Ars slowly extended his arms to accept the knife and magic stone; his father's eyes lit up when he saw his son would take his place.
Ted is not an idiot; he knew that Ars is still a kid. If he had a choice, he would never let his son go outside until he reached the awakened warrior tier 2, but he can't be picky. After all, they don't have any luxury right now to be complacent; they only have reserved millets for a week, and in a week his son couldn't forage a millet. Their camp will surely be doomed to starvation.
The outside world is very dangerous; only awakened warriors can survive outside for a short time.
As of a few days ago, they have 13 tier 1 awakened. They were able to forage food for at least more than 500 meters away from their camp and stockpile wild millet for food and some vegetables.
The average human running speed is 10-12 km/h; when carrying a load of at least 20 pounds, the speed will diminish to 6-8 km/h, while the initial stage awakened tier 1 was able to run 30 km/h faster than Usain Bolt, who's a gold medalist, and their speed will not diminish.
The base strength of a tier 1 awakened is 500 pounds, while the average human is 170 pounds. A tier 1 awakened is almost 3x stronger and faster than the average person.
To be awakened, one should absorb enough magicules from a magic stone or eat enough mutated beast meat to accumulate enough magicules to create a circle on the heart.
(A heart circle was the foundation of power of all magic beings; mutated beasts have circles as well as the demons and monsters. How many hearts one has indicates how many magicules and how much physical strength one has.)
But heart circles are different; some species are limited to how many they will have from birth to death, but some creatures can develop as many circles as they want. For example, demons at birth—ordinary demons are born with one circle, and when they reach adulthood, without any effort, they will have a 3rd circle but a hobgoblin can evolve in stronget form if they got higher circles.
The monsters are categorized as low ranking, mid rank, high ranking, and calamity.
The Goblins were the strongest low-ranking demons, comparable to 3rd-tier awakeners.
Comparison: A human is born without a circle and needs to cultivate the magicules from other creatures to survive.
Previously, according to this world's legends, bigger tribes before had the 8th circle awakened.
Inside a dim, lighter room in the middle, there's a crystal-like stone flickering a faint bluish light. There's Ars sitting in the Indian seat position, holding the mana stone with his 2 hands, tightening his grip.
According to his memories, this is how his father cultivates a magicule. Usually his father cultivates with mutated beasts' meat when they are lucky that a stronger beast killed a weaker one and didn't eat it. Usually gatherers split it among them, left with a few pounds, not enough to ascend to tier 2. The reason why their camp awakeners are all tier one is that they don't have the ability to hunt mutated beasts.
After a few minutes, Ars is able to feel something; it feels hot on his hands, and the magic stone is being absorbed by his body easily. He feels the surge of power within, and he guides the magicules from his body into his heart, where he feels the magicules are circling, forming a thin single circle.
He cultivated for a long time; he didn't notice how many hours had passed since he started.
Blue, green, and yellow light auras were appearing from his body; magicules were swirling in his room. Not all magicules were accepted by the heart; some were rejected by the body—those attributes that can't be absorbed by humans.
When suddenly the light from the stone flickered and dimmed out.
Ars notices it. Ohh, it seems I already absorbed the magicules I need. His body is full of sweat; all impurities came out from his body. The extra fat in his body that doesn't need fat from eating the carbohydrate millets is gone.
He looks lean and athletic, clearly different from what he looked like before.
Ars looks like some gym bro who's been lifting for over a year.
Height of 5'5" and weight of 128 lbs., around 13 percent body fat, abs and some striations visible from his body.
He feels that most of his fat was burned during cultivation, and his sweat was really stinky and disgusting; clearly impurities from the body and his blood vessels came out during cultivation.
He saw a blue shimmering light in front of him that looked like a system panel.
And it shows his status.
Arlo Henry
Tier 1 (13,120 - 200,000) Tier 2
Magic: 120
Str: 50
Def: 30
Agi: 40
Int: 60
Dex: 30
Wow, so here's my system. It seems that awakened warriors don't have a system, so that's the reason why they don't know when they will ascend to a higher tier.
Luckily for me, it seems like a cheat skill has been given; I can view my own stats.
He took a look at his system, and he saw skill from there: dimensional storage.
He read the description; it says the dimensional storage time doesn't apply, so all things you stored will not rot or spoil with the capacity of 30 cubic meters squared. If we compared it, it was as big as a cargo container.
He goes to a burrow where a container is. As a modern man, Ars is not comfortable when he feels sticky, so he uses the little water he has to clean his body with the cloth he has and uses his father's spare clothes after cleaning his.
Ars went out to take a look; he saw an old woman cooking a porridge made out of millet.
The woman noticed Ars and quickly called him out.
Little Ars, come here!! The lady shook her head, and her face dimmed. "Sorry, chieftain, come here and eat some porridge."
The old lady was Auntie Tina, wife of Uncle Dan, one of the tribe elders.
"Ars feels helpless. Come, sit with the kids and eat a bowl of hot millet poured on the bowl while it's hot," said the lady.
Ars just simply nodded before eating; he tasted the millet. It tasted nutty with a bitter aftertaste. He couldn't, for a modern person's taste buds, eat this wild millet.
When Ars almost throws up, he looks at the kids who are smiling and happy for having food on the table. These people are full of hardship, and they eat the same food every single day. Some kids were injured from the fight; their faces have cuts and bruises from the degree of chaotic fight of the awakened and the demons.
The kids are clearly malnourished from eating the same thing over and over again.
"How can I be an ungrateful brat? This food is all they have. I need to repay it right now. I'm hungry; I need to have strength to go outside."
Ars resolved himself before chugging out the entire bowl in seconds.
"Auntie Tina, I need more; I'll go outside to find food."
The auntie just shook her head and smiled. "Our leader, just eat more; you need strength to go outside."
"It seems like you already awakened, chief," said the old man who taps his back; it was Uncle Dan.
Uncle Dan noticed that suddenly Ars became muscular, clearly a sign of awakening.