Chapter 218: Two months later

Chapter 218: Two months later

Almost two months passed, and during that time, I went hunting a few times, but not too much, so my level increased by a little bit. It could be even less, but at some point, I got into a big fight.

Who wouldn't get angry, having to fight against a big group of invisible snakes somewhere in a jungle-like forest? Well, I kind of burned it down, so it's not that much of a forest anymore.

And less than five days remain until I can enter Beyond once again.

My status also looks nice as heck.

Name:Nathaniel Gwyn

Difficulty:Hell

Floor: 4 - Waning Realm

Time left until forced return:4y 130d 16h 21m 16s

Traits (1/3):Mana Circuit (Passive)

Lvl 170

Strength: 83

Dexterity: 86

Constitution: 221

Mana (Stage 1/3 - Vast Mana): 650 + 650

Primary Class:Focused Channeler (epic)

Sub-class:[Initiate of Pride]

Active skills:

Focus (Dual Focus Consolidation) - Lvl 39

Mana Manipulation (Advanced Mana Manipulation) - Lvl 41

Perception - Lvl 39

Redistribution (Symbiotic Transference) - Lvl 38

Armament - Lvl 36

Mana Infusion - Lvl 35

Resonance - Lvl 31

Mana Domain - Lvl 11

Tether - Lvl 9

Constructs:

Reinforcement (Construct)This chapter's initial release occurred on the n0vell--Bjjn site.

Kinetic Mana Heart (Construct)

Mana Regulator (Construct)

Mana Sovereignty Mantle (Construct)

Passive skills:

Cerebral Harmony (rare)

Mana-Fortified Resilience (rare)

Pyrokinetic Resurgence (rare)

Mana Reservoir (epic)

Tokens:

Beyond Difficulty entrance token

Shards:2990

Currently, the orb is filled enough to explode the entire house and take a big chunk of the street with it.

That's my girl!

It was my idea, obviously, and Izzy seems to love it. Especially the name of the orb that I came up with. Us, two fire enjoyers, call it the ANTomic bomb, to her amusement.

Sophie doesn't like it, and apparently, Izzy is allowed to train that way only when I am around so I can disrupt the orb in case something happens.

It's silly, a little bit of danger will only make her improve faster! Maybe we should get her an epic passive a bit later. Something similar to my Mana Reservoir to store her fire. Unfortunately, epic passives start at 8 thousand shards and much more for some of them so it might take a while.

I also found out what Izzy's subclass is and bought information on Sophie's.

Isabella picked one of the seven Blights, Kindness. She refused to tell me more about the effects as I was unable to sell Biscuit anymore. Sophie went with Greed.

It looks like I'm still the only one with Pride, even after talking to others in the community who were willing to share their subclass.

Surely my subclass is the best one! Just looking at how much it helps me to improve my control over skills and class, I can say it must be one of the best when it comes to improving personal power, and I'm curious to see what higher stages of it will prove.

Initiate, adept, and master. The difference should be huge.

I lean over Maya and take some dried fruit from the bowl in front of her while she fiddles with some musical instrument on her lap.

She has been nice lately and supplies me with nice snacks, so I ask, “How is your practice going?” I gesture at the instrument, similar to a violin.

“I used to be really good ten years ago back on Earth, so I believe I can do well here,” she says.

From past conversations, I even know she hired a teacher in Virelia who helps her learn to play.

“What happened that you stopped playing?” I ask.

“I have learned that a few of my friends constantly called me a fat bitch behind my back, so I dropped it and started going to the gym,” she turns to me and smiles. Black hair, dark skin, and a figure that only proves what she said.

Even though Maya is close to thirty, she starts to look younger with each passing week. It's something that is even more noticeable on Haddy. It's not like they are turning to teenagers, but their skin looks better, and some wrinkles are disappearing. Not too much, but if you look deeply enough, there is a difference.

“Gym can be really addicting,” I tell her.

“Yes, after two years, I called them fat bitches and made their boyfriends leave them. Then I ditched the guys before they got what they wanted,” she smiles even wider, “But it's as you said, the gym is really addicting,” she laughs shortly.

After saying a thing or two more, I quickly leave.

Heck, even Maya is scary. All Hell difficulty people are scary. I am the most normal one here.

Nommimg on the same snacks that I got from vengeful Maya, I reach Hadwin, who is diligently taking care of his armor and epic sword from the 3rd floor that I gave him. His armor is only upper rare grade, but not bad at all, and the older man takes care of his equipment extremely carefully.

It's something I do not understand that much. Having his [Strengthening], I would just walk around without armor at all. I saw his fight a few times during hunts, and he is really extremely durable, and rarely do enemies draw blood from him, even when they are at a higher level.

Hadwin has already used his attribute upgrade token on constitution, and that made him even tougher. The cheeky ex-policeman even asked me for help, and he learned to use his [Disruption] to create a barrier of disruptive mana on his skin.

Instead of using it to directly attack, he creates a disruptive barrier that reaches only a little bit over his skin. That allows him to ignore plenty of magic-based attacks, and when he attacks, it also disrupts the enemy's defense magic.

When I finally get to create a construct for him, he will become even scarier. His only weakness is a somewhat weak attack, but with a strong item that he uses [Strengthening] on, he becomes quite cool.

And that item is the epic sword that I gave him! Epic-grade weapons cost around 4 thousand shards in the system shop, and even though this one isn't too strong, its effect was lost after all, it still is nice of me to share it, isn't it?

Old Haddy is even taking some swordsmanship lessons in Virelia and apparently, he has a talent for it.

“Nat, I think I got it,” I hear out of nowhere. It's Sophie's voice, and when I turn to her, there is a big happy smile on her face.

There is no fear towards me in it anymore, and Sophie looks happier and more comfortable than ever.

She shows me the mana stone I gave her, “I finally did it! Finally!” There is excitement and happiness from success in her voice.

It looks like after months of hard work, we can finally try to sell coordinates to the shop and get ourselves a huge amount of shards.

Just in time to buy an epic passive before the 2nd Beyond trial.

Noname -Hey, weirdo, any advice on the second Beyond trial?

Savant -Nope, just don't die.

Noname -Simple as that?

Savant - And maybe invest some stats into your brain.

Noname -It didn't help you.

Savant -Screw you.

To make it hurt, I do not answer and just close the window, absolutely sure it will annoy Savant more this way.

I look at the mana stone in my hand and then at Sophie, "Okay, let's sell the coordinates."