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Chapter 101. An Insightful Party
🕑 Added 2025-06-17 15:00:05 +0000 UTCNew insights detected.
Insight Into Spatial rends (beginner).
That was…typical. Typically annoying. It was also to be expected, everything considered.
Your insight into Spatial rends has grown…
Insight into Spatial rends.
(beginner>>Intermediate)
Your insight into spatial rends has been judged to be at the elite tier.
Rafe blinked at the notifications. First off, he was out of the visions and yet the superfluous thoughts were not being cut. The potion was probably wearing off.
He could hear a hammer banging distantly. He could even feel a faint hint of strain where his arms ought to be, but he hadn't regained control of them yet.
Besides, he still had one insight to get through, didn't he?
‘Ding’ Final insight growing.
Processing personal knowledge…processing known data…system interference deemed impossible.
“Wait, what?!” Rafe said, although he could hardly hear himself.
The system couldn't interfere with the process? Was it just trying to reassure him? The system had been giving him a lot of attention, and at times it seemed like it was even trying to communicate with him. To reassure him it meant no harm.
Final insight detected.
Insight into temporal force.(Beginner)
“What?!” Rafe shouted and heard himself this time, albeit faintly.
How the hell did that make sense? Sure, his sharpness could be turned into spatial tears. That was kind of alright with him. Messed up, but alright.
But how the hell was time related to momentum?
“Something so fast it can break the laws of time,” he found himself murmuring.
Rafe did not think for an extended amount of mental time. He just let himself feel out the statement. It had been buried deep in his subconscious.
His last insight was different from the others. It was more of a wish. A dream. It fit him, fit his soul like a glove. They all did. They were his. They had chosen him, as surely as he'd chosen them.
He didn't know any conceivable way to upgrade them into concepts, but they were his. He had been planning for maybe two concepts. One from the momentum insight, and the other a combination of hardness and sharpness, but now, well…
Sword energy as a concept wasn't going to cut it. He already had liquid metal. And now he had another pinnacle-tier insight.
Your insight into temporal force is growing…
Your insight into temporal force is growing…
Your insight into temporal force is growing…
Insight into temporal force.
(Beginner>>Intermediate>>Advanced>>Peak)
Your insight into temporal force is judged to be a pinnacle-tier insight.
Congratulations, you have two pinnacle-tier insights and one elite-tier insight. Rewards shall be dispensed…rewards shall be dispensed…rewards…
The system was glitching. Rafe couldn't help but chuckle even if it was too quiet for his slowly returning senses to hear.
“Huh, so that's why the system tried to interfere? Having such highly rated insights must mean more rewards, and the system is stingy.”
It was stingy. Though it normally gave him more rewards than it gave others. Even C grades and above would be hard pressed to get as many quest points and credits as he had after so few quests.
Rafe somehow still felt cheated. He was like a spoiled child who wanted more pocket money from his dad instead of appreciating the obscene amount he was already getting. Well, said spoiled children never worked. Rafe was working for his pocket money, wasn't he?
Bonus objective successful. You managed to grow your blacksmith skill to level 100.
Rewards: 1,000 quest points, 1 E-grade credit, 2 stamina potions, 1 high-tier health potion.
Rafe frowned at that last bit. A high-tier potion? It was still an F grade potion but it was a high-tier one. Why was he even surprised anymore? Everything and everyone under the system was ranked two fold it seemed. They were ranked in both strength and quality.
For example for system users like himself, strength would be perhaps their stats and specs and even their overall level. Quality would be their ability to apply those stats and skills and everything to their maximum effectiveness. Like Rafe's higher than normal fighting ability. Techniques and conceptualisation counted toward a user's quality as well. Raw strength and the quality of that strength.
Like with his soul cultivation. He had seen the system message the gods had left in his soul manual reward. It had been deemed that he had to work on both the strength and quality of his soul.
‘Ding’ Special quest completed.
You are the first person to develop your insights with the help of the system.
You have introduced something new to the system, again.
“Is that exasperation I sense, system dearie?” Rafe teased.
No! It is not exasperation. It is also not amazement. We are used to it by now.
“...” Rafe’s lips froze for a few moments. “...what the hell?...” he managed later.
Your quest system gets more complex. There are more avenues for advancement. Gain more achievements to introduce a whole new system service to the multiverse. Gain more quest points to upgrade your quest system.
Rafe had seen those messages before. He had to say, he was a little torn. There was already a perfectly viable upgrade option. It was a cheat from what he had heard. An option to increase his strength. Could he really sacrifice that option in order to try for something new and untested?
He shrugged internally. He could do nothing about it now. All he could do was wait and see what would happen when the time came. Or maybe he could get some more information about the quest system and credits and the merchant system. Hmm…
Rewards(all achievements included): 10,000 quest points, 10 D-grade credits, Two levels worth of experience, 10 free stat points, 20 free spec points.
All his achievements in regards to the insights and their development had been lumped together. He had gained a godly amount of quest points and credits, if he said so himself.
He was feeling good about himself. He had done well.
Now, how the hell was he going to stop his hand from moving? And what was that? Some kind of Essence flowing towards him? It was like a storm of Essence with Rafe as its eye.
****
He was having multiple insight breakthroughs, Rafael Kingsley.
It was almost impossible, only it was happening right there in front of her. Filoria Benhaven was not a happy Elemenoid.
He had been weaker than she'd anticipated in their little fight the other day, but he'd also been strong enough to push her. Her. The daughter of the chosen, the hero. But now there was an explanation for his weakness. His insights were either locked somehow, or they hadn't reached their full potential yet.
But if they were locked he couldn't be above level fifty, could he? Hestus had told them something though. Something they hadn't considered because even if the system and definite levels were new, things like insights were a part of their cultures already.
The bottleneck at level fifty was real. It was everywhere. Insights were everywhere as the most reliable way to break past that bottleneck. Unless someone was willing to spend decades as a level fifty grinding their skills to the max. And after that there would be the E grade bottleneck anyway.
They hadn't known the name of the method they used to advance. The information came after their induction. About insights and concept abilities and concepts and all the bottlenecks.
With a name and a method, or a number of tools, the people of Primus hadn't needed more. But Hestus had told Helare, in Filoria's presence, that there were lots of ways to get past at least the early bottlenecks in the system run multiverse.
Advancing was a major problem and so brilliant people had put their minds to it. With how large the multiverse was, it was no wonder they had found many ways around it. Primus hadn't needed that.
But what if this boy had? He had credits. He had been connected to the tutorial system despite being away from his world when the system came. Did that mean he'd attended the auction? Had his planet even chosen an auction?
Filoria had no idea. What she did know was that the boy's insights were going through such a drastic change they could have been upgrading to concepts. Then having been in a nascent form before was the most plausible explanation, but she admitted she was just trying to understand.
They could all sense them before. Were they sensing insights in a nascent form? And now the oppression settled over every single person in the camp. Even the E grades. There was a qualitative gap in the boy's insights.
And one of them was hot. And the heat was an enemy to the Ma’la.
The air around the boy, who'd been pounding away on a sword this whole time, was red hot. The air was red hot. And it was hard to look in the boy's direction. It felt like she was looking through a cloud, a haze of heat. And there was something else off even aside from the heat. Like the space around Rafael Kingsley was volatile.
“Is he using concepts?” Filoria heard Helare speak.
“No,” she had a familiar voice. Collab, her trainer. “Concepts would tear him apart, body and soul. Although, suddenly refining his insights this much in one sitting. It's like he is unlocking them for the first time. And yet…that is impossible. How can newly hatched insights threaten me so?”
Filoria couldn't believe what she was hearing. “They threaten you also?”
“Maybe it's just because of the heat?” Helare said, shielding her eyes from the glare of the air.
She was struggling a lot more than Filoria because her bloodline was purer. She had a stronger affinity to water so the heat must have felt anathema to her, but she was still standing a whole foot in front of Filoria. She only looked away to moisten her eyes for a few moments at a time.
Another bang. This one was loud enough it surprised Filoria. It was like a god of thunder was working at that forge. She could feel insights far stronger than hers play. They were stronger and of better quality too. Were they really recently hatched insights?
Hers were truly young. She hadn't advanced them at all since she'd first developed them.
She wondered how the metal Rafael Kingsley had been working on wasn't a vapourised mess yet. She wondered how his whole forge could still exist in such circumstances, but it still did. What was getting destroyed was the Earth around and on top of which Rafael and his forge sat. The blacksmith was digging a ditch.
And then the heat started to congregate.
She thought that was a good thing. She thought the boy was running out of will power or that he was getting the things under control. But she was wrong.
“He's not yet in control,” Collab said, and she could hear the frown in his words.
Helare, who was in front of Filoria, whipped her head around to glare at Collab.
“What does that mean?”
The trainer shrugged his shoulders. “That maybe the insights are currently too strong for him.”
“What?!” both Filoria and Helare asked at the same time, though Filoria was sure she'd asked for a different reason.
“If he doesn't get them under control, he could die,” Collab said, calm as a cucumber still.
Just on cue, Rafael Kingsley, who they could now see thanks to the drastic reduction in the diameter of the heat haze, bent down and threw up a liter of blood.
“Huh?... Rafael…” Helare seemed panicked, taking a short step forward. “What do we do?”
“The heat, princess,” Collab said slowly, looking at the frozen Filoria.
She saw his look and followed his eyes when he looked away and toward Helare. The princess was tense. She was preparing to do something stupid. Something irrational.
“We can't help him,” Collab continued. “Because we'd be hurting ourselves.”
And that was when she decided to make a break for it. Filoria was ready. She caught the princess, wrestled her.
She did it mechanically, not even paying attention to the scratching and kicking. The princess had negligible physical presence. Filoria had to be careful just to not crush her.
What was distracting Filoria though was not the princess. It was the boy who even as his body and soul started to get destroyed wouldn't stop swinging his hammer. What was it Helare liked about the boy? What was it that made the princess lose her treasured decorum?
“What is that?” Under the haze of heat the boy was shining, his tattoos moving ever so subtly and shining. The light they gave off was almost divine.
Collab looked shocked at the new development as well.
“That is something crafters go through sometimes when they grow their truths,” Hestus’ voice came out of nowhere. Filoria had honestly forgotten the goblin was there.
