Felix was instantly teleported to the top of a very familiar structure. Next to him, the tip of the volcano rose through the clouds, far bigger than he had imagined it would be. Around him, across from the volcano, a jungle stretched out over the horizon. He looked around and found the familiar trap door he had expected to find. He descended through his tower and found that everything was exactly where he had expected it to be, even the furniture remained.
The only thing that was out of place, was a large wooden lectern in Felix's bedroom. walking up to it, he placed his hand upon it and was greeted by a screen for managing the tower itself. He scrolled through it and found that, similar to how the cities were upgraded, he could upgrade his tower. The differences were that, this screen included minor changes like furniture and decorations. He never needed to have anyone come to construct things ever as everything could be paid for through a combination of credits and mana.
He also noticed that there were 3 subterranean floors below the lobby. The first was simply labeled Storage, the second was labeled Dungeon and the last was labeled Vault. He had no idea how to get down to those floors though, so he just let them be. He continued to explore the screens before him mostly trying to figure out how paying with mana worked.
Eventually he figured out that he was supposed to install a large battery somewhere in the tower and have it passively collect mana. That would allow the tower's basic functions like lighting and the kitchen to function. For now though, he didn't worry about it and instead decided to only make a single change which was actually free. He had the stairs replaced simply with a long empty tube down one of the pillars on the side. Effectively, it was an elevator shaft, except he didn't need an elevator to ascend or descend, instead simply flying up or down as needed. That also freed up a good amount of space on each floor, which was an added bonus.
Well, I guess it's something else to do. What's the point of upgrading the tower though?
To help defend against the inevitable army that tries to conquer this continent and the legendary stormbringer. Grim added unhelpfully.
Alright, first things first, time to see about some Kraken Gear.
Felix pulled the Kraken Gear Set out of his inventory causing a large chest to drop onto the ground. It was an ornate wooden chest that was as wide as Felix was and heavy as hell. On it was a series of intricate carvings all across the surface of the chest with a Kraken surrounded by waves in the middle. The chest was made of a dark treated wood. Felix bent down to open it and was presented with a screen.
[D - Epic] Kraken Gear Set (Caster)
This chest may not be opened until you have reached the prerequisite grade.
Well that's a pain in the ass. Guess I grind out a few levels then.
Wait, hold on. There are a couple of things I think we should do first. Grim interjected.
Ok, shoot.
This is less important, but you should try and open your soul space sooner rather than later so you don't have to carry me around everywhere. We should talk about familiar choices because we can likely kill two birds with one stone and hunt for it while getting you to D grade. Lastly, I sorted through all the Faction Tokens and some are actually worth looking at sooner rather than later.
Ok, tokens first.
Thankfully, the tokens have rarities so I didn't have to manually sort through them. I did anyways, but there was nothing interesting in the Common or Uncommon rarities. In Rare, we have one of the most beneficial tokens for both of us, The Guild of Answers. It seems like, using the token, we can ask questions and then we get a price. If we pay the price, someone answers us. There are also options to pay someone by the hour to answer anything, but I figure someone will abuse that and drone on as long as possible. There's also the option to offer answers but you'd have to register and it's complicated.
Yeah, good call. Can you manage that? Just put up a bunch of questions either of us have?
Yeah, I've already added a bunch of them. I'll let you know when I get answers and if it's more than a million credits, I'll ask your permission.
Sounds good. Anything else?
Yeah… Remember that enchanting book you have?
Eramith & Edelis: Enchanting Basics, what about it?
You've got an offer to attend the school with a scholarship. If you take a test for them, the scholarship can also be increased.
What's so special about that?
It's the only one with a Legendary rarity.
Holy shit. Guess I know where I'm heading next.
First you need to hit D grade, then you need to figure out how to escape this integration universe.
That shouldn't be too hard, right?
That's one of the questions I already posted.
Anything else?
Not for the tokens, the rest I'll mention if they become important. Oh and some of them had the audacity to send their tokens in puzzle cubes. None of them seem to be a super high rarity though.
Interesting that Eramith didn't.
Another question I already posted. ‘What is Eramith?', ‘Why are some tokens in puzzle cubes?' among others.
Alright, what's next?
Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.
Familiars. Let's quickly go over the basics. You already know how a soul-bond works, you exchange and implant each-others soul seeds into your souls. Familiars are one of the best ways of shoring up weaknesses or even just gaining strength. I have no idea why it seems like only casters use them in your universe. What happens is that when the seeds grow, you each gain a small bit of the other's abilities or something else. Typically, with normal familiars, they gain intelligence and sentience. They won't have complex philosophical discussions with you, but they become smarter and can understand more complex commands. If the thing you soul-bond with already has sentience or intelligence, it's not considered a familiar, not where I come from. Instead those are soul-bound partners or friends.
Like you.
Exactly, instead of sentience and intelligence, I gain other things. With most people I probably wouldn't gain anything other than what you consider levels. My soul strength would just level with yours and I would be about as durable as you are, just for convenience sake. Carrying around an E grade book forever would suck. In your case though, you're a monster, so I suspect my mana control is going to get quite a bit better as our bond strengthens.
What do I get out of this?
From our bond? Nothing. Instead of actual power, I can sift through your memories and index them. I also have forbidden knowledge from another universe that will slowly reveal itself over time.
Alright, fair enough. I guess I won't kick you out for now.
Ha ha. With most casters, you probably want to choose something fast or durable. Your biggest weaknesses tend to be things you can't avoid. A fast assassin can take out a caster very easily. Basically anything that manages to get into range, being faster makes it easier to keep your distance. The alternative is something durable, so that if something does make it into range, you can take a few hits instead of a single one before going down. In my universe, birds were a popular choice for the former and metal or stone elementals and golems were popular for the latter. The other advantage is that familiars can often be used to cast spells through.
Hence birds.
Exactly. Now, what do you want to shore up? What do you think your weaknesses are?
Uh… I have trouble fighting at close range, but now I have the skill ‘Combat' so that's already handled. I don't know, what do you think it is?
Nothing.
What, I have to have some weaknesses?
You will run headlong into danger and you tend to overestimate yourself, at least you have in the past. But in a fight against something of equal level to you, you are essentially unbeatable. Most caster's suffer from slow telegraphed casting, you don't have that issue at all. Most of them also can't cast multiple spells at once, you are essentially a baby and you can cast 5 at once. You also figured out energy early on and seem to have a stronger than average soul so you likely won't fall victim to a soul attack. If we think about a higher level enemy, one that's about equally matched to you power wise, how do they take you out? What weakness do they target?
Not sure. If it was me, I would just play to my strengths.
Exactly, there are no glaring weaknesses. Some things are weaker than others, but there doesn't seem to be anything that stands out as a weakness. You have enough mana to encase yourself in a mana shield and survive for a long ass time so assassins aren't an issue as long as you can see them coming.
So what the hell do I bond with?
A Material Sprite.
What the hell is that?
My recommendation for your familiar. They are relatively common, so we should be able to find one and that was the first question I had answered, it cost a single credit. They exist in this universe but typically people call them trash sprites as slang or matter sprites. Matter or Material is more accurate though.
You want me to choose something called a ‘Trash Sprite' as my familiar? Also why is it called that?
Yes. It's a stupid nickname because they are often used to dispose of trash. What it does though, is so much cooler than that. A Matter Sprite can eat just about anything and break it down, completely. Then it can reconstitute it's body into those materials it's learned.
So I'll be able to shapeshift? Make my body made of metal?
No, almost definitely not. That's a property of it's body, not it's soul. What is does have, is control over matter similar to how you have control over mana. Not to the same degree though.
Ok, I'm confused. Also, how does it eat matter? Where does it go? Does it poop it back out?
Alright, a little background. Sprites and elementals are born in the same way. Some ambient Anima happens to group up and become a soul, it happens fairly often actually but typically they just die out. A soul without a host tends to just vanish. Elementals are these souls that attached themselves to something, like a rock. A sprite doesn't need to attach itself to anything because it was big enough when it formed to continue existing for a little while. A sprite is similar to an elemental but it doesn't have as much intelligence or power, instead it happens to have an open soul space. Having an open soul space, makes a soul officially a sprite and means it will live on for a while without dissipating. Typically, the soul space is massive too, hence why people use sprites as trash compactors. A lot of sprites will gain an affinity to things, like water sprites or fire sprites. Instead of an elemental which is a soul that possesses an element, a sprite eats the element and stores it. It spends time around that element and will have a seemingly endless supply of the element.
Wait souls can just, form?
Yeah, happens all the time all around you. A soul is just a bunch of Anima that agrees on enough things to travel together.
That's it? What about the layers?
Not necessary, they just happen naturally in almost everything that lives for more than a few minutes.
That's a weird thought. So basically ghosts are real?
Sort of, usually those are called remnants. Back on topic though, a matter sprite attaches itself to nothing in specific, just matter in general. This is a double edged sword, it's a lot weaker early on but becomes kind of ridiculous later on. It eats all forms of matter and breaks it down on the atomic level to reconstitute it into whatever it wants. Sounds ridiculous but it mostly does it to matter it's eaten and that's in it's soul space along with the matter than makes up it's body. Bonding with one usually gives it intelligence and sentience. The mana manipulation any familiar gets, even if you're a god, is negligible. With you though, it will likely be able to cast simple spells raw, by shaping mana. At least by the B tier it should be able to, if my interpretation of the tiers is correct. It could happen way sooner, as soon as the end of D tier, but B tier at the latest.
I guess that's cool, not sure I care a ton about it casting spells though.
That's the other advantage to a matter sprite, they can essentially grow infinitely. Given that they can reconstitute their body, you can grow it to the point that you have a giant steel griffin, if you wanted.
Ok, never mind everything I said before, where do I get one?
Hold on, let me lay it all on you before you make up your mind. What you get, at first, will be very basic telekinesis. Just lifting pencils at first. By the end of C grade, if you properly bond, it will be more like lifting a book shelf with a little bit of breaking down matter. Just simple things though like turning a book to dust, given a few hours. Later on, you can reconstitute matter into a different material, hold back projectiles, things like that. You will have much more control though, over the matter of your own body, right from the start.
Ok so that handles a lot of problems I've had so far, I can make actual mana channels an- can I use it to fly?
Should be able to relatively early on, if you bond before you move to D grade. I asked some questions to the guild about familiars and apparently your bond gets a big bump when you evolve, with a little system fuckery. It will also let the sprite evolve at the same time. Otherwise, you would need to manually level it to D grade. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .