beddedO
patreon
Chapter 69 - Treasure Trove
🕑 Added 2023-09-30 19:12:07 +0000 UTCChapter 69
Treasure Trove
Ethan steadily worked through the sheer list of notifications that swarmed him, some of which were purely informative, but most of which regaled the various rewards that fell upon him. The Emperor’s death would likely speed up the fall of the city, but Ethan suspected he wouldn’t be part of the ‘rewards’ on that end, too, as this string seemed like a finality.
[Congratulations on slaying Emperor Bylon the Fourth! Your name and feat echo across the Dimensions!]
[You have Levelled up! Congratulations on reaching Level 21!]
[You have unlocked a new Feature! Mentorship: you may select a Direct Inheritor that will receive a lesser variant of Blood Inheritor, Blood Disciple]
[Congratulations on being the first to reach Level 20! Your ‘Trailblazer’ title has been upgraded to ‘Trendsetter’, increasing 2% XP gain to 5% XP gain from all sources]
[Congratulations on being the first to slay an Emperor-level threat! Your Kingslayer title has been upgraded to 'Emperor Slayer', increasing damage dealt to all Emperor-level and King-level threats by an additional 35%]
[Congratulations on being the first to slay an Emperor-level threat on your own! Your 'Slayer' title has evolved into: 'Worldhunter' (Unique) – increases damage done to all minor, major, and final bosses by 50%, decreases the damage taken from them by 30%, increases the XP received from them by 100%, and increases the chance of Unique Loot by 5%]
[By reaching Level 20, you have unlocked 4 new Abilities: 1 Core Ability, 2 Passive Abilities, and 1 Active Ability]
[Crimson Rain <Core> – envelop an area with a range of 100 square feet into a Field for 30 seconds. It will rain blood for the duration, dealing damage to everyone with the exception of those holding Blood-related Classes. The damage dealt is measured by how much Blood Pool was sacrificed to use the ability. The rain cannot inflict Bleed status. While within the Field, all Blood-related Classes–friendly and otherwise–gain 10% to all their base stats, and a bonus of 50% to their base Leech. Cooldown: 3 minutes. Cooldown begins upon the Field's expiration rather than upon the casting of the spell itself]
[Blood Shuffle <Active> – Level 1 – recall blood and flesh into nothing and appear at the designated location after 1s. Cost: 25% of Max Health per use. Cooldown: None. Cannot be used if it would kill the user.]
[Carmine Covenant <Passive> – Level 1 – 1% of the damage Blood Devotees and Blood Disciples do is leeched as Health to you. 0.01% of the damage you do is leeched as Health to them.]
[Bloodbound Core <Passive> – Level 1 – you may store up to 10% of your Blood Pool internally as either a passive reserve or active resource. Note: Bloodbound Core is an Evolving Spell.]
[...]
[...]
[The following spells have Levelled up: Crimson Blade, Sanguine Snap]
[...]
[You have acquired the following items: Radiant Robes, Sunlit Scroll, Light-infused Medallion, x40 Mana Orbs, x2 Low-Grade Health Potions, x2 Low-Grade Mana Potions]
[...]
[Radiant Robes]
Rarity: Rare
Level: 25
+22 Intelligence
+18 Wisdom
-10 Vitality
-5 Strength
+50% Mana Regeneration
-35% Health Regeneration
-15% Mana Costs
+20% Cast Speed
[Special Effect] – pour Mana into the robes to inflame. For the next 10 seconds, all Mana Costs are reduced to 0, casting speed is reduced by an additional 45%, and the next attack is deflected completely. After 10s, enter a temporary state of Weakness: for 30s, movement speed is lowered by 80%, Health by 40%, and cast speed for all spells is tripled (applies to 'Instant' spells, too, that are treated as though they have 1s cast time). 5min cooldown.
[Special Effect] – gain 1500% bonus Mana Regeneration for 3s when your Mana falls below 10%. 10min cooldown.
[...]
[Light-infused Medallion]
Rarity: Rare
Level: 25
+35 Vitality
+50% Health Regeneration
[Special Effect] – every 3rd attack/spell deals an additional 10% additional damage as 'Holy'. It can only occur 3 times within a short period of time.
[Special Effect] – the first instance of damage that deals more than 50% of the user's Max Health is reduced by 80%. Gain an additional 30% resistance to that type of damage for the next 8 seconds. 3min cooldown.
[...]
[Sunlit Scroll]
Rarity: Unique
Level: 0
[Special Effect] – summon a pillar of golden light at the targeted location for 15 seconds. The pillar deals 250 damage per second to everyone within its range, moving to the nearest targets if there are none to attack.
[...]
[Low-Grade Health Potion – Common]
– Heal 80 Health immediately and an additional 100 over the next 30 seconds –
[Low-Grade Mana Potion – Common]
– Restore 30 Mana –
It was… quite a lot to take in, even for Ethan. Most things he expected, even the ‘Mentorship’ that he did not receive in the past as his Class was simply too low grade for it. What surprised him the most was definitely the Medallion–he recalled the item as it was quite lucrative in the past despite its +35 Vitality baseline, and that was simply due to its secondary special effect. It was extremely good at taking the ‘special attack’ and, for a long while, was mandatory for a lot of Tunnels. However, even so, the +35 Vitality was seen as just a nice boon since most would have preferred either Strength or even Agility.
Nonetheless, Ethan couldn’t help but grin–not only did he recover the 15 Vitality that he ‘wasted’ to kill the Guardian, but he more than doubled it. Equipping it, he watched his Vitality soar to 74 while his Health sat at an impressive 740. Though his defences were paper-thin, he could take quite a few attacks before dying just on the basis of his Max Health alone.
He, naturally, put the Robes away and saved them for Elijah as well as the Mana Potions, while saving Health Potions for Ronald. The Scroll that he got was nice, but because it had a baseline damage value, it was best used early on before its damage was completely outscalled.
All in all, the haul was substantially better than the one in the Savanna, and he even suffered less for it. Looking at his status window was rather… inspiring. His growth compared to the past was, well, incomparable, really.
Name: Ethan Flynn
Age: 32
Race: Human
Level: 21
Variant: N/A
Titles: Explorer, Worldhunter, Arbitrator, Trendsetter, Savanna Hunter, Lion Tamer, Enduring Tapestry, Untamed, Child of Sun, Emperor Slayer, Desert Wanderer, Challenger, Near-Death, The Holy Guardian, Chaos Sower
Items: [Tar-Tipped Waeul’s Dagger], [Elegance], [Life-infused Medallion]
Relics: N/A
Class: Blood Inheritor [Prime]
_________________________
Vitality: 73.8
Strength: 22
Intellect: 11
Agility: 23
Wisdom: 5
Health: 738
Blood Pool: 13
Damage: 99
Cooldown Reduction: 10% (temp)
Physical Defence: 0 [Reduces physical damage intake by the amount]
Magical Defence: 10 [Reduces magical damage intake by the amount]
____________________________
Abilities:
Core:
Hemomancy, Crimson Rain
Active:
Sanguine Snap, Blood Mania, Crimson Blade, Blood World, Blood Shuffle
Passive:
Bloodbound, Vampiric Touch, Bleeding Agony, Vorpal Veins, Leeching Touch, Heartlock, Vital Hex, Carmine Covenant, Bloodbound Core
Even his base damage climbed up to near triple digits which, while not particularly impressive especially at Level 21, was still on the far high end for all tanks. And to increase it, he would simply need to stack more and more Health. He felt greed surge within him, but rather than pushing it back down as before… he let it go wild. He needed to be greedy, after all.
Delilah, he mused inwardly. 'Michael' had found her, and after they'd left the Tunnel, Ethan would 'have' her. Not only would Layla finally have a friend somewhat close to her age, but Ethan would also have a world-spanning tool that was the perfect concoction of factors to enable him. While the anomaly of field Tunnels appearing was infuriating and worrisome, Ethan looked forward to the normal Tunnels opening up in droves within the next month. He would raid as many of them as he physically could and use Delilah to go back home in an instant.
Though he didn’t know the ‘conditions’ for setting up a portal, chances were that it was similar to a lot of the other mind-breaking abilities: time. A lot, a lot of time. Likely days, if not entire weeks, just to set up a portal on one end. But… it was worth it. So, so worth it.
It was within an hour that the final notification appeared, informing him that the Tunnel had been cleared. As he suspected, aside from simply getting XP–and thus reaching Level 23, though not unlocking either a Feature or an Ability–he didn’t get anything else. It didn’t matter, however. What mattered was that they were done as quickly as he suspected, even with his desperation blinding him.
Though the Altukeens wanted them to stay for a feast, Ethan simply walked towards the exit and others followed. Even though nobody saw him the entire ‘mission’, they all did receive a notification that the ‘Emperor had fallen’. He hadn’t fallen because he got sick, of which they were all certain, which meant that he, on his own, defeated what was likely the ‘boss’ of the entire place.
Soldiers, though suffering no casualties, did experience the wall–were it not for the monstrously strong Altukeens, they would have never managed to do as well. In fact, they would have failed. They had to attack in duos, or even entire squads, just to kill a single ordinary soldier, while they couldn’t even approach the Knights that were all exclusively killed by the Altukeens.
As such, their rewards were rather pedestrian–a few Levels, an occasional, awful item that’s even worse than a simple army knife, and not much else… but the experience of it all was definitely worth it.
Ethan was the first to step out and the first to realise something was remarkably off–there was nobody there. He fully expected a squadron of men and women all with guns pointed at them to be a part of the welcoming committee, but there was nobody. Well, not nobody. There was Ronald. Ethan didn’t see him but he did recognise the boy’s Mana signature, immediately rushing over.
He found the boy and Layla and Tian hiding in the forest to the east. They seemed fine, but if everything was fine, Ronald would have stayed in the city. Were they discovered? Chased out? Possibly.
“Eh? Ethan? You’re back!” Layla exclaimed, the first to see him, rushing over into his arms.
“Ha ha, of course, lil’ one. Did you miss me?”
“Always,” she nuzzled into his chest. Ethan looked down at Ronald whose eyes seemed… torn.
“What’s wrong?” Ethan asked.
"The city," Ronald said. "Uh… well, just take a look." Ronald fetched the phone from his pocket, loaded a photo from his gallery, and showed it to Ethan. Even with Layla in his arms, he couldn't hold back.
“Are you fucking kidding me?!”
