Chapter 512
Chapter 512
After the fight with the insectoid winged Titan, Jake spent a few days progressing. However, during that time, he’d only leveled up ten times, from 192 to 202. The reason for that was that his main focus was not on leveling up but on other things. He allocated all the points to Mind to increase the total number of creatures he could have under his command at any given time.
The first thing he had done was visit the Void Temple to unlock everything that hadn’t been unlocked by that point. The Void Temple had seven tiers in total, each one offering a different set of magical abilities that could be unlocked for essence points.
In the past, he had unlocked the first four tiers and purchased some of the runes and spells, such as Fire Trap, Cloud of Darkness, Proximity Rune, and several others. Tier 5 cost 1,000,000 EP, while Tiers 6 and 7 cost 1,350,000 and 1,750,000 EP respectively.
He still had a lot of EP to earn if he wanted to unlock the three remaining tiers, so he placed as many curses on himself as he could without compromising his defenses too much. After that, he fought various groups of ravagespawn. Every time he was wounded in battle, he earned a hefty amount of EP.
Eventually, he earned enough essence points to unlock the final three tiers. After examining them, he learned that the fifth and sixth tiers offered powerful runes and spells of all kinds.
Most of them had effects similar to some of his own abilities, though. For example, one of them allowed him to turn invisible and another allowed him to cling to walls. There was no reason to purchase spells that essentially mirrored his own abilities, so he skipped out on getting them.
Some of the other spells and runes were quite interesting and differed from his abilities, but Jake chose not to purchase any of them yet. The reason for that was that the final tier allowed him to boost every type of resistance he possessed. It was just what he needed, so he spent some more time earning EP and investing it in resistance upgrades. Eventually, he increased every single one of them to 80%.
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Elemental Resistances
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Fire: 80% (+20% from Basic Elemental Shielding)
Frost: 80% (+20% from Basic Elemental Shielding)
Shock: 80% (+20% from Basic Elemental Shielding)
Explosive: 80%
Corrosive: 80%
Radiation: 80%
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Other Resistances
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Pierce: 80%
Poison: 80% (+20% from Basic Elemental Shielding)
Mana Bleeding: 80%
Mind Control: 80%
Stun: 80%
Chaos: 80%
Ethereal: 80%
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Another interesting thing was that he still had the Basic Elemental Shielding artifact in his inventory, which he had earned back in the Maze of Torment dungeon. This artifact increased his Fire, Frost, Shock, and Poison resistances by 20%. Since each of those resistances was already at 80%, they should have been increased all the way to 100%.
But that didn’t happen. He also couldn’t purchase any more resistance upgrades in the Void Temple. All of that meant he probably wasn’t allowed to increase his resistances beyond the 80% mark. It was likely the highest threshold they could reach.
Even so, it was still quite impressive. Now that each of his resistances had been increased to the maximum possible value, he no longer needed to worry about them. He was now well protected against every type of damage, which was great.
Since the Basic Elemental Shielding artifact was no longer needed, he sold it at the Void Temple, earning a bit more essence points. However, he didn’t acquire any new runes or spells yet, having decided to take a closer look at them at a later time.
Sure enough, before leaving the Void Temple, he removed all the curses he’d placed on himself earlier.
The other thing Jake had accomplished during the past several days was evolving the Saurian Prowler two more times, from Rank II to Rank IV. Thanks to that, the Kaiju had gained two more special abilities. One of them was Gravity Leap and the other was Drill Gauntlets. Both abilities were identical to his own, and Jake believed they suited the Saurian beast well.
During one of the two recent evolution cycles, he had also applied the genetic material harvested from the insectoid Titan, making Void Siphon much more powerful and effective. Now his Kaiju had only one more rank to reach.
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Name: Saurian Prowler
Type: Reptile
Rank: IV
Special Abilities: Transfer Maw, Void Siphon, Gravity Leap, Drill Gauntlets
XP: 321,880 / 795,525
HP: 3,665,550 / 3,665,550
MP: 2,750,125 / 2,750,125
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Jake had also evolved both the Apex Hollow and the ten-story lair to the final Rank X. Upgrading a lair to Rank IX unlocked two more structures to build: Vein Rift and Infestation Pit. However, evolving it to the final Rank X unlocked only a single structure called Fleshy Egg.
So he could now build three new structures, but so far, he hadn’t gotten around to checking them out yet, so he didn’t know what purpose they served. Still, he had a feeling that whatever Fleshy Egg was, it had to be awesome and overpowered, considering it was the lone structure unlocked at the final level of evolution for his lairs.
The reason he evolved his lairs to the final rank was that it was a requirement for evolving from Stage III to Stage IV. So now he was finally able to initiate the evolution process.
At that moment, he was in the Apex Hollow. The Saurian Prowler was in Dead City, still hunting down ravagespawn and gaining XP. The rest of his creatures were carrying out their respective duties as well. He took a quick glance around the lair, then closed his eyes and initiated the evolution process.
His body began to change. The changes were subtle, and the whole process took only a few seconds. When it was finished, a flood of information appeared in his mind.
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You have successfully evolved into Stage IV: “Damage Master”.
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Each of your attributes has received 100 points:
Body has gone up from 315 to 415;
Mind has gone up from 404 to 504;
Magick has gone up from 350 to 450.
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The Evolution Stage IV: “Damage Master” section has been unlocked in the Genetic Development Interface.
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You have received 1,750,000 XP.
You have gained enough XP to level up. Your level went up from 202 to 205. You have gained 15 SP.
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Just as before, he allocated the freshly earned points to Mind, increasing it from 504 to 519. He then checked his stats.
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Name: Jake Turner
Race: Ex-Human Morphus
Evolution Stage IV: “Damage Master”
Level: 205
XP: 32,125 / 375,150
HP: 515,000 / 515,000
MP: 550,000 / 550,000
Shield Integrity: 0 / 175,000
CP: 797
SP: 0
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Body: 415
Mind: 519
Magick: 450
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Chainsaw Arms: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 4 of 5) (Epic)
Drill Gauntlets: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 4 of 5) (Epic)
Grappling Hook Arm: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 4 of 5) (Epic)
Rotary Blade Launcher: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 4 of 5) (Epic)
Cinch Net Blaster: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 3 of 6) (Legendary)
Ground Strike: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 2 of 5) (Epic)
Shardflare: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 2 of 5) (Epic)
Restoration: Rank V (MAX) (Upgrades: 1 of 5) (Epic)
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During the past several days, he had also advanced every one of his abilities and skills to the final Rank V, even Restoration. However, he hadn’t acquired any new upgrades for them yet.
His Command Points now sat at 797. His total working units, such as arachnoxes, managatherers, and wyrmcallers, accounted for about 300 CP. All his combat units took about 150 CP, as it wasn’t an especially large force by any means. It consisted of 15 crawlers, 15 wingclaws, and numerous wasps and blastfiends. The Saurian Prowler alone cost 100 CP. That left him with roughly 247 CP that he could use to create more monsters or an additional Kaiju if needed, which wasn’t too bad. Still, it could hardly be considered a formidable force by any means yet.
He then checked the Genetic Development Interface. First, he looked at the third section, paying attention only to the remaining skills.
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Evolution Stage III: “Apex Manifestation: Corruptor”
Abilities: 8 of 8
Skills: 1 of 4
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Skill: Rigging
Requirements: Body 140, Mind 230, Magick 215, Enhanced Intelligence (Rank V)
Cost: 90,000 MP
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Skill: Foresight
Requirements: Body 265, Mind 235, Magick 310, Enhanced Intelligence (Rank V), Feral Instincts (Rank V)
Cost: 140,000 MP
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Skill: Psychic
Requirements: Body 290, Mind 350, Magick 325, Enhanced Intelligence (Rank V), Mind Reader (Rank V)
Cost: 175,000 MP
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He preferred to acquire and max out every skill before evolving to the next stage, but he had made an exception this time in order to grow more powerful. Now that his attributes were increased by 100 points, he could acquire all three remaining skills from the third section as soon as he leveled up again.
He then checked out the fourth section of the Genetic Development Interface that had just been unlocked.
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Evolution Stage IV: “Damage Master”
Abilities: 0 of 5
Skills: 0 of 1
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Ability: Internal Storage
Requirements: Body 420, Mind 520, Magick 455
Cost: 125,000 MP
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Ability: Spiteful Roots
Requirements: Body 425, Mind 525, Magick 460, Internal Storage
Cost: 125,000 MP
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Ability: Vengeful Branches
Requirements: Body 430, Mind 530, Magick 465, Internal Storage
Cost: 125,000 MP
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Ability: Malicious Bugs
Requirements: Body 435, Mind 535, Magick 470, Internal Storage
Cost: 125,000 MP
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Ability: Deadly Duplicate
Requirements: Body 440, Mind 545, Magick 475, Internal Storage
Cost: 125,000 MP
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Skill: Mental Intruder
Requirements: Body 420, Mind 535, Magick 460, Mind Reader (Rank V)
Cost: 120,000 MP
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So he had a bunch of new abilities to learn, which was awesome. He couldn’t wait to unlock them. As he studied the list, one detail stood out. Spiteful Roots, Vengeful Branches, Malicious Bugs, and Deadly Duplicate all required Internal Storage, which was the very first ability on the list. Apparently, they couldn’t function without it, so he would have to learn it first.
However, he decided not to check the descriptions of those abilities just yet, as he couldn’t acquire any of them at the moment anyway. So he opened his eyes, and all the information vanished. He took another look around his lair, then stepped into the Fleshport to teleport back to Dead City.