I opened my eyes, a serene calm washing over . I had achieved sothing? Oh, right, my class evolution! The trial! I had succeeded! But how had I done so again?
My mories had been tampered with. When I tried to rember my trial, or even my earlier trials, I only rembered an endless white void accompanied by feelings. Emotions?
The first trial was accompanied by a sense of guilt and impatience. As if I had forgotten about sothing and quickly needed to set about rectifying it.
The second was by far the most painful, the most disturbing. A sh of hopelessness, despair and agony. Sothing told that I should be glad not to rember the contents of this one.
The third and most recent trial gave a sense of contentnt. As if I had- had made up for sothing bad I had done, sohow. As if I had found the answer, the solution I had been looking for. A solution, rather. One that made feel proud.
While this ss of emotions slowly floated to the back of my mind, I wondered whether I would ever receive clear mories of what had happened during the trials. Where before I hadnt rembered anything, now I at least felt emotions paired with the trials. That was an improvent, one that I wasnt certain was worth encouraging.
Before I could get too lost in my thoughts, a system prompt blocked my vision, distracting from myself and notifying of a welco occurrence.
Ding! Class evolution complete!
Assigning class....[Hollow Death Knight]
[Hollow Death Knight]
An exception among [Death Knights], you lack the guidance of a master. As a result, you are left with the burden of finding true purpose by yourself. Like a hollow pit, mana flows into you and transforms into sothing else entirely. One day, you will find your purpose. When you do, you will be hollow no longer.
Your signature skill is [Dark pursuer]
Gain 30 stat points in each physical stat, 10 stat points in each ntal stat and 10 free stat points per level.
I balked at the description of my newly evolved class. Not because of the summary itself, though. No, that drivel was as obnoxious as it had always been and suitably vague to boot. Poetically, the na had co full circle and returned my title of [Death Knight], while pointing out my lack of a master. That didnt bother much, of course.
What really caught off guard was my new stat growth. I had expected my stat growth to be doubled, as it usually seed to do with most of my evolutions. Instead, they had nearly quadrupled! Well, my physical stat growth, anyway. To compensate, my free stat point gain hadnt grown at all, but that was only a small loss considering the flat 30 increase for so of my other stats.
I did so quick calculations to see if I would be able to reach the fabled fifth milestone before my next class evolution after all
Milestone requirents were multiplied by their respective tier each ti, making it almost absurdly difficult to keep up with at higher tiers. The fourth milestone was at 1200 stats, so multiply that by five 6000?!
The figure seed impossible to get to with only 150 levels to go before the next tier, but after so more calculations, I realised that I actually had a shot at reaching it! My physical stats would grow by 4500 each between then and now, leaving only 300 short in each stat to reach the milestone!
If I rembered to keep investing free points into each of them, I would be to reach the milestones, if only barely. Just the thought alone made giddy How many tier 5s could boast about having reached those milestones before their advancent?
After calming down a bit, I inspected my new skills, starting with [Dark pursuer].
[Dark pursuer](0%)
Tier 5 skill.
Manifest the pseudo-elental Dark pursuer. It will follow a single command with each use, given to it upon its manifestation. The Dark pursuer can copy any of your skills at your leisure. You cannot use a skill while it is being copied by the Dark Pursuer.
The higher the tier of the skill being copied, the more mana/overloaded mana is used.
Increase skill tier through repeated and creative use.
I was instantly drawn in by this new skill, its implications tantalising. A pseudo-elental? What form would this pursuer take? Either way, it seed that I had gained another summon besides Revan. This one wasnt ant as a mount, but as a combatant of so kind. It could even copy my skills! If I loaned it [Dark embodint], the elental would beco nearly unbeatable on top of being a tier 5 creature. Unfortunately, I wouldnt be able to use said skill until I unsummoned the elental, which was a significant drawback. Nonetheless, it was a powerful skill.
Unable to stop myself, I didnt even bother looking at the other two skills and activated [Dark pursuer]. The skill responded eagerly, a black tear appearing in the air before . There wasnt much space in the cave, though. The tear spread from the top of the chamber to the bottom, before widening into a black, abyss-like hole that covered my exit. A single hand ca out of the portal, so large that it barely fit. It sunk into the stone of the cave, as if trying to find a hold to pull itself up by. Imdiately, it beca apparent that this [Dark pursuer] was far too large to fit inside the cave, forcing to stop the skill activation and watch in disappointnt as the hand sunk back into the blackness and the portal closed itself.
Whatever this dark pursuer was, it was wearing armour. Its gauntlet, in fact, looked almost exactly like those of the knights I would often see wandering the streets of Capital Roa. Except for the fact that it was pitch black, of course. Unlike the shining knights armour, this one had drawn in all of the nearby light, sucking it up as if it were a hollow pit.
I sighed, putting off the summoning until later and decided to look at my other new skills first.
[Unstable breaking swipe](0%)
Tier 4 skill.
Empower your next physical strike to deal a disproportionate amount of blunt damage, ignoring a certain amount of armour before breaking it. There is a 10% chance of a dark-affinity explosion upon contact, which automatically inflicts a random curse mark held by the skill holder.
Increase skill tier through use in battle.
[Greater curse resistance](0%)
Tier 4 skill.
Effect, spread and duration of curses are greatly diminished. This skill can be overwheld by higher-tiered curses or a great amount of curses spreading simultaneously.
Increase skill tier through use.
The first of the two seed far less impressive than [Dark Pursuer]. Maybe this was because I hadnt actually tiered up all of my skills before going right for my class advancent. Instead of gaining another groundbreaking skill, I had been given a rather mundane, if effective, one.
While I couldnt help but express my disappointnt in the skill inwardly, I also couldnt deny that the skill would have co in handy against the tough armadillos I had faced before coming here. A skill like [Unstable breaking swipe] would have been a godsend. Furthermore, the ability to leave a guaranteed curse mark without needing to leave a wound was also quite convenient. This way, even classers that were a lot more powerful than wouldnt be able to prevent the mark and suffer the consequences. I suppose the skill would have its uses, eventually. Active, all-purpose skills like it always did.
The second new skill was even less impressive, on paper. It was highly situational, after all. That being said, I welcod the skill greatly. Resistances were already incredibly rare on their own and my recent encounter with deadly curses had left shaken. Sothing about the new addition made feel more secure. Protected, even. If there was one thing my [Dark embodint] had trouble dealing with, it would be curses, after all. Covering my bases had always been one of my priorities.
With all of the new additions looked at, I took a mont to reflect. Tiering up without training had been a risky move, but it was necessary. If Eri and I wanted to survive the coming battle, we would have to pull out all of the stops. Unfortunately, the fact that I had left so skills by the wayside ant that the system had granted two less inspired skills to work with, though they certainly seed effective. The system had used my recent hurdles as the foundation for these skills, rather than my new class. That was the price I would have to pay.
Besides, my new fantastic stat growth was more than enough to satisfy and my new signature skill paired well with what I already had available. Overall, I couldnt say that I regretted my decision. Ti would tell if it had been the right one.
I rested for a few more minutes before crawling back out of the cave. Right outside of the entrance I found the familiar form of the dry man hunched over so tos and drawings that vaguely resembled the fort I had tasked him with enchanting.
Arthur. Forgot sothing? he asked, noticing my presence.
Huh? What do you an?
Well, shouldnt you be getting to your trial right about now? Or have you changed your mind? he added laly, not looking up from his work.
Trial? I just finished it, actually. Why?
This ti he did look up, eyes wide in alarm. You finished it?! he asked, incredulous.
I chuckled nervously, not understanding why he spoke so urgently. No need to sound so surprised, old man. Did you not have faith in , or sothing?
Child only a few minutes have passed since you stepped inside of that cave for the first ti.
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