The ensuing battle didn’t last long. Lev gave it his all, pulling out even the stops reserved for suicidal tactics.
None of that mattered.
Like a Monarch damned grim reaper, the monster simply powered through his attacks, utterly focused on tearing him apart. Chains shattered with a single flex of its wings, Fracturing Waves might as well be gentle taps, and even potent waves of unstructured lightning from his armor didn’t deter it in the slightest.
Lightning let him run, blue fire let him clash temporarily, usually resulting in Stargazer’s blade shattering. Lances and arrows didn’t even register in the eagle’s senses, and any orbs hidden by shadow mana simply failed to damage it.
Lev hated how much he learned from the humiliating defeat.
Now he stood over the monster’s corpse. It was torn, burnt, and even missing large chunks. The moment his mana had dipped below ten percent, Drakys had taken over.
Once again, the battle began anew, but this time, Lev could only watch with his mouth ajar. Well, watch might not have fit as a word.
He literally couldn’t see anything.
Inside the bubble with Beatrice, both of them kept their heads on a swivel. A shockwave here, an explosion there, a blurry streak to the right, and a long chain of attacks to the left.
It was a confusing mess of a battle, made even worse by trying to observe it with Arcane Intuition. Sometimes, Lev could almost see the eagle through its glitchy, instant movements. The monster could identify the threat Drakys posed and was reacting appropriately. It hadn’t needed to do that against Lev.
The worst part was that when it finally fell, the level was revealed, and it was quite a bit lower than expected.
[
Your Group has slain [Elder Soaring Eagle - Level 652]
Arcane Maelstrom has reached Level 313
Arcane Maelstrom has reached Level 314
Arcane Passage has reached 4th Level 6
Superior Senses has reached 4th Level 8
Fracturing Wave has reached 2nd Level 6
Arcane Intuition has reached 2nd Level 2
Augmented Carving has reached 2nd Level 2
Trapping has reached 2nd Level 10
]
The gains were decent enough, he supposed. The first level came from killing that group of monsters, whereas the second came from the assist. It showed just how little he had contributed to the kill.
Trapping was now just one push away from evolving. Lev wasn’t quite sure what direction it was going to take, so instead he brought up his full status.
[
Name: Lev
Class: Arcane Maelstrom - Level 314
Titles: Reinforced Mind, Extraordinary Soul, Youngest
Prodigy, Goliath Slayer III, Daunting Steps VII, Rift
Explorer, Hunter, Seen, Survivor I, Titan Slayer, Master
Pioneer, Seigebreaker I, Favored of Kassavin, Wisdom
Specialist, Epic Crafter, Abhorrent Slayer I, Spiritual
Harmony
Attributes:
Strength: 355
Dexterity: 355
Constitution: 770
Intelligence: 870
Wisdom: 1155
Perception: 770
Class Skills:
Arcane Barrier Authority - 4th Level 8
Unerring Volley - 4th Level 7
Wrath of the Arcane - 4th Level 8
Arcane Protection - 4th Level 8
Superior Senses - 4th Level 8
Expeditious Empowerment - 4th Level 7
Arcane Passage - 4th Level 6
Mage Conduit - 4th Level 7
General Skills:
Consistent Mana Channeling - 2nd Level 10
Identify
Aerial Maneuvers - 2nd Level 10
Arcane Intuition - 2nd Level 2
Gaze of the Marskman - 2nd Level 10
Augmented Carving - 2nd Level 2
Wanderer's Repository - 2nd Level 5
Fracturing Wave - 2nd Level 6
Dance of the Elements - 2nd Level 4
Trapping - 2nd Level 10
]
Just like every other time, Lev’s eyes lingered on the titles section. Nothing new had emerged after surviving an encounter with the Stormfury, not even after escaping many of the lightning serpents, getting rescued by the Hunter, then again by Hakim, and then also witnessing their clash.
The System’s ways were truly a mystery.
All of his class skills were progressing nicely, with Arcane Passage lagging behind slightly. He had plans to improve that.
His general skills were at a point where every single level represented a decent improvement. No more were evolutions going to be commonplace, not even for Trapping. That skill was going to be just as wide in scope as Dance of the Elements.
There was also the matter of his extra General Skill Slots. From the start, one of the skills he wanted was Blueprint. It simply stored a set of enchantments and runes to be deployed at an accelerated pace with minimal losses. A standard skill for any Master Crafter.
Other than that, there were two more types of skills he was after. The first was a body enhancement skill, something to eventually build towards the activation of the Arcane Supremacy rune. There was no doubt in Lev’s mind that the rune would require at least a few titles and skills just to gaze at its inner workings.
Then there was the matter of using different mana types. The rune demanded a bunch of them, and so far, he could only claim to have some manner of mastery over fire and lightning. Pure mana may or may not count, so he wasn’t going to bet on that.
“Do you need a moment?” Drakys called out to him, materializing out of thin air behind him.
“No, I just got lost in my status.” Lev smiled and bowed his head in a proper greeting. “I greet the Exalted.” Rising after a few seconds of silence, he asked, “So? Why was I sent here again?
“Guess?”
“As bait? I already knew that, just not why.”
“That particular eagle is, if you’re willing to believe it, far too fast when fleeing even for me. So I had to make sure it was properly invested in a battle and had all of its escape routes blocked.”
“Lovely,” Lev shook his head. “I wasn’t in danger, then?”
“Well, considering the eagle’s level, you were definitely in a small degree of danger.”
That made Lev pause and look at Drakys intently. There were no signs of trickery or amusement on the bald man’s face.
He really could’ve died if he messed up too badly for Drakys to intervene in time.
Shaking away those thoughts, he looked at the corpse again, then at his bubble. Beatrice was still inside, more at ease now.
“Now, you go explain to that girl why you know so many important humans.”
Lev shrugged and almost flew to his bubble before pausing. “Actually, how did the eagle not notice you? There’s no way it didn’t see you just floating there and run away.”
“Guess?”
“Oh, come on,” he sighed and focused on the mystery. “Your presence is completely hidden, so maybe it didn’t recognize you? Maybe it just forgot. Or maybe it wasn’t able to locate you at all, which is weird because I could see you quite clearly. Was it your first time actually coming face-to-face with the eagle?”
“It was not.”
“Huh,” Lev tilted his head a little, pacing around. “Monsters like that won’t forget. That’s just not how they operate. So it couldn’t perceive you, while I could. How does that even work?”
“Guess?”
… I really walked into that one.
With a snort, he returned to thinking. “Well, enchantments usually have straightforward effects, so it is likely something related to your skills and class? How does one even twist runes… never mind,” Lev finished with a chuckle. “It’s willpower, isn’t it?”
“A lot more than just willpower, but yes,” Drakys confirmed with a nod. “You will understand more when you can create Epic items reliably. If I’m not mistaken, you’ve obtained something that lets you peer beyond the surface-level workings of enchantments.”
“Yep.”
“Then you should understand just how long the road is.”
Lev dipped his head appreciatively. Knowing a small extent of what an Exalted could accomplish by further augmenting runes with his willpower was enough to keep the gears spinning in his head.
Absently, Lev stared at the bubble before getting his thoughts under control. Turning around, Drakys was already gone, leaving behind a recorded message.
“I’ll see you back at the fort. You will probably appreciate the opportunity.”
****
Once again, there were no mentions of the Stormfury, nor did Drakys ask where Lev had gotten his hands on red lightning, whatever that terrifying element was. Even if the other Exalted hadn’t seen it, Hakim sure had, and yet there were no inquiries. Not even any curiosity.
It was suspicious.
It also smelled like something they wanted him to figure out and digest on his own, while also keeping an eye on him from a distance.
Again, he pulled back his spiralling thoughts about that day and focused on his status.
For his other General Skill slots and Mana Manipulation, it was painfully obvious that Lev had overestimated himself somewhat.
Without any new skills, titles, or other means to go along with it, manipulating more elements was going to be a challenge, and not a small one either.
Arcane Supremacy required ten or more elements to work in tandem for a body enhancement. That alone was enough to plan for an eventual skill to deal with the activation of the rune, but in the long run, that wasn’t the main purpose of such a skill.
His barriers took priority, and they could use even more mana types than the rune. Hell, no matter what elements he wanted to specialize in, his barriers were not going to have a problem beyond mana conductivity.
Finally, the nature of his barriers brought him to the current dilemma. Fire and lightning worked pretty well, and with shadow mana being necessary to stay alive, he had to make a conscious choice about primary and secondary elements for his skillset.
When the strength of mana types was considered, he also had no qualms about adding more basic elements into his arsenal if they fit. It was possible to evolve them, and given the effectiveness of his unevolved lightning, he wasn’t willing to say it was any weaker than something like acid. An even higher version of that, such as corrosion, probably outclassed lightning, but such an element would be just as dangerous for his barriers.
In short, base elements were just as strong when combined with the versatility of his class.
There wasn’t any reason to make hasty choices for now. Lev merely wanted the questions to be present on the front of his mind to plan around them, and also keep an eye out for any opportunities and knowledge regarding manipulating multiple mana types.
A day later, he and Beatrice returned to the fort. With her active and passive buffs, Lev’s mana pool was hovering around full. A nice thing, as it turned out, for Drakys grabbed him and his bubble the moment he said farewell to Beatrice, knowing that she wouldn’t be accompanying him.
Now outside the fort, he sat on his usual seat in the bubble, waiting for the Exalted to say something. Drakys remained absorbed in seeing something beyond the horizon, as if his gaze could stretch to the end of the continent.
"How is everything coming along?”
Lev paused. The question was too broad for a short answer, and it also covered too many things to reply to quickly.
So, he took his time. From his progress to his mental state to his crafting expertise to his opinion about where he currently was, everything was a valid answer.
“I could’ve possibly killed that eagle,” he began. “Not sure how to explain it, but something in the back of my mind told me that, if I fought perfectly, that certain enemy was not beyond me.”
“Go on.”
“That perfection, however, probably won’t come to be for a long, long time. Like, hundreds of years of training and fighting. It’s just the potential of the class that seems so incredibly wasted in the hands of a human.”
Drakys didn’t even turn to him. “Sounds pathetic, does it not?”
“… Kind of?”
“Fortunately, that’s the case for most Masters who take progress seriously. We are ultimately humans with flaws and a functional set of emotions, and those matter far more than you think. The sense of inadequacy stems from that, too, making it feel like nothing you ever do is enough.”
“And how do the others deal with it?”
“They try harder and get rewarded for it. You’ve unlocked Spiritual Harmony rather early, which is the main culprit for what you’re feeling. In time, that will settle into a background noise, urging you forward.”
Now, why does that sound very familiar to what I’ve been feeling since my childhood?
“So we just have to live with it?”
“Correct. Humans can only do so much, even with the incredible potential at their fingertips. I can confidently say that, other than perhaps Hakim, no one can truly do their entire status justice. That is not to say that we’re far behind monsters. We’re clearly not. Just that the road is long enough that it will never end.”
Lev could accept that. Knowing that it wasn’t only him going through those feelings helped settle his mind, though he was also certain that his mind was hit worse than others. After all, who else at his level could compare to his personal strength?
Storing those thoughts for later, he continued. “As for actual progress, it’s acceptable for the circumstances. Couldn’t really do much holed up in the fort, and now that I’m out, it’s time to start looking for better ways to treat my barriers.”
Drakys smiled, but otherwise didn’t react.
“I was also considering how to use different mana types better in tandem, so to that end, the skills I need to acquire are Blueprint, a body enhancement skill, and something to split my focus better? Does a skill like that even exist?”
“Nothing that directly helps you accomplish that,” Drakys replied. “General Skills are naturally narrow in nature, targeting specific aspects instead of whole concepts. Mana Manipulation and Mana Perception are the two greatest exceptions to that rule. They cover everything under their name with the right evolutions.
“For the mind, you will find no skill that helps you focus on multiple tasks directly. What you can do, especially with all your free slots, is piece it all together. A specialized Perception skill to observe it better, a channeling skill to handle the mana flows, and some other supportive skills to create a whole set.”
Lev nodded slowly. “How difficult would it be to acquire all the supportive skills that do exactly what you described?”
Drakys grinned. “Guess?”
Lev groaned into his hands.