Chrysalis

I'm exhausted and my mandibles are aching something fierce after all that digging, but is it time to rest?

NOPE.

Those damn pupae are teasing me with their very existence. The twenty large casings are resting against the side of a chamber, taunting me with their stillness. Within them, the hope of ant kind is taking the final steps of their gestation, turning from a grub into something more, something incredible. The ant species to end all ant species.

At least that's what I'm hoping for. If they suck I'm going to be really disappointed…

It shouldn't happen though! I reinforce my own positive mindset. They are going to be great, I've put so much effort into creating them and into making sure they'll get a solid boost to start out their new lives, surely they'll be great!

The closer this project is getting to fruition the more stressed I'm getting.

Put it behind you Anthony, put all of it behind you!

Focus on yourself for a while, treat yourself. To what should I treat myself? To skill training, of course!

Not only me, Tiny and Crinis have been roped in as well.

our knowledge of the system has greatly expanded and the weightiest nugget of wisdom to come out of that was the importance of

been putting too much emphasis on evolution and the energy within my core, I was ignoring two aspects of the holy trinity of monster power!

properly, drowning instead of thriving, and the other

rank he'd nearly slapped me out of sheer shock and in the process lost his only remaining

part in

grind like

to grind? Of course its

I'd thought I'd made use of an awesome hack in using my free magical affinity gland on gravity mana, and in a way, I

gland doesn't give me access to what I really need to make use of it, which is the spell forms. I have the generic spell shapes that I've been using, but according to Beyn, every mana type has particular spells that make best of its attributes, the more advanced the mana type,

magic before, he was sure it was a particularly advanced form of mana, which means that the skill I want,

I have to level up my basic affinities, which will unlock the next rank of affinities, and so on until I

will unlock. That is my most immediate goal. Apparently the exact types of mana that unlock are not necessarily set, and can vary from individual to individual. With a bit

levelling all of the basic affinities to the third rank and then fusing them to form the skill Elemental Mana Mastery, which gives powerful boosts to the basic elements. Most local mages aim for this elemental path apparently, but it seems like a waste to me.

Rush to the top!

Crinis and I settle in to grind our skills, repetitively, endlessly, mind numbingly. For me, that means forming and releasing the ice mana construct over and over again, casting water and ice spells at everything I can see.

in combat situations against monsters gives a much faster boost than just hitting the walls but being as mentally exhausted as we are, I don't want us diving

we grind, and grind, and

a mortified Crinis to attempt to use her skills on me, thinking