Chapter 1607 (2/2)

Those waves lapped gradually deeper through Randidly’s thoughts and perceptions, shifting and searing them. Suddenly Randidly was shivering as his senses began to feed him a confusing mix of information. Several times he once again briefly lost consciousness, only returning to himself after the particularly massive wave of energy had passed and burned away his very perception of it.

Randidly pressed his lips together as he lay in the middle of the swirling maelstrom of black mist Nether. This had better be fucking worth it…

The process of ‘enrichment’ lasted for almost ten minutes. Each second was agony. As time was fractured and broken into minuscule chunks by the pain of the transformation, Randidly felt like the actual duration was much longer than his Absolute Timing indicated. He seemed stuck, eternally tormented as this strange, mutated Stat grew to the full of its power.

And then, after one last wave flowed through the entirety of his being, the heat in his nerves began to ease. As the muscles of his torso loosened, Randidly released a stale breath.

The pain began to recede, leaving the buzzing of raw nerve endings along his arms and legs. Groaning, Randidly rolled a bit to a sitting position. His limbs tingled. He flexed his hands and gradually checked in on the state of his body. His bones and muscles ached slightly, but it just a lingering sensation after all of the overstimulation.

And as that change faded away and he could actually feel the fineness of his mental acuity…

Randidly’s eyes were luminous as he slowly stood and stretched. Then he paused and looked upward at the sky. The whole of the universe seemed to spin predictably before his gaze. The steady process of the birth and death of stars as well as the long orbitals of celestial bodies spun before his vision. Then he refocused on closer phenomena.

He didn’t blink at all as he carefully studied the powerful, wheeling patterns amongst the Nether particles. As he continued to focus, the grinding and thunderous discharge from the struggle faded away and left behind only the ethereal beauty of the Nether King’s work. Motes of light and meaning wove together. As Randidly carefully followed them, he began to see something much bigger than just the current fight.

Congratulations! Your Skill Left Hand of the Nether Oracle (M) has grown to Level 223!

…

Influence +3!

Congratulations! Your Skill Left Hand of the Nether Oracle (M) has grown to Level 241!

Gradually, Randidly allowed his eyes to slide shut. That’s probably enough for now. I’m still a little short of being able to create a pattern like that… But I’m starting to understand the basic principles…

The improvement to his abilities with his new Fidelity of the Ascendant Moirae was difficult to quantify. But above all, the sensation was pleasurable as the last after effects disappeared. He wasn’t sure if it was his imagination or not, but Randidly felt like he could reach out and directly dominate his surroundings. Almost unwillingly, he kept himself from testing that theory, in case he was still under observation.

Perhaps even stranger than that was the impression that the entirety of the environment was oddly… predictable. As though Randidly’s new Control came pre-loaded with insight to the vital mechanisms on which the natural world functioned.

But Randidly couldn’t resist producing Acri once more. As he held the spear in a combat stance, the squiggly lines of Ripple of Amenonuhoko swam playfully outward from the blade. Narrowing his eyes, Randidly released a breath. Then he cut sharply upward, following one of those lines. With the edge of Dreadful Alacrity, his speed was brutal.

Congratulations! Your Skill Ripple of Amenonuhoko (M) has grown to Level 335!

Congratulations! Your Skill Ripple of Amenonuhoko (M) has grown to Level 336!

About a hundred meters away, an enormous pillar of stone ruptured the ground as it exploded upward. Randidly clicked his tongue in appreciation as he lowered Acri. The effect, ease of activation, and range have definitely increased with using this spear Skill… but more than that, it’s the Skill Levels that really show how immense the change to Control was.

More capability makes Skill Levels easier. All of my experimentation earlier only yielded a single Skill Level, but with this new Stat, a single strike earned me two…

I’ll still need to do some digging to make sure this new Stat doesn’t contain any sort of venom from the Nexus, but right now my Nether is still flowing cleanly through me… What sort of improvement did I stumble across, I wonder… combining an Alchemist with an Oracle, huh…?

Randidly lowered his spear unwillingly. After glancing around, he opened up his Path menu once more; he still had so much PP to spend. He scanned through the Paths and selected Conviction of the Celestial Cataclysm. Of the remaining Paths, Randidly believed it would provide the broadest benefit. But as he poured PP into it and earned 1 Willpower per 50 spent, a sardonic smile crossed his face.

With how much my Stats are growing by spending all this PP, it remains to be seen if I’ll be able to control my own body afterward…

Congratulations! You have completed the Conviction of the Celestial Cataclysm Path! An unavoidable truth of your existence is that your unflinching resolve is an enormous part of your strength. The Path to your current heights could not be traversed by the faint of heart. Yet as you look up, the Pinnacle looms even further above, taunting you with the intervening distance.

Yet there is no doubt in your heart, is there? You will continue forward. The Path continues ever onward.

Congratulations! Willpower +100. Your Skill Conviction of the Smiling Horror (L) has evolved into Conviction of the Celestial Cataclysm (T)! Skill Level will be maintained. The increase in image efficiency is slightly increased per Skill Level. Damage improvement is slightly increased per Skill Level.