The next item was one that he was curious about, the skill stone.
At first he had thought the item would grant him a random ability out of the blue, but after reading the description he was shown that he had been wrong as to his opinion, this was a whole load better than acquiring at probably useless skill to his now settling 'build'.
[—Item – Skill Stone.]
[—Rank – SS]
[—Description – A Skill Stone, radiating knowledge as if it were supernova. Inside this stone lays the pure weave of knowledge, allowing any who so touch it enlightenment at a lesser degree and when utilised to its fullest potential will allow one deeper and vast knowledge in a single skill.]
[—Effect ¹ – When held, will increase the comprehension rate of the user by 20% anything they may be endeavouring to learn.]
[—Effect ² – When crushed will grant a +5 levels to any skill the user chooses.]
The skill stone was a wonderful thing, having both a passive and active effect.
It granted two choices to it's user, the passive increase in comprehension or the active use to immediately jump five levels into a skill.
But to him, the active effect was all that mattered.
He already had a lot of ways to obtain knowledge than the measly 20% boost the stone granted, either it be traits like [Genius Comprehension], his ability to create clones that fed his knowledge alongside being in more places than one and being able to multitask on learning a variety of things or his skills.
So when he obtained the stone, he'd immediately crush it.
Though he had to wonder which skill he would use it on—[Aura Decryption] was a solid contender, being exactly level 5 meaning that he would immediately max it out and not waste a single level in doing so.
But he was sure that there were other skills he'd gain in the future that would be hard to improve, so he'd hold on to the thing for a moment.
Though the last item he obtained was interesting in its immediate use, it being incredibly especially since he was about to turn into a Chimera of which would soon be a fusion of multiple races of creatures or beasts.
[—Item – The Beast Mask.]
[—Rank – A]
[—Description – A sleek silver-black mask that glistens as if made out of obsidian. The Beast Mask is created for beasts, man or creatures that hold a semblance of beast in them, using this mask simply amplifies that—making a man's anger soar to a wild rage that could tear though concrete or a monster seemingly ascend their limits in power. Be wary though, for if the mind is not strong enough, the Beast will take over, indefinitely.]
[—Effect ¹ – When worn will consecutively increase all physical stats by 1% a second for a limit of 150% all around physical boost. Note though, as the percentile increase furthers—the more anger the wearer will feel until at 100% the wearer will have been induced into a Wild Rage. So long as the mind is strong enough the anger and wild rage will be minimal enough to allow conscious control in said state.]
Markus grinned just as he did when he had first looked at this items sole effect.
At first for an item that was ranked [A] to have one effect kinda soured his mood, but after reading through that one effect he had immediately wanted the item then and there.
But he didn't, there was more reason to that decision than just wanting to claim the rewards along with the Chimera rewards.
One of them being that he didn't know what would happen if his regeneration got in the way of the experiments, as normal humans didn't have rapid regeneration and they really didn't to mess up their one true way to absolute power.
But the effects of the item were worth salivating for.
That due to the fact that if he wore this mask and fully reached that +150% boost in his physical stats then they would look like this.
[—Strength - 25+150% = 62.5]
[—Dexterity - 24+150% = 60]
[—Stamina - 26+150% = 65]
That was a big increase from his base stats— especially since he understood that a single stat added from 21 was not the same as 31.
A single stats power increased alongside the person, meaning that a person with 30 in their stats wouldn't be able to contend with someone with 31 in the same stat—even if it was a single stat difference.
So seeing the effect of this one item was exciting, especially since his were about to increase with the experimental procedure he was gonna undertake.
With his enhanced stats after the serum was injected to him, what would the increase possibly be like?—would he be able to punch through concrete? Metal or bring down entire buildings?
He didn't know, but he was all the more happy to find out where in the totem pole he would be, he was sure about one thing though— that being that he'd stop being the hunted and finally be the hunter.
Closing the screens infront of him, he looked at the clones which at this point had been waiting for his orders to begin the procedure.
Smiling at their loyalty and obedience he gave them the go ahead.
Stilling himself as he relaxed his body and settled on the pod as it slowly started filling up with viscous liquid—liquid which would serve as a catalyst for protein in the event that he needed more mass to complete the procedure.
That wasn't all though, as he was hooked up with needled hooked around his body, each one connected to coils that would feed him pure mana as a catalyst for the serum.
As for where the serum would be injected?
Just on his back was a series of needles drilled into his spine that would pump the serum straight into his spine marrow, luckily for him he had taken an anaesthetic before he was hooked up to them.
So hearing the machine powering up he braced himself, he afterall knew that the procedure would be painful even with the anaesthetic in his system.
So he had braced himself enough that when he slowly felt the embers of heat spreading from his spine to his brain, nerves and every pore of his body he didn't scream, initially.
But as the first minute passed by he had to grit his teeth, as he felt as if his blood was boiling him from the inside.
Five minutes in and his body was riddled with veins showing under his red skin while he held his scream at bay.
10 minutes in and he couldn't help but let out grunts of pain, only to be distracted from the pain by a screen popping up infront of him.
[—Ding! You've learnt the Skill – Pain Tolerance[1]-]
Seeing that screen he wondered whether using an anaesthetic had been the right call, as immediately after the skill settled he felt a sense of calm and indifference to a percentage of the pain riddling him.
But as the 15th minute entered the tolerance was all for moot as the pain trippled in intensity as if actively trying to torment him.
" Arhhhhhhh!" He screamed out, feeling happy that the scream was muted to some degree by the mask on his face allowing him oxygen and the liquid around his body.
As time went on from there he started thrashing around to no avail, finding himself completely strapped to the pod even as his bloodshot eyes threatened to black out but happy at the fact that his [Pain Tolerance] skill was leveling up as he did not ever want to feel this type of pain again.
When the thirtieth minute settled, that's when another screen appeared before him—reading through it made him immediately want to scream out curses to whatever intelligence controlled the system.
[—Ding! You're undergoing a Metamorphosical Ascension! You are advised to stay conscious, lapse of or complete unconsciousness will decrease the Metamorphosical Ascensions benefits!]
' Oh Fuck off! As if staying sane or conscious in this amount of pain is easy!' Was the only thought he had been able to bring to the head of his mind before he fought a seemingly losing battle to stay conscious.
________________________________________
[For extra support and extra chapter's of this fic please visit my pat! Advanced Chapters Available up to Chapter—73(+15 Chapters)
—patreon.com*/Depravity685(remove the *)]