It took Jason a few minutes to calm down. The first minute he had found himself almost getting up to kill Selene or Caleb whom he could also see. He had even found himself halfway to them before he controlled himself again and sat down.

After he calmed down though he looked down and saw that his hands weren’t clawed. They were his normal hands. Runed and… not scarred. Alright so maybe not normal hands. After examining the rest of his body he found that all of his scars were gone. The runes were still there, but the scars were completely gone. If my scars are gone… IS MY EYE BACK! Jason excitedly reached up and touched his missing eye. Nope still gone. DAMMIT ALL! Jason sighed to himself. I don’t know what I expected. I’m sure I would’ve at least felt a little bit different if it was back.

After finding out that mildly disappointing fact Jason turned his attention to the system notifications that he had received once he had woken up.

Requisite mana density achieved…

Beginning mana evolution…

Successful mana evolution!

Congratulations! Your mana has evolved into a more personalized attribute

Mana has evolved into Essence of Ferality

Mana pool has been turned into Essence of Ferality pool

Focus stat has disappeared

Willpower stat has disappeared

Essence of Ferality pool and damage boost is determined by averaging Fortitude and Endurance

Essence of Ferality regeneration is set to 5 essence per hour

Level Up!

Luck of the Draw I (X) activates

Luck Would Have It I (I) activates

No. Those two stats just didn’t completely disappear right? That’s like… kind of a big deal. Jason tried to turn and look at his status but before he was able to, another window popped up.

Available Classes:

Berserker (Rare) Boosts the effects of Fortitude by 80%, Vigor by 70%, and Vitality by 50% Reduces the effects of Endurance by 25% Gains experience through combat and skills Beast of Fortune (Rare) Boosts the effects of Luck by 70%, Fortitude and Endurance by 40%, and Vitality and Vigor by 25% Reduces the effects of Charisma by 50% Gains experience through combat and skills Monstrosity (Legendary) Boosts the effects of Fortitude, Endurance, Vigor, and Vitality by 100% Reduces the effects of Charisma by 150% Gains experience through combat and skills

Really they're making me choose one now. Before I even get to see my stats. I’ve put a hundred points into my luck and I’ll be damned before I throw away that stat. So no matter how appealing Monstrosity looks I ain’t taking it. As for Berserker… no… just no. Jason quickly and easily chose the Beast of Fortune class and tried once more to see his stats only to once again be blocked.

Talents:

Gift of the Monster Anytime a skill checks the natural Endurance stat the stat will appear to be 30% larger Gift of the Dragon Anytime a skill checks the natural Endurance or Luck stat the stat will appear to be 10% larger Gift of the Leprechaun Anytime a skill checks the natural Luck stat the stat will appear to be 25% larger

The system seems to like making me into a monster. I’m pretty sure it’s sending me a message here. “Hey man if you take this route you’ll get so much stronger. Just look at the benefits!”. Fuck you system. I’ll say it again. I have a HUNDRED points in Luck. I’m NOT throwing that away. I’ll take Leprechaun thank you very much. Jason again with barely a thought chose an option and then hurried to see his stats. It might have seemed irrational to choose that quickly, but in Jason’s mind he had poured effort into the Luck stat and while it was almost purely a utility stat he wasn’t going to give it up.

General Information

Class: Beast of Fortune

Species: Human (evolving)

Favor: NA

Experience: 1,603 / 63,837

Level: 25

Titles: None

Stats

Fortitude:

10

140 / 140 hp | 70 Phys Attack

Vitality:

10

6 hp / hour

Endurance:

10

140 / 140 sp | 56 Defense

Vigor:

40

100 sp / hour

Essence of Ferality:

(Fortitude + Endurance) / 2

140 / 140 e | 63 Mgc Attack

EoF Regen:

NA

5 e / hour

Charisma:

10

5 bf

Luck:

100

680% (1,564%) | 68% (156%)

Stat Points Available: 10

Skills and Talents

Active:

Offense: None

Defense: None

Utility:

T1 {Death Dog Transformation [I] (0 / 200), Hybrid Transformation [I] (3 / 200)}

Passive:

Offense:

T1 {Wooden Fists [X]} T2 {Stone Fists [X]} T3 {Iron Fists [X]}

Defense:

T1 {Wooden Bones [X], Wooden Muscles [X], Wooden Skin [X], Fast-Twitch Nerves [X], Primitive Runic Skin [X]} T2 {Stone Bones [X], Stone Muscles [X], Stone Skin [X], Instant-Twitch Nerves [X]} T3 {Iron Bones [X], Iron Muscles [X], Iron Skin [X], Automatic-Reflex Nerves [X]}

Utility:

T1 {Lodenstone of Chance [X], Well of Fortune [X], Unnatural Endurance [X], Unnatural Speed [X], Unnatural Flexibility [X], Unnatural Awareness [X], Unnatural Leap [X], Unnatural Grip [X], Eyes of Inspection [X]} T2 {Aura of Misfortune [X]} T3 {Luck of the Draw I [X]} T4 {Luck Would Have It I [II] (0 / 3200)}

Talents: Touch of a Gambler, Mark of Fortune, Gift of the Leprechaun

Skill Points Available: 0

What the hell? I leveled up and got two new skills which are obviously therianthrope related. I also have no skill points even though I should have two. Maybe it’s because I got two new skills so two of my skill points were taken. Damn system.

My species now says evolving next to it which means that I’m not done truly turning into a therianthrope. Which is probably best because being a death dog therianthrope doesn’t feel right to me. I mean death dogs are powerful, but they’re only so powerful. I want to be better. Obviously new class and talent which I picked so no need to look at those.

My luck got worse though, but honestly I expected that. Going from a hundred percent boost to a seventy percent boost would reduce me. The Leprechaun thankfully reduces the heartache though. I guess I did have clawed hands earlier. I got three experience points in Hybrid Transformation after all so I probably did have claws.

Now the most important thing. What the fuck is this mana evolution. I saw what was probably my mana get condensed into a ball and then explode outward into a sun looking thing. Which then further condensed into the death dog. Jason looked at the dead boss. I guess it was a death dog because that’s the heart I ate? Probably. That makes a certain amount of sense I guess. God! Jason sighed to himself. I really need to know more about the system and how everything works. The condensing part happens naturally; it's what happens next that kills people. Whoever talked to Selene gave her false information. Well they said the condensing was easy to maybe not completely false, but still… assholes.

Jason shook his head to rid himself of ridiculous thoughts. Going back to the problem at hand. The Essence of Ferality huh? What am I a beast to them? Jason was oblivious to the fact that he was simply a monster. Not in the “oh my god this guy is so strong for his level he’s a monster” kind of way either. He was a human who went around wearing the skins of his prey, devoured raw hearts as his main source of food, fought without any sophisticated weapons or armour, and as an addition he was a therianthrope progenitor which made him naturally inclined to be beastial. His mana had simply evolved into what suited him best. Nothing more and nothing less.

How do I even use it and what does it do? It replaced the Focus and Willpower stats so it better be worth it. I assume you would use it the same way you would use mana, but… how do I do that? Jason had never once used mana. Even for his Aura he had never actively used mana. Whenever he sealed his Aura he felt a little bit more refreshed as if he had more energy at his disposal, but the difference was like the difference between getting eight hours of sleep and eight hours plus a minute of sleep. So small that it was essentially negligible. Jason truly had no idea of how to even begin using mana.

Alright well mana and this evolved mana should be a part of me right. Typically in stories there’s a whole thing about dantian or the inner world or some nonsense, but the idea is the same each time. Essence and mana is within our bodies, but not in the physical plane. It’s in the spiritual plane or something similar. All I have to do is look within myself right?

Jason got in meditative pose and looked within himself. He looked so hard and so far within himself that he gave himself a headache. Yet he came back with absolutely nothing. So instead of doing that hopeless exercise again he decided to start playing around with his two new abilities. The therianthrope abilities.

Jason first wanted to try out the Hybrid Transformation ability as he assumed that would be easier to get used to. Giving one last look at the boss room he made sure his two party members were alright before leaving to try and find a mirror or something of the sort.

It was on the third floor that he found what he was looking for. It was a large bronze plate that sat in front of an altar. The plate was used for offering to the Taurus-Eye god and still had some offerings on it when Jason found it. Jason unceremoniously took the plate and started to clean the dust off of it leaving the offerings on the floor. Once Jason was done cleaning the dust off the plate he could see himself through the shine of the bronze. He made sure to stand far enough away so that he could see his whole body.

He could almost see his entire body because of his ruined clothing. At first Jason was going to change into better clothes than the short cape and shorts he had on, but after thinking about the transformation he was about to go through he thought better of it. I could maybe rip the new clothes and that would be tragic. Before activating the ability Jason made sure to check it to see what it should do.

Hybrid Transformation [Rank I] (3 / 200) Transform into a half-human half death dog hybrid Increase Fortitude and Foc-Error-us by 5% Increase Endurance by 2% Reduce Charisma by 10% Gain three abilities while in the hybrid state Breath of Corrosion [Equal rank to Hybrid Transformation] Breath of the Damned [Equal rank to Hybrid Transformation] Necrotic Saliva [Equal rank to Hybrid Transformation] Increases Fortitude and Foc-Error-us boost by 5% per rank and Endurance’s boost by 2% per rank Increases the reduction of Charisma by 10% per rank Cost 1,000 Essence of Ferality per second Only costs Essence of Ferality if the user isn’t a death dog therianthrope

Well that’s a lot of things. Not a super large increase and it seems that the system had a bit of a mental breakdown because I don’t have the Focus stat, but it should be ok. After all I can’t be the first to lose that stat because of a mana evolution. Right? Anyway I already know what two abilities are and the fact that I got those means that I can actually start doing some damage. How did we not notice the saliva though? Did no one get touched by it?

Jason stopped looking at the skill and actually activated it. He could feel his bones and skin shifting and contorting to transform him into his new form. If it wasn’t for his pain resistance he probably would’ve fallen to the ground screaming. He felt his face get longer and started to feel and see lots of jet black fur sprout from his body in various places. Just as he feared his clothes ripped and tore during the transformation until all he was left with was some very tight shorts. His cloak being discarded by him since it wouldn’t fit his head.

After the transformation was over Jason looked at himself in the bronze mirror amazed by what he saw.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

New Skill:

Death Dog Transformation [Rank I] (0 / 200) Transform into a death dog Increase Fortitude and Foc-Error-us by 10% Increase Endurance by 4% Reduce Charisma by 25% Gain three abilities while in the death dog state Breath of Corrosion [Equal rank to Death Dog Transformation] Breath of the Damned [Equal rank to Death Dog Transformation] Necrotic Saliva [Equal rank to Death Dog Transformation] Increases Fortitude and Foc-Error-us boost by 10% per rank and Endurance’s boost by 4% per rank Increase the reduction of Charisma by 25% per rank Cost 5,000 Essence of Ferality per second Only costs Essence of Ferality if the user isn’t a death dog therianthrope