Ebony's Fable

Elcra consists of 2 continents, Elva and Tova. Separated by a vast sea, Fissure. With a couple of islands in between them.

Elva had one and only one ruling power in the form of the Empire. The Empire of Ebbing Waves had Beastmen, Dwarves, Elves and Humans coexisting in their cities, towns and villages. Obviously, it hasn't always been the case.

When Elva was still split amongst the races they waged wars against each other for breakfast and backstabbed each other for dinner. Each race had their own strength to stand for themselves.

Beastman had strong warriors with strong regenerative powers.

Dwarves were great craftsmen and their weapons and armour shined more than their warriors yet their warriors are equally strong in terms of physical strength. Perhaps even stronger than the beastmen when it came to pure strength.

Elves were magical powerhouses that brought devastation to battlefields with their magic. There were just a lot fewer of them but it mattered not when they tend to outlive the other races. They didn’t like the Dwarves and neither did the Dwarves like them. The beastmen didn’t like anyone and waged wars even amongst themselves, between the same subspecies or not.

Humans were mediocre but numerous. What irks the other races was their cunning minds and the fact that at any point in time there were always a handful that were much more powerful than their peers. Unlike the other races more attuned towards certain magic, humans had the widest range of types of magic as well, giving them variety.

That was a point in history where no one had a single day with a modicum of safety. Monster hordes or even solo monsters easily wipe a village or town off the map. A dungeon break was a natural disaster that no one managed to control.

Yet that wasn’t all. One day, the indigenous race of Trolls from Tova found a way to cross the vast Fissure Sea and laid waste to Elva with their almost undying bodies that put the beastmens to shame. Whether they cut their heads off or smashed their bodies to a pulp with earth magic it didn’t matter and the trolls would have their bodies regenerated in the matter of hours or even minutes depending on the relative strength of the trolls themselves. They exhibited weak control of water and earth magic and were mostly physical fighters.

They are cruel predators looking to eat anyone they defeated in battle. Elva managed to fend off the first wave of trolls with many casualties only because of the small group sent. Yet, it was only so as the first group was a scouting party.

Wave after wave, the numbers of trolls coming increased.

Elva stood no chance while divided, so the cunning humans proposed to combine their strength. Dwarves would make weapons and armours, beastmen their warriors and Elves their mages. So what did the humans do? They took command with their cunning to push the Trolls back?

Of course not.

None of the races could stand being ordered around by the one they thought to be the weakest race. Yet even their pride couldn’t survive long enough. The wars amongst themselves gradually stopped as they received more attacks from the Trolls, pointing their blades towards Tova instead.

It wasn’t enough.

More and more died and some of the other races proposed to combine their forces again. They tried. But discrimination against each other was too strong, their pride fought back. Ultimately, their pride meant absolutely nothing to the trolls and overwhelming power.

War evolved into an invasion.

The people of that time, fighters or not didn’t see much hope in defending themselves against the trolls anymore. They didn’t think of being subordinates of the trolls either since the trolls just ate any who went to submit themselves to them.

At one of the darkest periods of the history of Elva, a certain group of humans that looked a little different than normal human residents of Elva showed themselves. They showed themselves in eastern Elva and were pretty far from the battlefront. They didn’t propose cooperation this time nor did they start protecting the people of Elva from the trolls.

They declared complete domination of Elva. Not war but domination. There hadn’t been many internal wars on Elva for a long time with the threat of the trolls, dungeon breaks and monster horde looming on them every second of the day.

Obviously, people didn’t take them seriously. A group of hundred or so slightly different looking humans didn’t matter much to them on the scale of things. They were proven wrong fast. And hard.

It hardly took this small group 10 years to bring the entire continent to listen to their words. Every single one of them split up into even smaller groups, each going in different directions.

Every group conquered and suppressed entire cities and kingdoms a few times a day. It was just a matter of time for them to cross the distance of the continent. The main kingdoms of every single race toppled like dominoes to this group of people that were referred to as the Eastern Barbarians.

The Eastern Barbarians didn’t destroy the armies or kill any of the other races’ strongest warriors. They went around challenging every single person who wanted to fight them and suppressed them without killing many.

When their domination was complete they implemented many changes. They reorganised all the armies or different races but none disrespected them and obliged their words like a wish that they must fulfil.

It took time for changes to actually see results but slowly they began to push the trolls back for the first time. The Eastern Barbarians themselves rarely come out to fight the trolls. They had one leader they called Empress and her words were ‘Fight your battles yourselves, trash.’

And then they did. Other than the major changes they implemented the Eastern Barbarians left and returned to their home, uncaring for their claim of domination. The change they implemented didn’t revert and the races got friendly to each other in the span of a few centuries under the roof of the Empire. A few centuries was a very short time for races to reduce their discrimination against each other. Especially for the older generation, grudges ran deep.

When people asked the Eastern Barbarians why they didn’t rule the Empire the replies they got were along the lines of; ‘not worth the effort’ or ‘what’s the point of ruling a bunch of weaklings?’ The only thing their Empress graced them with was a name for the Empire which was Ebbing Waves. Hoping that every generation would ebb and be stronger and better than the last.

Today, the races truly coexisted in the Empire of Ebbing Waves. Only small tribes like the Frost Elves remained in small tribal villages. They weren’t shunned and neither did they shun others which was quite a long way Elva had come regarding racial discrimination. This happened many thousand years ago.

The ruling structure was more…structured than what Ebony thought a medieval fantasy world would have.

Firstly, they had the king. Chosen and voted for amongst the nobles from the 4 Archdukes. There was only 1 Archduke for Humans, Dwarves, Elves and Beastmen each. So the Empire would usually have 3 archduke families and 1 royal family at a time.

The current royal family was human, the Lord household. Navin Lord the Barrier King. Yvette Lord the Life Queen.

Chosen for the immense contribution to the Empire making them stronger. Protecting cities and towns with their barriers and saving too many lifes to count.

Below the archdukes were the dukes and duchesses, Marquis and Marchioness, Earl and Countess, Viscount and Viscountess and finally Barons And Baroness. Pretty standard to Ebony so far, the thing he was surprised about was that there was more law and order than he thought. Especially after seeing the escort party kill those bandits as if it was a natural thing.

Apparently, any commoner family could gain nobility as long as they meet some conditions. A tier 2 skill lineage and challenging a noble family to a duel to take their place. As simple as that. A tier 2 skill lineage basically means they would have to prove that their tier 2 skill is somewhat unique to their family and can be taught and handed down in their family. Dukes and above required tier 3 skill lineages, some even had more than 1 tier 3 lineage skill.

This lineage thing was also what cemented the nobles’ power. People who got their Classes from a tier 2 skill or higher were almost always better at the things they do. Excluding the number of skills required for the said Class of course.

As for tier 3 skills, it would be redundant as Classless could never learn them before their life runs dry. They would only learn their families tier 3 skill after their Classing and decades of training. They might not even be able to learn it before evolving to Master or higher if their talent was insufficient.

It was quite common for nobles to pick the skill handed down in their family as their Core Skill. After many generations, their lineage skill only gets better and better after being refined by every generation.

Then there was the one known as the Emperor or Empress for some reasons even though the king and/or queen was the one who was ruling the Empire.

The Emperor is merely a title given to the strongest known person on Elva. The current Emperor, Oplot Qoriq was said to be invincible, impenetrable and all that crap about being almighty. Oplot was personally the leader of the Guardian Knights of the Empire which was honestly a little weird to Ebony.

Calling the leader of a knight army under the Empire, Emperor who was under the King just seems silly but Clovis clarified that the Guardian Knights were a school the Emperor opened to train guardian knights and they were not directly serving the empire. Though the funny thing was the guardian knights always fought together with Empire armies if there were any monster hordes or dungeon breaks.

The last attack from Tova was almost a century ago when Oplot stood out to fight and be announced Emperor soon after repelling them. Oplot was a guardian knight that has not been seen using his shield. He never needed to.

Trolls’ immense physical strength could not harm a single hair on his body. Magical or physical, Oplot had never been seen being damaged or hurt by anything. It was also largely unknown how he deals damage as he doesn’t carry weapons but seems to be able to use every known magic like its natural.

The Eastern Barbarians that Ebony had long heard of from Gen himself did not go forgotten in history. Ebony held no grudge against them, even Gen didn't seem to. Ebony knew it was only natural for the strong to seek the stronger, he himself just wasn’t at that stage yet.

The Eastern Barbarians grew and expanded into the current city of Xienor. They didn’t care at first but being called barbarians for long enough started to piss them off so they clarified that they were to be referred to as Xengs. Nowadays, there were not as reclusive as they used to be and some Xengs could be seen from time to time travelling the continent.

The greatsword he carried around was also made by them. They had the strongest swordsmen, strongest mages, and maybe even the best craftsmen were Xengs.

After learning all this did Ebony understand why the Empire didn’t conquer the Xengs, because they were the ones that had been conquered. The Empress title was also probably made for them as a form of respect and deference to them.

Religion on Elva was pretty practical. They revered actual people and not some concept or form of a higher being like gods and goddesses though some believe in them too it was not the same kind of reverence.

The Sovereign Temple of Heroes was an enormous temple with not just the statues of all the previous Empresses and Emperors but also great heroes throughout history like the Life Queen and Barrier King both making the cut as well.

A large majority of the people in the Sovereign Temple were Empresses. Almost every past Empress was a Xeng, the only few times like the current generation was because they were either low key or the previous Empress handed over to a young Empress that hasn’t grown strong enough yet. Apparently strong Xengs tend to be women and were nonsensically strong for their level while their men were better craftsmen than they were warriors in general but it wasn’t always the case.

Each Sovereign had their own titles. Oplot the Indestructible, Life Queen, Barrier King for example. They built the temple for the first Empress of Xengs at first and revered her as the First Empress as no one knew her name and it hasn’t been written down in any book.

Yet, the first thing she did when she found out was to obliterate every temple, every mention and every city or town that called her that. No one had seen the Xengs or Eastern Barbarians with such wrath, wrath that the Empire was not able to handle. She was then known as the Cruel Empress. The Cruel Empress was pleased with the title and left it at that, giving them silent consent to build whatever statues they want.

Each city or town are generally patrons to one of the Sovereigns and their temple would only hold 1 or 2 statues unlike the main temple in the Capital city. While the Cruel Empress had her firm believers, the most widespread today was the Life Queen. Plainston was also one of the towns that were patrons to the Life Queen.

❅❅❅

They continued on their way after a meal of bison stew. Ebony didn’t stop training his skills and testing different things with his magic for the next 2 days till the town came into view. He made surprising progress in creating new skills and he even got sound magic.

Mana Vibration - Ability to vibrate mana in such a way to produce sound. Ability to manipulate vibrations to produce desired sounds increases slightly per level.

Classification: Sound Magic

There was no Sound Mana Manipulation as far as they knew and thankfully it fell under generic skills and not his Mana Meister Profession so he had the choice of it being one of the skills for the requirement under a Sub-Class. Ebony guessed that it was because it was classified as sound magic and not a pure mana manipulation skill. He actually got the skill together with another skill which mutated, Humming.

Battle Hum - Inducing mana vibrations into your hum of musical melodies producing minor effects of increased stat of 0.01% of Intelligence depending on melody per level.

Consumes 10MP/Min

Classification: Sound Magic

This was a skill that was pretty out there and something Ebony didn’t aim to get. He suddenly thought of pushing mana to go along with the vibration of his throat and when he hummed tsuna awakens. The buff was pathetically unnoticeable but found out that he could get a Strength, Agility or even Intelligence buff depending on what kind of tune he hummed.

Honestly the biggest waste of mana with the almost non-existent buff but Ebony believed it’ll stack up sooner or later. He found that he could extend the effect to anyone in his range for a slightly more than 10MP/Min cost based on range and number of targets.

He would need to manipulate the mana though so it would take one of his casts if he were to extend it to someone else. Pretty pointless to do so now.

The worse thing was that if Ebony wanted to use Battle Hum properly in a fight he had to control his breath such that it didn't affect his humming. Despite Ebony's almost wondrous control with his breathing to slow his own heartbeat and be more stamina efficient he found it too difficult if the fight was physically demanding.

It was impractical so he just trained it during normal humming for now. As long as he doesn’t incorporate mana into it he could still hum normally but why would he not. He had mana to spare.

He got the perception skill he wanted together with another skill that was about discharging ice mana into his surroundings to freeze or slow his opponents. They merged when he got both of them into a skill called Frost Mist Perception Sphere.

Frost Mist Perception Sphere - Release Ice Elemental Mana into your surroundings in a sphere with you at the centre. Has the effect of 10% + 1.0% Intelligence. Perceiving the absence of Ice Mana gives you another form of sight. Has the effect of 10% + 1.0% of Perception and 100% of Mana Perception.

Consumes 100 MP/Min

Classification: Ice Magic

The mana consumption was due to ice mana melting from the heat and he had to keep it up. The skill also took into account his range of 5 metres, he could reduce the range to reduce mana consumption. The further he pushed the mana to, the more mana it would take in an increasing fashion due to the volume of mana needed increasing exponentially.

The skill causes a thin white mist or fog to surround him like when one opens a freezer. The effect it has on slowing or freezing others is pretty small and so was his ‘sight’ but it has an additional effect of affecting other’s sight. Including himself, so he will have to level the skill quite a bit if he doesn’t want it to be more detrimental for himself.

Well, the white mist isn’t so thick that it affects sight much so the effect is not so apparent. Not unless he releases a whole chunk of compressed mana.

Ebony was a little surprised when he got the choice whether he wanted to let his skill mutate or get a new skill.

Ice Sword - Conjure a sword of Ice, has the effect of 80% + 1.0% Intelligence.

Consumes 250MP/Sword

Classification: Ice Magic

He received the choice of letting Ice Spike mutate or just having Ice Sword take one of his skill slots. Ebony asked the others their opinions and why this happens. Ice Sword was just changing Ice Spikes size and shape.

The reason for the choice was the significant increase in mana consumption. If he were to mutate it, when he wanted to create an Ice Spike with less mana he would no longer get the 30 + whatever percentage buff with the same amount of mana. Letting it take another skill slot lets him keep both skills separately.

Ebony chose to mutate it in the end. Even if he wouldn’t be able to sustain the mana consumption now he would sooner or later, or so he believes. The thing about Ice Sword was that he doesn’t have to fling it as a projectile to use it effectively, though he can do that too. It was inspired by Rowent’s spear, though Rowent used it the way he does to save mana. Class Skill slots were limited and he wanted to keep them free if he ever learnt a stronger skill in future.

He checked his status to see how far he’s come.

Name: Ebony Rime

Core Skill: Deep Persistent Meditation Lvl 95

Class: Meditative Swordsman of Frostblaze - Lvl 36

Class Skills:

Treading Step Lvl 53

Ice Mana Manipulation Lvl 55

Icebody Enhancement Lvl 65

Single-handed Greatsword Mastery Lvl 50

Frost Injection Lvl 32

Ice Sword Lvl 32

Two-handed Power Stab Lvl 26

Layered Ice Carapace Lvl 20

Frost Mist Perception Sphere Lvl 2

Empty Skill Slot

Empty Skill Slot

Empty Skill Slot

Empty Skill Slot

Empty Skill Slot

Empty Skill Slot

Sub-Class: N/A

Profession: Mana Meister - Lvl 17

Profession Skills:

Mana Moulding Lvl 38

Sheer Mana Compression Lvl 59

Mana Perception Lvl 12

Empty Skill Slot

Empty Skill Slot

Health: 242/250

Stamina: 500/500

Mana: 990/1320

Unallocated stat points: 30

Strength: 20

Vitality: 25

Constitution: 70

Endurance: 50

Agility: 35

Intelligence: 46

Wisdom: 132

Perception: 25

Generic Skills:

Stealth Lvl 6

Identify Lvl 12

Sheer Cold Resistance Lvl 28

Running Lvl 29

Battle Hum Lvl 26

Mental Mapping Lvl 7

Kicking Mastery Lvl 33

English Lvl 8

Elcrian Lvl 6

Mental Arithmetic Lvl 8

Dish Washing Lvl 8

Physical Conditioning Lvl 4

Magical Conditioning Lvl 4

Peak Performance Lvl 32

Tracking Lvl 5

Game Processing Lvl 10

Heat Resistance Lvl 11

Mana Vibration Lvl 3

His Core Skill was as per usual on drugs and levels with time. His Class skills saw more development in the magic department. Especially Icebody Enhancement, Frost Injection and Layered Ice Carapace.

His Profession also stood to gain experience when he uses compressed mana in battle. He focused more on Sheer Mana Compression for an increase in combat capability.

Mana Perception was getting useful to train together with his Frost Mist Perception Sphere since the skill was also dependent on Mana Perception. The 7 levels gained in Mana Meister gave 7 points in Wisdom and Ebony was stuck on where to add the 30 stat points so he had been keeping it undecided.

He was mostly healed up from the Cysaru’s attack and no longer had his movements affected.

Mana Injection or imbuing ice mana into himself without circulating it was a new method Ebony used to train Sheer Cold Resistance which he figured he could do when freezing Obsius. Ebony was a Meditative Swordsman of Frostblaze without any skills relating to the combusting flames due to the outrageous mana required that Ebony currently doesn’t have.

He got a prompt for a Sub-Class for Battle Hum reaching level 25 called the Bardic Amplifier. It obviously wasn’t what Ebony was looking for in a Sub-Class. His other generic skills improved here and there with Conditioning leveling once just last night.

Rowent being down without magic for some time slowed his Heat Resistance training, he also didn’t want to waste much mana in case of a fight.

According to the loudmouth Boom, there were other minor groups who wanted to raid them too but he called dibs on them. They followed them since they left the town, staying in Bubble hills and finding Obsius who didn’t attack them after some secret tricks they pulled.

The Z&Z Company kept the contents of their merchandise secret for a long time so, few are really sure what the goods on them were. Most assumed they were just ice type materials that they put out on sale after every trip to Arcta and that alone was pretty profitable.

They would long be dead if anyone with bad intentions found out about the Thoya’s robes. Even an escort party 10 times as strong wouldn’t be enough if that was the case.

“We’re almost there.”