It is known that a person acquires minor regeneration when they reach the first milestone, but this regenerative ability is useless against fast-acting poisons or toxins injected directly into the bloodstream, especially when such toxins come from a higher-tiered individual or creature.
Sahira Noridan.
Member of the assassin guild.
6th sector, Calodan.
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“He’s not healing.” Daruk lamanted. “Why is he not healing?”
“I don’t know, but I’m trying to remove the toxins in his bloodstream.” The ship’s healer, a bald middle-aged man, replied, his expression tight with concentration.
“How long will that take?” Daruk inquired a moment later when he saw no change in Aodhán’s condition.
“An hour or two.”
“What?!” Daruk’s eyes widened in shock. “He doesn’t have an hour; he looks like a corpse already!”
Aodhán was pale and still bleeding from several cuts. Toxins slowly leaked out of his open wounds, but at this rate, it would take forever before he was completely purged of the kanima’s poison.
“If you would just let me concentrate, then perhaps this will go faster.” The healer replied in a clipped tone, but Daruk hurriedly pushed him aside. “No, we don’t have that kind of time. He’ll heal if he advances, right?”
“He should, but with the amount of toxins currently in his bloodstream, I cannot say for sure.”
“We cannot afford to wait any longer; we have to try it.”
The healer scoffed and stopped channeling his {Cleanse blood} for the first time in almost an hour. “In case you haven’t noticed, he’s unconscious and unable to absorb any cores at the moment.”
Daruk paused and turned to the healer, who was dusting his hands smugly. “Can’t you wake him up for a moment, just enough for him to absorb the needed cores?”
“Sadly, I don’t have enough control for such a skill.” He paused for a moment and frowned. “I could stop channeling {Anesthesia}; perhaps the pain would be enough to wake him up.”
Daruk nodded without hesitation, and a few seconds later, Aodhán suddenly screamed, his expression tight with pain. He shook aggressively, but before he could tumble off the makeshift bed, Daruk shoved a tier 12 arachnid core into his mouth and shouted. “Aodhán, you need to absorb the core.”
“He’s not responding.” The healer stated as he grabbed Aodhán’s shoulders and held him down firmly.
“Aodhán, absorb the core.” Daruk repeated as he desperately tried to get through to him, but when they got no response after an entire minute, the healer suddenly grabbed Aodhán’s head, and light flashed as a large amount of energy was drained out of him.
Aodhán’s eyes instantly flew open, and Daruk repeated the words again. It took a few seconds before the words pierced into Aodhán’s mind, and with the last of his strength, he willed the core’s energy into himself.
The energy rushed into his throat and burned through his damaged pathways. Only about a quarter of the energy reached his core, though, as the rest leaked out of his damaged pathways and exited his body like a cloud of colored gas.
Daruk kept feeding him cores, though, placing a new one into his mouth immediately after the previous one crumbled to dust. During their delve into the dungeon, they’d gathered about 40 cores, which should have been a fortune, but only 6 of those cores were above tier 9, and considering the amount of energy they required to advance each tier, they were severely broke.
After two tier 11 cores and one tier 10 core, energy finally surged out of Aodhán’s core and into his damaged pathways. Pain roared through him as the energy redrew the pathways and burned the toxins out of his body.
Aodhán spent the next few seconds coughing up blood and mucus as he slowly regained his energy before turning to take in his surroundings. He was in a small building made from wood and palm leaves, and the smell of the sea hung heavy in the air.
Daruk glared down at him, but before berating him, he turned to the man beside him and handed him a trio of arachnid cores. “Thank you for your services.”
The man chuckled and placed the cores in his robe pockets before gathering his tools and exiting the tent. Daruk waited for a few seconds before he turned to Aodhán and scolded him. “Just how much energy do you really need to ascend a single tier? You consumed four whole cores; the healer was becoming suspicious.”
“Sorry.” Aodhán sighed as he lay back down. “I damaged my pathways, and only about a quarter of the energy actually reached my core.”
Daruk winced as he remembered the pain he’d felt when his pathways had been torn out to make way for his new affinity. Deciding that Aodhán had been through enough pain, he gently squeezed his shoulders to console him. “It’s alright; you can rest now.”
Aodhán shook his head gently and asked. “Did you get the alpha’s core?”
Daruk smiled and pulled out a mottled brown core the size of his fist. “Sure did. A few of the survivors tried to scam me out of it, but I think they were too scared of you to do more than that.”
Aodhán chuckled, and they chatted for a few minutes, until Aodhán determined that he’d gathered enough of his strength, and with shaky steps, he walked out of the room with Daruk trailing only a few feet behind him.
It was almost midday, and the sun shone down with great intensity. Towards the edge of the forest, a group of people stood in a semicircle around a row of hastily dug graves, and a solemn air emanated from them.
“How many are dead?” he asked quietly, and Daruk sighed. “Many, about a dozen, but I’m not sure of the exact number.”
Aodhán nodded, shunning the guilty thought that crept into his mind. This wasn’t his fault; neither was he responsible for their safety, yet sorrow filled his heart at the sight.
The burial ceremony lasted for only a few minutes before everyone dispersed. Aodhán saw a few people he recognized, including the Gishan girl, but immediately their gazes locked, and she turned away in anger.
Many walked towards him to appreciate him for saving their lives, but he politely waved them away. Three people were adamant and stayed even after he sent him away. One of them, an unawakened woman with dirty brown hair and a tired expression, asked a moment later. “Is there a way off this island? We’ve been here for two days now.”
The man on her right nodded in agreement. “Yes, we would be very grateful if you could help us.”
Aodhán sighed in response. It was funny how the same people who had looked at him with accusation two days ago now looked to him for salvation. He had thought of simply creating a ship large enough to contain them all, but he didn’t even have enough control to create something that big and with so much detail.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
“I will try.” He replied as he thought of an alternative. From what he’d gathered from some of the crew members while still on the Raventhorn, this area of the sea was a pretty common route for ships going to the 5th sector, so one should pass by them anytime soon. When the trio finally left, Aodhán channeled energy into {Create construct} and used the storm to write out the word ‘help’ in extremely large font.
The word hung boldly in the air, able to be seen for miles, and was sure to attract the attention of the next passing ship. All they had to do now was wait.
With nothing else to do, Aodhán and Daruk made their way towards the edge of the shore, closer to the sea but far from the haphazard collection of bamboo tents the survivors had created.
Foam-tipped waves lapped at their feet, and with each ebb and flow, the sea painted intricate patterns in the sand. If one overlooked their current situation, they would find the scene delicate, gentle, and peaceful.
Aodhán leaned back slightly, enjoying the gentle swirl of breeze against his face, but a moment later, he cracked an eye open and asked. “Is there something in particular that’s delaying you?”
He was obviously referring to Daruk’s class advancement, and Daruk smiled in response. He took out the evolved core of the alpha Kanima from the vine pouch and observed it for a moment before sighing. “Okay, let’s do this.”
Without hesitation, Daruk began to absorb the core, and Aodhán watched the process carefully, hoping to glimpse some sort of insight into how class advancements usually occurred..
The Alpha was a Tier 17 creature, so its core definitely packed a lot of energy. Even as he watched, energy began to swirl and gather around Daruk, not from the core he held but from the world itself.
The potency of this energy was much higher than what Aodhán was accustomed to; it was purer and denser than the energy found in cores. It gathered around Daruk in such a large quantity that he was obscured from view, and a moment later, light flashed and an intense chill soon engulfed the area.
What happened next was hidden from his view, and even his core sense was unable to pick anything up, but the process only lasted for a few minutes, after which the haze of energy suddenly disappeared to reveal Daruk in all of his evolved glory.
Daruk’s hair had grown longer; the silvery-white locks now reached his shoulder blades and almost completely obstructed his eyes. He’d added a little more mass, and he’d grown about an inch or two, but the greatest change was revealed after he pushed his hair backwards.
His pupils had changed from the silvery color of frost and were now a piercing blue ringed with a band of silver. The temperature dropped once more as his aura exerted more dominance over its surroundings, and a thin layer of frost began to appear on the shoreline.
Daruk looked worn out from the advancement, which was unusual, but his eyes were wide in amazement as he watched small particles of frost gather in his palms, even without his input. If Daruk had been beautiful before, now there were no words to even correctly describe him.
“This is so amazing.” Daruk muttered softly. “I feel so amazing.”
Now that Daruk had shared his status screen with him, he didn’t need permission to review it, and with a thought, the screen appeared before him. There were only two visible changes. The first was the class change to evolve, while the second was something he hadn’t even expected.
Bloodline: FrostForged Ancestry (Rare+).
•Amplifies ice and cold-related abilities by 2.25%.
•Grants major resistance to cold.
•Aura of frosted heart.
The rating of the bloodline had changed, which made him believe that the class advancement was a sort of refinement process. This meant that with constant advancement, Daruk could refine his bloodline to its peak, although, from his expression, the occurrence seemed to have drained a tremendous amount of willpower from him.
“Now, I can advance my tier.” Daruk shouted with excitement, and Aodhán shook his head in amusement, slightly jealous of Daruk’s good fortune but mostly happy for him.
“How many cores are left?” he asked, and Daruk placed the vine pouch on the floor between them. He then began separating the cores by tier, and a minute later, he replied.
“We have thirty-five cores, but only ten of them are above Tier 7.”
Aodhán grinned at Daruk’s pained expression. “You can’t keep them, Daruk; cores are meant to be absorbed.”
“I know.” Daruk scowled and gestured to the cores between them. “I just thought we should keep a few in case of emergencies, like today.”
“That’s smart.” Aodhán agreed, and after a moment of deliberation, he suggested. “How about you absorb the cores below Tier 8 and see how far it takes you?”
Daruk agreed and returned the ten cores to the pouch before pulling the others closer to himself. By now, they’d drawn the attention of several people, but many of those staring were unawakened individuals who were simply too awed and curious to afford them any modicum of privacy.
Not that unawakened individuals couldn’t be a threat, but at his current tier of advancement, none of them could physically damage him. That wasn’t the case with the awakened ones, though, but the strongest core he could sense was only tier 7, and with its slightly dim state, Aodhán suspected that it wouldn’t be long before it reached its limit.
Now that his proficiency with the core sense ability had increased, he was now able to differentiate between healthy cores and those nearing their limit.
A healthy core blazed to his senses, but a core that was at its limit was dull and usually had a sort of muddy texture and quality.
Slowly, Daruk began absorbing the cores while Aodhán kept an eye on his status screen. After absorbing about eight Tier 3 cores, energy surged out of Daruk’s core for the fifth time, and the Neophyte title was added to his status, but instead of a new skill, a message appeared.
[AWARDING SKILL…]
[
[
The percentage bar kept increasing as Daruk ignored the message in favor of absorbing more cores. About ten minutes later, Daruk finally came to a stop as the last core crumbled to dust in his hands, and Aodhán could almost taste the envy in the air.
The other awakened survivors had just watched Daruk ascend ten tiers in one go. If they didn’t fear his power, Aodhán was sure they would have tried to bully them and take the cores.
Daruk opened his eyes and smiled as he flexed his muscles and stood up. He stumbled, unused to his new strength, speed, or dexterity, but he burst out laughing and shouting. “This is the best feeling ever!”
“Yeah, well, check your status and tell me what the skill does.” Aodhán chuckled, and Daruk sat down to review his status.
….
[STATUS]
Name: Daruk Brystion
Class: Evolved Ice awakened (28.7%)
Title: Neophyte
Tier: 10–87.9%
Skill {Innate}: ice manipulation and creation.
Bloodline skill: forge.
Bloodline: FrostForged Ancestry (Rare+).
•Amplifies ice and cold-related abilities by 2.25%.
•Grants major resistance to cold.
•Aura of frosted heart
Neophyte: A title awarded to an awakened person who has reached the Tier 5 milestone.
…
Daruk spent a few minutes absorbing the information about the skill before he smiled. “It’s very similar to your construct skill, but mine grants me the ability to further imbue my forged constructs with properties such as durability, sharpness, and stuff.”
Aodhán groaned in envy. “That is such a cheat skill; damn, I hate you.”
“Thank you.” He replied with a grin, but suddenly asked. “I know our imaginations are our limits and all, but how do I create a skill? Do I just imagine it and then... get it?”
“Well, yes and no.” Aodhán replied. “Asides the fact that we’re still very limited by our tiers and the system itself, trying to create a skill is like submitting an application or request to the system. If you have enough control to use the skill or enough willpower to brute force the process, the system grants you the skill.”
“Oh.” Daruk nodded in understanding. “So, what now?”
“Well, the first skill you should learn is to convert water into ice,“ Aodhán replied, gesturing towards the wide blue sea before them.
…..
“Why is it so hard?” Daruk groaned as water slipped through his fingers, unchanged.
“I told you, you have to will it into existence.” Aodhán replied sagely as he parroted the advice that Aldric had given him. “You have to believe the water in your palms is actually ice.”
“You sound like Aldric right now; is that how he taught you?”
“Well, it worked for me.” Aodhán replied defensively, completely ignoring the fact that the logic wouldn’t have worked for him either if Aldric hadn’t helped him believe with his empathic mumbo-jumbo. Maybe he was enjoying Daruk’s frustration a little.
“Fine, I believe it. Truly, I do, but water doesn’t seem to believe me when I tell it what it is.”
Aodhán was about to give another cryptic response when a thought suddenly came to his mind, and he frowned. “Maybe that’s because you’re telling it what to do, but water has a different temperament. Have you tried cajoling it?”
When Daruk just stared blankly without responding, he continued. “You know, cajole, urge, sway? Have you tried persuading?"
“I get it! You don't have to list all the synonyms of the word.” Daruk snapped and turned his attention back to the sea. Before they could implement Aodhán’s idea, though, the bellow of a horn suddenly echoed in the distance, and they turned to see a ship heading towards them.
Shouts of jubilation filled the air as people scrambled to pack whatever luggage they’d managed to save from the Raventhorn before it sank. Fortunately for them, Daruk had saved their coin pouch, so they had enough to pay their way to the 5th sector.
As the ship drew closer to the shore, though, Aodhán noticed the design of the ship, and his heart sank. A chorus of excited yells filled the air as the people celebrated, and a man shouted. “It’s the army; we are saved!”
“Oh boy.” Daruk muttered nervously. “We’re so screwed.”