Chapter 154

Chapter 154

Aster yipped a hello to Matt, but he wasnt in the mood for her diversion. She had no reason to be feeling that bad if she had only been playing with her new best friends, as her messages had indicated. Aster had done something to her very spirit, and was now recovering.

Still, he trusted his bond, and first asked what she had done before yelling. Are you ok, Aster? You feel as bad as I look.

Through their connection, he felt that Aster was different, but in a way he couldn't quite put his finger on.

She was still Aster, but she felt like a new flavor of Aster.

At least that was the best way Matt could describe it. He just couldn't identify the exact difference.

I had to upgrade my bloodline because the dragon bloodline was starting to push me in another direction. Aster tried to shrug but mostly flopped down. So, I chose a direction and went with it. I'm now a winter fox instead of an ice fox. Im me, but better.

Matt had hobbled over to his bond by this point and scooped her up before running his fingers through her fur and giving her a good scratch as he felt for any injuries.

Feeling nothing obvious, he asked, What does that mean?

He looked from Aster to Liz, who both just looked at Aunt Helen as if for permission.

Matt glared at the old phoenix, sensing that she was the gatekeeper for this information.

Aunt Helen just smiled and asked, Are you going to force the issue, Matt? There are good reasons for not telling people until after Tier 15 after all.

Matt clenched his jaw and let his expression do the talking for him.

Aunt Helen chuckled and shook her head. Matt, its actually illegal to tell you. Humans have bad reactions to this information before Tier 15. Just know that Aster has grown in power at the cost of some blood and pain. She did it to better keep up with you. The dragons blood you found was strong, and with her bloodline being simple, she ran out of space to grow and had to evolve or sidestep. She chose to do the latter, and changed her existing bloodline from ice to winter, and gave herself a better foundation to grow from. Myself, Mara, and Luna were all there to make sure that she didnt hurt herself.

That last bit of information was a relief, but Matt chafed at the secrecy. Without thinking, he asked, Why is everything always seemingly restricted? Liz kno

Thinking of Liz made Matt turn and ask, Are you going to have to do something similar? Youll take on a phoenix form at Tier 15, right? A blood phoenix?

Aunt Helen laughed slightly and shoved a plate of cheese and crackers in front of them, saying, These will help with the spirit strain. And no, Liz will not be turning into a blood phoenix. How easy that would be if a standard Talent like hers could affect her bloodline? Sadly, it's not so easy. If Liz wants to turn into a blood phoenix, she's going to have to do the same thing Aster did. But that isnt until Tier 15 or beyond, which means we can explain more then. Youre still young, and cling to certain ideas and beliefs. Given some more time, those will fade, and youll be more accepting of the different things out there.

Matt took a deep breath before he counted to five, then to ten as his irritation at being kept in the dark spiked once again.

He couldn't change anything, and despite the anger at being left out of the loop, he did trust those who were keeping said secrets. He decided to let the matter rest. Not that he had much of a choice.

Not yet, at least.

Nonetheless, he decided to drop the topic and move on.

Turning to Liz, he asked, How was your Legacy?

She smiled before she frowned. The lady inside was a right bitch, but I ended up beating her finally. What about you?

Matt smiled and thought about reaching for his new skill, but stopped at the pain that lanced through his spirit.

Looking at the plate of cheese that Aster had more than half demolished on her own, he snapped some up and ate it.

As the cheese hit his tongue, he was surprised at how tangy it was, but before he could fully process the flavor, he felt the effects.

The cheese was like cool water to his sore and irritated spirit. But while it felt good, Matt could tell that it wasn't solving the underlying issue, only masking it. Still, it was a pleasant sensation, and he gobbled the rest of the plate down.

Aunt Helen seemed to have timed their appetite correctly, and almost immediately had a small soup ready for them.

This dish was beyond words in taste, and Matt felt it strengthening his sore spirit directly.

It was like a weight off his shoulders, and he sighed as he noticed the contents were gone, and relief flooded his entire being.

The slight lull in the conversation made Matt think of the dinner they had had with the wyvern meat on East Flower, and how they thought it was the best food they had ever eaten. Apparently, his taste buds had a short memory, as even this simple soup was miles better than the meat had been.

Matt didnt know what his past self had been thinking.

Looking to Liz, he explained what he had seen in the legacy, but found himself limited in what he could say to an annoying degree.

All he managed to get out was, I learned a lot but didnt manage to beat my trainer. You must have done well.

Liz teased him for a few minutes until Aunt Helen brought them around to the more important topic of conversation.

I don't just do these little meals for you kids. I actually do this for all the victors to get them back on their feet a little quicker. But for you, Matt, we have less time than normal. If you want to get a chance to go back into a legacy, you need to go finish your fights as your other selves.

The very thought of fighting as he felt now made Matt want to crawl into a hole and die, but he managed to keep eating.

It took a few spoonfuls of soup before he realized that Aunt Helen knew about their other identities, but he wrote that off as normal enough after thinking it over.

As they were being served a thick steak, and Aster was telling of the new rabbit friend she had made who was actually paired with Camilla, Matt raised a questioning eyebrow to Aunt Helen. She was the one who brought the woman here, after all.

Aunt Helen just smiled as she said, Cammie has come a long way in getting her head on right, and wanted to come watch you two fight and say hello and sorry. But thats for her to do, not me.

She then finished up their meal with a brownie covered in hot chocolate, paired with a delectable ice cream that she whipped up in minutes.

Now that he was a higher Tier, Matt could see her using spells through each dish. He tried to memorize what she was doing, but he was too tired to really give it his all.

Liz was already on the bed, and had a wet towel covering her face. Matt found a bowl of ice water and a towel ready for him on his side of the bed, and joined her before passing out.

***

The next morning, after the two of them were functional enough to get out of bed and start moving, they rejoined their friends.

For the ones who didnt manage to squeeze their way into a bracket, they could only watch on as they suffered. But as the month neared its end, most everyone recovered and were stronger for their ordeals.

In an interesting turn of events, the teams who topped a rift leader board had a massive change in the rankings. Nearly all the teams who won a spot were new teams who had taken advantage of the former top teams' fixation on winning the legacies.

That caused a cascade of changes in the new and ever changing points ranking.

As the fifth month settled into its first weeks, Matt and Liz focused mainly on their alternative identities earning points in the Jungle while baiting out assassins. At the same time, they were trying to keep their true identities in a top one thousand ranking, but without showing off too much. Their doing so well in the Legacy contests had sparked an increase in their popularity amongst the general population and news stations.

There was a small pool of people that expected them to climb to the top one hundred, or top fifty in the solo and group tournaments.

Neither of them wanted that attention, and they purposely held back a touch more in the next month, letting the furor die down.

Both of them intended to fall out of the competition in the top one thousand bracket after fighting a poor match-up.

For both their team battles and solo fights, they were simply told something was planned for them already, and not to worry.

Most of their free time was spent watching the crafting Pathers' tournament that was starting to heat up.

Groups consisting of tens of thousands of contestants were battling it out in various professions.

Liz focused on watching the alchemy competition and trying to learn what she could from her professional colleagues in the art. Matt, on the other hand, spent more time watching the other crafters, and even spent time watching the smiths and how they worked. Anyone could hammer metal or pour a mold, but these people made it look more like an art form in most cases.

The enchanters were always a popular venue, but this year, the stands were packed after Quills recreation of various runes that had been locked down under patents, or were too expensive for widespread use. That publicity and the help he had gotten from some of the various enchanters had brought more idle combat Pathers into the stadium to watch the show, despite Quill himself not participating.

Quill and torch had just recently left the Jungle after a week of wandering around while defending themselves and fighting through various rifts and Tier 14 monsters. During their latest stretch of downtime, he decided to make an appearance in the competition as a special guest.

Originally, he wasnt going to do anything important with the event, but he had the idea to release his new rune in conjunction with this bracket of the tournament. He heard that the judges were willing to adjust one of the tests. Instead of having the competitors using a more established rune, which could give some participants an advantage through prior experience, they were using an entirely new rune to level the playing field.

His newest rune was a water concentration and purification rune based on [Create Water], which was hardly a new idea, as there were thousands of variations of the rune already. Instead of just trying to simplify one of those preexisting runes, most of which were in the public domain already, Matt took a step back and had his AI analyze the skill. He had it in his outer spirit, so he was able to start building a new rune from scratch, instead of basing it off of the single existing variation.

It had not been an easy task, but he had managed to create an entirely new base rune that extracted water from the air, purified it, and then condensed it. If needed, the rune, like the skill, could create water from pure mana at a higher cost. But that was a secondary feature that Matt felt was superfluous in most modern cities.

Matt wasn't sure if the new rune base was exactly an improvement on the preexisting ones, but he wanted to see if he could make anything good out of it. He knew it was possible, as some other skills had different base runes, but the simple Tier 8 skills all only seemed to have the single rune as far as he could find.

He had directed his AI to focus on the condensation and purification aspects of the [Create Water] spell, since most habitable planets had more than enough atmospheric water to be forced to create water through mana.

While the runes he had managed to create werent actually better than the older, more specialized rune combinations used currently, Matt hoped that the new rune base could eventually be expanded upon in further iterations to be a cheaper, more specialized alternative.

After seeing the new rune, the judges became excited. After learning he had already scaled the rune from Tier 5 to Tier 10, they immediately jumped on the idea of having the contestants use the new rune for a challenge.

That earned Quill another round of interviews with Diego and the now returned Paige, but most of the attention was focused on the competition itself.

Quill enjoyed watching the competition where the enchanters needed to work in small groups to create and then build a working water purification plant for a simulated forward military base. The new rune threw them all for a loop, and caused a few of the formerly more composed competitors to fumble and make mistakes. Meanwhile, a few of the previously middle of the pack Pathers were able to roll with the changes and adapt.

He was watching on with interest as the clones of the judges walked around and supervised while their real bodies sat around with him. Despite not knowing exactly which cloning skill they were using, none of them seemed bothered by splitting their attention, and all of them eagerly tried to engage him in conversation.

They were all trying to recruit him to the various guilds and noble families they represented, both subtly and openly. It was amusing, as he was vetting them in the same way. Matt knew that having older, more experienced hands in his guild would go a long way towards creating a stabilizing voice to measure the radical ideas he wanted to try and implement.

With his crazy mana generation, he could fuel dozens of intensive projects, and intended to do exactly that. But enchanting, and its applications in every other profession, would be his most important cornerstone.

Currently, Brenda Woo, and Alejandro Eltoro were highest on his people worth recruiting' list. They had made their initial offers to join their corporation and noble family, respectively, and when he politely declined by mentioning his desire to stay on The Path of Ascension, they dropped their recruitment efforts, and started talking shop about the rune and his methodology behind creating it.

While his AI had done the heavy lifting, Quill still knew everything it did about the practical enchanting it had applied for him. He had the advantage of unlimited practice and a near unlimited supply of resources, which put him head and shoulders above even most of the noble heirs and guilds chosen.

They had the advantage of higher Tier backers, but their resources were usually split between half a dozen or more people, while he got everything he created for himself. It didnt hurt that he was pretty good at it, and had learned to love the craft over the years. He eventually embraced the fact his mana gave him the perfect foundation for enchanting work.

Alicia Day and Genghis Quarter were in turn at the bottom of his shit list for near-identical reasons. They kept trying to recruit Quill and pry into exactly how he was making the runes so quickly. When he didnt answer their questions, they started trying to pry into who he had studied under, and generally trying to find out who was under the mask. Not at all uncommon, given the circumstances, and the likely rewards they could earn if they had found out. But they werent subtle about it at all, which was annoying to say the least.

It made him quite happy that he was, in fact, wearing two layers of masks, and had the Shawn identity to fall back on, because those two would do anything to get leverage against him. Whether or not they would survive the ensuing fallout depended on what they did with that information, but he didnt think they were stupid. Just greedy.

The final three judges mostly kept to themselves after their instructions, and he was unable to get a good grasp on their personalities.

When that round of enchanting ended, everyone got quite the shock.

Robert Seed, one of the three general overseers of all the crafting tournaments, came out and made an announcement. Instead of the normal next round, we will be taking a slight break in our testing for Queen Tur'stals upcoming auction at the end of this month, to signal the start of the solo and team matches. We will be having all of you build, create, and then sell an item for the auction. You may work in teams or by yourselves, but know that any team divides the points among the members based on the contribution they gave toward the final project. Also, we have been given generous mana allocations. You have the final three weeks of the month to make your arrangements. Points for advancing in the competition will be based on two criteria. The first being how well your item performs, judged by all the respective judges. The second? How much profit your item earns at the actual auction itself. Assuming you can even secure a slot for it on the auction block, that is. The auction house wouldnt dare disgrace our beloved Queen Turstal by accepting substandard goods into her auction. And make no mistake, Her Most Bountiful Majesty's standards are fittingly high.

After that shocking news, the man vanished as a portal opened under his feet. He sank through it gracefully, leaving behind a shocked crowd and competitors. The judges were cursing while scrambling to get both groups under control.

Quill hopped down and moved out of the mad house that the stadium had become.

The news was spreading through the entire planet, and all the materials that the combat Pathers had been gathering were suddenly in the highest demand. Every crafter was trying their hand at making something valuable for the upcoming auction.

Matt was excited to see what would come of all this, and enthusiastically ear-marked the names he had chosen to keep an eye on, if only to see if they would continue to impress him.

He had high hopes for a few of them.