[Michael’s POV]
He was currently sitting under the sunny sky, it had been 5 whole days since he got here and the improvements were pretty drastic.
To start it off, he now had a whole 40% progress towards the next tier, he felt significantly more powerful.
It had gotten a bit difficult to increase his progress past a certain point, the system told him that it was only natural, his mana core was expanding and providing room for more mana to seep in.
Added on to the fact that he finally received a skill from his cold exposure.
Cold Resistance [Basic] [Passive]
# You take 15% less damage from anything related to the cold.
It was nearly identical to the Heat Resistance passive skill, he just wished he could finally combine passive skills so he could get something good from this.
‘Anyway..’ Michael stood up and waved off the heat that was coming from out of his body, it was way hotter than training in the cave, however, it was also more efficient.
However, he decided it was time to finally leave, he was satisfied with the progress.
Michael felt like if he were to train his remaining days here, he would, at maximum, increase it by another 15%.
While it did seem like a lot, it would require him to be under direct moonlight or sunlight for many hours at a time.
And quite frankly, he had grown a bit tired of it, he needed a break.
Although he was being fully healed each time, the sensations never faded.
Come on, do more.
‘Fuck off, I have been at it for 5 days straight, I deserve a break too’ Michael said with a tired sigh and walked back to the cave, noticing Astraea preparing some kind of a meal.
He looked forward to it, she tried cooking while he was training and surprisingly, it tasted delicious.
Ever since then, she took up the duty of cooking the food, it was not like she had anything better to do.
Orin still wasn’t out of his sulking phase, the conversations they shared were minimal and Michael did not try pressing him to change.
Things like loss take time to heal, rushing him would only cause the scars to further affect Orin in the future.
And as for Astraea, she seemed to be in deep thought most of the time, they were not talking much either.
However, every time they did, Astraea showed more and more emotion, it looked like whatever memories were bottled up down inside her mind, were slowly resurfacing.
‘Too bad I am not regaining anything’ Michael grumbled. He only had one memory of her, yet she seemed to be regaining more and more.
It was strange, she wasn’t an open book either, he couldn’t exactly gauge her current personality, the only conclusion he could come to was that she was overly curious.
Michael walked up to the two of them and sat down, grabbing a piece of food before announcing “We are going to be leaving soon.”
Orin’s eyes seemed to light up while Astraea remained passive.
“What will you do?” Michael asked Astraea, so far she had been accompanying them, however, he was not sure what her plans moving forward were.
For all he knew, she might have been a little lonely and wanted some company while in the forest.
However, if she was anything like how he observed then…
“I will go with you” She said with a faint smile while staring into his eyes.
Despite the usual look, her gaze looked warmer than he was used to, it even made his heart skip a beat.
“Good… let’s see” Michael nodded and turned to the map, it looked like there was some sort of a city not too far away.
But still, even if it wasn’t far by his standards, Orin was with them, he didn’t want to make the kid winded by traveling at very high speeds.
Unlike the people up in the sky islands, Orin was weak, he couldn’t even feel his mana but if he were to guess, he was likely under level 10.
Michael finally picked the destination and stood up “Astraea, are you sure you want to go with us?”
“I want to go with you” She proclaimed and stood up with Orin by her side.
They seemed to get pretty close over the last few days, maybe he saw her as some sort of a mother figure.
She was, after all, making food and taking care of him, maybe that was a way for him to relieve his grief, by indulging in further delusion.
But he wasn’t going to stop him, once they took him to the city, Orin would be taken care of and he could finally go back.
‘I wonder when Amanda is going to call me.. shit’ Michael thought for a moment before freezing.
He had forgotten all about his phone, it wasn’t military grade or anything of the sort so it must have melted along with his other clothing.
The one thing he was glad about was that he didn’t take the orbs he had gotten back at the temple, if he were to lose one of them it would have been bad.
No, it wouldn’t have, the trials are connected to the system and the orb you used for concentrating your mana, you have been subconsciously doing it already, it was meant to be more of a beginner tool.
‘Oh.. that’s good to know’ Michael felt relieved, but at the same time pissed, the phone he had lasted him for several years, even if he couldn’t use it much in the temple, it was still working.
And it also had every single important contact he could think of, safe to say, Amanda would give him an earful.
They didn’t waste any time and packed up whatever they had, which wasn’t much and headed for the city, it would take nearly a day of walking at their current pace.
Astraea suddenly sped up and walked beside him with Orin in the very back.
She looked forward, not making eye contact with Michael and said “Mik-Michael, do you remember when we met?”
‘Is this some sort of a trick question?’ Michael thought for a moment before coming to a realization, she must have remembered much deeper into the past than he could imagine.
However, he doesn’t exactly know the answer to that question, he knew when they met this time though.
“Nearly a week ago right in front of the forest, why?” He said while acting slightly oblivious.
Her eyes became unfocused for just a moment before they returned to their usual clear silvery color “It’s nothing..”
Michael could tell that she was a little upset, but what could he do? It was not like he could remember anything else.
‘System, any tips?’
Increase your synchronization rate.
‘Do you remember what happened last time? I don’t even know for how many years I was gone and it did not feel longer than a few hours, if Freya hadn’t cast that time stopping spell, I would have been screwed.’
Time won’t pass if you do the trials directly through the system, that orb was only an imitation and my capabilities are the real deal, don’t worry about it.
Michael paced forward while trying to hold a poker face ‘You telling me to not worry about it, makes me worry about it more..’
