There wasn't time to use the skill upgrade shards before Ronan was whisked away through the shifting, shadowy void into stage 3. He landed at the bottom of the grassy valley, and immediately took the bonecrusher mace out of his inventory.

Firstly, he had to appraise whoever wrote the description of the weapon. He could tell it was forged from a single hunk of metal, because it took everything he had to simply lift it over his head. He would need a few more levels before he could wield it properly. Thankfully juggernaut gave him a great deal of strength every time he leveled up.

When the first wave of goblins ran at him, he had to use charge of the juggernaut off the bat. Revealing it to Gurz'krax was risky, but he doubted the elite warrior would be able to survive a full-speed charge regardless of whether he knew that Ronan could perform it.

By the time he'd wiped out all of Gurz'krax's subordinates, Ronan had reached level 24. He'd been investing the majority of his free points into agility and dexterity up until he received the bonecrusher mace, but during stage 3 he changed strategy and started putting 1 of his 2 free points into strength every time he leveled up, alternating the second point between agility and dexterity.

There were probably better ways to invest the points, by utilising the other stats, but Ronan wasn't prepared to sit and think about it. He still had limited information about the exact function of all the stats, which would make it a punishing mental challenge. Besides, he was certain that he could get through stage 4 using brute force alone, and that meant overcomplicating his strategy was pointless.

The elite goblin warrior gazed down at him, and Ronan noticed that there was a hint of hesitation in its movements. That pleased him.

Still, Gurz'krax didn't truly fear Ronan. Even after seeing him decimate the other goblins, the warrior rushed down the hill and swung its greatsword with vigour. Ronan met the sword with his mace, wanting to enjoy the thrill of battle for a while before he ended things with charge of the juggernaut.

That he would earn a little more mace mastery for doing so was simply an added bonus. He might even tip it over the edge to reaching the first tier, which would be yet another advantage against the goblin rogues in stage 4.

Ronan couldn't contain himself during the two minute wait between stage 3 and stage 4 of the hard difficulty tutorial. He considered cultivating with the body shard, but two minutes was barely enough time to get started on it, let alone consume the entire thing.

When he finally arrived in the dimly lit tunnel, he had to forcibly calm his nerves before he rushed straight at his foes. There were a few things he needed to do before approaching the darkness that concealed the goblin rogues and the shaman who cast the voodoo spell.

First, he needed to use his skill upgrade shards. He'd held off on using them at the end of stage 3, because he wasn't sure how long he would need to decide on which skill to upgrade, and whether time would freeze during the decision, as it did when choosing a class.

He took them out of his inventory, and mentally willed the two uncommon shards to be dismantled. He hoped it was that simple, as many other processes were within the system. Thankfully, it was.

Dismantle [Skill Upgrade Shard (Uncommon)] x2?

You will receive: [Skill Upgrade Shard (Common)] x6

Once he'd mentally accepted the prompt, Ronan was confused when the shards disappeared, and nothing else appeared in his hand. Only when he opened his inventory did he realise his mistake.

Facepalming, he took one of the six common shards out to inspect. They were roughly hewn crystals, reminiscent of quartz that had just been hacked away from a deposit.

He placed it back inside his inventory, and used the crystals. The description said 5 was the minimum to upgrade a common skill, with skills requiring more shards depending on how powerful they were. That meant there were differences between skills of the same rarity, but that wasn't exactly news to Ronan. It had been obvious from the moment he'd begun to acquire a number of skills that some were far better than others.

Double strike, for example, was absurdly strong for a common skill. He would even go as far as to say it was better than a lot of his uncommon skills, and he wondered why it was common at times. He wasn't complaining, though, as the skill had helped him through plenty of fights that he would otherwise have died in.

Skills available for evolution:

Vital Surge [Cost: 5 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

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Critical Experience [Cost: 6 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

Magic Money [Cost: 5 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

Excessive Endurance [Cost: 6 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

Eagle Eye [Cost: 5 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

Quick Forage [Cost: 5 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

Negotiation [Cost: 5 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

Enhanced Acuity [Cost: 6 Skill Upgrade Shards (Common)]

Off the bat, Ronan eliminated negotiation, quick forage, eagle eye, and magic money. Magic money was one he considered briefly, but compared to the others left on the table its utility was limited.

He was leaning towards critical experience or vital surge as his most likely choice, but enhanced acuity or excessive endurance would provide gains in every single iteration without him lifting a finger. It came down to passive stat increases versus active combat utility.

In his recent battles, he'd been using the critical experience/tempo combo quite a lot. It earned him a lot of extra levels, and made killing his foes far easier when he didn't have the perfect weapon or skillset to do so. Upgrading the experience gains of the combo would simply make it even more potent, and would be a great choice.

In the end, Ronan went with critical experience. Vital surge would be a powerful skill to upgrade, but he didn't really need the boost. Unlike others, he wasn't limited to one life. If he died, he could just return and try to kill the same enemy again. There was no need to go overboard with boosting skills. The same went for the stat-boosting skills.

Critical experience, on the other hand, would let him keep pushing the limits of his multipliers across endless iterations. Not to mention Ronan was sure he would receive skill upgrade shards again in future. He was just prioritising what would have the most impact if he upgraded it now.

[Skill Upgrade Shard (Common)] x6 has been consumed!

[Critical Experience (Common)] is evolving…

[Critical Experience (Common)] has evolved into [Critical Experience (Uncommon)]!

Critical Experience (Uncommon): Gain 2.1x more experience when you kill an enemy with a critical hit.

An extra 0.6 multiplier. Not bad. Ronan nodded in approval as he read through the upgraded version of the skill. He wondered if he could upgrade it to rare in future, and beyond.

He idly dreamed about killing the first enemy in the tutorial and immediately hitting level 100, or something equally ridiculous. It would be an incredible feeling, no doubt.

The flickering shadows on the walls of the dungeon corridor beckoned him to enter, but he resisted a moment longer. There was one final task Ronan had left to complete before he took on the goblin rogues hidden in the shadows.

He raised the bonecrusher mace over his head, and then smashed it against the wall of the dungeon with all of his might, even going as far as using as many of his skills as he could stack into a single blow. Despite that, only a tiny fragment of the system-generated wall broke off.

It was enough.

Raising it to eye-level, Ronan found that it looked and felt no different to any other chunk of stone that one might find lying on the ground. However, he knew it had to be far superior.

And he was hoping it might allow him to gain an unprecedented advantage over his enemies. Holding it against his chest, Ronan willed mineral skeleton to activate, and awaited the results with bated breath.

Material analysis interrupted! Material outside scope of trait rarity!

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Material analysis complete!

Foreign material identified as [C??m?? ??i???o??]!

[C??m?? ??i???o??]

✌︎ ❍︎♋︎⧫︎♏︎❒︎♓︎♋︎●︎ ⬧︎□︎ ❒︎♋︎❒︎♏︎📪︎ ⧫︎♒︎♋︎⧫︎ ⧫︎♒︎♏︎❒︎♏︎ ♓︎⬧︎ □︎■︎●︎⍓︎ ♋︎■︎ ♏︎⬧︎⧫︎♓︎❍︎♋︎⧫︎♏︎♎︎ 🗐︎ ♑︎❒︎♋︎❍︎⬧︎ □︎♐︎ ♓︎⧫︎ ◻︎❒︎□︎♎︎◆︎♍︎♏︎♎︎ ♎︎◆︎❒︎♓︎■︎♑︎ ⧫︎♒︎♏︎ ♏︎■︎⧫︎♓︎❒︎♏︎ ●︎♓︎♐︎♏︎⧫︎♓︎❍︎♏︎ □︎♐︎ ♋︎ ⬧︎♓︎■︎♑︎●︎♏︎ ◆︎■︎♓︎❖︎♏︎❒︎⬧︎♏︎📬︎ ✋︎⧫︎ ♍︎♋︎■︎ □︎■︎●︎⍓︎ ♌︎♏︎ ♍︎□︎●︎●︎♏︎♍︎⧫︎♏︎♎︎ ♋︎■︎♎︎ ◻︎❒︎□︎♎︎◆︎♍︎♏︎♎︎ ♓︎■︎ ●︎♋︎❒︎♑︎♏︎ ❑︎◆︎♋︎■︎⧫︎♓︎⧫︎♓︎♏︎⬧︎ ♌︎⍓︎ ⧫︎♒︎♏︎ ⬧︎⍓︎⬧︎⧫︎♏︎❍︎ ♎︎◆︎♏︎ ⧫︎□︎ ♓︎⧫︎⬧︎ ◆︎■︎♓︎❑︎◆︎♏︎ ♋︎♌︎♓︎●︎♓︎⧫︎♓︎♏︎⬧︎ ♋︎■︎♎︎ ◻︎□︎⬥︎♏︎❒︎📬︎ 👍︎□︎⬧︎❍︎♓︎♍︎ ✞︎□︎♓︎♎︎⬧︎⧫︎□︎■︎♏︎ ♋︎♌︎⬧︎□︎❒︎♌︎⬧︎ ♋︎●︎❍︎□︎⬧︎⧫︎ ♋︎●︎●︎ ♏︎■︎♏︎❒︎♑︎⍓︎ ⬥︎♒︎♓︎♍︎♒︎ ♍︎□︎❍︎♏︎⬧︎ ♓︎■︎⧫︎□︎ ♍︎□︎■︎⧫︎♋︎♍︎⧫︎ ⬥︎♓︎⧫︎♒︎ ♓︎⧫︎📪︎ ♋︎■︎♎︎ ♓︎⬧︎ □︎■︎♏︎ □︎♐︎ ⧫︎♒︎♏︎ ⬧︎⧫︎◆︎❒︎♎︎♓︎♏︎⬧︎⧫︎ ❍︎♋︎⧫︎♏︎❒︎♓︎♋︎●︎⬧︎ ♓︎■︎ ⧫︎♒︎♏︎ 🙵■︎□︎⬥︎■︎ ❍︎◆︎●︎⧫︎♓︎❖︎♏︎❒︎⬧︎♋︎●︎ ♍︎□︎⬧︎❍︎□︎⬧︎📬︎

Absorbing all of the [C??m?? ??i???o??] will cause the following changes:

+163 Resistance

+96 Endurance

+38 Regeneration

+18 Wisdom

+122 Strength

+84 Tenacity

+2319% Energy absorption efficiency

+7183% All damage resistance

-52 Agility

-73 Dexterity

-12 Charisma

Absorbing all of the [C??m?? ??i???o??] will destroy the fragment of material…

Absorb [C??m?? ??i???o??] using [Mineral Skeleton]?

What the actual fuck!? Ronan yelled inwardly as he read through the material analysis. His heritage had intervened, clearly. The ear-splitting screech had been enough to tell him that, but the garbled description and lack of a name for the material was another clear indicator that he was fucking with something far beyond his abilities.

Even so, he still had the option to go through with this madness. The sheer stats alone were enough to tempt him. Is it possible to have negative stats, though? That was a major worry, based on the devastating agility and dexterity losses he would incur if he went through with this.

For the first time, Ronan felt that his heritage might not be able to bail him out if he made the wrong decision here. Then again, it had proven time and time again that it was beyond the power and influence of the system. Would it save him if absorbing this material proved to be crippling?

There was only one way to find out.

Absorbing [C??m?? ??i???o??]...

Unlike with the sword and shield, absorbing the fragment was far from flashy. It simply exploded into a small cloud of dust, which then rushed into the skin on his chest.

And then his mind went blank as he was consumed by a cosmic pain that exceeded anything Ronan had ever experienced.

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