Chapter 1331 (2/2)

Congratulations! Your Skill Ignition of the Emerald Essence (L) has grown to Level 233!

And then again.

And then again.

Congratulations! Your Skill Ignition of the Emerald Essence (L) has grown to Level 251!

After almost twenty more attempts, Randidly was forced to slow down the rate of his challenges against Illym due to his depleted mental strength. In addition to the increases in all of his Skill Levels related to Ignition Essence, Randidly also was starting to have some concrete gains in terms of the potency of his image.

Part of it was learning to endure Illym’s fire for longer periods of time with Stigma of the Lifeless Phoenix, which let him utilize Ignition Essence more fully in the conflicts. The flames tempered each other, but only Randidly kept the benefits. But it was also because Randidly had a burst of inspiration one of the times that Illym had roasted him to a crisp: one way to unite the emotions of Illym with the sparks of inspiration from Ignition Essence was by gradually incorporating Innate Violence into Ignition Essence.

Innate Violence was the evolved form of Combat Proficiency. And in Randidly’s mind, if he thought about Innate Violence in a certain way, it could be considered both complimentary with the dark, burdened emotions of Illym and the sudden bursts of novel inspiration that could be obtained from Ignition Essence.

In order to properly prepare himself, Randidly took almost a half-hour to slowly push himself into that headspace. He carefully considered the relationship between the different Skills and images, checking to make sure this premise was reasonable. As far as he could tell, it was workable. With renewed vigor, Randidly went into the Dreamcatcher of the Long Night to confront Illym. His consciousness brushed that insistent chime.

When the surroundings stopped shifting, Randidly threw himself forward. Emerald and orange fire swirled around his body, but that wasn’t the main form of his attack. Instead, his leg whipped out in a kick toward Illym’s temple.

With an annoying amount of poise, Illym took a half step back and then twisted her sword around. Her powerful image of fire swirled around her in an almost defensive conflagration that immediately began to char Randidly’s skin. A tornado of fire erupted from the ground. Gritting his teeth, Randidly forced a denser wave of emerald and orange flames out from his pores and began to repel the worst of the heat.

Congratulations! Your Skill Stigma of the Lifeless Phoenix (L) has grown to Level 256!

Just barely, with the combination of his Skill and working his images to the limit, Randidly achieved a sort of balance with the ambient heat that Illym’s image produced. With the advantage of surprise, she couldn’t just overwhelm him with the force of her image any longer. Which allowed Randidly to take another step forward and launch out a Talon Strike toward his foe. A few seconds later, Randidly was out of the Dreamcatcher of the Long Night.

Turns out that she’s damn good at close combat as well, Level 90 Talon Strikes are not gonna cut it... Randidly laughed wryly to himself. Then he rolled his shoulders and tried again. He stuck with Skills not relating to Yggdrasil or the Grim Chimera, which essentially meant that it took a while for Randidly to find the groove for close combat.

The Skills he utilized were simply that weak. Considering the pressure Randidly was already under from Illym’s image and her quick responses, this resulted in another two dozen losses before Randidly could sneeze.

But each time, Randidly gained a couple of Skill Levels here and there. Each time he grew more accustomed to associating Innate Violence with Ignition Essence and the strong negative emotions that he had inherited from the woman that he now fought against. Each time he edged a little bit closer to a powerful image after their confrontation.

Ignition Essence burned a little bit brighter. Strange shadows could be seen moving within the shifting flames. The heat it released became a heavy, vicious thing radiating outward from a cooler and aloof core.

When Randidly returned to his physical body once more, he was sweating heavily. Panting, he looked at his Status screen. Immediately, his eyes widened.

All this in four hours of concentrated effort! Randidly was honestly rather impressed with his speed of improvement. At some point, he had gotten back up to possessing 650 PP. Which was plenty to start on any interesting Paths that he had available to him. So he took a glance at the Path screen.

Friend to Humanity 0/100, Mantle of the Patron 0/500, Aether Convergence II ???, the Bell of Doom Tolls 0/600, The Ashes of Ulaat, Patron of Ash 0/1000, Order Ducis: Font of Guidance ???, Humanity’s Torch 0/500, Bearing of a Teacher ???, Puppet Master 0/100, Pain Immunity I 0/250, Cleaver of the World Tree ???, Weakness of the World Tree 0/500, Experimenter IV 0/1250, Guilty Conscience I 0/100, Peerage of the Baleful Court I 0/600, Hands of the Artisan 0/???, Ashes of Illym, the Above-Average Child 0/5000, The Flame the Burns Memories 0/????, Exodus, the Terror 0/1000, Genesis, the Considered 0/1000, Image Cooperation I 0/100, Body Refinement I 0/???, Chimera’s Struggle II 0/????, Spear Mastery III 0/200, Mysteries of the Fiery Emerald Waltz 0/???, Violent Heat I 0/???

Randidly took note of the two new Paths likely relating to Ignition Essence that had appeared, but he knew that he wouldn’t take them for the foreseeable future. He believed his prior thought process about waiting to take Paths until his image was set was the correct one.

Still, how do normal people manage to not rip their hair out with Path related decisions? Randidly thought as he scanned through his choices. I get so much PP, but there are simply so many more things that I want to try…

His decision making on his next Path was put on hold, however, as he felt a familiar sensation overtake him: Reign of the Eidolon Crucible had been triggered.

It seemed that Kharon wasn’t quite done celebrating his birthday. And what better way for Randidly to work of some aggression than with some harmless violence against foes weaker than him?