Book 3: Chapter 14: Progression

  [Time Remaining: 621 Days, 19 Hours, 41 Minutes]

  Alex sat apart from the others, firelight dancing across his face, the bloody stink of the battlefield and the putrid stench of bile still clinging to his clothes and inside his nostrils. At this point he wasn’t sure if the basilisk stomach bile, or the black goop of stat refinement was the worse smell.

  The camp hummed faintly behind him, low voices, the scrape of metal blades being cleaned, the occasional pained grunt from the recovering wounded. He didn’t join them.

  Instead, he stared at the hovering text only he could see.

  His eyes darted to side, swiping away the notification with a thought. He repeated this process for the few Juvenile Basilisks he had killed, each also giving him a nice chunk of experience points. Once every kill notification have been gone through he sighed and pulled up a portion of his status screen as well.

  The numbers taunted him with possibility. He had enough experience to push Wisdom higher into the earth tribulation threshold. That would certainly make Obby happy. Or, maybe pour more into Willpower, a tactic he had seen as bearing fruit before, boosting his growth overtime. He could also just stack Vitality until he was a sheer meat-wall that no one could bring down. Something that would also massively increase his already pitiful aether pool. Every option pulled at him, and every choice had a cost.

  He rubbed his temple. As always the question is investing on future growth, risking death in the short term, or focusing of survivability in the now, and slowing my long term power…

  “Do I even need to voice my opinion?” Obby floated in front of him, tentacled arms crossed.

  No, I know what you’d pick, you crazed iron suppository. He waved a hand through the illusion that was Obby’s body, dispersing the aether.

  “You know,” a voice said behind him, “I’m starting to think you break my stuff on purpose.”

  Alex glanced up over his shoulder. Devon stood over him, arms folded, face half-lit. His thin frame cast a long shadow behind him, and his eyes were narrowed with the exact blend of irritation and wounded pride Alex had expected to see.

  “Not on purpose,” Alex said. “It just… happens. You keep making weapons too good not to break.”

  Devon huffed, dropping down onto the log beside him. “That’s your attempt at a compliment huh? I guess it not too bad, that spike was a prototype. You weren’t supposed to smash it with everything you had, though.”

  “Sorry,” Alex said, and he meant it. He thought for a moment, then added, “I’ll make it up to you.”

  Devon’s eyebrows arched. “How?”

  Alex’s gaze drifted inward. Obby, could you record one of your [Glyphcraft] lessons onto an aether-slab? Devon would eat that up.

  The pebble’s voice chuckled in his skull. “Possible? Sure. Easy? Not for you. But later, yes I can help you put my brilliance into... stone. Finally, an audience worthy of me, I’m excited to spread my genius.”

  Alex smiled faintly. Good. We’ll do it.

  Turning back to Devon, he said, “I’ll get you something better than schematics. A real [Glyphcraft] lesson. Might help you push your designs further.”

  Devon did a double take, his face caught between suspicion and eagerness. “You’re serious?”

  “Serious.”

  Devon muttered under his breath, then sighed. “Fine. I’ll forgive you this time. Like I said, it was a prototype anyway.” His lips twitched into a nervous smile. “The plan is, I’m going to make it smaller. A version you could fire from a rifle. Imagine the output. Portable projectile bunker-buster.”

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  Alex sat back, impressed by Devon’s idea despite himself. If he could make that spike into something as small as a bullet, with the right metal or material to handle the strain... “That’d change everything on the field. It would be scary even.”

  For the first time all night, Devon’s grin wasn’t bitter or nervous. Just pure excitement showed in his face. “Yeah. I thought so too.”

  He rose, brushing dirt from his pants, and wandered back toward the wagons, away from the fire, already mumbling calculations to himself. Alex watched him go, the faintest tug of relief in his chest.

  The world was never 100% fair. The System was cruel. But Alex found it reassuring to see that at least some of them still had the fire to build something better.

  But he didn’t have the time to spend enjoying optimism. There were choices to make, and points to spend, stats to increase. Alex went into his bracelet, pulling out the tea set and Hallow Seraph Dust he had bought from the Dark Den dungeon shop. He already knew what he was going to do, and he needed to have himself be prepared. Even if the Enduring Tribulations for the stats wasn’t as painful, or messy as the Refinement Tribulations had been, Alex knew not to tempt fate by attempting them without the help of the Seraph Dust.

  He remembered Obby’s verbal warning, as well as the living cautionary tale that was Lord Orien Velcryn when it came to failing the Earthly Tribulations. These tests could kill, or permanently cripple him, so he had to be careful.

  It was easy enough for Alex to go over the math in his head while the tincture brewed. He had more than enough points for what he wanted to do, and he was just deciding on where to put the remainder when the teapot screamed at him, forcing him to remove the porcelain container and pour his oh-so-delicious concoction.

  Bottoms up Obby, here we go.

  He drank it in two swallows, then set himself in a lotus pose. Without hesitation, he mentally brought up his status screen, and began spending his experience.

  ***

  The first stat he had increased was his Wisdom, not under the incessant behest of Obby, (even though that did indeed factor in) but because of the potential benefits the little rock could give him. Alex was still certain that the crazed pebble was evil as all hell, and would turn on him at some point. But, for now, the extra assistance with [Glyphcraft], monster information, item analyses, and even the HUD he created for Alex during battle, was all priceless. He couldn’t just ignore that potential.

  Sure enough, the moment Alex managed to push his way through the tribulation, the little rock was ecstatic.

  “Oh it’s so great to be back.” Obby’s illusion body was even more realistic now. Not in the way that it looked more human, no it was still a fucking abomination of eldritch horror, just with more realistic looking detail. He started to regret his choice the moment Obby created it in his vision.

  That remorse was amplified by what Obby said next.

  “I can teach you that ritual Doudra tried, now. Since I’m back to that access level. I’m sure we can get a wonderful power-boost draining away all your meat-friends.” Obby’s pointed gremlin teeth flashed.

  Uh, one; no, I told you before we are not killing my friends. That’s not what the word ‘friends’ means, despite how much you insist it has different definitions to some of the other sentient races. Alex had this conversation with Obby a few times now, with each one ending in Obby giving a culture lesson on the “wonderful cannibalistic rituals of the Dark-elves.” Each time, Alex ignored him and spent most of the day trying to scrub the information from his mind.

  Perhaps that’s what I should have tried getting rid of and looked at the basilisk’s eyes on purpose? He shook his head and continued addressing the stone-ciopath that was his magically bonded pet rock.

  And two; Doudra’s Wisdom was at twenty? How the hell was that possible?

  “Fine, no killing of the flesh-buddies. And yes, it was her highest stat, obviously, the crazy ass little lizard woman must have put every possible experience point she could into it. Why she did that, I couldn’t say, but it made things easier for me, that’s for sure.”

  Alex ignored the questions he had regarding the kobold’s mental state, even before she bonded with Obby, and instead pressed on to focus on his next stat-boost.

  Intelligence was the next choice for Alex, as the stat directly correlated with the efficiency and potency of his aether channels. Intelligence affected his soulgate after all, and since his channels were crafted from the gate itself, boosting the stat meant a huge return on his aether efficiency and power when casting his spells.

  The last choice was to dump everything else he had left into his willpower stat, sky rocketing it up into twenty-seven. With another “Enduring” threshold down, his [Lattice Spiral], and all the work Sylvaris and he had done to increase his technique to the [Three-fold Condensing Spiral], Alex was sure his could keep progressing his [Aether Attuned Body] faster than ever.

  A bit of trial and error, as well as some quick references to the scroll from Sylvaris—which he still had yet to completely understand—he was able to confirm the idea of a [Nine-Fold Condensing Spiral] was still just out of reach.

  Perhaps once I can get my willpower to thirty? He wasn’t certain, but he was hopeful. Even if he couldn’t pull it off, Alex had a back-up plan, one that would be far more dangerous, but be a huge return on investment, should he manage to pull it off.

  “You seem to be treating your body more and more like a playground to fuck around with,” Obby added. “Just make sure to always invite me to playtime, okay?”

  Alex rolled his eye’s at the enchanted rock and pulled up his notifications, going through the expected results quickly:

  Most of what he saw was completely expected, but there was one piece of information that caught his interest.

  “Meridian Points are now active?” He repeated the phrase out loud, a line he read under the new “Enduring Intelligence” ability. He didn’t know what that meant, but he was sure that he was going to find out. Just not tonight, he was much too drained physically to deal with much more.

  Instead, he needed to get back to his friends and try to relax a bit. There would always be new things to worry about, and learn.

  Such as the question that still tickled the back of his mind.

  What parts of themselves have my friends lost to the Basilisk Mother when under her gaze?