Battleforged
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Chapter 342 - Lilly's Evolution: Part 1
🕑 Added 2023-09-13 04:04:29 +0000 UTCBefore Lillian could say anything more, all became soft billow white clouds and an avatar of herself looking down at her.
“Boy, I do look kind of hot with elven blood flowing through my veins, don’t I?”
The girl in question immediately opened her eyes and nodded. “I’d like to think so!”
Lilly whimpered. “Oh no. You’re the Silvery tentacle monster! In my brain?”
Lilly’s twin rolled her eyes. “You really are a drama queen. No wonder Roland broke up with me.”
Lilly snorted. “Roland was a complete ass, and he couldn’t dance for shit.”
“True.”
Lilly bit her lip. “Are you really, um… going to replace me?”
The other girl snorted. “You know we’re going to wake up and you’re going to remember asking me that question like a scared little rabbit which you totally look like and yes, you’re adorable, and you will CRINGE SO HARD!”
Lilly immediately cringed. “So what now?”
Her twin’s exasperated look turned to a happy grin. “Now is the exciting part. The payoff for everything that happened since those fucking orcs happened to us, and then the goblins and the caudrons full of boiling steel and being chased by Elmer Fuck-head with his blunderbuss inside an actual temple of torment! Now, Lilly Silver, because I’m never saying Hendrix again... because our FORMER dad was a complete fuckup and our present dad is awesome… NOW is when we PICK OUR STATS!”
All remaining flickers of hesitation, doubt, and dread were replaced by a cheerful smile and bright eyes shimmering with excitement and greed. “How many levels are we up?”
“Eighteen.
Lilly squeeled. “EIGHTEEN!”
“Yes! And that’s just the first part! Conceptio, who we both know is really the System trying to be cute with Latin names and shit, will want to talk to us before we go any further. I mean you or me, but you’ll be me. But don’t worry, I’ll be you too by then. Mkay?”
“Okay, but please please tell me that includes spells and skills and not just stats?”
Her twin gave a throaty chuckle and winked one silvery eye. “You’re damned right it does.”
Lilly snorted. “I’m going to pretend I didn’t just see a silvery worm winking in the back of your eye, but at this point… WHO CARES! I JUST WANT THE SWEET CRUNCHY STATS!”
Lilly and her twin filled the white chamber with giddy laughter, any lingering feelings of existential dread immediately displaced by the sweet, sweet hunger for delicious scrumptious level-up points so she too could savor the joy of crazy high ability scores.
Lilly Silver!
Physical Characteristics
Strength – 78
Vitality – 81
Finesse – 63
Quickness – 109
Appearance – 16
Mental Characteristics
Scholarship – 18
Perception – 302
Willpower – 20
Charisma – 16
Potency Pools
Arcane Potential – 29.7
Mana Pool – 356
Spiritual Energy – 29.7
Qi Pool – 356
Psionic Potential – 27
Psion Pool – 327
Soul Reserves – 128
Stamina – 787
Health – 891
Resistances & Recovery
Physical Resistance – 12.9
Physical Regeneration – 8
Elemental Resistance – 2
Qi Resistance – 2
Mental Resistance – 23
Primal Adventurer Powers
1. Runic Spell Forger – Rank 30 (Appetite For Destruction 1&2&3 = 137% Damage boost)
Additional Node Slots available = 2 (Rank 10, Rank 20)
Spells Known
- Inevitable Doom (105 Mana & Qi) - Rank 1
- Hell Vines (140 Mana & Qi) (You can direct this spell!) – Rank 1
- Lightning Bolt – Fulmen - (30 Mana & Qi) – Rank 12
- Blood Lightning – Sanguis Fulmen - (15 Mana & Qi, 1.5 (.50%) SR) – Rank 20! (Efficiency & Appetite for Crimson Destruction +50% damage Perk = 267% increase w RSF AFD III)
(This spell dispels/abjures/& can cut through soul wards & partially heal.(X2 heal baseline Bloodmastery Synergism!)
- Fire Bolt - Ignes Pilum - (15 Mana & Qi) – Rank 1
- Psionic Rupture – Fragor - (30 Mana & Qi & 4 Psion) – Rank 20 (Appetite for Psioinic Destruction. 50% Potency Boost / Controlled Destructiong (extremely focused or spread out!)
- You have earned the free perk: Hit Them Where It Hurts! You have a chance to score a Critical Success with Find Weakness skill checks when using Psionic Rupture… if you’re willing to hit them where it hurts! (Note. This perk effects biological males only (for obvious reasons!)
Force Ward – (Scutum sized shield. Shape how you like with RSF Check. Blacks all Physical & Elemental (electromagnetic) damage. Pay mana cost of damage/(RSF Rank + Force Ward Rank) +1/(RSF+FW) mana/min) – Rank 3
Skills
Find Weakness – Rank 26 – (Spell Cleave, Qi Perception, Additional Magus/Cultivator Bonus, +5 Vs Dragons)
Unified Perception – Rank 24 – (Sense Heat, Spiritual Energy, Magic, & Qi Flow.)
Necromancer Affinities & Skills NOTE THESE SKILLS HAVE BEEN SUBSUMED FOR LEGENDARY CLASS – SPEAKER FOR THE FALLEN!
Blood Mastery – Rank 30 (Blood Claimance, Lesser Healing, Essence Infusion, Vampiric Drain)
Spirit Mastery – Rank 31 (Tier II Path of Dominion, Forced Obeisance)
Rituals of Summoning and Binding – Rank 31 (Tier III Path of Dominion, Ritual of Greater Spirit Summoning, *Instant Transcription)
Flesh Sculptor – Rank 24 +1+1 (Tier II Path of Dominion, Basic Revenant Preparation)
______________________________________
Lilly whistled. “Wow, I’m almost certain that I wasn’t quite that strong or fast just an hour or so ago… or however long it’s been!”
Her twin looked smug. “That’s the advantage of a Bronze title giving us an eternal 10% bonus to all our stats.”
Lilly nodded, before she checked over the numbers with a furrowed brow. “Not that I’m complaining but…”
Her twin flashed a shit-eating grin. “We also got 1/5th our Father’s physical stats… and that includes the latest 10% Bronze enhancement… in addition to our own 10%. And no, that’s not normally how it works, but considering that we did the peeps upstairs a major favor… Conceptio’s willing to let it slide.”
Lilly blinked. “That’s just…” she shook her head.
“Fucking awesome?”
“I’ll say!”
“You just did.”
Lilly’s gaze narrowed. “Careful, or I might start to really like you which will make the upcoming fighting for control of our brain confrontation a total cringe-fest.”
Her twin rolled her eyes. “Sure. I can glare and scream about freedom while looking in the mirror, because as soon as we’re done here…”
Lilly gulped “I won’t exist?”
“No, idiot, you’ll wake up. Because you’re still me. Remember? Now get your head in the game, girl, and let’s focus on what matters!”
“What could matter more than knowing who the fuck I am when I wake up?” A panicked Lilly asked.
“How about 450 points to spend?”
Lilly’s mouth hung open. “That’s a mighty powerful argument, evil twin. So let’s spend our sweet, sweet, loot already!”
Her not so evil twin chuckled. “Okay, beautiful. Just put those points where you want them.”
Lilly blinked, about to ask what her mirror image meant, before she intuitively understood, as her newly installed interface showed a hollow image of herself with lines and graphs leading to a dozen or so specializations, not to mention all her spells.
And even if she was a little bit sad at all her crossed out necromancer skills… the words ‘Legendary Class’ helped to console her… but nowhere near as much as the 450 points she now had to spend.
She chuckled evilly, rubbing her hands. “You know, twin, it occurs to me that while I have all these silvery worms squiggling in my brains… I could probably advance my favorite spells and skills in the world and wouldn’t suffer nearly the traumatic backlash that made it such an awful pain in the ass before.”
Her twin smirked. “I totally agree. Which isn’t surprising, since I’m YOU! So, you gonna boost me or…” Her twins eyes widened. She shuddered with something that looked uncomfortably like ecstasy, biting her lip and trembling and it was so utterly cringe seeing herself look like she and her ex were having angry makeup sex, the best kind of sex, but it was just her, and now SHE was feeling the incredible rush of so much knowledge and wisdom flooding her soul, and it was all the sweet good memories of spending years learning sacred arts under a stern but approving master before finally proving herself ready for the mighty task before her, triumphantly screaming to the starry heavens when her Crimson Lightning blasted the absolute living fuck out of the hideous swarms of abominations crawling up from a purple sea.
She glared at the abominations that crawled up on the shore under inky black clouds crackling with streaks of lightning in a hellscape right out of a Cthulian nightmare. Yet despite her best efforts, their original exultation she and her class felt at finally being able to prove themselves to their masters was rapidly turning to despair. The damage she and her companions were doing just wasn’t enough. Despite their best efforts, it failed to cut through the abominations in time. First one of her fellow guardians was sent flying with a desperate cry as others rushed to his aid, which then left the front line momentarily vulnerable, and of course that’s when the mass of hideous abominations blinking bulging black eyes filled with hideous secrets made their move, hissing and cavorting as they attacked as one.
Just a heartbeat before they all exploded in a pyrotechnical masterwork of lightning and gore, their dying shrieks echoed by the screams of agony and ecstasy howled by the one guardian who had pushed herself too far, crackling with oblivion’s retribution lancing through countless thousands of abominations before she herself exploded in a triumph of crimson flame.
You have invested 10 points in Runic Spell Forger.
Runic Spell forger is now Rank 40!
You have achieved Master Tier in Runic Spell forger!
You now enjoy +27 to Arcane Potential / Spiritual Energy / Psionic Potential!
You have Chosen the Perk: Appetite For Destruction: Rank IV! (Because of course you did, Lilly!)
You have invested 20 points in Blood Lightning!
Blood Lightning is now Rank 30!
Blood Lightning is now Rank 40!
You are now a master at channeling Blood Lightning!
You now enjoy +36 to Arcane Potential / Spiritual Energy / Soul Reserves!
You have chosen the Perks: Appetite For Crimson Destruction Rank II – And (Surprisingy) Chain Lightning! You can now chain this skill against multiple opponents! Basic skill roll prevents you from hitting friendlies! - Contender Status assures it only hits the REDS on your interface!
Overcome by the flash of transcendent insight trembling through her soul in a stormy sea of revelations, an entire galaxy’s worth of revelations that the silvery sentinels guarding her own fragile brain could barely control, Lilly forced her howling psyche to dare the forbidden. What she knew was forbidden, yet was absolutely determined to make so.
For now she was one elevated guardian amongst countless others gazing with sorrow upon the planet being overcome by purple death. So close to a pristine ascension, before spite, malice, and the overwhelming beast hoards shattered all dreams of glory to a desperate retreat.
“We have to leave, number seven. Now.”
But the sentinel known as Lilly refused to budge. She only glared down at the abominations below as she cultivated the way only a hybrid could, her body and mind thrumming with the power of the System… and the power of the forbidden as well.
“No, you fool! You’ll destroy us all!”
She paid the words no mind, choking back her scream as the sacred gift that was her birthright abruptly burst through a crystalline node that had served her well over the countless decades she had fought for her land. Her home. Knowing she was shattering so many dreams, plans, and long term potential. But in the end, it didn’t matter. None of that mattered if she couldn’t keep her planet intact.
And even if she couldn’t, she swore to herself, as the air lit with crimson lightning flaring so bright her companions cried out in dismay… she would make her enemies pay.
Their screams below were the only balm that could quench Lilly’s own howling agony when her first free node was imprinted with her father’s gift.
You have successfully imprinted Runic Spell Forger upon your first primary node! WARNING this is an exact duplicate of you INHERENT TRAIT Runic Spell Forger!
You have saved versus Catastrophic Cascade.
You have achieved Harmonious Synergism!
You will now find it significantly easier to gain mastery of Runic spells and to understand the Runic underpinnings of all spells and supernatural phenomenon! All spells you cast will be 50% More powerful than they would otherwise be.
NOTE! This enhancement is multiplicative of ALL other factors!
The girl once known as Lilly howled under the force of her breakthrough, shaken to her core when she realized that she could sense the underlying code making up her entire reality. Only instead of roman numerals, it was all in Runic Script.
She wanted to laugh for the sheer glorious madness of it all, for just a heartbeat feeling like she truly could take on the world! Or at least understand the world as power flooded through her shuddering frame like never before.
Then she sensed the insights fading, realizing on some level that she had enhanced herself as far as she dared with a single node cracked open, yet she knew as well that despite all her fears, system warnings, and over-emphasis on raw power above all else, she’d now find it much easier to understand the Runic components of any spell she had a chance to thoroughly study… and find it far easier to learn, which hopefully meant a reduced cost as well.
“I guess that’s as far as I can push myself with a single node open, even with this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” she acknowledged with an exhausted smile that immediately turned into a wolfish smile that her father and former master knew so well. “So how about I crack open a second node and we see just how far I can push this glorious madness!”
Before she could second guess herself, she took full advantage of that which in any other circumstances would have horrified her, yet were now her best friends. She reveled in the feeling of her mental muscles clamping down on the silvery squirmy wormies that were now absolutely saturating her brain, body, and of course her meridian channels and nodes.
“We can do this, can’t we? OF COURSE WE FUCKING CAN!” She howled with furious glee, taking full advantage of her fears to forge herself into the powerhouse she had always dreamed of becoming.
You have successfully saved versus Catastrophic Cascade! (Helped by more than a few of the Silvery Friends your Sire fears for good reason! But nothing you need to fear, Lilly. You’re already EXACTLY what we need you to be!)
You have achieved Harmonious Synergism!
You will now find it easier to gain mastery of Runic spells and to understand the Runic underpinnings of all spells and supernatural phenomenon! All spells you cast will be 50% more powerful than they would otherwise be. NOTE this enhancement is multiplicative of ALL other factors! (Including your other nodes! Overkill much?)
And just an eye-blink before Lilly sensed that the sheer ecstasy of revelation would turn to excruciating agony, she forced her eyes away from attempting to understand the runic underpinnings of elementary particles within all the arcane forces and fields that now enhanced their formerly very basic reality.
Instead, she found herself snapping out of an exhausted stupor as the howling wind blew her scratchy woolen psionicist’s robe and the loose locks of her hair. Even her ears were knocked askew by the howling winds. Yet all of that paled before Lord Lou’s thunderous appearance against a backdrop of stormy skies as the pair of them stood, together, at the summit of a mountain radiating exotic energies that were absolutely off the charts.
“Lilly Hendrix Silver, you should not be here! No matter your aptitude or the strength of your fortuitous encounters, there is no way you’re ready for further advancement! Return to Earth this instant and await my summons and perhaps you will be worthy of further lessons then.”
Lilly’s smile was all teeth.
It said something, perhaps, that Lord Lou, clearly Deep Bronze and able to control countless mortals back on earth like puppets on a string Lilly had no doubt, actually paled and stepped back.
“Ready yourself, Sifu.”
The Psionicist Cultivator? Blanched. “Impossible.”
“Three… two…” her smile grew when she sensed the wave of debilitating psionic and spiritual energy now crackling off of him in waves. Good. He was finally taking her seriously.
Lord Lou flashed the barest smile. “I will remember this, child. If this is a prank, you will pay dearly before your lessons truly begin. But if I can actually feel it… you will be the first among my disciples.”
“And if I draw blood?”
Lord Lou laughed. “Then you will be worthy of all my secrets.” He blinked, seeming only in that moment to come to himself with sobriety’s prudence, for all that he was clearly lost in reverie. He cleared his throat. “What I mean to say is…”
“FRAGOR!”
It was a shout that echoed endlessly off the mountain top, quickly followed by the thundering roar of an avalanche as ancient stone crumbled under inconceivable pressure and the entirety of Lord Lou’s body exploded into bloody mist.
You have invested 20 points in Psionic Rupture! You are now a master at unleashing Psionic Rupture! With triple ranks of Appetite For Psionic Destruction! - Even Master Lou would be proud, just as soon as he gets over his first taste of fear in over a century!
You now enjoy +36 to Arcane Potential / Spiritual Energy/ Psionic Potential!
Lilly cackled like a madwoman when she came back to herself, even if she was now so dizzy that she fell on her ass.
Her twin, clone… replacement? Gazed down at her in shock. “Lilly, what’s wrong?”
“I did it! I fucking did it!” she chuckled throatily. Her twin tilted her head.
“Did what?”
“Blew Lord Lou right off his mountain! Guess he’s the one silently screaming now.”
Her twin, who was really just her, after all, chuckled throatily. “Fucking awesome. He came off as more pretentious and stuck up than all the cultivators in all of Eric’s xianxia novels!”
Lilly nodded. “I think his clan is full of Psionic Cultivating hybrids or something? Which is actually pretty cool, since we’re hybrids ourselves on all sorts of levels. Anyway, he promised to share all his secrets with us if I could make him bleed… so with all the damage multipliers scaling off eac hother like the sweetest Exile’s Path build…”
“You broke his nose?”
Lilly snorted. “I turned him into bloody paste!”
Her twin looked at her nonplussed. Before rubbing her hands with sisterly glee. “Ooh, please, break it all down for me, super awesome twin that I absolutely love to death?”
Lilly smirked. “Sure, replacement, as if you weren’t being absolutely literal there. Well, first is the fact that it’s fucking Level 40, Master tier, which I can sense means oodles more damage than at Journeyman rank, even if, for some stupid reason the exact amount of scaling between skill ranks isn’t specified. So too, our Psion Potential has shot up from a respectable 24 to what’s now a 96! And Spiritual Energy and Arcane Potential, since our Psionic Shout uses all three pools, is 138! And that’s when the fun begins!”
“Ooh I do love fun,” said her twin, eyes positively twinkling with an avaricious hunger. “So tell me all about the juicy damage modifiers!”
Lilly grinned. “First there’s the four ranks of Appetite for Destruction, with each of those 33.3% damage boosts compounding with each and with everything else! Then there’s the two extra Runic Spell Forger nodes, each giving me an additional 50% damage boost, cumulative as always!” She rubbed her hands together with glee. “And to top it all off, I have Appetite for Psionic Destruction at Tier 3! which means three separate 50% damage boosts, all scaling off each other again!”
Her twin squealed for joy, eyes tearing up with those sweet numbers. “Fucking hell, Lilly-been! That’s an absolutely absurd 24-fold Damage Multiplier for Psionic Rupture, and 16-fold for Blood Lightning! And that’s off a baseline of Mastery Tier 1 and stats close to 100!”
Lilly gave an enthusiastic nod. “Despite losing out on some more sweet, sweet damage, the utility that chain lighting gives in terms of striking multiple abominations at once, as many reds as I can get on my Dominion Interface sheet while avoiding my allies with a basic skill check, was a must after reliving the final moments of countless heroes whose sacrifices are still indelibly etched into the System.”
She chuckled ruefully, shaking her head. “And if my lovable goofball of a dad hadn’t fucked up the flow by picking Efficiency and passing up on another Appetite for Destruction perk, Blood Lightning would also be doing 24-fold damage.”
Her twin gave her a pointed look. “That’s one of those inside thoughts you keep on the inside, Lilly-bean, lest you come off as an ungrateful bitch to the man who literally brought us back from the dead, took care of us, petted us, loved us, resurrected us into his own daughter and even resisted his mother’s monstrous ravaging instinct, so as to NOT devour us alive and be up another couple hundred points himself.”
Lilly nodded in complete agreement. “Damn right. The only thing dad’s getting is a hug from a daughter who misses him like hell… whenever we get home, that is.”
She then gazed worriedly at her reflection. “I’m sorry, by the way.”
“For what?”
Lilly sighed. “I thought I could embrace the most righteous mad-lad power exploit imaginable. Getting what amounts to forty freakin’ points in each of three stats for every spell I could raise from below Rank 10 to Rank 40. We would have been making such bank, point-wise, and the payoff in terms of spell power? Un-fucking-believable.”
She flashed a pained smile. “But it turns out that not even my brain, with multiple nodes invested in the same incredibly awesome Runic Spell Forging power can withstand that burden. And that’s with a Legendary System Hero class and a friendly nudge and wink from that very System and a bunch of silvery brain worms who swear that they like me just fine… so I don’t have to worry about being mentally rewritten into a drone-slave in the blink of an eye.”
Her twin snorted. “Melodramatic, much?”
“Okay, the point is that even with all those sweet perks and safety nets… I’m at my limit.” She shrugged helplessly. “I invested fifty points slamming three ‘leet skills and powers to Rank 40, or Tier 1 Mastery… and my brain is full. Honestly, I don’t think I’ll dare put more than a point or two in any given skill per level from hereon till whenever..” Her gaze turned thoughtful. “I mean, a point or two in any given spell, or my sweet sweet node perk which effects all spells is okay, and rush-learning some practical skills to Journeyman level might be no problem at all. But anything more than that? I’m not really sure I can handle anything more intense at this point. Not for a good while or a fuck-ton of levels, anyway.”
A part of Lilly had been expecting snarky comments, outright derision, or if nothing else, a jaded hairy eyeball. Surely she was stronger than that.
Yet all her twin did was shrug. “Okay, so let’s stop here.”
Lilly blinked. “Stop here?”
Her twin nodded. “Sure! You did great, you locked in the sweetest node power imaginable and two absolutely killer spells, and all of them are at a crispy Level 40. And we’re smart enough to give them some flexibility, even if we kept our primary money maker all about Appetite for destruction, no apologies. I love it! Now we just slam the rest of our points into our stats and we’re 100% winning at life!”
Lilly swallowed, anxiously looking at herself. “So you’re not mad, I’m not being like… maximum efficient?”
Her twin snorted. “I’m you, remember idiot? How many times did we look ourselves in the mirror after getting drunk and fucked up and feeling ashamed as hell. What did our counselor say? It’s about self-love and self-healing and taking care of ourselves. Not hating and punishing ourselves and being so hard on our asses that our lives became hell and then our only relief was the shit that fucked us up in the first place.”
Lilly flushed in remembered shame, before choosing to let that go of as well, just like she had been taught. She nodded in relief. “You’re right. If our mom could forgive us, we could forgive ourselves. We just had to start fresh and listen to our needs, not ignore them. Not beat ourselves up when we had a bad day. And all in all, I think today’s been a damned good day so far.”
Her mirror image’s grin matched her own. And for the first time, she felt like they were truly one and the same. “Alright,” she whispered in tandem. “I think I know where the rest of the points are going. One hundred in each of my magical stats. And even if that puts my Soul reserves at a mad 250+, it’s the smart move, since I’ll no longer have the benefit of a Soul Orb to cut my blood magic costs in half.”
Yet when she closed her eyes and finalized the changes, she was almost as shaken by numbers that were far to high as she was by the sudden shift in perspective, realizing that she was the only one standing in the center of a glowing beam of pearlescent light… and always had been.
Chapter 343 - Lilly's Evolution - Part 2
Comments
Tony C.
Is this battlefirged or battle bunnies?
Grayman
I agree that this plot line is a dead end. If the author want to travel this road then a separate book should be written rather than sticking it in the middle of “Eric’s Story”.
David Flagg
Uhh. Seriously... Why?
Goldfish2
More!
Chance
A B, as far as I'm understanding, the multipliers aren't just additive. It's not (20 + 50% + 50% = 40) Instead, it's (20 + 50% + 50% = 45) So every new multiplier is using the previous total as a base, instead of the original base number. I don't know if the math checks out or not, and I don't feel like checking 😅 But that makes more sense when you consider the crazy totals, imo.
A B
meanwhile the math is killing me. How do a few 50% and 33% or whatever bonuses turn into a 2400% multiplier or 1600% ?
LordHailith
I’m just waiting until I lose my membership benefits at this point, I dropped this story because of the fever dream daddy daughter plot. That was the end of the road for me along with the annoying kids the MC is taking care of, along with the crazy love interest of the MC who is so deeply in love with damn near any chick he sleeps and and would die for them/give up a ton of benefits for. This whole plot came apart at the seams as soon as the author introduced the kids and made lily his daughter instead of a companion of some sort. Let’s not forget she wanted to sleep with the MC and is now his daughter like what the actual f***.
M Schweibold
I like the Lilly plot line now it fits well
