Chapter 501 - So devoid of passion and genuine effort

POV Myrra

“Did it work, Lady Lissandra?” I ask after a minute.

The silver-haired young woman in front of me looks away from an empty space in the air and nods, “It works as expected. I should soon be able to do the same thing with you. Because of the unfinished work on your status, we will be getting our own instance and will synchronize with little pup after you gain it fully.”

“Sorry for the trouble and thank you very much.”

She waves it off and gestures at me to follow, and I do so, already used to the way she acts.

As we walk, I look at her again. Shorter than me, with silver hair, a pretty but stern face, but most of all, there is that confident aura around her—as if nothing can stop her in her way. It's something I saw confirmed over and over again.

When we reached that ruined continent and got the remains of that Absolute's heart. When she combined the remains with the heart of the Champion. When she spent months working on a new heart and then tore open her own chest to place it in. When she then stabbed it through with that bone dagger with an orange eye imbued in it to reignite it.

That first beat of the heart powerful enough to nearly make me unconscious before she took control. It took just a second for her to do so. Now I have trouble imagining how powerful she might be, even though she says she is still far off from her original power and will need years to return to it and adapt to her new body and heart.

She calls her body unsatisfactory, her heart weak, and complains about her skills being rusty. The body and skills she honed over millennia now feel too vast for the fragile frame she currently possesses.

But even after getting a new heart she still holds that black dagger on her belt as we walk on the surface of this new planet. And she is satisfied it’s a new instance and not a continuation of the one Nathaniel previously visited.

This place during the day has the sky covered by dust and nights show a view of a brilliant night sky.

And now we stop—a desert full of white sand in front of us.

“Are you sure, Lady Lissandra? That man in the Last Rest said the desert was made by an Absolute long ago.”

“Little kitten.”

“I'm sorry!”

With that, she takes a step through that invisible border and steps onto the white sand, which doesn't react to her at all. It doesn't even twitch even as her new heart generates that incredible mana.

I have seen people thrown into the desert by competing groups; I saw what it can do and how it reacts even to the littlest amount of mana. I saw a swarm of brilliant white particles tear them apart.

Lady Lissandra stands silently, bending down to scoop up a handful of sand, letting it slip through her fingers.

“I’ve suspected it for some time, but it seems modern Absolutes and Champions aren’t what they once were. All these trinkets, arrays, and emblems… leaning so heavily on the system's gifts without ever truly understanding them.”

The last grains of sand fall through as she turns to me, her silver hair moving within the gentle wind, “It all feels so detached, so devoid of passion and genuine effort.”

The words come softly, yet with weight. “Little kitten.”

“Yes!”

“Follow close behind me.”

Without another moment’s pause, she takes a step forward, heading deeper into the desert.

I follow close behind, stepping onto the white sand without a hint of hesitation or worry.

As expected, the sand doesn’t react to me or my mana, and I continue along her path.

***

POV Nathaniel

Please pick two skills from the following that you would like to combine.

Warning! Combining two skills will reduce the level of the acquired skill.

Warning! Combining incompatible skills may result in worse skills.

Warning! After combining these skills, it will be extremely difficult to reacquire the skills used in the resulting combination.

List of available skills to combine:

Perception - Lvl 54

Resonance - Lvl 60

Mana Domain (Pride) - Lvl 57

Infusion - Lvl 49

Mana Manipulation - Lvl 60

Bone Knitting - Lvl 24

Okay, I have an opportunity to do again what I call a pro gamer move and big fuck you to the system. I can combine [Mana Manipulation] with some skill and regain it later.

The question is if I want to with the primary class upgrade coming close. I know that primary class offers active skills as well, and it seems to be the only way to gain active skills other than learning them, evolving skills, or combining skills.

I'm sure the system would somewhat deal with it if I had all skills full, but do I really want it? With all my preparations, my primary class offerings should be goddamn good, so I will likely get some amazing active skill. Something at the level of [Focus], [Redistribution], [Mana Crown], or [Ley Line], which now aren't among the skills offered for combination.

But there is [Resonance] and [Mana Domain], which weren't offered with previous skill combinations, meaning this token is of a higher tier than previous ones.

So the options are:

[Perception] and [Resonance]

[Perception] and [Mana Domain]

[Perception] and [Infusion]

[Perception] and [Mana Manipulation]

[Perception] and [Bone Knitting]

[Resonance] and [Mana Domain]

[Resonance] and [Infusion]

[Resonance] and [Mana Manipulation]

[Resonance] and [Bone Knitting]

[Mana Domain] and [Infusion]

[Mana Domain] and [Mana Manipulation]

[Mana Domain] and [Bone Knitting]

[Infusion] and [Mana Manipulation]

[Infusion] and [Bone Knitting]

[Mana Manipulation] and [Bone Knitting]

There are a few favorites I have.

The first one is [Resonance] and [Mana Domain]. As they appeared in skill combination options only now with a higher-tier combination token, it means they are higher-quality skills, and logically their combination should be stronger—if they fit nicely together, and I think they might.

[Perception] and [Mana Manipulation] could also be pretty good, but I suspect the skill would be similar to my trait, which I think would still end up being stronger, especially now with the second strengthening and my new passive. And I still think I should skip using [Mana Manipulation] this time in preparation for my primary class upgrade.

Then there are also [Resonance] and [Infusion].

Leaving this decision to the future me, I lean back in my manabloc chair and open the Hard Community. It looks like the cockroach is curious, switching back and forth between them all.

Hadwin (Hell, group 4) - I'm not the man called Hadwin.

Fox (Hard, Hoarders) - Then why the fuck do you have that name? You even belong to the same group.

Hadwin (Hell, group 4) - I don't understand why I should explain it to you, child.

Noname (Hell, group 4) - You should be able to change your Community name to your real name. Apparently, it's possible to change it but only once and to your real name.

Hadwin (Hell, group 4) - Little pup, are you dumb? I can talk here only because the system judges me to be that person. How would it make sense for me to change to my real name?

Noname (Hell, group 4) - I hadn't thought of that.

Fox (Hard, Hoarders) - Noname, bud, are you fine? Little pup? Are you getting bullied? Is this some play you guys do, whoever that person is?

NotAaron (Hell, group 4) - Fox, my nice but dumb friend, I recommend you to stop. There's a chance you will meet that person during the tournament, and we've heard stuff from Noname. Scary stuff.

Fox (Hard, Hoarders) - What stuff?

NotDennis (Hell, group 4) - Even Noname treats that person somewhat nicely.

Fox (Hard, Hoarders) - Oh.

NotAaron (Hell, group 4) - Yes, oh.

Hadwin (Hell, group 4) - I'm switching back to Beyond Community.

I follow her and switch as well.

Hadwin - Is there any difference between these Communities?

Noname - Not that much. Just there is less censorship on some information, and it's possible to communicate across the floors.

Tacita - ヽ(ー_ー )ノ

Hadwin - What is that?

Noname - I... I don't know how to explain.

Tacita - (・_・)ノ

Hadwin - Whatever it means. I will be leaving now. Also, little pup, I have kept my promise and got that heart for you. I hope you kept yours.

With that, she is gone.

Tacita - ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

In the real world, I turn towards Lily, who sits nearby in the same chair as me, examining healing marks she tests placing on different materials to see what would happen.

“Lily, Beyond Community.”

She looks quickly up at me and then at the empty space in front of her, reading the messages.

Grumpy - (づ￣ ³￣)づ

Tacita - ＼(〇_ｏ)／

Tacita - C= C= C= C= C=┌(;・ω・)┘

Noname - Gareth, how is your group?

He answers a few minutes later, likely after one of the regular checks we have people do on the community chats, looking for information.

Gareth - Hello, friend! We are still on the 6th floor, but we have a plan. It will likely take weeks or a month or two if it works out. We continue slowly but safely. And you guys?

Noname - You know it, every floor is easier in the beginning.

Gareth - I can only agree with that. A few days ago I tried asking Savant where he is, but he didn't answer, and getting that information from Tacita is...

Tacita - ヽ( `д´*)ノ

Gareth - I apologize! Anyway, as I told Sset, I should be there at the scheduled time, Noname. See you then!

With that, I close the community and check the numbers.

Easy difficulty 1159/2000

Normal difficulty 842/1000

Hard difficulty 223/500

Hell difficulty 36/250

Beyond 9/10

Easy difficulty has close to 200 people less than the last time I checked. With all of them who used the difficulty change token already, this is very surprising, as nowadays rarely anyone dies.

People in Hard difficulty theorize that it's possible some of them already cleared the tutorial and got out, but it's hard to confirm. Even now we can communicate with people from other difficulties only when they are on the same floor as us. That's why I haven't seen Channeler for a while and some other people. Beyond is the only exception to that.

It's an interesting thought, leaving the tutorial after clearing the 13th floor, and I'm curious if I'm still the only one who knows the exact number of floors. So far people either estimate 10, 20, 50, or a hundred floors in some cases, and it's hard not to feel a bit cheeky about that.

And for other difficulties, Normal is missing only around 20 people who likely died, Hard around 20 as well, and Hell three people. I even think some of that is from Gareth's and Brainiac's group, but I haven't asked.

Two days remain until the Beyond expedition, and preparations are in full swing.

Setting up the safe base.

Collecting information about this floor.

Healing marks, items, mana batteries, charging crown, Lily's sacrifices in the form of my cut-off left arms stacked in her armory.

My training with Whitey and my decision to not wait for beating him to level 300. If the situation allows, I will reach level 300 within Beyond and continue with the mana way.

I have thought of it, and I think my pride got the better of me, making me want to beat him up with kinetic energy only and with a level lower than his.

Just that behavior was akin to a slap to the face and me looking down at him—someone who shows as much amazement of kinetic energy as I show towards mana. I can confirm that just from seeing his memories and the way he fights.

I have become too greedy, but it's not a fully bad thing as I have learned a lot in the process and will continue to do so. But my path is that of mana and always will be. Everything else will be supplementary.

Once again, I look at the options.

[Resonance] and [Mana Domain]

[Mana Domain] and [Infusion]

[Resonance] and [Infusion]

I think I’ll keep [Mana Domain] as it is, focused solely on mana. I like using it on my body alone, almost as if declaring it my personal mana domain, making it even harder for anyone to take control of my body’s mana. That leaves me with one option.

Congratulations, you have successfully combined [Resonance] and [Infusion]! A new skill has been created.

You have acquired [Eclipse].

[Eclipse - lvl 0 > Eclipse - lvl 8]

***

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