Reborn with the Conquest System-Chapter 56: Aftermath

After drying himself off with a towel, a tired Magnus collapsed on the bed.

’Not bad. The martial art seems to have gotten stronger.’

[It’s mana art now, since you can use mana.]

’OH. Makes sense.’

He turned around, his eyes wandered over the ceiling, before settling on his status window.

[Name: Magnus (changeable)]

[Level: 13]

[Experience: 15624/16000]

[STR: 64] [SPD: 54] [INT: 13] [WIL: 98] [-] [-]

[ Mana total (2INT+WIL)= 124]

’That ice mage was about on par with me stat-wise, yet he got demolished.’

[You have a mana art, he didn’t.]

’Where did you even get this from?’

[When I was younger, I stole it from a temple in this world. Don’t ask for specifics, that temple is also long gone so nobody would recognise it.]

’Wait—’

[I’m not answering.]

"Tch... Fine." Muttering it under his breath, he went through the skill window. Having killed a whole bunch of different enemies, a wide selection of skills had shown up.

’Affinities for different magics, summoning magic, mana reservoir expansion seems good... Hmm...’

His eyes lingered on ice magic affinity for the longest. After a few minutes of silent contemplation—

’Convert everything except for the mana reservoir into points.’

[Eh? You’re not gonna get affinity for other elements!?]

The ice mage flashed through his mind. He shook his head, "Too slow."

’Why should I? Instead of wasting time learning a new magic type and making my own spells, I want to get stronger now. Also, I doubt any of them are better than lightning for killing things.’

[... Fine, you would need to develop a secondary mana pool as well, so your decision isn’t wrong.]

[36 points rewarded.]

’Secondary mana pool? Oh so my current one is just for lightning magic? Yeah then scratch that.’ His eyes locked onto the mana reservoir skill.

[Mana reservoir LVL 1]

[Doubles your mana capacity by improving your mana circuits.]

[ Mana total (4INT+2WIL)= 248]

[30 points remaining]

’It not increasing mana regeneration speed is a bit sad, since now it would take two full days to recover to full. Meh, still good.’

A knock came from the door, interrupting his thoughts.

’Ent—oh.’

"Enter."

The captain walked in, her face beaming with joy.

"Magnuuuus~ my friend~."

"Let me guess, you struck gold." He didn’t bother getting up, instead having one eye locked to the captain.

"Aye, they were loaded with enough goods to make any pirate foam at the mouth. There also were some useful items — so come and get your cut."

"Would there be anything useful for me? I don’t use weapons as you can see."

"It’s not just weapons. Enchanted accessories, spirit stones, and some sort of black ore we can’t identify."

At the mention of the ore, his eyes lit up. Getting off the bed, his eyes locked onto the captain.

"You got my interest, lead the way."

A few minutes later, they entered the captain’s cabin.

"The rings were on the ice mage, I haven’t identified the enchantments yet. The staff he had is pretty good, could fetch a few hundred coins. We also found a bunch of spirit stones on the ship, and finally—" Her hands quickly pointed to different things, before finally resting on a fist sized piece of ore.

"This thing. It’s—"

"Unnaturally heavy, right?" He cut her off, eyes locked onto the ore that had cracked the floor underneath.

"Yes. You know what it is, and more importantly, if it’s worth anything?" She asked, her eyes sparkling with curiosity.

"Is there any forge in the port we’ll be seeing?"

"Yes?"

"Then I’ll be taking that. That’s Drant, while it’s disgustingly rare it’s also the hardest material to process. A smith that can deal with it properly is far too rare." He explained, recalling what the dwarves told him.

"How rare?" She shot him a skeptical look.

"A dwarven high smith. Anything lesser and you’re committing heresy by harming the metal." His hands traced the ore, wondering what to craft. 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

"Oh right. It’s worth its weight in gold." He casually added afterwards.

The captain’s eyes began to glow with golden light as she gazed at the ore.

"How about you let me sell that beauty? We split the profits, you get eighty. "

"Why sell something that has demand but no supply? Instead of that, let me make something with it. I’m not on par with a high smith, but I’m close to one."

"You? A high smi—actually, it’s not that unbelievable. Compared to having a high tier mana art, that’s more reasonable."

"Ahem!" He faked a cough, before looking at the captain. "Mana art aside, what do you want?"

"Oh my, you’re confident I’ll go with making something?" She looked at him, her arms crossed.

"Grow stronger, or grow richer. Most people would pick the second one— if they’re not constantly risking their lives." He replied calmly.

"Sigh... Fine, bracelet or amulet. What can you make for yourself? Definitely not a weapon, that’s for sure."

"Nah, I can make a decent weapon with this. It wouldn’t be pure Drant but it would still be top tier. But we could also cover ourselves in accessories that boost mana—and later have enchantments inscribed on them."

"Is that even worth it?"

"Having your mana capacity and regeneration increased multiple times over is definitely worth it. And that’s without the enchantments that would be dozens of times more powerful than normally."

"Hm... Fine."

"Ah but it will be heavy as shit, unless you waste space with weight reduction enchants." He added casually, having forgotten the most important part.

"I’ll take it, I’m strong enough to handle some stupid rock." She flexed, trying to act tough.

"Then pick up the ore?" Magnus’s deadpan eyes looked at her.

"Ahem... Nice weather." She turned around, beginning to stare out of the window.

"Pffft. Don’t worry, it won’t be too heavy once it’s processed."

"I’ll hold you to that, you know?" She looked back at him, a faint smile on her lips.

"Hahahaha, sure." His eyes momentarily lingered on the spirit stones.

"Interested in spirit stones? Why, wanna gamble? A lot of them could have at least mid rank spirits inside of them." She held up a yellow stone the size of her fist.

"Doubt you’re getting anything from that." Magnus replied.

A stream of mana began to flow into the stone from the tips of her fingers, a blue light shining from the stone. A few seconds later, the stone cracked open, revealing a ball of lightning.

"Wow, how lucky. Even if its a low grade one, that can still fetch good money."

Yet seeing the spirit’s grade, a disappointed expression crept on her face. Murmuring a name she came up with, the spirit remained in her hand without any changes.

"Bah. I’ll just sell them, I got a low grade one from the only mid tier spirit stone." Her eyes scanned the rest of the spirit stones, all smaller than the one used. "Can’t believe I lost a fifty-fifty chance..."

"Why are you after a mid grade spirit even?"

"I only have one mana pool, so if I wanted a second spirit it would take ages to make the second pool." She replied honestly, shrugging her hands.

A memory flashed through his mind, and he remembered getting a mid grade spirit from a lowest grade spirit stone.

"Hmm... Okay. Well, if you’ll excuse me, I still have to train. Goodbye captain. "

’She might just kick me out of the ship if she knew that.’

Leaving the sulking captain behind, he left the cabin.

As the following days passed, another thought struck Magnus.

’We’re being followed.’ His gaze locked onto a dark shape slithering beneath the waves— too large, too smooth, and far too quiet