Chapter 119: The Climb

Chapter 119: The Climb

The hundreds of seabirds that called the sheer cliff home were less than pleased at his presence. Leif couldn’t really blame them, especially considering the damage he had done during his fall. But that didn’t stop being constantly swooped by dozens of the angry creatures at a time from being quite annoying. Gét latest novel chapters on nov(e)lbj/n(.)c/om

His aura, or perhaps nature, seemed to mollify the majority of the birds, his presence pacifying them. Unfortunately a majority of the winged beasts being mostly impartial to his existence wasn’t much of a comfort when being constantly swooped, battered, pecked and screeched at by the minority.

To make matters worse, a good portion of the seabirds that had taken issue with him having crash landed into their homes were evolved. Harsh winds battered at him, beak and claw tore at the golden shield that protected not just him, but his clothes. Not for the first time he internally complained about how small the spatial ring he had looted was, the small drawer sized space being already filled to capacity with what few belongings he possessed.

Leif's arms reached up to grasp the shallow ridge above him, then his conjured limbs pulled him up. Progress was slow, and it was slowed further when the seabirds started to assault the golden arms he was relying on. Pain slowly built as his soul began to strain from skill overuse, before long he would need to rely on his physical attributes.

He ignored the birds, focusing entirely on the climb. Then a massive surge of wind crashed into him, his shield flickered, absorbing the attack but the stone around and above him was less fortunate. The rocky cliff-face crumbled under his weight, and Leif fell, scrambling to regain his handholds.

The spray of ocean waves meeting rock splashed against his back, the water below only a handful of metres away. Leif cursed under his breath, the sound coming out more like a hiss of anger than any actual words. I’m not going to make it at this rate. He thought, the ache in his soul growing by the second. Above the circling seabirds let out cries of triumph, their calls seeming to mock his misfortune.

He needed a new plan, somewhere to recover and hopefully wait out the ire of the cliff's residents. There seemed to be a small gap some thirty metres to his left, a place where the sheer stone wall had been carved into over centuries by wind and waves. Taking one final glance upwards, Leif began to make his way towards it. Moving horizontally was far easier than vertically, but doing so didn’t take him further away from the rising tide’s clutches.

At one point he sensed the presence of something in the waters below, but when he looked down he couldn’t see anything. The water gradually rose, the crest of waves partially submerged his legs every time they met the cliff. Soaked entirely through he finally reached the gap, only to have his hopes sink.

There was no ledge, nor cave to take shelter in. Instead it was a fairly narrow crack that only got wider the closer to the sea it was. Leif wedged himself inside, digging into the stone with his clawed hands, lodging his legs in such a way that he wouldn’t fall. The seabirds seemed to lose interest with their target mostly out of reach, so he let [Amber Aegis] finally drop along with his conjured limbs.

The strain of skill overuse immediately lessened, but he would need to rest before making another attempt at scaling the cliff.

===

The sun was setting when Leif pulled himself bodily over the edge of the cliff, the sea was lit by a vibrant cascade of gold, red and pink. Bright blue motes of light skimmed the water's surface before spiralling up into the clouds above. He unsteadily got to his feet, taking a few shaky steps forward before gaining his balance.

He glanced around looking for the merfey’s corpse, he ended up smelling it before he saw it. Dozens of seabirds fought over the remains, their beaks tearing into exposed sections of flesh that his battle with the thing earlier in the day had revealed. As he approached the birds took off in a squawking mess of feathers.

Leif let out a breath of satisfaction, the shard had saved him several weeks of waiting. Being at the level fifty bottleneck he could no longer level up, new skills wouldn’t be available until after he regained the ability to level up. After he passed the advancement trial his maximum number of normal classes would likely increase to four, but he didn’t know how he felt about diving into a brand new class.

From level one to ten a class would give him five total skills, another five if he levelled from eleven to twenty. There was something to be said about constantly gaining new abilities, but Leif was also cognisant of the fact he would constantly be battling against his maximum number of skills in order to not suffer a massive experience penalty.

It struck Leif that due to his nature, he actually had one more class than humans at the same level. Humans started with a maximum of two classes, gaining their third after level twenty five. His maximum was currently three, but he also had a monster class. No wonder I’m constantly pushing against the skill limit, I’ve been getting more skills than normal. He knew from his time with the academy expedition that classes offered skills every five levels after reaching tier three.

People at my level would likely have a class pushing the high twenties by this point, maybe they would have two classes at exactly level twenty five if they had limited themselves to only two classes.

He summoned the promotion seal from his spatial ring, flipping the intricate metallic and gemstone object over so that its surface reflected the night sky as it spun.

Would you like to consume this promotion item to increase one or more of your classes from tier 1 to tier 2?

Classes available for promotion: [Brawler]!

Classes available for merge: [Brawler] and [Adept], [Brawler] and [Attuned: Life], [Adept] and [Attuned: Life]!

Warning! Merging classes will not grant new skills or attributes based on combined level!

Warning! The options available when promoting classes by merging two tier 1 classes will be less than promoting a level capped tier 1 class!

Warning! You are vulnerable during the promotion process!

Leif read over the system prompts, flipping the promotion item once again to make them disappear. There were choices to make, and now was likely the best time to make them. But I’ll wait until I’m somewhere safe. He thought, before standing and marching away from the sea.