Chapter 199: A Week Has Passed!

-----

[Day 123]

A whole week has passed since my second Mana Core ranked up to Rank 2, and I haven't been slacking off! We trained diligently through these seven days.

I trained my skills, techniques, and everything I had. I had even begun to practice alchemy with Benladann and Pekora, who was unexpectedly very talented at it.

I had also begun trying my hand at blacksmithing, but the conventional way of doing it doesn't seem so easy for me… My Icesmith, however, is superior! And I've been multi-tasking on it by creating weapons, accessories, and armor with ice, scales, and lesser and more moldable materials I could find around.

I had built myself a whole set of equipment for my ice giant form to wear, alongside my Skadi, there is a new friend in a giant Ice Blade too!

My entire equipment set is awesome, and it brings a clear boost to my power. Although modifying it to adjust to my dragon form is too hard. However, I've infused enough runes through my alchemy knowledge and alchemy magic, I've made it so these special equipment turns into magic energy when I transform and then go back to normal when I go back to an ice giant form.

However, in my dragon form, I don't receive their boost in power, but in such a form I am too mighty to even need them!

But because they would surely try to hunt me down if I revealed I was a dragon, pretending to be an ice giant was ideal in situations that involved meddling with other societies.

So, aside from the vicious and bloodthirsty Skadi, who has been slowly growing stronger, there is another partner in an Ice Blade, which I named Uller, like the Norse God of Winter. I am pretty clever, huh?

The other equipment I made doesn't become intelligent as weapons do, I don't know why that is, but weapons have some kind of transcendental mysticism in this world, there's something that makes them possible to become intelligent. Or maybe it is because I've been crafting this blade as a side project for months now?

Whatever's the case, here's this bad boy:

…

[Cold Heavy Ice Blade of Winter: Uller (B-Grade++)]

[Durability: 9000/9000]

[Attack Power: 8000]

[Magic Conductivity: 7500]

[Weapon Speed: 6500]

[Traits: [Dragon Mark: Steel], [Evolving Weapon (B)], [Slicing Ice Blades (B)], [Furious Dragon Strength (B)], [Auto-Repair (B)], [Winter Fury (B)], [Uller's Blessing (B)], [Slaughter Healing (B)], [Levitate (B)], [Independent Weapon (B)], [Living Weapon (B)], [Mana Core Assimilation (B)], [Soul Absorption (B)], [Blade Technique (B)], [Aura Blade (B)], [Bone-Crushing Claws (C)], [Berserk Mode (C)]

…

After I made it, I gave it a piece of my soul, almost of the same size as Skadi, and it gained sentience. Alongside that, it gained a Dragon mark as well. For some reason, Dragon Marks Traits in living weapons appear as SSS-Grade in quality, meaning that they're excellent and surpass even their limits… He naturally gained the ability to assimilate Mana Cores and even souls, so he's quickly catching up to Skadi.

Due to this, he can easily get Skills from monsters after assimilating a lot of their Mana Cores… this week he got two, which are those C-Grade Skills, both come from hunting many bears and assimilating their mana cores.

Or is he? Here's Skadi for comparison:

…

[Bloodthirsty Spear of Freezing Winter: Skadi (B-Grade+++ -> A-Grade)]

[Durability: 14000/14000 -> 22000/22000]

[Attack Power: 12500 -> 18500]

[Magic Conductivity: 10500 -> 16500]

[Weapon Speed: 13500 -> 20500]

[Traits: [Dragon Mark: Slaughter (SSS)], [Evolving Weapon (A)], [Piercing Ice Spikes (A)], [Furious Dragon Strength (A)], [Auto-Repair (A)], [Winter Storm (A)], [Skadi's Blessing (A)], [Slaughter Healing (A)], [Levitate (A)], [Independent Weapon (A)], [Living Weapon (A)], [Mana Core Assimilation (A)], [Soul Absorption (A)], [Spear Technique (A)], [Consecutive Triple Thrust (A)], [Acrobatics (B)], [Bone-Crushing Claws (B)], [Adaptability (B)], [Fear-Inducing Aura (A)], [Venomous Fang (B)], [Ice Magic (A)], [Mana Manipulation (C)]

…

She got stronger… She already evolved again and reached A-Grade in quality. Her stats skyrocketed after absorbing hundreds of souls and mana cores through these last days. But it seems that she finally hit a bottleneck and is not getting much out of mana cores anymore.

That's good, she was getting way too OP, it was honestly scared me to even provoke her!

Anyways, she got super strong, strong enough that I fear she might be able to slay me. Her Skills all ranked up with her, some of them became B-Rank while others A-Rank.

By Ranking Up she got the Ice Magic and Mana Manipulation Skills out of nowhere though, which surprised me. It seems that she can now use more intricate magic spells and so on, so she has become even deadlier.

Her Dragon Mark enhances her ability to… well, slaughter, and gives her bonuses when she has killed enough beings, or when she's fighting many foes at the same time.

Meanwhile, Uller's Dragon Mark enhances his defenses and makes him steel-like sturdiness and resiliency. But maybe even higher than that. I believe steel is kind of shitty compared to my magic ice.

Anyways, with these two bodyguards, I have nothing to fear inside the dungeon, I believe, and I will have even less to fear with my companions. Yuki, Frost, the Crows, Benladann, and more, which I am planning to bring with us. Alongside Benladann's parents too, why not?

Probably I will bring Tisha and Pekora too, I want to see them in more action, and this practice might sharpen their rusty fighting spirit.

Although you don't earn EXP by killing monsters in this world, the materials they give are special and useful, and the monsters inside a dungeon can also bring a lot of rewards and the like.

Although the 50% that we have to give back is a pain.

And that's why I have already cut apart the small soul piece where the contract was and saved it inside my Inventory (LOL).

This way, even if I violate the norm and give less than 50%, it doesn't matter because the contract was now made with a separate soul from mine!

-----