-----
Ding!
[The [Cooking: Lv6] Skill Level has increased to Level 7!]
[You acquired the [Apprentice Chef: Lv1] Title Skill!]
[The [Apprentice Chef: Lv1] Skill Level has increased to Level 4!]
-----
[Apprentice Chef: Lv1]
A Title Skill only given to those who have begun to walk across their culinary career. The more you cook the better you become at it. Cook as many meals as you can and find the best flavors. The path towards delicious food can only be carved by you alone.
Enhances your Cooking Skill Effects, Cooking Abilities, Ingredient Detection, And Cooking Imagination by +50% with an additional +10% with each Skill Level. Additionally, Cooked Food can be granted special, magical effects that can restore HP, MP, and Fatigue more easily, and at higher levels, even grant bonuses to Stats.
-----
"Oooh, I finally got it!" I celebrated.
Not only was my Cooking Skill at Level 7 by now but I even got an Apprentice Chef Skill at Level 7 already! Isn't it pretty amazing? My cooking tasted so good perhaps because of this. Well, I am also pretty good at cooking, I cannot keep denying the fact.
After our meal, we decided to take a break while I watched over the faraway Ants colonies. They were all Abyssal Ants, slowly farming Miasmic Crystals, Demonite, and eating it. Ant Queens should be there as well, I suppose. Unless there's the same Ant Queen as before, in such case, it would be the final boss again.
Well, if things repeat themselves, I'll simply do the same and absorb the Fragment of the Evil God while taking over the Dungeon Core. It shouldn't be such a complicated task all things considered. But for now, I decided to rest, leaving everyone else to sleep too.
Time went by slowly, as I concentrated my power into my soul, making it move around more and more. Each time I leveled up, I was able to sense this "Aether" better. It was a special Soul Essence, the more I moved it around, the better it reacted to me.
"Hmm… You're getting better at controlling Aether, though you'll need more power to utilize it properly." Tyr showed up at my side.
"Oh, you've been spying me or what?" I sighed.
"It's nothing like that! I am merely saying that." Sighed Tyr. "But controlling Aether at the level you're doing so is very rare, well done."
"Huh, I don't think I need your praise…" I said while trying to ignore him.
"Tche! Don't get so cocky now. You barely know any Aether or Mana Circulation Techniques." He sighed.
"Techniques?" I asked.
"It is something we use to maintain this power within our bodies and reinforce it over time… But you need at least 200 Aether if you want to learn any of them." Tyr said.
"Come on teach me something!" I complained.
"Don't get cocky! If you overuse Aether too much, your soul might end up being destroyed." Said Tyr.
"Eeeh? Is that the only thing? Then I doubt that's a problem, I've had my soul destroyed a couple of times already, I just regenerate it back, no biggie." I laughed.
"Huh… You're awfully confident… Fine." He laughed. "But don't blame me if your soul's destroyed…"
Tyr suddenly inserted into my head some sort of strange knowledge. It felt a bit disgusting when he did it, but I had no other choice but to accept his knowledge. In an instant, I learned the right ways to move Mana and Aether correctly, and I even was able to comprehend something called… Elemental Law.
The depth of darkness, the cycle of death, decomposition, turning back to the soil, and being reborn… The darkness that fills the void, and the light that illuminates it… Woah, this is pretty deep. But I think comprehending Laws is like understanding the element you use a bit more.
"Then I can manipulated Aether and Mana of my Element like this?" I wondered, as Aether and Mana emerged from my soul, waving around with gray, black, and dark blue colors, some hints of purple and red could be seen as well.
The energies fluctuated rapidly all around, beautifully so. It was as if a flame was burning inside of my soul, energizing my very being and turning it more… real. It was strange, yet I felt like I was slightly connected with the cosmos, maybe only a bit more.
I felt like I could keep pushing some more, adding more and more power into this flame, as it kept flickering and growing larger… But then, an enormous pain reached my soul!
CRACK!
And then it began to shatter! Just like Tyr said, this was the worst!
Ouch! Ouch! Okay, I'll stop!
I quickly stopped before getting shattered. It was hurting more than usual as well, as if a "deeper" part of my own self conscious was being destroyed.
I better not play around too much. I guess I owe him an apology… But now that he's looking at me with eyes wide open, I don't know what to say.
"Y-You…" He muttered in surprise. "Incredible, were you able to light then Ember of Divinity?"
"Ember of what?" I asked while raising an eyebrow. "Ah, this little flame? Wait, it wasn't metaphorical?!"
"T-This is… To think a being of such a low level could attain it… Your Unique Skills and… that Ultimate Skill too, must be the ones granting you such insane Soul Resiliency and Soul Vitality to be able to do this…" Tyr was surprised.
"Can you explain what you're talking about please?" I asked him "politely". "Also can you stop calling me a "low level being" it is very rude!"
"Well but you're something like a low level being…" Said Tyr. "And the Ember of Divinity is the flame inside your soul, it is very small but you've somehow forced your way into having one…"
"Ember of Divinity? Is that what gods have?" I wondered.
"No…" Tyr said. "It is merely a stage of metamorphosis; it eventually evolves into… something else." Tyr said mysteriously. "Ah, I can't remember anything more than that, but don't play around with it too much. It might completely destroy you."
"Huh? That bad?!"
-----