Chapter 95: I Wonder Who That Could Be

The second it was over Julius released all his skills immediately and dropped to his knees. He hadn’t realized it as he was doing it, but his brain was literally burning away during that last test. He was bleeding profusely from every orifice and could barely even remember his name.

It was only because of his instincts that [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] activated. His brain felt like melted ice cream and it was almost as if someone had just taken a big old bite of his brain. He didn’t know if it was because he used [Empowerment of Will] on [Savage Dance] or if it was because he was doing so much.

It wasn’t just his mind that was injured, it was also his soul that was damaged. That might be why [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] was struggling to heal him. It had already been close to a minute since he began healing himself, but he still wasn’t fully healed. His head was still fuzzy but he was luckily getting better, he could feel it.

An entire arm took less than half a minute, but it seemed that healing his brain or soul was much more difficult to heal. There was a soft red glow from his skill, enveloping his entire body. It was the first time in a while that he had been worried for his own health. Ever since he had gotten [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] he had been very willy-nilly about his health.

But seeing the amazing skill struggle to heal him, was an eye-opener. He had to pay close attention to injuries that weren’t physical in nature. Maybe he would need to be a little more careful in the future

After what seemed like forever, the cloud in his head was starting to abate. He could finally take a deep breath again without feeling like he was swallowing his own tongue.

The only silver lining in his misery and pain was the fact that it wasn’t in vain.

[Savage Dance lvl 18 -> lvl 19]

[Empowerment of Will lvl 10 -> lvl 11]

[Mana Slash lvl 13 -> lvl 14]

[Mana Layering lvl 14 -> lvl 15]

[Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal lvl 14 -> lvl 15]

The last several levels of rare-ranked skills were very very difficult to achieve. So it felt very rewarding. However, he felt like he deserved it after putting himself through something like that.

He was still kind of out of it and he almost overlooked the notification of [Mana Layering]. It took him longer than it should have, but he eventually recognized that he had finally reached the end of uncommon. After all the time he had spent cooped up in here, he was finally done.

[Mana Layering] has reached level 15. Would you like to evolve the skill [Mana Layering]?

A part of his was a little nervous. He had been taking a chance when he chose [Mana Layering] over [Advanced Mana Manipulation]. He had been looking for a skill that would evolve well with his others, and also thought that [Mana Layering] was the better skill for him.

He would like to say that he hadn’t regretted choosing the skill so far. In fact, he was glad he made that choice. [Mana Layering] was an extremely good skill. There was no way Julius could incorporate so many complex and robust mana layers into his constructs without the skill. He had also learned much about the process via the skill.

He mentally selected yes, and waited for which options he would have.

Skill [Mana Layering] is evolving… possible advancements: [Complex Mana Layering], [Multi-Layer], [Compound Barrier], [Composite Mana], and [Compound Strike].

Julius was happy to see more options than he had been expecting. The books he had read about [Mana Layering] said that there were many evolutions documented. However, most people only received a couple of choices at most. The author hypothesized that the skill only offered advancements that fit the user well.

For example, a shield-using warrior would get a skill like [Compound Barrier] or other known variations such as [Multi-Barrier], [Layered Mana Shield], and other defensive-focused abilities. There were also people who had gotten some sort of mana resistance skill out of it.

Julius had seen firsthand how potent a good mana resistance skill was. Gabriel used his to great effect.

He did the usual thing and went down the list. First, there was [Complex Mana Layering]. Like normal, it was most likely the general upgrade path and did everything that [Mana Layering] did, just with some extra oomph to it. He definitely didn’t mind that option. After all, the skill was great and he would love to keep many aspects of it.

With that being said, he felt like he was reaching a plateau of how much he was able to learn from the skill. Before he got the skill, layering mana was not an easy task. It took way too much mental focus and time to prepare and was not always done effectively. However, now that he had been using it so much, he was much more comfortable with those aspects of mana manipulation.