Chapter 259 - Time passes
And time passed.
Artigan disappeared. While his words and challenge lingered, the way he had departed left the citizens wondering if it had all just been some unusual dream. When people found out that he wasn’t an ascendant… well the energy of such an amassed crowd tried to find something else to target.
Some even tried to turn on the Son of Valmere.
Though one look at the giant of a demon bowing his head slightly made everyone turn on the staunchest of protestors.
It wasn’t like everything had been fixed. There was no such thing as a perfect society that you could guarantee would last forever. All you could really do was have faith, have faith that you gave the next generation as much as you could so that they would carry the torch when needed.
And if you didn’t fight for them hard enough?
Well then maybe history would repeat itself until someone finally learned what to do.
And time passed.
It truly did.
…
Day nine out of seventy-two
In the most famous magical tower of Valmere, a certain human appeared out of nowhere; there were no records of this human in all of the land. Though there was little doubt as to his true identity as he bowed a little performer’s bow to the fellow researchers.
Just a little humility maybe.
He was not welcomed back warmly, for every single one of them had been in the protests themselves, though they did not reject him either. For what they saw was a surprisingly young face that was a little embarrassed at what he had done.
And maybe they thought they would be able to instill some of their own virtues into him.
Though of course that enthusiasm was quickly snuffed out after working with him for one whole day.
Fetterue raised an eyebrow.
“How does a skill break?”
“I pushed a class too hard? [Aura Crystallization] is a skill originated by resonating with the [Aura Tyrant]. I think that skill ties closely with the class but I’m not too sure myself. I got it back when I repaired it though. Good thing too because it was an Epic.”
“This rarity, it’s an Epic? Did you not say that Epics are what truly differentiate ascendants?”
“Yeah but the [Aura Tyrant] is an Epic class. It’s sort of half the reason why having an Epic class is so important. You get a free Epic skill when you resonate with the class.”
“How? Why?”
Ryan just shrugged.
“I don’t know, because it’s an Epic?”
If they thought the headaches were over, well, they were sorely mistaken.
…
Day ten out of seventy-two.
“You said you’re a special case? What does a normal skill list for your adventurers look like?”
Ryan started drawing out adventurer builds, he organized them by rarity and grouped them into teams. He continued until there were hundreds of common teams.
All the way from realm one to realm nine.
Fetterue’s eyes shined as she read through them all.
“I see. They build around something specific or become complete all rounders. Then they choose teams based on complimenting each other.”
“It’s more like they climb up together and make skill selections with teams of experts until they’re a well-rounded team with an edge somewhere.”
“Why do you have none of the cohesion that’s present in these builds?”
“Because you don’t just simply turn down Epic skills.”
“But did you not say that Epics, when used correctly, define battles between ascendants? Would supporting your Epics with lesser skills not be more effective?”
“Or I could support Epics with other Epics.”
“Ah. It still lacks cohesion though.”
It did annoy him a little, how his skills didn’t work together as well as others might. It wasn’t really about power or versatility, he had that in spades with his various Epics. The problem was that his current skill list was something that he himself would have given him shit for if he was still an internet armchair commenter.
As a response, Ryan got a little defensive.
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“A lot of my skills are precursors from Epics or first time resonance effects from my class. I’ll get cohesion… later.”
“And how will you do that? When you don’t even know of the skills you could learn from your other classes?”
Fetterue was talking about his class crystals, there might be five Epic skills waiting for him there.
…
Day eleven out of seventy-two.
They were trying to train—and struggling to get Ryan to resonate with his [Juggernaut] class. It was considered one of the weakest Epic classes out there and he had made the mistake of thinking that meant it would be easier to resonate with.
“I would still like to figure out about how and why you get these Epic skills for simply resonating with a class.”
Fetterue interrupted him before he could answer.
“And if you say ‘because the class is an Epic’ I will throw you off my tower.”
“But it’s true. Fine. I don’t know, I don’t think anybody does. Skills are just skills.”
“But sometimes they can be spells. Is that not strange to you?”
“Yeah, but it can also be [Cleave] and your warriors can learn that on your own.”
Though now that Fetterue had pointed it out, it was a little strange that skills could be simply learned from resonating with a class.
Fetterue turned to one of the researchers, Darrel.
Ryan was wondering what she was thinking until he remembered. That was the researcher that Ryan had helped gain the [Student] class, and then Ryan wondered as well.
Darrel was startled by both of their stares.
“What?”
Fetterue shook her head.
“We’ll work on that later. We’ll work on your skill list and then the choices for your next skills.”
Though she suddenly seemed daunted by the task. She stared at Ryan’s list of Epics, then at the list of ten Epic skills he could choose.
“All of these… ‘skills’ are the same rarity as [Aura Crystallization]?”
“Yea?”
Fetterue showed a rare moment of weakness where she sucked in a breath. It took a moment to realize why she was so daunted. It had taken her decades of research to understand [Aura Crystallization] and he had thrown at her ten skills of the same tier that he could pick. Now she was seeing Ryan’s problem his way.
Power?
[All Against Me!], [Fearless Cutdown], [Combat Art: Lu Baizhen’s Infinite Requiem of Shattered Fists] and [Cleaving Riptide Spin]
Versatility?
[Ruinous Mockery] and [Parallel Cognition]
Or a wildcard that could change everything in a pinch?
[A Ruinous Insight]
Fetterue stared at the skill list and the descriptions for a long moment, then came to a decision. She copied the paper with magic and started passing it around to the other researchers.
Ryan stood up in alarm.
“Hey, that’s a secret.”
“Not a single soul here will dare to leak any of this. You said your adventurers have teams of experts dedicated to understanding and unlocking high realm adventurer’s potential? Do you have such a team you can trust for yourself?”
“No.”
“Good, then that is also what we’ll be. You’ll answer our questions and… since you like to debate, we shall do that with you in a week’s time. You will do what we call a thesis defense. You will stand there in the middle while arguing for the skills you will choose and we will do this until you feel confident about your decision.”
Ryan considered this.
“Huh, that sounds fun.”
He missed the malice that glinted in the eyes of the researchers.
…
Day fourteen out of seventy-two.
For the first time, Ryan was satisfied with his rate of progress. It was an odd thing, but he truly felt like the talent that the Trial System’s modifications were supposed to make you.
If there was one thing that had changed… well all he could say was that he had found a step beyond the flow state, or maybe it was deeper into it.
It was difficult to explain what it exactly was, but as Vedit the drunk swordmaster explained it…
“You’re wholly focused on every single strike, and taking everything into account. This is when your mind, motivation, and body are all coming together. Good, this was the state I was trying to get you into.”
With every strike, Ryan was focused on every minutiae of his body. From the tip of his fingers to every single strand of muscle fiber to even the location of his hair. He could keep that state… until the sun went down.
[Valmere’s Sword School: Silver] Learned!
And for once the swordmaster’s eyebrows rose, just a little.
Vedit still trounced him in a spar. Though the Vedit seemed a little dissatisfied at how it went.
“These damned skills, you don’t make mistakes once you learn a skill? That’s…”
“I mean I can still make decisional errors.”
Ryan’s slightly apologetic shrug did nothing but anger Vedit further. He took a swig of alcohol and waved him away.
“Piss off, I need to go try something.”
…
Day eighteen out of seventy-two.
Ryan was finally defending himself against a panel of researchers. His [Conceptual Neophyte] class burning as he did.
“[Parallel Cognition] is a trap. It doesn't matter that it’s an Epic, it won’t ever be able to react in time—no—yes I don’t have examples of mindsplit Epics. Look they’re amazing for spellcasters but close combat specialists we need every damned fraction of reaction time.”
Two hours later…
“Look I’m not taking [Lu Baizhen’s Infinite Requiem of Shattered Fists]---yes—I mean maybe the words always are accurate in their descriptions but seriously, it can’t really be infinite or it would be a Legend. Right? What’s my source? About what? The fact that infinity means it has to be a Legend? I don’t know! Just think about it! Screw you Darrel! I’m claiming my defense as intuition from the [Conceptual Neophyte], okay!”
One hour later…
“So then why am I not picking up [A Ruinous Insight] if the words don’t mean anything?! BECAUSE I DON’T NEED IT OKAY?! Do you really want me to pick up that skill? Do you really want to see what happens if I take it and start relying on it?”
For the first time ever, Ryan did not have fun hypothesizing about skills.
The problem was… that they were right.
I better get some more Epics in my next selection because I am not picking up [Combat Art: Lu Baizhen’s Infinite Requiem of Shattered Fists]. How do I use that skill without getting distracted in combat because of that ridiculous name? Just saying [Lu Baizhen’s Infinite Requiem of Shattered Fists] out loud is making me cringe.
It had to be impossible.
…
Day nineteen out of seventy-two.
“A what?”
“You know this ring that recites your adventurer’s guide and is a pain in the ass to turn off? Can you do that but with pre-recorded music?”
Ryan played the four part Artigan theme song for Fetterue and her team. They were well and truly confused as to why he had a song dedicated to a villainous identity.
“What is… this?”
“A theme song, you know, you play it while you fight or make a cool entrance. I can make the phone louder using my aura but I have to focus on it. I was wondering if you could just put the recording of it into the ring and I could adjust the volume?”
“You want me to spend our precious limited time on a—a theme song?”
“Hey! It works, they hear this and go ‘oh shit, it’s Artigan’ and that’s a good initial burst of fear… I think. At the minimum it’s distracting.”
“That goes both ways.”
“Yeah but I’d be used to it.”
“No.”
“Come on, it’s useful.”
“No, we have more important things to do. Why did you think of this now? A–are you requesting this because of yesterday?”
“N-no, why would you even say that? It’s useful, surely it won’t take that much time.”
“The answer is still no.”