My first coherent thought was “oh shit I died.” Then it came to me that if I was dead I wouldn’t be able to think. I tried to open my eyes, but I wasn’t able to. Next, I tried to move my limbs. My arms and leg wouldn’t move. Finally, something clicked in my brain and I expanded my mage sight to see what the problem was.

I was in my bed sleeping next to Willow and somehow, I had cocooned myself in the comforter. My eyes were glued shut with crusted blood which must have been a side effect from me trying to absorb too much energy at one time. Idiot me rushed to conclusions again not just with my stunt the lead to me passing out once again but also when I woke.

First, I used cleaning magic on the entire bed to get rid of the blood on my face and anything else that could have gotten stained. I then used my mage sight to view my cocoon and through some wiggling and the use of magic I was able to free myself.

I usually hate having my head covered while sleeping so I’m not sure how I ended up all wrapped. I also didn’t want to wake Willow and so my movements had to be slow and gentle. Willow had a thin blanket over her, but I added the comforter to give her extra warmth.

I made my way back down to my workshop. I absorbed some of the gravity pulling on me to lighten my steps. It’s not like I didn’t learn my lesson from absorbing gravity but that I tried to do too much at once.

I have noticed that the more I used my magic, the more my capabilities grew. Every time I blacked out from overly exerting my magic, it seems to grow exponentially when I recovered. This method seems like the most expedient way to grow my powers but trauma to the brain repeatedly can’t be good. Its best to stick with a more conventual training method.

As I arrived at my workshop, I saw a scene out of a horror movie. There was blood everywhere. Bloody footprints on the floor, bloody hand prints on the door and walls, bloody drag marks like what you would see in the movies after a murder. The most horrifying part was the giant pool of blood. I can’t remember how much blood is inside of the human body but what was in front of me looked to be a lot more then what a single body could hold.

I knew that all of it was mine, there was a feel to it that I got from the blood. Strange enough the blood was still red and only the edges had started to coagulate. I could feel that there was a lot of energy still in the blood. Was that what was keeping the blood alive? On a whim I stuck my index finger into the pool and the energy started to flow into me even without me doing anything.

The amount of energy I was able to absorb was roughly equal to the amount I used to conjure 10-12 silver coins. If this was a week ago, that would have been close to the amount of personal energy I could use in one go but I get the feeling that my current self could easily do 20 times more then that and not feel exhausted.

Thinking about how I was growing more powerful made me feel a lot better and my chest puffed out a bit all on its own. After I had finished absorbing the energy from the blood pool, it resembled puddle of jelly. Looking at my own blood was starting to make my feel sick and so I activated cleaning magic on the entire room. I watch as the blood disappeared.

As I watch the blood slowly dissolve, I started to wonder. Where does all the dirt I clean go? I used my mage sight to examine the last bits that were dissolving into thin air but got nothing, it was just gone. Damn, I was hoping that it was turning into energy and being absorbed without me noticing or I had an inventory system that was accumulating all of this stuff.

I decided to experiment by using clean on my coins. They immediately gained another level in appearance; every coin now had a polished look to them. I then scattered the coins onto the floor and closed my eyes to concentrate on the idea that the floor was now dirty by having all of those coins scattered everywhere.

Once the thought was fixated in my mind I opened them and casted clean on the workshop floor. All of the coins vanished. A huge grin bloomed on my face. I’m not sure how this works exactly but I had confirmed that I was onto something. I looked back down at the empty coin purse that I was still holding a tried to conjure replacement coins but now I got the feeling that I had options. I had never noticed it before, but I could feel 2 distant ways to create the coins.

There’s only one way to find out what each did and so I tried the first method. I was able to produce a silver coin without difficulty. The second method had almost the same result. This coin had a kind of resonance to it that felt similar uniquely of myself. The first coin must have been what I started out using where I used the material around me to create, while the second is what I now refer to as conjuring.

I then used both methods on creating a copper coin. Method 1 used significantly less energy than method 2 which used only a little less then the cost of the silver coin. I looked over to my shelves and saw that the closest ingot seems to be missing a corner. If my thought process is correct, then depending on if I have material available to me or not I could switch between the two and maximize my efficiency.

I still don’t know where the stuff I clean go but I feel that I have learned a bit more about myself in the process. If I can just use cleaning magic to clear land or make tunnels it would make my building project go much smoother.