(Note: Vitality points and Spirit points have been changed to Life and Will points respectively to avoid confusion.)

"[Spirit Energy Sacrifice]."

Fwoos.h.!.+

In an instant, the remaining SP that Aurus had was being sapped away as a silver flame started to cover his body. From an outsider's perspective, the bar that showed his remaining SP decreased to 0 in an instant and then not long after, silver flames covered Aurus' body.

Ding!

Of course, Aurus didn't notice what he has done.

'Your SP is being sapped in exchange for power!'

"s.h.i.+t!" Aurus couldn't help but curse at the notification. "I activated the wrong skill!"

"Gahhhh! [Spirit Channeling]!"

Whoos.h.!.+

If before, his SP was being drained to 0, at this moment his HP was being rapidly drained until Aurus had 1 HP left.

But that didn't happen.

At times, there would be cases where Aurus' HP would be close to 1, but it didn't reach it. This was all thanks to the 5 Anima Aurus made that had a specialized purpose of either regenerating his HP or SP.

Not long after, multiple notification screens appeared in front of Aurus' vision.

Ding! Ding! Ding!

'Your HP is being transformed into SP!"

"Your SP is being sapped in exchange for power!"

"Your HP is being transformed into SP!"

"Your SP is being sapped in exchange for power!"

"[Spirit Energy Sacrifice] has leveled up."

"[Spirit Channeling] has leveled up."

Although it has only been around 2 seconds since Aurus activated the two skills, they already ama.s.sed enough experience to level up, reducing amount of HP and SP being drained from his body. Then again, the both of them were only at the C-grade.

Arogancia felt a small sense of danger after looking at Aurus but didn't mind it as it remembered that it sacrificed all of its Life points in exchange for power that surpa.s.sed its limits.

Not recognizing the possible consequences of this ignorance, Arogancia shot his roots once more towards Aurus as the tips of the roots started to glow a faint silver.

"[Root Barrage: Boosted Nature]!"

Whoos.h.!.+ Whoos.h.!.+ Whoos.h.!.+

In the midst of Arogancia's roots trying to hit Aurus, multiple blurry silhouettes of roots the color of silver also mixed in between the attacks of those roots, putting Aurus in a precarious situation.

But who was Aurus? He was a G.o.d level existence within the game named Infinite Stick Evolution! Although he was reborn as a stick in the same world of the game, his memories that were recently unsealed gave Aurus the confidence to avoid Arogancia's attack.

"[Tempestuous Spiritas Glide]!"

Whoos.h.!.+

After activating the skill, what Aurus did was...

Leave the skill's area of effect!

Why would Aurus bother dodging each and every root Arogancia threw at him if he could just leave the skill's area of effect? He was a Spiritas with a smart soul, why would he think inside the box like the other sticks?

"I can't believe you dodged that!" Arogancia couldn't believe it as this was the first time an enemy completely avoided its attacks.

Aurus then couldn't help but say in an awkward manner, "It's not that I dodged it, I just can't believe that you didn't change the attack's direction after I moved."

"Heh..." Arogancia's soul started to buffer after hearing Aurus' reply before saying, "What did you say? Something useless? I'm undefeatable with this boosted power! Taste it!"

Swoos.h.!.+ Swoos.h.!.+ Swoos.h.!.+

Rather than attacking Aurus with quant.i.ty, Arogancia instead controlled its roots to converge and spiral as it formed a lance-like shape. It then infused its SP into the roots, increasing its piercing power and speed as it headed towards Aurus' direction.

"Take this! [Unavoidable Root Lance]!"

Whoos.h.!.+

As expected, Aurus easily avoided it with the help of his doubled movement speed thanks to [Tempest Burst]. He also used the momentum of his dodge to get closer to Arogancia's trunk that was still injured after going berserk.

At this exact moment, only 2 seconds remained before the effects of [Tempest Burst] disappeared. It was also at this moment that...

Ding! Ding! Ding!

'[Spirit Energy Sacrifice] and [Spirit Channeling] has leveled up.'

'[Spirit Energy Sacrifice] and [Spirit Channeling] has reached the MAX level.'

'[Spirit Energy Sacrifice] and [Spirit Channeling] has met the necessary requirements needed and is ready to evolve.'

As Aurus saw these notifications simultaneously popping up, Aurus let out a small chuckle. This was what he was waiting for.

"It is an honor to fight against you Arogancia," Aurus continued, "But you'll have to die here."

In an instant, a menacing aura could be felt coming from Aurus as one of the floating Anima quickly transformed into a lance as it pierced into Arogancia's trunk, giving Aurus some free time to do what he needed to do.

Ding!

'Aurus has dealt damage worth 356 HP to [Arogancia].'

"Wow, that's a lot of damage actually," Aurus couldn't help but say to himself as three-tenths of Arogancia's was removed in an instant. "Then again, the stick's defense stat is useless...for the most part."

The defense stat. One of the three main stats for sticks other than attack and HP. Although this stat grew every time a stick leveled up and evolved, it never did anything useful. All of the players also noticed this and then did a lot of experiments in order to find out why.

After a while, it was then revealed that the defense stat only took effect towards slas.h.i.+ng attacks. Stabbing, piercing, and blunt attacks bypa.s.sed the defense stat, which was unfortunately the majority of the attacks of the sticks, thus most people ignored this stat until they reached the Animate level.

Ding! Ding!

'The exchange of SP into power has reached its limit, boosting the user's power by 30%!'

'The SP bar has been completely filled, thus the [Spirit Channeling] skill has been deactivated!'

Being lost in his own world, Aurus was brought back to reality after hearing those two notifications. Aurus instantly remembered what he was going to do and commanded, "Evolve all the skills that can be evolved at this instant!"

Ding! Ding! Ding!

In that instant, three skills were evolved to a higher grade. Only 1.5 seconds remain before the effect of [Tempest Burst] disappears.

'[Spirit Energy Sacrifice] has been evolved to [Spirit Energy Augmentation].'

'[Spirit Channeling] has been evolved to [High Spirit Channeling].'

'[Wind Affinity] has been evolved to [High Wind Affinity].'

Why did Aurus command the system to evolve all of the evolvable skills without choosing the path of evolution? It was because these skills didn't have any! All cla.s.s-related skills only had one evolution path, the same goes with elemental affinity skills.

After he evolved all of these skills, Aurus activated the newly evolved [Spirit Energy Augmentation] and [High Spirit Channeling] in order for him to boost his power to its highest possible peak.

After a second of repeated exchange between HP and SP, a few notifications popped up in front of Aurus' vision.

'The exchange of SP into power has reached its limits, boosting the user's power by 50%!'

'The SP bar has been completely filled, thus the [High Spirit Channeling] skill has been deactivated!'

'[Spirit Energy Augmentation] and [High Spirit Channeling] has leveled up.'

After closing all of these notifications, Aurus looked at Arogancia's trunk that was close to being torn apart. After attacking its trunk once more, there was now a delay in its attacks, allowing Aurus to unleash an attack.

In an instant, the Spell Core that was attached on Aurus' body started to light up once more as a crude magic circle materialized within again. That's right, Aurus didn't destroy the Spell Core although the skill had the option to do so. It was because he would need it for situations like these.

Only half a second remained before the effect of [Tempest Burst] would disappear.

It took 0.3 seconds for the magic circle to finish conjuring the energy bolt that looked stronger than before. Seeing that time was short, he threw it without hesitation.

Whoos.h.!.+

"[Spirit Wind Bolt]!"

Bang!

Since he was already close to Arogancia's trunk and the energy bolt hit the injured spot, it was not unexpected to see Arogancia's body explode and scatter around a certain radius as multiple splinters of various shapes and sizes. It was a good thing there was no blood since it would definitely make someone gag at first glance.

Aurus looked at the conclusion of their fight and noticed that Arogancia's roots were still firmly stuck on the ground. Not long after, these roots started to decay as green and red blobs of energy headed towards Aurus' body. Aurus didn't reject them at all as he knew its purpose.

He then looked one more time at the scattered remains of Arogancia before continuing onwards on his journey towards the Tempest Ruin.

Ding!

'Aurus has dealt 529 HP damage to [Arogancia].'

'Experience +200'

'Congratulations! Aurus has leveled up.'

'Congratulations! Aurus has leveled up.'

'8 Life Points have been obtained from Arogancia's remains.'

'3 Will Points have been obtained from Arogancia's remains.'

'The Life and Will bar have been unlocked.'

'Skills related to the Life and Will bar have been unlocked.'