Path to Transcendence

He came across a couple more rabbits along his way. None of them managed to make a dent in his barrier, not even surviving the impact.

Realizing that defeated the purpose of his delving, he stopped using [Armaments of the Arcane]. In fact, he put a restriction on using any skills that didn't have any direct synergy with [Thermal Empowerment].

So when the next rabbit came flying toward him, he didn't place a barrier, instead concentrating on its movements with razor-sharp focus.

It was fast, but Julius had experienced faster attacks before.

He only used [Thermal Empowerment] to empower his body. The flames from the skill radiated from his body in a soft aura glow.

He refrained from using [Kinetic Augmentation] for the moment. He knew that he would eventually have to use the two in tandem and he wanted to combine them, but for the moment he wanted to see what this new skill could do.

He sent a surge of fire mana to his arm, increasing its speed and allowing him to be barely fast enough to catch the rabbit by the base of its horn before it could impale him in the face.

He let out a sigh of relief but he couldn't help but notice the addicting thumping in his chest. He missed this.

Training with nothing to lose or risk wasn't as fun as something like this. At least this way, if he had missed he would have been punished for his mistake.

He felt its wind mana that was surrounding its horn slicing his hand but he ignored it. He could always heal it. However, before he killed it, he stopped himself.

He had a better idea.

He threw the rabbit away from him and allowed it to stagger back to its feet. The monster gave him a confused look, but that only made him smile.

He gestured toward the rabbit with his bloody hand, inviting it to attack again. Fortunately, even if it probably didn't understand his actions, it decided to attack again.

This time, he stepped aside and tried to grab it by the chest as it passed him.

That was harder than just grabbing it head on and he missed it by a hair. Receiving another cut to his hand for his failure.

The rabbit wasn't smart by any means, but it was persistent. It continued to attack Julius with no qualms, just launching itself over and over. Toward the end, he got much better at snatching the fast little monster from the air.

He also learned to manipulate the radiating fire mana from his [Thermal Empowerment] skill to create a hardened layer of fire mana woven into his skin.

It was quite similar to how he used [Armaments of the Arcane] to create a skin-thin barrier over himself, but unlike the epic skill, this method didn't feel restricting at all.

One of the downsides of creating armor or thin barriers over himself with [Armaments of the Arcane] was the slight stiffness he felt whenever he moved using it.

It was similar to trying to run around in denim jeans. This new skill felt like wearing polyester fabric. But it also protected him much worse than his other skill.

He made some good progress at least. In his opinion, he was already making better progress in his new skill than the last week just using it with Richard. The notifications seemed to agree with his opinion too.

[Thermal Empowerment lvl 3 -> lvl 5]

His little breakthrough of using the skill to harden his skin seemed to help him get two levels in one go.

He looked down at where the rabbit was on its back, completely worn out. It had tried to kill Julius until it was too tired to move anymore.

But now that it was totally done for, it was kind of cute. Its pink tongue was rolled out of its mouth and was panting with partially lidded eyes.

He didn't kill it, no he had another brilliant idea.

He gathered the rabbit in his arms and went off deeper into the forest with a smile.

***

There were now three rabbits in front of him. The original rabbit, the one who had gotten tired out was the only one who was looking at him calmly.

His plan had been to find a couple more rabbits to help him with his practicing. That had been pretty easy considering his [Spatial Perception] and the rabbit's tendency to attack anything on sight.

The new rabbits were still restricted with kinetic energy, but the lone calm rabbit didn't need that at all. It was merely staring at Julius as if waiting for him to do something.

Ever since it woke up, it hadn't tried to attack him once. A totally different attitude than before.

Not sure what to make of it, he gestured at the rabbit the same way he did before. However, it still didn't make any moves to attack. Its friends, on the other hand, couldn't wait to get a piece of him.

They were powering their horns with mana in anticipation.

Feeling kind of confused, he decided to see what would happen if he released all of them. Not to his surprise, the new murderous rabbits shot themselves at him with glowing horns aiming for his vital points.

The original rabbit hesitated for a moment before joining its friends. However, Julius noticed that it wasn't powering its horn like the last time and it didn't move as fast either.

He was so distracted by this that although he caught one of the rabbits, he completely missed the second one. Getting impaled just right over his heart.

Julius could have stopped it with his other skills, but he was somewhat curious about what kind of attack it had. So he allowed it to hurt him but made sure to examine it in detail.

What was a bit surprising was the payload that was unleashed once the horn had connected. A big wave of wind mana blasted through his shoulder and ripped a massive hole through his upper body. His hardened skin was not able to protect against it.

The rabbit, once it had released its payload, jumped off his chest and removed the horn from his chest along with it.

He was astonished at how fast his healing skill activated. [Phoenix Renewal] felt so much more compatible with his body. The circuits that replaced his core improved the efficiency and effectiveness of the skill in a shocking way. Even though his body required more mana to heal, the efficiency of the healing more than balanced it out.

The hole in his chest healed in a matter of seconds.

The original rabbit had stopped when it noticed him get hurt and almost looked… worried.

However, when it saw him perfectly fine, it looked confused for a moment before attacking him. This time he was paying attention and was able to catch the rabbit in his empowered hand. Being much more gentle about it.

He brought the rabbit up to his face and didn't notice any malice behind its gaze anymore.

Weird…

He continued to let the rabbits attack him in a frenzy. He only stopped once he gained another level in [Thermal Empowerment].

[Thermal Empowerment lvl 5 -> lv 6]

Once he did, he left the area with the original rabbit following him like a pet. He killed the other rabbits easily, but he wasn't able to bring himself to kill this one. He didn't try to bring it with him, it had just followed him on its own accord at a safe distance.

He ignored it, for now, he could decide what to do after he finished up.

Eventually, he sensed another monster nearby. And this time, it definitely wasn't a small rabbit. Nope, it was a pretty big burly burly-looking creature.

He would say it was a bear, but the last time he checked bears didn't have long tails and they certainly didn't have two heads, but still looked very much like one.

The first thing he noticed after that was the profound earthly feeling from it. He instantly recognized that this monster had a Concept of its own.

Julius consciously updated the danger potential of this monster to a higher tier. He had learned that Tier 3s weren't that much of a threat unless they had a Concept to fight with.

The monster didn't seem to have that great of perception, even with an additional set of eyes and ears. He was able to walk up it and got pretty close before it was able to smell him.

It turned around and Julius calmly watched as the massive monster snarled at him. Its bulging muscles were already infused with its Concept and mana.

Julius on the other hand waved at it with a smile.

The bear monster thingy must have thought Julius was taunting it because it immediately took off and started charging Julius.

It wasn't that fast, but it was much faster than Julius would expect from something of its size. It was on him in a matter of moments.

Even though his gut told him that he wouldn't win in a contest of pure brute strength, he decided to test his newfound Tier 3 strength on the bear.

He stepped forward and tried to block the devastating blow of the monster with his elbow. His new skill was the only thing empowering his body.

It was clear to say that he lost that contest very badly. The claws of the bear-like monster tore right through his newly hardened skin and smashed him in the chest. He was sent flying backward until he finally was stopped when he slammed into a nearby tree.

Well, that answers that, he groaned to himself.

Upgrade physical abilities or not, going head to head against a monster that obviously specialized in brute strength was not a good idea. Especially when he wasn't using his primary body enhancement skill.

However, he found himself smiling as he got back up. His wounds were already almost all the way healed and he stared at the monster who was slowly making its way over to him. The beast probably thought the fight was already over and was expecting to enjoy a meal.

Thus, it was surprised when it saw him standing up with no injuries. Julius didn't let it get comfortable, he quickly dashed toward the monster.

Just because he wasn't going to use some of his skills, didn't mean he was going to take it completely easy on it. He was still planning to kill this thing after all.
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His recent mistake was already learned from, he ducked under the wild swipe from the two-headed bear and smashed a perfect strike into the monster's snout. Flames blazing out from his fist as he tried to do his best to burn the monster as an aftereffect.

It didn't really work though. For one, the fire didn't cause that much damage. It was like he had just singed the monster a little bit.

For two, the blow didn't seem to do all that much except to piss it off even more.

It roared at him and did its best to maim him. Julius had to use a couple of [Flash Steps] to dodge the close ones but continued to try and hammer away at the monster with mainly [Thermal Empowerment] as his only offensive skill.

It didn't work all that well considering the skill was still only at uncommon rank, but he felt himself gaining a lot of experience when using it.

Unlike sparring with Richard, he was constantly making slight adjustments to how he used it with greater ease.

Each strike became a little more sharp and a little more powerful. He was completely in the flow and he made sure to make the most of it.

He took several large slashes that sheared through his skin and strikes that broke some bones, but he continued to rain down as many punches as he could.

This thing's defense was impressive, especially since it was using its Concept almost entirely to enhance its physical prowess. But for every strike he got, he made sure to return it ten times over.

It was a straight-up brawl between the two of them. It was dirty and messy, but Julius loved every second of it and found himself laughing.