The first eight pills were easy enough.
Damian swallowed them one after another, waiting for each to dissolve into warm medicinal energy before taking the next.
[+1 EXP.]
[+1 EXP.]
The warmth was still pleasant, although nowhere near as powerful as before.
By the eighth pill, the System updated again.
[Qi Nourishing Pill Adaptation Count: 60.]
The next ten were worse.
[+0.8 EXP.]
Damian swallowed, then swallowed again, and again.
By the time he crossed seventy pills, the faint medicinal sweetness he had originally associated with the Qi Nourishing Pill had become nauseating.
His stomach felt heavy despite the pills physically dissolving almost immediately, while a strange warmth accumulated through his liver and bloodstream.
[+0.6 EXP.]
Ten more.
Damian leaned back in the garden chair and closed his eyes for several seconds.
"Whoever invented pill resistance deserves to be beaten."
Unfortunately, the laws of reality did not respond to complaints.
Another pill went down, then another, and the conversion fell again.
[+0.4 EXP.]
At this point, Damian finally understood why cultivators did not simply swallow hundreds of Qi Nourishing Pills despite their low cost.
It was a miserable experience.
His mouth felt dry and his stomach repeatedly clenched despite containing almost nothing physical, and every new medicinal current entering his bloodstream felt less like nourishment and more like pouring hot soup into a container that was already full.
A faint headache developed behind his eyes.
The System also continued reporting accumulating medicinal resistance and low-grade pill toxins, though nothing suggested immediate danger severe enough to stop him.
Damian continued with ten more.
[+0.2 EXP.]
That was the cruelest part.
The pills still felt like medicine, so his body still had to process them and his liver still received the same stream of foreign energy.
Yet where the first pill had effectively produced two Experience Points under Qi Acceleration, he was now enduring the same process for one tenth of the reward.
By the hundredth dose, Damian placed both hands against the garden table and breathed slowly through his nose.
He felt bloated without being full, hot without having a fever, and nauseous without actually needing to vomit.
And he still needed twenty-seven Experience Points!!!
At 0.2 each, that was one hundred and thirty-five more pills.
Damian stared into the distance.
For the first time since discovering the Qi Nourishing Pill, he understood why a protagonist might look at a convenient shortcut and decide that climbing a mountain while carrying iron weights sounded more dignified.
Then he remembered the alternative involved fighting monsters, risking his life and spending months or years slowly accumulating Experience.
Damian picked up another pill.
"Fuck dignity."
Down it went.
[+0.2 EXP.]
Another.
[+0.2 EXP.]
Another.
The notifications became almost insulting.
Damian eventually stopped reading them individually.
He counted batches instead.
Ten pills, pause, drink water, another ten, pause, walk around the garden until the nausea settled... then another ten.
By fifty additional pills, his tongue had started psychologically rejecting the taste before the medicine even touched it.
By seventy, Damian had developed a ritual of glaring at every pill before swallowing it, as though intimidating the medicine would somehow increase its conversion efficiency.
It did not.
By one hundred, even the peaceful birds in the garden had begun keeping their distance from the strange human sitting beneath a tree repeatedly swallowing tiny pills and muttering obscenities.
Damian did not blame them.
At one hundred and twenty, he briefly summoned the Marrow Cleansing Pill again.
He looked at it, and the pill looked back metaphorically, whispering ’do it loser’.
Thirty Contribution Points worth of suffering versus permanent Experience inflation.
Damian’s expression hardened as he put it away.
"No, I will not falter!"
Fifteen pills remained, and Damian swallowed them one at a time.
[+0.2 EXP.]
Fourteen.
[+0.2 EXP.]
Thirteen.
The remaining numbers slowly disappeared.
Five... four... three...
By the final pill, Damian was slumped deeply into the chair, his Apprentice’s Arcane Robe hanging loosely around him while his expression resembled that of a soldier who had returned from a particularly pointless war.
He held the last Qi Nourishing Pill between two fingers, the one hundred and eighty-third pill since reaching Level 5 and the two hundred and thirty-fifth since his previous cleansing.
Damian stared at it with genuine hatred... then he tossed it into his mouth!
The pill dissolved and a warm medicinal energy flowed through his liver and entered his body for what felt like the thousandth time.
The System chimed.
[+0.2 EXP.]
[Experience threshold reached!]
[Main Class: Mage has advanced from Level 5 → Level 6!]
[Overall Level increased to 6!]
[Novice Rank completed.]
[Journeyman Rank achieved!]
[Level Advancement Reward: +1 Free Attribute Point.]
[Special Power: One Feat Per Level activated.]
Damian remained completely motionless.
Then, very slowly, an exhausted grin appeared across his face.
One hundred and eighty-three pills, no second cleansing and no permanent twenty-percent Experience modifier.
The miserable ten-percent penalty from his experiment remained, but Damian had refused to worsen it merely for convenience.
He had eaten the cost himself instead.
Oh sure, his stomach hated him and his liver probably wanted legal representation. But as the brilliant words [Journeyman Rank achieved!] floated before him, the young man decided that he could tolerate all of that.
"Worth it."
Probably.
He opened the Attribute panel first.
"Wisdom."
[WIS: 9 → 10.]
The sensation returned, stronger this time.
Damian’s awareness settled into a strange balance.
INT 10.
WIS 10.
SPI 10.
His mind possessed power, his judgment possessed refinement, and his soul possessed strength.
A small goal, perhaps, but one he had deliberately built toward.
Then came his Feat choice, of which Damian immediately chose <Metamagic Adept>.
[Metamagic Adept — Class Feat
Effect: Allows the Host to alter the construction and execution of spells beyond their standard formula.
Note: Select Two Metamagic Features.]
The available list unfolded.
<Careful Spell> — Shapes an area spell around chosen allies, reducing or potentially eliminating harmful effects upon protected targets at additional Mental Energy cost.
<Distant Spell> — Extends the effective range of compatible spells by reinforcing projection stability and targeting structure.
<Empowered Spell> — Injects additional control into a damaging spell to improve weak or inefficient portions of its magical output.
<Extended Spell> — Reinforces sustained spell structures, increasing the duration of compatible magical effects.
<Heightened Spell> — Intensifies a spell’s pressure against one target, making the effect substantially harder to resist at heavy additional Mental Energy cost.
<Quickened Spell> — Compresses a spell’s ordinary construction process, greatly reducing casting time in exchange for significantly increased Mental Energy consumption.
<Seeking Spell> — Allows a failed ranged magical attack to correct its trajectory and attempt to reacquire the intended target.
<Subtle Spell> — Removes ordinary verbal and gestural requirements from compatible spells, allowing their structures to be formed almost entirely through internal magical control.
<Transmuted Spell> — Alters the elemental expression of a compatible spell without changing its fundamental magical structure.
<Twinned Spell> — Duplicates a compatible single-target spell toward a second valid target at additional Mental Energy cost.
Damian immediately wanted half of them.
<Careful Spell> would make Burning Hands and future area magic considerably safer around allies.
<Distant Spell> was universally useful, but if he wanted dedicated range enhancement later, <Spell Sniper> already existed.
<Empowered Spell> improved damage consistency.
<Extended Spell> was deceptively excellent for buffs, defensive magic and rituals.
<Heightened Spell> could become terrifying against powerful enemies whose defenses normally allowed them to shrug magic aside.
<Seeking Spell> solved accuracy failures.
<Twinned Spell> potentially doubled the practical value of powerful single-target buffs or attacks.
Then there were three Damian found particularly difficult to ignore.
Subtle, Quickened, and Transmuted.
<Subtle Spell> was wonderful for deception and emergencies, but Damian was not currently building himself around stealthy spellcasting.
<Quickened Spell>, however, attacked one of magic’s oldest weaknesses... time!
A spell that took several seconds to construct could become useless if an enemy crossed the distance first.
Reducing that window could be the difference between casting and dying.
That earned the first selection.
[Metamagic Acquired: Quickened Spell.]
The second was even easier once Damian thought about Shengyuan as elements mattered there.
He had already seen Burning Hands gain tremendous effectiveness against wood-attributed false Qi and especially corpse-related death energy.
What happened when he eventually fought a Fire cultivator?
Would throwing more fire at them really be intelligent?
Probably not.
<Transmuted Spell> meant Damian did not need an entirely separate offensive repertoire for every elemental matchup.
A fire spell could become cold, cold could become lightning, and lightning could potentially become another compatible elemental expression depending upon the underlying spell.
One spell formula suddenly became several tactical possibilities.
For a man with a Five Elements cultivation foundation?
The synergy practically danced sultrily towards him.
"Transmuted Spell."
[Metamagic Acquired: Transmuted Spell.]
Damian finally leaned back.
Level 6... done!
He summoned his updated Character Sheet.
[Name: Damian Baines]
[Race: Human (Otherworlder)]
[Overall Level: 6]
[Main Class: Mage — Level 6]
[Subclass: None]
[Class Stage: Standard (Journeyman)]
[Experience: 0/66 EXP.]
[Attributes: STR: 3.5, DEX: 4.5, AGI: 2.5, CON: 3.5, INT: 10, WIS: 10, SPI: 10]
[Feats: Mage Initiate (Origin), War Caster (Class), Truesight (Special), Ritual Caster (Special), Lucky (General), Drow High Magic (Racial), Fey Touched (Special), Metamagic Adept (Class).]
[Skills: Mage Hand (Cantrip), Firebolt (Cantrip), Frost Ray (Cantrip), Detect Magic (Cantrip), Dispel Magic (Cantrip), Levitate (Cantrip), Burning Hands (Level 1), Mage Armor (Level 1), Magic Missile (Level 1), Speak With Animals (Level 1, Ritual), Speak With Dead (Level 1, Ritual), Identify (Level 1), Misty Step (Level 2).]
[Metamagic: Quickened Spell, Transmuted Spell.]
[Specializations: Valorian Overworld Language (Master), Arcane Knowledge (Journeyman), Survival (Novice), Persuasion (Novice).]
[Titles: None]
Damian stared at the sheet for several seconds.
That was quite a change from the pathetic Wanderer who had arrived in Rosewood.
Several upgrades had happened quietly while he focused on pills and Feats.
Level 2 had granted another Level 1 Spell Slot.
Level 3 granted his first Level 2 Spell Slot and unlocked <Upcasting>, allowing Damian to prepare lower-level spells inside higher-level Slots.
Doing so did not merely waste a stronger Slot, but the additional magical capacity could reinforce the spell beyond its ordinary limits where its structure supported enhancement.
So basically more projectiles, greater damage, larger areas, longer duration.
The precise benefit depended upon the spell itself.
Level 4 added another Level 2 Slot.
Level 5 granted another Level 1 Slot and another Level 2 Slot.
Finally, Level 6 gave Damian his first precious Level 3 Spell Slot.
This made for a total of four Level 1 Spell Slots, three Level 2 Spell Slots, and one Level 3 Spell Slot.
More importantly, reaching Journeyman automatically upgraded <Arcane Knowledge> from Novice to Journeyman, and that improvement was immediately noticeable.
His mana sensitivity had grown substantially sharper, while his understanding of routine spell construction had become more efficient.
Manual spellcasting time and ordinary material requirements were reduced by roughly twenty percent across compatible magic simply because Damian now understood how to construct the same results with less waste.
Interestingly, the change had crossed worlds too.
His supposed Five Elements Spirit Root had risen from Low Grade to Medium Grade in functional effectiveness.
That alone doubled Damian’s original base cultivation speed before <Cultivation Prodigy> was even counted.
And with INT now sitting at ten?
He very much looked forward to seeing what happened the next time he cultivated.
Still, none of these class benefits were uniquely Damian’s as every Mage in Valoria received comparable progression as they advanced.
Fighters, Rogues, Rangers, Clerics and Wardens likewise gained their own rank-specific improvements.
Damian’s unfairness came from everything stacked around those ordinary advantages.
Though one embarrassing issue remained.
He had three Level 2 Spell Slots and one Level 3 Spell Slot and knew exactly zero normal Mage spells of either level.
Damian’s lips twitched.
"Misty Step technically counts as Level 2, but I got that from a Feat, so I’m probably the only Journeyman Mage in Rosewood walking around with Level 3 capacity and nothing to put inside it."
...A problem for later.
Because another notification had been patiently waiting at the edge of his vision.
[Optional Side Quest Completed!]
[The Birth of a Journeyman!]
[Objective: Reach Overall Level 6 and become a Journeyman — Complete.]
[Reward acquired.]
[Special Power: Skill Upgrade System.]
Damian’s amusement vanished as he sat upright.
Then he opened the reward, and the next screen appeared.
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