It seems being an asshole can work in your favor. Ethan thought while floating away, if he was lucky those elves should stop bothering him, he didn't want them to be involved in his affairs and they didn't want him in theirs. So he wouldn't back down if they tried to confront him again. The reality was that the exit would appear here and not somewhere else. The first time was his mistake he was overconfident and got himself burned now he knew what they were capable of and just needed to keep his distance.

The more important thing was that he had time here. Time to focus on more exciting things and constant bickering, he wanted to improve his weapon fighting to shore up on his weaknesses. While he had a good grasp on his magic, in his humble opinion, he was still lacking in terms of close quarter combat, ideally he kept his distance but that wasn't always possible. Having a staff as a spell focus and for rituals was good but if he was honest with himself, fighting with it sucked.

When you're in a cave for example or a corridor, there is no real room to move around with a staff this size. What if somebody manages to restrain his arms or injures him, good luck using a staff of all things as a weapon. No, a staff wasn't the right choice, he needed something that was universally usable and while no weapon was perfect for every situation he had the ability to make the right weapon for the right situation.

When he set his foot down on the ground again he started to continue on his walk around the mountain. While walking he created a dagger made from ice in his hand. It was crude, not very nice to look at but the blade was sharp. Ethan knew he would never be a sculptor but he just needed something to fight with not parade around with to impress others.

He stopped after inspecting the dagger and slammed the end of his staff into the ground and summoned a second dagger in his now free hand. Ethan wasn't trained in close quarter combat and he didn't have skills for it either. So he did what everybody would do in his situation, he just winged it. For the next two hours he did nothing else than walking around, creating weapons and experimenting with them.

Axes and knives got thrown, daggers got wielded, swords were created to hack away at branches. Shield got summoned to serve as a sturdy defense. The end result was that he sucked with weapons. There was no other way around it. Still he liked to have options and maybe there was a skill for improvised weapon fighting down the road. If he manages to impress the system enough to grant him one.

What worked a lot better was modification. Spearheads, axes, halberds, hammers, maces, morningstars, poleaxes, war picks and so on. You name it, he tried it, being a nerd had its uses after all. With his staff being sturdy he could use it to modify both sides to fit his current needs.

Ethan even tried a blade staff but that was just a longer, more uncomfortable version of his already big staff. The best experience he had was with the poleaxe and halberd, what the staff lacked, these weapons provided it. Axe, hammer and spear combined to have an answer for any type of encounter, no matter how well armored or large the enemy was, these weapons worked.

For now he kept it as a poleaxe, a large axe blade, a broad hammer on the back and a spear as long as his forearm, the ice was pale blue and radiated with an aura of cold . Resting the staff on his shoulder he continued on his way. The thought about elemental infusion to have a weapon that dealt even more cold damage to enemies. While walking he kept one eye on the mountain, that guardian meant trouble but Ethan was sure as long as he didn't try to burn the whole forest down he would be safe to travel wherever he wants. He and Nora decided to meet on the other side of the mountain range so that's where he's heading for now. A shiver ran down his spine, in the past every plan seemed to be going wrong but he still had some hope left for this part of the tutorial.

During his walk his thoughts drifted again and he was curious about the world after the tutorial. It won't be the same, but which changes would his world go through once the tutorial ends or maybe it was already finished? A world he lived all his life in now gone, the grave of his sister was certainly gone too. The back of his head tingled, the system tried to suppress his memories again but after the visions he saw it couldn't control that part of him any longer.

He raised his middle finger into the air and sighed, he would build her a snowman somewhere in the north where nothing can melt it. She always loved to do that, even if her hands get numb from the cold she never stopped until it was absolutely perfect. Ethan looked at his own hands, pale and cold. Even colder than winter itself, he closed them into tight fists and sighed again. Maybe he could have brought her back when his mind had been his own during the integration but there was no turning back now.

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Looking into the sky he took a deep breath and nodded to himself. "Maybe it's better this way, she never liked fantasy anyway, more of a sci-fi nerd." Ethan smiled, he still missed her but there was nothing he could do and maybe it was better this way, death was inevitable for her in the old world. There are hundreds of "if's" that could be used in an argument but it would only bring him further down the spiral of despair.

So Ethan made an easy decision, he slapped himself as hard as possible and just continued walking, his cheek burning like fire but he didn't really care at this point. In a world full of magic there were endless possibilities and he would explore them all but never would he experiment with the good and the bad memories he had of his sister for the off chance she could return.

He continued on his path and for the first time after nearly three days he felt hunger and thirst. It seems for now that was the limit so he would need to hunt for food again. While it was trivial with the help of magic, he tried to improve his overall skills the old fashioned way. When throwing yourself with a knife on something is considered old fashioned.

Ethan travelled through the forest, searching for an animal that would make a suitable meal, preferably something without an exoskeleton this time around. He quickly noticed how bad he was at concealing his presence, his aura wasn't even activated, it was still constantly leaking from his body and alerted the animals of the jungle. Screaming "I'm here" would probably attract less attention.

So instead of a hunt it turned into an aura exercise, using his aura was usually something that just happened, it was almost a passive in that regard, especially with the help of skills. He could activate it and the system took over the work, spreading his aura and handling the effects it should have on enemies and allies.

Then there was the other form of aura and if Ethan understood it correctly it was like breathing. Every living creature breathes in and out again to supply their body with oxygen, the same seems to happen with aura but like breathing it was a reflex. Your mana is constantly moving around in your body but not only there, it gets absorbed from the surroundings, pulled into your body but also expelled through your skin again. Even while breathing you take in mana and breathe it out again.

He was pretty sure it had something to do with mana saturation, at one point you just couldn't take any more mana into your body so instead of getting poisoned from mana your body just expels it, drawing new mana in and repeating that circle.

What happened now was the simple fact that Ethan was a dumbass, again, like always. He told himself to not rely on skills all the time and improve beyond them and now he ignored such a significant aspect, well he was no rogue or assassins so it was pretty much useless to him, monsters spotted him anyway while he stumbled around in the jungle.

Still he would do well to learn such an ability, with a grumbling stomach he sat down on the nearest log and closed his eyes, the staff turned poleaxe rested over his knees while he focused on his mana. At this point he damaged his mana channels a few times already until the recent burning out that made him into the equivalent of an old man without his medicine.

Ethan focused and tried to control the flow of his mana, instead of letting it breathe in and out he wanted it to circulate through his body. From his left hand, up his arm, through his head, down his right arm and back up again. From there into his core and down his right leg, up and down into the left leg, a second time into his core and down his left arm. Forming a circle that could store his mana for a while. This way no part of his body was oversaturated as it moved so quickly it didn't have a chance to poison him, at least in theory.

Well, it didn't work out. Literally five minutes into his exercise his right pinky just rotted off, the mana poisoned him and it just dripped from his hand, leaving only exposed bone in its wake. The terrifying thing was he didn't even notice it because the mana killed his nerves in a heartbeat.

Ethan looked at the skeletal finger and formed a finger made from ice around it. He couldn't move it but it was better than having the bones that got held together by a small amount of muscles and tendons rip off too. Determined to continue with his exercise, he lost the ring finger of his left hand before he finally figured out how to circulate it properly with the right amount of speed and density.

It was like encasing his mana into a thin flexible shell that carried it through his mana channels, without it he would poison himself rather quickly. Jumping to his feet he checked for signs of his aura but there was literally nothing, he was a blind spot in a world of mana. Grinning, he continued on his way, it was time to hunt his dinner.

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