Chapter 48: Broken Links
Crystal Blue of ice.
Deep Purple of the shadows.
Flickering Yellow of lightning.
And Silver Blue of metal.
Four colours swayed around in Shiro's aura as she herself was unaware. Right now, she was in a state of focus as she brought out the mana from deep within her.
She dived deep into her basic mana construction as the stars above her glowed.
The attunement halls were a special place. It was designed, crafted and enhanced to allow one to awaken their elemental atonements.
While most would awaken 1 and the rare case of 2 elements. Shiro had 4 elements living in harmony inside her. Each supporting each other and growing stronger at the same time. Making up for one another's weaknesses.
Originally, she should only have 2 elements. Lightning and metal due to her Nanomancery. Ice came with her reincarnation into a snow girl and shadow due to her contract with Yin.
As Shiro opened her eyes, she realised she wasn't in her own body anymore.
The area around her was a strange mess of twisted colours, floating platforms, flickering orbs of light and tendrils of mana swaying around gently.
"Am I tripping on some acid?" Shiro muttered. Her body was strange as she was a light silhouette of what her body was.
She could not move physically, but rather with intent.
Focusing to move her body, Shiro frowned slightly.
"It feels a little strange. But I'll manage."
Looking ahead of her, she saw 4 main platforms that were near her.
She was about to walk ahead when she paused realising where she was.
Right now she was inside her mana realm. The place which she draws her mana. She remembers seeing the mana realm in her past life.
However, compared to what her previous mana realm looked like; Her current Mana Realm right now was akin to a jumbled mess. Hardly recognisable due to the broken links of colours which resulted in them being crammed together.
Sticking out her hands, Shiro narrowed her eyes as clutched her palm.
A batch of colours started to shake as Shiro focused on separating the link. However, no matter how hard she tried, they refused to budge.
'If the links were all sorted out, my mana efficiency would shoot through the roof. But why would my mana links be broken and scattered?' Shiro frowned.
Mana link, human or monster, are all aligned and connected. And whilst her elements were in harmony, they couldn't work to their best abilities.
The effect may not be obvious in the low levels, but when she increases her level and gain higher-tiered spells. The consumption would be many times greater than other people and monsters included.
An example would be if someone could launch a catastrophic spell 5 times before they ran out of mana, she would only be able to launch it once or twice. And this was including her massive mana pool.
'Broken links and unorganised connections are a rare case. If broken at a high level, the surge of chaotic mana inside a person's body would cause them to die. However, to break the mana link, a few very careful steps need to be taken as it would be hard to affect them otherwise.
'Not many would go out of their way to destroy the mana link as you can just kill them instead. The only reason someone would do this is when they wanted the person to feel great pain before death.' Shiro thought to herself.
"Then why was I born with broken mana links?" She muttered.
Broken mana links were a huge set back as there were only a few ways to fix them.
Sighing out heavily, Shiro decided to visit her elemental islands first.
Elemental islands are beacons which helps you connect with the elements and enhance their power.
The more developed your island was, the more powerful your elemental attunement became.
Right now, each of her islands was bare as there is nothing to help her connect better with the elements.
The islands would eventually develop itself further over time. But right now, all of her elements, except for ice, was the lowest in the Tier 0 spectrum. Her ice, on the other hand, was at the peak of Tier 1 and almost reaching Tier 2.
Landing on the ice island, Shiro sat down in the centre.
Crystal blue lights surged around her as a magic circle was being formed.
Shiro frowned when she felt her fatigue increase at a horrendous pace.
'Broken mana links also obstruct the advancement of Tiers huh?' Shiro thought.
One would automatically be sent out of the mana realm should their fatigue hit a dangerous level.
The worst part is that that Tiers had to be upgraded in one go. She couldn't just do it in parts.
Taking a deep breath, she increased the amount of mana that surged towards her.
The island started to tremble as the ice started to expand across the entire island.
Shiro's body started to float upwards as she closed her eyes.
A ball of crystal blue mana appeared around her like a shield. Clutching her hands, Shiro increased the build-up of mana as she had to grit her teeth slightly feeling her fatigue almost reach the limit.
Opening her eyes, she erupted out with a wave of mana that shattered the shield and turned the island into a frozen tundra.
"KUAH!" Shiro coughed out a slight amount of blood as she was forced back into her body.
Sweat was dripping from her forehead as she frowned.
The broken links were obstructing her from upgrading the island. If she wanted to reach higher up in the tiers, she needed to fix her mana realm fast, or else there will be a point where she will no longer be able to tier up no matter how hard she tried.
Wiping the blood from her lips, Shiro stood up weakly as she was heavily fatigued.
Yin chirped in worry as she saw Shiro cough up blood.
"I'm fine don't worry." Shiro smiled and patted Yin's head.
Check back on her status, she smiled seeing that the upgrade was a success.
[Name: Shiro
Race: Snow Girl (Evolution Criteria yet to be met)
Title: Shadow Empress, Beginner Monster (0/10 Humans Killed for Title Up)
Level: 30
Class: Snow Girl★(Star Advancement In Progress), Nanomancer
HP: 46,200/46,200
MP: 73,700/73,700
STR: 230 (+85)
VIT: 250 -> 300 (+70)
INT: 400 -> 450 (+140)
AGI: 340 -> 400(+75)
DEX: 260 -> 300 (+40)
DEF: 150 (+135)
= Title Bonus
Unassigned Points: 0
Attunements:
Ice – Tier 2
Lightning – Tier 0
Metal – Tier 0
Shadow – Tier 0
Balance: 629,500 USD
Equipment (Tap to Display)
Skills –
Snow Girl ★:
Tier 2 Ice magic, Passive Regeneration, Blessed by Ice, Snow Magic, Faded Snow Movement, Cold Aura.
Nanomancer:
Dagger Creation, Nano Tech Engineering Tier 1, Sword Creation, Bow Creation, Heavy Weapon Creation.
Other:
Mini-map, Inspection, Disguise, Harden (Equipment), Lesser Fear (Equipment), Mana Barrier.]
With a Tier 2 attunement in Ice, her abilities would gain a rough increase of 10% in damage and 10% efficiency.
With this, she only had the bosses left to kill.
[Snow Girl ★★]
Kill 20 Ice elemental Based LVL 30 bosses
30 Ice Cores
Reach Tier 2 attunement in Ice element ✓
Wiping away her sweat, Shiro left the attunement halls.
"Ah Shiro." Mark called out after her.
[Yes?]
"You must have done your attunement right? We'll need to register your attunement onto your ID." He said as he handed her a tablet.
'I'll hide metal and lightning for now. Shadow will be obvious sooner or later when Yin evolves.' Shiro thought as she entered Tier 2 Ice attunement and Tier 0 Shadow Attunement.
"Thank you." Mark smiled and took the tablet. While his outer appearance seemed to be composed, he was shocked deeply inside.
'She has two attunements?! A shadow one as well. Perhaps her pet was the one who gave her the attunement, then that means the pet is something special.' He thought.
[Are my 30 Ice cores ready?]
"Yes, we were about to send them but you can collect them instead. Follow me." Mark said as Shiro nodded.
As she was following Mark, she couldn't help be think about her broken mana links.
No matter who or what, they will always be born with unharmed mana links. Yet her's was a jumble.
This meant that it would be either a birth defect or something happened to this body before she occupied it.
Snow girls/woman were monsters that can be formed in a few ways. First was the natural way.
Mana would gather near an icy location and slowly gain sentience.
The next was the reconstruction kind. Mana would take the negative emotions of a woman who died in an ice surrounded area and slowly reconstruct them into a Snow girl.
This meant that there was a high possibility that her body was the reconstruction kind.
'Then this means the previous owner on this body had a feud with someone to warrant a broken mana realm.' Shiro thought with narrowed eyes.
This will make everything a lot more complicated as she didn't know who the person was. She could literally walk in a big city and someone come slap her head right off her torso.
'I'll have to keep my face hidden more often then.' Shiro thought.
'Maybe a lower face mask from Aarim will do the job.'
A lower face mask that can be removed or pulled up at any moment will help her hide her face.
'That being said, I could literally just be thinking about this too much.' Shiro shrugged.
Arriving at a set of doors, Mark had her wait for a moment before he came back with a box.
"In this box is the 30 ice cores that you wanted." Mark said feeling a pinch in his heart. If it wasn't for the fact that his Lord told him to give it to her, he would try to find some other excuse to not give it to her.
[Thanks.] Taking the cores, Shiro walked out of the building.
'With 2/3 tasks done, I'll just need to kill the 20 ice-based bosses.' Shiro thought as she searched up for any level 30 Dungeon.
[LVL 25-30 Silver Wolf Forest]
[LVL 30 Yeti's Mountain]
Out of 5 LVL 30 Dungeons that were in this city, only 2 were ice-based.
'Silver wolves hunt in packs which will be annoying. While every single one of the Yeti's are like a mini-boss in itself.'
There were benefits to fighting either one but Shiro wanted one that was quick and easy. She did have 20 bosses to kill after all.
Eventually, Shiro decided with yeti as it would be easier to target boss whilst avoiding the mobs if they travelled outside of a group.
Fighting the wolves would just be time-consuming and not to mention, stamina consuming... also a pain in the ass.
Returning to the dorms, Shiro knocked on Lyrica's door.
"What's up?" Lyrica asked.
[I'm going to be a little busy tomorrow so I won't be in the dorm.] Shiro typed, leaving out the fact that she was challenging a Dungeon solo.
"You're going to be challenging another D ranked Dungeon aren't you?"
[No.]
"Don't lie. I know what you're like Shiro. Just make sure you have supplies and stay safe." Lyrica said with a sigh.
Shiro was a stubborn one. Lyrica knew that while many people would want to avoid danger, Shiro wanted danger to increase her level. How else would a 13-year-old be a level 30?
Shiro patted Lyrica's head with a smile.
[I got it don't worry. I picked a Dungeon that was weak against me.]
"Alright…"
###
Shiro left the dorm early in next morning as she arrived before the gate to Yeti's mountain.
Sneaking her way in, she made sure that none of the guards saw her.
Her vision shifted as she saw where she was. As stated in the name, she was on top of a huge mountain. She could see dangerous cliff sides that would lead to one's death if they fell down it. The snow was falling gently as the ground was encased in layers of snow and ice.
Normal adventurers would need to get special gear just so that they could fight at a decent level in the Dungeon.
There were no obelisks here on the mountain. Every one of the bosses was at different heights as Shiro tilted her head and looked up.
The mountain could be split into 3 areas of varying heights with the final boss at the very top of the mountain.
Not only did the adventurers have to fight with unstable footing, but they also had to put up with lack of air, the biting cold and the occasional blizzard that may happen.
However, these did nothing to Shiro as she was unaffected by the conditions.