After waiting for Lyrica to completely enter the trial space for the Nirvana Soul Blades, Shiro hopped off the tree and made her way to the city. Even though she promised Kanae that she would stay put for a few days, she would feel bored if she just did nothing. Therefore, she wanted to use this time to continue her search for the jade ice that would help her with her star up.
Walking along her usual route to the city, Shiro frowned slightly when she felt the presences of two people sneaking up on her.
While normal adventurers would have a hard time discovering them. How could Shiro, who was at the apex in her past life, overlook them?
Sighing for a slight moment, Shiro purposefully exposed an opening for the two to attack her.
'Did they see through it?' Shiro thought to herself with a frown.
This frown only deepened as they never took the bait.
'Could I have encountered two experts? That shouldn't be. Otherwise, they wouldn't have been so easy to discover.' Shiro thought with a sigh.
However, just as she sighed, the two reached out their hands in order to kidnap her.
Even though her mind was wandering, Shiro was still accustomed to multitasking and could react to the situation easily.
Since the two weren't anyone she knew, all restraints were unlocked as she went into instant kill mode.
*Kacha
Before the two even noticed what happened, Shiro had already broken their elbows. Grabbing their jaws with her hands, she stepped on their foot whilst tugging the jaws down with her full strength.
*PSHH!!!!
While she tugged downwards, her shoulder had collided with their throats and gave her the perfect moment to rip their jaws off. Shiro didn't know why but a sadistic grin crept up on her face, she could even feel her joy for killing increase every passing second.
Discarding the lower jaws in her hands, Shiro twisted her body so that she faced them. When the two men saw her face, they were both horrified at the fact that she looked like she was enjoying every moment of this.
Her pupils glowed with an ominous blue light as sweat dripped down their backs. They cursed at their boss who had sent them on this mission.
Within the next moment, Shiro had already plunged her hands down their throats whilst making Blue Fire inside their bodies. Seeing their pain, Shiro's grin only increased as she snapped her fingers and nanobots started to devour them from the inside out.
After a short moment, all that remained of the two were slight traces of blood that had been splattered around the area.
"Hmm, well that was refreshing." Shiro muttered as her expression reverted back to normal. Glancing at her hands, she started to wonder to herself.
'Hmm… seems like my restraint towards killing my enemies are harder to control?' Shiro thought to herself.
"Meh, not like I restrained myself much when I killed them anyways." She shrugged her shoulders. It wasn't as if she never killed anyone before.
However, the fact that her restraints that she had subconsciously placed on herself were loosening was a little concerning.
Making a slightly complicated face, Shiro sighed.
'I've been a little too relaxed. I should probably take some time out to rein in all of my killing intent.'
She had been using it quite a lot during the time that she was in the dungeon. Naturally, that meant the control she had over it wasn't as sturdy.
Once she had arrived at the city, Shiro proceeded to walk towards the alchemist association. On the way, Yin was hungry again causing Shiro to glance at her with an indescribable expression.
"Don't you think you're starting to eat a lot more now? Could it be like what happened to me and the E ranked stones?" Shiro asked.
Yin pondered for a moment and nodded.
Shaking her head, Shiro pulled out a few D ranked mana stones and handed them over to Yin. However, Yin had seen a little kid with a lollipop and had the odd desire to make something similar.
Looking at the D ranked mana stone, Yin slapped Shiro's head to get her attention.
"Ow, didn't I just give you the mana stone? Why did you smack my head?" Shiro asked as she glanced upwards.
Looking at the kid that Yin was pointing to, Shiro couldn't help but raise an eyebrow.
"You want a lollipop?"
Seeing Yin nod, Shiro took the mana stone from her and made a stick using her nanobots. Naturally, out of people's sight.
*Chirp!
Chirping in delight, Yin grabbed the lollipop and stuffed it in her mouth.
Looking at Yin, Shiro couldn't help but chuckle at the fact that she was just like a spoiled baby sister.
'Well I suppose that's not inaccurate.'
Glancing at Yin's blissful face, Shiro couldn't help but wonder what difference the stick made.
Making herself a lollipop, she also stuffed it in her mouth.
"Oh my. Well this is certainly a little different." Shiro muttered whilst eating her mana stone lollipop.
"Wait… I can get away with eating mana stones if they're like lollipops!" Shiro thought as her eyes glistened slightly.
There was always the problem of having to hide what she was eating when she went out with people. However, with her makeshift lollipop's, she would be able to eat mana stones blatantly.
Smiling with bliss at the new discovery, the pair of bird and snow girl attracted a few gazes. The fact that they were both eating lollipops with such a happy face caused a few people to chuckle and smile.
Arriving at the alchemist association, Shiro popped a new lollipop in both her's and Yin's mouth before entering.
The design of the alchemist association was much more orderly when compared to the other associations. There were signs everywhere and everyone were working without too much delay in their actions.
In addition to this, the scent of medicine and different concoctions drifted in the air causing her to wrinkle her nose slightly. Since her senses were better than the average person, the stench was especially strong for her.
"Hello, welcome to the Alchemist Association. How may I help you today?" The receptionist smiled warmly when she saw Shiro eating a lollipop along with her bird.
It gave her the feeling that she was a curious child looking around the place.
[Yes, I would like to ask if I could purchase 3 pieces of Jade Ice.] Shiro asked.
"Three pieces of Jade Ice? Hm, we do have some in stock but they're more expensive than the current market price since the demand is rather high right now." She smiled apologetically.
[That's no problem. How much is it in total?]
"3 pieces of Jade Ice will cost a total of 39 million USD."
Hearing the price, Shiro felt the corner of her lips twitch.
Paying the money, the receptionist soon returned with three pieces of the Jade Ice.
Sighing in relief that she had fulfilled everything she needed for her star up, Shiro left the building and walked towards a low level dungeon. She didn't want to star up in the middle of the street after all.
Arriving at the Giant's Heart dungeon once more, Shiro snuck inside and made sure that there were no enemies around her during her star up.
Looking a her system interface, she pressed yes for the star up.
A blizzard suddenly picked up around her as Yin was thrown backwards.
Shiro had to grit her teeth feeling the piercing cold. After becoming a snow girl, she had never one felt cold but this blizzard was different. It was so cold that Shiro could feel as if her entire body was being frozen from the inside out.
Surprisingly, she could even see a layer of ice being formed over her body. Her breaths were becoming sharper as her vision was blurring.
Glancing around, she could faintly see that the entire chamber had become an ice cave. Thankfully, Yin was safe.
She suddenly felt a sharp pain in her brain and passed out.
###
It was unsure how long it had been, but when Shiro opened her eyes again, the blizzard had long died down. Not only that, there was also not a single thing in the chamber than wasn't frozen, except for Yin of course.
Glancing at her rewards for the 4th star up, Shiro wasn't too surprised about the bonuses.
[Snow Girl ★★★★]
300 free points per level up.
2% increased in ice elemental attack effectiveness and efficiency.
Skill gained: Cold Illusions.
Cold Illusions: Activate while in a cold environment. The skill will cast an illusion on your enemies and confuse them during the fight. Effectiveness and duration depends on the difference in strength.
Cost: 1,000MP per activation
Duration: N/A
Cool Down: 5 minutes when the illusion is broken.
With this star up, it only left her 5th and final star up before she could attempt her second class up.
However, now that her second class upgrade was just around the corner, Shiro couldn't help but grow worried due to the fact that the second class would no doubt need her to increase one of her attunements to Tier 3.
Just upgrading her Ice Attunement to Tier 2 caused such a strong backlash, she knew that she definitely wouldn't be able to upgrade to Tier 3 before she healed her Mana Links.
Glancing at Yin, who was somehow able to sleep in this situation, Shiro sat down and closed her eyes. She wanted to inspect her Mana Realm and see if there were any improvements. The reason as to why she hadn't entered before now was due to the fact that one could only upgrade their elemental islands once in a while, paired with her broken mana links, Shiro needed to wait longer than usual before she could re-enter her Mana Realm to upgrade her islands.
After a short moment, Shiro found herself back in her chaotic mana realm.
Looking at the links that were still broken and mashed up, Shiro couldn't help but want to cry.
If you're going to reincarnate me, at least give me a working body!
Sighing at her current dilemma, she looked towards her elemental islands. Right now the lightning island had a few mountains with thunder clouds in the sky and the shadow islands is well… completely covered in shadows.
The only one left was her Metal island.
Since the other islands were already at Tier 1, she may as well upgrade the metal island so that it wasn't left behind.
Floating over to the island, Shiro landed with a soft thud. Glancing at the silver strands of mana that were floating around, she narrowed her eyes and raised her hands up.
Mana gathered towards her palm as Shiro could already feel a bit of pain creeping up on her. However, this was unlike when she upgraded her ice island. The pain wasn't as intense and the difficulty was easier as well.
After gathering her mana for a short moment, Shiro slammed her palm into the ground.
*KISH KISH KISH KISH!
Metal started to erupt out of the ground as it started to convert the island into a metal island.
Once the entire island was converted, Shiro saw that her Metal Attunement had successfully been upgraded to Tier 1.
She smiled softly and exited the mana realm. Once she returned to her body, she felt a bit of blood leak out between her lips as just upgrading to Tier 1 still incurred a little bit of backlash.
"Well that's sorted." Shiro sighed out as she stood up.
She glanced briefly at her stats and noted that not much had changed except that a new skill was under the snow girl tab and her human's killed increased from 7 to 9.
The next thing she wanted to check was her appearance. Every star up brought her changes to her appearance.
Conjuring up an ice mirror, Shiro glanced at her appearance and sighed at the fact that it seemed like her height had not changed at all. However, as her eyes drifted downwards, she widened them in surprise.
"I got tits!" She called out in shock.
While the growth wasn't huge, what used to be called a runway had now evolved into two speed bumps.
"Umu umu good start!" Shiro couldn't suppress the smile that crept up on her face. Finally! She was showing signs of growth on the physical side!
Walking with a slight skip in her steps, she scooped Yin towards her chest.
"Fufufu, Little Yin. Guess what? This lady is finally growing!" Shiro laughed as her body had been plaguing her mind for so long. Watching her friend, *ahem* Madison, suddenly grow out a pair of melons while she was still in the body that could best be described as jailbait, wasn't the most pleasant feeling.
She would have been happy for even a little bit of growth in her b.r.e.a.s.t department but it seemed like all of her nutrients went into her height during the previous star ups.
HOWEVER! The runway Shiro is long gone and instead, speed bump Shiro had joined the fight!
Walking out of the dungeon, her delighted mood seemed to roll off of her as it was causing the people around her to feel their moods lift up as well.
A few unsavoury fellows had something else lift up but Shiro wasn't about to let that destroy her mood of finally growing more on the physical side.
Walking back towards the campsite, she was going to try to get back before Kanae woke up. Or else she may have to sit through a mini lecture about not going to the city since it was dangerous.