‘I have insurance? Handy.’ - David chose not to think about the damages that would warrant enough money to cover Cherz’s charges. As he often said: “Past is behind us, don’t stress about it”.

  Finally getting to the system, even here screens bombarded him.

  Thinking better of sending an error report to Cherz while he’s resting, David sends a quick message to himself and moves on.

  With a sign and another letter in his inbox, David finally quickly navigated to the settings and switched the system alerts to “Alert Urgent, Hold and notify if else”.

  With some fear and trepidation, David slowly let his mind flow, and saw the sea and… veins? Where once David could feel invisible shores, now he saw them for what they were, pure white veins, pulsing with the waves, and carrying off excess mana toward the shard, towards his core, towards him.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  David wasn’t a squeamish person, and in fact quite enjoyed practicing… he could not remember the word, but it had something to do with knives. Stabbing?

  ‘No, it wasn't violent…’

  Quickly moving on, now knowing what he supposed to be his aura was, he felt a tap in his mind. He disregarded it, and tried moving his aura. At first, nothing happened. Then some more nothing. Until! Nothing.

  Remembering how he interacted with his skill and system, he willed one branch to move to the left, and it moved! The problem for David was that every other vein moved as well, even slightly rotating the crystal, but try as he might, the only thing that happened when he willed two veins closer, was a mild headache.

  ‘Hang on, if I can’t move them, can I grow them?’

  Trying and quickly succeeding in growing an almost impossible to see hair, he saw it waving in the waves of mana, and noticed how it absorbed mana as it moved. David would continue to grow tiny hairs to get more mana if not for the system becoming harder and harder to ignore with every action he took.

  Getting back to the … Being unable to remember the saying, David focused to go back to the sea and make more hairs when he froze.

  He… Was making more veins. But, he was also looking at himself doing it? Not actually looking at himself, but at the progress that he was-wasn’t doing. David… David’s? David’s focused on where they approximated the other was, but there was nothing?

  Feeling a headache growing, David’s went back to his core to stop thinking and relax for a second, and there was one? Being a smart… Feeling a little frustrating at not being able to remember his favorite sayings, David tried both leaving the crystal and staying in it. And he succeeded.

  Feeling giddy, he tried again and felt like he was trying to read two texts at the same time. Well, one and a half, as the other David shared the burden. Feeling disappointed but hopeful, both Davids went to work on the veins, with the attempt at a third just disappearing when not thought about.

  David both made the veins more numerous, and started expanding as he noticed that while his aura touched the surface of the stone, it was only “On” the stone, and not in it. Picking a random direction and starting his work, he soon realized why his aura didn’t expand past stone. It was hard.

  If him growing through air was as easy as breathing, but through stone, he had to use large amounts of force, which soon exhausted him and prompted him for a rest after only a few grains.

  Although he was exhausted and, as the system helpfully told him, dry on mana, he tried feeling through the new vein, which he discovered he could do when he once again crashed into one. The stone felt… warm. It was warm and stressed. He didn’t know how he knew that, but he felt that the stone wasn’t used to holding the loads it was currently under, but was strong enough to withstand them nonetheless.

  As he was observing the stone, he started feeling peckish. Surprised at suddenly remembering that such a thing as hunger existed, and even more at the fact he forgot about it, he looked around searching for something to… eat.

  Somehow the only appetizing thing around seemed to be… the stone? No, that couldn’t be right, stones weren’t food. Food was…

  Deciding that ‘Screw it, you live only once! Wait…’ Deciding to ignore the error, he Chomped, and the stone was gone.

  ‘A bit dry, nice crunchy texture, a mellow taste with some undertones of something bitter?’

  Giving the impromptu meal a solid six, David opened the system sudden message.

  ‘Well, that’s useful. And hang on, gray with black specks?’ - Turning his human eyesight on, he looked, and indeed, it was gray with black specs. ‘Weird, I never noticed. Or, I did but… eagh, this spotty memory stuff is making my mind hurt.’

  Feeling refreshed once again, David returned to what he was doing, two making the aura more saturated, and one expanding outwards. ‘Wait, wasn’t it two? Whatever, the more, the merrier.’