Dungeons Online

Over the last few hours, Tom continued to use his skills in a specific succession. The time that he had to sacrifice to use his desired skill for the first time resulted in his ability to rather easily replicate its effects. 

Tom struck his spear against the shining surface of the stone. 

It felt as if some sort of vortex appeared at the tip of his spear. A vortex that was at the same time connected to Tom's very own flesh. When Tom struck, the stone came into contact with that vortex. 

Tom's spear filled with energy. As if he sucked on the straw, the mana came gushing. It washed all Tom's exhaustion away. The burden of sharing his own energy to let Claudia strengthen her body was no more.

Then, Tom felt the energy rush into his body. As if it desired to reinforce every single cell his flesh was made off. All at once, he felt his personal strenght surge on the very physical level. 

And then came the last part. Once his flesh was properly reinforced, the mana started...

But it didn't finish. Right as the process was about to conclude, the mana stone crumbled. 

There was no gradual decay. The stone was as shiny when Tom pulled it out from the sack as it was a second before it fell apart. There was no way to guess when the last moment of the stone would come just by looking at its exterior. 

'Next,' Tom thought. He pulled his hand back in a trance before stabbing his spear at another stone. 

The feeling returned. Tom's reinforced body took the flooding mana like a dried-out sponge finally flushed with liquid. And as his inner self seemingly bloated, Tom felt something. 

It was as if this weird perception of his inner energy, the strange image of his body massively sizing up...

Tom somehow connected with it. 

This time, there was no announcing voice. There was no system message. 

'I see,' Tom thought when all the knowledge about this strange connection flooded into his mind. He didn't need to learn it. He was free of the pains of training to notice this connection. 

It was as if he suddenly recalled how to use just another sense that everyone was born with. 

"How are you doing?" Claudia asked, approaching Tom. She was smiling gently. As if she was trying to hide a bright smile. 

"I can see you brimming with self-satisfaction," Tom said. A smile blossomed on his lips as he opened his eyes. "What did you find out?" he asked. 'Rather than flexing my own skill, let's let her have her moment of glory,' he thought, looking at the girl as if she was some kind of adorable, cute mascot. 

"I can strike anything for as far as one meter away from my body," Claudia said, raising her chin with pride. "While it's easier to control this skill when striking forward, I can also move my attacks to my back or sides," she continued. Each of her words oozed with confidence. 

"Isn't that great?" Tom asked in return, looking at the girl with honest awe. 

This wasn't a contest of who would get a better skill. The stronger each of them would get, the easier they could conquer the dungeon. 

Tom was genuinely happy. 

"Most importantly, I'm free to use this skill or not," Claudia added after a moment. Her happy face turned slightly serious, proving how important that part was for the girl. "I was worried that this skill would completely wreck my life, like, being unable to grab a spoon or something..." she added as she averted her eyes. For a moment, Tom couldn't get enough of how cute the shy version of Claudia was. 

"Either way, I can see that you are excited as well," Claudia suddenly changed the topic, looking at Tom with a wide smile. She jerked her body up, making her chest wobble enticingly. "How about you share what kind of skill did you get as well?" she asked. 

"Is it really that visible?" Tom asked, surprised by the sudden question. 'I thought I wasn't showing it,' he thought, shaking his head before moving his eyes back at the girl. "This time, it's a magic spear," Tom said, raising the hand he was holding his weapon with. "Look," he added, shaking his spear a little before closing his eyes. 

At first, nothing seemed to happen. Tom simply held his spear at the level of his chest as if it was some kind of muscle training. 

Then, he opened his eyes. "It's done," he said with a satisfied smile. 

"What's done?" Claudia asked, baffled by the complete lack of changes in either Tom's disposition or the weapon he was holding.

"Can't you really see the difference?" Tom asked, leaning his head to the side with an amused smile. Then, with a single twitch of his hand, he made his spear disappear. 

"What?" Claudia could only mutter in shock when Tom's weapon vanished. "What did you do?" she asked, raising her eyes at her partner. 

"It's magic spear skill," Tom said, shaking his hand once again only for the spear to appear back in it. "But it has a few more uses," he added, suddenly stretching his hand to the back and throwing the spear forward. 

Even though Tom's throw wasn't the greatest attack he was capable of executing, the spear managed to embed itself into the dungeon's wall either way. 

"I can recall it to my hand," Tom said, snapping his fingers. And once his middle finger made the snapping sound against his thumb, it rested on the handle of Tom's spear that somehow made its way back to his hand. 

"I can swap positions with it," Tom added, throwing the spear again. This time, he didn't snap his fingers. Or rather, Claudia couldn't hear anything like that happening before. Instead of staring at Tom's face, she was observing the twitching end of his spear. 

"Overall, it feels like I can now use it in a far better way than before," Tom added once he swapped places with his spear again and then called it back to his hand. "Finally, I can make it disappear like I did before and materialize whenever I need," Tom finished his explanation before looking at the girl with a smug smile. But before she could assume that he was feeling superior, Tom suddenly shook his head. 

"Sadly, there are obvious limitations to those skills," Tom said, lowering his spear to signal that he was no longer going to showcase his new abilities. "The more my actions invade against the natural laws, the more energy the skill will consume. So while calling the spear back to my hand is relatively cheap and simple, swapping places with it is quite taxing," Tom explained the downside of his ability so that Claudia wouldn't expect more than possible from him. 

'That, and in order to do any of that with the spear, I need to first consume it,' Tom thought, bringing the greatest drawback of this new skill of his to his own attention. 

The reason why he stalled for so long before presenting his ability was just that. He was unable to exhibit any of his new abilities of his without having a magic spear in the first place. 

And while it was possible and even cheaper to just create a spear out of pure magic, Tom wasn't willing to give up on all the bonuses that his current weapon was giving him. As such, he had to fully infuse his spear with magic, register its inner structure in his mind and seemingly absorb it all into his soul, turning his simple, mechanical spear into a weapon of a spiritual level. 

"Okay, you win," Claudia said, raising her hands and taking a step back. Her smile soured a little, proving that she wasn't a big fan of losing to someone else.

"It was never a competition, to begin with," Tom countered, shaking his head. "My entire skillset is aimed at fighting with the spear, so it's only natural those skills will be more and more versatile with each addition," he added, bringing forth one of the few well-proven rules of obtaining new skills. 

"I know this, but that doesn't make it any easier to just accept a defeat like that," Claudia replied, tightening her jaws. "Still, it's good that we are stronger now," she added as her head moved towards the deeper part of the dungeon that they had yet to explore. "Tell, do you think we should take our time to polish our ability to wield those skills? Or maybe we should use all the stones we have in hopes that we could break through and get a new set before going any further?" Claudia asked, bringing up an actually important question. 

Tom looked down at the rest of the stones that waited on the floor for someone to either pick up or use them. Then, his lips turned into a wide smile. "I think we should go all in and use them all!"