The warriors that were stationed in Astros heard about Souta's news. They visited him and Souta talked to them for a while. He inquired about happenings around the continent to get a bigger picture of the whole situation. He also learned that he was being called back to the Champion's Den.
It wasn't an immediate call since the higher-ups knew that he was heavily injured from the battle. They just wanted him to go back and report. Also, they have an important announcement.
"Before I go to Champion's Den, I need to visit Eilish."
Souta muttered. Gragas said that something occurred in the war against the tribes from Earthen Woods. She refused to tell anyone about it.
He sighed and glanced at his palm. He was stronger compared to before. He was taking it step by step, building his foundation solid. He had great combat arts and spells that could give him various options in battle.
His equipment was high grade too. There's nothing he could complain about.
[Soul Blood Earring] and [Yin-Yang Unification] were his two universal grade artifacts.
[Vajra Sword Saya], [Solid Hunter State Boots], [Burning Ring Seal], [Goblet of the Night], and [Darkness Hourglass] were his five dark grade artifacts. Two of these came from Alexander.
His equipment alone gave him an advantage over an opponent of the same level. He was level 72 right now so he could be considered a high fourth stage monster. Plus, he already advanced his class to Rank 1 Great Battle Mage - Dual Wielder. This gives him strength beyond any of the peak fourth stages.
Fighting No God Emperor damaged his body greatly but it also increased his strength. Some of his skills had leveled up throughout the entire battle.
Souta was sure that he could fight an expert at Four Shackles Realm. He would be able to defeat them in a one-on-one fight with some difficulty. Yep, he saw Draymond, Governor Ray, Grain Leader Ibis, and Grain Leader Carmel's strength so he was sure that he could defeat them. Draymond, the weakest among them, would give him slight trouble.
If he could use his Archetype which would give him a huge boost, Souta would have no problem in fighting them in a one-on-one battle. He could even fight them in one versus four battles but he wasn't sure if he could defeat four of them at the same time. But in one-on-one, he would dismantle any of them using Archetype.
In short, his strength was beyond Four Shackles but below Fifth Shackles. His power was closer to the Fifth than the Fourth so he could clash with the weakest Fifth Shackles for a few rounds.
Souta glanced at the system. He was level 72, the rewards from clearing the final quest of the Chain Quest gave him enough experience points to level up by one so he was level 72. When he was fighting Draymong and No God Emperor back then he was only level 71.
[Congratulations on completing the Quest "Awakening"]
[You've received 100,000,000 experience points, 25 free attribute points, and 15 skill points]
[Congratulations on completing the Chain Quest 'Unprecedented Child']
[You've received a Grade A- score!]
[You've received 50,000,000 experience points, 30 skill points, 60 free attribute points, 1 Level-up card, 3 Skill level-up cards, the Title "Vanquisher of the Lord", and Emperor's Blessing Card!]
Souta then focused his attention on his skill points. At this moment, he had a total of 48 skill points. This would greatly enhance his power.
Hmm...?
Souta suddenly recalled his dream. The dream where he was fighting himself and that person said that he shouldn't rely on Imperium's support as it would disappear when he had grown.
Imperium's support...?
He didn't know why but when he heard it the first thing that came into his mind was the system. Perhaps, it was really right since he didn't know the origin of the system. The Imperium maybe gave this power to him so that he could adjust himself in this new world.
Souta shook his head. For now, he would use what's available to him. He couldn't be picky with the current situation.
He glanced at his skill set.
Spell(s):
Tier 1: [Light Heal], [Ice Shot], [Fire Ball], [Mud Slide], [Agility Boost], [Strength Boost], [Shadow Spike], [Shadow Bind] Level 10, [Shadow Ball] Level 10
Tier 2: [Gravitational Ball] Level 10, [Dark Cloud Hunting] Level 10, [Dark Shooting Ray], [Doppelganger] Level 10, [Shadow Damager] Level 10
Most of his Tier 2 Spells were level 10 except for the [Dark Shooting Ray]. After upgrading his class to Great Battle Mage, their effects had reached a higher realm.
As for his skills...
Skill(s): [Dash] Level 10, [Stab] Level 10, [Cat's Speed] Level 10, [Air Walk] Level 9, [Triple Muscle Strengthening] Level 10, [Shadow Cloak] Level 10, [Shadow Step] Level 8, [Crimson Moon] Level 10, [Cross Moon] Level 10, [Transforming Shadow Barrage] Level 4, [Night Overlord's Aura] Level 10, [Dark Menace] Level 10
Auxiliary: [Weapon Master], [Divine Dark Circulation], [Divine Light Circulation], [Energy Manipulation] Level 7
Most of his combat arts had higher levels than spells. After all, combat arts could be trained in battle while spells needed to learn the structure and build the magic circle. If he wanted to level up his spells manually, Souta needed to change the magic circle that was in his inner consciousness. It was hard since the effect could damage his inner consciousness. So before changing the magic circle, he needed to build a magic circle outside and learned to tweak it. Only high-level mages could achieve it.
For now, Souta was still an amateur mage. Even Saya wasn't a master mage so he was relying on Eilish in learning magic circles. In the entire Astros, no one could match Eilish in terms of mage skills. She was unrivaled in this aspect.
Souta smiled and opened the skill tree. After upgrading his class, he finally unlocked the top skills in his class. Some of them were still locked since he needed to unlock the skills below first. But all of them were top-tier skills.
[Black Hole], [Void Shield], [Darkness Section], and [Negative Land] were four available spells in the upper section of his skill tree. These three spells were all Tier 3 Spells.
[Void Plasma], [Investiture of the Dark],[Void Disappearing Step], and [Darkness Bite] were all the combat arts available. These combat arts were all high-level that could rival or potentially rival Tier 3 Spells.
Great Battle Mage was a Tier 3 Class and it was the highest state of class that one could achieve in the game. Promoting this class was different from before since it needed four skills; two combat arts and two spells.
But Souta already had skills in his mind a long time ago. He didn't need to think through this so he hurriedly used skills points to learn four skills that he had chosen.
[Congratulations you've learned Black Hole!]
[Congratulations you've learned Negative Land!]
[Congratulations you've learned Investiture of the Dark!]
[Congratulations you've learned Darkness Bite!]
4 skill points had disappeared in an instant. Souta then leveled up [Investiture of the Dark] to level 6. 20 skill points were used to level up this skill. Then, he used 2 Skill Level-up cards to increase its level once again.
[Investiture of the Dark] Level 8
Souta still had 24 skill points left. He used 20 skill points again but this time he used it to level up [Negative Land] to level 6, leaving his 4 skill points.
He glanced at his remaining Skill Level-up cards.
Skill Level-up cards: 3
He rarely used this card since he focused his attention on unlocking the Cosmic Body Parts first. These cards were from his previous chain quests back in the sub-world.
Two cards had disappeared once again.
[Negative Land] Level 8
Two of his newest skills had reached level 8 and it was a great boost in his strength.
[Investiture of the Dark] was an extremely powerful combat art. It was a boost-type skill that would enhance his body but it was mainly focused on boosting his other dark enhancing combat arts such as [Shadow Cloak], [Dark Menace], or [Night Overlord's Aura]. Their effects would receive an enhancement of twenty percent and it could be stacked up to four stacks. The stacks would disappear after leaving the battlefield for one minute.
Each level increased the stack limit by one. So at level 8, the stack limit was eleven.
It was good since each stack could increase the effect of dark combat arts by twenty percent.
[Investiture of the Dark]: A skill created by a Dark God forty thousand years ago. It can enhance all the dark attribute combat arts. It was created by trying to copy the effect of Element Drive.
Trying to copy the Element Drive. Although it was a failed product, the effect of the skill was still great. Element Drive could enhance the stats, elemental control, combat arts, and spells to a higher level. While [Investiture of the Dark] could only boost combat arts and stats.
The good thing about this was that he could use this skill on top of Element Drive.
