Farmers delight

As it had been a long day he decided to rest and harvest some more plants, began to mature increasing his daily work a bit more with the maintenance and pollination. He did this a couple ways to try and determine the most effective method, eventually settling on using a cotton swab he had in his first aid kit and swabbing the insides of the flowers, then repeating it in another plants flower to mix the pollen. After about thirty minutes of hand pollination he was done for now, quickly whipping up one of his few remaining rations and dicing up the tomatoes for topping along with one of his smoked fish.

It had started getting late so he postponed starting the knife arts till tomorrow, finishing his night after downing a little time reading one of the hundreds of books left in the cabinet. The next day he started a new routine of full heartedly devoting his time to magic training during the day after field work (harvesting and pollinating) and began his knife training in the evening after some more work. Before finishing off his day reading through the enormous stack of magic related books. This allowed him to comprehend more about the different magic types and how to begin awakening his affinities.

For his nature magic to awaken he had to meditate near the crops till he was able to sense the invisible man's particles which were absorbed and emitted in its process of cellular respiration. During the week spent training his knife skills, he made slight progress. He was able to vaguely sense the mana particles, but it would take a while to fully grasp before he could even begin to absorb any of the particles. He learned that being able to absorb the mana particles of the certain elements refines the elemental affinity. Once the rank increases past a certain percent the amassed mana is absorbed and infused into the mana core. This is a complex magic circle with the center of the formation being heart. This allows the mana to rotate around the heart in the form of rings, the more concentrated the ring, the more developed the affinity. Each advancement in tier combines the three rings developed during that tier with a ring being added at every level increase (John currently has two rings formed as he increased in rank once, plus a ring is developed when the affinity is obtained, thus allowing the user to utilize that form of magic). The texts also stated that there is no limit on how many types of mana one can wield, only that the heart must be reinforced by numerous methods to be able to handle more types without overheating and/or exploding.

He was completely shocked by the severity of the situation but learning that he unconsciously had developed several element rings around his heart made him worry about the other new changes that could be occurring to his body without his knowledge. After putting aside his worries, he decided that there was nothing he could do about it in his current situation and decided to get back to training. He struggled hard through the daily training as per usual but had more time than usual due to the majority of the tomatoes being pollinated and still in the process of developing fruits. While the remainder of the crops were showing an expedited growth rate compared to usual but still were larger and more complex foods and required a more significant period to develop. This let him lay back and put a serious effort to reading more of the tomes and books, resulting in a new discovery, a huge number of cultivation scrolls for him to try out. The cultivation techniques were vast and held numerous benefits and abilities, he tried them all out and ended with the same result, failure. This caused him to go for a more in-depth survey of the scrolls and cultivation associated tomes to attempt to understand how to use them. 

Through using the knowledge in the tomes, he had found a way to get a better connection with his mana flow and to cultivate his dantian (the lower dantian specifically is the energy center, where martial artists and cultivators gather qi/life force), which made him awe at the catacomb of knowledge he now had unlimited access to. He eventually realized why the techniques wouldn't work and he would have to painstakingly go through the techniques and attempt to alter it for the higher tier physique he had developed. He scoured though all the cultivation texts and was able to get a general understanding, in his era the cultivation techniques of the past were mostly lost to time leaving only the most basic of qi gathering techniques for the general public's use, with the most powerful families being those which had not lost the cultivation techniques of old. Due to this the only thing that students got as a mercy from the dungeon management bureau and the government was a basic technique which didn't allow for dantian development, but rather to simply open the meridians located on the back in order to draw in energy and use the body as a much similar and less refined energy storage. With the little time he had left at the end of each day he was able to train in it for about half an hour before his body couldn't handle the insane quality and concentration of qi in the dungeon at least that was up until that point. 

Now he figured out that since his body was too advanced and refined with the mana from deep in the dungeon, his dantian required a much higher output to even begin to develop (the principle that the more developed one part of the body becomes, the easier it is to develop the others applies here, it's just that since he hasn't refined his upper dantian/mind realm, he has to deal with more tribulations as his existence seeks a harmony upon a higher level due to his more complex existence). So, using the information he gathered and using the basic technique as the basis he began developing a technique that would allow for the larger strain of qi he required to develop his dantian (going forward I will only call the lower dantian/energy or life force center as dantian, the upper dantian is the mental real or mind realm, and the middle dantian will be the body/physique). 

The days continued to pass as he full heartedly poured himself into his training, technique creation and crop cultivation. His stats didn't seem to increase all that much through the course of his training, but that's due to the trainings purpose being different from strengthening him. It was rather a guided course in the blade where his knowledge and skill were refined past the basics he had learned in the beginner's course hosted by the school in association with the dungeon management bureau. This was especially beneficial as he had always gravitated towards knifes and daggers rather than swords, it seemed like the goddess was able to get a full read on his skills and abilities and planned accordingly. 

Finally, having finished the last of the intensive training he slumped to the ground dead tired. "Ugh, the damn system lied to me. It made it sound like the training would stay the same, not get exponentially harder". He cried out, sweat beading down his forehead and blood dripping from his calloused and blistered fingers.

While the training seemed simple in the beginning, it had actually ramped up in difficulty as the days progressed. The first three days the time he needed to spend in the training module had slightly increased, but on the fourth day the difficulty shot way up. The skills of the training dummy had advanced to where he could barely keep up, not able to rest a single moment in the now three hours of combat training. This was due to him finally grasping what the training was preparing him for and unlocking dagger mastery [uncommon] (rank f), and stamina {rare} (rank f). The goddess wanted him to survive and in order to do that, he would have to train hard and work his body to its breaking point. 

Thus, the training continued to get harder as the days passed and by the time the training had concluded, his skills had vastly improved. He was almost like a different man because of the intensive training. Though his stats had significantly improved his body still could hardly keep up with the strain of using the dagger skills as each strike was designed to pull out the limit of strength he possessed. The skills were also positioned at such a high level that it required his full concentration to execute the majority of his attacks, but the skills of the goddess were insanely powerful compared to any he had ever seen before then. 

"Thank you, the help and guidance you've given to this point has been a significant help. I thank you from the bottom of my heart for choosing to be your apostle". He said while grinning ear to ear, before going to his stock pile of harvested crops stored in a makeshift container of small logs. He bit his thumb drawing blood before drawing a leaf and rock on his palm and chanting. "As the apostle of the great goddess of earth and the harvest I make an offer of crops to show my sincerity". The drawing on his palm seared into his skin and shifted becoming a more elegant image which looked like an ink tattoo before a circle surrounded it and began glowing. About a third of the diverse crops glowed before getting sucked up into a whirlpool which formed attached to the glowing sigil. 

[Goddess x^$&*%x of the earth and harvest praises her apostle for his offering, though she asks how you learned to perform such a task]

"It was in a diary I found in the from one that camp I found a while back, it showed me how they had accessed the particular guide for the offering ceremony though the system screen. I was able to see though the system that your ceremony was quite simple to perform, and I wanted to show my sincerity and appreciation". 

[The blessing has advanced; direct communication has become possible due to Apostle John Ross's sincere offering]

{Hiiiiiiiii, it's me the goddess. Sorry I can't tell you my true name yet, it holds too much power and might cause you too explode so just call me goddes or by my title, m'kay. You should send me over the knife super, I'll make sure you get an awesome reward for your hard work and devotion}. The typical blue panel was immediately replaced by a golden yellow panel with vines and flowers growing along its edges, before the bubbly voice of the goddess flowed into his ears like a beautiful symphony, her angelic and bright personality apparent though her words. 

As a slight blush appeared on his face, he quickly unhooked his utility knife and its sheath from his waist and offered it toward the system panel. It quickly glowed before vanishing into the dark blue floating translucent panel of the quest rewards. Soon after it was sent off his palm finally stopped glowing and he could feel mana being drawn to it. The cold rush of mana flowed over his palm like water, as time progressed he noticed the blisters slowly start to heal before his very eyes. While the healing continued he waited for the knife to come back, but he got another surprising notification from the system.

[Sigil of Goddess x^$&*%x of the earth and harvest has been inscribed upon the users body, new effects have been added to the farmers blessing skill]

Farmer's blessing (rank f): This skill passively absorbs mana from the surrounding and enhances the farmer's body, While in combat this raises the user's strength, speed, and perception by x% based on rank. #####'s Blessing to the farmer for the systems mistake.}

- 5% increase at current rank

- A small amount of absorbed mana is diverted to heal injuries. (weak)

- Goddess x^$&*%x of the earth and harvest bestows an increase in comprehension of nature and earth related subjects.

{Earth and harvest sigil}

- A sigil created through knowledge lost to time, allows for contact and interaction with the apostle of Goddess x^$&*%x of the earth and harvest.

- Allows for offerings to be made, power of sigil increases based on the karma of the offerings.

- Mana +10, allows for one magic circle to be engraved on the body.