“Ah Ben, how did the rest of your investigation with Verbum go?” Myriad asked when he arrived as the god dealt with his work while a particular goddess was perched atop him doing the same.
“Well, me and Thera were both involved in the next two sections after the first and on the last we had to deal with a herd of a few hundred demons before nearly being killed by a proper invader but none of that matters. Helori, I’ve got a question for you.”
“Wait, that second part definitely matters!” Myriad yelled out with Helori looking equally concerned about what she’d just heard.
“Not to me. Now miss goddess of knowledge and magic, if Thera awakens her dark magic, what are the odds it absorbs her charm and from there what are the odds that it still pulls people into its effect without any control?”
“For the first, good but not guaranteed since the trait is tied too tightly to her race, and for the second, slim. She’s at the fifth level of it, correct? She’s close enough to having control of it that even if it were to merge into the rest of dark magic now, it would be surprising if it didn’t grow enough as an aspect of an awakened skill for her to not have control of it. Honestly, even if she was at the zeroth level of it and it merged into an awakened dark magic, I would expect her to be able to control it by that point.”
“Okay, well there’s two big areas where you’re wrong. As of today, she’s at the sixth and she still can’t suppress it so how does that change your evaluation?”
“I suppose that explains why you’re glossing over the invader encounter,” His god sighed while Helori atop him looked thoughtful.
“It’s definitely a unique situation,” The goddess muttered as she thought to herself. “I’ve never heard of anyone with charm not being able to manage it by that point, but then, there’s probably never been a case of anyone who’s struggled with their mana control to the extent she has, especially not with a succubus heritage. Of course, anyone else who found they struggled to that level likely wouldn’t have chosen to pursue the path of a mage. Either way, I would still expect that if it merged together then she shouldn’t have any problems. You should be well aware of the power an awakened skill has compared to its unawakened form by this point. It’s just a matter of making sure it properly merges into it. While I stand by how likely I feel it is, it's still not a guarantee and since it’s already surprising for her to not be able to suppress it at this point, I wouldn’t gamble on the odds it merges no matter how good they’d be for anyone else.”
“I don’t love hearing that but it’s something to work with, thanks.”
“It’s fine, now can we please get on to whatever happened that left you seeing an invader?” She asked him, cutting to the heart of what mattered far more to her. “This is the sort of thing we need to make the others aware of.”
“Fine.”
He gave them the rundown of exactly what had happened along with how they’d dealt with it, leaving the gods just a little relieved compared to what they were expecting.
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“Well, it’s good there was just one, though the way they were hiding is worrying. That could be hard to find,” She sighed. “And Myriad, keep more of an eye on your apostle. If he’s going to keep running into trouble then it’s better for us to just know.”
“There’s too much work for me to be constantly available to him,” His god sighed. “You know what his mind is like now, if I don’t put up boundaries then he’ll never give me any time to rest or focus on other work.”
“Mmh, true I suppose.”
“Wait, rude, that’s why you haven’t been answering?”
“I haven’t been answering because like I said, I’m constantly swamped by work. We all are. Anyway, was that everything?”
“Actually, I did notice one other thing,” He said after a second's thought. “Its equipment was shockingly awful.”
“Shocking how?” Helori asked him, curious about that particular perspective given Ben’s status as a craftsman.
“I looked it over a little bit before we handed over the body. If you ignore the fact that it was only wearing four arm bands, anyone with the eye for it could see that it maybe wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t anything special either, all of them were ranked low-uncommon. The enchantments on it used the standard weave method and the effects were straightforward. A strengthening effect, a healing effect, a mind stabilizing effect, and a pain suppression. Just from the last one alone, I can say that none of them were likely super effective either because we definitely hurt it.”
“And that stands out to you why?”
“I saw this thing’s skills while we were fighting, it had three awakened ones; air, low soul, and unarmed combat. Think of the mages and warriors of this world. Would anyone with even a single awakened skill have equipment that bad?”
“It’s odd, but there is a chance,” His god said thoughtfully. “There are some who forgo upgrading their equipment as a form of training, you know, forcing them to manage their skills with what they have. It could be the same thing here.”
“Then they’re idiots,” Ben said bluntly. “A proper craftsman will make weapons and tools while ensuring it won’t hamper anyones growth, that sort of attitude is more likely to slow them down if anything. I’m not going to say that couldn’t be the case, but still, based on what I saw I think the equipment was strange in just how average it was. Imagine conquering thousands of worlds. You’d expect you might learn a thing or two from any records or artifacts from the old civilization, so why can their enchanters do something that I was pulling off at level three of my skill, especially for someone who has to be one of their better fighters? I don’t care how powerful they are as a race or how many of them there are, that sort of skill can’t be common.”
“In that case, my guess would be that it's a characteristic of their society,” Helori suggested after considering it a bit. “They’re the only known race that starts with a non-sapient form and rises up later. Combined with their destructive nature, it’s pretty possible that they simply aren’t suited for the work needed to develop their craft or study the worlds they destroy.”
Was that all, just a nature that was incompatible with what he was devoting his life to? From what he’d seen and felt from them it made sense but couldn’t help but feel unsatisfying on an entirely personal level. If their society held no or few proficient craftspeople and still managed to conquer the stars, that almost felt like a statement on how unnecessary everything he’d built up was in the face of raw power. It felt like a challenge, driving him to make something.
But not now. Later.
Thera’s issue was going to be taking up the majority of his brain power until he had a solution and regardless of what the two with him had planned for the night, he fully intended on making them help whether they liked it or not.