After the disturbing events with the Leviathan tear, Sofia’s ‘vacations’ at the academy finally felt like actual rest. With no pressing issues remaining, she could slowly keep helping the students progress while working on her own skills at a leisurely pace.
The first thing she did was to finally read the entirety of what she had access to of the Academy’s library then of the Empire’s public great royal library. It only took her a few minutes to go through even the bigger tomes, flipping through the pages like a lunatic, quickly earning herself a reputation among the nobles of the Empire as a book-eating freak. On a happenchance meeting with ‘Elizabeth’, she traded the flask with the Leviathan’s tear back to her for a pass to the Mithrium-rank-ID restricted section of the royal library where she found books about all the known classes, siege rituals and dungeon locations as well as sparse but interesting information on the Major Gods and the Deep.
Among all the interesting information, one that definitely caught her eyes was the mention of Scripture as one of the strongest major gods worshiped by humans of the pre-system era and his downfall as people began to associate holy text with the system, redirecting power to its creator God, whose identity, just like that of the two other admins, wasn’t mentioned anywhere.
Uncensored knowledge on the system itself was sparse, there was apparently God’s incarnation in charge of every trial after the first, though their names, too, were not spoken.
Finally, she found a few passages mentioning ‘The rot Dragon’ and ‘The higher races war’ which the book described as: ‘a tragedy that left an entire continent uninhabitable’.
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For months, life was calm at the academy, even during the events for tokens with Sofia and Astelia’s students, there were no more attacks or suspicious activities.
Shaily fell off in the token rankings as she had become obsessed with mastering the [Angel’s Bolt] and was already at a point where she could throw genuine, if weak, piercing bolts. Unlike Sofia who trained to channel them faster, Shaily was trying to modify her version to be more mana-efficient.
Instead of her, it was Lola who solidified her ranking in first place, with a small but meaningful lead over Saria in second place, Erian in third, a level 199 student in fourth, and En and Opal constantly battling and dueling each other for fifth place.
After every public class, more and more students would apply to Sofia’s class but she rejected all of their applications as she felt she couldn’t focus on any more students at once. Many of the other teachers also used their lesson credits to come to spectate her and each other’s classes.
Sofia also started proactively using all of her accumulated credits, finally learning short range teleportation from Astelia’s lessons, and overall just getting to know every teacher in the academy while learning random knowledge in a bunch of unrelated fields. In particular, she spent a lot of time in Eternam’s necromancy lessons, which she was already overqualified for most of the time, but enjoyed anyway. Since Zerei was already often with Eternam, Sofia could often be seen hanging out with the two Avians around the academy grounds.
She was attacked a few times for her token pouch by organized groups of students, netting her quite a few new hands for her room’s door, but no one ever challenged her to an official duel again after the humiliation of Marquess Proudwall.
Her skills were slowly progressing, the combat skills in particular she trained by organizing frequent all-out brawls with Astelia, Saria and Alith whenever the four of them were all free. She was admiring the result of her hard work on the seventh out of the ten months of the school year, when she noticed her first mana pearl from [Crystallized] was finally ready.
Name : Sofia Aphenoreth
Age : 21 ♢
Class : [Saintomancer] ♢
Level : 249 ♢
Health : 85 980 / 85 980 (20k + (20/level - 4k) + 65k)
Stamina : 21 047 / 21 047 (20 067 + (20/level - 4k))
Mana : 417 100 / 417 100 (319 100 + (2k/level- 400k))
Main Specialization : [Eclipse Skeleton]
Alteration chance : 100%
Secondary Specialization : [Heat Death]
Active Skills (8 / 8)
[Spine of the Black Sun] - Level 249
[Summon Blood] - Level 249
[Maiden Banshee] - Level 249 (Lv.249)
[Graveyard of the righteous] - Level 247
[False immortality] - Level 3
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[Skull Choir] - Level 236
[Reign over shadows]
[Saintess’ madness] - Level 2
Passive Skills (7 / 8)
[Blessing of the Deep] - (2/4)
[Vakariazrehafin of Sorrow] ♢
[Exalted Exoskeleton] ♢
[Venerable physique of the primeval void] ♢ - Fifth step Light forging realm
[Bone dominus] - Level 2
[Erredian Rot]
[Runeforged Overlord] ♢ - Level 249
Classless Skills (7 / 7)
♢ [Dreams Of a Demon which Gods Envy - March of the Envoy] ♢
[Summon Self] - Level 42
[Mana manipulation] ♢
[Radiance] - Level 99
[Quintessential] ♢
[One with Suffering] ♢
[Crystallized] ♢
Special Skills (1)
[The Book of Skeletons] ♢
Summoned heroes (4 / 4)
* Lv.249 Pareth (Holy Boneplate Mauleur Eclipse Skeleton)
* Lv.249 Alith (Alith)
* Lv.249 Book of Skeletons (Book)
* Lv.249 Ihuarah (Heartless Shade)
[Mark of Aphenoreth]
[Bone dominus] really is stubbornly stuck there… Most of everything else is almost ready though. I need to work a bit more on the teleportation classless and finish optimizing the bolts and I should be good to go for the trial. I’ll just need to take care of Pareth and Bookie next before going. Also pay Erredis and TLDR a visit.
“Now onto the pearl… It’s been almost ready for a while but it’s just dislodged itself a bit I think,” Sofia said to herself as she prodded the pearl on her chest. With a gentle pinch, she dislodged it, revealing the small budding bead of a new pearl underneath. Oh so the new pearl is what pushed it out.
Sofia held the pearl in front of her face and observed it closely, it was perfectly smooth and round, about the size of one of Alith’s candy, and its pearly surface was a marbled mix of reflective blues and purples.
There’s quite a lot of mana aggregated inside. It’s surprisingly heavy, too. About six months for this… I hope they come much faster later on, since the growth speed is linked to the mana regen. Let’s see what Mr Scribe has to say.
[Mana Pearl] : A pearl of very finely compressed and woven mana taking a physical form from the sheer density of energy contained within. It can fuel rituals for a long time or be swallowed whole to gain a 100% bonus to thinking speed lasting for around twenty minutes as well as fueling your mana regeneration even in an environment devoid of mana (up to a certain point). Will slowly dissipate in about a decade, use within five years for best results.
Well, keeping that one for the trial. Might even be worth it to wait until I get a second one before going in. Actually, what if I ate two at once? Mr. Scribe?
Identifying the pearl again, there was an additional line about mass consumption diminishing returns.
Good to know…
There should be the next competition event in a few days, no? How come Ms. Deathmarch hasn’t brought me anything yet? I’ll see if Astelia is home. She should be napping around this time I think… Do I wait?
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“So it was not just me?” Astelia asked, sleepy-eyed and still holding a yellow bird-shaped plushie, “I thought the academy might have skipped me by mistake when making the papers, I was going to bring it up to you at tonight’s fight.”
“Well… Time to pay a visit to our lovely coordinator. Are you coming with me?”
Astelia nodded. “Give me a second to change.” She closed the door and reappeared two minutes later, her hair tied in an approximative ponytail and wearing a simple long tunic in the colors of the academy.
“There’s no rush, you know,” Sofia commented jokingly.
“I would not be so sure about that… Moon just sent me a very creepy vision of a weird mask.”
How nice. Just when I was starting to get used to the slow life here.
Sofia shaped the one-eyed mask of Scripture’s newest pawn out of bones and showed it to Astelia, “By any chance?”
“Yes! This one. Is it what I think it is?”
“Exactly that one, this bastard Scripture must be planning some shit again. So don’t rush, be ready for battle. We’re safe in the academy, but who knows how fast things can go awry… I’m not getting caught unprepared again. How long do you need?”
“Hmm… About ten minutes to be sure I’m fully ready,” Astelia answered after a second of reflection.
“I’ll be back here in ten, then.”
Sofia summoned the graveyard skeletons and phased right out of the teachers’ tower.
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Sofia phased right into Alith’s alchemy lab, which was where she was at this time of day with 100% certainty.
“Sof? Something going on?”
“I have reasons to think it’s time.”
“Right now?” Alith asked while she cut the fire under her multiple cauldrons and glassware tubes.
“I’m not sure but it’s better if you come just in case.”
“Give me a second to make sure nothing’s going to explode and I’m good to go.”
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Sofia found Saria in the spectator benches of the underground arena, watching the ongoing duels. She tapped on her shoulder.
“Time for plan Birthday party.”
“Really?” Saria asked as she turned around.
“Uncertain, but Moon just sent Asty a vision on the elf’s mask.”
“Alright, I’ll be heading out with Pareth then, Cinthia is in our room if you want to check the Chat, don’t forget your runes.”
“I’m working on it.”
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