Return of the Woodcutter
Chapter 48 - Durability (part 2)

Despite his exhaustion, Aito only slept for a few hours. The room's special effects seemed to be even more incredible than he had thought. Upon waking up, he felt invigorated, full of stamina, mana, and a need to take a bath.

Once naked inside his spacious bathtub, soaked in warm water, he found something unexpected on his right arm where Belmand had previously grabbed him: a red mark depicting a cushion with a black star on top of it.

The cushion was the symbol of the god of sloth. Every mortal under his influence carried that red mark. Although Aito hadn't asked for it, the god granted it to him, anyway. It served as a VIP pass of sorts in Iris and gave privileges to those who directly served the gods, such as buying favors from the gods using glory points, privileged access to certain areas, being granted more resources, etc.

As for the unmarked ones—if the bonus informations he had extracted from Roan were correct—they formed over 50% of the inhabitants of Iris and were composed of the noncombatant classes. Since they generally did not serve on the frontline, or in other words risked their lives, they were undeserving of privileges.

Disgusted, Aito tried to erase it, although he knew it was pointless. Unless his arm was cut off, or Belmand himself removed it, the mark would remain where it was until his death. He sighed, got out of his bath, dried himself using the towels kindly provided by the Tower and ate a few of those blue fruits called indigo.

Apparently, they tended to grow easily pretty much in any kind of environment, turning them into a staple food of Iris. On top of being cheap, they were an interesting, perfectly balanced mix of sugary and salty taste.

After finishing his breakfast, with plenty of time before the staircases opened, he trained his control over mana for an hour by infusing the peculiar energy into all sorts of magical items scattered in his room. The room's cooling system, the tap, oven, stove, and even something akin to a refrigerator.

Using mana still felt unusual, but he was getting the hang of it even faster now after inheriting Ogoro's memories. The giant of a man had copied his combat knowledge from his past life, but also his second one, such as the basic skill taught on the third floor to all combat classes: Durability.

Durability allowed the user to enhance the potential of any nonliving matter to resist an external force applied to it. With it, a simple stick could become as hard as iron. It seemed more useful to warriors than mages. However, that was a common misunderstanding for newbies.

This skill required to fuse the power of one's soul as well as one's mana, creating what was called aura. To put it simply, aura allowed the user to influence its surroundings in infinite ways, which was how magic came to be.

Durability was the simplest application of aura—at least that's what was commonly acknowledged—thus making it meaningful for all classes to learn it. On top of providing an additional layer of defense, it made for an excellent introduction to the source of their powers.

Each combat class used aura differently. The roots of their powers were more or less the same, only the application differed. That's why Durability was chosen as the most basic skill, but it wasn't the first that was learned. Upon surviving the first trial, if willing, a challenger would be granted a class which came with skills.

Aito sighed. Soul power, mana, and aura. These presumed energies still had many mysteries to offer, which gave him a headache. But using Ogoro's memories, it was all he managed to understand.

However, he still had many questions regarding these three energies. What exactly was soul power? What was the relationship between soul power and mana? Did some of his current skills require the use of aura? If yes, how had he been able to use them before knowing about aura? Did it have something to do with the System?

Such questions piled up on his already full plate, threatening to spill over the carpet of his mind. He sighed once again and decided to focus on what he already had an answer to. On what he could currently do.

Dressed in a simple but clean brown linen shirt and pants he had previously bought from Roan, he walked to his bed and grabbed his double-edged ax, lying on the bed like a lover. Since the island, he had developed the habit of sleeping with a weapon within hand reach, so even in such a secure location, he couldn't let go of this habit.

Weapon in hand, he sat on his bed and drew from Ogoro's memories the necessary informations to activate Durability. He closed his eyes, focused on his soul core at the center of his bosom, and tried to feel every minute change in it.

Thanks to the memory bead, it only took him a bit less than an hour to feel two distinct sources of energy. One that was easier to detect, another that was located deeper into his core. From that feeling, he drew a mental diagram of what was happening inside him.

As he understood it, there were two layers to a soul core—also called mana core, depending on the circumstances. The first layer, he identified as the mana tank or whatever it was called, filled around 90% of the core's space.

It surrounded the second layer where the soul power resided. And at the center of it all, hidden within the depth of the core, nested a tiny ball, the soul. That tiny ball seemed to produce the soul power, and it probably had other properties he wasn't aware of.

'So small… no wonder I've never felt it before,' he thought, trying to tap into this hidden source of power. An hour and dozens of drops of sweats later, he finally barely managed to reach it.

It felt warm, aggressive, yet calm. The soul power seemed to be trying to escape, but was imprisoned by the mana, as if it kept it in place, preventing it from dissipating.

Using Ogoro's knowledge and his own experience with mana infusion, he ordered his mana to create a way out for his soul power. An hour passed with little to no result. He then remembered that aura was made by fusing mana and soul power. If one of the two were to be missing, it would not manifest.

So, instead of opening a way out, he used mana to grab a small portion of his soul power, and very slowly tried to pull it out of the second layer. After hundreds of tries, something interesting happened once he finally succeeded.

Out of the second layer, the soul power fused with some of his mana creating a formless energy that seemed to emit some sort of undulating waves, just like wavelength, like… a signal Aito felt he could control. In fact, he felt aura was easier to order around compared to mana.

Using this opportunity to experiment, he sent this wisp of formless energy to his weapon. The aura jumped out of his core, traveled through his right arm while leaving waves of warmth in its wake, and exited his palm into the weapon.

Once there, he felt an unexplainable connection with the ax, as if a part of himself was in it. Then, following Ogoro's memories, he imbued his ax with aura then, like an emitter, Aito ordered the energy to harden—at least that's the image he built in his head.

And, like a receptor, the aura responded to its call, entirely coating the ax, forming a glowing yellow tailor-made armor. However, it didn't feel like the phenomenon only took place on the surface but also inside the weapon, as if the aura had completely fused with it, keeping the properties of steel intact but reinforced.

Simply put, it made the weapon more durable.

Aito opened his eyes to gaze upon his achievement with a satisfied smile. After all, he had accomplished in a few hours what most people took an entire week to do, if not more. Although, some talented challengers could take three or four days to arrive at this point.

Realizing that it might have taken a week for him to learn Durability, he felt grateful towards the person who had provided him with the chance to speed things up.

"Thank you, Ogoro." He said, his trust in the man growing ever so slightly just before a familiar blue window popped up in front of him.

BING!

[Congratulations! You have acquired the active skill Durability!]