Infinity Is My Affinity?!?-Chapter 104: A Cheap Paper Straw

-Kzzzt!

I popped out of the outer flow of time on the other side of the roots before spinning around on my heels to face the tiny opening just as the screeching goblin tsunami slammed violently into the other side of the pitch-black funnel.

The sickening crunch of their bones echoed through the narrow tunnel.

The sheer kinetic force of a thousand frenzied monsters pushing blindly from behind instantly crushed the goblins trapped at the very front against the reinforced roots.

I dumped forty mana directly into Ice Reinforcement, feeling the freezing wave crash through my veins.

The magic bonded to my physiology, dialing my cognition up superhuman degree while the frantic pounding in my chest smoothed out into a cold, calculated rhythm.

A fine mist of cold air wafted off my clothes while a thin, crystalline layer of frost rapidly encased my skin from my fingertips to my elbows, turning my body into a living superconductor for ice magic.

[Let’s get serious...]

I raised both my hands and pointed my fingers right at the screaming faces like a pair of finger guns.

And the next moment, four Armor-Piercing Ice Pebbles instantly materialized over the tips of my fingers on each hand.

"Say cheese, you ugly bastards," I grinned as I leveled my hands at the meat grinder and let the ’Gatling guns’ rip.

-Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta!...

The AP rounds broke the sound barrier the exact microsecond they left my fingers, tearing straight into the thirty-centimeter gap and shredding the frontline of the horde, each pebble shredding through at least three goblins.

A continuous spray of dark green blood and pulverized flesh and bone painted the walls of the narrow tunnel, while I held the mental trigger down, firing a relentless, deafening stream of death directly into the choke point, dropping them by the dozens in mere seconds.

But the horde simply did not care. They just kept pushing, shoving, and trampling their own dead to get to me.

And soon came a point when the sheer, overwhelming force of the rabid monsters pressing against the barricade began to take its toll.

I narrowed my eyes at the hardened roots splintering under the immense kinetic pressure.

And a beat later, a sharp snap echoed over the Ice Pebbles as a thick chunk of root violently broke off, widening the thirty-centimeter gap by another few inches, before another violent shove from the horde produced a second sickening crack.

[Crap!] I thought, keeping my hands leveled and maintaining the rate of fire. [The funnel isn’t going to hold.]

That’s when a sudden, uncomfortable heat flared up inside my wrists.

It started as a mild prickling sensation beneath my skin, which I ignored, focusing entirely on the encroaching green tide, but the sensation rapidly intensified.

The sharp, stinging pain sank straight into my muscles, creeping up my forearms and flooding directly into my chest.

It felt exactly like millions of tiny, aggressive ants biting down on my body, both inside and out.

The stinging rapidly climbed my neck and pierced straight into my brain, making my vision physically blur.

-Ding!

{Alert: Host’s body has reached the limit of mana conduction.}

"What the hell?" I grunted through gritted teeth. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

I refused to drop my hands, forcing the barrage of AP rounds down the narrow funnel while the prickling behind my eyes flared into genuine, throbbing pain.

-Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta! Ta!...

-Ding!

{Host, the amount of mana that has been conducted through your body far exceeds the capacity a Tier-1 physical form can withstand.

A standard Tier-1 mid-stage practitioner possesses a total capacity of 50 to 70 MP and must naturally recover their mana after expenditure.

Due to your infinite regeneration, you have been forcefully conducting 50 to 60 MP per second for the majority of the day.}

A fresh wave of dizziness hit me as another splintering crack echoed from the pitch-black roots ahead.

{Your physical form has only survived this long due to the enhanced mana control granted by being the host of the Chronos Protocol.

Otherwise, your body would have catastrophically failed hours ago. You have suffered numerous internal hidden injuries from the constant flow of your own mana. Your body is failing.}

[But don’t I got nine circuits?] I argued back, desperately trying to keep my Gatling guns aimed at the gap while the stinging ants bit down harder on my optic nerves.

-Ding!

{Circuits dictate how much mana you are capable of manipulating at a single time. They do not dictate how much mana your physical flesh is capable of safely conducting over a prolonged period.

You have been conducting mana worth the entire capacity of a normal Tier-1 practitioner per second for hours now.}

It made sense. I was pumping endless gallons of water through a cheap paper straw.

[Fine. Guess I gotta make some time to down a healing potion...] I thought, blinking through the stinging sweat dripping into my eyes.

-Ding!

{Analysis-

Your rate of sustained mana conduction is causing accelerated cellular degradation.

Ice Reinforcement’s physiological enhancement is compensating by providing your body with the energy to rapidly regenerate and replace your cells.

But the continuous death-and-replication cycles are increasing oncogenic mutations at a rate that is rapidly accelerating.

Projection: At this rate, malignant cells will soon outpace healthy cellular replacement and your immune system even if enhanced by Ice Reinforcement

Recommendation: A Grade 5 Healing Potion.

Cost: 3,500,000 Credits.

You have insufficient credits.

Advisory: Rest. Prolonged cellular damage may cause cancer.}

The cold, suffocating weight of it all slammed straight onto my head, instantly drowning out the adrenaline and the frantic noise of the horde.

Cancer.

The word echoed in the sudden silence of my mind like a death knell.

The prickling heat inside my veins no longer felt like mana fatigue.

It felt exactly like that sickness.

Like the phantom memories of an eight-year nightmare that started when I was just twelve.

But mostly, it felt like that suffocating guilt of watching my single mother drown in an inescapable sea of medical debt just to keep a dying boy breathing for one more day.

My greatest joy in stepping into this world had been this one supreme, undeniable comfort that her financial nightmare was finally over, and my body was finally free of the rot.

And now the System was telling me I was building it right back up inside my new body just because I’ve been abusing a magic glitch.

[No,] My breath hitched in desperate panic. [No, no, no...No!]

Just as the suffocating dread reached its absolute peak, my pitch-black roots suddenly glowed a furious orange.

My Ice Reinforcement’s hyper-focus caught it the very second it appeared.

Instantly cutting the mana feed from every active magic, I triggered Temporal Step the exact same microsecond.

As the world slowed to a crawl, I saw the roots buckling into splinters.

[No time!]

I aimed the Exit Point 10 meters back and-

-Kzzzt!

-BOOM!

The very moment I popped out of the outer flow of time, I sent the mana feed back to the magic I had active.

And in the very same instance, a massive fiery explosion violently ripped the hardened roots apart, gushing in a torrent of flames exactly where I had just been standing.

The entire barricade shattered into burning shrapnel, sending a violent shockwave of heat straight over my frozen skin, while a jagged tear in reality hung in the air between me and the blast, warping the flames before smoothly ironing itself.

I instinctively stumbled back a step, keeping my trembling hands raised toward the fiery breach, and before the System’s cancer warning could even resurface-

-GRRRAH!

A deep, guttural growl ripped through the burning wreckage, completely drowning out the frantic snarls and shrieks of the lesser goblins.

As the flames faded, a towering silhouette stepped out.

It wasn’t a normal goblin, but a hulking mountain of bulging green muscle and thick, pulsing veins, standing easily over ten feet tall with violent, roaring fire literally pouring off its green skin.

I stared up at the massive, flame-drenched monster while the sharp, stinging pain of my failing body bit deep into my very consciousness.

As though sensing my gaze, the fiery beast locked its glowing red eyes onto me right as the wave of goblins poured out from behind its massive legs.