Chapter 45: Perception Baby
Perception Baby
’This is hard.’ Mike thought as he stared at his latest piece of work.
Several broken stones lay discarded around him, bits and pieces of some covering parts of his body, but mostly his arms.
In front of him, his hands hovered above another piece of broken rock. It somewhat resembled a prism, but it was rough on every side, and none of the sides were equal either. It also looked very lopsided and was filled with cracks, looking on the verge of shattering.
Needless to say, it was a failure. One of many.
Despite this, though, Mike wasn’t discouraged. In fact, he barely registered the failure as his mind spun.
Without really thinking, he waved his hand, but it didn’t hit the ’prism’. Instead, a weak blast of aura was released and finished the job, fully shattering the stone and blowing the pieces away.
As soon as he did, the slot in the ground opened once more, and a new stone emerged. Mike had questioned where the stones kept coming from earlier or why there were stone depositing slots in an arena in the first place, but he couldn’t be bothered to try and find out.
’Okay. Let’s review what went wrong and try to make a solution.’ He thought as he closed his eyes and started to ponder on his latest failure as well as how to improve.
The last time, he essentially tried to use his aura to ’grind’ out the shape he desired. Making it latch onto the stone and condense before moving in a set pattern, grinding through the stone to get the desired shape.
However, he faced two issues with this method.
First of all, stability. Or rather, consistency. It was difficult to keep the pattern he set for his aura to follow straight, as it could easily lose its integrity, making him accidentally grind out of place.
It was fine when he was still on the outer parts of the stone where he had more material to work with, but as it got deeper, it got more and more obvious that it was an issue.
Another issue was the idea of grinding itself. While grinding objects could be used to achieve a perfect shape, it was harder compared to other methods.
’Alright. Onto the next method.’ He hummed and positioned one hand above the stone and another by the side, his aura activating once more.
Mike was so focused on his task that he’d completely attuned his senses to the stone in front of him and his own body. Effectively drowning out his surroundings.
Hence, he didn’t notice two things. The first was how, compared to his peers, he’d burned through the most stones and was making the most progress.
The second was how Edward was ’staring’ right at him, a faint smile on his face.
Occasionally, he would open his mouth and say something softly, but no one else would hear it other than the person who was addressed directly, as he used his aura to ensure only the one he was speaking to would hear him, and it was usually him giving pointers or advice, because unlike Masha, Edward actually guided his students directly and gave them instructions.
However, he didn’t do this with Mike as he watched him try and fail constantly.
’His rate of improvement is astounding. He could barely control his aura when the class started, but in the span of a single period, he has increased his control over his aura immensely. Truly fascinating.’ He watched as Mike failed again, but instead of getting annoyed, he seemed to get excited.
’Earnest too.’ Edward noted.
’Okay! I think that can work.’ Mike thought excitedly as he once more positioned his hands, one above and one by the side of the new stone, the old fragments having been blown away.
He exhaled and once more let out his aura from the hand above the stone. It concentrated into a small point and slowly descended, and when it touched the top of the stone, it started to dig into it, almost like a drill.
Mike used his other hand to stabilize the ’drill’ as he concentrated, and when he reached a depth he was satisfied with, he took a breath and dug in.
From where the aura had stopped drilling, it split into four smaller drills that branched downwards at an angle. However, as soon as he started, he stopped as he huffed.
’That’s hard.’ He thought. He was already cutting it close with how small the drill of aura was, and it was difficult to keep track of the energy without letting it disperse. Splitting it up even further just added to that difficulty, as he had a hard time sensing, and therefore maintaining it before it dispersed.
’Hm. What to do?" He closed his eyes as he considered his options. He truly felt like he was on the right track, but his ability to perceive, and therefore control the energy wasn’t good enough, so this path would be–
’Wait, perception.’ Mike suddenly had a thought and opened up his status panel.
STATS
Strength: 31
Agility: 33.8
Endurance: 32.4
Vitality: 36.8
Perception: 30.2
Ferocity: 11% (Stable)
Allocatable Stat Points: 6
Mike instantly zeroed in on the six allocatable stat points and pursed his lips.
’I really could...’He thought as he was tempted to just dump everything into perception. It was his lowest stat after all, so a bit of uplifting wouldn’t be bad.
’Moreover, my next class after lunch break is Power Management & Flow, and my following classes depend on my ability to read people and situations, which primarily depend on perception...’ Mike mused. His instincts were silent on the matter, indicating that there was no true correct choice.
’Screw it.’ He decided to bite the bullet. Hesitating needlessly wouldn’t bring results, and he needed to
He dumped all his stat points into perception.
The effects were immediate.
Mike blinked as he felt a sudden tingle in his senses before they seemed to... surge.
Everything became louder, smells turned sharper, his eyes picked up more details... it was a lot, and it proved that adding a large amount of stat points into any stat at once produced a tangible effect, and it took Mike a few seconds to get acclimated.
It didn’t take long, though, as while 6 stats were quite a bit, it wasn’t so much that Mike was debilitated simply from adapting to the change.
He let out a sigh as he refocused on the stone which he could now see more details of, and he sent out his energy. As soon as he did, he was both surprised and elated at how much easier it was to sense.
’Dang. Perception my low-key be one of the best stats.’ He marveled. It wasn’t just his energy either, as he could sense his body even better than before. However, he soon felt a bit odd.
’System, isn’t this improvement a bit much for just six stat points?’ He asked. 6 wasn’t a small number for his current level, but still, it felt a lot. At least more than when he got an increase of 6 in each stat when he leveled up twice previously.
[Not particularly. As the Host grows stronger, every single stat point becomes more and more effective and scales higher. For instance, say you allocate a stat point to strength when you reach level ten and a stat point to agility when you reach level four hundred. Both were a single point, but the quality of increase they bring about differs widely. If not, then you’d reach a point where investing hundreds, or even thousands of points into a single stat wouldn’t bring about a noticeable change.] The system promptly explained, and Mike blinked.
’That... makes sense. Hm.’ He tilted his head. However, he quickly focused on his task. That was something to think about later.
He once more condensed his aura into a single point and sent it down into the hole that had already been drilled, and once more, he split it apart into 4 smaller points that spread outwards at a downward angle.
’It’s difficult... but doable.’ Mike thought as he doubled down. The four smaller drills continued their path, slowly making their way to the bottom of the stone as they did their thing
The progress was slow, but it was happening, and a bit of sweat covered his brow as he fully committed to his task.
As for his approach? Well, instead of straight-up slicing the stone apart, he wanted to try and drill holes into the stone to create the ’frame’ for the shape, giving him an easier time in shaping the stone from the inside and outside.
Minutes passed, and Mike was almost done creating the frame when the entire stone just got reduced to dust.
’... Huh?’ Mike blinked, snapping out of his focused state as he stared at the dust of the stone.
’Huh?! What went wrong???’ He was about to start ranting inwardly when a voice sounded.
"I understand you were concentrating. Sadly, class has come to an end, so I will have to stop you there." Edward’s voice sounded right next to Mike’s ears despite him still being in his cross-legged position at the center of the arena, and Mike blinked as realization dawned on him.
’Oooh, it was him.’ He scratched his head, a bit annoyed that his work had been cut short so soon, but fully understanding that Edward couldn’t just let them be late for their lunch.
He looked around and saw the other students who also seemed to be focused on their work look around with confusion before realizing what had happened.
"That’s enough for today, everyone." He clapped his hands twice and nodded.
"You all had varying progress. Some slow, some quick, but you all still made progress. That is what matters. Now go and get your lunch. We will meet back here tomorrow." He said simply, dismissing the class.
Mike frowned as he felt himself being observed by Edward, but the odd man didn’t address him, so he simply shrugged and started to leave the arena with his classmates, his mind drifting to the class and his approach as shaping the prism.