Healer Book 4 -- Chapter 29

Chapter 29

Thaden hesitated to go through with it, but Sadia was already reacting to his clear pause.

“If you want this to work, you’re going to have to do it.  No matter what happens, this part is important.”

The Omenic Drifter leaned back against the trunk of the tree he’d picked as a good spot to rest for the moment, as they’d been traveling for about an hour after leaving Darkwood Vale.  After he had really looked at his new Class and spoke with the giant squirrel about its details, it had been determined that leaving the city as soon as possible was the wisest decision.  Why?  Because that 300-foot radius where people using single-target spells and abilities could inadvertently cause the deaths of numerous innocent Contenders and even some of the local Charee. 

Of course, it wasn’t like he would simply walk through a crowded city and people would just start dropping dead – far from it.  As Sadia really dug into what the 1% chance of instant death really meant, she helped him realize that it would take Contenders or those who could cast spells and use abilities using those spells and abilities within the city, which didn’t happen all that often – there was no real need for them to do so, after all.  When the majority of those single-target spells and abilities were offensive-based in nature, if they weren’t actively fighting a monster or attacking another person, then 99.5% of the time while they were in a city, most people didn’t use anything.  Support Class individuals might use spells a bit more if they had ways to boost stats that was important to getting around quickly, or for protection if they felt unsafe, but it was unlikely to cause too many problems.

But unlikely didn’t mean impossible.  While there weren’t many people using spells and abilities in a city, and there was only a 1% chance of instant death, it was still possible that it could inadvertently happen.  Even though he chose to distance himself from others just in case they accidentally got caught up with his new Class’s instant death chance, that didn’t mean he would be avoiding cities or other people in the future; he just needed to get a better handle on his new Class before he could feel comfortable being around crowds. 

Which was why Thaden was in the Darkwood Forest, off the beaten path and somewhere that it was unlikely that anyone would be venturing near his location.  He knew that he couldn’t avoid people forever and he couldn’t beat himself up and take responsibility for every death he might inadvertently cause, but he could still mitigate it as much as possible.

“Fine.  Let’s do this.”

There were a few decisions that he’d put off until he received his new Class, such as a few Advancements and a chunk of Free Stat Points, but they were still pending until he understood what he needed most.  In order to discover those needs, he had to find out what his new Class had to offer other than what was listed in the Class description; to do that, he had to Level-up.

PICK requirements met!  56,500/56,500

Increase Personal Level? Y / N

Note: This can only be completed while not currently in combat and while not in a dungeon.

Level up!  You are now a Level 190 Omenic Drifter!

As part of the Leveling process, you have received the following:

Physicality +5

Celerity +5

Mentality +20

Personality -5

Fortuity +10

As it had been with the Solitary Shaman Class, it appeared as though the Omenic Drifter also incurred a penalty to Personality when he Leveled-up, but the stats that did increase were surprising.  It seemed as though Physicality and Celerity weren’t as important to the Drifter, as they only increased by 5 each, which was half of what he received as a Shaman.  Mentality, on the other hand – an important stat for any Support Class – went up by 20 points – twice what he received at the maximum for his previous Class. 

But what shocked him the most was the 10-point increase to Fortuity, which was something he wasn’t expecting.  From what he’d learned from multiple sources was that Fortuity wasn’t a stat that any Classes actually increased, as it was thought to be an unimportant stat to most.  Thaden knew differently, of course, as it had been important to increasing his chances for his Lifewarden bonus traits to activate, and he could only assume that because one of his new bonus traits with his Drifter Class involved Fortuity, that it would continue playing a big part in how it operated.  With his Fortuity up to around 3,500 with his Plates adding huge chunk of that, he thought he was well-equipped to take advantage of the chance to double his future rewards – and stay away from the chance of getting no reward.

While knowing the breakdown of the Level-up increases was important, what Thaden really needed information on was the type of spells he would receive as an Omenic Drifter. 

Level up!  You are now a Level 191 Omenic Drifter!

As part of the Leveling process, you have received the following:

Physicality +5

Celerity +5

Mentality +20

Personality -5

Fortuity +10

Level up!  You are now a Level 192 Omenic Drifter!

As part of the Leveling process, you have received the following:

Physicality +5

Celerity +5

Mentality +20

(2) Spell selection choices

Finally!  Let’s see what I have to choose from.

Please select (27) spells from the following selections:

Weak Repeat (Single Cast)

……

Exceptional Repeat (Single Cast)

Weak Repose (Channeled)

……

Exceptional Repose (Channeled)

Weak Repast (Reserved)

……

Exceptional Repast (Reserved)

Spells not selected will be available during your next spell choice selection

With 27 spell selections available to him, there was absolutely no reason why he couldn’t pick up all 3 of the selections, and of course he picked them up at Exceptional strength.  There was no reason to get anything at a lesser strength, after all.

After noting the interesting naming scheme, he looked at the descriptions of them all – and was pleasantly surprised.  Considering that he had been forced into this Class, he had half-expected all the spells to be less than stellar, but he was glad to find that he was wrong; none of them were necessarily the most powerful spells he’d ever seen, but they were strong in their own right.

Exceptional Repeat (Single Cast): All single-target healing spells and effects that affect the target of Exceptional Repeat will now have that single-target spell or effect instantly repeated at a chance-driven effectiveness.

Number of Repeats: 7

Effectiveness Magnitude %: Fortuity/20

Duration: 3 minutes

Range: 90 feet of caster

Casting Time: 5 seconds

Mana Cost: 15,700

Exceptional Repose (Channeled): Creates a protective field around a single target that has a chance to block each instance all forms of damage from all sources up to 60 Levels higher than the target; target cannot physically attack or cast any spells that target another entity, though this effect will not cancel any attacks or spells currently in progress; target may choose to cancel Exceptional Repose at any time, which will trigger a cancellation cooldown, extending the time until target can be affected by Exceptional Repose again.

Damage Nullification Chance: Fortuity/40

Range: 90 feet of caster

Cancellation Cooldown: 2 minutes

Casting Time: Instant

Mana Cost: 4,500 per second

Exceptional Repast (Reserved): While active, Exceptional Repast has a chance to repeatedly drain the spiritual will of a single designated target within range, reducing all of their physical and magical resistances by an equal amount of drained spiritual will and moderately slowing their reaction speed; spiritual will drained with this process is absorbed and converted into Health and Mana for a separate designated target within range; only a single Exceptional Repast can be active; if either target moves past the designated range, the spell is canceled.

Drain Magnitude: 7% of spiritual will and resistances

Drain Cycle: Every 3 seconds

Drain Chance %: Fortuity/50

Health and Mana Restoration: 7% of max Health and max Mana

Range: 120 feet of caster

Casting Time: 2 seconds

Mana Cost (Reserved): 30% of Mana pool

The main thing he noticed about all of his new spells was that all of them relied on his Fortuity stat, as each of them had a Fortuity-based effect or chance to do something. 

Exceptional Repeat was an awesome spell that repeated any healing spells on a target 7 times in an instant, but how effective it would actually be relied on the Fortuity stat.  In his case, it appeared that if he took his Fortuity of about 3,500 Fortuity and divided it by 20, getting 175, that would mean that each repeat would be at a 175% effectiveness of the original healing spell or effect.  He thought that was simply absurd, though he also realized that it was only completely absurd because of his abnormally high stat; most people might only have a few hundred Fortuity by this point, if that, but his Plates were kind of a cheat in that respect.  Of course, as he went up in Level and acquired even more Fortuity, this would continue to increase, making this spell even more busted than before.

Speaking of busted, Exceptional Repose was the return of channeled spells and it protected a single target, while also having a “chance” to block all forms of damage from sources up to 60 Levels above that target’s Level.  For normal Contenders, this might not be all that great, considering that it also prevented the target from physically attacking or casting spells on another target, but that was perfectly fine for Thaden considering that a lot of the time he was casting spells on himself.  The only downside was that, despite his 3,500 Fortuity, he only had about an 87.5% chance to block all damage, though this would increase as he obtained more of the stat. 

The last spell, Exceptional Repast, was probably the worst of the 3 spells he received, but that didn’t mean it was necessarily bad.  What it did was essentially link two targets together, ideally one hostile target and one any ally (or himself), and there was a chance that the first target’s spiritual will and resistances would drain, which would then “feed” the second target Health and Mana.  He could see this being helpful against strong monsters, such as the Adversarial Elite, though at the moment there was only about a 70% chance of the drain occurring based on his current Fortuity, and it only happened every 3 seconds.

Once he was done looking at the spells and sharing them with Sadia, he couldn’t help but notice that each of them – in addition to relying on Fortuity – were also single-target.  If he understood the 1% chance of instant death trait accurately, Repose and Repast would only trigger the chance a single time when the spell was originally cast, but Repeat seemed like the perfect way to increase the occurrences of that instant death effect happening.  Sadia confirmed for him that each “repeated” healing spell or effect triggered by the Repeat spell would trigger it, so there would automatically be 8 chances with one single-target healing spell.

“It wouldn’t surprise me to find that all, or at least most, of the spells you receive will be designed to increase the opportunities for your trait to trigger instant death,” the giant squirrel told him with a nod once he mentioned his observation.  “Still, it’s something that you can take advantage of if you handle it right.”

He knew she was correct, and this new information didn’t really change the plan she had concocted and he had agreed with.  Those he brought along on a Raid Party probably wouldn’t appreciate dying so often, but that was a them problem, no his.  They wouldn’t die permanently, after all. 

“Stop stalling and get on with it,” she chided him, waving her squirrel paw in his direction.  Chuckling, he did just that.

Levels 193 through 199 gave him the same stat increases as did Level 190 and 191, so he acquired another +35 to Physicality and Celerity, +140 to Mentality, only -25 to Personality, and +50 to Fortuity.  He didn’t receive any other spell selections throughout those Levels, unfortunately, but that changed when he got to Level 201.  Before that, though, Level 200 increased the Mentality he acquired by +5, but the others stayed the same.

PICK requirements met!  62,500/62,500

Increase Personal Level? Y / N

Note: This can only be completed while not currently in combat and while not in a dungeon.

Level up!  You are now a Level 201 Omenic Drifter!

As part of the Leveling process, you have received the following:

Physicality +5

Celerity +5

Mentality +25

(1) Spell selection choice

The PICK cost to increase his Level changed at Level 200, changing from only a 300 PICK increase between requirements to a 900 PICK increase, which Sadia warned him about beforehand.  It was a surprise to him, as it hadn’t changed the entire time he’d been on Tarth, but it was something that everyone knew about except for him – because he hadn’t attended the Training, of course.  That meant, if their calculations were correct, then his reserve of PICK would only get him to Level 212, but that was still a huge jump from where he had been stuck at Level 189 for so long.  Not that he was necessarily going to push his Level that far ahead yet, as it wasn’t needed yet for their plan to work, but it was nice to know that he had some room to grow yet.

Now, as he looked at his newest selection of spells, all 3 of which he immediately picked up since he had 25 selections to play with, he grinned when he imagined using them to absolute devastate the next Intermediate dungeon with his Raid Party.