, nit-picking instructions as I worked on it.

How exactly are you going to adapt this rune pattern for my body? I asked.

Samantha responded.

Well, thanks for making me feel like shit.

Samantha shot back.

Touché.

Samantha continued using a visual guide superimposed in my vision to help me form my unattributed mana into runes in the air.

It was a very methodical process. She would show me the form the runes needed to take, almost like a hologram in my vision, and I would fill the hologram with my mana.

That part was almost fun. The annoying part is that Samantha would consistently nit-pick where I put the mana, often demanding precision down to a millimeter, before I could connect the rune to the rest of the pattern.

It was painstaking, demanding work, but eventually, we completed it.

Congratulations! You have learned the Mana Cannon Rune Pattern Blueprint (C-rank): When activated, converts attuned Mana Beads, Mana Shards, Mana Crystals, or Mana Orbs into long-ranged, elemental attacks of varied range, density, and size. Requires: Rune Master (C-rank).

I had no idea what time it was when I came out of the illusory world, but due to the time magic involved, I felt exhausted.

I checked my Communication Amulet for anything important, and then promptly fell asleep.

I woke to the familiar buzz of my Communication amulet.

“Hello?” I said, somewhat blearily.

“Jarek. We found South America’s Zone Lord,” Abelino’s warm voice resonated in my head. “It’s a Jaguar. We were trailing it for a while, but it escaped us. Did you say you had a tracking skill?>

I woke up completely in an instant. “I do. Tell me where to meet you, and I will be there in a few minutes.”

As I was talking, I started heading towards the Teleportation Circle.

Samantha said, suddenly.

I froze where I stood in the doorway of my manor. You finished the Mana Cannon already? Why didn’t you mention you would be doing it last night?

Samantha responded, calmly.

I thought we would do it together. You were controlling my mana without permission.

Samantha sulked.

We will talk about this later, I said, sighing, and then I went to the warehouse that Petra had built that stored all the crystals we had collected.

Fortunately, it seemed Petra had deigned to give me Administrator Privileges in the town, which allowed me to open the warehouse. Inside, I was shocked to see a huge number of shards, crystals, and fragments. Everything was neatly organized by attribute and by size.

Samantha said.

It felt vaguely like stealing, but I took what I needed regardless, including something I had asked Petra to prepare for me—a Fire-attributed Compressed Mana Crystal. It was worth well-over a million dollars, and my conscience complained slightly at the thought that this Mana Crystal could likely power a city’s shields in the upcoming battle against the sea monsters.

Normally, our procedure was to extract the attribute before consolidating shards into Crystals, but thanks to my Mana Cannon skill, that was going to quickly change.

And then I was off to South America.

Just like with Europe, Dawnbreaker and Abelino had set up an easy way to travel between continents. From Nova City, I could travel to Tapachula, Mexico, which was just on the border of Mexico and Guatemala.

The southern border of Mexico was the border between Zones, and I only had to run a few hundred yards or so before coming upon a small town in Guatemala. Once I was in Guatemala, I was able to teleport with just a few more hops to the town that was closest to the last sighting of the Zone Lord.

I floated above my body, pausing for a moment to glance at the Abelino clones guarding myself, and the Mana Shield around my body.

After Evangeline tried to kill me, it was easy to imagine Abelino trying to kill me as well.

The only comfort I could find was that if he wanted to kill me, he could kill me at any point. He wouldn’t need to wait for my soul to be outside my body.

I wasn’t more exposed right now than I was at any other moment I was alone with Abelino.

I rose above the treetops, hundreds of feet in the air, and I surveyed the Amazon Rainforest using Mana Sensing.

It was a confusing, convoluted sight. There was so much life, so much mana, everywhere around me, in over a dozen different colors and shades.

Alright, so…what now? How do we find the Jaguar?

Samantha said.

I started moving, my soul traveling in exactly the same direction that the Jaguar had last been seen following.

The rainforest below me was just waking up. Before I left my body, I had been able to hear the sounds of birds chirping, and leaves rustling.

But now, traveling over the rainforest with just my spirit, I couldn’t hear or smell anything. It was a weird combination of sensory depravation and overstimulation from the Mana Sensing skill.

Samantha said.

I picked up the pace, until the colors of the mana in the rainforest blurred together in a haze. I focused solely on traveling, ignoring all else, losing track of time as I passed hills, lakes, rivers, and swamps.

Samantha said. I had no idea how much time had passed.

With Samantha guiding me at a slower pace, I soon found the Jaguar. It had climbed half-way up a massive tree.

From the mana density in the tree, I could tell something was off. The tree shone with almost as much mana as the Jaguar relaxing on its branches.

I had heard before that trees in a forest are often connected by their roots. Sometimes, trees can strengthen each other, creating a vibrant ecosystem by sharing nutrients and stabilizing each other during storms.

With Mana Sensing, I could see this. The tree the Jaguar was in was not the tallest tree around, but it was the brightest tree to my Mana Sensing, and as I watched, I could see it sending pulses of mana through its roots into the roots of nearby trees.

Should I use Soul Explosion? I asked Samantha. Unless the Jaguar had evolved past level 100, I could likely kill it with Soul Explosion.

Samantha said.

Name:

Jarek

Level:

37

HP:

47/47

Physical Defense:

28

Strength:

30 (+5)

Mental Power:

14

Dexterity:

10 (+5)

Agility:

24 (+10)

Perception:

20

Luck:

22

Mana Pool:

131 (+10)

Mana Regeneration:

72 (+10)

Available Points:

0

Coins:

1,234,000

Class:

Mana Modulator (D-rank)

Profession:

Rune Master (C-rank)

Titles:

Region Lord (E-rank)

Skills and Spells:

Identify (E-rank)

Mana Modulation (D-rank Core)

Death’s Defier (A-rank)

Mana Sensing (C-rank)

Healthy Magic (E-rank)

Aquatic Respiration (E-rank)

Polyglot (E-rank)

Soul Communion (D-rank)

Cursed Lightning (D-rank)

Spiritual Traveler (D-rank)

Soul Explosion (D-rank)

Mana Control (C-rank)

Affinities:

Internal Mana (D-rank Low), External Unattributed Mana (C-rank Low), Soul Magic (D-rank Low)

Equipment:

Vampiric Blade (D-rank): +5 Strength, +5 Agility.

Bloodied Battle Robes (D-rank): +5 Mana Pool, +5 Mana Regen.

Greedy Gloves (D-rank): +5 Mana Pool, +5 Mana Regen.

Bonded Blades (D-rank): +5 Dexterity, +5 Agility.

Communication Amulet (E-rank):

Personal Mana Shield (E-rank):

Interdimensional Pouch (D-rank):

Missions:

Zone Offense

Renegade Bounty Hunter