Incursion Empire Ch. 25

Twenty-Five

Dane lay stretched out across the ground, breathing heavily as steam rose off of his burning arm. Thick piles of ash lay around him, consumed by the hellfire he’d unleashed as the last wave of monsters had pushed toward the top of the hill. Tolic floated over him with all four of his arms crossed, frowning at him.

“What are you doing down there?” the damned spirit asked.

“Catching my breath.”

“Stop being dramatic, it wasn’t that hard. Didn’t break a sweat myself,” Tolic said, lifting a hand and peering at his nails.

“You don’t have a body to break a sweat in,” Dane complained as he got to his feet and looked over the destruction he had wrought. The entirety of the hill was covered in corpses and ash. Most of it was from Gabe, but he had had to unleash his own hellfire in the last burst of attackers. 

A stiff breeze scattered a pile of the dirty ashes, sending them to swirl on the winds as Dane stood to his full height. A sense of accomplishment washed through him as he stood above his foes. Not entirely in his own destructive abilities, but in how he had survived it all.

“Years of training and it finally pays off.” Dane only had a moment to bask in his own accomplishments before the System reminded him what it was he had originally come to compete for. 

Title Earned

Modifier Added

Sole Survivor 

Generating Reward

“Uhhh?” Dane said out loud as he stared at the words. He tried to bring up the leaderboard, but now that the event was over, there was no way to access it. He couldn’t remember the last time he had checked the board, to focused on surviving the next wave of monsters. 

Jackalopes, Grass-Fiends, goblins and their wolven companions, the shambling stone behemoths and their summoners, and in the end, the forest itself. Powerful nature spirits had come forth, walking up the muddy slopes encased in trees. They hadn’t been ents, which he was thankful for, but had been close enough. All of them had burned eventually. 

His blade had drank deeply and the amount of sacrificed cores sitting waiting to be cashed in was burning a hole in his metaphorical pocket. Mel’s promises were heavy on his mind as Dane glanced to look over at the overly talkative Tolic.

“Definitely something that doesn’t talk.” 

Pop!

Mel appeared next to him, her long slender form rising up and above him as she surveyed the destruction with a bored look. Her emerald eyes glittered with a hidden humor as she took in a deep breath, reveling in the carnage. She let it out slowly with a content sigh. 

“You might be a decent investment in time and resources,” Mel said after a moment. She turned sharply on her foot, the contract appearing in her hand along with the book of summoning that Dane had secreted in a tree before coming back up to fight on the hill. 

“There will be a class skill available to you when you turn in your sacrificed cores. It will be called Summoned Binding. It will only be available for the first time you cash in your cores until you would have opened it up later. For pleasing me so well, I shall offer you advice.”

“For free?” Dane asked. The demon didn’t seem to be one who would offer anything for free.

Mel froze, slit pupils widening for a moment before her head tilted back and she bellowed with laughter. Great, body shaking convulsions of laughter. Dane thought he saw a tear slide out of an eye as Mel howled at the thought.

Tolic chortled off to the side. Dane glared at the spirit who normally shut up when Mel was around. Tolic shrugged with all four arms before floating off, picking through the corpses to find one appealing. 

“Ohhhh, I needed that,” Mel said as she wiped at her eye with a single finger. She looked back at him and chuckled again as they met each other's gaze. 

“The first lesson about dealing with demons. Nothing is free. But, this is more repayment for exceeding expectations. Think of it as a bonus,” Mel said. Dane fought the urge to scratch his head and try to parse out the difference.

“Save some of the cores before you summon your being. With your weak level, the summon will be weak. Feed it the cores to strengthen it after you subjugate it.” 

“Hey! Those are my cores!” Tolic yelled indignantly. Mel didn’t even look at him as her dark green eyes drilled into Dane’s. He nodded to her as he took the book. She disappeared as fast as she had appeared, leaving Dane standing there alone. 

“I think you stink or something,” Tolic said as he came floating back. He hadn’t managed to find a single body suitable for habitation.

“Huh?”

“She always leaves so fast. I would tell you if you stink, but, no body,”Tolic said. He waved one of his overly large arms up and down to point out himself. Dane just snorted and started to walk down the hill. He tried to remember the small area they had taken refuge in last time to go through the rank ups, but the forest had been significantly rearranged.

Having the trees start walking had that effect.

Dane picked his way around corpses, broken trees, and mounds of broken up rocks as he searched for somewhere to hide while he went through the list of notices he had.

“Tolic, can you scout ahead? I need a place to sit down to get through this,” Dane ordered. The spirit flew ahead of him, looking around as Dane sat in a cluster of rocks, glad to get away from the talkative spirit.

Title Generated 

Solo Conqueror 

Be the Sole Survivor of a Beast Wave Event

+10 to all stats 

Skill- Monster Slayer 

F-1

Monster Slayer

A secondary sense for when System generated mana formed biomass is in the area. System Generated monsters are more vulnerable to your skills.

Dane stared at the list of the rewards and had to fight back a smile. The boost in stats would be immediately helpful to him, especially since his class didn’t give him stats to most of his attributes. Dane had to hope that the next evolution of the class would give him more stats to spread out.

The skill was a lot better than the quick boost of stat points. Being able to get a feel for when monsters were around, especially on an incursion was absolutely just what he needed. 

Dane Rawling

Lvl. 12

Race: Human

Strength: 31

Dexterity: 20

Endurance: 20

Vitality: 31

Intelligence: 29

Mana Core: F-Grade

Bloodline: F-Grade

Skills

Elemental Resistance F-4

Meditation F-3

Stealth F-2

Mental Resistance F-4

Tracking F-2

Heat Resistance F-7

Monster Slayer F-1

Summoning F-1

Dane had to repress a grin at seeing the jump in his skills and levels. The marathon fight on the hill had been rewarding for him. He looked over mass alerts of kill notifications and skill updates and the smile broke free. 

“It was a good day,” Dane whispered to himself. He wanted to get into summoning right away, but he needed to go through the bloodline upgrade first. Tolic would be back any minute and impatience was pushing him to hurry up and push forward. 

The notification appeared in his interface and he clicked it instantly. Dane sat there, thinking nothing was going to happen as the moment stretched out further and further. 

“What the hell?” 

Then the pain hit.