For all the confidence he had projected the night before, Eric had to fight back the wave of anxiety threatening to drown him as he glared at the wand in his hand by dawn’s early light.

He took deep breaths, seeking calmness, doing his best to center himself as he put into practice the lessons from the cultivation manual that had sparked such grand hopes before one roadblock after another present themselves. Regardless, the tips on meditation and achieving a state of zen were perfect for helping him to focus past the growing worry that he was once more playing the fool.

Because at this point, he had invested far too much of himself to do anything but press onward. As glorious as the arcane blaster was, its charges were limited and he might never see the like again. But should he successfully unlock the secrets of wands aligned to the essence of Flame that called out to him even now, there was no limit to how far he could go.

For as much as he enjoyed his growing mastery over his chosen weapons, now possessing a predatory grace and physique beyond his wildest dreams, and well able to perform feats of agility and power that had once been limited to the most highly choreographed of movies scenes, he still couldn’t deny how wondrous it would be to actually wield the elements like a true honest-to-goodness mage.

His anxious dread of just moments before was lost as a surprised smile caressed his features as long minutes of intense concentration paid off and he actually, albeit for just a heartbeat, felt a connection to a vast sea of endless flame.

Flame that was a whirlpool of energy and glorious potential.

The sea of mana all around him that his Arcane Potential could somehow tapped into.

For just a heartbeat, he had felt connected to that maelstrom of magic, one with the wondrous promise of infinite possibility.

The relief he felt with that revelation was monumental as he braced himself to take a plunge that still might imperil him. But at least he now knew that it wasn’t just delusion. He really had felt, for just a heartbeat, a connection to magic as a whole, the wand somehow completing a wondrous circuit.

A wand he was determined to make his own.

You have successfully forged a Soul Link with Exquisite quality Basic Wand (Element of Flame). You have permanently anchored Exquisite Quality Fire Wand to your soul! Modified Soul Reserves are now 52.

Congratulation! You now intuitively sense the innerworkings of all wands channeling the element of Flame! Your basic Arcane Affinity has increased!

Eric allowed the words to wash over him as he laughed with wonder at the glorious tool in his hand. Because in that moment he got what he had been fruitlessly pounding his head against for countless days. At that moment, he understood the essence of fire, and how to manipulate it, like never before. Seizing his epiphany, he immediately pulled a massive spirit boar out of storage and stepped back, a big dopey grin coming over his features as he almost ceremoniously raised his wand while simultaneously clenching mental muscles he never realized before that moment he had.

In but a moment, he drew forth a tiny vessel of glorious golden potency from the universe all around, a tiny pocket reality so infused with the essence of flame that his manipulation was almost effortless, before slowly funneling it through the artifact in his hand.

An artifact he could now sense the innerworkings of so well that he could actually sense the golden circuits and silver mirrors within transforming the shimmering current of magic into the element of flame before shooting it out in a streak of blazing plasma that was the farthest thing from that classic fireballs of fantasy and very much like a blast from his arcane rifle that had just seared a hole an inch and a half wide and at least a foot deep into the massive boar carcass, the bristly fur around the entrance wound catching ablaze as well.

Eric didn’t hold back, he outright whooped for joy, leaping in the air by the cavern entrance, smiling fondly at the peach-laden trees swaying peacefully just a few dozen yards away, and the pair of boars glaring at him from the forest’s edge. Boars that, for whatever reason, maybe sensing the barrier, choose not to approach any further.

He had done it! He had actually manipulated the element of flame and magic as a whole with the casting of his first true arcane spell!

He gazed fondly at the wand in his hand, a wand that was now just an extension of himself, making it disappear into storage and reappear in the blink of an eye, glad that he hadn’t stinted in paying for what he now intuitively sensed was an exquisitely made prize indeed. An exquisite work, even for an Adept tier craftsman, its arcane circuitry and prisms were as perfectly aligned as any basic tier arcane artifact could be.

He summoned forth his wand in the blink of an eye, and unleashed a stream of liquid flame once more.

“Ignis Pilum!” He roared, the words echoing oddly through the air, somehow helping to carry the magic forward, facilitating its ease of summoning and flow.

“Ignis Pilum! Ignis Pilum!” Eric laughed aloud with wonder as he drilled the massive warthog cadaver with a full dozen spears of liquid flame, each hitting just a tiny bit harder than the one before, Eric not letting up until the whole carcass was smoldering and he was on one knee, oddly dizzy, only then noting that his mana was dipping close to zero.

But even the sudden queeziness he felt couldn’t dampen the grin on his face as he looked at the notifications flashing across his mind’s eye.

You have successfully cast Flame Bolt using Arcane Focus (Fire Wand.) 4 mana spent.

Congratulations! Flame Bolt is now Rank 2!

Eric took a deep breath before slowly settling into a lotus position whereupon he began using the breathing exercises from his cultivation manual, and was gratified to find that the same meditative pose that was supposed to help recover and refine his Spiritual Energy or Qi flow seemed to work for his Mana Pool as well, amazed to find it ticking back up at a very precise 1.7 mana per second, which was exactly one tenth of his Arcane Potential.

He gazed down at the wand in his hand with as fond smile, before turning to glare at the tuskers squealing at him from a safe distance away.

“You want some? Come and get it, porkers! We can always use some more porkchops!” He declared with a cheeky grin, before focusing once more on his training dummy, finding that it was effortless to quench the flames and even reshape the body once he put it back in storage, finding it as easy to manipulate as a certain greater lizard beast had been, not that long ago. Of course he wouldn’t dare eat it at this point, now pretty sure that his knack for necromancy was what had allowed him to reinforce his armor and make those cannon batteries and bulwarks on the fly. But damn if it wasn’t useful being able to fuse together corpses into a greater whole, a wonderful necromancy hack that didn’t require animating any bodies, just shaping the resources as he needed, even if he did sense a steady trickle of potency being expended with his use.

Fortunately the cost was minimal, the tiniest tweak presenting a porker whole and intact once more, even if he could sense it radiating the subtlest of necromantic energies… like a zombie or revenant just waiting for animation when he summoned it forth a moment later.

“Sorry buddy. Just need you for target practice,” he said aloud, before pointing his wand once more at his target, whispering the words that helped to catalyze the spell once more.

Words he found he didn’t even need to say by the time he had depleted his mana reserves twice more, now feeling the flow of fire through his wand as effortlessly as squirting water between his hands had once been at any number of hotel pools when he and his sister used to goof around and relax what now seemed a lifetime ago, as fresh messages across his interface informed him of truths he needed no interface to sense.

Congratulations! You have achieved Apprentice Tier with Flame Bolt!

Flame Bolt is now Rank 5!

He had indeed, he thought with a smile, as the beams of plasma hit with increasing intensity and force. Plasma javelins that would hardly be fatal in a flank shot on a tusker, but they were more than enough to sear through any mortal human, especially ones who had no luck of fate, or hit point pool as Eric thought of it. As if reality itself was bending the rules to give its favorite heroes the chance to slip free of certain peril, very much like his favorite archaeologist in the movies.

And if he kept his cool and struck a charging porker between the eyes at close range before the plasma stream weakened with distance? He suspected it could kill even the spirit boars squealing and glaring at him even now.

A challenge he was eager to put to the test, not hesitating to spring to his feet once his mana had recharged once more, pushing his inhuman Strength and Quickness to the utmost as he went from cross-legged pose to Olympian sprint in the blink of an eye, laughing and roaring as he charged for the momentarily flat-footed boars, racing as fast as any motorbike as he embraced his wildest impulse, wand jutting forward for the closest boar even now twisting around to charge before Eric’s legs launched him in the air as he made a wild leap for the boughs of the forest canopy, twisting in midair to deliver superheated death to his target below.

“Ignis Pilum, motherfucker!” He roared, sending a stream of fiery death between the eyes of the massive tusker actually leaping as if it would goar Eric in middair. And much to its target’s wide-eyed disbelief, the boar actually managed to rip into Eric’s ankle, before falling over dead as Eric’s beam of fiery plasma pierced its skull and vaporized a good portion of its brain.

“Fuck!” Eric hissed as he tumbled through the air, torn calf spraying blood as he was gored at one of the few spots vulnerable to such a maneuver, thanks to the angle of Eric’s mad attack that should have worked flawlessly but didn’t, and it was a wildly spinning Eric that just managed to grab a branch… while doing everything he could to avoid touching one of the gloriously ripe peaches just inches away from his face…

Feeling the awful screaming pressure of impossibly hot flame roiling and searing through a dozen different points in his head and body, as if it would tear him apart from within, if he dared touch a single peach.

He pushed away from the tree with something close to relief, falling back to earth just in time to see the second spirit boar glaring at him with beedy, hate-filled eyes, getting in position to gore Eric as he tumbled back down from the deadly tree…

Before retreating with a squeal when Eric’s flame-tipped javelin, instantly summoned, was rammed into its snout.

And then it was Eric glaring at his foe with a snarl as he stumbled and fell, one Achilles tendon still too injured to stand on for as many seconds as it would take to regenerate while he kept the point of his chitin bardiche between himself and the tusker squealing and glaring as it twisted and thrashed while Eric’s javelin-head baked it from within.

Until with a final squeal the thrashing pig managed to wrench itself around so fiercely htat Eric’s weapon was torn from its flesh, super-heated shank blazing like a tiny sun at well over 4000 degrees that Eric immediately summoned back into storage before it could set the undergrowth ablaze, and Eric could tell that the pig had paid an awful price as it stumbled away, gushing boiling blood, tearing through the forest in a desperate bid to escape.

But Eric had no intention of letting his prey get away so easily.

Regeneration has full restored achilles tendon.

You have successfully spotted your prey!

With a new respect for the exquisitely tempting, yet undeniably deadly fruit swaying so invitingly on the branches overhead, Eric darted through the forest as he hounded his prey, lashing out with repeated blasts from his wand upon the flanks and legs of his target, perforating it with one smoking hole after another until the massive beast gave one final defiant squeal and spun back around to face its laughing foe before lowering its massive skull and charging.

Eric braced himself, sensing time begin to stretch and warp as it so often did when looking death in the eye as twenty paces became ten then five and Eric could so clearly see the tusks lowered to gore for him.

“Ignis Pilum!”

Before he sprang to the side, adroitly dodging the charging beast, but not before shooting a white-hot stream of plasma through its beady red eye.

Congratulations! You have critically struck Spirit Boar!

Spirit Boar has perished.

Experience Earned!

Flame Bolt is now at Rank 6!

Eric flashed a fierce smile when his hunch proved itself right once more. When it came to ranking up skills, nothing quite beat stress-testing his talents in the crucible of battle.

He’d either come out tempered as all hell…

Or never come out at all.

He chuckled softly. “If nothing else, my heritage means I regenerate mana a hell of a lot faster than poor Alice. Which means I can launch spells with my wand far more often than she. And how jealous would she be if she could see me now?” He thought aloud as he gazed at the wand in his hand with a bemused smile, before chuckling ruefully as he peered up at the soaring canopy of the massive peach trees all around him.

“At least now I know why I don’t dare pluck them. It seems that you really do need to be a cultivator to touch them, and a damn strong one at that, if the pressure I felt burning through me was any indication of how close I came to what… all of my meridian gateways simultaneously exploding if I dared touch any of them?”

He sighed and shook his head, giving a bitter little chuckle at one more prize that seemed to be forever out of his reach, when he suddenly froze.

Eyes widening as his heart lurched in his chest.

Suddenly understanding.

Recalling exactly how he had felt when his trajectory had taken him a bit to close to the perilous prizes dangling so temptingly overhead.

Twelve.

He had felt twelve white-hot balls of pressure in his body, or soul, that were ready to explode.

Not seven.

Twelve.

“Are you kidding me? Are you fucking kidding me?” Eric whispered to no one at all as he turned around and raced back the way he had come for all he was worth, ignoring the far-off squeals of prey he now had no interest in pursuing.

Because if his understanding was correct… then maybe things weren’t quite so hopeless as he had thought.