Alice spent some time relaxing after her previous experiment. She got a few pastries from the kitchen, and then spent a few hours laying in bed with some light reading. Ethan had a few historical records laying around, which were written in a style somewhat similar to the fairytales from Alice’s previous world. Since the writers had focused on making it entertaining to read, the books read surprisingly similarly to an adventure story, especially since basic history in this world included great warriors and powerful monsters as a matter of course.

The exceptional reading speed she had acquired as a result of her {Super Speed Reading} Perk ensured that she finished reading each book within an hour, something which Alice had mixed feelings about. While she usually liked the convenience the Perk provided, finishing a story she was reading for entertainment after only an hour felt oddly dissatisfying.

Finally, after a few hours of reading and relaxing, Alice felt ready to tackle her System notifications and Perks.

The first thing Alice noticed was that during the aftermath of her pervious experiment, she had actually missed a System notification for the {For Science!} Achievement tiering up. It had gained another tier, meaning Alice had acquired another 20% levelling speed for research classes and 5% growth speed for her mental attributes.

Which was a rather small increase, but it certainly didn’t hurt. The Achievement claimed that it would gain some sort of notable boost at Tier V, and Alice was now more than halfway there. She was looking forward to seeing how the Achievement improved.

In addition to her Achievement tier, she had gained enough levels for three new Perks. One Perk from [Explorer of Magic], one from [Scientist], and one from [Survivor]. However, Alice couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed by how few levels she had gained in [Explorer of Magic]. She had only gained one level from an experiment that, while theoretically perfectly safe, had been more than slightly terrifying.

Alice sighed. The low number of levels she had received as a result of the experiment was a problem new to her, but most people experienced a similar problem the moment they hit level 50. The levelling speed penalty that increased every 25 levels was incredibly harsh. Alice had basically escaped the influence of the levelling penalty entirely while between level 50 and level 75, due to her exceptional Achievements and high experience multipliers, but now Alice was facing the same problem as everyone else, albeit at a much higher level.

The levels between 75 and 100 were generally considered the biggest obstacle to most aspiring Immortals. After the class evolution at level 100, one generally aged slowly enough that their levelling speed didn’t matter too much, as long as they weren’t already really old by the time they reached the level 100 class evolution. Even if one levelled up at a glacial pace, since they didn’t get older very fast, it didn’t matter very much as long as they kept working hard. However, between level 75 and 100, people were usually still aging at a noticeable speed, and were simultaneously fighting against major levelling speed penalties.

And now Alice had joined the ranks of people stuck at level 75. She felt that if she wanted to keep levelling up quickly, she really needed to get a few more Achievements or Perks to boost her XP multiplier by a bit.

Before picking Perks, Alice took a moment to count up her total levelling speed bonus for [Explorer of Magic], her highest level Class.

She was getting 400% levelling speed bonus from {Seeker of Truth}, her best Achievement. Another 30% from {Baptized by Broken Mana}, 10% from {Bookworm}, 10% from the class evolution bonus from {Kinetic Manabinder}, 125% from {Seed Creator}, since [Explorer of Magic] was both a magic related Class and a research-related Class. Finally, she was getting a 30% bonus from {Immortal’s Disciple at the Battle Against the Society} and 60% from {Scientific Discoveries}. Apart from that, Alice had some scattered Perks that made her more productive, but nothing else directly influenced her xp gain. In total, that meant she had a 665% bonus to her levelling speed for [Explorer of Magic].

Most Immortals had a levelling speed bonus of around 1,000% or 1,100% by the time they hit Immortality, because that was what was needed to push through the barrier between level 75 and level 100. And now, Alice was going to stare that giant gap in levels in the face and wish she had another 400% levelling speed.

Alice winced at the thought. At least she was at level 75 quite a bit earlier than most people. That meant that she had a lot more time to rack up another few good Achievements to boost her growth speed. While aging speed varied quite a bit from person to person, she knew that past level 75, aging would usually drop to less than half of the normal aging rate.

In other words, Alice was probably aging less than six months for every year that passed now. Which was a strange thought, since Alice was still only physically sixteen. If one discounted the effect of slowed aging, Alice was less than half a year away from her seventeenth birthday. And she was already aging much slower than a regular human being. For a moment, Alice was struck by the bizarre notion that if she reached Immortality tomorrow, she would be stuck as a teenager for all eternity, which was a rather unpleasant thought. Alice would prefer to reach her early twenties before she stopped aging. Being stuck at age 16 forever sounded awful.

Alice shook her head to clear her thoughts. She hadn’t even reached the class evolution at level 100 yet. It was still an open question whether or not she would reach Immortality at all, and if she did reach Immortality it would still require a lot of hard work and effort. However, thinking about Immortality and her System notifications had calmed her down enough that she felt she could think properly again. Which meant that she had decisions to make.

Alice started scanning her new Perk options.

First of all, Alice checked the potential Perk combinations and new Perks for [Explorer of Magic]. She was probably going to end up combining her level 70 Perk with {Three Seeds}, as she had planned at level 70, but it was worth double checking the new Perks she had available first just in case she saw something amazing.

There was a Perk that gave Alice six new seed slots, which she found somewhat appealing, but not valuable enough to actually pick up since {Seedy Ambitions} already covered her long-term magic seed needs, and another Perk option that gave her improved insights and a 100% boost to levelling speed for research classes if she had successfully concluded a magic experiment within the past year. Alice felt that the second Perk was just an inferior version of {For Science!}, and didn’t really appeal to her very much. She needed boosts to her levelling speed, but a 100% boost just couldn’t keep up with her needs at all. It was also overly specific and hard to keep activated long term.

Alice swapped to the Perk combination menu, and then checked the results of combining {Three Seeds} and {Seedy Ambitions}. Alice grinned to herself. She hadn’t been 100% accurate when guessing what would happen when she combined the two Perks, but she had been close. It was definitely worth combining the two to improve her long term growth. She took one final look at the two Perks she was about to sacrifice.

Three Seeds Requirements: Explorer of Magic level 30 or higher, Perception 100 or Greater, Magic 100 or Greater

You may form 3 more magic seeds, with a maximum mana conversion ratio of 10% each

 

Seedy Ambitions Requirements: Explorer of Magic Class at level 70 or Greater, Intelligence 150 or higher, Magic 150 or higher, At least 5 Magic Seeds, At least 3 Perks related to studying and interacting with Magic seeds

With enough study, you can create an inferior magic seed for ANY subject of study you are interacting with. This requires  you to have a strong understanding of the subject, and only one seed can be created this way per month. These inferior seeds will NOT count towards your magic seed limit. Inferior Seeds are limited to 25% Mana Conversion ratio. They cannot be upgraded via Achievements, but other Perks may interact with them.

Then, she paused. Alice suddenly noticed an issue.

It seemed that currently, Alice had six magic seeds in total. If she combined Three Seeds with another Perk, what exactly would happen if she suddenly had more seeds than her maximum magic seed limit?

Alice had to admit, she had forgotten about this problem when she had been planning to combine {Seedy Ambitions} and {Three Seeds}. Her maximum number of magic seeds would decrease below the number of magic seeds she currently had if the new combined Perk didn’t give her any new magic seed slots.

Alice had no idea what happened if she had more magic seeds than she could theoretically hold. Alice had neglected to research what the result of this problem would be, but she doubted she was the only person to come across this particular issue. After all, since Perk combination existed and plenty of people had used it, it was inevitable that someone else had stumbled across this issue in the past.

She quickly left her room and headed to Ethan’s library, before searching for any information he had on the topic. Luckily, Ethan had prominently placed several books related to research and mage related classes at the front of his library, in a spot where Alice could easily see and reach them.

Alice was pretty sure Ethan had put them there explicitly for her use. He definitely wasn’t worried about levelling up his Mage classes very much, after all, but Alice certainly needed to have references available from time to time.

After rifling through some books. Alice learned that the magic seeds she had gained from the Perk would deactivate. The moment she got some new magic seed slots, she would be able to ‘connect’ her old magic seeds to her new slots, although if the new Perk had different restrictions or maximum mana conversion ratios, the mana conversion ratio of her magic seeds might decrease as a result.

Since Alice had {Scholar of Magic} and {Expanding Comprehension} to boost her mana conversion ratio, she wasn’t very worried about losing a little bit of her mana conversion ratio. She could just raise it again using her Perks. She wasn’t quite sure when she would get some new magic seed slots, but with how often she got new options for magic seed slots from [Explorer of Magic], she doubted it would be an issue for long.

Thus, after a few final moments of hesitation, Alice finished combining her Perks.

Seeds of Ambition Perk Costs: Three Seeds +  Seedy Ambitions sacrificed to create this Perk.

Two times a month, you can create an inferior magic seed with a maximum mana conversion ratio of 30%. The seed creation rules from {Seedy Ambitions} are applied to this Perk. However, Achievements may now apply to the Inferior magic seeds as they would to other magic seeds.

After Alice sacrificed her {Three Seeds} Perk, Alice felt her maximum number of magic seeds decrease from six to three. The three magic seeds that occupied the magic seed slots created by {Three Seeds} suddenly turned themselves off, as if they were entering a state of hibernation.

Suddenly, Alice no longer had access to pure mana, healing mana, or organic mana. And Alice’s one Perk from [Organic Mage] had also turned itself off, since one of the requirements for the [Organic Mage] Class was to have a 40% mana conversion ratio organic seed, and Alice no longer met that Class requirement. More troublingly, Alice lost {Lesser Organic Vision} from the [Scholar] Class, since that Perk also required her to have access to an organic magic seed.

She could still tell that she had six magic seeds, even though she only had three working right now. It was a very strange feeling.

Since Alice knew this was coming, she only spent a few seconds acknowledging that she had temporarily lost access to some magic seeds before moving on.

The Perk {Seeds of Ambition} was not on cooldown, meaning she could immediately use it. In fact, Alice sensed that she could turn her previous magic seeds into lesser magic seeds. She immediately reactivated her pure mana seed and her organic mana seed. She didn’t need healing mana right now, since it had mostly been used to generate money, and Alice was no longer worried about her finances. She would still reactivate it next month, so that she could level her enchanting classes if she got a new idea for an enchanted item, but she relied on her other two magic seeds much more right now. In particular,{Lesser Organic Vision} was critical for some experiments, and pure mana was fundamentally similar to what the System did in some respects, so Alice was unwilling to wait a month to regain access to it.

Alice was quite happy with the overall result of her Perk combination. Doubling the amount of magic seeds she could create per month would drastically improve the speed she made progress towards forming a System seed. It was worth temporarily losing access to her healing magic seed.

Then, Alice moved on to her [Scholar] Perk.

It was Alice’s first time combining [Scholar] Perks, so after double checking her newly available Perks, Alice started carefully tossing one Perk after another into the Perk combination System menu, trying to get a feel for what would make a good combination with what. A few Perks, such as {Rhetorical Flourish}, were only occasionally useful, and Alice would be more than happy to combine them with something else just to get a more useful Perk. However, it was hard to make a final decision on what she wanted to combine. There were just too many different Perk combinations that had potentially useful results.

Eventually, however, Alice settled on a rather unusual combination of Perks, because she felt that it would provide her with the best growth boost, even if it wouldn’t directly resolve her levelling speed problems.

Alice decided to combine {Super Speed Reading} and {Lesser Reduced Sleep Requirement}.

Lesser Reduced Sleep Requirement Requirements: Scholar level 10 or higher, Endurance 75 or greater

Your body needs 10% less sleep every day, and your sleeping habits will be better optimized for the amount of sleep your body is able to function with.

Lesser reduced sleep requirement was surprisingly useful, even now. It removed about an hour of sleep from the time Alice needed each night in order to function. Plenty of Alice’s research was restricted by other cooldowns or supply problems. Despite that fact, Alice was still very happy with having an extra hour every day to work on projects or relax. It was a Perk that didn’t seem to do much, but Alice found it quite useful.

However, even though the perk was still useful, Alice still eventually decided to sacrifice it, because the combined Perk she could create with it felt very useful to her.

Super Speed Reading Requirements: Scholar level 45 or higher, Intelligence 150 or higher, Perception 100 or higher

While reading any form of written text, you can read and process information ten times faster than before. Your comprehension abilities are also greatly enhanced while reading (note - this bonus only applies to things you are reading. If you are reading and doing something else at the same time, only reading gets this comprehension bonus).

{Super Speed Reading} was the other Perk she decided to sacrifice, even though it was also a fairly useful perk. It allowed Alice to quickly absorb and understand information contained inside of books. She used it several times a day to parse information she needed in the library of the magic academy, and more recently, Ethan’s library. While a lot of Alice’s research was in new territory that hadn’t been explored by other people, there was plenty of previous experiments that had been conducted by natives of this world that Alice found useful to study as a method of improving her understanding of the System and the way mana and magic worked. Losing this Perk would definitely sting, even if it wasn’t vital to her growth.

However, the combined Perk was very appealing to Alice.

Sleep Reading Perk Costs: Lesser Reduced Sleep Requirement + Super Speed Reading

Any time you are asleep, so long as you are close to or touching a book and have permission to read it from the owner of that book, you may read it inside of your dreams. This will not affect your sleep, meaning you will still fully rest after a night of sleeping, and all of the speed and comprehension bonuses offered previously offered by {Super Speed Reading} will still apply while you are asleep. Note: Any books stored inside of any storage Perks you have are considered to be touching you at all times for the purposes of this Perk.

Normally, Alice might have hesitated to create this Perk. After all, she needed to be in contact with a lot of books at once to properly take advantage of this Perk. Books were quite expensive, and unless Alice had a lot of books, the Perk wouldn’t be very useful.

Luckily, she was the apprentice of an Immortal now.

After creating the Perk, Alice quickly wrote a message and had one of the [Servants] carry it to Ethan for her. Twenty minutes later, one crate after another of books arrived in Alice’s room, each one packed with a variety of useful books on geography, history, biology, and magic. There were also several case studies and records of specific experiments that had been done on magic seeds and mana baptisms. Ethan also wrote a message to her, letting her know that one of the servants would go check the local bookstores in the capital and get a copy of any other books she might find useful or interesting.

Ethan didn’t seem fazed at all by the fact that he was probably dumping dozens of gold crowns into helping Alice make her Perk stronger. All she had needed to say was that she had recently acquired a Perk that required lots of books related to her field of study. Ethan hadn’t asked for any further details, and had immediately sent her everything he felt would be useful.

Sometimes, it was really quite nice to be an Immortal’s apprentice.

After that, Alice started focusing on her final Perk.

It had been a long time since she last got a new Perk in [Survivor]. She didn’t gain levels in the class very quickly, after all. However, a couple of the Perks in the Class were very useful. {Adrenaline Rush}, for example, remained one of Alice’s most reliable combat Perks, and {Moderate Tissue Regeneration} was Alice’s go-to Perk for if she got hurt or an experiment went wrong.

However, there were also plenty of Perks that Alice only found somewhat useful, or didn’t use very often at all.

After messing with several Perk options, Alice eventually combined {Sixth Sense} and {Sense Hostility}.

 

Both of these Perks were still somewhat useful to Alice. {Sense Hostility} occasionally provided Alice with a warning sign if someone was watching her with hostile intentions, and {Sixth Sense} provided her with information about nearby monsters so that she could avoid fights when she was in the wilderness.

However, these days, Alice didn’t fear most monsters. She was good enough at fighting that she could deal with most weaker monsters, and so the Perk had lost a great deal of its usefulness. And while losing {Sense Hostility} would sting quite a bit, Alice was guessing that the Perk wouldn’t be able to keep up with the level of anyone sent to harm her anymore. After all, Alice was now a ‘combat-specialized’ mage training under an Immortal. Anyone sent to harm her would probably have Perks to counter things like {Sense Hostility}, meaning that Alice needed to upgrade the Perk or accept that it was no longer useful.

Combining the two Perks would hopefully fix this problem.

The sensing ability of both Perks she had used as fodder had been significantly enhanced, and Alice had gotten an extra 30% Perception effectiveness on top of that. In addition, Alice had gained another Perk effect that somewhat resembled {Adrenaline Rush}, which made it easier for her to survive any unexpected ambushes or problems. Alice had very little lasting power in a fight, since she could burn through her mana very quickly and several of her Perks could only be activated once a day. However, with the increasing strength of Alice’s life-saving Perks, it was much easier for Alice to escape any situation that put her in danger.

After looking over her final Perk combination, Alice nodded to herself. She had finished dealing with her System notifications, at least for now. Since she hadn’t gotten any Achievements that would boost her levelling speed recently, she decided to ask Ethan if there were any good Achievements she should aim for that might not be recorded by the Church of the System, and that she should also pay another visit to the local branch of the church to consult their records of various Achievements. She had already scanned it a few times to try to find something that was both useful and easy to get, but hadn’t found anything that she felt fit her needs. However, Alice was holding on to the vague hope that she had simply missed something and would find it if she checked again.

As Alice thought of talking to Ethan about Achievements, Alice frowned.

Now that her System notifications were dealt with, she needed to actually start preparing for the tea party. She made a mental note to herself to ask about her {Etiquette} teacher when she spoke with Ethan later. And to get a few books on Etiquette as well, so that she could read up on the subject while she was asleep. Even though she wasn’t entirely looking forward to the event, she would do her best to fit in and make the event useful to her. She just hoped she didn’t make a fool of herself when the tea party actually came.