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Chapter 246 Knights Knights Knights
🕑 Added 2019-07-11 12:49:41 +0000 UTCAuthor's note July 20th: Hey all, new chapters up :). Let me know what you think.
More coming on Tuesday.
Author's note July 11th: Hey all! New chapters up, I hope you like them :).
I'm figuring out the discussions and problems regarding levels / power and all that. Most of it I feel like was fabricated by me and I apologize. I feel like I'm on a good track again and will deliver some explanations, reasoning and hopefully satisfying progression as time goes on.
I appreciate all the thought and discussion regarding the latest chapters. Cheers!
Chapter 246 Knights Knights Knights
Despair Ilea wrote down in her notebook, taking his words seriously. First Dragonrider Ilea The legendary warrior healer returns from her journeys. She could already hear the proclamations of the newspaper boys. If newspapers have become a thing by the time she reached the apparently ludicrous goal. To be fair, they are usually supposed to be game changers for whole empires. I get it. Dont fuck with dragons.
Your little human body will combust even getting close to one of those creatures. The forces are something completely beyond your imagination.
I said I. Get. It. Ilea said again, not letting the elf destroy her dream so easily. If her levels werent somehow capped at some point or her body vaporized, she didnt see how it would be written off as unachievable. I guess it kind of rules out that the elves are serving dragons they wouldnt go look to fight them if that were the case. She considered.
She got up from her chair and made her way back into the dungeon, Youre not the source of unlimited information I thought youd be elf. He only grumbled something in return, continuing his work. Would a truly strong elf really hang around here, in front of a dungeon he could instead explore himself? I doubt whatever pain, fear or religious beliefs keep him from entering would stop someone with a mission.
At least she could take her time to clear out the whole place on her own without an annoying second person stealing her experience. Another knight would fall before she left the cave to train with the stalkers of the mist.
Tenth day of Nul, 358
The Soul Rippers have proven to be most dangerous, even to experienced veterans in the ranks of mercenaries as well as adventurers. Queen Invalar has ordered the dungeon entrance to be shut, to avoid further incursions from the beasts at night time.
Ilea read through the translated log book by the guard captain. Kingsguard captain likely cant imagine how powerful that one was , Around half of the log book was already translated, Elfie really doing a good job. Just over a month after he had cracked the code, the elf had already transcribed so much of the book. He was still frantically deciphering, telling her about the new discoveries he had made.
A looming war with an unknown nation, a previously rather unproblematic dungeon suddenly taken over by a beast described as Soul Ripper as well as the daily business of the guards. Assassins and spies apprehended, questioned and likely tortured. All overseen by the man called Reyker. He didnt seem to be quite a fan of the king but never missed an opportunity to praise a decision by the queen. Invalar was the name of the two and Ilea had a feeling there was more than just loyalty keeping the man in his position of guard captain.
She left the book and checked her armor again. The fourth one already and it was time to switch again. Dents and cuts lined both her arms as well as her torso, the knights usually not trying to hit her legs or head. Ilea changed to a fresh set and chucked the barely usable one to the collection of armors growing in the corner of the cathedral.
The elf hissed at the noise, The metal. It bothers me. Are you even trying to find anything new in there?
Ilea rolled her eyes and summoned her notebook, flipping to the page where her map of the dungeon was growing by the day, Look all the buildings with nothing in it are marked. The kingsguard is too strong for me so Im not bothering with the palace yet.
She closed the book after he had taken a look, calming down a little. She knew he was just struggling with deciphering the book still. Apparently the captain had changed the algorithms every month, giving Elfie a new riddle every fifty pages or so. That was at least how many days the months in Rhyvor had. Be happy it isnt thirty. Even if he hissed at her sometimes, the elf hadnt attacked her a single time. He did leave from time to time but then again Ilea sometimes stayed in the dungeon for over a week at a time, only going out to get rid of the armors.
She had killed another twenty four knights but the only reason she knew the number was because of the corpses stored in her necklace. Ilea tried not to think about it too much. Getting to the last usable set of armor, she was inclined to visit Goliath again. Fighting through the Tremor dungeon proved to be a long term project, the knights making it harder and harder for her to separate them and while she was getting more used to them, she was a long way to fighting two or even more at the same time. Still, she had gotten a couple levels and perhaps a new step to further power with the last months worth of fighting.
ding Azarinth First Hunter has reached lvl 237 Five stat points awarded
ding Azarinth First Hunter has reached lvl 238 Five stat points awarded
ding Azarinth First Hunter has reached lvl 239 Five stat points awarded
ding Azarinth First Hunter has reached lvl 240 Five stat points awarded, 3rd tier skill point awarded
ding Inheritor of Eternal Ash has reached lvl 230 Five stat points awarded
ding Inheritor of Eternal Ash has reached lvl 231 Five stat points awarded
ding Inheritor of Eternal Ash has reached lvl 232 Five stat points awarded
ding Inheritor of Eternal Ash has reached lvl 233 Five stat points awarded
ding Hunters Sight reaches 2nd lvl 12
ding Hunters Sight reaches 2nd lvl 13
ding Embered Body Heat reaches 2nd lvl 8
ding Embered Body Heat reaches 2nd lvl 9
ding Wave of Ember reaches 2nd lvl 19
ding Ashen Wings 2nd lvl 17
ding Health Drain Resistance reaches 2nd lvl 5
ding Health Drain Resistance reaches 2nd lvl 6
ding Mana Drain Resistance reaches 2nd lvl 4
ding Mana Drain Resistance reaches 2nd lvl 5
While her levels were steadily rising, the knights still providing good experience, her resistances against the Miststalkers were taking a long time to grow. Considering how long she had trained with Trian, Eve and Kyrian, she was certainly prepared for the time consuming resistance training. Still, some of the nights Meditation was all that prevented her from just going back into the dungeon and fighting more knights instead of sitting near the sea of mist. She kept telling herself that in the long term it would be worth it.
Ilea was at level 240 already and in another thirty to fifty, she would get little experience from the normal knights. Either she had to face whatever lay deeper in the dungeon or she could simply kill a couple hundred Miststalkers. The latter would probably be easier considering the hard time she had with the knights. Her forty remaining stat points she distributed into Endurance, Intelligence and Wisdom. Twenty into her main damage stat and ten each into her resources. She was now at six hundred for both Vitality and Intelligence, the two skills she considered most important next to Wisdom.
Her skills enhanced a variety of things like Resilience which likely had something to do with how much damage an attack actually did to her or with Vitality directly. Her speed wasnt listed anywhere but a variety of skills enhanced it as well. Strength and Dexterity were a little weird. Even the base stat improving from an initial five to now 266 didnt make sense to her, especially coupled with the fact that several skills improved both properties additionally. Her corresponding strength wasnt exactly what one would expect. At first her strength and the physical impact of her fists had done the majority of the damage, later replaced by the mana intrusion damage of both Wave of Ember and Destruction.
If this were a game, there was no reason for her not to simply invest into Intelligence and Wisdom alone. With her ashen limbs and Wave of Ember it would likely result in the highest and longest available damage. The problem was that perhaps a monster would arise with a weakness to physical damage and near complete immunity to mana intrusion. The knights she was fighting were resistant against physical damage, at least the blunt type Ilea was dishing out. Their bodies were already dead and even if she managed to break a bone or rupture muscle, the magic keeping them animated would simply ignore it. Having seen the bodies afterwards she was sure of this.
They required all her Dexterity, making her able to dodge and weave through attacks, her Strength allowing her to deflect their attacks, to stand against their kicks and to deliver punches that would damage them if they were alive. Her resource stats kept her going, Wisdom being the most important one of them. Vitality was usually left somewhat untouched, quickly healed back to the max but considering the ludicrous damage all of the monsters here dealt, she had to have enough for a couple hard and direct hits at least.
Perhaps increasing her Strength and Dexterity would be beneficial again in the future but for now she focused on her magical damage as well as how long she could fight. Next to the stats and more importantly, she had received another skill point to advance one of her Azarinth First Hunter skills to the third tier. With how big of a change the third tier of Ash and Ember Manipulation had brought, she hoped for something good.
3rd tier skill points available [Azarinth First Hunter]: 1
Skills available for third tier advancement in [Azarinth First Hunter]:
- Destruction
- Hunter Recovery
- Azarinth Perception
- Azarinth Fighting
I said Id take Recovery first , Ilea remembered, sitting down on a chair and thinking about it. She had enough knights in there to last her a while at least. Enough probably to reach two sixty at a reasonable pace, maybe a couple months. Increasing her healing capabilities didnt seem to help that goal for now. Perhaps with the miststalkers but her mana drained as well while fighting against them. Fuck it Fighting or Destruction.
Summoning a coin, she flipped it in the air. Heads for Fighting. Tails Destruction. She caught it and opened her palm. Destruction it is. Anything that would increase her damage somewhat would bring a big improvement to how quickly she could reach the next third tier skill. Depending on how many knights were left she might even chose Azarinth Fighting the next time instead of her healing skill.
ding Destruction advances to 3rd tier
Active: Destruction 3rd lvl 1:
Send a destructive pulse of mana into your enemy with every punch or kick. Your Intelligence stat enhances the damage potential.
2nd stage: The amount of mana used per strike can be regulated with a maximum of 20 mana per strike.
3rd stage: Due to the healing nature of Destruction it partially ignores protection against Mana intrusion.
Category: Healing
Ilea read through the newly added third tier before a big grin spread on her face. Fucking worth it. Well she didnt know exactly how much this would change her damage output but against the knights she was sure it would be significant. A big chunk of the magic from both Wave of Ember and Destruction simply rebounded against the knights of the rose, their armor either enchanted or something else preventing her skills from being fully effective.
Before she wanted to continue, she had thirty nine sets of rose knight armor to deliver to Goliath. As well as plenty of armors to be repaired or completely remade. Still, it was hard for her not to go back in immediately and test out how long shed need for a single knight. Even a ten percent improvement would shave off over thirty minutes per fight at least.
The elf was looking at her, What? She asked and he just hissed again.
Perhaps you could check one of the other dungeons on your map. Find some new things there. The book on wines is translated and it is difficult to keep working on deciphering this one.
A plea? Really? Youre bored.
If you want to call it that.
Ilea smiled under her helmet and walked to the damaged armors, Ill see what I can do.
It would take her a couple trips to get all the armors to Goliath but it was soon night and shed be able to travel through the terrain quickly, ignoring the valleys and rushing down towards Hallowfort. Stepping towards the platform at the end of the cathedral, she spoke, Your fire cube thing?
The elf simply summoned the item and threw it her way, Ilea looking it over before pushing some mana into the ten centimeter cube. A swath of flame burned into her helmet, singing her eyebrows within. The elf just looked at her and shook his head when she summoned a bunch of wood, spacing it out enough to allow for all the dead knights. It took her a while but ultimately, she had a pyre going with all of the corpses she had collected over the past month. She waited until the fire had consumed them all.
The first trip went without problems, Ilea rushing over the dark landscape, keeping her orientation through the valleys she saw in the distance, the cracks in the earth already filled with mist. Whatever creatures had occupied them now pushed aside by the Miststalkers. She had to travel a short distance through their territory but near the Penumra dungeon the mist already dissipated, allowing her to quickly make her way towards the small town.
Coming out into the cave after navigating through the darkness, she spread her wings and jumped down towards the sea, finding it the quicker way to the blacksmith than walking through the streets and down the stairs. Ilea hung in the air, stopping her momentum as she looked over the endless mass of water below. The crystals shining into the underground cave illuminated not water but mist, like a blanket covering what lay beneath. Pillars of stone covered in crystals rising interspersed as they gave the abyss a newfound eerie feeling.
Knowing there was water below the mist didnt make it much better. Ilea wasnt sure how the mist had gotten down here but it certainly was a sight to behold. Advancing in speed again, she quickly reached the side of the massive statue, finding the spot where Goliath had destroyed the wall and blinking inside. No enchantment stopped her from entering and the smith didnt react, hammering on something on one of the anvils. Hey. Ill be dumping some things here. Couple trips for everything.
The smith didnt interrupt his swings and replied, Welcome back young human. Do as you please.
Ilea dumped nine armors and blinked out again. There were thirty nine from the knights she had killed and four damaged ones from herself. Nine per trip meant five total trips. The next hours were spend flying. On six of the trips she had to hide from a swarm of leathery birds, the Famine Crows circled the territory but were gone again when she sped towards Penumra for the last time tonight.
There you go. She said, another five armors appearing on the growing stack that by now filled nearly half the forge. Goliath had sparkling eyes, having finished the helmet it was working on.
It moved towards the armor and touched one of the pieces, How many do you wish to have this time?
Ilea summoned the armor mold and placed it in the middle of the room, Nine sets, the rest you can keep.
I am in your debt then, huntress. It said as the armors vanished. It really did seem like once people hit the two hundreds, storage items became more common. Either that or Ilea just happened to run into those kinds of people all the time.
She looked at the smith and nodded, Well if you have anything more sturdy than the Stonehammer steel Id love to trade it. Another question, youve been around for a while right? I was wondering if I could bring an elf here, he calls himself a historian and I thought he might be interested in this little town.
The smith looked at her for a while and then spoke, I do not have what you desire, not at the moment. You may bring me any armor or ingots and I may reforge it for you. In regards to the elf, I of course welcome the opportunity to share stories with one so rare to find here. I doubt many in the town above would be against such a visitor. I however suggest you discuss it with the dwarf at least.
Ilea nodded and walked towards the exit, Ill do that. How long do you need?
Six hours. May I multiply the mold? Then I might be done earlier.
She smiled and clapped her hands, the idea hadnt come to her earlier. Without the mold it would likely take a smith days if not longer to finish a single set for her. Perhaps in the future Goliath could make her ten sets in the span of a couple hours, Sure, however many you think makes sense. I doubt I will need more than ten sets made simultaneously though. Ill look for other metal as well, maybe something comes up.
Waving at the happy smith who quickly got to work, she made her way up the stairs, to Teroks house with quite a lot of work for him as well as some questions. She had to optimize this as well, maybe ordering armors beforehand. Still, shed simply go back and fight more knights while the dwarf enchanted everything. Her set was fresh and would hold at least a couple days if she didnt do a stupid mistake.
Comments
Straven
Thank you for the chapter.
I'm sort of pissed that she didn't choose her healings ability into third tier because that could save her life in a situation where even maxed out second stage wouldn't be enough. Sure the third stage of healing wasn't helping immediately but in the long run and in the future it may just save her life and help immensely in fights that she wouldn't normally be able to engage in. I hope she chooses her healing to be in third stage next. I also get a little annoyed that she doesn't raise her hunter stats such as strength, it's getting a bit unbalanced in my opinion. I understand that stats such as wisdom and intelligence may help her damage output but she should at least try and keep up with the other considered less important stats. By the way it has been a while since I've seen all her stats of wisdom dexterity strength Etc. but I do remember the strength stat being particularly low and maybe another one or two.
G. Harthane
Depends on the skills used during the fights. It's not distributed equally.
G. Harthane
It's up and down depending on which skills are used more during the fights. No major reason.
Is there some reason her two class levels are getting further apart? They where within 4 levels back in chap 181 and seemed to be getting closer over time. But now it’s up to 7 levels which seems odd, especially as she has not commented about it.
Solarlancer
i bet she needs 3rd tier perception to get 3rd tier sphere
G. Harthane
The arcane resistance level was mostly due to being blasted by arcane lightning.
G. Harthane
I submitted it half a year ago or so but it was declined by the editors. First ten chapters or so were more of a mess back then so I might try again at some point :).
Håvard
He did not he is just above level 220 unless I rember totaly wrong
Jonathan
I still think she's missing out on something. Destruction is a healing skill and gets only 100% increase from First Hunter. (200% total) Azarinth fighting is a body enhancement skill that gets buffed 200% from AFH and another 200% (or was that nerfed to 100?) for a total of 500% effectiveness (or 400%) making it potentially at least twice as effective. She already leveled main active body enhancement skill for AFH to level three, State of Azarinth, but, Body of Azarinth, her regeneration skill is also a body enhancement skill, and IEA has three damage related BE skill, one active and two passive. (Although a couple of them might have been labeled body enhancement -- ashen magic, or simply switched to ashen, so the 4-500% bonus for them might not be applicable.) That will be two cents, please.
searchnresqtoo
Curious, as the amount of experience required to increase each level increases; shouldn't the levels for hunter and ash close? Not get larger.
Atlas Dwarf
Thanks for the chapter. It's good to see a lot of progress. Also nice to see confirmation that Veteran doesn't level unless you get paralyzed, although she never did gain a level for being stunned for 15 seconds by that snake (probably to do with not being the target/danger). Surprised she didn't gain a single level in Arcane Resistance considering how fast she gained one in the first day in the north.
Michael
if it's 5 trips back and forth it would be ten one way trips... but yeah, should be clarified either way.
J H
Isn't Azarinth perception the sphere? I think she should get that next as that is one of her big strengths and somehow the drop saurians were still making her life difficult.
J H
Or maybe reflect some damage to her enemies when they damage her? I think it's more likely something like the tier 3 blick though and will give like a full resurrection that can only be used once every month or something.
Arcanes
Great chapters! Love the grind. Ilea is sometimes impulsive, but she has the patience when she trains or fight. More her style this way of living life. A Question about her third tier azarinth skills - wasn’t the sphere an option too?
Chymor
What other options would make good anti-Ilea builds? Without just raising the level of the opposition that is. I guess most crowd control counts, but she’s exceptionally resistant to all types we know of. Same for heal or teleport blocking skills.
Chymor
I think you have a good explanation to the knights power per level here... They are simply decent anti Ilea builds. Mana intrusion resistance and blunt force tolerance to minimize her damage. High strength and combat skills to prevent frequent hits or grappling. Someone with a high damage long distance attack, flight and blink like Viper would have a much easier time. It’s actually pretty ridiculous that she can deal with them, when you think about it.
Kristoffer
Moar pls! I can't wait for the next chapter, I'd love to see a nice powerup for Ilea, preferably in the form of a nice time-skip after which we get to know just how powerful you can become with time, dedication, and a healthy dose of luck!
Cyryl Chołodowski
With armor on she gets battered and bruised. Without armor she would have to constantly pick up her limbs, and close body wide cuts.
Cyryl Chołodowski
I always figured it would be fun if some foreshadowed villain came as a slap target. (not the way they are in chinese novels, there its slap target, but the slapping lasts hours... no, I mean proper one-hit-KO) But 400 is a little high. I doubt there are humans above 300 (and if there are, they are the 2 Guild masters who are missing, and maybe like one person in that Illuminati thing).
Achille Boneza
Good catc
Have an argument going with a friend about how much armor matters for illea fighting phys-damage heavy opponents like the knights, if you can, would you mind answering these: 1a. does she still take significant damage through it and a lot of her time is spent recovering HP before attacking again? 1b. or does it block a significant portion of any hit that slips through, thus allowing for more mana and time spent pumping destructive mana, and the intrusion enchantment is the reason they take forever? 2. how would she fare against a knight without any armor on, relying just on her veil and body enhancements? 3. is illea being more aggressive about the above with her new sets of armor, trading them getting damaged for more hits in against knights, or does she just switch them out a lot earlier before they get as damaged as her elven set?
Stranger
Nine per trip meant five total trips. The next hours were spend flying. On six of the trips she had to hide from a swarm of leathery birds Makes no sense, is it five or six trips?
sharkattack
More dee pee ess!
Arkeus
Oh right, something to note: her previous armour got broken after killing 8+ Knight, and that's when she didn't know what she was doing and then fought a King's guard. She got 4 armour broken when she killed 16 Knigh or so, so 1 aarmour every 4 knights t. So... current armour is much more fragile than old one, or is she taking more risks and tanking more with it?
Call0013
Cool Destruction was probably the right chose for her Tier 3 point after all speeding up how fast she can kill the knight will help he get to the next one. really while she has enough knights she could try to get Azarinth Perception or Azarinth Fighting to Tier 3 as well as long as she gets Hunter Recovery before she is done with this relatively safe dungeon. Well the Elf was a bust when it came to system information,but mabye Goliath who is thousands of years old will have some information if the smith who has lived for thousands of years dosen't know anything no one will after all he probably maxed out all his tier 3 skill thousands of years ago.
Corwin Amber
thanks for the chapters
Keifru
If T3.Destruction uses the healing aspect to bypass intrusion resistance, I wonder if T3.Recovery will have hardening/resistance aspect. It makes me wonder if T3.Azarinth_Reversal will allow her to use both ablities and both aspects of them all at the same time.
Håvard
higher quility? what skill do you think she schould have taken, I for one agree with her. she don't need more healing at this time, perseption is good, but I dont see what level 3 can give her to make the farming faster. fighter, well it can go both ways so the coin toss was fine with me (prefer destruction so whod have just taken it)
J H
Glad to see some progress, hopefully she'll get her inheritor class to 240 soon as well to upgrade ash creation to the 3rd tier. I think once that happens the regular knights won't be worth it and she'll need to kill the mist stalkers or drop saurians for quicker leveling until she gets more 3rd tier skills so she can fight the kingsguard. It sounds like that soul ripper was even able to destroy the kingsguard so hopefully she doesn't encounter that for a while.
Jonathan Walker
I can't wait till she is lvl 300 and has a better grasp on her next evolution in her classes I wander what they will be ughhhh this is sooo exciting love it, and glad she is leveling so fast maybe keep her in the north just grinding out till she is lvl 400 or higher that way she can just walk around humans and fuck them up if they try bullshit hahaha that would be great also would love to see her go into the woods to talk to more elves as she hits high levels like the 400+ range that would be really cool make friends with them all. Oooooh meet the queen of elves or some shit would be bad ass
Arkeus
It is immensely frustrating to see her constantly ignoring her higher quality skills because the lower quality ones are shinier, especially given the self-delusion arguments she uses to convince herself :(
Seems like the story is picking up the pace somewhat. Love it!
ArturScott
Why can't we vote for Azarinth on http://topwebfiction.com? I need the vote button!
Nodlehs
Foreshadowing a stupid mistake? lol thanks for the chapters
Alan McBrayer
Funny how the chapters with the most grind for the characters are the ones with the quickest advancement for the readers. Good to see some good leveling again. Ilea is on track to be the highest level human we've seen the level of in a few months. If she does get to the point where she can kill a good number of mist stalkers it would be interesting to see how the creatures in the north react. We could see a whole new type of monster fill their place in the food chain
