Lewis woke up with a jerk, finding himself lying on the body of the ape general, making him blink before scrambling to get back up. He had probably only lost consciousness for a few seconds, but the other apes that had been encircling them and blocking off his escape were beginning to move in on him. It looked like they were trying to rush him now that their leader had been defeated and left Lewis in a vulnerable state, but they were all low-level enough that he didn't worry.
A minute later, all the body builder apes had been slain, and Lewis was sitting on a rock, wondering why they hadn't run off. The ape general had mentioned that the other ape generals all had their own domains, so couldn't these mob creatures simply go get another ape general to finish him off?
Then again, maybe they were limited to a certain region of the trial and were forced to attack him when their leader failed. The quest did mention that he had to destroy all the ape tribes, so the system likely forced them to fight independently to give him a chance, since the general even thanked him for coming to their turf, as if he wouldn't have been able to fight otherwise.
But his thoughts soon drifted to his unexpected win against the ape general and his combination attack, which overcame the ape's annoying toughness and regeneration. With his mind clearer and the pains in his body receding at a surprising rate, considering each hit of the ape general was equivalent to getting hit by a truck, Lewis summoned his status window to check his gains from the fight.
You have slain Nature ape general - lvl 30 (+400 TP) Congratulations! You have reached level 18 (+1 STR, +1 DEX, +1 CON, +2 INT, +1 Free)
Skill: Unravelling strike has reached level 14
Skill: Unravelling strike has reached level 15
Skill: Arcane nullfield has reached level 13
He scrolled through the various notifications, nodding along at the skill level ups and the extra level before coming across an unexpected notification.
Congratulations! You have learned the skill Void control - lvl 1
Skill: Void control
Summon the destructive power of the primordial void. Eroding the very fabric of space itself, along with anything in your path. (High mana cost)
I guess this is what I created by combining my two skills. And if even the system is warning me about the high mana cost, then that's probably why I felt so exhausted after using it.
Checking his mana capacity, he found it to be at 19%, so he had used a significant amount during his battle and when using that last skill fusion move to sever the ape's arm. And that's with his mana being greatly bolstered by his aligned spirit, granting him over 120 points in spirit, and even then, he had nearly run out of juice.
Still, as he thought back to his desperate gamble, he realized that his two skills seemed a little too perfect together, almost like they were designed to be two halves of a whole. The moment they interacted, it was like Coca-Cola and Mentos, the two halves coming together to form a sum greater than the whole.
It was like an explosion of power that drank up his nullfield more than anything he had experienced before. Not even his fight with the orcs had drained so much mana from his nullfield, since the skill was directly connected to his mana and constantly draining a bit of it to keep itself running, that pull on his resources had been like a black hole feeding off of him to keep itself alive.
He didn't even dare attempt to use the skill until he recovered his mana, not wanting to know what would happen if he let it suck him dry, but getting the impression that it might simply grab at his spirit and attempt to pull it in to feed itself. It sounded like a horrifying thing to experience, but then again, the skill literally said it imbues his fists with the power of the primordial void, so it was bound to be extremely dangerous.
It seemed clear to him that his unravelling strike and nullfield skills were designed to function together, only that he wouldn't be able to use them until he got a lot stronger, and even now, he didn't think he could handle the absolute destructive power they create. Or more accurately, the complete void they form, erasing both magic and matter.
Still, this had definitely become his hidden trump card to get him through this mess. He wasn't sure what the normal way people would enter a secret trial was, but he imagined that this place was designed to be far more deadly than the Spire Mines dungeon. The fact that he had nearly had his brains exposed by a mini-boss just went to show how dangerous this place is. He was honestly trying to avoid thinking about how strong this ape lord would be.
But he wasn't about to run headlong into another fight, as the other ape tribes probably weren't allowed to attack him here. A small mercy and a chance to recover, but without access to the system shop, he felt even more isolated and unsure about what to do. The fact that he didn't even know how to leave this trial before slaying the boss was making him uneasy. But maybe defeating the other generals will give him the final two levels he needs to teleport to the second floor of the tutorial, bypassing the final boss entirely.
But right as he was musing about that possibility, he suddenly remembered that the tattoo on his hand could be used anytime once he had reached level 10. Shooting upright, he focused on the token and tried to mentally connect with it the same way he usually would with the system shop, but that plan was also shot down by the following notification.
Information: 2nd floor advancement token is blocked within the trial.
Well, so much for that idea. I'm pretty sure the automatic teleportation at level 20 is also canceled out by the secret trial. Looks like I'm gonna have to struggle through and finish this trial the hard way. But first, I'm gonna rest a bit.
For the next few hours, Lewis closed his eyes and recovered from the exhausting fight, eventually even getting some sleep when he found no sign of any more apes showing up. He had no way of keeping track of time, but he felt a lot better when he woke up, his body feeling less sore and mana having greatly regenerated.
But as he was inspecting himself, he sensed his spirit had become seemingly even more unstable than before, the purple cloud of spirit matter within his body seeming to have unraveled further. A far cry from the sharp shadow outline described in the cultivation manual. If anything, it seemed like his spirit was bleeding out into the ether, slowly dissipating away. It had happened when he had used his void control, the skill having piggybacked off his arcane nullfield and put a great strain on his spirit, likely aggravating its instability.
It was worrying, but without getting out of the secret trial, he had no way of learning how to fix the issue, and unfortunately, he was definitely going to need to use void control again if he wanted to survive this, so he had definitely found himself in a tricky situation.
He cursed himself under his breath for not being satisfied with all the points he had earned from selling the granite sentinel loot, but there was nothing he could do about that now. He just had to hope that the solution to firing his unstable spirit physique would be possible even if he was forced to worsen it by straining his spirit further. After all, if he manages to survive this trial, then he would probably be directly sent up to the second floor of the tutorial, so he couldn't be reduced to a feeble mess or even the basic mobs would be able to rip him apart, since he doubted their average monsters would still be low leveled like on the first floor.
Looking around the area, he found the bodies of the nature apes were still emanating residual nature affinity mana, especially from their hearts. It reminded him of the source of his own power. For whatever reason, his body didn't seem to directly hold his mana, but the apes hearts were clearly some sort of biological mana core, making him wonder about why his own body isn't affected by the destructive energy he can so casually wield.
He formed a crude blade from his nullfield, having learned to better control its shape instead of simply expanding it from his body in a sphere. He trained his mana detection on the palm sized blade of anti-mana, feeling it dissolve the ambient mana in the air. But even as he passed his hand over the shaped nullfield, it simply passed straight through it, like it didn't even exist at all. He wouldn't even know it was there without his mana detection showing an unnatural emptiness in the air.
He couldn't actually see the ambient mana, of course, but the lack of it was clearly visible. Sort of like light. It's impossible to easily differentiate between individual rays of light most of the time. But when there's an absolutely lack of light, the difference is obvious.
Yet no matter how closely he inspected his own mana, he found no hint of anything at all. Not even the slightest sense that it exists at all, unlike the nature apes whose bodies were even now radiating a fresh and soothing life affinity. His own mana appeared to be an absolute hole in the world, a void of sorts. Even the various invisibility techniques he had witnessed so far had been somewhat detectable to him, although some hid from him better than others. That ring of the observer was the best so far, but even then, it had given off a slimy feeling to his detection. Even a rare item designed to conceal a person's presence left behind some kind of signature. But not his mana.
It made him ponder the guides words, about how Lewis was an anomaly, and seeing his spirit now, that much is obvious. What he couldn't understand was where this had come from. His spirit must have been born this way for it to be perfectly integrated with the strange purple void mana he could see in it, since the manual had explicitly said that anything that touches the spirit after its formed can only 'taint' it and form small channels in it that allow for the manipulation of said energy. But that would mean he had always possessed such powers from birth, even before the system integrated Earth, but that had clearly not been the case.
These thoughts filled his head with far more questions than he had answers, but he eventually shook his head and got back up.
No point mopping around and thinking about stuff I don't understand. Best to take things one step at a time. Only this time, I want to tread carefully and not have another one of King Kong's relatives try and turn my brain into jelly.
Determined not to make the same mistakes twice. Lewis started walking out of the former bodybuilder apes' section of the jungle, wanting to investigate the three other ape generals to form a real plan of attack. He was born with a fully functioning brain, after all, so he probably shouldn't rush into things and try to solve them with pure brawn like a dumb ape, not that these apes seem particularly stupid, just a turn of phrase.
After half an hour of exploration, he eventually came across the sound of a running river, accompanied by the clear sound of something splashing in the water. Peeking out from the opposite bank, he was surprised to find a group of apes hanging out on the rivers edge. Some of them lazily floating in the clear blue waters while others sat on the sand strip between the river and jungle. Shadows under the water suggested a few of the apes were even diving under the currents.
I didn't even know apes could swim. He thought to himself, right before a far paler ape with shorter hair and a leaner build leap out of the water like a dolphin, the currents folding around them in a gentle embrace as they were carried ashore before the swirling platform of water collapsed back into the river.
Well shit. Their waterbenders.