The Achievement Junkie

With the brief conversation over, Jack stepped back into the conference room to find everyone either celebrating their future growth or feasting on the food across the table.

"How'd it go?"

Jack looked to the side, finding Maura with a smile. "It went well. But we'll need to be on edge for now. Halmut will respond, probably sooner than later. For now…

"Everyone! I have one last thing to say!"

"You didn't forget after all!" Hadurt howled, hurrying to Jack without fail. "I'm ready when you are!"

"We still need to kill a god for you, but…" Jack still had Halmut's imminent response in mind, so he laughed, "that shouldn't take long. We'll have you enter godhood in no time. As for everyone else here, we need to redo our pacts so that I'm not stealing all of your EXP."

One by one, the many gods and others present stepped up to Jack and formed a line.

First was Hadurt, who couldn't wait any longer to become Jack's chosen demigod. Next was Jin, who asked, "you didn't forget about me, right?"

"I--"

"Go for it, Jack," Duorda's voice came from across the room. While lounging on the comfortable cushions, Duorda explained, "After aiding my ascension, you can then help multiple people at once. It's something that Daruun put in the god system to keep gods from spreading themselves too thin at first. The more people you help, then the less time they have to ascend. But given the circumstances, that's not an issue right now."

"Then--"

"Then help me too!" shouted Jin, not giving Jack a choice. "I'm ready now!"

Jack sighed and gave in. Placing his hand on Jin's shoulder, Jack planted a morsel of his energy inside of Jin. He could feel how it was slightly weaker than the energy planted in Hadurt. Also, Jack could feel his connection with Hadurt weaker to a minute degree.

"Finally!"

"What can we do now?" asked Haldurt, trying his best to search for any new affinities.

"I… I'm not sure. Duorda, do you know?" asked Jack.

"Why would I know? You're the one giving them the blessing?!"

"But you've already experienced it, so haven't you noticed anything different?"

Sighing and leaning back into his seat, Duorda replied. "I've noticed a few things… For starters, I have way more mana than I should for an early one-star."

"But that's from the pact…" argued Jack.

"Oh… I forgot about that…" the skeleton sighed. "Then I'm not sure what's from the pact and what's from the blessing."

"What other effects do you notice?" asked Jin, joining the investigation.

Shrugging, Duorda replied, "A lot of my natural skills have gotten much stronger."

"That's from the pact!" shouted Hadurt. "What else?"

"Ummm… Well… Then I'm not sure what Jack's blessing does…" stated Duorda.

"Wait…"

Hearing Jin, both Jack and Hadurt turned their attention to him. Then, the others in the room began to focus on his as well.

Jin stood there silently, admiring his arms. He carefully inspected the biceps, then the triceps. Taking a moment to feel his own hands, Jin was in awe of how perfect his illusory arms now were. There was no ethereal energy around them and no appearance of them being false, yet they were still able to pass through each other without effort like before.

"Jin… were your extra arms always like that?" asked Jack.

Shaking his head, Jin replied, "No… I never had enough mana to do this before…"

Four more arms took shape, appearing to be just as real and perfect as the rest. It was surreal for many witnessing this but Jin was the most focused of all spectators. He struggled to believe how real they felt, more so than how real they appeared.

"Mana?" Hearing Jin mention his former lack of mana, Hadurt peaked at his own mana supply. Instantly, Hadurt burst into roaring, maniacal laughter! "It was worth the wait! Completely worth it!"

"What is it?" Jack asked.

"I have more mana than ever!" shouted Hadurt, struggling to smile any wider.

Jin added, "And it replenishes faster too… This is incredible!"

"See, I told you!" berated Duorda, shaking his head and sighing in relief.

"Really? Then I need to try something!" An explosion of flames poured over Hadurt, startling Jack completely.

"He can do it too?!"

"We helped him, but we've never seen his flames become black…" Kori replied with a smile.

Just as Hadurt was getting more excited than ever, a plume of freezing water rocketed into him and the surrounding furniture that had caught fire.

Lunara clicked her tongue and stated, "I get it, you're excited. But don't destroy the conference room! Save that for outside!"

"Sorry…" Hadurt chuckled, not disgraced at all by his antics. He was too excited to feel shame at the moment.

"Duorda," Jack looked back to his new assistant and asked, "how much much extra mana do you think you have?"

"Mana is cosmic energy, right? Hmm… I'd guess that it's been multiplied a few times. I've got energy that can rival an average one-star and even though I'm just an early one-star for now. I may even rival a few of the weaker late one-stars."

"What do you mean?"

"Each star class is divided into three to make gauging people easier. Those that ascend recently are early one-stars. After more training and growth early one-stars become an average one-star and eventually a late one-star before ascending to the two-star class," explained Duorda.

"So, even though you just ascended, you've got enough energy to compete with more experienced one-stars?"

"Yeah… Didn't Daruun tell you that's what would happen after you ascended?" Duorda reasoned.

"Yeah… but I didn't expect it from them…" Jack looked back to Hadurt and Jin, who were still basking in the glory of their newly gained mana supplies and skills. Following his assumed train of thought, Jack mentioned, "I think my blessing gives you the full strength of my passive skills, not just half of the strength…"

"So that's how you beat me!" Duorda laughed heartily. "With this much energy, you deserved to win by default!"

"What about us? Is there no way for us to get that too?"

Jack turned his attention to the line of people waiting to have their pacts altered. Only now they were eyeing Jack like starving cannibals in search of fresh meat.