> Spells and sword arts, both functions born of skills or creatable through one's own efforts even if rare.
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> Spells often come from magic skills such as
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> Sword arts mostly come from upper-class sword skills,
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> It is very much possible to combine spells and sword arts, as they are not mutually exclusive. Though it is not easy to mix them, requiring either one casting a spell or using a sword art without the support of a skill while manifesting the other with the help of a spell or using both through a skill at the same time, both methods being non-viable in common combat in most cases. Though, {Spell blade} and {Magic swordsman} holders are usually the ones who attempt to manifest this possiblity due to their class offering both skills that give spells and skills that give sword arts.
An excerpt from 'Basics of the system' by 'Marth Cel' published on the 3rd day of Julia on the 252nd cycle
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Two men were walking down the steps of the slime plains.
One was Thalos "Ugh... Why the hell is there a variant so early?"
The other an old {Mad arcanist}, Lest von Balis, now known as Lest "It's probably that slime apostle 1 you and your mooks found, didn't it say that it transcended? That means it became a transcender variant."
"A transcender variant? You must be joking," Thalos joked as he enjoyed the little orb of light levitating around them "How old is this dungeon? Maybe a few weeks at the maximum? It's definitely a more normal variant, maybe an sapient variant? They're rare and all, but they exist from time to time."
Felt scoffed "And you take this dungeon as the standard, when not even the first floor has been cleared after a week? That there are slimes that can kill those newbies is already worrying."
"Sure, sure," Thalos waved, obviously relaxed "As if slimes could ever be a valid threat, its just that they're all still newbies. Have you seen anyone above bronze in town? No, I would know, guild master and all."
"Well then, if you're so confident, what makes a level 10 like you any different?" The old arcanist very intently asked.
"How extravagant, to think the retired silver found the need to use
Lest rolled his eyes "
"Whoa," Thalos couldn't help but exclaim in a bit "How high level does
The old man currently on the job for free frowned "At level 30 it will start giving rough level estimates for those weaker than the user, but don't think I don't see the stunt you're trying to pull."
"Haha... I have no idea what you mean," Thalos, having his attempt at steering the conversation thwarted, decided to actually give the far stronger veteran what he wanted "It's a difference in both skills and class, their best skills are multiple levels below my
"Your highest level skill for mine?" The ververnt user of madness magic offered.
"Sure, you first though." Thalos said, not intending to actually answer.
"Haha, no, you young upstarts should respect your elders."
The two bickered animatedly, walking all the way into the slime plains with Lest casually shooting a bolt of fire directly at any slime close by.
"-And, there it is, slime apostle 1; 'A herald for the future of all slime kind'. Huh, what a joke." Lest remarked, as he raised his arm without haste and manifested a tiny ball of concentrated flame mana.
Thalos, instead of letting him do his work and returning the dungeon to a safe state, stopped him "Dude, no. I need to get the kill on the guild card, it's worth basically worth zero experience anyways so at least get the variant bounty. If it's really a transcender we'll get at least a silver for our trouble."
"And you'll be able to get the credit since I'm not a part of the guild anymore." Lest said bickered back.
Thalos' face contorted in confusion "Yea, so what? Make the most of everything, its not like you need the credit."
Lest paused for a moment, and realized "Huh, that is true. Go on, kill it. Its just a level 2 right now, so a single kick should be enough."
With the arcanist's blessings, Thalos went off in the direction before stopping "You can attach a lantern spell to me right?"
"Yes, that would be possible," Lest responded, before catching five coins, all of them copper. Not much, but something. It was just a latern spell, five copper was way worth it. Coalescing his mana and turning it into light mana before linking it to the body of Thalos and set up a little construct on the inside to convert mana to light mana before finally manifesting it "Pour mana into it if you want it to last."
Taking a moment to get comfy, Lest watched as the {Magic swordsman} ran toward the darkness in hopes of finding the transcender variant, though he was quickly used as a target for the slime's acid attack.
Though 'Slime apostle 1', its name being a worrying indication that there could be more, quickly started to run off into another dark corner. Sadly, the latern was strong enough and the speed of Thalos fast enough that he found it running away. With the enhanced senses given by high stats, he could hear him loudly chant from far away: "O' heavenly thunder that birthed the first life, grant me the strength to smite the impure!"
His sword suddenly charged with a good few arcs of blue lightning, crackling with power. He took a moment to pause and ready his attack, before swinging with a sudden and unnaturally refined and standardized slash, all of the electricity taking a distorted line towards the slime, though only hitting where it had just hopped from.
'Hmm... Was that a spell and a sword art at the same time? Or was it a combination?' He thought to himself, choosing to take a proper look at the panel he had gotten from
Slime apostle 1 Common
A slime born with the ability to expel magically acidic fluid, transcended twice over, crowned by its creator and highly valued by him. A herald for the future of slime kind and honoured by its role, prideful in its superiority over the rest of its kind.
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Strongest skill:
Level: 2.
Weakness; Aspected attacks.
Warning: The slayer of this creature and their helpers will gain the long lasting ire of its creator.
The moment he read the last line, the warning not often included in any inspection he used, specifically 'Will gain the long lasting ire of its creator', he suddenly felt his blood pressure rise "Hey, get back here!"
Still going after the slime, and having also had his face coated in acid which was slowly degrading his skin, Thalos was not very much intending to listen "Why should I?!"
"Damn it dumbass, if you kill that the core's going to be pissed!" He exclaimed as he himself ran after him with full speed "And I'm going to be caught up in the blast radius!"
Thalos paused before shouting back "A [Common] core can hold grudges?!"
"This one can apparently!" He shouted back, luckily seeming to have an effect on the slightly antsy Thalos.
After a few seconds, Lest finally caught up to the now still Thalos, who complained the moment he entered hearing range "You better show me the details screen or so help me god of death, do you have any idea how much that thing is going to do for me? I'll finally be able to completely push all the paperwork on the other guy!"
Lest, knowing that trying anything outside just showing him the results of
"...This dungeon is already conscious?" Thalos asked, annoyed.
With just a shrug, the old arcanist turned to the entrance and started to stroll "Maybe its just gotten to the threshold of making memories, or maybe not, it's unique."
Thalos himself started to think of a way to get rid of it without directly getting blamed for the kill "...I guess I'll just kill with a borrowed hand."
"That would be the smartest move." Lest affirmed, the duo walking back through the slime plains, through the tunnel, then through the rooms before it and finally leaving through the entrance.
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The slime that had transcended twice over slowly hopped through the darkness, knowing its creator held its eyes on it, relieved at its escape from the dastardly lightning wielding foe. But quickly, its gaze faded, returning to what it had been doing, attempting to bring the rest of its kind up to its standards.
It had survived once more, and it would continue to kill sentients as it was created to do!
It hopped and hopped, finding a large lack of sentients, but it still waited and watched for their signs and killed one or two groups that entered.
But then a large group came down the stairs, three light sources all the type that wouldn't go down with a shot of acid, all with grey heads and even grey chests. The entirety of their journey was cautious, not showing easy openings it had discovered over time, such as fighting for or harvesting the nuclei of its kind.
The group always strayed in its general direction, following its trail. It was confused, why did this group of sentients follow the path it took?
Luckily, the creator seemed to realize quickly what it meant, and told it; They were tracking it, following it through the traces it left.
It could feel the anger and worry inside its creator as it was informed, and it felt angry that they brought its creator to such straights. With a small pause, it gathered a slight bit of power and shot the one that its creator thought was the tracker straight in the head before circling around at full speed to avoid any and all attacks directed in its previous direction.
From what it could see the tracker was completely stopped from doing what it did, completely saving slime apostle 1 from the threat of being traced! But as its creator informed, it was best to kill the tracker before it could get back to tracking. But before that happened, another sentient with a plate of metal in its hand shouted and for some reason it couldn't think about attacking anything except that sentient.
Whenever it tried to go for the tracker, its thoughts returned to the sentient with the plate of metal. It was not smart to go for the metal plate sentient, that was what its creator told it, and it tried its best to convey its issues with its semi-sapient mind; but could not.
But quickly, the worry disappeared, as its creator directly forced it to shoot the tracker's hand as it was being covered by a green light while another sentient sat next to it and causing a its flesh to slowly erode.
But it was worrying, its hand did not directly melt like sentients normally did. But still, the sentients were quickly brought to disarray and for some reason one of the lights disappeared.
Its creator kept at it, forcing it to shoot at the sentients in their 'Hands', 'Arms' and 'Legs' which weren't grey. And it even tried to shoot out an extra shot at the tracker, though it quickly went towards the metal plate sentient where its shot was stopped by its metal plate.
It all went well finally, it could shoot at them from a bit away while circling around, even a few of its fellows with nuclei were dragged closer to attack with it. Even if they weren't as strong as it, they could help to obscure its own location. For some reason the metal plate sentient once again shouted, though even louder this time. It wasn't worried, as long as its creator kept it under control-
-It had to attack! IT HAD TOO!
It leapt with ferocity, nearing the metal plate sentient and planning to crush it with both acid and its own body. While its creator confusedly tried to stop it, it fought back, it had to attack! Finally as it entered the light with a sharp jump, it was quickly forced to backdown by its creator, why did its creator have to stop it?! Slime apostle 1 was so close to killing that sentient!
Luckily the sentients had found it and kept going after him somehow, they were taking the initiative to die by slime apostle 1's hands! But its creator kept trying to have it shake them off, it tried to resist and got a few shots of acid at the metal plate sentient out, making sure they could still find it. Though it might've angered its creator greatly, luckily its hatred was not directed at it but instead the metal plate sentient for some reason...
For some reason he felt something was off, that something was wrong. It had directly gone after that metal plate sentient and of course wanted to directly crush its head with its weight, but why? it wanted to kill it so intensely after it shouted, but why? When it first shouted all its attempts of attack kept centering around the metal plate sentient, but why?
It didn't know, it was confusing, but in this state it stopped resisting the wishes of the one that made it. But it sadly couldn't run away from the sentients, as one of the lights chased after slime apostle 1 in order to make sure than it couldn't escape in to the familiarity of shadow.
But why did it think it was to stop it from escaping? It was confused, but its creator wanted only one thing; For slime apostle 1 to escape and live for another day.
If it could just force out a strong shot of acid it could kill that metal plate sentient, it could still feel itself raging in order to attack it. But, it could do that later, it had to live longer and not disappoint its creator- Ah, yes, it just had to escape. It needed to escape, and it had to use everything it could in order to do so.
It started to constantly spit out acid, not in order to attack, but in order to use the recoil to escape faster. Somehow, said shots of acid completely ignored what every forced it to attack the metal plate sentient and sprayed a few of the sentients in acid.
As it and its pursuers neared the edge of the slime plains, its creator quickly become worried for where it could go, but was not worried even with the prattling of one of the sentients with a weird floaty body outside of the grey parts which indicated some kind of projectile attack. Taking the initiative, it jumped directly onto the wall, then boosted diagonally to the right back to the ground before once again jumping to the wall.
Using all of its power to boost up off the wall to a height that the sentients wouldn't expect, it was surprised to find the light still followed it. Normally such attempts at showing it travelled in a straight line or moved around slowly, now, it was directly soaring through the air without the slightest chance at redirection or evasion while a ball of fire rapidly homed in on it.
Its creator had already started to fumble and panic, trying anything it could to help it escape. But it didn't need that, it was created the same as its brethren but became greater, it could do it again. It could get stronger, it could become smarter, it was slime apostle 1!
Congratulations, 'Slime apostle 1', you have attained rudimentary sapience and manifested a soul, allowing you access to the system proper.
It knew what it needed, its nuclei called for more mana in order to truly forge itself anew. And when slime apostle 1 called for it, its creator happily obliged, pouring copious amounts of mana within it without concern for its life or death. It poured and poured, filling slime apostle 1's form and quickly offered to the nuclei which called for more, and more it received.
Using some of the mana supposed to go its nuclei, the slime poured out a large burst of acid to the side to avoid the ball of fire while still letting its nuclei gather more mana.
For some reason the light that kept following it stayed where slime apostle 1 had almost died, and the only big thing it could remember happening there was the intense density of mana. But all the time it spent thinking, its creator kept forcing it to run with everything it could, even trying to use manifested mana to push it further even if only slightly.
All the while, it could feel its nuclei fill and morph with all the extra power it had access to. Just like when it had first formed, and slime apostle 1 had yet to even see the world, its body finally filled with mana beyond just what it regularly harvested from the atmosphere to fill itself.
It still called for more, and slime apostle 1 relayed its call to its creator, who still filled it with mana even after having almost escaped its predicament.