-Breadtalk-

“HAHAHA GOTCHA NOW SUCKERRRR!” I exclaimed, dangling Belieber by the tail, lassoing her around my head like a cowboy.

Suddenly, I was holding on to nothing and my feet were equipped with new shoes that looked to be made of fur in the colour of Belieber's fur colour.

“LOKI! I THINK I KILLED BELIEBER!!!”

“Relax. That is Belieber's weapon form. Of course you wouldn't have known you have never rolled a 1 before. Belieboots is what I like to call it. It gives you an insanely powerful kick but that means its only useful for close quarters combat. However, once you've gained higher mastery over a weapon and tamed it's subconscious, you will unlock new abilities.” Loki entered the house and told me.

“Right now, you've unlocked the phase ability and passive increased movement speed.” My boots said to me.

“WHAT THE FUCK MY BOOTS?”

“When you've tamed a weapon's subconscious, he or she will be able to talk to you directly in your mind. It means that we can actually communicate telepathically as long as you're equipping the weapon.” Belieber explained.

“Sounds like lonely people need this I better give you to Jinx.” I said.

Suddenly, the boots at my feet vanished and belieber took it's place, jumping up and giving me a bitejob. After over a hundred people sucking my junk, a cat biting on it is not a good feeling.

-Soup-

The thousands of wolves lay at my feet, unconscious as I checked the time on the clock.

“58 minutes and 39 seconds.”

“HELLYEAH ALLAH KU ABAR PRAISE THE LORD BY THE BLESSINGS OF BUDDHAAAAAAAAAAAA!”

“What religion do you even belong to?” Fenrir asked

“I don't know I haven't asked my parents. But hey the more the merrier right?”

Fenrir could only shake his head.

“Alright young one, you've mastered the lycan form perfectly. You should realise the strength and weaknesses of this form now. You're the sort who just dives in and uses first hand experience to understand things anyway right. Just the way I like my students.”

“You trying to say I'm dumb?”

“You know you are.”

“Ah fuck who am I kidding. YEP #YOLO #StronkDumbWarrior.”

“Hashtags have no meaning here.”

“......”

“Alright now you mastered the lycan form, I can teach you a few skills of mine that you can only use in lycan form. They will add to the variety of things you can do while you can put your gladiator buffs on top of that.”

“I'm going to be more OP than Jinx or Breadtalk muahahaha”

“Hmm I'm not very sure about that though... You're extremely capable fighting up front but your versatality... Let me just be blatantly honest about that you suck so hard that you could wipe out any vacuum cleaner business as a competitor.”

“You only can straight up man fight. If someone has a higher movement speed than you and is ranged, basically all you can do is suck cock. Like honestly sucking your own cock is more possible than beating someone faster than you.”

“HEY! I HAVE FEELINGS TOO YOU KNOW!”

“This is why this training is meant for you. Sure you all work as a team and in that regard all of you are indispensible. But what if there comes a time where you have to fight by yourself? Isolated by enemy front lines while the other 3 are seperated at the back?”

“I will bash through anyone I see and that will be enough.”

Fenrir shook his head again.

But I really like this dumb kid.

-Beathoven-

“Sit. Sit! FUCKING SIT DOWN!” I screamed.

The huge flaming giant was still busy running around, trying to wreck the castle, leaving fire wherever he stepped on and crashing into chandeliers on the ceiling because of his enormous size.

“Beathoven I've said this before. You're talented enough to summon him but you also need to be charismatic enough to control him. You can deal with thousands of people in Carnival but you can't deal with one giant?” Hel sneered.

“How the fuck am I supposed to be charismatic to a giant?! I look like a midget to him and you don't see many charismatic midgets around for the human race right?” I asked, clearly annoyed by my task at hand.

What the fuck can I give a flaming giant to make him listen to me?

I had to try anything and everything I could. I decided to give him my first love.

“HEY SURTR! CATCH THIS WITH YOUR MOUTH!” I hollered while taking something out from my pocket, unwrapping it and throwing it at him.

Surtr turned, looked at a brown chunk of stuff flying at his mouth and surprisingly he just opened his mouth just like that.

Suddenly, his expression changed. From something like a curious child wondering about a mall at the first time to an emoticon which had heart for eyes and a huge smile that could blind anyone.

Then, he suddenly shrank to about the size of a human and walked in front of me.

“WHAT?! FUCK IS HE ALLERGIC TO CHOCOLATES OR SOMETHING?! HELPPPPPP! HEL?! HEY HEL WHAT THE FUCK?!” I shouted at her.

Hel just stood there, mouth agape and wide-eyed.

Holy shit holy shit holy fucking shit i've said this three times already but it feels like its not enough. I made a kickass flaming giant become one of the fantastic four? How the hell does this game work?

“Master, your name please.” Surtr asked.

“Beathoven. You can call me Beat for short.”

“Yes master Beat. I am at your service.”

It would sound better if a hot chick was the one saying those lines but I guess it's alright.

“Surtr, how come you suddenly became so... small?” I asked.

“I can change size at will master. I can become bigger than that as well but normally I just stick to my default size which was the one you saw just now. If I may ask, what is that gloriously delicious piece of rock you threw at me?”

“It's called chocolate. It is a type of food that is popular with the humans and especially me. I will feed you more if you perform well.”

Surtr's eyes sparkled more brightly than a sea of a thousand stars.

“I've never seen anything like this... It took even me a few days to tame Surtr to even talk to me and in just 5 minutes you got him to shrink down and talk to you respectfully?” Hel recovered.

“Never underestimate the power of chocolates.” I said while taking a milkybar out of my pocket, waving it at Hel while unwrapping it, in front of Surtr's flaming puppy face.

-Jinx-

How fucking long does master think I should use to walk from one trial to the next? It's more walking than actually training?!

I was walking towards what I suspected was a third clearing. The first two trials taught me more than I thought. The first was about mana control which I was clearly lacking in according to master. The second was about mana precision in which the amount of mana I conjured about could be accurately “measured” such that I could bring out spells in the best combination of mana as possible. I could only wonder what the third one was.

I also realised why for this trial, anyone from level 1 to infinity could do it on equal grounds. None of the tests here require raw strength or skill mastery. The higher the better of course but in here, it just teaches you about subtleties of mana manipulation. It was like a dungeon meant for specific mana training and nothing else.

As I wondered about the experience up till this point, the third clearing finally came into my line of sight.

It was a small clearing, about the size of the previous one. Now however, there was not a signboard like usual but something like a mascot sitting on a stump in the middle of the clearing.

“I've been expecting you Jinx.” said the cuckoo bird perched on the stump.

“Hello. May I have your name?”

“My name is Cuckoo.”

Well it's a no brainer there.

“Hello Cuckoo. This should be a trial right? May I know what I should be doing?”

“Just as Jörmungandr described. You really are the sort to go straightforwardly into things aren't you? Well most of us don't dislike types like that. Very well. Get ready for the brief for this part of the trial.” Cuckoo said.

I thought snakes ate birds for breakfast lunch tea and dinner. Oh well whatever.

“This part of the trial wants you to combine part 1 and 2 in a sense. In part 1, you learnt more about intricate mana control. In part 2, you learnt how to conjour up a specific amount of mana. For part 3, it's demanding you to conjour up a specific amount of mana within a certain space. In other words, this is Trial by Compression.”

“Wait what?”

“Nevermind let me show you instead.”

Cuckoo flew off from his stump and flew beside me, facing the stump. He spread his wings and because of my new found intuition, I could feel him conjuring up wind mana in both his wings. However, I had a weird feeling about it. I could clearly see mana being conjured in both wings but for some reason, the mana in the right wing had a noticeably shinier glow than the one on the left.

Then, he shot out the mana towards the stump from both wings. The wind bolt from his left wing buried itself about three inches into the stump. The wind bolt from the right pierced through the entire stump.

“What in the. It's the same skill right?”

“Congratulations for noticing. What else?” Cuckoo said with a smirk.

“I just saw the mana in your right wing glow alot brighter than the one in your left.”

“Let me explain. For both spells, the size of them were the same. However, the amount of mana I put into them were different. I used about three times the mana in the right one than the left. I compressed the mana to make the resulting spell of a higher quality. Do you get it now?”

Then it hit me. The size of the spell is determined by the mana I use no doubt. But it did not even occur to me to try this before. I could've packed the mana as closely as possible together such that it would take as little space as possible but that space would have such a high concentration of mana that it would result in a higher quality result.

“Yes. I get it.”

“Very good. Time for you to undergo my trial. There won't be any mechanics like the snakes or weighing scales. To pass this trial, you have to survive my training. That will be it. Then I will judge your talent impartially.”

“Please help me get stronger.” I said and I readied myself.

Cuckoo taught me the basic theories of mana compression. One must visualise the mana being squeezed tightly into the space you created for it. It was like stuffing a luggage with clothes and souvenirs after you finished a trip. You had to feel the mana, stuff it into the space which for me was a cube and then pack it as tightly as you can. The result was that the 1KG cube of mana I had as a standard of measurement fit about 3000 mana instead of 1000. I could pack my mana 3 times as tightly as I subconsciously did.

Then there was another trick to mana compression. Instead of compressing it, you could do the direct opposite. Disperse it. Try to make as little mana as possible exist within that space without it totally disappitating. If you used too little mana, the whole aura would be lost. I managed to use only 50 mana instead of 1000 when I tried this in the 1KG cube experiment. The uses of dispersing the mana though were very enlightening.

True, one could make a spell more compact and devastating which was a good thing. Something fast and small like a homing mana bullet usually does not pack a punch but by compressing the mana, you could potentially make it a small fast bullet which could do a huge crapload of damage onto your enemy. However, the reverse was also true.

Imagine a huge ass spell like freezing field which requires a huge ton of mana to conjour up a freezing field the size of a football field, raining glaciers onto the people below, affecting their movement speed as well as their footing. It was a huge ass spell but by dispersing the mana required, you could use less mana, even though the effects will be less obvious to cast such a huge spell. The benefits were huge.

Usually mana was my limiting factor. If I only had a small amount of mana left I might be able to cast freezing field but only a small one. But now if I master dispersion and compression, I might be able to cast a huge freezing field but with smaller effects. I could control both the size and aptitude of the spell. Against a whole army of enemies, I might even be able to make a freezing field so large it could debuff them all. Even though the debuff might not be as strong, it was important to affect huge AOEs in huge wars like that. It gave me easily twice if not three times the versatality than I already had. The opposite was also true. I could cast a small freezing field with so much compressed mana that the effects could be five times as potent. Imagine reducing movement speed by 50% instead of 10%. That's how scary this training could make me.

I trained hard. I knew the importance of this aspect. I pushed myself to make my mind which was capable of splitting itself into 8 parts and focused all of the parts onto squeezing as much mana as possible into a tiny space.

I also tried to feel how little mana as possible could exist in a certain space. Because dispersion would usually be used with large area of effect spells, my estimation must be almost close to perfect for it to be highly effective. 1KG blocks were too small to serve as an estimation. I used the clearing as an estimation and for that small clearing which was about half the size of a football field, I realised the minimum amount of mana that would enable me to envelop an aura around the whole place cost me about 1400 mana. Good enough. It means that with my current mana pool of 7000, it would be able to cast a freezing field the size of five clearings or two and a half football fields. Impressive stuff.

I trained day and night inside the forest. It wasn't just a simple matter of passing a test this time. I had to spend quality time with my tutor Cuckoo as well as improve it with his advice and mentorship as I possibly could. By the end of three days and two nights, Cuckoo declared me as a success.

“Well done Jinx. I can see why Jörmungandr has high hopes for you. Only 7 people made it here so far and only 3 have passed this test before you. Zarak, Dumblemore and Grendel. The other 3 were utterly worthless. I have always judged people based on two things. Attitude and aptitude. Your attitude was stellar but your aptitude, that was what really shocked me.”

What? I fucked up?

“You show more talent than any of the previous three when it comes to this. You managed to stuff 5000 mana into that cube of yours. Even for me that would be hard. Your talent at dispersion is also undeniable. I always specified weird areas for you to cast your dispersed aura in and everytime, you managed to estimate such a dispersed aura that it barely took you any significant amount of mana. Compressing is easier because all you have to do is stuff mana till you reach your limit but dispersion my boy. You have more talent than anyone I've ever seen.” He added.

Suddenly, a pop up box appeared.

Trial by Compression and Dispersion.

The ability to compress and disperse your mana within an aura affects the quality of the spell on top of your mastery. This enables you to control both your scope as well as effects of your spells to a frightening degree. The example of a freezing field is ample for you to understand. A small freezing field the size of a pond that could inflict thousands of damage per second while slowing the enemy by 50% would take extreme compression. A huge freezing field the size of a valley that still slowed enemies down while they take damage would also be possible by extreme dispersion. Congratulations on passing this extremely useful trial. Hall of fame will be shown.

Jinx : 100/100

Hall of fame : 1) Jinx : 100/100

2) Zarak : 90/100

3) Dumblemore : 85/100

4) Grendel : 65/100

I did it. I showed more aptitude in this than Zarak. I FINALLY WON HIM AT SOMETHING. But this was strange because he did better than me in both part 1 and 2 and this was something like a combination of the two. However, there was little doubt that this part required a natural talent for estimation and cramming of the mana. Jörmungandr must have been training me for this as well when he asked me to train how to split my minds into parts. This made my mind more powerful and adept for handling these sort of things where it boils down to talent and concentration.

“You have done well Jinx. Now, one final trial awaits you. I wish you all the best. Only Zarak has passed the last test from my knowledge. I have judged you as one to surpass him from the score I gave you so don't let me down.”

“I won't.” I gave Cuckoo a little pat on the head, feeling confident as hell upon gaining approval, glad to master a whole new power even more potent than any new spell and of course knowing that I was just one step away from clearing this highly difficult trial.

Then I saw the path I had to take again.

One step away my ass. How ironic. WHY THE FUCK MUST YOU MAKE ME WALK SO FAR THE CLEARINGS COULD BE ONE AFTER ANOTHER THERE WOULD BE NO FUCKING DIFFERENCE ARGHGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK!

I rarely raged. But this was utterly ridiculous. Even with “A Thousand Miles by Vanessa Carlton”, a kickass song playing in the background as the BGM, this was unacceptable.

End of Chapter 27