Chapter 274 – Day 543 (Part 4) – A Discussion Of Meta-Points
Added 2022-12-30 00:06:00 +0000 UTC“Meta-points as I call them, are awarded by the System for accomplishing an impressive feat without help or knowledge of the meta-points,” the Astrologer said, and it all clicked in my head. I closed my eyes and let out a long breath.
“Now you understand. There was only one easy way, and easy is relative here by the way, for you to gain a meta-point. To run into a level 4 zone. You can’t fake the risk. Also, the System has to favor you for you to get some of the chances that are presented.” I frowned at this. What chances? Then it clicked.
“Death!” I said as the realization hit me like a ton of bricks to the face.
“Indeed. If you had fought it on your own right away, there was a good chance of dying. But if you had won, then you would get a meta-point. The System rewards people for acting individually at great risk. Bombs, going outside the system, getting help, running away, those are things that the System doesn’t like.”
“Why not tell people then at least?” I asked in frustration. If the System wanted people to go out and risk their lives for even more power, it should say so. But telling people, violated the requirements for said power.
“Because the System wills it to be so. If people know, it cheapens the requirements. People would try to find exploits, loopholes, and any manner of getting these meta-points by any means possible other than personally risking their life.” I sat there in silence. Maybe they weren’t that good? I knew that wasn’t the case if they had a name like god-point.
“What do these meta-points do?” Clarissa asked the question I didn’t want to. I felt ill at missing out on something so valuable.
“A meta-point at its heart is a wish.” The Astrologer held up a gloved hand before I could scream in frustration. “With hidden limits. You get to ask for up to three things, information, skills, stats, anything. And then the meta-point will present the option closest to the request. Then the person must pick from the three options.”
“What did you pick?” Clarissa asked. That was a dumb question, Clarissa. I shook my head at that.
“Things and stuff. I mean you don’t seriously expect me to answer that? These abilities go beyond conventional knowledge or patterns. But they are rare. To illustrate how rare, I only know of three people to earn one of these meta-points. Myself, the Divine Empress, and a person she killed in her ascent to power.”
“Thankfully, you can’t steal these meta-points. I suspect that the Divine Empress picked something related to her sense of self. A unique passive skill enhancing everything about herself, to compound the effects of her insanely high Body stats while having to spend less in other areas to be protected from various types of attacks.”
“That combined with her mastery over the martial arts, makes her truly unstoppable in direct combat and near impossible to hit.” Now I was dying to know what meta-point or points the Astrologer had. But that was a question that was never going to be answered. It was his trump card. His power to reverse a bad situation.
“So, you wanted me to get one of these meta-points and spend it to free you?” I asked incredulously.
“I would have asked you to pick something related to energy absorption with a filter. Then you could have broken me out and the skill would be incredibly useful, to fuel your other skills. If you didn’t like that option, there are a few more I could have suggested. The cage doesn’t need a key and can be broken in various ways.”
“So, it is the System in the end? Are you sure it discriminates?” Clarissa asked.
“Yes. Another way to get a meta-point is to upgrade a city to level 4 and triumph alone with no assistance. And yes, these points would compound over time. Making it easier to get the second once you have the first, but the requirements increase to match your power and ability.”
“That is frustrating,” I muttered. I also realized that there was a good chance that the Astrologer had more than one meta-point. I wanted to curse and scream at how unfair this was. The missed opportunities, which wouldn’t come again. It made me feel ill.
“Of course. I warned you, but you wanted to know. My Valkyries tried so hard to earn one, but it never happened, no matter what they tried. So, the only way is the very hard way. A lot of Spirit stat and training,” the Astrologer said.
“How many stat points is one worth?” I asked, wanting to get a better understanding of the meta-points.
“It is multiplicative. I know that much, but I never asked such a question. You can only ask for three possibilities. Iterating on a single goal is much better than trying to work out the scope of the meta-points. But if I had to guess. Than I would a multiple of ten in a single stat.”
“TEN!” I screamed in shock! A multiplication factor of ten, would mean millions or even billions of points that would have to go into that single stat. If that was how much a meta-point boosted a single stat, then I wanted to scream some more in rage. Why did I have to ask the Astrologer to explain things? I should have just closed my brain and run right into whatever hell he wanted me to run into.
“That is a huge multiplier,” Clarissa replied.
“They aren’t called meta-points or god-points because they are cabbages that you can pick up off the ground. Each one is rare and precious. While grinding can help make up some of the difference, the boost they give is insane,” the Astrologer said.
“Ten years and only three people who have earned this meta-points?” I asked.
“There may be more, but they are keeping a very low profile. The Divine Empress spreads this knowledge, why do you think she is called the Divine Empress? She wants people to ask about the Divine part and ruin their chances.”
I wanted to curse the stupid Almighty System some more. You couldn’t give me a clue? A hint? Just like, hey this is what I want from you, and you will get super rewards. How could you cultivate a certain mindset if you don’t tell people?
Or maybe the Almighty System was more insidious than that. It wanted to see what outcome was the strongest. Grinding away forever, or taking huge risks to get these meta-points.
“What other ways are there?” I asked.
“None that are within your power level at the moment or even close to that have a chance of working now that you know about the meta-points,” the Astrologer answered.
“Alright, let’s prepare for this Divine Empress and trying to free you. Clarissa?” I asked.
“I have no objections. We will need to reorient our combat doctrines. Any advice to take her down?” Clarissa asked.
“How would you kill someone with at least 50,000 in their Body stat? Start there. If you come up with anything, let me know,” the Astrologer replied.
“But you wounded her?” Clarissa asked.
“I attacked her in a way she wasn’t expecting. I used my skill Imbue Life to create a living tumor in the center of her brain. No way to remove it. And it cursed her. A close person to me died just to give me the chance to make this happen. In addition, it was piggy backed on a very powerful mental skill that I no longer have access to.” Well, there was some vindication for Clarissa’s mental attack plan with imbue type skills.
“Again, it is not the size of the skill, but how a skill is used that matters. The Divine Empress is a battering ram and spiked club. No subtlety at all. But her method of combat is effective. She will have resolved the gap in her defenses. But she is still cursed,” the Astrologer said and my respect for him went up a notch. Creating a living tumor in an enemy’s head to curse her was not simple.
I could see why both sides would back off after such a fight, but I was curious. “Why not press the advantage?” I asked.
“The Valkyrie who was killed had the mental attack skill and catching the Divine Empress with her insanely high Body stat is not simple. There were also resonance-based tricks I could use to bypass all her defenses and drive her off.”
“I actually pressed her quite a bit. But just like you made a treaty with the Ritualist, I made a treaty with her. I was expecting to become even more powerful by the time we fought again. Gaining another meta-point to crush her.”
“Unfortunately, the calamity struck, and trapped me. Now I am reduced to begging for help like a pathetic wastrel. If you want my thoughts on fighting her, then don’t. Fighting a martial arts master with a high Body stat is a fight that happens in a single second. And plays to their advantage.”
“So mental and physical attacks are out?” Clarissa asked.
“Everything is out,” the Astrologer said.
“But how will your main body stop her, if you didn’t manage to kill her the first time and she has only gotten stronger?” Clarissa asked and I nodded at that. It was a very good question.
“Why would I reveal my plan for round two? If she captures either of you, I don’t want such a thing leaked,” the Astrologer answered. It was a good point, though slightly frustrating. “High level fights between people are decided inside of a second. It comes down to information and method of attack. If a fight lasts longer than a second, then someone is not leveraging all their advantages. And yes, it would technically be possible to have even stats, but that speaks to poor planning with skills and meta-points.”
“By your own admission you only had a single fight with someone with a meta-point?” Clarissa asked.
“I have had several other fights. You don’t gain meta-points by sitting around safely or being meek. Now we need to focus on the short term plan. You need to grind up Spirit, and preferably against a level 4 monster to go as fast as possible,” the Astrologer said.
“How much?” I asked.
“At least 1,000, but realistically you would need 5,000 to have a decent chance of freeing me. After that, there are other stats that would need to be focused, but Spirit is the most critical. After Spirit, then Absorption,” the Astrologer said.
“Two things. How do you expect me to grind level 4 monsters efficiently? And what about the Absorption stat is important?” I asked.
“The answer to the second question can wait. But to put simply, you need to manually unmake my prison. Spirit, will allow you to get to my prison and not die. Absorption will allow you to unmake it. Yes, it involves draining energy from the environment to sustain you, but it is more complicated than that. You need to work for an explanation.”
“As for grinding level 4 monsters. I have one in mind. You can upgrade your Acid Shot to level 3, and then you can directly South of the place you call Neo Brasilia to the darklands. The monster, The Bulwark Shield can be damaged over time by your skill and you should be barely able to dodge,” the Astrologer said.
“What happens when I upgrade my skill to level 3? Does the cost go up?” I asked.
“No. The only thing is you lose all upgrades, but the skill remains the same except the power increases. You add on a hand sign and add a word to the skill use. There is no cost increase. That is why skills leveled up from level 2 are superior to higher level skills you pick up.” I wanted to scream at this. Another critical mistake I had made. Well maybe not. Since my current upgrades allowed me to spam it, and that was a big help against the Ritualist.
“I will speak more on skills in detail at a later time, once you have proven you aren’t useless. Consider it encouragement to hurry up and free me,” the Astrologer said.
***-***
NOTE: I am giving out the bonus chapters for hitting 350 patrons a bit early. I was worried people's heads might explode if this conversation was dragged out. In addition, I am going to be trying to push Patreon up to a total of 90 chapters ahead, from the current count. You may see more than 2 chapters per day. This is not a mistake. The free release will be kept at 2 chapters per day for the foreseeable future.
This would put Patreon ahead by 45 days instead of 22.5 with double releases.
Comments
Thank you for writing a very long comment across various topics. The viewpoint chapters I keep to 10% or less of the total chapter count. Some people like them and this seems the right amount. As for filler and dragging the fight with the Ritualist out, the sad part of webnovels is that there is a spike in Patreon, when it ends on a big cliffhanger. If I did 5 chp/wk instead of 14, then I would be more inclined to have less filler chapters. I suspect that my fast release rate is hurting Patreon. While there will be no filler volumes, having filler be ~30% of the story is acceptable with my release rate. Spelling and grammar, the twins evils of writing. On a serious note, I write a lot. While I do editing passes, things escape. You can get 5 chp/wk that are solid in terms of grammar and spelling or 21 chp/wk now that are a bit more shaky. Everything tells me people want the later. I am working to edit my older chapters, and have hired a copyeditor and lineeditor, but it will take time to catch up to my current chapters. Another bane of writing fast is that it takes a lot more $$$ to catch up. Meta-points have been planned for a while and energy=thought, thought=energy has always been laid down in stone from the start. Some inside knowledge was that meta-points came into being after realizing I couldn't do 20 volumes per antagonist. I know, you talk about filler now, imagine my original goal. But they also align quite well with everything else from the System to the world building. They were initially planned back at the end of volume 2, start of volume 3. Crazy...urg, it is hard to describe that. Summoning =/= rabies. It equals heightened aggression. But I have made a point to touch this up in the final editing pass. Crafting chapters are lacking. I don't disagree. The problem with crafting and research is that they are fundamentally boring. While another writer might be able to spice them up a lot, I struggle. Another reason is to limit the scope of items and be able to grasp the full range. One reason why crafting got pushed back to volume 4, was that I was struggling with the crafting system for the longest time. Initially I wanted it much more free form. But then the exploits would have been crazy. Then I looked at a much narrower range, and it was too boring. So you got the type chart, and it will be worked out more in the background. That is something I have to be aware/careful of. The timing of having random powerful people (mid-level 3) that show up. Volume 7, will have people from Purgatory with actual skills/builds that are actually useful/interesting in a fight. Crafting stuff will show up later and it takes a lot of investment/time. I consider a level 4 city a gateway into such things on a wide scale and people having the money/time to try stuff. In story meta-points are the favor of the Almighty System made manifest. Like Mosses witnessing a burning bush before getting the 10 commandments. A meta-point is basically the Almighty System paying attention to an individual and giving them a leg up. They are never going to be common/farmed/exploited. And they are an answer to the power curve present in the story. As for the naming, there are clues within the names given. So it is not wrong to look at that. Very few people have brought this up or considered it. The nice thing about having written the ending is that I am pretty much locked in at this point. Anything other than what I have planned would not make sense in the context of everything, which makes things a fun mystery to try and work out. Ah cool skills. Well we are about to get people showing up with skills/builds beyond just Michael and some select people in Volume 7 and beyond. I need to be very aware of how the general world is progressing. Having Michael level combatants pop up all over the place, just doesn't make sense. But there will be interesting combinations, and skill upgrades we haven't looked at yet. Again it really is a pacing issue. Ah Ruth and the Divine Empress. Oh boy. I won't spoil who/what/where the 2nd antagonist is. But Ruth will come back and she has been enjoying the 'tender care' of the Divine Empress. As for the Divine Empress, she is someone who is completely and utterly evil. Not kiddie friendly evil either. This is someone meant to be so horribly evil, everyone is just like nope but her personal power is so great, killing her is next to impossible. A high level body fighter and martial artist. Enjoying human suffering for her personal amusement, her Empire is a mess, there is a reason the Astrologer could poke at the Envoy regarding rebels. The Astrologer is stringing out information on purpose. To keep Michael engaged and coming back to him wanting more. This is something that will be touched on in the coming chapters as well as more of the Astrologer's abilities. He is a very gray character. As for the East Bastion, he wanted Uday dead and/or warned to stay away, since he is a source of knowledge that could speak to Michael, wanted the Ritualist placed out of the way not to cause trouble or dead, and to keep the Ritualist away from Michael and avoid the diviners sensing things to the West. A combination of reasons, which is why he acted personally at that point. He also believed he could kill the Ritualist in one attack if he got out of hand. Unfortunately the Ritualist stuffed crystals inside himself, gaining the knowledge of several level 4 monsters of energy manipulation to counter the Astrologer. So the Astrologer was like 'screw it', time for plan truth and slowly tempt Michael with knowledge so he can free me. The Astrologer is not someone who likes to use a stick, but is more than willing to do so. You don't get meta-points by playing nice. And the Astrologer is not a nice person. Also this thing, is not really him, but a creation of sorts the Astrologer made with his memories and instructions. Whew! :)
Mister Vii
2022-12-30 23:06:39 +0000 UTCHello again! Caught up again after binging the piled up chapters :d Here are some of my thoughts/feedback again. Wall of text pt. 2: -A short summary Love the recent chapters explaining a bit more of the mystery of the system, introducing a new type of powerlevel and giving more context to the current power scope. Also setting the stage for a new baddie, that apparently does even meaner things than the Ritualist (I hope the baddie after this new one is a bit more nuanced, I mean probably, since an evil baby army is hard to top haha). Before this, we had an epic conclusion to the Ritualist arc. This came with a tense characteristically annoying multistage boss fight, to finish him off. The East bastion part of the story before that, set the stage for the suspicious Astrologer. On top of that the highly anticipated level 4 shop upgrade finally came... or not. In typical Systematic lands fashion, it got cockblocked by the destruction of a pillar lol. Speaking of duds, the crafting system also turned out to be air for our MC, because of the high requirements for it to be useful to him. At least we got bombs out of crafting crystals (oh wait... now probably also gone lol). Apart from those chapters we also had a lot of exploring and dungeoneering chapters by the gang. Those chapters were always fun. -General feedback FILLER The first thing I noticed binging this time was that the filler was increased by a bit. It is honestly not bad if you read a bunch of chapters in one go, but it might get a bit annoying if you read the daily chapters. When binging, the worst I noticed was at the final Ritualist fight. It reminded me of the end of the Hunter x Hunter chimera ant arc, where everything goes in slow mo and things are dragged out a lot to display the different viewpoints. The final Ritualist fight had every part explained 3 times (MC POV, Ritualist POV, and random viewpoints). I'm kind off conflicted about this since most of the time the different POV's are interesting. However I specifically felt at this part the different POV's should be reduced a bit, since it drags on a bit too much. Maybe combining the random POV's chapters into one chapter or combining some of the Michael/Ritualist/Astrologer chapters could work. A specific suggestion for a filler viewpoint chapter would be the Astrologer playing as different guards. I saw you explained it in a comment on one of the chapters, but personally I think it would be interesting to have a whole chapter on that (somewhere after the reveal of course). Regarding Astrologer I also found it nice that there was an explanation for his cringe way of talking (because his projection gets emotional) in the recent chapters. Maybe this could be explained a bit earlier in one of his viewpoint chapters though. In general I understand that the filler is a necessary evil and honestly it doesn't bother me much, since it's way worse in other novels. Also for me personally I find the viewpoint chapters only a bit annoying when there is action/fighting going on. Otherwise I enjoy them. SPELLING AND GRAMMAR There were quite a few spelling/grammar and missing/wrong words mistakes I noticed. My question regarding this is if it is useful or not to correct these in the patreon comments, since you are getting stuff edited anyway. And also if it is useful, in what kind of format do you prefer that feedback? Since I assume you don't look at older patreon posts comments , is it for example better to post every mistake spotted all in one go under the recent chapter (with added chapter numbers where a mistake was found). Also are maybe these long feedback posts more fit for discord? (imo the patreon website is far from ideal lol) Speaking of discord, when scrolling through yours for a bit I saw this comment: "One potential flaw with your system is that it is the only one that doesn’t reward challenging yourself and risking your life. There really isn’t a reward for trying super tough monsters until you get to the point that you can farm them on trivial mode" This must've given you quite the chuckle if you already designed the meta point system at that point haha. While almost always even with spelling mistakes etc the intended meaning of a sentence can be extracted and is harmless, on rare occasions it can create a bit of doubt/small annoyance. A recent example is: "Michael has to kill a lvl 6 monster to free Astrologer" from a few chapters ago. Because with crazy statements like that a small doubt appears whether or not it's an error, since errors happened before. Astrologer said himself that the Divine empress is at most at low lvl 5. Is a human with meta points at low lvl 5 easily able to beat a lvl 6 monster? If plan A was for Michael to get to lvl 6 powerlevel wouldn't that take too long even with meta points? Even later on he says that he would've used the meta point for the same type of thing that the Spirit and Absorption grind would give Michael and there isn't a mention about combating a lvl 6 monster. So in this case a doubt is created whether or not that "lvl 6" was a spelling mistake or a misunderstanding on my end. -Specific feedback AKASHIC RECORD Honestly when I first saw that name in a recent chapter I got a bit of PTSD from reading so many novels that execute the concept badly. The Akashic Record has kind off become a bad cliché in my mind where authors use it to sound cool with poorly designed systems (and just in general that the specific novels that I read with that word got worse the longer they went on and left a bad taste in my mouth). Not saying this novel is/will become that. Just the word in specific. I was glad when I read it was explained as meta points. The idea behind Akashic Record is cool though. To get to the next tier of power (in this case tier 1 = level 1,2,3 tier 2 = 4,..) you need to do something epic. To be more specific in this case it might not be necessary to get a meta point to get to lvl 4 (as far as we know). I also like that there is already more nuance than most novels with this concept due to the constraints explained afterwards. Need to do it solo, no loopholes and must be unknown to you. More speculation on this later. LVL 4 SHOP AND NARAN With the upgrade of the shop to lvl 4 came another classic setback. This one was mostly predicated on the fact that flying lvl 4 monsters weren't expected. This honestly was fine with me. There was a small thing that bothered me though. The fact that Naran didn't prepare many swords beforehand. This was exemplified when Naran had to steal a sword from a guard to replace his old one. Although this created a cool scene, I would've liked that Naran initially prepared more swords himself. It was fairly established that with the upgrade likely lvl 4 monsters would come. And Naran knows he needs multiple swords to fight almost all lvl 4 variants. The time he had to prepare may seem short if you read the chapters in a row, but when I looked at the actual time passed (multiple days), this mistake seems even more inexcusable. SUMMONERS NOT GOING CRAZY The switch from Ritualist being a normal person to suddenly going crazy seemed all to do with summoning. Later it was vaguely explained there might be some memory loss, but that wasn't expanded upon. Now there have been many summoners in Purgatory and none of them have ever shown signs of crazy (as far as we know). First this was explained by them having mental help. However, later was explained that the mental help system in Purgatory was very bare bones/non existent. Is this little bit of mental help all that is needed to prevent Summoners going crazy? (not talking about upping energy sensing too much since Ritualist also didn't go too far in that from what we know). My suggestion is giving Ritualist more background information on why he might go crazy (like having a crazy hobby), maybe this is already addressed in the soon to be edited volumes though. CRAFTING CHAPTERS LACKING Personally I found the crafting chapters a bit lacking. The passive and active variants of enchantments and its requirements were for example not that clearly described, in my opinion. Most the reasons of why Michael couldn't use certain enchantments were mentioned, but the pacing and the way it was described/phrased was somehow confusing to me. I can't pinpoint it exactly. I think most of the confusion can be fixed by having Michael using some enchantments on his travels. Also if I was Michael I would've rushed to get good gear even if it's lvl 3 enchantment, since better gear is faster farming. This is also a point where imo Michael has lost his edge. More on this in the speculation part. Projectiles and their usefulness are also still a bit vague to me. I feel like the description of that wasn't too clear. How I reasoned it for myself now is: Projectiles like small bullets are hard to use with high body stat, because in addition to air resistance you have energy resistance. That's why you want to use objects with higher mass as projectiles as they have more impact. This brings the question though if you can inject energy into smaller objects through crafting to negate this and how effective are massive iron javelins for example? -Speculation fun With some of the recent mystery titbits being revealed I have to get some of my speculation in too :P WHY MICHAEL HAS NOT RECEIVED META POINTS You mentioned in a recent comment that you predict meta points will be contentious. My best guess is that people will complain about why Michael hasn't received meta points. Michael has done a lot of epic things but no meta points, why? Here's my speculation: First of all the lvl 4 requirement (henceforth tier 2). All the meta points seem to come from stuff involving tier 2 beings. Furthermore apart from involving a tier 2 being it seems to also have to involve a tier 2 environment, unless it's a special event. Michael has not stepped foot much in a tier 2 environment (dungeon or zone). Special events, however, he encountered. The special events I think Michael has encountered are: 1. Death, his first real encounter with a tier 2 thus being special. 2. Upgrade to the tier 2 shop. Now both of these he seem to have failed because of the rule of not teaming up with others. The more interesting part however, is the question: was it even possible for Michael to solo these encounters? Most likely: No. Going into detail for this answer will speculate on a fundamental principal. Namely: does the system design the 'special events' with the current powerlevel of the participants in mind? If the answer is "Yes" to that question, I'm disappointed. Why so? Let's dive into it. DBZ-ESQUE SCREAMING FOR POWERUPS So the answer is "Yes" to that previous question. What do you get? If Michael could've beaten the special events solo, without using loopholes, with the events tailored to his skillset, it would've most likely meant he had to do the impossible and power up in the middel of the fight. This powering up could have something to do with channeling your will/getting really emotional about something and getting more power out of yourself. The Dragon Ball and shounen "Scream for power-up" cliche. The reason why I'm even considering this option is because of the screaming and subsequent powerup of the Ritualist when he was on his last legs. I hope this stays tied to summoning etc. and doesn't work for system related power progression. MICHAEL HAS UNKNOWINGLY LOST HIS EDGE This is the interesting and in my opinion more likely one: the system doesn't tailor special events to the persons current power. The reason why Michael doesn't have meta points and why it was seemingly impossible for him to be able to receive meta points in special events, is because Michael has lost his edge. With all the internal monologue Michael has about keeping his edge, he has unknowingly lost it. Not because he doesn't work hard enough, but because he didn't understand his god "System" enough. He didn't work smart enough. IT IS ALL IN THE NAME An internal monologue from a while back revealed something interesting. Incomprehensible things in the Systematic Lands are given fitting names by human intuition. More recently it was also revealed these 'names' have more power than previously understood. So what about the name Systematic Lands? Michael with his reading experience has more context than most for naming their current environment fittingly. Also it was mentioned by others that the name Systematic Lands was a fitting one. Now this may just be a nod to the title, but what if it also revealed the "God's" preference? What does doing things Systematically entail? The first truth of getting meta points, doing things solo, is perhaps the most difficult to understand. With how the Systematic lands are set-up how does "God" guide you towards being solo? One example is the limited monster spawn rate and the costliness to progress. Being solo is more efficient. You might think it guides you to getting a team that covers a variety of skills, to tackle the variety of monsters. However, the 1000 points in a stat soft-cap tells a different story. You are meant to be versatile in stats. (btw just releasing that maybe I'm writing the dialogue for the system religion preacher here lol). Obviously Michael has leaned towards being solo, but most of the time he has someone with him. The extend to what the "God" considers solo play or not has not been determined, but I guess it has to do with being in combat with a monster. If you have aggro you can't have others hitting the monsters. Now for overal outline of a Systematically "God" approved progression. A progression that guides you towards tier 2. First of all you have to get a level 2 skill. If your first skill is a level 3 skill it is most likely you have been carried by someone else. "God" doesn't like that. That is why upgrading skills is so powerful. A powerful person will clear more than one dungeon on his own and it is less likely for a person that is getting carried to upgrade his skills. This is were Michael has lost his edge. The fact that upgraded skills are so powerful should have told him something. Also the lack of skill slots before upgrading the store was also a clue that you should focus on upgrading your skills. He should've followed the system, instead of trying to find a loophole with his acid skill. I believe if Michael had upgraded his skills earlier and risked to tackle more dungeons earlier he would've been strong enough to beat these "special events". You have to use the systems that "God" gives you. The second system in this case is the crafting system. Michael ignoring it for so long and placing grinding for points first on his priority list, cost him the opportunity to be powerful enough to clear special events for a meta point. His biggest mistake was thinking "God's" biggest intention was to test peoples determination to grind points, instead of using the "Systems" available. The next name with meaning is a bit with hindsight, but it is "meta point". Follow "God's" meta, the way you should power up, and you get rewarded with points. COOL SKILLS Now to something different: domains. Domains are a cliché often seen in xianxia novels, where a sign of power is having one. A domain gives you the "homefield advantage" and makes sure you are always fighting in a favorable enviorment. Most of the time it comes with instant attacks/chip damage to your opponent and is often a crucial factor in deciding high level fights. When I saw the skill "Null Field" mentioned I immediately thought to myself: "that's a freaking domain!". It was mentioned it started of weak, but I hoped Michael would see the potential in it. It would be cool if the skill is mentioned later on. Also I wonder if Astrologers skill "Null Refraction" is a upgraded version of that skill or not. The next skill I would like to highlight is stealth. I think the skill from the wolf dungeon at the beginning is being overlooked a bit. The character that has been seen (probably) using that skill is Ruth (more on her later). Stealth is maybe not the best way to grind monsters, but for staying save from other humans it is OP. Although, this depends on how powerful it can get with upgrades. I hope the skill is mentioned more with for example special units from Purgatory that protect Clarissa or that the group that is spying in other cities have it. Going back a bit to what the Systematic "God" wants from you. I wonder if it is possible to progress to tier 2 with every skill adjacent to a city. If so then Michael has been seriously underestimating other skills. Maybe they all become powerful when upgraded to level 3. In general the mapping of how powerful certain skills are when upgraded and what it becomes at tier 3, is a massive area where Michael lacks information. It might even be more important than a type chart. The Astrologer uses this information about skills as a bargaining chip and rightly so. RUTH AND THE DIVINE EMPRESS In the beginning I mentioned the new baddie being the Divine Empress, however I think the main antagonist focus might shift to Ruth too. It has been mentioned multiple times that Ruth is "hiding in the West" and the west is where the Divine Empress is. Now a cheap author might make a plot like: something something Divine Empress jealous of Ruth's beauty something something. It has been mentioned however that the Divine Empress values strength. Is the resourcefulness of Ruth enough for her to take her under her wings? Maybe a situation happens where she manages to get on the good side of the Divine Empress. For example, she becomes a spy for the Empress. It is also possible she joins up with the rebellion and manages to find her influence there. Her stealth and mental skills are effective for dealing with people and sneaky stuff. Her beauty can be used to gain good will. All in all I'm interested in what is next in store for the new antagonist and Ruth. SUSTROLOGER Now over to the man who is venting all over the map. First lets go back to East bastion. Why was East bastion a thorn in Astrologers side? There didn't seem much wrong with the place when Ritualist arrived there. Apart from the mention that they might potentially 'move' from their city to somewhere else. What kind of past do Ruth and the Astrologer have? How does this imposter know about Michaels encounter with Death and how closely has he been monitoring Michael this whole time? Was the day 1 instead of 0 reveal just because of the "Calamity" or does it have a deeper plot? (btw I totally missed this due to my binge read habits of not reading titles and caring about numbers most of the time haha). The conditions for Astrologers "So I Predict" skill have been met with Ritualist death, what will his next usage of this mysterious OP skill be? Personally I would have asked the Astrologer also about the size of the "Lands" is it just the East and the West, and if so what lies at the borders. Also would've asked about what's in the tier 2 shop. Lastly the question of is it considered using a loophole if you solo a tier 2 with shop regens (my prediction is that it is okay for special events since it's a system "system") Thank you for reading! P.S. I really appreciate your work ethic. It is amazing the amount you write per day. Keep strong!
HeartRango
2022-12-30 20:56:44 +0000 UTCInteresting point on the Empress. I was/am inclined to believe the Astrologer on her but... there is the matter of the treaty banning a lot of horrible things. Sure she might not want people messing around outside the scope of the system, but there are potentially other reasons as well. And there is the whole Calamity thing, it seems quite possible the Astrologer set it off while doing whatever he was doing when he got trapped. Additionally his projection is showing some signs of mental instability this could be a projection thing, a divergence thing, a malfunction thing, or just an Astrologer thing.
David Burchfield
2022-12-30 20:22:21 +0000 UTCNaran is not here, he can get sword-point
reji
2022-12-30 17:15:41 +0000 UTCTime to note every word and info Astro have said and let the team science with the Doctor go systemic on it and verifie everything and see if some little aspect get missed (intentionaly or not) or discover potential other use/aspect with
Zarik0
2022-12-30 14:00:34 +0000 UTCGood comment David, that resume the situation perfectly in all the aspects Astro is just suss :°) Believe only Pov of him and his though !
Zarik0
2022-12-30 13:56:09 +0000 UTCCongrats on 350 patreon's. And great time to see Michael get back to grinding again my fav part of this book.
kyle
2022-12-30 11:29:45 +0000 UTCThank you for your kind words and support. Oh, yes, the Astrologer is sus as all hell and Michael knows it.
Mister Vii
2022-12-30 11:19:54 +0000 UTCThanks for saying this. I try not to drag out mysteries too long with a few exceptions, and even then I try to put in clues. Also no drawing things out just to draw things out pointlessly. It would be too easy to have the Astrologer play coy all the time and not have real conversations. I wanted him to give actual meat for people to sink their teeth into.
Mister Vii
2022-12-30 11:17:24 +0000 UTCYep, and that is where having knowledge of what level 4 monster is the best/weak to Acid Shot is a huge help. Good math by the way.
Mister Vii
2022-12-30 11:10:11 +0000 UTCI went back and forth on this a lot. But Michael is impulsive when he doesn't view any risk to himself and hates not knowing. Also having an achievement be withheld just by knowing about it, that isn't in the Steam store lol. So I absolutely agree it is frustrating, but it is the choice he would make. EDIT: Also correct about this being a single data point from the Astrologer who is sus as all hell. While the Astrologer has 2 meta-points, again, this is his projection. One of the things people will have to judge is the Astrologer's truthfullness and scope of information.
Mister Vii
2022-12-30 11:05:44 +0000 UTCWe don't know what he really looks like. He goes about in a black bathrobe with stars on it and it has a hood. Also that isn't even his real body.
Mister Vii
2022-12-30 11:03:52 +0000 UTCYeeeaah the Astrologer only tells half-truths for sure. I wouldn't believe most stuff about the Empress if I were Michael, the Astrologer must be overhyping her extremely so Michael and Clarissa think they absolutely HAVE to get the Astrologer out. I think Michael has every chance to catch up. He just has to play it like in his beginning days. Remember when Michael went exploring, nearly dying in his first dungeon? Or clearing the wolf mist dungeon barely? He has become very cautious in comparison to those days (which made sense with his information). I hope he realizes this and steps up his game. Dungeon clearing needs to be a priority after this. Upgrade all Skills to level 4, farm level 4s, upgrade the city store (try single handedly defeating the monsters, maybe you can still get a meta-point). Most important of all, keep a clear mind and continue to follow your best path, but I have faith Michael and especially Clarissa will realize this. The Astrologer clearly uses a sales-tactic, shocking them with groundbreaking information and putting a tight timer on them so they have to hurry and can't think too much. Thank you MisterVii, I cannot believe how lucky I am to have found a captivating story like this, with so many massive updates. I'm looking forward to reading these everyday. Wish you all the best! Cheers
Parametrix-Bootstrap
2022-12-30 10:41:02 +0000 UTCWhen/if Michael gets his first meta point, he should ask for the ability to force himself to do something risky and at the same time forget why he does that something.
Gio
2022-12-30 10:25:20 +0000 UTCWow, I agree with that guy, genius idea dude!
Cirex123
2022-12-30 08:35:19 +0000 UTCGuys, guys! 4d chess move right here: Michael now thinks that he cant get those metapoints anymore, because the system doesnt reward risks taken mostly in expectation of metapoint rewards. But doesnt that mean, that if he does fight a tier4 monster alone, that since he will not expect a reward (thinking he is spoilt by the knowledge), that in that case he is not fighting for a metapoint, making him eligible for one again? Think of it like this: you only get a metapoint after an insane feat if you would be super surprised getting one. And Michael would be, even now (especially now), therefore he can still get them. Eureka!
Cirex123
2022-12-30 08:34:47 +0000 UTCRambled on a couple places here, but in any case just want to say it is fun having a mystery worthy of speculation, having a lot of fun thinking about it. I think you struck a great balance of giving 3nough information to chew on, while maintaining the mystery.
David Burchfield
2022-12-30 07:59:37 +0000 UTCI am not at all convinced the Astrologer is playing it straight or fully understands what he is talking about. He certainly knows more than Michael but that does not mean that all of his assumptions are correct or that he is sharing his knowledge fully. He seems very much like that "I taught you everything you know, not everything I know" type. Also the projection could be malfunctioning to some degree, he created the problem with the ritualist and dramatically underestimated him, and is not doing a great job (as you pointed out) dealing with Michael. How much of this is intentional vs incompetent vs malfunctioning vs unknown is very very hard to say. But it did not escape my notice that was happy to share the meta point knowledge just like the Empress potentially crippling Michael. Also we don't know if his level 4 zone plan would have worked, by his own admission he has never succeeded in guiding someone else to getting a meta point. He seems to be working off 3 data points (run into a level 4 zone, do the upgrade alone (assuming this was the empress), and whatever he did to get his second. This would seem to leave a lot of room for errors and misunderstandings even if he is being upfront (which based off him having 2 meta points he isn't at least completely)
David Burchfield
2022-12-30 07:51:14 +0000 UTCI used google sheets and unless I made a mistake somewhere, Michael needs 121,977,100 points to get 5000 in Spirit. He would need another 36,580,600 points to get 1000 in Absorption. A total of 158,557,700 points, which means he would need to kill about 44,044 level-4 monsters. Which is insane. Even if he killed an average of 100 a day, it would take over a year. The only way I see him doing this in a reasonable time frame is if he perfectly counters The Bulwark Shield and is able to grind several hundred a day. tftc
F100D
2022-12-30 06:07:07 +0000 UTCI REALLY do not like that michael just had the astrologer tell them both about the points without even having clarissa hear him out first. Really fuckin dumb. Especially since if he healed Naran, could have told him first as a filter for Michael. The fact that the Astrologist didn't even mention this makes me think that he doesn't actually want to get out that badly, or he's completely dumb, but no one would get that strong while being so silly in this setting. Hell, Clarissa even suggested it. AAAAHHH He's going to have to grind level 4 monsters ANYWAY, so why not just leave out the info about the points and tell him he needs to grind to at least 1k spirit and absorption, and repeat the exact thing about the shield monsters to the south? He'd go into the zone to grind more eventually and just passively get the point most likely. So painful. SO many ways for this to have gone better. Not a fan of that at all, honestly. TY for the chapters nonetheless
ZaA
2022-12-30 04:38:36 +0000 UTCSo basically Michael will have to do risky things or settle for being mediocre.
Gio
2022-12-30 04:26:56 +0000 UTCSo Meta Points are basically achievements lol. And the Astrologist sounds somewhat like a harem protagonist, he's also an old man, right? I totally forgot about what he looks like ngl.
Karp
2022-12-30 03:35:25 +0000 UTCTy
Alba
2022-12-30 03:27:46 +0000 UTC
