His hand shot out surprisingly fast and grasped my arm. I felt a burning sensation.

  You have been provided with portal access to Emil Larsen’s portal and lab. Limited permission granted.

  Do you wish to portal to this new location?

  I heard the sound of gunfire; the world was going crazy and I couldn’t help but feel that I was missing something major. I heard more gunfire outside and people screaming. Every fiber in my being was screaming for me to go save the innocent. Yet something held me back. I didn’t know enough. As eccentric as Emil was; I wanted to trust him. And based on Uncle Dan’s comments about Emil, I agreed.

  I accepted the portal and the world around me faded.

  As I blinked to clear my eyes, I wondered just where I’d ended up. A wave of dense mana enveloped me, thicker than fog on a cold morning. It was so concentrated that for a moment—it was hard to breathe, like trying to inhale under water.

  Time didn’t seem to mean anything as I felt the mana filling me more densely than ever before.

  Danger! You have been exposed to a build-up of mana equivalent to legendary tier mana.

  Status condition: Mana Poisoning- Minor Damage: 50 per minute

  It is recommended that you evolve your race or otherwise adapt to this concentration of mana.

  My body adjusted… slowly acclimatizing to the mana saturation, and I took my first proper breath in Emil's underground lab. The debuff was still there, and I felt the pain as my body was being eaten by the mana, yet it wasn’t so severe that I couldn’t keep up with it. My healing spells would easily be enough until I could figure out how to adapt to this better.

  The portal behind me pulsed steadily, a beacon of power in a room that was a cross between a high-tech facility and a mad scientist's dream. The air shimmered with mana, making the edges of objects blur slightly, as if I was seeing them through a heat haze.

  It took me a second to realize what was off about the portal. I stared at it and then it hit me. The portal was on. It hadn’t shut down after I entered the lab. In fact, I was pretty sure it had been on before I arrived. That was the only logical explanation for the density of mana here, a density which far exceeded any dungeon I’d ever been in. I felt like the clan leader was standing in front of me, but he wasn’t holding his aura back.

  My mind raced as I tried to understand the ramifications of what was going on here. Had Emil done this on purpose? It was potentially genius. More mana would mean more power. Maybe he’d found a way to accelerate growth. Or perhaps… no, I put that thought aside for later. I needed to take stock of where I was.

  The lab was cluttered with equipment ranging from the rudimentary to the highly advanced. Beakers filled with liquids of various colors bubbled quietly on one side, connected to intricate glassware setups that reminded me of an alchemist's workshop. In contrast, the other side housed sleek, modern machinery that hummed with electricity, screens displaying data in a relentless stream of numbers and graphs. I widened my eyes in surprise. How on earth had Emil managed to use working equipment around this much mana? It was going to have to be a question for future Silas to figure out.

  My focus was distracted for a second as more notifications popped up.

  Mana saturation is resulting in ability growth:

  Identify +16%

  Translate +19%

  Loot +8%

  Save for Winter +3%

  Mini-Map +28%

  My head throbbed as the notification went through me.

  Status condition: Mana Poisoning- Lesser Damage: 75 per minute

  That wasn’t good. If it kept increasing, eventually it would reach a point that I couldn’t keep up with it. That put a new sense of urgency into me as I continued to explore.

  The cages drew my attention next. Each enclosure was a showcase of Emil's audacious experiments, blending fauna in ways nature never intended. His comments about DNA took on new meaning as I stared at the horror show in front of me.

  The first cage that drew my eye was an anomaly—a turtle, its shell a familiar dome, yet its head was that of a serpent, complete with flickering tongue and sharp, observant eyes that seemed to pierce through the glass, assessing me with an unsettling acuity. Yet for all the reptilian features, it also had clawed feet closer to those of a cat, and a bit of patchy fur along its legs.

  Adjacent to this peculiar hybrid, a creature that defied any conventional classification fluttered weakly. It was ostensibly a bird, yet its body was cloaked in the soft, dense fur typical of a hamster. Its wings, disproportionately large and feathered, beat the air ineffectually, struggling to achieve the lift its avian parts were designed for. The hybrid's movements were awkward and painful to watch as it squawked and tried to throw itself against the bars of its cage.

  The next enclosure presented a spectacle that was both bizarre and unsettling. A snake, elongated and lithe, hosted a series of hamster heads along its body. Each head was fully formed, with beady eyes and twitching whiskers, surveying its surroundings with an eerie synchronicity. This grotesque concatenation of mammal and reptile moved with a disturbing fluidity, the hamster heads seeming to confer among themselves in silent communion. How such a thing could actually be living was going to be nightmare fuel—as if I didn’t already have enough of that.

  In another cage, a creature that might once have been a hamster commanded immediate attention, not for its familiar form but for its sheer size and the anomalous additions to its anatomy. It was the size of a medium dog, its body a patchwork of textures and colors. Clumps of bird feathers sprouted in haphazard clusters along its back, an incongruous sight against the rodent's bulk. Its eyes, too large for its furry face, imparted a look of constant surprise, as if it too found its existence perplexing.

  Beyond these, the array of hybrids varied wildly. One cage housed a creature that seemed to merge the aquatic grace of a fish with the terrestrial agility of a cat, its scales shimmering with iridescent colors as it paced its aquatic-terrarium, eyes keen and tail flicking water with feline precision. Another enclosure contained a hybrid that combined the robustness of a boar with the aerial grace of an eagle, its body covered in coarse hair, wings folded awkwardly on its back, snout rooting against the cage floor, searching for something beyond its grasp.

  I struggled to understand what Emil was trying to accomplish with these creatures, then I remembered reading that Emil had some type of beast tamer class. Was that what he was trying to do? Was he building an army of creatures here on Earth?

  Mana saturation is resulting in ability growth:

  Adorably Harmless +14%

  Halo of Rebirth +11%

  Hunter’s Instinct +34%

  Vampiric Aura +15%

  Inheritance: Inspiring Presence +12%

  Status condition: Mana Poisoning- Moderate Damage: 125 per minute

  I cursed. The essentially free gains to my abilities were amazing. In what only felt like ten minutes, I had gained in more than half of my abilities. If I could stay here long enough, I’d be able to push them all up to epic.

  The only problem being that a couple more jumps like this and the damage would outpace my healing. As it was now, I could stand here for half an hour without concern, but that could change quickly. I needed to finish searching the lab for any explanation. Emil wanted me to see something here… or at least he wanted me here for something, so I went back to searching.

  As I moved through the lab, observing these living contradictions, I noted the meticulous care that had been taken in their housing. Each cage was tailored to the specific needs of its occupant—with climate controls, feeding stations, and enrichment items—designed to accommodate their unique physiologies and behaviors. It seemed that far from being cruel, Emil had tried to accommodate each of the mutations.

  What was it that he’d asked of me? He said to feed them. He said he was worried about them. Except, I got the sense that these creatures were being sustained by the mana as much as by any food that they had. There were still large tanks of water and food which had been connected to each of the cages. The creatures would likely have months of food.

  The other obvious concern was their waste products, but each of the cage floors had a type of mechanism built in so the waste could be destroyed. It was oddly efficient, and I wished I had more time to study it. The technology looked beyond human levels, but maybe Emil’s class or occupation had given him access to knowledge beyond human science, especially if it could work in such a high concentration of mana.

  Out of curiosity I focused on the large tank of water and pushed with Identify. My head was still throbbing, but I kept pushing it. I made use of the abundance of mana around me as I pushed it into the ability.

  Mana-Infused Water (Epic) – this water has been exposed to sufficient levels of mana for long enough that it has ceased to be simple H2O. It is now useful for evolution, advancement, and crafting.

  Before I even thought about what I was doing, I activated my spatial storage and pulled out two of my largest water bottles. Stanley’s might be durable, but I could only hope that they’d hold up to mana-infused water.

  I emptied them of their contents and then went to the spigot and filled them up with the contents of the tank. I could only take a small amount, but this might be useful later on.

  Opening your spatial storage has exposed the contents to an influx of mana.

  All items within save for winter have experienced 128 days of growth.

  Status condition: Mana Poisoning- Serious Damage: 250 per minute

  My mind was racing now. The notifications were coming faster. I felt so powerful here, but I couldn’t stay here long. I kept asking myself why Emil had wanted me to come here, but then realized that I needed to just get out and take my time to think things through. I triggered my portal to return home, or at least I tried to.

  Mana concentration is interfering with recall function. Please leave the area of mana concentration before attempting recall again.

  Shit. What now?

  Chapter 60- Ground Zero: Oslo

  Earth Countdown: 371 days, 20 hours, 48 minutes

  I looked around for any options. The mana intensity was only growing heavier. Then it hit me. The system was recommending that I evolve my race. Maybe that would do it. I opened my spatial storage and felt another influx of mana flow into it, but I ignored the notification as I pulled out the object I was looking for.

  Tome of Racial Evolution (epic)- Human: this book will teach you a path to evolve your race. Change comes with a price. Be sure this is the path you want to take.

  Samvek had warned me about this, but death was a pretty strong extenuating circumstance in my mind. Besides, he’d said I could read about it, just not actually use it. So I cracked the book open. It was about four inches think and probably twelve inches high and eight inches wide.

  This tome has been generated specifically for your race. This is one of many various paths which might be applicable. The goal of all paths is the continued evolution of every species. Stagnation is death.

  Okay, so far so good. Then as I started to read it, between castings of Restorative Grace, I found myself growing more confused. It talked about DNA and the building blocks of carbon based life forms, although as I continued reading, it seemed to claim that once inducted, a human was no longer a carbon based life form. Rather, over time, human biology on a molecular level, would be adapted and modified into a mana based lifeform. In essence, Forerunners were the progenitors for their race evolutions. Ideas and postulations formed in my head, but now wasn’t the time.

  I read for another ten minutes managing to keep ahead of the damage, but not by that much. There were instructions about how to use mana infusion and a bunch of materials that I didn’t recognize to boost stats, change my molecular composition, and even alter my brain chemistry. There wasn’t anything about meridians or dantians so at least it wasn’t some kinda cultivation method.

  Mana saturation is resulting in ability growth:

  Hunter’s Tether +26%

  Shape Conjured Construct +9%

  Force Projection +8%

  Stealth +69%

  Inheritance: Spirit Walk +10%

  Inheritance 2: Spirit Singing +4%

  Status condition: Mana Poisoning- Critical Damage: 750 per minute

  Hmm… this time, the damage tripled rather than doubled. Without healing, I’d be dead in less than seven minutes. I didn’t have time for this anymore. I’d been half willing to try evolving my race despite Samvek’s warning, but what I’d read had only served to convince me that he was correct.

  I hopped back up and started looking around. I found an odd device next to the portal. It connected to the side of the panel and then led to a display panel. The technology was far beyond anything I thought humans were capable of but it didn’t look like a system construct either… interesting. I would love to ask Emil how he did it. With his help we might be able to rebuild our technology.

  If I had to guess, this was the device that was keeping the portal open. I just didn’t know why Emil wanted that to happen. Or was it possible that someone else had caused all this? No… I shook my head. I didn’t think that was the case. This was Emil’s doing. I knew it down to my core. But why?

  Then the pain in my body and the strain the mana was putting on me started to push such concerns aside.

  You have temporarily resisted genetic mutation. Continued exposure will increase your risk.

  I looked at the snake with chipmunk heads all over its body and shuddered. That was not going to happen to me.

  I began studying the interface and as I put my hand on it, text ran across the display. Limited authorization recognized. Do you wish to exit this facility?

  I clicked the ‘yes’ immediately.

  Error… lab is currently subterranean. It must be raised to ground level in order to open the door.

  I turned from the panel for a moment and flew across the room, throwing myself into the sole metal door in the room. The metal dented, my bones shook and for a second I wondered if I’d broken something.

  Physical trauma identified in new specimen. Augmentation protocols initiated.

  The voice came from the panel. It clearly wasn’t the system, yet I didn’t know what it meant. Then a strobe light like device descended from the ceiling. It pulsed with an even denser concentration of mana. My arm was hanging limply at my side from where I’m slammed into the door. Maybe that was why I moved too slowly or maybe I never had a chance in the first place, but a beam of light blasted out of the strobe and struck me.

  I screamed as pain lit up my world. My arm felt like it was being ground down, and then pasted back together.

  Target is resisting. Recommend increasing exposure levels. Mana pulse will weaken resistance.

  Limited benefits obtained. DNA changed 0.0004%.

  Then a system notification followed.

  Durability: +35

  That was a huge bump to a stat and it seemed to be permanent. Whatever system Emil had set up was designed to forcibly evolve the creatures here. I would have been tempted to stay inside and weather this as long as possible if I could gain benefits like this, but the message about my DNA being changed was enough to squash that idea.

  I returned to the panel and triggered the sequence to raise the lab. Since I’d been portalled in, I hadn’t yet seen what Emil’s home or base area looked like from the outside. The sound of heavy machinery starting to grind surrounded me and the entire room began shaking.

  I couldn’t see outside, but it felt like the building was pushing up through the ground. Then I heard wood splitting, glass breaking, and general sounds of destruction. I estimated with a fair degree of accuracy thanks to Perception that we’d risen a little more than twenty feet. Then the roof of the lab started to open and unfold.

  As they did, I saw that the lab was now in the remains of what must have been a home in Oslo. We were in a lightly residential area with a park right next to us. Walls, once upright and defining the boundaries of domestic life, now lay in ruins. Furniture, fixtures, and the remnants of everyday living were strewn about, crushed under the weight of the ascending lab. It was a destruction artist's canvas—plaster, wood, and glass mingled together in disarray. The remains of the house's second story clung to the edges of the lab's walls like torn fabric, flapping weakly in the breeze as if in a final protest.

  The lab continued to rise, the unfolding process revealing the suburban neighborhood around it. The houses were typical of a quiet residential area—each one distinct, yet uniformly neat, with manicured lawns and gardens that spoke of a community's unspoken pride. At least they were until the walls opened like some vast metallic flower and crushed in part, or in whole, Emil’s closest neighbors’ homes. I tried to cry out a warning but saw people attempting to scramble from the houses before they were crushed. Most but not all made it and I wasn’t happy to have a high enough Perception to hear their last cries for help or especially the sounds of their bones being crushed.

  Vehicles, parked or slowly moving along the roads, halted as their drivers and passengers witnessed the unfathomable sight. A couple walking their dog down the sidewalk, screamed in terror and went running with their pet leading the way.

  The park adjacent to the wreckage was a stark contrast to the chaos beside it. It was a swath of tranquility, with playground equipment that stood silent and expectant, waiting for the laughter and chatter of children. Benches lined the walkways, inviting rest and reflection, while trees provided a canopy of shade, their leaves whispering secrets to each other in the light morning breeze. I could pick out a number of small animals including some gray squirrels.

  People, scattered across the park and the surrounding sidewalks, stopped their morning routines to stare at the unfolding spectacle. Dog walkers, joggers, and parents with strollers stood frozen, their expressions ranging from confusion to fear. Some reached for their phones, capturing the moment with shaky hands, while others backed away slowly, unsure of the safety of being this close to potential disaster.