Archie stared at his 6 completed Rot Spreading Spheres and placed them within his spatial storage before looking at his notifications.
*Your Profession has reached Lv 63 – Points allocated, +4 Free Points*
*Your Profession has reached Lv 64 – Points allocated, +4 Free Points*
Skill Gained: Core Resonance Forging (Uncommon)]
Core Resonance Forging (Uncommon):
With this skill, you are able to use cores into your craft. This skill allows the smith to attune their forging process to the natural frequency of a beast core, allowing for smoother energy transfer between the core and the crafted item. As your skill improves, you learn to create resonant patterns in your items that can even draw on the emotions or instincts of the beast. Adds a low increase to the effectiveness of Core Resonance Forging based on Wisdom and Willpower.
Nice, Archie thought while looking at his new skill. So, Vitality was the missing link. I wonder why my gauntlets worked then…Do some cores not require Vitality to work? My vital energy contains my records, so maybe merging with the Cragforge applied the same concept with its records being related with the Resonance Bat’s abilities.
An interesting topic to say the least, one that will require much experimentation. But first, Archie needed to find a way to control his Vital Sight. After resolving that he would need to head to Michael and tell him what he saw.
“Locking people in cages and experimenting on them is…I want to say inhumane, but he isn’t human anymore.” Archie muttered while clicking his teeth. “Was it a dungeon that changed his Race? Did it do something to make him experiment on people?”
Nevertheless, I’m going to need help to take down the camp and kill Oliver. Archie thought while getting in a meditative position. I don’t wanna kill everyone in their camp, Sarah might be able to cure them. The ones being experimented on don’t deserve to die like that.
Fuck Oliver, Archie thought before entering Nature’s Meditation.
Within Nature’s Meditation, Archie felt his vital energy moving throughout his body. The vital energy constantly flowed within him, at a steady rate, except for one area. His eyes.
If the rest of his body’s vital energy flow was akin to a river’s constant flow, his eyes were going through a flash flood. It wasn’t as harmful as one would think, as it was his own vital energy. Why would his own vital energy harm him?
As well as Bralmir’s lack of hurry for him to get it fixed, cemented the thought that the rush of vital energy towards his eyes was a good thing. But it did cause a thought to go through his head; how do the energies within my body react when I channel Adrenaline Rush? Or Spirit Bond at that?
Activating Adrenaline Rush at 15%, Archie observed the flow of energies throughout his body. His mana and stamina energy flows intertwined with one another like a double helix, but the stamina helix was double the size of the mana helix. Covering his whole body, not leaving a single place uncovered by its effects.
Activating Adrenaline Rush at 45%, provided a noticeable difference. Looking at both his mana and stamina pools, he noticed that the mana and stamina cost was at least 7x the previous rate. However, in return, the boost he gained from the skill was more than worth it.
Pushing Adrenaline Rush to 50%, Archie felt his body start to strain. His body wasn’t able to handle such a rush of power, hence the strain. But it was manageable, pain can be ignored and when pushed, a bit of pain to live was well worth it. The cost, compared to the 15% Adrenaline Rush, was 15x.
While it might seem unfair, it more than made sense; going beyond the limit that his body could take needed a cost equivalent to the boost. Besides, this skill isn’t supposed to be active at all times.
A cool thing he found was that his ability to sense Vitality was also enhanced greatly. He could see a couple of the sea creature’s vital energies that he hadn’t been able to before. Adrenaline Rush enhances my physical body, thus enhancing my vital energy flowing within, thus enhancing the flow of vital energy going into my eyes as a side effect.
Deactivating Adrenaline Rush, Archie started to slowly manipulate the vital energy flowing into his eyes. Completely focused on lessening that amount of vital energy flowing into them and not cutting them off completely.
He wasn’t quite sure if completely cutting them off would just make his eyes stop working and make him blind. But he wasn’t going to take that chance when he barely knew how vital energy worked other than that it helped him regenerate. Hell, he just learned that his records are in his vital energy, and was pretty sure this was common knowledge within the multiverse.
Once Archie lessened the flow going into his eyes by 25%, he stopped manipulating vital energy and exited Nature’s Meditation. His ability to see vital energy thankfully lessened, allowing him to see somewhat normally.
“Best I go to Cyric’s and get his help before I do anything more than this,” Archie said as he got up. Taking a glance at the corpses of the gorillas and tortoise, Archie sighed. “Something always takes me away from experimenting…hopefully this whole Oliver shit ends quickly.”
Sending his forging equipment back into his spatial storage, Archie flung his arms towards the overhanging branch above his cave’s ceiling and activated Thornscourge Expansion.
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Archie entered the Assistant village, looking around with interest. He could see the humanoid figures within their own building either tending to their craft or relaxing. Syllia was hammering away at her forge and Xelgar was lying down someplace within his house.
Wait, what the hell is that? Archie questioned looking at a spider-like figure within the tailoring Profession building…Is the Tailoring Profession Assistant a spider?... Well, spiders are known for being the best weavers on Earth from what I know, so makes sense… I guess.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
Spiders are beasts, but seeing how it’s an Assistant that means it has sentience. Archie rationalized. I wonder when beasts become sentient? Is it D-Grade? Or high E-Grade? I guess I’ll find out when I ask it.
Weirdly enough as he approached Cyric’s tower, he couldn’t see his figure at all within his tower.
Knocking on the tower door, Archie waited only a second before Cyric answered.
“Archie it's…” Cryic said as he opened the door, but his smile contorted to one of concern as his eyes narrowed while staring at Archie’s head. He stared at Archie for a few more moments before ushering him inside. “Come inside.”
Archie nodded and headed into Cyric’s tower. Other than a few blankets strewn across the furniture, everything looked just like when he previously visited.
“Please sit down,” Cryic said while closing the door behind him. Now within the tower, Archie could see the vital energy of Cyric, however, it was very different, to say the least. Cyric’s vital energy seemed to be condensed within a sphere within his body and as he moved very thin tendrils of vital energy split off and flowed into his limbs as he moved.
Weird, Archie thought as he sat on the sofa with Cyric sitting on the sofa opposite to him.
“I see that you have started to experiment on your vital energy and judging on its controlled state it seems it has worked,” Cyric said as he took out a glass of water and placed it in front of Archie. “While experimenting is most of the time a good thing, I hope you understand the danger of self-experimentation, especially on vital energy.”
“Well, less as an experiment and more of a last-ditch thing I did to not die,” Archie said, gaining a concerned look from Cyric. “And I might have done something to my vision that I need your help to safely figure out how to lessen the vital energy flowing into my eyes.”
“Tell me what happened,” Cyric asked, his expression turning stoney. “I swear on my honor as a vampire that I won’t tell a living soul.”
Archie then began to explain his visit into the jungle, being attacked by the Verdant Serpent, his sudden understanding of vital energy, and flooding his eyes with vital energy to see where the serpent was.
“You were very lucky,” Cyric replied after Archie finished his explanation, his back hunched over. “Controlling your vital energy like that was nothing more than something miraculous”
Leaning back into the sofa, Cyric continued, “You did everything perfectly, with nothing more than intuition. If you messed up at any point during that process, you would have gone permanently blind best case or dead worst case.”
“But I didn’t,” Archie smiled, gaining a sigh of exhaustion from Cyric. “Is this what Father meant when he said karma has a way of biting back at me for being a pain in his undead ass,” Cyric muttered.
“So, what is the name of the skill you got and its description?” Cryic said as he pushed himself off the sofa and took out a glass wine glass full of red liquid.
“Vital Sight,” Archie said, gaining an almost spit take from Cyric. Smiling at Cyric’s reaction, he then read aloud his skill’s description.
“I have no words really…You gained a Radiant skill less than two months into the system integration…and my father called me a monster,” Cyric said looking at Archie with newfound interest.
“I can help you with your vital energy problem,” Cyric said as he got up from the sofa and went to sit cross-legged atop the table in front of Archie. “Vampires and other Hemomancers gain that skill after thorough study and experimentation. Seeing that I am a Vampire, and I have the skill, I should be able to help, no problem.”
“Unfortunately, I will not be able to do it for you, due to the system. So, you will have to control it yourself while I give you instructions while observing your vital energy.” Cyric said as he untied his hair and pulled out a hairband to pull it back. “Now focus on your vital energy.”
Archie nodded before closing his eyes and focusing on his vital energy. “Lessen the flow of vital energy going into eyes but do it slowly and keep at it till I say stop,” Cyric instructed. “Too fast or too much and you might kill the flow entirely towards your eyes and would have to either go to a healer or rip them out and fix them from scratch.”
Archie slowly lessened the amount of vital energy channeling into his eyes. Cyric’s words confirming his concerns of potentially ruining his sight if he tried to figure it out on his own. Best to listen to an expert on the subject before experimenting on my own and becoming blind.
“Stop there,” Cryic said as he focused on the vital energy flowing into Archie’s eyes. The rushing torrent of vital energy now became akin to a soft river, similar to the rest of the vital energy flowing throughout his body.
Archie opened his eyes and looked at Cyric. The sphere of condensed vital energy wasn’t visible anymore. Looking at the wall of the tower, in the direction of Xelgar and Syllia, he could not see their vital energies nor their sparks of Vitality anymore. “Thanks, man,”
“No problem,” Cyric said before smirking. “We aren’t done yet; you need to learn how to turn on and off the skill fluidly before leaving.”
“Great!” Archie smiled before asking, “If Vital Sight is a thing, does that mean Mana Sight is a thing?”
Cyric thought for a moment before nodding. “Yes, but you won’t be able to get the skill.” Seeing the look of confusion on Archie’s face, he explained; “As a human, you are a creature of flesh and blood, thus making you more attuned to Vitality. Elementals, Spirits, and other mana-like creatures are more attuned to mana as mana makes up their being.”
“But, my E-Grade Evolution says that I’ve been attuned to the flow of mana,” Archie pushed. “Shouldn’t I be able to gain the skill?”
“It’s a race thing,” Cyric explained with a shake of his head. “Unless you are just as attuned to mana as the mana-like races, then it is impossible. You need to have an extremely deep connection with mana to gain Mana Sight. Most mages who wish to gain the sight, perform rituals to permanently change their race to gain it among other things.”
“What about gods?” Archie asked, gaining a look of surprise from Cyric.
“You’ve met a god?” Cyric questioned and gained a slow nod from Archie.
“I won’t pry about who they are,” Cyric said as he took out his drink from his spatial storage. “To answer your question, I don’t know. I dare not ask nor question a god.”
I guess I’ll ask Bralmir, Archie thought. Suddenly remembering that he hadn’t looked at his status page in a while, he pulled it up.
Archie Gracefield
Race: Human E-grade Lv 68
Class: Nature-Attuned Pugilist Lv 68
Profession: Novice Forgesmith Lv 64
Health: 5980/5980
Mana: 2585/2585
Stamina: 6371/6371
Stats:
Vitality: 520 (598)
Strength: 619 (773)
Endurance: 554 (637)
Agility: 340 (374)
Intelligence: 276 (303)
Wisdom: 235 (258)
Willpower: 166 (199)
Perception: 261(287)
Free Points: 52
General Skills: Identify (Initiate), Nature's Meditation (Epic), Vital Sight (Radiant)
Class Skills: Leeching Strikes of Fury (Uncommon), Savage Charge (Rare), Adrenaline Rush (Legendary), Pugilist’s Grit (Rare), Retaliation (Uncommon), Relentless Flurry (Rare), Taunt (Rare), Thornscourge Expansion (Rare), Spirit Bond (Rare)
Profession Skills: Forgesmith’s Flame (Uncommon), Mana Smithing Mastery (Common), Advanced Runic Mastery (Uncommon), Material Insight (Rare), Gaze of the Forgefather (Epic), Core Resonance Forging (Uncommon)
Bloodline: Adrenaline Junkie (Unique) [+10% to Strength and +10% to Willpower]
Affinity: Greater Nature Affinity (Epic)
Blessing: Blessing of the Forgefather (Moderate) [+5% to Strength and +5% to Endurance]
Titles Collected: Bloodline Progenitor [+10 Vitality and +5% Vitality], Flawless E-Grade Evolution [+10 all Stats], Legendary Innovator [+20 to all Stats and +10% to all Stats]
Tutorial Points: 390,028
Archie smiled at both the increase in his stats and his Tutorial Points. “Alright let’s get started then,” Archie said as he dismissed his status screen and turned to face Cyril.