The next six months slipped by faster than Ludger expected, so fast, in fact, that he barely noticed them passing. Each day bled into the next, a rhythm of repetition and mana flow so constant it felt timeless.

Most people thought monotony made time drag. For Ludger, it was the opposite. Doing the same thing over and over, shaping stone, reinforcing tunnels, calculating mana lines, moving earth, blurred the days together until the world outside felt distant, unreal.

He could hardly tell when the seasons changed. One moment it was spring’s damp chill; the next, summer’s dry heat filtered faintly through the surface cracks of his underground routes. The tunnels didn’t care about the weather. They just grew.

It took him a full month to finish the first major line, an unbroken subterranean artery stretching from Lionfang all the way to the Empire’s eastern border. The work was grueling, even for him. He spent half his time carving, the other half meditating to restore mana, his body running on a cycle that ignored normal sleep.

Once the final section linked to the Velis League’s border, he personally accompanied the first two convoys eastward. He watched the recruits handle the route with growing confidence.

When they emerged on the other side, Dalan and Linne were there waiting, excited, chatty, and almost too eager to praise the efficiency of the new shipment.

Ludger introduced the squads to them with his usual brevity. “They’re the first generation to handle the shipments runs. Get used to seeing them.”

The engineers, as expected, were delighted. Dalan clapped him on the shoulder with a broad grin. “Do you realize what you’ve done? You’ve cut a two week-long trade route down to ten days! The League’s going to be drunk on efficiency!”

Linne smirked beside him, her runic glasses glinting in the forge-light. “And it’s all thanks to our new favorite earth mage.”

Ludger just grunted. “Favorite or not, I expect you to keep your end of the deal.”

They had. When the first shipment of froststeel and mana cores arrived a full week ahead of schedule, the engineers nearly threw a celebration. The League’s overseers were so impressed that Dalan and Linne insisted on giving Ludger a gift, one he actually needed.

A runic engine. Not one of their experimental constructs, but a compact, refined model designed to power automatic carriages through a mana circuit rather than beasts or geomancy. Its inner core could be charged through either runes or mana core infusion. They even offered him a fifty-percent discount.

Their reasoning was simple: “You’ve just set a new standard for punctuality,” Dalan had said with a laugh. “We’d like to encourage that rhythm.”

Ludger didn’t argue. The runic engine became the cornerstone of his next expansion. With it, he could push the tunnels further without manually propelling every wagon himself.

It freed his mana for the bigger picture, structural integrity, mana line balancing, the foundations for future branches connecting cities and trade posts. The work continued, steady and relentless.

And as the months slipped by, Ludger barely noticed the world above changing. For him, everything moved underground, where stone whispered and time forgot to exist.

After half a year of near-constant tunneling, construction, and reinforcement, Ludger finally hit the threshold he’d been chasing since the start. He opened his interface and scanned the new data.

Geomancer Lv 109 (+12 INT, +6 WIS / level)

Skills:

[Earth Manipulation Lv Max ]

[Stone Grip Lv Max ]

[Quicksand Lv 14]

[Seismic Sense Lv 14]

[Mineral Skin Lv 01]

[Terra Burst Lv 01]

[Gaia’s Grasp Lv 01]

[Rock Spike Lv 01]

[Continental Shield Lv 01]

[Earthen Surge Lv 01]

[Dust Curtain Lv 01]

[Tectonic Pulse Lv 11]

[Stoneflow Lv 01]

[Earthen Ward Lv 01]

[Landslide Break Lv 01]

[Geo Resonance Lv 01]

[Earth Pulse Lv 01] 

[Earth Attunement Lv 41] 

[Stone Surfing Lv 31] 

[Earth Creation Lv 11] – Grants you the power to turn your mana into all sorts of earth variations. Increased levels grant more variety when shaping your mana.

[Geomancer’s Hand Lv 21] You reached the peak of your path on geomancy. Your parameters per level up in this class have doubled from now on.

The Geomancer class had always been one of his strongest, its balance of offense, defense, and control made it ideal for both war and infrastructure, but now it had crossed the century mark, something most mages never achieved.

And it didn’t stop there. The class kept climbing. The progress bar still ticked upward past a hundred. But there were no new skills after the two he’d just received. Nothing appeared at 101, 102, 105… no new unlocks, just the same quiet hum of experience accumulating.

Apparently, the system had decided that reaching the peak didn’t mean the journey was over, just that there was nothing left to learn.

Ludger crouched, pressing his palm to the ground. The mana surged instantly, obeying him without resistance. The soil rippled outward in a perfect circle, layers of stone aligning like gears under invisible command.

He studied the readout again, focusing on the final two skills.

[Earth Creation Lv.11] – Grants you the power to turn your mana into all sorts of earth variations. Increased levels grant more variety when shaping your mana.

So that explained the sudden stability in his mana control earlier. He had noticed it while building the last segment of tunnel, he could move not just soil or stone anymore, but different mineral types, even metallic composites in some amounts. That wasn’t simple manipulation; it was full synthesis.

He tested it immediately. The dirt in front of him darkened, compacting into dense basalt, then shifted to pale granite with a flick of his will. A second pulse, and the stone took on a faint metallic sheen, an iron-sand hybrid that resonated faintly with his mana signature. Efficient, versatile, dangerous. He approved. Then his gaze fell on the second new ability.

[Geomancer’s Hand Lv.21] – You reached the peak of your path on geomancy. Your parameters per level up in this class have doubled from now on.

No new tricks. No fancy spells. Just power. The system had stopped giving him tools and started giving him raw numbers. Twice the growth rate, an exponential climb in intelligence and wisdom for every level gained. It would be awesome if he gained the points from the previous levels as well, but it would be too insane.

He could feel it too. His mana veins pulsed harder, more efficiently. Even standing still, the earth around him seemed to respond faster, its resonance sharper and more obedient.

This was no longer a class for learning how to shape the earth. It was the authority over it. He exhaled slowly, dust swirling with the motion.

“Geomancer’s Hand,” he murmured, flexing his right palm. The ground rose and twisted into a perfect, hovering sphere of stone that followed the movement of his fingers like an extension of his body. “Fitting name.”

He let it crumble and scatter, satisfied. The tunnels stretched far and wide behind him now, a network of arteries pulsing faintly with mana light, his work, his design, his proof.

He glanced once more at his status window. The class title shone faintly gold now, a quiet mark of mastery. And yet, Ludger’s only thought was simple, almost bored in tone.

“Now… let’s see how far past one hundred this thing can go.”

Then, as always, he pressed his hand to the ground, and the earth obeyed.

By the time Ludger reached Lionfang again, his boots were caked with dust and his mana reserves felt like scraped metal. The last checkpoint had taken more effort than he wanted to admit—three days of carving, reinforcing, and calibrating mana flow through the tunnel veins. The deeper the network went, the more maintenance it needed. And all the traveling between nodes wasn’t kind on his body either.

He had gotten used to the rhythm: work for several days, rest for a couple once a new checkpoint was stabilized. It wasn’t laziness—it was logistics. He needed the downtime to let the mana flow in his body settle before pushing it again.

As he reached the familiar gates of home, the weight on his shoulders finally eased. The tunnels could wait.

He’d earned a break.

He was twelve now, though sometimes he felt decades older. His birthday had slipped by quietly a few weeks ago, somewhere between tunnel expansions and supply transfers. The only thing that reminded him of the date was Elaine’s furious hug and a slice of cake that nearly got crushed under the twins’ excitement.

He’d grown, too, already one meter and seventy, a height that made most adults double-take. It was convenient for work, though part of him hoped he wouldn’t shoot up much further. A tall frame meant a higher center of gravity, and in combat, that wasn’t always an advantage. He preferred speed and control to raw reach.

When he finally pushed open the front door, he barely had time to take a step before two small shapes launched at him from across the room.

“Ludgie!”

He caught them both automatically, one in each arm, as their laughter filled the hall. Elle and Arash, two years old now and growing faster than his tunnels, grinned up at him with identical mischief.

He blinked once, still holding them. “Ludgie?”

Elle nodded with the utmost seriousness. “No more Lulu. Ludgie better.”

“Ludgie better,” Arash echoed proudly.

Ludger exhaled through his nose, the faintest smile tugging at his lips. “Progress, then.”

Elaine’s voice came from the kitchen, warm and amused. “They’ve been practicing for days. You should’ve heard the arguments about syllables.”

“I can imagine,” Ludger said, setting the twins down. They immediately began running circles around him like twin storms of chaos.

“Don’t run too fast,” Elaine warned without even turning from her work.

“They’ll get tired in five minutes,” Ludger said dryly.

“They never do,” she replied.

He couldn’t argue with that.

As he hung up his coat, the twins darted back to him, each grabbing one of his hands and tugging toward the living room. They didn’t care that he’d just spent a week reshaping the world underground. To them, he wasn’t the Vice Guildmaster or the Geomancer who could carve roads through mountains, he was just Ludgie, the giant who lifted them high and spun them around.

And honestly, that was fine. He let himself sink into the warmth of home, the hum of the hearth, and the sound of childish laughter echoing off the walls. The earth could wait a few days. For now, he had his hands full, with two small, unstoppable bundles of energy calling his name.

A while later, the front door opened again, letting in the cool evening breeze—and two small blurs immediately bolted across the living room.

“Papa!”

Arslan barely had time to drop his bag before the twins collided with his legs, nearly toppling him over. Normally, he took their ambushes with his usual good humor, lifting both of them high and spinning them until they squealed. But this time, his laughter didn’t quite reach his eyes.

He crouched down, scooped them up with a practiced motion, and gave them each a kiss on the forehead. “You two have been waiting for me, huh?” he said softly.

“Ludgie home!” Elle announced proudly, pointing toward Ludger. “Now Papa too!”

Arslan’s gaze flicked to his son for a moment, and Ludger caught it immediately, the faint stiffness in his shoulders, the slight strain in his smile. He knew that look. Something was wrong.

Still holding the twins, Arslan gave a warm chuckle that didn’t sound quite real. “Good. Then the whole army’s home.”

Ludger watched in silence for a moment, then spoke quietly. “Work?”

Arslan’s smile twitched, the corners of his mouth tightening just slightly. “Yeah,” he said after a heartbeat, voice calm but too even. “Just work.”

Ludger nodded once, expression unreadable. “I see.”

The message was clear. Later.

They’d done this before, enough times to recognize the code. “Just work” meant something important, something not for young ears.

Arash tugged at his father’s hair, breaking the tension for a moment. “Papa tired?”

Arslan chuckled softly, adjusting his hold on the twins. “A little. But I’ll live.”

Elaine peeked in from the kitchen, smiling at the scene. “Dinner’s ready. Wash up, both of you.”

Ludger gave a small nod, brushing the dust from his gloves. “Sure.”

Arslan followed with the twins still clinging to him, laughing again, this time with a little more ease for their sake.

But as Ludger watched them head toward the washroom, he caught the faint flicker in his father’s eyes, worry, or maybe something heavier.

Whatever it was, they’d talk once the twins were asleep.

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