Between the time I had spent climbing the tower, battling the Storm Dragon and the various bouts of meditation required to fix the foundations of my soul in the aftermath, a few days had passed. With my need for sleep waning by the level, my rhythm was completely messed up, but I was fairly sure I had now spent more time stuck at level twenty nine than I had climbing there. Soon, I would move on.
The vault of the Storm Dragon in which I found myself was not the dragon’s true horde. Were an F grade, or even E grader human to find themselves within his lair, the very magic in the air would be enough to kill them. While the Storm Dragon was naturally hostile to any intruders or thieves, such low level issues would be dealt with in short order by the items themselves.
Only one such item existed in the vault, and it was this item which had sung to me even before I entered the room. The other items were likely legendary pieces of equipment or weaponry in their own right. There were even a few impressively bound and thick tomes which would undoubtedly help me learn the spells I had been craving since the arrival of the System. I ignored them all.
I had eyes only for the smallest item in the room. There was no ignoring its place of import in the room, placed on the highest and most central pedestal. The strength of the magic within the tiny sphere was given pride of place, even amongst the myriad treasures which filled the vault. There was no need to circumstance, so I walked up and plucked the item from where it hovered above a fine looking pillow.
Once the item was in hand, my senses returned in full and I found it could now be identified, along with everything else in the room. To avoid anything akin to buyer’s remorse, I avoided the other items and made my way outside while reading the description before me. I definitely made the right choice.
Item - Hurricane Heart (Legendary)
As the Storm Dragon grew, like other lizards, it shed its skin. When the Storm Dragon finalised its rise to power, the last vestiges of mortality were cast off. Created in reverence by a pair of A rank alchemists, twins on the path of Thunder and Lightning, the Hurricane Heart was designed to mimic the dragon’s insatiable ability to absorb energies. When imbibed the user’s mana will undergo a complete transformation.
The choice was made, and the trial tower was complete. A system prompt jingled as I grasped the supposed pill. It looked more like a pearl to me, but that wasn’t very far from pill shaped, I guessed. I was more than happy with my choice. While a new weapon would be immediately useful, the Hurricane Heart was something else entirely.
“What do you know about pills?” I asked Naea upon leaving the vault. The temptation to remain within and study the markings on the walls kept growing stronger. Obviously, this only increased my desire to leave. The greed inside me was not my own, and I had no intention of pushing my luck. I kept Naea within my aura and we both left together. The opening was sealed behind us, like it was never there.
At being asked the question, Naea would be able to provide me with knowledge a typical F grade anywhere else in the multiverse might know. When I reached E grade, the encyclopaedic library she drew from would increase. She was like a magical search engine. Incredibly useful, with the only issue being she didn’t love the task.
“They’re cultivation resources,” she intoned with a bored voice, “generally consumed and then broken down within the cultivator - that’s you. The most common pills are level pills which push you into higher levels without the need for combat.”
“Oh, so that exists? I guess not everyone’s a fighter, but that doesn't mean they need to get left behind. What about other pills?”
“Some pills grant attribute points, sometimes even efficiency. There’s a limit to how many you can use, so you can’t just eat a million pills and become insanely strong. Well, you could but you’d have to be the richest being in the universe while also being dumb as a rock. The highest grade pills have more unique effects which can’t be predicted so easily. In general, they’re an amazing and valuable resource.”
“How do I know-”
“Just eat it and see,” Naea interrupted my string of questions with the obvious final answer. There was no way I wasn’t going to throw this thing down my neck. She didn’t say anything about pills being dangerous, just having a limit, so I should be fine. Even if I could only eat one of these things my whole life, the one described as legendary in big bold letters was probably a safe bet anyway.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Once bitten and twice shy, however. I had continually pressed the big red button since the world changed and the System had, more often than not, kicked my ass for it. Every precaution and boost I could give myself before doing so again was just good sense. The first step in that regard was to finally return back to Home Base. The journey was mostly uneventful, but once more useful for learning some of the ins-and-outs in using Harmony of the Storm.
Mostly. I still had the System prompt I received upon grabbing the Hurricane Heart. As I opened it, a valve opened within and strength flowed into every fibre of my being. Naea jumped as she no doubt received a similar achievement. Like the Boss Combat into my Dungeon Boss Destruction achievement, I had received a reward for our haste.
Achievement Unlocked - Trial Tower Triumph (World First)(Solo)
Fate has been nudged with your victory over a Trial Tower. As the first to receive this achievement on your world, your gains are greater.
Effect: Highest Attribute +15%, Other Attributes +10%
I punched the air upon seeing another “world first” achievement. Naea apparently didn’t count as an extra person for the purposes of the System’s judgement but it had given her the same achievement as myself so I suppose the same could be said for me. “I’m definitely your familiar at this point,” I joked.
Naea looked at me with pity and patted my head with condescension. “You always were,” she nodded. I shooed her away, again feeling how sturdy she was as my hand pushed her and met unexpected density. Her evolution had put her at a level where she could challenge me, a thought brought to life by her joke and my Dao. I squashed it quickly.
The sight of Home Base was surprisingly emotional. The strongest emotion was relief, as the defences I purchased had kept the place safe. I smiled as the conical roof came into view, the rustic hut standing whole and secure. Due to my eyesight having improved massively along with pretty much all my other physical capabilities, it was still a way away.
Time to spend some more money.
Faction Page Members: 2 Buildings: 1
Home Base
The landing page for my faction was currently abysmal. Without the ability to talk to others, there was no way for it to grow, which limited my options when it came to building options. With less than five followers, I could only have one faction building. With that said, I wasn’t going to live in squalor, nor the past. This was a world with magic and, based on the Faction shop, I was filthy stinking rich.
Turning my original affront to carpentry into a lovely little cottage had cost 100 gold coins, with most of the money placed into the building coming from the 400 gold spent on keeping it safe. Both of those were upgradeable, and there were a fair few options available to add interesting additions to the base. The security upgrade was a simple 4,000 gold cost to bring the quality from “basic” to “adequate”.
The same was true for the main structure, but seeing my living arrangements described as basic or adequate wasn’t enough. Each upgrade was ten times the cost of the last, so I chose the prompt twice. In the distance, a large dust cloud full of the sound of sawing, hammering, dropping, or otherwise working with, wood appeared. 11,000 of my 19,249 gold coins were removed from my inventory. “Better do a good job…” I grumbled half-heartedly.
Of course, the System completely outdid itself. For the low, low cost of money I had no other use for I received a fortress. The process was finished before our leisurely walk towards Home Base was finished but I tore into a sprint alongside Naea once we saw the high walls come into being.
“A château,” I said in wonder. A family holiday to France when I was younger had given me the chance to visit a historic French castle called Château Gaillard. The resemblance was striking, except my château wasn’t on top of a hill. I bit my cheek and asked Naea her opinion. “Would it be better on top of a hill?”
We had some back and forth about the best placement of a castle while we entered and explored. The System didn’t skimp, and it also didn’t send me back to the middle ages either. A fully fitted kitchen, multiple bathrooms, multiple bedrooms, a wine cellar which actually had wine. I took my first alcoholic drink in months, not much of a drinker beforehand. It was awful, just how I remembered it. Each and every amenity I could think of was expertly layered throughout the house. A stocked pantry, a full linen closet, a full walk-in closet.
“First, though…” I found a bedroom at the back of the house which I decided wasn’t going to be mine and crashed into the bed. It buckled slightly before adjusting to my weight. “I love magic.” Murmuring the words, not for the first time, I fell into a deep and comfortable sleep.
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Naea wandered the halls of the mansion without looking at her surroundings. Sometimes walking, sometimes flying, she was barely paying attention to herself, never mind the crap paintings on the wall. Her mind was upstairs, at the back of the house, watching over her patron with worry.
Not worry for himself, at least not yet. Naea was full of information about humans, and being the biggest and toughest in the room was usually a good thing. Grant was definitely that. Naea’s worries came from that truth. There were rules which had never been broken before that Grant simply ignored because he didn’t know they were there.
She herself had been forced to evolve just to keep up with him. She was happy with the power at her fingertips, but she had felt the challenge within Grant’s soul as he fought the Storm Dragon. He would try to reach the peak of his impossible potential and bring the true form of the dragon to heel. She could feel it. She was scared he might be able to.
Because while being a big fish in a small pond is great, Naea knew there were sharks waiting in the waters beyond. Standing out too much now would put the largest target on Grant’s head his universe had ever seen, and then some. Naea bumped into a table as she absent-mindedly floated about with concern.
“Whatever,” she growled, rubbing her head. Did it really matter? There was always something bigger and badder around the corner waiting to kill them before they would reach the dragon. There was a murmur from the Dao within her as she decided to throw caution to the wind. “Let’s just go crazy.”