As the scent of corrupted abominations vanish in the vicinity I gain clarity enough to remove the charm. I look at the shredded corpse through my 4 pairs of eyes, disappointed that I took it this far. "I can't even use the corpse…" I groan in frustration but store the entire body anyway.
My pile storage memory is overflowing and the weight is very bothersome, but separating the weight between 4 demon class awakened who are [Physically Gifted] it isn't that crushing. I sigh and head home as quickly as possible, worried that I'll be have to fight another swarm of unique monsters.
A quick sprint later I arrive home, seeing that a saint is standing in front of my place with a few masters. I look at them confused, Saints are rare commodities that only 27 saints exist in the Song Domain which is twice the population of saints in Valor I believe.
They see me, with 3 others behind, each having their face covered by their helm. I walk up to them confused on why they're here, but before I can ask they speak first.
"hello Luke, we are here today about the suspicious activity you have exhibited." they say in a serious voice, the tall man, with jet black hair flowing down to his neck.
It makes sense, after all I was seen as weird even by explorers standards, my ability to be unscathed, my understanding of runic sorcery, spell tech and the amount of shards that I have in my house, not to mention the sheer number of dismantled corpses in my back yard even though I haven't left my house in years is very strange.
"wanna come in for tea?" I ask politely, "its better than talking out here" the saint looks at a master behind him who nods, and follow me inside.
I make them all tea, morphing my table to fit all of them using the enchanted runes I engraved on it. Their expression hardens and grows more worried. I make the tea with an enchanted kettle, while asking them their preferences in how they like their tea.
I place the cups of tea in front of each of them placing my own and sitting. "I am ready to speak now~" I smile politely taking a sip of tea.
One of the masters start the conversation. "you have been seen twice in 2 different places, is that your aspect?"
I nod, "my aspect allows me to clone myself, the 3 who are dismantling the corpses in the back are my clones."
Another master asks a question. "how do you gain so many Fallen and Corrupted corpses and so quickly?"
"I found multiple large colonies outside the influence of The sovereign. So naturally, I've been culling the population of the Tyrants, just today I killed off the entire population." I enjoy my tea, while trying to create a narrative of hit and run tactics rather than annihilating them.
The Saint asks a question. "how many clones can you create?" I think about the answer carefully, currently speaking I have 4 clones but its saying how many I 'can' make, so using the logic I say. "I can create 7 clones, but that takes a lot of time and effort."
The Saint nods and asked another. "are you willing to sell your corpses?" I look puzzled at that question and ask why.
"currently, Ki Songs throngs are mostly comprising of awakened rank, and we expect.. A collision of ideals to occur with Anvil" I nod at the grievous implications. "I'm sorry but the corpses are dismantled thoroughly, and even if they weren't I can't sell them to you, they are part of my research, and if the implications of clash is true.. I'd rather focus on empowering myself. I hope you understand."
They nod, in understanding. And finally. "I would like to test your strength" I knew this was coming, and I expected it, I nod and go outside, the Saint's aspect allows them to turn their body into obsidian steel, which can be shaped and morphed into anything. Though its has the rigidness of obsidian.
My clones jump into the front of the building, currently the fight is highly in my favor, due to my strength and the clones, but this is a saint.
I summon my weapons and begin the battle, dashing forward as Silverworn dashes to the back, while Redscales and Thornhelm attack his side. I watch as the Saint turns obsidian, and parries all 4 attacks by morphing his body, 'incredible' though my sheer strength is able to chip some of it away.
We continue the assault, overwhelming the Saint, with numbers and speed, but that is of no avail. I back away and throw my sword at him, he parries the blow, chipping away at his obsidian body, I use the enchant to pull it back into my grasp and attack again, while Silverworn continues to chip away at his back, which is full of jagged spikes.
"stop." the fight ends in a draw. As my attacks already prove that I'm at least on par with masters. Though if he was playing more offensively I would have surely lost extremely easily.
"we would like to recruit you into the Song domain. You would gain benefits of shards, memories, and more resources that normal awakened would have, and after reviewing you, we believe that you have the potential to be a saint."
"no thank you, I have no intentions of going into the 2nd or 3rd nightmares anytime in the future, I also like playing things safe." they are a bit baffled by my contradictory statement, after all I hunt Corrupted nightmare creatures a lot of times. But they nod, and leave.
I sigh in relief, knowing that are going to be a lot of things that are going to happen in the future which will involve a lot of people.. Currently speaking, Ki song seems like they will win, after all the sheer number of saints they have under control is much higher than the Sword domain, but to me, that doesn't seem likely, as they have a saint with a divine aspect, Nephis, who survived the dream realm alone for over 4 years and who has the fire keepers, who the oldest members survived over 9 years in the dream realm as sleepers! Each are masters and are extremely capable warriors.
So I expect the Sword domain to win, but there also seems that some.. '3rd' party will interfere and change the history.
There's no telling who that may be, because of my own lack of knowledge, but I plan to cultivate my own strength much faster than I intended on and eventually becoming a master only after I create a titan core and by the looks of it, I have to get 23,000 give or take, which certainly makes the path to strength much longer, but each time, [Physically gifted] grows more and more, and I want to see the upper limits of it.
Why is [Physically Gifted] so powerful? Its because its intrinsically connected to one's body. This attribute alone puts me much higher than anyone who consumed the same amount of fragments as me. It also scales with the fragments you have, which was why even being only awakened with a full core, I could fight Fallen ranks and tag team corrupted. But since each class upgrade increases your strength even more, gaining my second ever core greatly increased my power output.
If an average person created their own monster core, the strength they gain because of that core is extremely limited. Because the human body isn't meant for having more than one core, but [Physically Gifted] allows a person to gain much more of the strength and speed that comes from having another core because the body is much more adapt at handling it. The attribute itself also has the unique property of gaining more benefits from any memory or blessing aspect that buffs the user physically. It's the single most broken attribute anyone can have, and especially for Luke who can have clones himself.
also a small discovery, Physically Gifted evolved? i checked my status window after that intense battle and see the name has changed to [demonically Gifted]
'this didn't happen when i formed a monster core?' when i had that it still only said [Physically Gifted]. though all the changes have been the slight alteration of words.
"about a week before going on that trip.." currently, he is looking through his stuff to see what he can use or adapt, while a clone is researching the 'circuits' in the memories using the monocle.
Another is forging nuke arrows for the Terror, since the Corrupted Terror seems much more deadly by the fact that its breaking the box that its predecessors made.
Its ability to camouflage, doesn't make an army of thralls, hunting like that of a human, makes it a terrifying adversary of the Song domain.
"I need to rework the monocle so I can wear it without falling off" a clone started to work on goggles, with one normal and the other refitting the monocle. Remaking the monocle itself Is impossible in such a short time, so fitting it in goggles that are not rudimentary with enchants of eye protection and thermal sight if essence is inputted makes it much more useful.
The next thing is getting my new Transcendent memories reviewed and learn its enchantment, which is what Thornhelm is doing.
[Fear Feeding Carapace]
Transcendent: Tier 6
[A pathetic mundane ant, force fed essence until it gained sentience, and after it gained sentience it realized pain. The pain of being weak, the pain of being useless, before he was unaware of that misery but now, he can't go back to being ignorant, he can't be normal anymore. But it was too weak, too pathetic to defend itself.
Until one day, its capture was too preoccupied allowing it to escape. Revenge was on its mind, the immense hatred fueled It, making it fight for every lick of strength, every drop of power, to be feared, to gain revenge… And once it did, it realized there were still forces it couldn't defend against.
Corrupting and turning mad, trying to gain endless strength-trying to protect its offspring only to kill and eat them...
Until it met its demise at the hands of an intrinsic mad men who shared the same face and also yearned endlessly. Its fear finally ending as its life draws to an end.]
Enchants: [Fear Monger][Pained Strength][intrinsic soul][Benevolence of Family]
The armor itself is highly capable, able to match the flexibility of his grey tunic and since my physicality is that of a demon, it's becoming less necessary for lowering weight for high speed movement, when each movement has such high power, lightening yourself is barely a boost.
The first enchant, allows the user to passively induce fear onto enemies, making them less likely to attack, when activated however, the enemies become paralyzed by fear. Allowing for easy hits.
The second grows the armor's power and the users power when injured, it's a conditional enchant and the boost is extremely high, almost half of the [Bubbling Lust of Blood].
The third enchant increases the amount of essence the wearer replenishes, which is also enhanced by the fact its tier 6 while only having 4 enchants, boosting the armors potency. Its speed is 2.5 times faster than normal, without constant manipulation of essence, making it extremely the most useful.
The fourth and final enchant is that anyone who has a familial relationship to the wearer gains an enhancement based on how familial you are, and since the clones are literally me, they gain an extreme boost.
This is valuable, as I'm taking more of a commander role, so this fear inducing memory, which boosts my strength based on connection makes me incredibly formidable, coupled with [Bubbling Lust of Blood] I gain extreme bloodlust and strength, making me almost as strong as saints. Almost is an overestimation…
As Thorn helm back home, it sees, Luke training in his main body, integrating his new power and revising his fighting technique. While Silverworn is studying memories through the monocle, now turned goggles to see if he can find enchants by just looking at a weave. Redscales is filling up the essence brooches and making new ones using his new and Transcendent armor~
I realize that publishing the new research on cores should occur after the war between Supremes, otherwise I might be taken prisoner and be experimented on. So I soak its pages in corrupted blood, giving mystical aspects to the paper also using leather from a corrupted demon wolf as the book cover. Inscribing it in enchants making it only open to a person who knows the password. I carve the words of forbidden power in the runic language, to give it lore~ and finally place it in my storage memory, so if I die, it dies with me~
After all me doing all that crazy shit made me look like a creep, but it was satisfying to make it mystical~
And so, I plan to hire a personal enchantment examiner, to make understanding the circuits a lot more easier, but during the single readings I was able to discover more than just the basic enchantment of making things a memory. I also found a few weaves that share the same meaning, making a simple structure, and speeding up my understanding greatly.
During my research on memories and the circuits inside them, I discover that there are circuits that overlap, the more complex the circuit is, the more power it brings out, and the more power it brings out the more the item is strained. This doesn't happen with runic enchants, unless you overload the item itself with essence, maybe its because the innate essence it holds is what makes the enchantment work?