Chapter 539 - Skills, Skills Everywhere! (Patreon)

AN: Sorry for the minor delay. Wish I could blame it on Patreon but nah, this one's all me. Enjoy!

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I woke up and stretched, shifting my body around. Classing up space was a little unnatural. It was more akin to being unconscious than being asleep, and my body didn’t do all the little adjustments.

Iona was a blur of motion next to me, a tray of food rapidly being assembled from parts.

“Sandwiches?” She offered up a stack, a glass of cold milk next to them.

I was ravenous. I grabbed the top one and chowed down. Fresh lettuce and tomatoes, thick slices of turkey, generously applied mayonnaise, and freshly cracked black pepper and salt.

That was just the first one. Iona had outdone herself. The second one was brontosaurus belly, salami, pate, grilled chicken, cucumber slices, avocado, and egg. It seemed like too much at first, but the combination worked beautifully. 

A reuben was next, and I started to slow down as my stomach woke up and realized we had FOOD again. I poked the dramatic organ, mentally telling it to not be such a drama lama. I’d blitzed the classups, it wasn’t like I’d been down for days reading every book.

A long drink of cold milk helped wash it all down, and I reached for a fourth sandwich as Iona started talking.

“Ever going to check your notifications?” She teased me. “You’ve got some nice skills.”

I had a lot of notifications. I’d already looked at a few of them, just quickly checking what I had, but now I needed to look at all of them. I scrolled back through the log to find the right spot.

[ding! [Erudite Archmage] leveled up! 256 -> 712. +512 Mana, +512 Mana Regeneration, +1024 Magic Control, +1024 Magic Power from your class per level! +1 Strength, +1 Dexterity, +1 Speed, +1 Vitality, +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regeneration, +1 Magic Power, +1 Magic Control for being Chimera (Elvenoid) per level! +1 Mana +1 Mana Regeneration from your Element per level!]

Holy stats. I’d glanced at it before, but I was about to get a loooot of magical stats.

The one minor ‘downside’ to [Erudite Archmage] being a beautiful combination of reading and scholarly magic was just that - it was scholarly magical research and reading. It was less intended for battle and fighting - although it had no real penalty for it, and could easily be bent in that direction - but the stat distribution was all-in on the magical stats. The class didn’t need or want any physical stats, so it didn’t offer any. There was a reason wizards were routinely depicted as old. Combined with the levels I was going to get from [Seraph of the Dawn] though, I was excited to see what my stat total was going to be..

[*ding!* [Blink] has merged with [Rapid Reshelving] to create [Teleportation]!]

Teleportation: Move objects, including yourself, from one spot to another. Slightly increased range per level.

Huzzah! The two felt like a natural fit to merge, and I’d been able to instantly [Blink] myself around for a while now. The limited range had been annoying, but now I was FREE! To slowly level up and gain more range.

The class wasn’t a dedicated [Teleporter] class, and I doubted I’d ever get fantastic mana discounts or secondary skills to really go somewhere, but being able to instantly reposition myself and objects had been fun and useful for years.

[*ding!* [Technical Drawing] has merged with [The Everflowing Quill of Phoenix Feathers and Whimsical Dreams] to make [Reality, Writ As You Will]!]

Reality, Writ As You Will: Your works have shaped reality and now your spells shall too. Your quill dances with feverish energy, drawing out mystical symbols that will reshape and bend reality to your will. The cosmos bends to your desires, making each spell cast cost less mana. -4096 mana regeneration.

First off, that was such a cool skill name! It came with a minor discount on casting spells, and I couldn’t quite tell yet if I’d be casting large enough mandalas at a scale where the benefits would kick in, or if it would end up being mostly flavor text.

Wizardry was the pursuit of a lifetime, and I could endlessly improve in a variety of ways. From inventing new spells, to refining existing ones, from researching and learning new languages, to learning more tricks in old ones, from preparing more spells for life and combat, to thinking of smarter ones to use in a given situation, there was no end to the depths of wizardry. 

[*ding!* [Reality, Writ As You Will] is level 530]

That was a bit of a shame. It dropped, probably because the power went way up in level, and possibly because it crossed classes. It wasn’t maxed anymore, and it was going to take me a long, long time to level it all the way up again. Especially if Auri kept doing insane things to level.

My stomach nervously clenched, and I let [Luminary Mind] start worrying over her again. I dismissed the rest of my skill level up notifications - I’d see them all at the end in my stat sheet.

No upgrade on [Spatial Authority], which was expected. I wasn’t delving deep into the elemental aspects of the class, so much as using the elements for their thing. I wasn’t explaining it well. 

[*ding!* [Manuscript Mastery] has upgraded to [Cozy Reading]!]

Cozy Reading: A book, a crackling fireplace, a storm outside, a cup of hot chocolate and your wife nearby. What’s not to love? You always understand what you’re reading, and will rapidly acquire new languages when reading them. Improved control over reading speed per level. -64 mana regeneration.

It was an unusual variant on [Reading], and on the surface felt like a bit of a downgrade to the skill. At the same time, everything from [Manuscript Mastery] was still there, with the potential for more from the line ‘You always understand what you’re reading.’ The scant description meant I was fully prepared for it to be deceptive, and do something like improve how comfortable I was while I read. The ‘control over reading speed’ was a fascinating line. I’d seen something similar in the past, mostly from [Speedster]-related abilities from books - I’d go faster and faster each level, but I could also deliberately move slower, and keep myself at the lower speed. In other words, with careful application of the skill and basic math, I could choose exactly when I would finish reading a book. Like, right before bedtime.

Perfect for [Cozy Reading]. 

The skill was interesting on another axis. It was far, far more powerful than the name suggested. I wasn’t going to make any bets, but I suspected if I did a deep dive into all recorded instances of the skill, I would have one of the strongest-worded ones.

[*ding!* [Loremaster’s Library] has upgraded to [Repository of the Magus]!]

Repository of the Magus: Infinite books at your fingertips. Summoning speed depends on number of books in storage. Summoning speed increased per level. -512 mana regeneration.

My eyes narrowed at the ‘upgrade’, and I tried to summon a book to me. It instantly appeared in my hands, and I had a moment of enlightenment.

By Ciriel! I had no maximum capacity for books. If I ended up with too many in my storage, I suspected I’d start to have issues with getting any particular book out, but everything strongly implied I could walk into the School’s library, and teleport every single book into my storage.

They’d murder me dead, of course, but I’d die with a smile on my face. 

[*ding!* [Vault of Ages] has upgraded to [Tower of Knowledge]!]

Tower of Knowledge: The repose of every good archmage, the tower spirals up into the sky, providing all manner of rooms a mage might need. +1 extra story every 8 levels. -8192 mana regeneration.

That sounded great! On the other hand, I was dreading to see what the inside of my storage looked like right now. I had planned on emptying it all out before upgrading, just in case, but life had conspired against me with the Auri deadline. I’d asked Librarian for [Vault]-only options, and the skill was a little too useful to ever ditch, but I was…

Why was I speculating, when I could just go check?

I teleported into [Tower of Knowledge], and dragged my fingers down my face in horror.

“Nooooooooooooooooooo…” My scream petered off into nothingness.

The more I saw, the worse it got.

[Tower] was indeed arranged as a tower. Each floor was far larger than eight rooms in [Vault] combined, a solid upgrade in total storage volume. There was hemming and hawing to do on larger, more warehouse-like floors versus many little rooms, but that didn’t concern me at the moment.

Each floor had a large opening in the middle, with no stairs, pole, or anything to help get between levels. The [Tower], being in its own pocket dimension, naturally didn’t have any gravity. There was soft light glowing from everywhere, banishing all shadows, and the air was fresh and crisp, smelling slightly of a spring breeze. A number of cargo rings could be found carefully placed on floors, walls, and the ceiling.

The lack of gravity meant I could easily fly between levels.

It also meant there was nothing keeping my stored supplies grounded. I had previously strapped them down, put food into barrels, teleported in furniture to better store items, had water in kegs, etc. Everything in its place, as much time and effort as that had been. Enchantments had been carefully laid down to improve my quality of life and the vault.

The skill upgrade had reshuffled everything. It didn’t even have the good grace to keep things together! Flour coated every other surface, only being picked up by some droplets of water spinning through the air. Dishes spun lazily in space next to swords, a hammer lightly bounced off the glass of a cabinet, fruits and metal ingots rattling around in a mug, and a partial rune lay mercifully dead on the wall. 

It was a disaster. Forget anything being in its place, it would’ve almost been better if nearly everything had been destroyed. At least then I wouldn’t have had to clean the place up first! If there was gravity, at least everything would break once and be still. 

I pushed through the mess, every action causing a never-ending cascade of follow-up reactions, looking for my major items. My Sentinel gear, some rope and straps. 

At least The Great Reshuffling hadn’t split individual items apart. My helmet was still in one piece, and I didn’t bother looping rope in fancy ways around it, simply choosing to use [Teleportation] to instantly tie a knot. I dragged it along behind me like a boat gathering seaweed, slowly searching through each level to find what I needed.

Full emergency combat gear acquired, I moved back towards the entrance, using [Teleportation] on every single spare bit of mango that came into my sphere of perception. I stress-ate them, justifying to myself that they might get ruined with all the chaos going on in here. I tied my armor down with the handy cargo rings. Then I teleported back out, figuring it was going to take months at the very least to handle it all.

Great timing. I’d known there was a risk-reward with upgrading, and it wasn’t a disaster, just… really shit right now.

[Astral Archives] kept the same name and had minimal changes. It was already a fantastic skill.

[*ding!* [Lust for Lore] has upgraded to [Endless Pursuit of Knowledge]

Endless Pursuit of Knowledge: The pursuit of knowledge is never ending. The day you stop seeking it out is the day when you stop growing. New knowledge is easier to grasp and some connections or patterns in the grand story of existence become easier to pick out. 3.5% increased experience for classes and skills per level.

Hurray! The experience boost was subtle, but I gave it a lot of credit for my levels over the years. The bonus from [Sentinel’s Superiority] helped out quite a bit too. Also, the bit about classes and skills was interesting. Had prior iterations only helped with one? I was unsure about ‘new knowledge is easier to grasp’ - I rarely had any issue picking things up, even when other students complained that professors didn’t make sense.

Okay! There was still a ton of testing to do, but I had my new Spatial skills! Onto the Radiance skills!

[ding! You’ve upgraded [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance] to [Seraph of the Dawn - Radiance]!]

[ding! [Seraph of the Dawn] leveled up! 768 -> 855. +512 Speed, +512 Vitality, +1024 Mana, +1024 Mana Regeneration, +1024 Magic Power, +1024 Magic Control per level from your class per level! +1 Strength, +1 Dexterity, +1 Speed, +1 Vitality, +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regeneration, +1 Magic Power, +1 Magic Control for being Chimera (Elvenoid) per level! +1 Strength +1 Mana Regeneration from your Element per level!]

I knew this was quite a lot from Auri, but every spike in levels I had, stored or not, resulted in a spike of anxiety for her. I hoped she was alright, and had just been delayed by something dumb. She was a bit of a birdbrain at times, and maybe something important had slowed her down, or maybe she’d waited until the last second and then the Living Storm had delayed her, or…

None of this worrying was productive, and I kept going through my skills.

[*ding!* [Radiance Affinity] has upgraded to [Radiance Mastery]!]

It was a bit of a shame - I’d hoped that I could go straight to [Spirit], with dancing under the sun for eons, but the System clearly didn’t agree. 

[Radiance Resistance] stayed the same, and I was debating if I should drop the skill. It was only good at protecting myself, and I constantly self-healed with massive bonuses. Was that sort of minor self-harm a violation of my [Oath]? I’d come to the conclusion yes many times in the past, but narrowly. It was worth meditating over the question once again to see if my thoughts and feelings had changed on the matter, and if I could get to a no answer.

My beliefs weren’t whatever was convenient for myself at the time. They were my beliefs. I’d love to get all the benefits of [Oath] with none of the drawbacks, but that just wasn’t how it worked or who I was as a person. 

I set [Luminary Mind] on the task, and moved on.

[*ding!* [The Rays of the First Dawn] has upgraded to [The Rays of the First Dawn]!]

…

Thanks System.

The Rays of the First Dawn: When the sun first crested the horizon at the dawn of creation, its rays struck the earth and changed its prospects for all eternity. Wield those rays as your weapons, summoning that which will disintegrate all that stands in your way. Increased damage, range, control, blinding ability, destructive power, and heat per level. -16376 mana regeneration.

The description was almost identical, with a higher mana regeneration cost. I’d need to spend a little bit of time at the firing range to work out what else had changed.

[*ding!* [Nectar] has upgraded to [Celestial Dew]!]

Celestial Dew: The glittering mists of the divine realm condense into delicate dewdrops, upon which angels sup. 0.25% increased mana regeneration per level. 

I wasn’t going to complain about a solid 25% increase to the skill. Short, sweet, to the point, and worth millions of points of regeneration.

[*ding!* [Solar Corona] has upgraded to [Sunrise Halo]!]

Sunrise Halo: Crowned in glory, wreathed in light, haloed by sunrise. Dramatic improvement to Radiance skills per level. -1,048,576 mana regeneration. Small cost on activation.

Holy Ciriel. I was going to hit like a meteor strike. If most high level people had skills like this, it explained so much. It was nice - the stats I got from leveling up combined with [Celestial Dew] more than made up for the loss.

Hang on - there was another line. Small cost on activation? It was a passive, it didn’t usually need an activation. That, and a large part of passives working the way they did was the ‘always on’ nature accounted for where all the extra power came from. 

I toggled the skill, and a halo popped up over my head, bathing the room in soft light. Iona’s eyes locked onto it.

“That’s nice.” She said. “Can I touch it?”

Bless her for waiting patiently while I sorted through all the new skills. I was more than willing to let her play with some of my new toys.

“Sure!” I said. Iona tried to hook a finger through it, but it just passed by.

“Awww. No halo frisbees.” She complained. I side-eyed her.

“Wouldn’t that be, like, ridiculously sacrilegious?” I asked.

“Nope! It’s a class theme, you’re not an actual angel. I’m not one of those stupid religious people, you should know that by now.” She chided.

Also, it was clear Iona had been reading my stat sheet. 

[*ding!* [Wings of the Mystical Sunbird] has upgraded to [Wings of the Seraphim]!]

Wings of the Seraphim: The grace of an angel. The might of a divine warrior. Upon the six holy [Wings of the Seraphim], fly to the aid and succor of all those in need. Dramatically improved speed, agility, durability, and maneuverability per level.  -16376 mana regeneration.

I couldn’t wait to try them out.

[*ding!* [A Raging Tempest of Golden Phoenix Feathers] has upgraded to [Six Wings, Six Million Feathers]!]

Six Wings, Six Million Feathers: With every flap of the Seraphim's wings they can summon an insurmountable number of radiant feathers to attack or defend. Each can burn with righteous fury or be soft down to catch a falling lamb. -16376 mana regeneration.

Well, either the skill name was being poetic, or I was about to have a feather problem. The firing range would help me figure it out!

I had an open skill slot from where I’d lost [Lepidoptera], and the class was a half-successor to [Butterfly Mystic]. Just as I’d been offered a million skills when I’d taken the [Butterfly Mystic] class - [Egg Laying] still occasionally haunting my dreams - I had a wide selection of skills offered to me here and now.

[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [Behold My Splendor]!]

[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [Purge the Heretics By Holy Flames]!]

[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [A Light Shining in the Darkness]!]

[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [Harsh Judgement Ordained from Above]!]

[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [Radiant Angel’s Spear of Obliteration]!]

[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [Be Not Afraid]!]

[*ding!* You have unlocked the Class Skill [A Single Flap of an Angel’s Wings]!]

So many options! They’d all start off at level 1, which sucked, but what was I going to do about it?

My ruminations on my [Oath] from [Luminary Mind] came back with a conclusion - it was alright to drop [Radiance Resistance]. It ended up being a question of ‘what caused the least amount of harm’, and [Radiance Resistance] always prevented a tiny amount of deliberate harm. Another powerful skill could prevent a large amount of dramatic harm. The expected balance between the two, the way to prevent the most harm, was to take another, better skill.

My thoughts had wandered a step further - was it harm to not take a better skill? Fortunately, I’d talked myself off that ledge, because down that path lay madness. Forced to always hyper optimize myself? Whooof. That would’ve been bad. I was at a minor risk of my thinking changing and coming to that conclusion though. I hoped it never would.

I had concluded that some forms of Radiance training and practice would be off-limits. There was lightly crisping my fingers casting [The Rays of the First Dawn], and there was driving a sword through my guts. The first one was borderline, but the second was entirely unacceptable. If skills caused too much self-harm, it was going to be hard justifying practicing them extensively.

After carefully looking over the skills, there were two skills that I thought would work well and help my kit.

The first was [A Light Shining in the Darkness]. I was admittedly influenced by how often the description had come up about me in recent classup descriptions, and it was a broadly useful skill. It was a controllable surge of blinding light, that I could have radiate from all directions or narrowly focus in one direction. It included a strong anti-Mirage and anti-Darkness aspect, banishing illusions and shadows - even those designed to eat light.

A Light Shining in the Darkness: A beacon of hope to the meek, a bane to the dark and the predators lurking within. The bright light drives away all shadows, blinding the unbelievers and bringing hope to those who beg the Seraph for succor. Shatters foul illusions. -8192 mana regeneration.

It played nicely with a number of things I wanted to do. It would be much easier for me to take people down non-lethally if they couldn’t see, it was a nice anti-Mirage tactic, it played well with my work as a War Sentinel, and the anti-Mirage… my thoughts carefully danced around a part I wouldn’t admit to myself, a part that had to deal with Iona. A huge part of my existence rebelled against the idea, against the plotting, but I knew one more endeavor that it was going to be useful for, centuries from now when it was significantly trained up.

I was suddenly engulfed in a warm hug. Iona let me go just as fast. No words were needed.

The second useful skill I decided to pick up was [Radiant Angel’s Spear of Obliteration]. I wasn’t completely sold on it versus another utility skill, but I’d need to think of one first before swapping over. I took the skill, and to my mild but pleasant surprise, I had no huge wave of nausea. I’d been fully prepared - reluctantly - to utterly lose my lunch when I dropped [Radiance Resistance], huge waves of nausea and disorientation common when a skill was lost. 

I suspected I knew the reason. [Radiance Resistance] was a bit of an oddball skill in some ways. It passively protected me from myself. Often the disorientation from losing a skill was knowledge and feelings abruptly leaving the mind, the invisible and untouchable levers and buttons that controlled skills being ripped out.

[Radiance Resistance] was fully passive, and didn’t help me improve my ability to do anything. It wasn’t like [Knives] that helped me handle objects leaving, where knowledge and capability was removed. It wasn’t an active skill. It just… was, and the loss didn’t come with any repercussions.

For now.

Radiant Angel’s Spear of Obliteration: Summon a beautiful spear of pure Radiance with a single thought, choose a target, and obliterate them. Clad your weapon in Radiance and smite your foes. Improved speed and destruction per level. -8192 mana regeneration.

The description was suggestive that I could conjure up unlimited spears of Radiance and fling them at sub-lightspeed at targets, as well as infuse any weapons I held with Radiance and turn them into lethal weapons. 

There was some redundancy with [Rays]. [Rays], to me, felt like a much better skill, and there was a reason I’d used it for years. The largest upside to a third truly offensive skill was it increased my damage output by 50%. The big bottleneck in a mage’s instantaneous combat ability was the number of combat skills. I could throw [Rays] and [Feathers] at my magic power, effectively hitting people ‘twice’. [Spear] let me hit people ‘a third time’, and looked like it was going to end up stronger at hitting a single target than [Rays], even if it was a little slower. 

I was going to need to spend every waking minute between now and when we left the island to get Auri practicing my skills at the firing range.

Satisfied with my picks, I could finally take a peek at my stat sheet.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Chimera (Elvenoid)]

[Age: 38]

[Mana: 6,910,190/6,910,190]

[Mana Regeneration: 13,699,941 +(41,557,542)]

Stats

    [Free Stats: 0]

    [Strength: 40,823 (Effectively: 326,584)]

    [Dexterity: 65,269 (Effectively: 694,984)]

    [Vitality: 203,035 (Effectively: 3,172,422)]

    [Speed: 190,267 (Effectively: 3,745,025)]

    [Mana: 691,019]

    [Mana Regeneration: 1,555,370 (+ 4,155,754)]

    [Magic Power: 903,671 (+ 39,580,790)]

    [Magic Control: 903,392 (+ 39,568,570)]

[Class 1: [The Arbiter of Life and Death - Celestial: Lv 876]]

    [Celestial Mastery: 876]

    [Aurora Curialis: 771]

    [The Stars Never Fade: 55]

    [Luminary Mind: 602]

    [Universal Cure: 876]

    [Etheric Aegis: 222]

    [Event Horizon: 650]

    [Zenith Everlasting: 609]

[Class 2: [Seraph of the Dawn - Radiance: Lv 855]]

    [Radiance Mastery: 855]

    [A Light Shining in the Darkness: 1]

    [The Rays of the First Dawn: 855]

    [Radiant Angel's Spear of Obliteration: 1]

    [Celestial Dew: 855]

    [Sunrise Halo: 855]

    [Seraph's Wings: 855]

    [Six Wings, Six Million Feathers: 855]

[Class 3: [Erudite Archmage - Spatial: Lv 712]]

    [Spatial Authority: 488]

    [Cozy Reading: 712]

    [Teleportation: 195]

    [Repository of the Magus: 557]

    [Tower of Knowledge: 92]

    [Reality, Writ As You Will: 530]

    [Astral Archives: 326]

    [Endless Pursuit of Knowledge: 644]

General Skills

    [Long-Range Identify: 532]

    [Handy: 1]

    [Companion Bond between Elaine and Auri: 876]

    [The World Around Me: 216]

    [Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 876]

    [Sentinel's Superiority: 876]

    [Persistent Casting: 650]

    [Tender Gardening: 108]