After six long, gruelling hours of training, Elliot was surprised to gain three stat points—one in strength and two in endurance.
This also confirmed his previous suspicions: his previous training method had been inefficient. Moreover, now that he had discovered the correct way to condense the energy of attributes into stats points, he could do it much faster than he had imagined it was possible for him to.
This satisfied him more than enough and also lifted his spirits. Thanks to that and following what he had read on the internet while he was doing his research for gym training methodology, he headed to a nearby park for calisthenics.
According to his research, parks were the best free training spots for beginners with strength and agility below 10 points.
And his research proved correct.
In fact, since he had never done calisthenics before and his arms were already strong enough to do all the exercises without problems, he only needed to focus on repeating the agility training. After several hours of repetition, the results were astonishing—he had gained three agility points in just six hours!
For a workout that wasn't too intensive, the improvement was amazing.
Seeing his stat points increase so dramatically wiped away any trace of tiredness he might have felt. Or maybe it was the effect of his enhanced strength—he wasn't sure, but he didn't care. There was no reason to stop if he wasn't tired or feeling sleepy.
The sooner he reached 10 points in a stat, the better.
So, he pushed forward, heading straight to the martial arts center, where he resumed his mixed martial arts training.
He seemed to have lost his mind, but his straight 12 hours of mixed martial arts training were amply fruitful, even if he couldn't score the desired points in those last 12.
By the time he finally stopped, it was again 8 a.m., but this was September 5th. He had awakened two days earlier at night, so not even 48 hours had passed since then.
But the radiant happiness beaming on Elliot's face showed just how fruitful the last few hours had been.
It had been over two years since he last felt this happy.
Naturally, he was looking at his stats.
[ Statistics: ]
| Strength: 8. [+3]
| Resistance: 4. [+4]
| Agility: 3. [+4]
| Sense: 5 (Maximum achievable by the common human).
Remaining Stat Points: 11
Getting 11 stat points in just 24 hours didn't make sense—but as the saying goes, it's the newbie's increase.
Having never undergone this kind of intensive training all his life, his body was experiencing explosive growth, and now that he was finally doing it, his stats were soaring. Perhaps more than anything, his rapid progress was likely due to his increased strength, which skyrocketed in these hours and allowed him to properly train his resistance and agility more effectively.
That's why, despite being completely exhausted, he felt utterly satisfied.
A soft smile formed on his lips.
"I should savor this feeling."
Without hesitation, he immediately allocated all his remaining stat points—raising his strength to 11, resistance to 8, and agility to 7.
He didn't leave even a single stat point free.
He wanted to enjoy the feeling of increasing so many stat points at once.
And likewise, the change was immediate.
A refreshing sensation swept through his body as if the boost was either dulling his pain or making him more resistant to it.
Under a mysterious force, his arms and legs grew stronger, and at the same time, his body suddenly became more fluid, and the flesh and muscles in it became much harder.
Closing his eyes, he let himself bask in the sensation, feeling this moment of joy.
Then, without any warning, he felt an overwhelming drowsiness. His eyelids grew heavy, and he struggled to keep himself awake.
"Oh… I see. It's because of the Sense stat."
His mind was exhausted.
"Even though my body doesn't feel tired, staying awake for 48 hours and pushing myself so hard has greatly exhausted my mind."
That was why his body started to feel sleepy, and the mental fatigue was clearly noticeable on his face, indirectly affecting his body and muscles.
'Mental exhaustion certainly cannot be ignored,' he mused, smiling wryly.
But even his smile looked weary now, and he began to feel as if his whole body was getting heavy.
There was no avoiding it—he had to stop training.
He could worry about looking for a way to increase his Sense attribute another time. Right now, he needed rest.
Returning to his room, he collapsed onto his bed and slept peacefully for several hours.
When he got up, 4 hours had passed, and it was already 12 noon.
Surprisingly, he didn't feel exhausted; instead, he was completely refreshed.
'It was only four hours of sleep, but I already feel like new.' He smiled. It was something that had never happened to him before.
He wondered if he was becoming one of those people who needed very little sleep, increasing their productive time during the day.
'Although that might trigger some problems in the long term.'
His thoughts made him want to make fun of himself. There was no point in worrying about those issues now.
With a refreshed body and a smile on his face, he set out to find the cheapest meal he could find.
His limited funds meant he couldn't eat well, but he was used to it. However, today, he woke up feeling unusually hungry compared to previous months—most likely due to the extreme training he had put himself through.
Still, he had no problem being patient for a few more days. He had endured this lifestyle for four years; a few more days wouldn't hurt.
After having his breakfast in a soup kitchen, Elliot wasted no time and ran back to training, following the same routine as the day before—only increasing its intensity by a large margin this time.
But he had to stop after 10 continuous hours of different types of relentless training.
It was 10:30 at night.
"2 points in agility in the afternoon and 2 in resistance… but I have only obtained 1 point in strength. It seems that this training is no longer as effective."
He looked at his statistics, which had now increased to 12 for strength, 10 for resistance, and 9 for agility. It became clear that he had to start considering whether he should continue with this training or not.
Mentally, he was burning out at an alarming rate. Although he was still making progress, he felt that he was becoming less and less effective at creating stats points, and his gains were slowing down.
The good thing about having a system where you condense the energy inside yourself is that you can realize when an exercise is effective for you. By observing the energy flow inside him, he could determine what workout was more effective and what wasn't.
That would be great in the long term but also in the short term when you're still starting out because you can optimize the time spent on each workout.
Thanks to this ability and his growing mental exhaustion, Elliot concluded that gaining the next two stat points could take him more than a day. That was still impressive, but it wasn't ideal in his case.
Mental exhaustion was problematic in every sense, especially when he couldn't manage to increase even one point in that attribute. Although he tried to ask around for advice, the only information he got was that he needed to go to libraries to read or to attend the academies.
Unfortunately, an academy was out of the question. He had never been able to attend one, and due to his job, he had never been able to go to a library since there were restrictions that prevented the Misfits from entering—only normal or awakened people were allowed access.
With that in mind, he put training on hold and returned to his room.
It wasn't that he was disappointed with gaining two stat points per day—it was an incredible rate. But right now, he already had enough stats to start hunting, which could possibly yield him greater results in the same amount of time.
Although he wasn't yet strong enough to take on the goblins in that dungeon, he wasn't too far off. In the meantime, he could hunt the infamous two-legged rats in the city.
Besides, his priority right now was to increase his Sense. During this time, he realized just how crucial that attribute was, but he needed access to the libraries to improve it.
He ruled out the possibility of going to an academy because he was no longer old enough to enroll in one. If he wanted to go, he would have to enroll immediately, which wasn't something he wanted to do.
That left him with only one alternative: to register with the Awakened Association to certify that he could enter those libraries.
And to register, he needed to increase his strength and reach Awakened Rank—meaning he had to raise two of his stats to 20 points.
This meant one thing: he needed to become strong as soon as possible. And the best way to do that was through hunting.
While he was in his room, he pulled out a map of the city—something he had always had with him in case something happened, and he needed it.
Loen City was truly vast, consisting of multiple small villages with a lot of territory, making it much larger than several large cities in the Kingdom of Arce.
However, in terms of power, it wasn't too powerful. In fact, it was one of the weakest coastal cities in the Kingdom. Although it wasn't close to the coast, two cities still lay between it and the shoreline.
Therefore, although the Loen City was large, its dungeons weren't dangerous, and the types of creatures they attracted weren't strong.
Studying the map, he examined the marked places that belonged to dungeons and began to trace the different routes that led to the two-legged rats' hunting grounds.