Once Xavier had successfully drawn and initiated the Willpower Infusion spell pattern, he felt like a new man.
After all the pain he’d gone through getting back to this point, after finding every part of him shattered, having to rebuild himself from a starting point that was less than zero, it was invigorating to discover not everything had been damaged.
When he first used the Willpower Infusion spell pattern in that clearing, finding that not only had his control not d...
2025-07-28 19:00:08 +0000 UTC
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After six months inside that forest clearing near Collinsville, the breakthrough Xavier had been chasing finally came.
It was not earth-shattering. The clouds above did not part to allow the sun to bathe him in its warmth and light. The System did not suddenly announce he had achieved a great thing by providing him with a title for his efforts.
But it meant everything to Xavier as a trickle of Celestial Energy finally entered his body.
For the five months that he’d been al...
2025-07-24 19:00:04 +0000 UTC
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Hovering above the Bright City of Aethisa, Xavier gazed upward into the sky, shaking his head, in awe at what he’d just done.
Using the Untethered gravity spell he’d learnt with Recursive Analysis, he had sent a large section of the Bright City’s battlements into orbit, killing every one of the dwarves that had been standing on it.
He looked down at himself. At the staff in his hand. Yes, he could have killed those people just as effectively in a different way.
<...
2025-07-24 19:00:03 +0000 UTC
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The energy seeped out of Xavier’s body almost the moment it had entered. When he’d felt it flow into him, he’d opened his eyes and smiled, reflexively pulling his hands from Justin’s to pump his fists.
The elation he felt was intense, far stronger than he’d expected, but the action rocked him out of his calm, focused state, allowing the Celestial Energy to flow straight back out of him before he’d even released it was going.
The burst of energy he’d received had felt...
2025-07-23 19:00:05 +0000 UTC
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Hovering above the Bright City of Aethisa, wings flapping lazily, Xavier watched the ballistae bolt as it shot toward him. Phoexians scattered after the force field powered by the massive subterranean crystal had pushed them high into the air.
The bolt moved slow enough for him to perceive its arc in the air. He shifted the Lost Bone of a Dead God into a shield and lazily held it in front of him. The ballistae bolt—which crackled with lightning—slammed into the shield and splintered...
2025-07-23 19:00:04 +0000 UTC
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Xavier’s mind was chaos.
Sitting on that boulder in the clearing a few miles from Collinsville, his old party lost in meditation and cultivation nearby, the elf spirit Rhaalir silent beside him, Xavier delved deep inside himself.
Before his cores had been shattered, his mind had been an ordered place. Not perfectly ordered, but it had a certain logic to it. One Liana had first helped him find.
Now, all of that had changed.
His emotions were almost completely unchaine...
2025-07-22 19:00:04 +0000 UTC
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“I assume you have some sort of plan?” Siobhan asked.
Xavier would have run, would have flown, back to the portal to Earth if he wasn’t mindful of the others having to keep up. As it was, he was walking so swiftly they each had to jog just to match his pace.
Walking back through the city of Mareketh was a completely different experience to what it had been when they’d arrived here. He still felt vulnerable. That hadn’t changed. How could he not, given what he’...
2025-07-21 19:00:08 +0000 UTC
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Mareketh was exactly as he remembered it. The time that had passed since his last visit hadn’t changed the place at all. The streets were as bustling as ever, the people just as varied.
It was strange walking through the markets without his Farscope ability. As unnatural as the ability to see everything around him sounded, it had become normal for him. Walking around without it was an eerie experience, one that made him feel like danger could be lurking anywhere, and he would...
2025-07-17 19:00:04 +0000 UTC
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The notification loomed in front of Xavier’s vision as he stood a few feet from the Tower of Champions’ tavern doors.
I don’t meet the requirements to remain within the tower?
Xavier didn’t even know the tower had requirements he needed to meet for him to remain. Though through all he’d been through, he’d barely given a thought to the fact that the System hadn’t prompted him to go to the next floor. Champions usually couldn’t take this long of a b...
2025-07-16 19:00:05 +0000 UTC
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Your cores are shattered.
Xavier sat on the floor of the Staging Room in the Tower of Champions, his legs crossed beneath him, hands on knees, eyes closed.
Everything was black.
Which would have been perfectly normal, considering his eyes were closed. But it wasn’t normal. Xavier had a Farscope. A red lens in his right, non-dominant eye. Even when meditating in a safe place like his Staging Room, Xavier never deactivated the scope.
The Farscope abil...
2025-07-15 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Bolts of brilliant white lightning sprang to life from the Soul Strike spell pattern, filling the chamber with their glow before shifting and materialising into ten thousand soul apparitions that launched themselves toward the Arakashinai Queen.
The soul apparitions were stopped at the edge of Xavier’s time dilation field.
Xavier paid no attention to the pressure on his body, mind, and soul from holding so many spell patterns active. Instead, he expanded his time dilation field....
2025-07-14 19:00:09 +0000 UTC
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Xavier hovered over the alien Arakashinai city, his black wings flapping lazily as he stared at the notification before him.
21,802 Kill Notifications Counted.
The number was absolutely absurd. He knew he could kill these Arak drones with ease, but… A single soul infused into Soul Strike would kill forty-three of them?
The moment stretched as Xavier hung there. The silence in the area following his attack almost made him forget that he’...
2025-07-10 19:00:05 +0000 UTC
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Time once more lost all meaning to Xavier.
When he’d worried the Arakashinai Queen would be able to notice what he’d done to its drones even with time moving at the slowest crawl he could manage outside his time dilation field, he’d rushed to her chamber.
That sense of urgency had left him when he’d realised the queen itself had never had a confrontation that wasn’t conducted at a distance with her drones.
Inside the chamber, he did not feel the weight of the queen...
2025-07-09 19:00:07 +0000 UTC
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Xavier flew through the different underground tunnels of the Arakashinai home world, moving across hundreds of miles, flying over one vast stone city after the next with skyscrapers taller than any back on Earth. Cities filled with nothing but mindless drones—or, at least, fragile minded drones without their own will or personality.
He was headed toward the Arakashinai queen’s chamber.
His time dilation field was wrapped tightly around him. Time outside of the field w...
2025-07-08 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Here's the link: https://www.royalroad.com/amazon/B0F38NPKRV
Thanks everyone for all your support!
2025-07-08 05:44:40 +0000 UTC
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Controlling the Willpower Infusion spell pattern with enough precision to enter an Arak drone’s mind was still only the first step toward what Xavier had wished to accomplish with these minds.
It was a step he hadn’t even known he’d needed to take toward this goal, but one he was glad he’d taken.
A new realm of possibilities when it came to his spell patterns had opened up when he’d first activated the Willpower Infusion spell and been able to use it on a specific target...
2025-07-07 19:00:03 +0000 UTC
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Damnit.
Hovering inside that massive chamber on the Arakashinai home world, Xavier shut his eyes and sighed. The Arak flier, the builder drone that he’d been delving into the memories of, had just had its mind crushed by his “brilliant” new idea.
Xavier had thought his idea was perfect. In theory, it made a hell of a lot of sense. When he’d found out his mind had those different rooms, he’d created a mental apparition to help him navigate them.
Since he wa...
2025-07-03 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Xavier emerged from the portal, his time dilation field still wrapped around him. Not for the first time, he had to thank Yarien for prompting him to learn how to push it through a portal in the first place. It was an invaluable skill.
He’d imagined using it in this way, to sneak through a portal to an enemy world, but he hadn’t known he would be doing that so soon.
The moment Xavier had materialised on the other side, he paused in the air and simply gazed around. His Farscope...
2025-07-02 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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You have gained the spell: Territory Defence
Territory Defence – Rank 150
Warning: Territory Defence is one of the two main spells in the Defender line of classes. When used in conjunction with Unity Defence, the spells will severely hinder the procurement of Mastery Points at the cost of heightened power.
This effect does not come into play if the spells are used alone.
2025-07-01 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Xavier smiled at the description of his newly acquired temporary spell.
He froze the world around him, stepping back farther along the battlements of Eldaarn’s last remaining stronghold. He took in the long, clear space around him, free of defenders, as none were in reserve. As he did, he had an intense feeling of déjà vu. The first time he’d done what he was about to do was on battlements much like these, under four suns blaring down.
Though much was similar, the situation ...
2025-06-30 19:00:07 +0000 UTC
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Perhaps it would be prudent to first learn the strength of one’s enemy before vowing to kill them, Bones said in Xavier’s mind.
Xavier smirked at the soul bound weapon’s words. Bones had been silent, up until that moment when, atop the Kingdom of Eldaarn’s castle battlements, Xavier had proclaimed to King Elric that he was going to kill the Arakashinai Queen.
You know, you’re probably right, Xavier relied. That would have been wise.
...
2025-06-26 19:00:04 +0000 UTC
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The king lowered his head. “We ventured to a new world. We were not looking to conquer. The universe is far larger than we could have imagined. There must be places we could go. Our world was riddled with beasts. They almost destroyed us. Surely, there were worlds where that happened. Beasts, I have no qualm clearing out to make way for my own people. They are savage things, after all.” The king spat on the stones. “We encountered the Araks the moment we stepped out of the port...
2025-06-25 19:00:05 +0000 UTC
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Xavier stood on the battlements on the one-hundred-and-fifty-fourth floor of the Tower of Champions, speaking to the King of Eldaarn, prompting the man to tell him more of what had happened to his world.
The man blinked, raised his head, looked Xavier in the eye. He seemed to see something, then, and nodded to himself.
King Elric began to talk. Once he got started, it seemed he would never stop. Three hundred years ago, they had opened a portal to another world. They hadn’t know...
2025-06-24 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Xavier soon got into a rhythm with the tower floors again.
His approach to them wasn’t altogether different to what it had been before. He still spent as little time on each floor as he could manage, quickly getting the lay of the land before moving on—with the exception of ranking up Recursive Analysis, as he wanted to get it to Rank 150.
There were other spells he could have tried to rank up, but for those his time would be better spent doing that when he was facing more pow...
2025-06-23 19:00:04 +0000 UTC
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When Xavier returned to the Staging Room, he didn’t instantly head toward the next tower floor. Instead, he took a moment to think.
Well, maybe a little more than a moment.
He cast Time Alteration and sat on his comfortable armchair within the time dilation field, thinking through the different things he wanted to achieve. The new impossible goal he’d set for himself to take down the System wasn’t what was foremost on his mind, even if it did linger at the edges of his thoug...
2025-06-19 19:00:08 +0000 UTC
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Nothing happened.
Xavier was not struck down by a lightning bolt from nowhere, nor was he teleported into a volcano, or thrown into a sun. The Voice of the System didn’t materialise in front of him. A notification didn’t appear. The air in the room didn’t so much as shimmer.
He sat, sunk back in the armchair, coffee mug still clutched in his fingers, eying the space around him nervously and feeling a little foolish for doing so.
A moment ago, a thought had flickered th...
2025-06-18 19:00:08 +0000 UTC
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You have completed this floor faster than any other Champion before you. However, as the parameters of the floor were changed, and the challenge you completed was different to that of other Champions in your universe, you will not be given the top spot in the leaderboard.
Xavier sat on the floor of the Staging Room, going through the notifications he’d received from completing the one-hundred-and-twenty-first floor of the Tower of Champions. He seethed a little as he ...
2025-06-17 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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You have gained the spell: Untethered
Xavier sighed in relief. When the pattern of runes he’d drawn with Celestial Energy had solidified within his mind, he’d been confident things had worked exactly as planned.
But he hadn’t been sure. Not until he read that notification.
It was like a weight lifted from him. He suddenly felt ten times lighter than he had a moment ago, which he supposed was only fair, given he’d gained a gravity spell. He couldn’t...
2025-06-16 19:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Xavier’s physical body sat, cross-legged on the Bright City of Aethisa’s battlements, the world frozen around him, both sides of the conflict on the hundred-and-twenty-first floor now aiming all their efforts toward killing him.
Xavier’s mental apparition, however, stood in a room within his mind, not giving what was happening in the real world a single thought as he focused.
His stylus soared through the air as he drew runes after rune inside of that room.
When he’d...
2025-06-12 19:00:03 +0000 UTC
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Xavier frowned.
The dwarves and the Phoexians banded together, throwing everything they had at him. Streams of fire poured forth from the closest Phoexian flights. Ballistae bolts arced toward him from the dwarven battlements. Spells were cast by every mage along the walls.
The leaders, too, joined the fight. Which was something Xavier hadn’t seen the last fourteen times he’d been on this floor, though he’d never pushed until the end. Perhaps they would have been revealed if...
2025-06-11 19:00:05 +0000 UTC
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