Randidly opened his mouth then hesitated paling He had damaged the formation That was honestly terrible because although the feeling of Aether that he experienced in there was painful it had been oddly invigorating
Thinking about it Randidly turned his attention inward It seemed that although Aether had definitely spread throughout him with more spindly branches extending into his arms and especially his legs it had fallen back into a dormant state It moved but extremely slowly pulsing only intermittently
Turning his attention to Shal Randidly noticed that he didn’t seem to be that upset that the formation was damaged In fact he almost seemed cheery
Standing Shal gestured and Randidly followed him out of the room with the inheritances For tonight rest and train your other skills
Randidly was slightly amused that he seemed unwilling to refer directly to the usefulness of his spells but he let it slide
Shal continued Tomorrow we will continue with training In the evenings instead of the formation you shall make use of the 2nd of the tools left behind by my father his journal During the night you will be free to continue your other pursuits Within a week we will leave to train at a more advantageous location Settle your affairs you will return strong or in a coffin
And with that Shal left him alone
After a nervous chuckle at the foreboding things Shal had said Randidly sat down and addressed his notifications It seemed the creation of his skill based on the movements had reached 80% which meant it might be possible to push towards creating the move within the week before Shal whisked him off to whatever dangerous location he had in mind for the training
The second notification caught and held Randidly’s attention
Due to your strong image the skill Phantom Thrust can be changed Do you wish to merge the image into the skill Warning based on the quality of the components efficacy of the skill or the image may decrease Do you still wish to continue
Perhaps it would be smart to wait but
Randidly stood and thrust forward The spear was slow and steady but when it finished a wave of force spread outward in every direction buzzing like a deep bass note Even Randidly’s bones vibrated slightly through the force
He also had Sweep and Ghastly Slash Sacrificing some of the speed for a move powerful enough to finish fights and force others to back off appealed to Randidly after being on the losing end of his conflict with Tertet He selected yes
Congratulations Your skill Phantom Thrust Lvl 70 has changed to The Inevitable Phantom Arrives Lvl 35 (Un) Half of the benefits of skill levels retained Skill levels will be slightly easier to gain until the level of the new skill rivals that of the old skill
Congratulations Your skill has become a skill with an Uncommon Rarity Continue to explore further You will find that uncommon starting places generate uncommon paths
Randidly hefted his spear and looked at the sharp obsidian tip The Inevitable Phantom Arrives huh Perhaps that really was the image that he had Always advancing always approaching This Phantom could not be avoided
Also the notification from the system was cute that it encouraged him to create more skills of different rarities and then use their paths But he already had a Runic rarity move It was just far more difficult than he had expected to level it resulting in not really having access to that path yet But it was good to know that path would probably be worth it
Then Randidly turned to the skill notifications He had gained 2 Lvls in Spear Mastery and Spear Phantom’s Footwork 3 in Iron Skin and Dodge (likely from Shal’s earlier beatings) 1 in Haste 2 in Empower 2 in Battle Intent 4 in Struggle 1 in Root Control and Plantomancy 1 in Potion Making 3 in Mana Engraving 3 in Physical Fitness 4 in Meditation 1 in Pain Resistance (It was good to see that the Aether really did cause actual pain) 4 in Bacterial Regeneration and Mental Fortitude and finally 5 in Second Wind
Because most of his time in the formation was used to train up his Phantom Thrust which transformed and the leg exercises it didn’t seem like he had gained much from his time there But it appeared that his regenerative stats had improved due to the brutal style of training that Shal employed
There was a little bit of regret in Randidly’s heart that he hadn’t used that time to develop images for more things especially things that would have resulted in noticeable increases but he set that to the side It wasn’t worth it to dwell on what might have been Better to focus on how things had changed for the better
Shal had been tight lipped about his move that he used but he had indicated he could continue training with it That acknowledgement was worlds ahead of the previous attitude Shal had towards him Honestly he was a pretty poor instructor but he was fair and thorough so Randidly couldn’t fault him too much Besides Randidly admitted in his heart that Shal’s teaching style was almost exactly what he needed to progress so things worked out
From these skill levels Randidly had 47 PP Inwardly he was quite pleased because it would finally be enough to finish off this strange Lonesome Spear path that had appeared within him There had only been the health mana and stamina benefits thus far but it seemed impossible to him those strange powerful hands would create a useless Path within him
So he put the 27 PP needed to finish it off into the path and looked at the flickering notification
Congratulations You have completed the Lonesome Spear Path You hold a spear and walk forward All else is left behind on your journey forward The sky above you shifts restlessly &()#() #( #(RQ#( # (# )#( (# DSF)# (#) A(#) (#( ()#& ( # )(+ )# # K #P(#) # (email protected) # ## # # (email protected)# OL) #(email protected) # (email protected) D
Randidly looked dumbfounded at the notification There was no reward at all But more than that what were those characters And they ended in an emoji
But before he could truly process what had happened his body shuddered That tightly packed ball of Aether exploded surging outward in three huge torrents The first torrent curled upwards winding itself into a spiral that tightly packed itself even more compact and compressed than the original Path had been This small little pellet hovered above the place where his Soul Skill still rotated and was still
The two other streams of Aether expanded twisting and shifting finally settling down in his stomach area where his skills resided Slowly settling the two morphed and shifted until they resembled the skills around them and ceased Curious Randidly prodded them with his focus and nothing happened
Then he focused more intently on those two shapes and two explanations came up
The Weeping Cloud ® Lvl 1 Conjure a small cloud that weeps Those who are touched by the cloud’s tears will experience increased health regeneration and have status ailments alleviated Concentration and Mental Clarity will increase outside influences will be wiped away Size of cloud and efficacy of effects increase with skill level Control increases with skill level
Weather Affinity Lvl 1 Read the winds allowing you to determine the weather and climate in moments Affinity to the natural world and effect increases with skill level
The sky above me shifts restlessly Huh Randidly said with narrowed eyes Neither skill appeared very useful and both seemed difficult to level It would probably provide additional PP over the long haul He supposed the Cloud skill referenced increased focus and mental clarity which might be useful but again these were purely supplemental skills
Randidly supposed he shouldn’t be too greedy He had finally found a new offensive move to call his own and Shal planned on training him over the course of the next two months or something Randidly wasn’t really sure how the time frame really worked There were times when he realized how oblivious he was and how it was slightly unfortunate