They left Tidal the next day. Koawe was done with his business. Leaving through the west gate and were assured a quick ride. Koawe led them a distance away from Tidal’s intimidating walls before whistling sharply, “Arti!” he called.
It took a few minutes before they heard a loud screech. A plane-sized bird with icy blue wings flew over and landed in front of them. Rubbing its head on Koawe.
“You’re a tamer?”
“Nope. It just followed me on its own will. Intelligent beasts do that from time to time and you can find a lot of them in the glades. Meet Arti, my companion.” Koawe’s smile was gentler than usual. It must have been his eyes that softened up. Koawe let them pet her. It liked Ebony’s touch, her feathers were only safe to touch in one direction. One's skin might tear off if she was pet against the other direction of these seemingly soft feathers.
Arti flapped her wings violently when Ning Xin got close but calmed down with Koawe assuring her that Ning Xin was a friend and not a foe.
[Arctic Condor Lvl ???]
Ebony was level 211 for all 3 of his Classes, having levelled up twice after Navin killed the Earthfly Queen. With level 16 Identify, he could only Identify up to 291. It was still clear the condor was above 300 he just wasn’t sure how much higher. It had a weaker aura than the Earthfly Queen.
The ride was indeed quick. Arti didn’t have a saddle since she wasn’t a ‘ride’ and it was a challenge to hang on tight without any barriers protecting them from sharp winds. They had to grab on tight but not to the point of hurting or irritating Arti. They hugged Arti’s body so that they weren’t blown off. Koawe just chuckled at their plight, he was very used to riding Arti with his legs comfortably wrapped around her neck and shoulder area.
Koawe didn’t dare to fly too high. Arti had great stamina but was easily distracted by prey. Ebony copied Koawe and conjured a little ice mana to chill her body and regain her attention.
It hadn’t exactly been a safe flight. The three of them were violently flung off when they encountered a nasty flock of [Cyclone Peckers] around level 190. These peckers didn’t fear the vastly stronger opponent and swept all of them up in their tornado-like flight path. Arti got irritated by the storm of pecks and reacted too violently, sending all of them off her back.
Arti didn’t bother with any tactics, she just breathed out a cloud of misty ice that swallowed the entire tornado. The small-sized peckers helped to spread the cloud with the winds they caused, essentially helping the freezing cloud reach every Cyclone Peckers. They turned flightless and fell to their deaths like a swarm of insects breathing in pesticide. Chances were, they were dead before they hit the ground.
Arti caught the three of them who were floating in the air with their own magic. Perhaps the Cyclone Peckers didn’t see them compared to the giant bird. She tried her best to get Koawe to pet her. They helped to unruffle her feathers that got pecked at before they continued their high-speed journey.
Arti began to take a liking to Ning Xin after she helped to comb her feathers. She wasn’t aware that the chef was an expert when it came to handling bird feathers. Poultry and avian meat was her favourite and she had plenty of experience with feathers.
They reached Arcta in four days and Arti flew away when they returned. She didn’t stay with Koawe all the time and lived in the wild most of the time.
They separated and he naturally went to the Thoya’s.
Ning Xin was recognised and she was better at restraining her overflowing Vitality so they were not as bothered despite the increase in her strength.
They opened the door to see Kiva walking with wobbly feet before stumbling onto the padded blanket she was placed on. She could now walk about a dozen steps before falling.
“Where’s Roya and Clovis?” Ebony asked Halvis who was the only one in the house. Kiva was reaching out for him, he took it as a win that he was remembered. Ning Xin took over instead, poking Kiva’s soft cheeks to get a giggle out. Kiva didn’t change in size at all, the Frost Elves physically grew very slowly.
Halvis smiled and got him to make a guess.
“I have no idea. Is he picking up mana tailoring?” He replied.
“Hahahaha! Sadly, that boy has no interest in tailoring. No, Roya’s teaching him her family’s spells. He was busy training with me this morning.” Halvis said.
Ebony knew they had some combat skills but the Frost Elves had their secrets too, they never specifically taught him any ice spells.
He could finally Identify Halvis to be at level 215.
“You’re back quick. Almost exceeded my level in such a short time too.”
“We met up with Koawe in Tidal, he invited us to witness your guardian beast’s birth. Has she given birth?”
“She hasn’t even arrived. Korben went to escort her.”
Halvis mentioned their village guardian who was a Grand Ice Mage.
“We also wanted a break since we couldn’t keep up with our excessive levelling.”
“I would bet. Even crafters who got an influx of multiple levels in a short time would see a decrease in the quality of their products since they misjudged their physical and maybe mental strength. Even so, it shouldn’t take a long time to get used to. You won’t stay for long will you?”
“Sorry to intrude…” Ning Xin said without explaining that their stay might be extended due to her needing quite a bit of time to digest all the crystalised blood she got.
“You misunderstand! I want you to stay longer. See how happy Kiva is to see you!” Halvis realised that his wording had been unwelcoming.
Ebony could tell Ning Xin was happy.
They didn’t actually stay in the village, opting to hunt for Seal meat again while they added their stats slowly. They took 3 days for the hunt this time and managed to fully allocate all their stats.
From level 100 to 212, he gained 112 levels. That meant a total of 1680 stat points from his Class, 1120 from his Sub-Class and 336 Wisdom stat points from his Profession. He was initially forced to put stats away from Intelligence due to the fact that his skin and muscles tore, his veins ruptured and his bones snapped when his mana started to fill up his chassis in their compressed state. It wasn’t like he didn’t want to throw his stats to Intelligence to power up his limitless body enhancement but his physical body just couldn’t withstand the strength of his mana.
Strength: 50 ➡ Strength: 400 [411]
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Vitality: 50 ➡ Vitality: 400
Constitution: 250 ➡ Constitution: 900 [4211]
Endurance: 50 ➡ Endurance: 150 [155]
Agility: 250 ➡ Agility: 600 [616]
Intelligence: 376 ➡ Intelligence: 626 [643]
Wisdom: 530 ➡ Wisdom: 1466 [1506]
Perception: 100 ➡ Perception: 250 [985]
He didn’t meet his stat goals and he didn’t like the current allocation but it was the only way he managed for his stats not to break his battle style. Even with 900 base Constitution his body was barely holding itself together. 4211 was a deceptive value based on Stock Mana Compressive Chassis at level 210 which provided him 525% of Intelligence to his Constitution which was 3286.5.
He got a 2.75% increase in most of his stats except Vitality and Perception from his Conditioning. It was only level 110 so there was a lot of room for growth.
He also realised after his evolution that he was previously wrong with Mental Arithmetic, he got tricked solely based on his status page’s numbers. His mana was now naturally 200% more compressible while in the past it was 100%. After his evolution, his natural mana density was also increased by 100%, effectively doubling the effect of Intelligence and letting him cover the gap between him and races who have higher base mana density unless they had the same Fortification. Even if he used the 3286 buff from Intelligence to calculate, he was effectively getting a 19,719 passive stat increase to his base 900 Constitution.
His effective Constitution would drop quickly in battle due to the usage of mana but it wouldn’t even matter after he cast body enhancement. He believed that if his body wasn’t so receptive to his own mana, there was no way 900 points in Constitution and maybe his other physical stat included could let him withstand his mana. His other physical stat most likely had to be taken into account as well from his tests and instincts. Thus, he had no choice but to heavily invest in his physical body.
He wanted to focus on his physical stat so it wasn’t a big problem. At least, he could fight even if all his mana was drained away now. His equipment wasn’t a burden to his unenhanced body and he could move perfectly fine without enhancement. His Perception had to be increased so that he could keep up with the high-intensity battles and the range of his senses had increased even more, getting more sensitive and accurate as well. The increase from his Everlasting Tranquillity saved him a lot of stat points.
The increase in his Strength and Agility greatly increased his stamina consumption too so he had to give some love to Endurance. His body gets sore slower with a higher Endurance.
His magic was slow due to his low Intelligence. Projectiles basically never hit since he usually fought stronger monsters. His clones weren’t viable in battle other than being used as distractions, a shield, an extra moving storage of ice mana that can attach themselves before bursting into flames or holding their positions since they were hard to break.
Everlasting Tranquillity at 294 gave him a 1470% increase in mana regeneration or a 15.7 times multiplier atop his natural regeneration. He currently regenerates 2364.91 MP/min or 39.42 MP/sec.
All his excess went to Icicle whenever he was in town and cannot repress it any further. He maintained a constant link to it, it was lucky Icicle consumed ice mana and it wouldn’t just freeze and shatter. He still exceeded Icicle’s consumption rate so if his robes were full he had no choice but to form a condensed Glacial Model before his mana leaked. He can do it in his sleep now so he can sleep in peace whenever he is in town. He still had his trailer home that had a huge mana ore that he kept topped up as well.
They returned and had a feast with the Thoyas.
❅❅❅
“Captain,” Hector whispered.
“Keep your head down.”
“Captain, are we really abandoning the camp?” Hector followed his group and continued moving in a weird squat walk.
“You want to join that fool of a commander that chooses to defend a hidden base and risk getting wiped out even after we inform them they are extremely outnumbered and outpowered? We’re supposed to stay low-key wherever possible.”
“But the soldiers…”
“...I can only trust that man will not let his men die in vain, I warned them multiple times.”
“But where are we going?”
“Shh. They informed me of the closest camp. General Truewater’s camp. We should be able to sleep well if a Truewater is in charge.”
It was surprising but it was actually the commander that allowed him the choice of action. More than a little odd.
“What’s the catch?” Hector knew that his captain was holding back some information.
“Closest, is probably more than a month away with our current speed. The real catch, according to that maybe not-so-silly commander, is that more and more Trolls are gathering near the coast. I can understand his reason for staying, there just isn’t anywhere they can set up a hidden camp with their numbers. Trying to cross the distance without getting spotted would be diffi-kh” Their captain leading the way moved his grip to his ribs.
The entire group acted lightning-fast after seeing the dart that pierced through the captains relatively well-held together armour.
“Stay down! 8 of them, they don’t appear to have spotted you. Move!” Their captain suppressed his voice and his thick arms held Hector back. Trolls tend to move in squads of 8.
“Take them down fast. As quietly as possible, stand down Hector.” Hector knew that Trolls had terrible communication capabilities and tended not to follow commands that well. If they saw food, they hunted. They wouldn’t report every single one of their hunts and that was only beneficial for the Imperials.
4 of them were left behind to watch the battle as their skills were loud, eye-catching or both. Their captain held back the poison in his system with his magic body, the Trolls haven’t changed their poison much so the soldiers here all had a certain level or resistance against it. He rushed out alone while the others surrounded the group of 8 without getting spotted.
It was no shock that most Trolls were purebred warriors through and through with far weaker affinity to mana than humans. Their captain’s sword burned bright, many commanders here used fire magic due to their effectiveness at slowing down the Trolls regenerative properties. All the captain had was an enchanted weapon.
He leaped to behead the one who shot the dart at him but was parried by a backhand, clashing onto the bladed metal vambrace. His blade snapped on impact, a miscalculation. It had better days and didn’t have any good maintenance for the past few years they took to travel.
His leg was caught by another Troll that moved in on him before he could react but was sliced off by the water mage on their side. He freed himself from the cut hand with a swing of his leg but the Troll’s arm was half regenerated already.
‘This squad is too strong!’ The captain could already tell from their regeneration speed and how they reacted to his attack.
“ALL HANDS ON DECK!” Perhaps he had been on the ship for too long.
Hector and his buddies came smashing their way into the battle, saving the water mage who almost got punched to a pulp.
Now that the water mage was free and protected, he was busy drowning 3 of the Trolls. An extremely useful tactic since the Trolls are rarely able to manipulate water and it was easy to restrain their movements. Unfortunately, the Trolls could go without breath for an unimaginable amount of time. Their flailing about was stronger than expected and the water mage couldn’t hold them back for too long.
Hector super panched the least clothed Troll on the belly, looking up to see the giant’s grin and his arm being enveloped by the giant’s grip. He screamed as every bone in his arm got pulverised as his body was sent flying like a rag doll. The Troll didn’t think he was a threat.
Drenched in sweat, Hector used the broken uprooted tree as support. He might have shared some of his potions and pills but he still kept most of them. The soldiers that died usually died instantly and he didn’t have a chance to save them. He was out of painkillers and had no choice but to bear the pain, drinking and eating the appropriate healing items. He was glad the Trolls didn’t seem to care about him, they probably Identified him to be the weakest since he was only a Journeyman.
Hector warned his allies with a shared glance with each of them. The Trolls were pushed close together by 25 soldiers who had impeccable teamwork. He readied his good arm, slightly afraid his body would tear apart if he overextended the usage of 6 elemental body enhancements. He put another pill into his mouth without swallowing it.
He looked at his shaking fists, took a deep breath and smashed them both into his head instead of each other. His body was flooded with conjured elements and instead of breaking bones and tearing tissues, his physical body started to disintegrate.
Hector jumped into the air for the greatest mega panch of his life till date.