Mila
Attempting to merge Second Self (F-Epic), Illusion Steps (F-Epic), and Blur (F-Epic) to Phantasmic Doppelgängers (F-Legendary).
Requirements met: Illusion Path Law Egg at peak grade or higher, effective Aura of 432 or higher
Congratulations!
You have merged three skills into Phantasmic Doppelgängers (F-Legendary)
Having taken an extra hour to find another good cave in which to leave the teleportation platform and then another eight hours to properly sleep, it was about a day later when Mila finally mastered Second Self and Blur. Then she immediately fused her three skills.
Before talking with Nana Xara, however, she played around with the skill a little, gaining a feel for it.
Whenever she activated Phantasmic Doppelgängers, a ghostly mist would spread out around her, causing an effect kind of like Blur, and then herself and up to four generated clones could start moving separately. She was able to control each clone individually and, like her real body, they could be covered in a ghostly mist, making it more difficult to tell them apart from her than the clones previously produced by Second Self.
The most useful aspect of the skill, however, was not the distracting nature of the clones, but the fact the clones, while not material, copied half the strength of her aura and could use all of her skills.
The range wasn’t that good. Like with the clones produced by Second Self, the clones from Phantasmic Doppelgängers couldn’t move more than 98 meters away from her, and their skills had to rely on her resources. But still, once she gained a stealth skill she could send clones to sneak into dangerous areas for spying and be far enough away to escape if they were found.
Already, she could use Devil’s Contract and Trickster’s Guise through the clones with the same effects as used through her own body, and she could even use Telekinesis with the same power, only half the range.
“Pretty nice, right?” Nana Xara sent over. “In a few ranks, you’ll be sending clones to different worlds to do your bidding.”
“Do you have a choice of charm skills or is there only one option?” Mila had deliberately not asked about the charm skill Nana Xara wanted to give her, mostly to not distract herself, but also because she was slightly scared of what types of effects charm skills would have. Now, however, as she actually got to gain one as Nana Xara’s reward for her reaching F rank, she was rather excited.
“There are a couple options, but the one I want to give you opens up a powerful advancement for your class once you reach E rank.” Mila was pretty sure, if Nana Xara were still alive, she’d be grinning from ear to ear. “The first option I wouldn’t recommend is a Legendary grade skill which allows for charming an entire group at once, with power based on Spirit and area based on Aura, but its charm strength is quite a bit lower than other Legendary grade charm skills and the activation time is a bit too long to make use of in combat.
“There is another skill which only affects one person, but where the power of the charm is based not only on Spirit but Aura as well, and that is what I would normally recommend to someone like you if you were just after power at F rank. The long term evolution of the skill, however, is quite a bit weaker than the skill I actually think you should take.
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“Finally, the skill I am recommending is a skill called Evil Eyes - Lust. It’s a diabolic eye-based charm skill, meaning you have to meet the other person’s eyes in order for it to work, and it can only create a lust effect and no other types of charm. But the initial effect is instant and the charm grows in power the longer eye contact is maintained.
“Its power is only based on Spirit, which isn’t as good for you, but it can make use of all three resource types and the range is infinite so long as you and the other person are able to see each other, which is quite nice. The charm state it induces is classified as a curse and lasts quite a bit longer than that of other charm skills. But the main reason you should choose it is it will likely produce interesting extra effects when combined with your Strong Soul Succubus Princess race and Third Eye Princess uniqueness.”
“Evil Eye, huh. Is there a version for each of the other six sins as well?”
“Yes.” Nana Xara sounded even more excited, likely because Mila seemed interested. “The Heroic grade version of Evil Eyes combines three of the sins and then the Fabled grade version of the skill contains all of them and is called Evil Eyes - Sin. There are several different upgrade paths from there, the most powerful of which you should find relatively easy to gain.”
Mila thought about it for a minute. The foremost reason for getting a charm skill was not to enable unfair contracts nor to distract opponents in combat. It was to help get food for her and Aalam, and Evil Eyes - Lust was obviously the best for that.
For her purposes, the fact its charm state was only lust-based was not a big deal. With her contracts, she’d almost never be using charm on its own. The true deciding factor, however, was its potential interactions with her Third Eye Princess uniqueness.
She was already planning to start building her Laws around her second uniqueness. Why shouldn’t she try to build her skills in the same way?
Before saying yes, however, Mila had another question. “Do you have any Legendary grade stealth skills?”
“Sort of.” Nana Xara’s voice became a bit more serious, allowing Mila to know what she was about to say would be important information for her to remember. “Technically I have two, but, while they both have the Stealth keyword, neither is what you’re looking for.”
“First, there is a skill called Silence. It is an advanced version of the Muffle skill and uses quite a bit of qi and mana to block vibrations, and thus sound, in a relatively large area. When controlled tightly to a cultivator’s body, it can be used just like the Muffle skill, but its main use is to block skills which require a verbal component, none of which you’ll likely see any time soon as they have very much gone out of style.”
“The second is Invisibility, which, while it perfectly blocks sight, would be mostly useless for you, as it does nothing against aura. Your Law Egg of Obfuscation is already good at making people without detection skills not notice you just through sight, so it would be a mostly wasted skill.”
“You have to remember, Mila, Legendary grade skills are incredibly rare. To form one naturally through actions, it takes a lot of effort and often some truly incredible achievements. Most skill orbs are made from specialized production classes processing the souls of the dead and removing the skills they mastered during their lives. Thus, for every Legendary grade skill orb, there had to be an individual who died at that rank having mastered the skill and his or her soul had to be recovered within minutes and then later processed. And this is for a one time consumable.”
“The System makes things easier. The skill orbs you get from it are created with godly power and don’t require that type of process. But there are very few people who have the talent to get a Legendary grade skill orb from the System yet not the desire to use it themselves.”
“Most of my skill orbs are either remnants from my own force or from the forces I destroyed in my life. Granted, quite a few of those were forces with gods at the helm, but the amount of skills I have for you and Diana is not large. For example, I have zero Heroic grade skills for F rank and I have none of the Legendary detection skills Aalam wants for his latest insane experiment.”
Mila contemplated that for several seconds and realized she had to value the chances she’d have at getting skill orbs more in the future. Apocalypse style integrations, if a cultivator was skilled enough, were the easiest time to gain skill orbs from the System, and she wouldn’t always have it so easy in the future.
“Thank you, Nana Xara. And thank you as always for your advice. I’ll go with Evil Eyes - Lust.”
“Good.” Mila could almost see Nana Xara grinning, her seriousness completely gone. “Before I send you the skill, though, you have one other decision to make. You have to choose the cultivation technique you will be using for the rest of your life.”
“Wait.” Mila, who’d still been practicing with Phantasmic Doppelgängers while talking to Nana Xara, stopped, the last part of Nana Xara’s words startling her. “The rest of my life?”