Copying out the combat manuals was much easier now that Cain had some skill in the inscription field. No more taking days to copy the hard parts, like what happened to him with the Dark Elven Combat style books. Instead, he just had to copy them carefully and they were completed on either the first or second try.
Which was a relief, because they were the entry-level texts to dozens of different martial combat styles used by human cultivators, magical warriors, and War Mages.
Evangeline brought in lunch, as well as Luna and Laura, just as Cain was finishing the last one, and the Librarian followed soon after, to check over Cain's work.
"It looks like you have all the basics down now, so if you've got everything that you need in your inventory, you should be safe to complete the quest now and see what happens." The former Puppet informed him.
"Well, that's good news, but we can't be doing that on an empty stomach, so why don't you come and join us for lunch?" Cain offered.
The Librarian had packed up a small collection of books for him, all copies of the original texts so that nothing could get lost due to translation errors from the original Ancient Language if someone needed a new copy. She had packed child care books, advanced Rune Crafting, Part 2 of the Spell Crafting book, and an "Animals of the Human Worlds" book that Cain assumed was to help him tell monsters from wild animals, and know what belonged on a human-controlled world and what didn't.
He was starting to see that the Human World might be a bit boring. They were limited in species diversity, there were no beastkin to pet, and, they didn't have any of the high technology of his past life, at least not according to what could be seen through the portal.
"I know, humans are everywhere, but aren't those limits a bit too narrow? I mean seriously, the scan says there is only one Lycan pack on the planet, and it's on the far side of the world from the Portal, the rest is all humans and Magical Beasts." Cain complained, making the Librarian laugh.
"Not every world is like this one, you should remember that. The last world you were born into didn't even have magical beasts, just wild animals, and humans, and still, the humans managed to entertain themselves." She pointed out.
"By making technology for entertainment. I swear, the species must have been on the brink of dying of boredom without anything to do until they introduced better entertainment. If I recall right, they even started out by having mundane humans fight wild animals to the death just to quell their boredom." Cain replied sadly.
"I'm sure it won't be that bad, plus we found cultivation sects. If nothing else you can join one of them and have regular fights every day just to keep yourself entertained." The Elf joked.
When lunch finished, their whole eclectic group headed for the valley center to the Portal just in case something went crazy when Cain finished the quest.
[System, Complete Quest] Cain thought as soon as they arrived, not wanting to drag out the suspense.
[Generating Quest Rewards]
[Bonus XP granted]
[Cain has gained an item] Blade of the Heron
[Random Reward waiting, collect now?] Y/N
"Yes"
Cain was brought to the familiar sight of the enormous wheel with the prize slots all over it, only this one was a bit different. Most of the prizes seemed to be human-related, and not-so-obvious magical items.
"Pills? System, I'm not an addict, what on earth would I need so many selections of Pills for?" Cain muttered, and for once actually got a reply.
[Progression from Spirit Rank to Immortal Rank requires activation of a Core of sufficient quality.]
"So you're saying that I need to do like the humans we captured and cultivate a core if I want to become a true Immortal?"
[Correct]
"And I'm not going to have the chance to do that here, on this planet, where it would be done with Mana instead of pills and those Cultivation Techniques that I learned from the Librarian, am I?"
[...]
"Yeah, I sort of thought that might be the case. Alright, let's get this wheel spinning." Cain announced in his own mind, then grabbed the wheel and gave it a whirl.
The wheel raced around in circles as all the assembled Avatars received the notification that they too could complete their quests and receive their random rewards.
The first to complete was Luna, who saw a shiny spell book and only gave her wheel a tiny spin, hoping for the good stuff. It still spun a full three times around, startling the young Lamia, but as it slowed, with her desperately hanging off it to try to force the random result she wanted, it came to rest on a very different spell book.
[Luna has received a book of Inspiring Presence] Spirit Rank, range 1km per level. Inspires allied sentient beings into following the User. Increases likelihood of devotion to User's cause by 0.1 Percent per level.
The book wasn't as shiny as the first one she was after, but the ability looked pretty good to her. She wondered if she could make a copy of some sort as well because Neffie would absolutely love this ability.
[New Skill Learned] Beginning Spirit Awakening
"Dangblastit, it used the book right away, I wanted a copy first." She complained as she returned to the real world.
"What did it give you?" The Librarian asked, seeing that everyone else was still in their rewards interface.
"A Spirit Rank Inspiring Presence skill. It says I can convince my friends to do fun stuff, and the chance gets better as I go up in level." Luna explained.
The Librarian thought about that for a while. They had assumed that Luna was the War Avatar since the other seemed to be taken, but what if she was the Avatar of something else entirely? She didn't seem very warlike. But then, a Charismatic Leader, with the ability to convince an entire nation at a time to follow them in any sort of endeavor. Wasn't that how most large-scale wars started?
Every species had a version of the same saying "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
"That's a very useful skill, Luna. I'll bet your friends will be happy when you use it to convince everyone to get along and do fun things together." The Librarian assured her, wondering if she could steer the little demon away from an Obsession with War.
"Thanks, that means a lot from you, since you know pretty much everything with all these books. I finished the ones on Rune Crafting already, and I think I've pretty much got them down, but it seems a bit harder for me than it does for Cain, and I can't figure out what I'm missing." Luna complained.
"That's because you're only half Ancient. He does it naturally, but you're more in tune with the world, so it is harder for you to break the normal rules that the System uses and create items using Runes." The Librarian informed her.
"See, you're really smart. When I get a chance I'm totally having you explain these new class options to me, now that I've reached level two hundred." Luna declared.
The bonus experience from the quest had brought her to level 201, and when she came back she got the option to change classes, but put it on hold, so that she could celebrate with everyone else, only to find that they still weren't finished.
"Take all the skills from your current skill tree first. You don't want to miss out on any of the good things just because you got in a hurry." The Librarian realized that the Lamia had skipped almost an entire progression without doing anything with her class, thanks to the increased Mana levels in the world forcing her evolution, so there would be a LOT of points left over.
"See, you know all the things. There, all done. And I get new summon options, and these are some good ones too, I can summon Ancient Quality things now. Oh, and it says I have more new class options. But we can do those tonight when there is more time." Luna whispered to the Elf, not wanting to disturb everyone else's progress.
The other Avatars all returned at the same time with big smiles on their faces.
"I got a Spirit Rank item and a new Mythic Spell," Jin informed the group.
"Yep, same here." Jessica and Kone agreed at the same time.
"You guys got an item? I feel slighted now. But I got a Spirit Rank spell." Luna informed them.
That made everyone look at the portal, but nothing seemed to have happened so far, so Luna's Spirit Awakening wasn't enough to cause any problems between the two realms' balance.
The last one to finish was Cain though, and the sense that things were about to get very interesting sent shivers down the spines of everyone in the city.
