THEOS

+ 4 Stat Points

Luke grinned at the notification and ripped his sword free from the Warrior-tier giants corpse. His chest heaved in exertion from the long battle. It never failed to surprise him just how much punishment the creatures could withstand, and not even the First Truth of Death had an easy solution for defeating them. Instead, it served to help him avoid hits, and land the most damaging attacks, while the monster's mana ebbed away and it was forced to heal itself over and over again. Death delivered by a thousand cuts.

He could kill one relatively easily if he relied on his higher tier weaponry, but watching it fall from the sky, hit the ground, and send a plume of dust into the air was a reward of his own. It also. made for good training on top of it all.

After all, in mere hours, he would be leaving Sylcra to participate in the Tournament. There, he wouldn’t have access to any tools, bar his trusty blade and whatever the Game Master saw fit to provide them during the course of the tournament.

Taking a moment to make sure none of his Mortal-tier charges were in any danger, he opened his Status, and split the points evenly between all his stats.

Status | Skills | Quests | Inventory

Name: Lukas King

Tier: Warrior

Bloodline: Eyes of Insight

Mana: 117 001 / 128 018

Rate: 17% per hour

Strength: 41 > 254

Agility: 43 > 256

Constitution: 77 > 506

Arcana: 84 > 506

Stat Points: 0

Charges: 7/10

Four points wasn't a lot in the grand scheme of things, but considering how rare Warrior-tier giants and monsters turned out to be outside the Northern Marshes, it might as well have been a windfall. One of convenience, more than anything else.

Killing hundreds of mortal giants was cathartic, in the rare occasions he was able to actually let loose on them, but also inefficient considering the time it took to go into battle, and kill each of them one by one with his blade. Sparring with other warriors on the other hand, tended to net both more stat points, and actually improved his skills.

Flying back towards the town’s walls, he sent his sword back into his storage ring, and watched bored as the mortals he was babysitting finished off the last of the giants assaulting the barrier. Briefly, he entertained joining them, before deciding against it. There weren’t enough of them left to even give him a single point, and the last time he had done so, Clite had given him a talking to. A tenth of a point wasn’t worth another one.

Something dumb about ‘stealing experience from juniors’, whatever that meant. Technically he was younger than all of them, but it wasn’t considered ‘proper’ for an Elder, or rather warrior, to overtly interfere in battles of the lower tier. Unless of course, their lives were in danger.

So, he just withdrew the Limitless Thunder Bow from his ring, and observed, while waiting for Clite to emerge from the city, where she was recharging the wardstone. Letting his thoughts wander as he did.

Like they often had over the past month, they drifted to his new Quest.

Status | Skills | Quests | Inventory

First and Second Place:

• Ensure Spiros of House Paris wins the Tournament of Olympus.
• Place Second in the Tournament

It was by far the weirdest and vaguest mission he had ever received, and the one that made him most nervous.

He didn’t know what it was about, and the more he thought about it, the more uncomfortable he got.

Whether it was getting his sword, escaping Carim, kicking Arke off the island, or killing the Rebel, every single one of them had benefited him in an obvious, and clear way.

They had made him safer, or they had made him stronger, sometimes both, and it had always been obvious how they did that. This was anything but.

If it was just finishing second place, I would understand. Maybe the prize is more suited to me or whatever. But, where the hell does Spiros fit into all this?

Obviously if he’s fighting in the Tournament, he made it out of the Tomb. It’s not even a stretch for him to make it to the Warrior-tier, if I’m being honest. If he cultivated manually, he could have done it pretty quick too. And joining the tournament itself isn’t a massive deal.

Emperors have a real, and tangible reason for sponsoring us, and I’m not shy enough to admit that both me and him have quite literally a killer Technique. Even with its limitations, it still stands head and shoulders above the others I’ve seen.

Hell, it let me kill a Hero- granted I had unlimited mana at the time, but still. Emperors would drool at a guy like Spiros with that kind of potential.

But… Why does he have to be first? More importantly, how does that benefit me? I doubt the Seed is doing this out of the goodness of its heart, so it has to tie into my chances of becoming a god in some way… but, how?

A cry of pain from below pulled him out of his thoughts, and instantly he slipped into the First Truth of Death. His mana sank into his ring, and the Limitless Thunder Bow appeared in his hands, in a mere fraction of a second. Funneling a good fraction of his mana into the artifact, he pulled back the drawstring the second it manifested, and let it go.

A blinding bolt of lightning flashed forward, and with perfect aim, turned to dust a single Mortal-tier giant.

“You good?” He asked, firing the bow a dozen more times in quick succession at all the remaining giants, clearing the field instantly. His earlier concerns about allowing the mortal cultivators to have their own challenges gone the second he felt he had a just cause.

“Umm… Yes, Elder Luke. Thank-you for your assistance.” A blonde woman, in her mid twenties bowed down to him.

Keeping his expression neutral, in spite of his discomfort at being addressed so formally, he raked his eyes over her form. His gaze landed on her arm, where she had been clipped by one of the boulders that the giants were so fond of throwing.

His ring flashed, and a vial of mortal-tier healing potion appeared in the air in front of her.

“Drink it.”

“Elder, I’m ok–”

He dropped the vial in her hand, and flew away. Not at all interested in her denial. It came from a good place, but saving potions wasn’t worth an injury on someone actively fighting in the tides, and he knew for a fact that the Emperor himself would agree with him.

Sure, supplies were limited this deep into the Tide, but being stingy would likely lead to her accruing even more injuries, which would in turn reduce her role to printing out talismans for the rest of the tide. Assuming that her next injury wouldn’t be fatal. It still amazed him how thin the island was stretched this late in the relentless war with the Earth itself.

Still, just another three weeks, and it’ll be all over, and they’ll have ten years to recover, and replenish, and whatever they need to do.

Quickly checking up on all the others that had come with them, he nodded in satisfaction, and flew back into the town.

He found Clite exactly where he had left her, with her hands held over an altar in the middle of the city, and her eyes closed in concentration as she pumped it full of mana. Stepping forward, he rested his own hand on it, and immediately dumped three quarters of his remaining mana, bringing it to full instantly.

Her eyes fluttered open, and she looked at him with exasperation. “You killed them all again, didn’t you?”

“There were only twelve left, and the disciples were getting tired… One even got hurt.”

“...”

“Look, it's a dumb rule, and I waited until one of them was injured. I still don’t get why I have to sit around and wait for them to kill all the giants, when we can end an attack instantly. Isn’t that a better use of our time.”

“Because, we don’t have enough warriors to both power the wards, and fight the giants. Coddling the Inner Disciples weakens them, and letting them battle strengthens them. We can’t always be there, and if they come to rely on our presence, then that results in more deaths not less. I understand that sitting back and allowing them to do the work is uncomfortable, but experience matters.”

“How well have you researched that?”

She didn’t dignify him with a response, and brushed past him.

“You know I’m kidding right?” Luke called out, as he walked after her. “Mostly.”

“You’ve become insufferable ever since you became a warrior.”

“I think I’ve always been this way. We just didn’t know each other that well before.” Luke said, a smile playing across his lips.

“I remember you listening more than you talked, and not arrogantly dismissing knowledge accumulated over millennia of battle with these creatures.”

“Are you sure about that? I think I’ve always been like this.” He smiled and nodded to the nervous looking townsfolk, as they made their way towards the teleportation platform.

“Perhaps. You were very fond of running off, so I didn’t have much time to get to know you.” Said Clite.

“In my defense, I had pretty good reasons, both of the times I left. And, if anything, I got stronger faster because of it. You remember I kil–”

“Yes. All of Sylcra remembers how you alone valiantly charged into battle against the Rebel and all her forces, and struck her down in the seat of her own power, days after rising to the Warrior-tier. Children sing songs, women look at you longingly, and men wish they could do as you did.”

He blushed red.

“I don't think any children know of me, do they? All this cultivator stuff is –” He stopped in his, as loud noise rang out from his storage ring. Retrieving the token that the drone had left him, he sent a small pulse of mana into it, silencing it.

“How much time is left?” Clite asked.

Luke glanced at the countdown displayed under his current rank of five-hundred and ninety-eight. It had steadily ticked down the first few weeks after his assessment before plateauing in the late five hundreds as the final entries were finalized. It was significantly higher than Lukeus’s, Nikitas’s, and Rose’s ranking who had all placed in the thousands, and embarrassingly lower than Rex’s, who had scored in the top one hundred. How he was allowed to use Blinky to tank all those hits, Luke didn’t know, but he didn’t look forward to facing the creature in the actual games, that was for certain.

“Just under seven hours.”

She frowned at him disapprovingly. “Yet you still came here, and wasted your mana. Is that truly wise? The Tournament is not something to be trifled with, and entering it with anything less than your best is not wise.”

“You’re forgetting I’m a Paragon. You know I recover mana a lot faster than you. And it’s not like the Tournament is going to start the moment we arrive.” That’s not even mentioning, my sword can store the same amount of mana I can, which combined with my already insane reserves, gives me a considerable advantage. And that’s not even getting into its other ability, or the Eyes of Insight for that matter. Besides, I was hoping I would make some last minute improvements with my Technique. What a wash that’s turning out to be, he thought miserably, having failed to make any improvements to it, even with all the effort he had dedicated to the task.

Clite flashed him a look that perfectly conveyed how unimpressed she was. “And yet, you have never defeated me in a spar.”

“You turn invisible, that’s practically cheating!”

“You have never defeated Heracles either.”

“He glows so bright, I can’t see anything. Most of the people there won't know how to get around my Technique the way you two can.”

“Rex.”

“Excuse me, that’s a low ball and you know it. Blinky is ugly, but she’s weirdly cute, and I don’t want to hurt her. If he ever fought me one on one, he wouldn’t last a minute, and everyone knows it… including you”

“Truly, your ability to make excuses for your shortcomings is formidable.”

“No it’s not. I’ll be able to take Heracles eventually–” Clite snorted. “Look, he’s just had a longer time to figure out his stuff, and he’s practically in the Hero-tier. Honestly, with how strong he hits, he might be.”

“He’s not.”

“Why are you so mean today?”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m not mean. You are arrogant. Yes, you are very strong for your tier and have accomplished much, but it will not do you any good to underestimate those you are competing against. You will face the best Theos has to offer. Do not forget that.”

“It’s not like I have to win though. Cyzicus will get his potion if I rank in the top ten. Which, you know as well as I do, is well within my means.” Besides, if the quest is anything to go off of, then I have what it takes to make it to second place.

Luke shook his head, and looked over his shoulder where the inner disciples were trudging their way back towards them. Despite his bravado, he was just as unsure about his odds of winning, or even doing what the Seed wanted, for that matter.

He had managed to complete his last two quests by the skin of his teeth, he had nearly been killed and forced to use a Charge by Arke, and nearly died when it came time to name his blade. Just because he had a quest didn’t mean things couldn’t go sour.