“I hit max level with that last batch.” Lia told Matthew. “What now?”
“Now, I send you home.” Matthew replied. “I won’t tell you what to evolve into, that’s outside of but I trust your judgement. If you have any questions on specifics, I’m sure Amelia, Rose, or Connie can answer those for you.”
“Do you have any general tips?” Lia asked.
“You’re going to get some very impressive-sounding options. Don’t feel shy to take them because you’re worried about potential blasphemy or anything; as long as it does not explicitly say that you’re becoming a god or something, and that’s impossible as far as we’re aware, you’re in the clear. And if you’re wondering, a Heroic option here does not make you an actual Hero. I know Connie’s warned you against being a Hero, so that’s something you don’t need to worry about either.”
“Then why do they share a name?”
“It was just a way to more effectively communicate the strength of the monster to people.” Matthew replied. “By using the word Heroic, it helps warn people that the monster is a step above normal monsters and should be treated as an emergency.”
“I see.” Lia replied. “Anything else?”
“No, I think that’s it.” Matthew replied. “Just remember that you’re almost certainly going to be in this evolution until you defeat the Lord of Monsters and conquer this plane. You’re getting pretty up-there in terms of power, and that means it’s going to take a very long time to get the requisite levels. You’re already ageless, though, so you’ve got time.”
“I’ll remember.” Lia promised.
“Good. In that case, I’ll be sending you back now, anything else you want to ask while you have me here?”
“No, but I want to say thanks.” Lia replied. “I know you’re taking time out of your schedule for me, and I appreciate it.”
Matthew gave her a smile. “You’re very welcome.” He said. “Honestly, it’s kind of hard to believe that I started all of this opposing you, and I’m glad I decided to talk with you that day. I’ve had a lot of fun teaching you, and I’m looking for to seeing where you go from here.”
Lia blushed, looking away in embarrassment. “I’m glad I met you too.” She said. “I hope we’ll be able to talk more once you’re done with your business.”
“We will.” Matthew said reassuringly. “And…sorry.”
“Nothing to apologize for, I’m sure you’re a busy man.” Lia replied. “Um…I’m ready now.”
Matthew gave her an oddly sad smile, but before Lia had time to ask why he had that expression, he had teleported her back to her home. She called out that she was home, but no one responded, which wasn’t surprising; it was still an hour or two before everyone usually got home. So, she sat on the couch, and began to look through her options.
There were a lot of them, and, like Matthew had predicted, many of them sounded almost scarily impressive, with many being Heroic and some even going so far as to say she was nearing demigod status. Lia certainly didn’t feel like a demigod, so she could only assume that those options referred to her potential with Blood Money, like Connie had mentioned a few days prior.
Lia got so deep into her contemplations that she nearly jumped out of her skin when Rose sat down next to her. “You’re back early, can I take that to mean that you’re ready to evolve?”
Lia put a hand over her chest, letting out a deep breath. “You startled me.” She said. “Yes, I am, I’ve been looking through my options for…I don’t know how long, probably at least half an hour.”
“Have you narrowed it down much?” Amelia asked, sitting down on the other side of Lia.
“Yeah, I’ve got it down to two, I was hoping that the two of you would be able to help me decide. Give me a second to pull up the window and I’ll read the exact descriptions to you.”
Lia brought the evolution window back up, scrolling down to the first of the options she was considering.
Ascendant Empress:
The Ascendant Empress is a unique Heroic race for the leader of the swarm. You have taken the first steps on the path to godhood, and are nearing demigod status. The Ascendant Empress grants a large boost in efficiency to all tasks that are only possible because of your status as a demigod.
Compared to Supreme Empress (Kitsune), Ascendant Empress provides a massive boost to all stats.
“It’s pretty simple, but it sounds impressive.” Lia said. “I’m pretty sure what it means by the whole demigod thing is Blood Money, though; Connie mentioned that gives me more potential than most Heroes, and that it’s Worship in a weird way, so I think it’d just make me better with it. Oh, and Matthew said we don’t have to worry about being blasphemous with stuff like this; it’s all fine as long as the evolution doesn’t make me an actual god, and he thinks that’s impossible.”
“It’s a strong contender for sure.” Rose agreed. “It’s vague, yes, but the kind of stuff you can do with blood Money is unthinkable, and the boost to stats isn’t half-bad either. What’s the other?”
Lia scrolled down a little further.
Unassuming Empress:
The Unassuming Empress is a unique Heroic race for the leader of the swarm. Despite commanding the most powerful army in the world, being personally capable of engaging in battle with some of the world’s strongest, and being the lover of the two most powerful mortals to walk the pane, you have retained an arguably unreasonable amount of humility.
The Unassuming Empress has the innate ability to mask her status, being able to hide Skills and Titles as well as change her race, hiding them from all but the most powerful identification magic. Unassuming Empress also grants a large bonus to the effectiveness of illusion magic and the ability to use a low-power cognition filter to prevent the unaware from recognizing her as queen of the swarm. Your non-resource stats are increased by 50% against those who are under the effect of the filter. Those who know the queen of the swarm will be in an area and are actively looking for her, are very powerful, or who know her well enough will likely see through this cognition filter without conscious effort.
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
By taking this race, you will gain the Humility Title, the Proudly Humble Title, and two personally tailored associated Skills, Guiding Hand, and People’s Champion. Guiding Hand doubles the power of conversions you make and quintuples the experience you get from converting things. People’s Champion allows you to add the stats of swarm members you are directly leading to your own (once the total of added stats surpasses triple your own stats, further stats are square-rooted before being added to your own). These stats are then multiplied by one plus twice the percentage of missing HP you have.
Compared to Supreme Empress (Kitsune), Unassuming Empress provides an enormous boost to all stats.
“That one.” Rose said immediately. “It’s definitely that one.”
“I was leaning that way too, but demigodhood…” Lia said.
“What’s this about demigodhood?” Connie asked, walking towards them from the middle of the room. “I saw all three of you were here and just got here, so I missed whatever you were saying before.”
Lia quickly explained the situation, and Connie nodded. “Yeah, if you want to be technical about it, then you’ve kind of been a demigod since the moment you were resurrected. Really, the term as we use it just refers to anyone who can use Worship but isn’t a god. I imagine that’s the classification this system is using, and both you and Amelia would fall under that category. It isn’t really an indicator of raw power.
“Even godhood isn’t a direct indicator. As we’ve established, Amelia, when unbound, is more than capable of defeating me in combat despite my position as a god. If you want my opinion, though, to be honest, Rose and Amelia are probably more qualified than me to weigh in on this, the second option is better, even if it sounds less impressive.”
“Both Rose and I agree.” Amelia said.
“Do you happen to know what this ‘Proudly Humble’ Title is?” Rose asked. “It seems to be on the same level as the Sin and Virtue Titles, but I’ve never heard of it.”
“I’m not surprised.” Connie said. “The Sin and Virtue system we use has an additional set of Titles for people who have the Sin and Virtue related to the same thing. The Sin Titles don’t directly relate to exemplifying those traits, while the Virtue Titles do, so it’s not as hard to get as you would imagine. It just doesn’t happen much because someone who qualifies for one of those Titles is rare, and to qualify for multiple is nigh unheard-of. The swarm is, of course, a nigh unheard-of situation, so it’s not surprising that Lia qualifies for both.”
“Was there really no one with the Humility Title already?” Lia asked.
Connie shrugged. “No one hit the threshold since the last one died. You usually have to be in a position of importance or have a lot of power to even think about qualifying, so the pool of candidates is low, and Rose kept it virtually non-existent during the time of the Ruby Empire. The closest we’ve come since is Nailah, but she just barely didn’t qualify.”
“Well…I guess I’ll go get started, then. I’ll see you all in an hour.”
“I’ll have dinner ready for when you’re done.” Connie said. “I can’t wait to see how you turn out.”
“Thanks.” Lia said, giving Connie a smile as she stood. “I appreciate it.”
“We’ll see you then.” Rose said, giving Lia a quick kiss. “I love you.”
“I love you too.” Amelia said, stealing a kiss from Lia after Rose had finished.
“And me.” Connie said bashfully, giving Lia a chaste kiss of her own.
“I love you guys too.” Lia said happily. “Be back soon.”
----------------------------------------
Rose perked up as she heard door to her bedroom open. It would appear that Lia had finished evolving, and Rose couldn’t have been more excited. Each of Lia’s prior evolutions had made her more of a looker, and, as shallow as it sounded, Rose wanted to see what this one had in store for her.
She didn’t have to wait long. Lia walked into view a few moments later, and Rose’s breath was stolen away. Like Rose was coming to expect from evolutions, Lia had gotten a little taller and a fair bit curvier, but that wasn’t really Rose’s focus. Lia’s hair and fur had regained the sort of white rainbow sheen it had had when she was a rat mage-queen, and she now sported nine bushy and, more-importantly, knot-free tails. It was a simple change, but a highly effective one, and Rose had to force herself not to stare too hungrily at her wife.
“Well?” Lia asked nervously. “How is it?”
“You’re absolutely gorgeous.” Rose breathed. “I forgot how much the rainbow fur suited you.”
Lia twisted around, eyes widening as she caught sight of her tails. “I hadn’t looked yet.” She admitted. “I rushed out here first thing. Can I…” The rainbow sheen faded back to the orange Lia’s hair and fur had been before, then returned. “I can, nice. Not sure how I feel about it, it probably clashes with my hair, right?”
“Your hair’s the same color.” Amelia said. “And I agree with Rose; you’re stunning.”
“Thank you.” Lia said, blushing slightly. “Where’s Connie?”
“Sorry.” Connie said. She had been standing in the doorway, staring at Lia intently. “I was lost in your beauty.”
“You flatter me.” Lia said. “It can’t be that different, right?”
“You were already beautiful, and every little change just makes you more so.” Rose said. “Have you checked your new Titles yet?”
Oh, right, let me check.” Lia said. “Um…looks like Humility makes all my Titles count as Special Titles, doubles their effects, and lets me turn off any I don’t want on, but I’m guessing you already knew that? Still, that’s really good, I have a ton of Titles that I just never use because I always have Conqueror of Death on when I’m in a combat situation.
“Proudly Humble seems to just make my Pride boost apply outside of my own territory, and changes the Title boosting effect to multiply the titles’ effects by the same amount my Pride boost multiplies my stats, if the Pride Boost is larger. Also specifies that the boosting effect does not apply to Sin and Virtue Titles.”
“What’s that at nowadays, anyway?” Rose asked.
“Two and a half times.” Lia replied. “It jumped by a lot after that raid. My stats are all at seven thousand right now, so after all buffs I think they’re effectively in the realm of…twenty-five thousand?”
“That’s pretty good.” Rose said appreciatively. “You should out-stat everyone at max level now, even if you don’t out-skill them, so you should be pretty safe to help on our side of things now. If things get bad, you’ll just need to rely on your stats to hold on until Amelia and I get there. What kind of buffs are you getting from your Titles?”
“Mostly just buffs to numbers.” Lia said. “I have a lot of random Titles that I haven’t given much thought, and a lot of them are just raw stat buffs, but we also have stuff like increasing the effectiveness of certain types of magic or reducing the cost of magic and Skills. I’m not totally sure how the Humility buff interacts with Titles that don’t have an effect that uses numbers, though.”
“It works fine.” Connie said. “Most everything can be reduced to numbers, even if those numbers aren’t shown to you.”
“We should probably reconvert all of the important people, right?” Lia asked. “I know they’ll have levels that will get reset, but I think doubled power is probably worth it.”
“It is.” Rose confirmed. “I’ll make sure to get the word out. Too bad reconverting doesn’t get you experience, that would be a great way to boost your level in these early stages. What’s your max level nowadays?”
“Three hundred, and I need three experience to reach level two. If it’s like Supreme Empress and the amount needed to reach each level will increase by however much experience level one to level two needed, then I think Matthew was right when he said I wouldn’t be evolving until we’ve both defeated the Lord of Monsters and conquered this plane. So…guess this is me for the foreseeable future.”
“And you look great.” Amelia said, walking over and giving Lia a hug. “The silver really suits you, I think you should keep it. If you like it, that is, you can keep your hair and fur whatever color you like.”
“I think I will.” Lia said, hugging Amelia back. “Um…about that dinner, though; I’m starving, is it ready?”
Connie smiled. “I’ve got it all in storage right now. Go grab your plate and I’ll take it out so we can eat.”
Rose took the opportunity to pull Lia into a hug of her own. “I love you.” She said.
“Love you too.” Lia replied, leaning up slightly to give Rose a kiss. “Let’s get sappy a little later, though, I really can hardly wait another moment.”