Infinite Potential System

The following morning, William resumed his previous routine. He spent the early part of the day experimenting with different Artifacts that duplicated the effects of the Wind Dial, while the evening would be devoted entirely to Cultivation.

William heard a knock at his door around noon, which turned out to be Sir Reynolds holding a set of specialized tools from Riyald's laboratory. At the door, Sir Reynolds dropped off a set of hammers, tongs, chisels, punches, and a few other small items.

"Here are the items you requested, Disciple William. Where should I place the anvil and furnace?"

"Thank you, Sir Reynolds. You can place them in this back corner over here." William pointed to one of the corners that were close to the doorway.

The Artifact Spirit nodded and retrieved the items from a Space Ring he borrowed from Riyald, then left the room quietly. He turned around at the doorway to peek at William, who was already inspecting the items that were brought over.

Sir Reynolds smiled. He was quite satisfied with this version of William, who was much more serious about his work compared to before.

William inspected the items one by one, using his knowledge of each tool to test their effectiveness or whether they needed to be replaced. Even though he had the Forging Talent, William felt like a novice when he first picked up the tools, his hands unaccustomed to the grip on the hammer and tongs.

When he found everything to be in working order, William immediately got to work drafting out a design he had thought of. His experiments with the Wind Dial had found some success lately, and William felt he was finally prepared to create his own Artifact.

But first, I need to be as proficient as possible. William thought to himself as he scrolled through the System Panel.

POTENTIAL POINTS: 16090

Most of this number was from the Soul Stones that William received, while the remainder came from his Potential Farms and a few random waves of Potential Points from the Tribulation and otherwise.

System, upgrade my Forging Talent to S-Rank.

If William had the Potential Points, why not go all the way?

-1375 PP

———

TALENT UPGRADED

Forging: (D --> C)

Effects: Skill with the forge +20% >> +30%

Forging: (C --> B)

Effects: Skill with the forge +30% >> +50%

Forging: (B --> A)

Effects: Skill with the forge +50% >> +100%

Forging: (A --> S)

Effects: Skill with the forge +100% >> +250%

S-Rank Bonus Effect: One year simulation of blacksmithing experience.

Next rank up: 2500PP

———

Since the Forging Talent was only considered a common-tier Talent, the cost to upgrade it was surprisingly cheap.

All the way to S-Rank and I only spent a little over a thousand Potential Points? Not bad at all!

William wasn't worried about the impacts of upgrading the Forging Talent so many ranks at once. After all, his Mind Talent was SS-Rank now; it wasn't like before.

His Mind Talent was more than enough to sustain the amount of knowledge from successive upgrades of the Forging Talent, so William only felt a minor headache that dissipated after a few minutes.

Once the effects of the S-Rank upgrade kicked in, William was pulled into a simulated environment just like when he upgraded his Arrays Talent. There, he spent what felt like a year inside learning the works of all aspects of blacksmithing.

Since he could see the data behind the Talent upgrades, William now understood why sometimes he would feel like a complete noob when using a Talent, even if it was at a high rank.

If William had no knowledge of the forging process and he learned the Forging Talent, he would still know nothing about forging until he was taught. Of course, with each Talent upgrade he was also taught a little bit about the trade skill, so it wasn't truly nothing.

Before receiving the single year of simulated experience, William could say he knew less than three percent of forging. Even with a 250% increase, that number was only around 7.5 percent. It was nothing worth mentioning.

That's why the S-Rank bonus effect was so powerful, since it directly increased his understanding to a confident thirty percent. With the 250% bonus, William was able to bridge the gap between him and master blacksmiths.

William spent another ten thousand Potential Points to upgrade his other Potential Farm to D-Rank, which increased his daily earnings to 300 points. Following this upgrade, there were only 8502 Potential Points remaining until the next System upgrade.

Let's get started with the Artifact.

William created a few pieces of parchment paper, having successfully replicated the material with Magic in the last few weeks while performing experiments. He had also borrowed some ink from Riyald to write with, since he couldn't yet figure out how to replicate it.

A few hours passed, sketch after sketch of what William had in mind forming. In the first thirty minutes or so, William would crumple up the sketch and light it on fire, finding it impossible to create with his current skills.

William suddenly had an idea.

I can't create something smaller, but maybe I can make something larger!

With this thought in mind, by the two-hour mark William had a semi-complete drawing of the Artifact in mind. Inscribed on the paper was a modern-style belt that one would wear for holding their pants up, except it was designed to be made completely out of Starmetal.

The silver belt was an inch thicker than many belts, and there were twenty-seven slots in which a gemstone the size of a thumb could be fit. William chose the number twenty-seven since that was the number of Elements known to the System at its current rank.

He drew the main buckle next, which would be a bit different from the standard belt buckle. Instead of being a clasp for holding the opposite end, it was replaced with a dial that could tighten the belt manually, while another dial directly on top could be turned with the help of Mana.

Turning the second dial would activate a set of self-restoration Arrays that would keep the Artifact in good condition at all times. Additionally, the dial would adopt some of the functions of the Tribulation Transcendence Protective Amulet, designed to erect a powerful barrier if a threatening aura came too close.

William inspected his work, mostly satisfied with the outcome. He retrieved two pieces of Starmetal Ore, then cut them up and tossed a quarter of the amount into the furnace and added some small pieces of charcoal with the Earth Element at the expense of a large amount of Mana.

He used the Fire Element to raise the temperature inside to the desirable amount, then waited for the refinement process to remove impurities in the Starmetal Ore.

Bits of Starmetal dropped to the bottom of the furnace in a semi-refined state, so William picked up the pieces and threw them back with the rest for further refinement. He continued this process for a few hours, until the metal was fully refined and ready to be hammered into shape.

William retrieved the Starmetal from the furnace with some tongs, then placed it on the anvil and had an Array Puppet hold it in place while he began shaping the metal.

William finished refining and shaping the Starmetal Ore by midnight, speeding up the process with the help of his Magic. He laid out the individual parts of the belt on a table, ensuring that each was correctly shaped and had no imperfections.

Everything is in working order, now it's time to add the Arrays.

William spent the entire night copying Arrays from the Wind Dial to the new Artifact. While he initially was very careful not to damage the Starmetal, he quickly realized that the metal was much more durable than that of his own Array Puppets.

Even after applying over six hundred improved Perfect Arrays, William could tell that the Starmetal wasn't stressed at all. That being said, he didn't consider adding too many Complete Arrays due to the immense difficulty, limiting the number to ten per segment of the belt.

His current limit was only forty Complete Arrays at one time, which would slowly improve as he became accustomed to the process but weren't nearly enough to compare with six hundred improved Perfect Arrays.

William continued adding Arrays to the belt over the next four days, occasionally needing to replace a segment of the belt when he made a mistake.

By the end of its creation, a total of four pieces of Starmetal Ore were consumed. William pieced the segments together in a few minutes and placed the semi-completed product on the table face-up to evaluate his work.

William stared at the twenty-seven empty sockets on the belt.

Now for the hardest part. he thought to himself.

William focused hard on the environment as he called the surrounding Wind Element Mana to form a greenish-yellow sphere. He continued adding Mana, the sphere of Wind becoming more and more unstable while he tried to maintain its form.