It was time to use some magic! The boring kind, where ones body shined with light, but still: magic. IT had to level this up in order to reach General Magic stage 3 where IT would finally be able to use telepathy. Shining like a lightbulb became rather boring after exactly 2 seconds though, so IT just continued forming small earth balls and moved them to the edge of the table.

IT would need them soon. Most likely at least. Using exactly 88 mana was enough to bring his Body of Light skill to maximum mastery, thus allowing IT to finally upgrade.

[Body of Light] - [Upgrade: Maximum]

[General Magic - Mastery 100.00%]

[Mana Cost: 1 Mana/minute]

[Turns you into a Entity of Light to blind or confuse opponents or to navigate through the darkest places.]

Aside from the rather boring upgrade, this seemed to unlock a new spell in IT’s spellbook. After reading through it, IT had a new favorite.

[Cultivation: First Earthly Layer] - [Upgrade: Free.]

[Earth Magic - Mastery 00.00%]

[Uses 1 Mana over 10 seconds to create 2 Mana]

[Restriction: You Cannot Move.]

This would allow IT to gain a lot more mana, especially if the free upgrade on full mastery made it much stronger. Immediately trying it out, IT used 1 mana.

As the mana started circulating through IT’s body, it was rather hard to control the flow. It seemed like the higher level skill would to that much more efficiently by default and IT was just stuck with this improvised messed up version. The ending felt like breaking up the whole process, barely getting more than used.

The Mastery level remained at a solid 00.00%. Which meant this would take thousands and thousands of tries, to master the skill fully. But maybe the problem here lied in the missing Earth Magic Talent? Operating on stage zero sounded rather bad after all.

Still this was the best spell. Offering risk free growth for free, and free stuff was always the best kind of thing, right?

Sadly even mastering the Body of Light spell did not raise IT to General Magic stage 3. Eying the other spells in the spellbook, the creation spell sprung to IT’s eye. Maybe IT could create some earth balls with this spell as well, instead of forming them with IT’s feet? The small balls would make some good ammunition later, for shooting at these rats, that seemed to occupy the friendly giants room so peskily.

Having enough mana, IT just used a bunch to form a ball of earth.

[You created [Golemhead].]

[This head can be ordered around once a body if found.]

Curious, IT stared at the now very solid ball of earth. Rather plumb, hardly resembling a head. No eyes, no mouth. Just roughly the shape of the friendly giants head. Very roughly. Maybe this was not right this way? IT tried to create a body for the golem. The friendly giant in mind, the golem would have two arms and legs and a simple torso. IT burned through a quite considerable amount of mana trying to create this new servant.

When IT finished a new spell was added to IT’s spellbook.

[Summon: Earth Golem I.] - [Upgrade: Free]

[Earth Magic - Mastery 00.01%]

[Manacost: 75] - [Upkeep: 1 mana per minute]

[Servant created with mana, infused to the earth element.]

There it stood just in front of IT. Judging from the newly developed spell, IT would be possible to keep two servants at the same time with IT’s mana regeneration. Considering that this golem was barely twenty centimeters tall a fireball would most likely be a more effective tool to attack.

Luckily the golem spell was Earth Magic. This would allow IT to both gain and spend the mana on Earth Magic, thus gaining a higher level in this kind of magic. Then IT proceeded to use some more mana to randomly form other things out of earth. A house, a sword and a cave, sadly not gaining any new spells.

[You have reached General Magic Stage 3.]

IT was happy to finally reach the desired stage. Now IT could not wait to finally speak to the friendly giant! With telepathy unlocked and new things to play with IT found another problem. Food. After going for a small snack the flesh and bread were quickly gone and IT’s hunger was still present. Now, what to do?

IT needed more food to gain a higher level and along that, a higher mana regeneration. This would be vital for IT’s survival. Eying the whole room, there were no further potions or food. Only a few of these dangerous Aggratit Crystals, that made IT’s leg explode earlier. IT would stay wide away from that!

One option was to stay in this room, safe and sound in order to train the Cultivation Magic and slowly exchange the leftover mana for energy, but that seemed not right. Hunt. Feed. Grow. IT needed to actively do something! The additional income of Energy was just too great a thing to let go.

IT eyed the new servant golem. A name. Even a servant of a great master needed a great name. Even though the master had none. Weird. IT called the golem [Destroyer One]. A great name. Immediately IT ordered the golem to hunt the rats on the ground.

Destroyer One took that a little bit too literally though. Jumping headfirst down the table he just splattered on the ground, leaving a soft pile of earth.

[Destroyer One was defeated.]

IT stamped on the ground angrily, breaking the artificial leg. Damn. Stupid Golem. Creating a new leg and a few cultivation cycles later, IT summoned two new golems. Destroyer Two and Three really looked much smarter. They were great in fact. Especially because IT had created them on the floor directly, thus they did not have to jump down. A very good plan. Sadly the rat was nowhere to be found.

Without any rats present and nothing to do, IT climbed down to join the Destroyer Brothers. Also a good name. IT was very good at naming things. After searching around for a while IT found the source of all the vile creatures that had been running around in this room. A open hole in a wall, barely big enough to fit a rat. Sadly the golem brothers were unable to fit in and IT was definitely not running head first into a rats nest alone.

So IT ordered the two golems to work on widening the tunnel. The walls were not made of stone everywhere, thus allowing them to do so. IT would explore the rats nest and roast them with a fireball, once IT had found them! Sadly nothing exciting happened for the next few hours. The work progressed smoothly and the maximum mana also would hit maximum soon.

[Profile] - [Magical Being] - [Level 6]

[Energy: 983/1.000]

[Power Level: 29]

[Size: 5] - [Upgrade: 1.000 E.]

[Enhance Body] - [Remaining Points: 0]

[Eyesight: 5: Max.]

[Legs: 3]

[Stomach: 160: Max.]

[Wings: 0]

[Mana: 1587/1600]

[Mana Regeneration: 1 per 30 seconds]

With such a huge amount of mana available IT decided to use 170 mana on the exchange spell. This would allow for a level up and a much higher mana regeneration too. It seemed like a smart thing to do, although the exchange rate really made IT feel very stingy. So expensive…

[Exchange Power] - [Upgrade: 1.000 E]

[General Magic - 00.17% Mastery]

[Manacost: depending on action]

[Exchanges Energy for Mana or Mana for Energy.]

[Exchange Rate: 10:1]

[You have exchanged for 17 Energy.]

[You have reached level 7.]

Quickly IT put all the newly available points into mana regeneration. The result was quite awesome.

[Profile] - [Magical Being] - [Level 7]

[Energy: 0/2.500]

[Power Level: 42]

[Size: 5] - [Upgrade: 1.000 E.]

[Enhance Body] - [Remaining Points: 0]

[Eyesight: 5: Max.]

[Legs: 3]

[Stomach: 160: Max.]

[Wings: 0]

[Mana: 1.426/1.600]

[Mana Regeneration: 1 per 5 seconds]

This natural mana regeneration was already as high as the cultivation spell. IT decided to use this to spawn more servant golems. With the current regeneration it would be possible to hold 20 golems! With enough mana available, IT immediately started to summon 18 more. A few minutes later the entire room was full of small little golems, trying to get into the tunnel and help with the workload.

IT immediately named all the golems, which was the most important part, and then tried to coordinate their work. Sadly that proved to be harder than expected. For example, [Clay Monster] always tumbled into [Super Golem Three] because it was so eager to help, which lead to [Super Golem One] falling over.

After a while of really frustrating coordination work, IT just ordered them to wide the tunnel even further. Now the golems were digging a 30 centimeter wide and twenty five centimeter high tunnel. Much wider than the very small rat tunnel that had originally lied there, but IT did not care. IT would find those pesky rats for the master, even if IT had to make a ten meter wide tunnel into these walls!

Leaving all the awesomely named golems to work, IT started to cultivate again. If the rats would not show up to be eaten, then the exchange of mana would have to do. The golems took most of the regeneration, thus mastering the spell further, so mana income had to come from cultivating.

Soon IT lost track of time, cultivating for hours. Eventually sleep overcame the small stick insect and IT fell into darkness. Dreaming of the friendly giant and what he would say about the awesomely named golems almost nine hours passed, before IT woke up again. Immediately new information pressed into IT’s mind.

[You have reached Earth Magic Stage 1.]

[Summon: Earth Golem I.] - [Upgrade: Free]

[Earth Magic - Mastery 100.00%]

[Manacost: 75] - [Upkeep: 1 mana per minute]

[Servant created with mana, infused to the earth element.]]

IT was really happy about reaching the new level. Reaching that in IT’s sleep just showed how much of a genius IT was. IT was just as good in magic, as IT was in naming golems. Speaking of golems. The little servants stood around IT, seemingly having nothing to do. At first IT thought that was because IT had fallen asleep. But then IT noticed the finished tunnel. Apparently the wall was no real wall, but actual earth below the building which eventually lead into the woods.

The tunnel was perfectly worked out by the golems, working the 30x25 centimeter instruction to the smallest detail. The tunnel seemed like carved out off the ground with a knife. [Cute Golem One] apparently had met with a rat, since he was quite damaged, a arm was missing alongside severe scratches in its body.

IT decided to upgrade the golem spell. What kind of awesome things would IT be able to summon now?

[Summon: Earth Golem II.] - [Upgrade: Free]

[Earth Magic - Mastery 00.00%]

[Manacost: 250] - [Upkeep: 10 mana per minute]

[Servant created with mana, infused to the earth element.]

IT decided to let the smaller golems go, but apparently, they only died when no mana was used to pay their upkeep. So IT let them go at it in a huge FFA Arena fight below the table. Oddly enough [Harmless Golem] won the whole thing, utilizing a more than brutal two handed swing, that shattered all his opponents quickly. Then IT proceeded and burned the golem with a fireball.

Using the spell was fun, although it melted the artificial leg, which IT had used to aim the fireball. Apparently fire magic was quite dangerous. Luckily the spell was strong enough to take out the earth golems magic. After recreating the leg, IT walked out through the tunnel and summoned the new golem outside. With about fifty centimeters it looked quite promising.

With twelve mana regenerating every minute IT summoned two smaller ones as well and headed out into the forest.

[Dwayne] seemed like a cool name. He looked like a rock after all.