Infinite Potential System

"Hello?" Carl's confused voice sounded from the other end of Filipe's communicator.

He had just set up his bedding to Cultivate, but his plans were foiled when the Artifact was thrown at him. William, the party responsible for the thrown Artifact, was standing on a pillar of ice tapping away at another Greater Fire Shard with his chisel.

Not only that, but a series of Arrays quickly surrounded Carl's position, soundproofing the entire area so no one outside could hear their conversation.

William mouthed the word "sorry" to Carl, holding the chisel in one hand and a freshly extracted Greater Fire Shard in the other. He clearly wanted to communicate that his hands were full, but Carl wouldn't fall for it. He knew Will had at least a dozen Space Rings.

"Carl, is that you? Where's Wi- Yuming?" Gunther asked.

"He's here, but busy." Carl replied while flashing a middle finger in William's direction. An appropriate response in his opinion.

"Oh. Charlotte is back, but we can't stay in the Sect for long, where should we meet you?" Gunther skipped the greetings and got to the point.

Carl looked over at William, who had already explained they'd be in the caves until the Beast Tide.

"We won't be in the area for a while, but maybe you could take a mission that's close to Blue Moon City." he replied simply.

He and Gunther spoke about a few more specifics, Tia and Charlotte chiming in from time to time. After they had sorted everything out, Gunther thanked Filipe for letting them use the communicator and hung up the call.

"If we're going to Blue Moon City, you should probably take the same mission our junior Disciples have been." Filipe said.

"What mission?" Gunther and Tia asked simultaneously. They spent most of their time training, and rarely listened to the inter-Sect gossip, so they were completely out of the loop.

"The Beast Tides have become more intense lately, and Blue Moon City has been asking for help defending. The pay isn't that good, but everyone gets a share of Magical Beast materials depending on their contribution." Filipe explained.

He had been watching this development closely, even planning to visit Blue Moon City himself. Bored in the Sect, Filipe had become a Blacksmith, so any rare materials would help him better hone his trade, and maybe even earn a decent amount of Mana Stones in the process.

The others agreed to Filipe's suggestion and decided to join the next Beast Tide. Though Filipe wasn't planning to follow William and the others after the Tide, he tagged along for the time being.

Gunther, Tia, Filipe, and Charlotte met with Yuming to pass along the information, who also accepted the same mission. He packed away his Alchemy cauldron and other ingredients he owned into the Specialized Titanium Space Ring William gave him, then took care of some loose ends in the Sect.

They spent the next day gathering the necessary materials and Pills for the trip, then left the Sect through the main entrance. At a moderate speed, the trip would take about seven days, only slightly slower than William and Carl.

***

After four straight days of extracting Greater Fire Shards, William's hands were starting to hurt.

He was honestly amazed that he managed to go so long without losing interest in the task, but he had always been the type of person to easily spend hours hyper-focused on things he enjoyed.

To William, seeing the blue text box fill up with notifications of "+25 PP" were so satisfying that he didn't want to stop. Before he knew it, he had extracted the shards for four days.

His speed was slightly faster than the first extraction, but after needing to create more cotton padding and even having Carl spend all his Mana to create stone boxes for storage, the added efficiency evened out. William wasn't complaining, though.

That was because he had earned an additional 7200 Greater Fire Shards, totaling 7430 in his Space Rings. Since each Greater Fire Shard was worth 25 Potential Points, that meant William had earned 180,000 Points in the last four days!

System, isn't this too broken? Why would you keep giving me Potential Points? William asked honestly.

-The Host is gathering natural resources manually. There's no reason not to issue rewards.

The System had reverted to its usual robotic voice, with little emotion compared to before. William noticed that this would happen often when the System was preparing for an upgrade, though he hadn't spent the Potential Points yet.

As much as I want to keep earning Points, I need a break. It's time to upgrade some Talents!

William opened up his System Panel and scrolled through to see which Talents would be the most useful to upgrade. It only took a moment to figure out what he needed to upgrade, since his Magic shouldn't be upgraded until he returned to the Ruins.

I would like to upgrade my Arrays Talent again, but it's not as reliable as some of my other abilities.

No one could guarantee that William would have time to put up an Array before he was attacked, no matter how strong the Array was. Not to mention that he always found himself trying to suppress his skill with Arrays, since so few Cultivators had actually reached the Perfect level.

The Physical Talents were the most reliable for now, while the others could wait until he was back in the Ruins.

System, upgrade my Hard Skin, Strength, Stamina, and Regeneration Talents.

It was the same request William had made but a few days ago. Before, upgrading the Talents cost him a total of ten thousand Potential Points, but this time it would cost forty thousand, a sharp increase from before.

-40000 PP

———

TALENTS UPGRADED

Hard Skin: (SS --> SSR)

Effects: Skin Cell amount, toughness, and compression +1200% >> +2400%

SS-Rank Bonus Effect improved.

SSR-Rank Bonus Effect: Rate of Skin Cell damage reduced by 100%

Next rank up: 50000PP

———

Strength: (SS --> SSR)

Effects: Full-body muscular ability +1200% >> +2400%

SS-Rank Bonus Effect improved.

SSR-Rank Bonus Effect: Chance of physical strain reduced by 100%

Next rank up: 50000PP

———

Stamina: (SS --> SSR)

Effects: Resistance to fatigue +1200% >> +2400%

SS-Rank Bonus Effect improved.

SSR-Rank Bonus Effect: Quickly recover your stamina when out of combat. When at full stamina, your first physical move is 50% more powerful and efficient.

Next rank up: 50000PP

———

Regeneration: (SS --> SSR)

Effects: Natural healing ability improved by 1200% >> 2400%, then healing speed improved by another 1200% >> 2400%

SS-Rank Bonus Effect: Host can recover from almost any physical injury, no matter the severity.

Side Effect: Healing injuries hastens the rate of cell division and will cause the Host to age by one year after healing 30 >> 120 years' worth of injuries.

Next rank up: 50000PP

———

Each of the Talents doubled in strength, while only the Regeneration Talent's Bonus Effect didn't improve. Instead, the Side Effect became four times weaker, which was exactly what William was hoping for.

All of William's injuries combined didn't equal 120 years, so he hoped that meant he would no longer age unless in extremely dangerous situations.

He reached forward to punch lightly at the air, controlling his strength as best as he could to limit it to the Nascent Soul Realm. This proved to be too difficult, since William accidentally used too much power and obliterated the opposite wall of the cave.

With just one punch at less than thirty percent power, William's strength had breached the Soul Formation Realm. If he used full power, there was a high chance that he could damage a Tribulation Transcendence Cultivator!