Duke Armton paced in his office. He had this habit of walking to digest new information. The more upset he was at the news, the more he walked.
"Brother, you are going to dig a hole in the floor," the forr Queen comnted, worried for her last protector's health.
"These new laws, they are insane," He replied, "How powerful can this King Locksley be, to put all of us under a leash?".
"If Count Toulon's death served for anything, was to prove that he's very, very powerful," she bit her thumb to the point of drawing blood. "My precious George didn't just die, he vanished. What is going on with Bundeus? Their church is being expelled from the country!"
"Yznera, Wyxnos, and Galbarar are now the official deities," He replied. "But that's not the point. This tax code. If the King expects us to send this much gold every year to the castle..."
"There won't be any left for us," She completed. The woman stood up and hugged her cousin. "We should cut our losses and go. Here in Windere, we're slaves. That's the truth."
He punched the wall, "Dammit! I won't--"
Duke Armton fell on the floor, twitching. The forr Queen worried he was dying the sa death as the other nobles. What power could punish transgression with thoughts? How to fight against such an entity? She doubted this new King was even human.
Then he started to cackle manically. "Oh, great Bundeus!" He exulted. "Blessed be Your wisdom!"
The woman knelt to help her protector but startled when he raved, "What's wrong, brother?"
"Nothing. Bundeus has shown the fate reserved for this King. It will be worth every copper, every mont of suffering we'll endure. Have trust in Him."
By putting a geas on almost all the human bureaucracy of the Kingdom, I risked one thing. They could easily break free from my control if all of them rebelled at the sa ti. Dozens upon dozens of them would perish but once I ran out of SP, the others' geasa would be lifted.
But to complete my mission, I'd have to fulfill every wet dream that ever spawned in Nicollo's mind. I had to rule with an iron fist. Create a utopia where corruption and inefficiency didn't exist.
That endeavor was fated to fail were I a re mortal. Yes, I had to detach myself from these secular worries that plague Kings whose existence ended when they died. I was angling my ga at the next lives already. Each of my lives brought sothing new and unique to the table. I couldn't squander these gifts for fear of invalidating that life.
The amoeba canceled my Exp penalty curse, which would cripple . The Cyst saved my life twice. The pseudopods as well, not to ntion the utility. Great White One with the power to fight against humans and the all-powerful {Vorpal Bite}. Lily and the were-jaguar. The strength to fight and the loyalty of the were-kin and beast-kin. Apricot and the power to deliver death at the press of a button along with the legends of the Death Princess and the First Hero. Silverstreak. Her silk, {Animal Shapes}, and fae magic. And a magical Kingdom where elves sing, fairies frolic, and werewolves prowl to this day. The Banshee and the secrets of undeath and incorporeality.
Finally, Queen Alloralla. Her existence was brief for elven standards, but she learned magic and unlocked the power to rule. Could I discard that so easily?
The answer was a resounding NO. In all caps and bold type.
What would be Rosewise's contribution to this patchwork of lives that made the corpus of ?
The question didn't have a proper answer. I was too close to the event, too absorbed at the mont to tell. Rosewise might be the one to break so of the shackles binding . Restricting my freedom. Shackles of the System in the form of the curses. Shackles of the mind, my prejudices against living as a female. Shackles of the heart, as I accepted soone into my intimate life. And shackles of the body as I learned to live in utter darkness.
I traced my finger over the fragnt of the dragon scale I had just engraved. {Skin Sight} told the glyphs and runic patterns were perfect. Playing with copper was okay for, well, playing, but it was ti to bring the big guns to the table. While the copper rings had potential in the ones and threes, the dragon scale could hold hundreds. After patting the prir over the scale's outer layer, I connected the electrode and soaked the fragnt in the electrolytic bath.
"{Lightning Electrolysis}!" I triggered the alchemist Skill. Holding cathode in my left hand and the anode in my right. As the current flowed, gold dissolved in the cyanide solution latched to the grooves carved in the scale, as the prir was not conductive. Long minutes later, I turned off the current flowing through my arms and removed the gilded scale. After setting it in a platinum backplate and carefully hamring in the clasps, it was finished.
You created a Superb Dragon Scale Amulet. You earned 30,500 Exp. (base 10 x 3050 modifiers).
Your Superb Dragon Scale Amulet's enchantnt potential is 830 points.
You developed a new Skill: Alchemical Electroplating (ultra-rare): Coat objects with precious tals to increase enchantnt potential by Rank x Willpower x 0.05%.
Your Skill level with Alchemical Electroplating is Journeyman 30 (current: 18.6%).
That's what this current incarnation brought to the table. Rosewise allowed to create wondrous artifacts to leave behind after my passing. An eternal legacy.
I scribbled and drafted the enchantnts I wanted.
8 Magic (256 pt)
8 MP (64 pt)
6 Poison Resistance (72 pt)
6 Fire Resistance (72 pt)
6 Lightning Resistance (72 pt)
6 HP (36 pt)
6 All physical Attributes ( 3 x 72 pt)
6 All ntal Attributes (3 x 144 pt).
5 Cold Resistance (50 pt)
1 all Spiritual Attributes (3 x 3 pt).
1 SP (1 pt)
Bloodline bound: Item can only be worn by direct descendants of the previous owner. (0 pt)
At a cost of 22.5 million Exp of which four were because of the last ability, almost two hundred thousand MP and a 63% chance of success with all my enchanting-buffing rings, I wove the enchantnt over the scale.
Enchantnt Successful.
Your Wild Enchantnt added a 5 bonus to the Baking (common) Skill.
I thought about trying the item on . The budding resonance I felt from it was overwhelming. I would have to remove almost all my other enchanted items to wear this one and then add the others one by one to see if there wouldn't be any resonance problems. I spent the rest of the day fine-tuning the amulet's resonance signature.
I could use my own [Enchanter] Skills to control the resonance, but the item wasn't for . It was a gift for Queen Lorna.
I sat with my wife - I guess that making a girl your Queen ans a serious commitnt - and talked. I spent hours telling her about my previous lives.
Lorna listened carefully and then grinned. "Show ," she said with an excited grin.
"What do you want to see?" I asked, a bit disturbed by her enthusiasm.
"Your previous forms. You were a man! I can't believe it. Can you shift into him?"
I shook my head. "No. Only the humanoids I've been after I ca to this world. But yes, I'll show you."
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I showed her my past life's forms. She squealed and got all handsy with Apricot and Alloralla. Lily had a child's body and Silverstreak wasn't made for these kinds of activities. I'll only tell that the Queen of Windere liked to play with the forr Queen of Fulgen a lot. I shifted back to my own form with a pout at the end.
"What's wrong?" She asked with a twinge of hurt. "Did I offend you?"
"It's nothing," And I felt silly for being jealous of myself.
"Won't you tell ?"
"I'm jealous of myself, okay!" I confessed. "You seed to have enjoyed the elf Queen much more than ."
I honestly couldn't believe I was feeling that way. Lorna pulled closer, nesting the back of my neck between her warm breasts. When a beast-kin and a halfling cuddle, it is easy to know who'll be the little spoon.
"Aren't all of them you?" She asked.
"Yes and no. I'm Rosewise. Alloralla died in a coward trap by the dragons."
That was one of my coping chanisms. Move on, embrace my new life, and live as a new . Reinvent myself. Looking back was too painful most of the ti. Entire worlds of potential, lost. The grief. I sniffled and cried a bit.
"That's why you don't just shift and live again as a previous of you?"
"Yes. And I have to grow up and wait for the System to beco accessible like everyone else. Living as a baby. Growing as a toddler. All the wonders of puberty. Getting my first period again. Not as an elf. They're cheaters."
"And by the ti you get the System again, you are too much of your current self to change, right?"
"I have a mother and a father. It's more than I've ever had since I got here," I said with a sob. "When I was a rabbit, I witnessed a barbarian hunter skinning my mother in the most grueso way possible. Lily saw her mother beco a stone statue. Alloralla died along with her mother as a sacrifice to summon the third Demon Lord. It failed, by the way."
By this ti, Lorna was crying with . "Will you rember ?" She asked. The question was so stupid that I broke into a fit of nervous laughter. I spun around in her arms and crawled to put my eyes at the sa level as hers.
"My naughty kitten-queen. It's too early to think about these things. I intend to live to a hundred years old this ti," I lied. My life would never be this quiet.
Lorna purred and we kissed. "But will you?" She asked with upturned eyes.
"I will, you silly."
I took a month to draft all the new laws and put all the governnt officials under a geas. By this ti, I had also opened a trail connecting Windere to the Eleon region, although I didn't annex it. But with the whole country firmly under my adamantite grasp, I could start the second phase of my plan. Culling the criminal elents.
As a needle-tail swift, the fastest bird I could think of - the falcon was the fastest in short bursts only - I flew around my small country and collected all the ghosts I could find. I bound them so they wouldn't dissipate or move on, promising vengeance for their deaths to so and a better life to their living loved ones for others. My own personal undead army grew.
So of them agreed to bind themselves to my service as cloth creatures. A perk I'd used once to create the guardian of the trading post at the outskirts of Fulgen using the orc chieftain's soul.
Cloth Body (ultra-rare): You can spend SP to force a spirit or specter to inhabit a previously prepared stuffed cloth body you created with your threads. You don't control the animated body.
I started to weave the cloth bodies. With my boosted Skill cap and a set of cheap golden rings - gold was cheap when one was the King - enchanted to enhance my weaving Skills, I could make two bodies per day at a hefty but sustainable MP cost thanks to my wellspring doubling my regeneration and siphoning MP from the city's population. I could use SP instead but I was keeping the tank full in case a rebellion broke out.
Differently from what I did to the orc chieftain, this ti I only bound volunteers to the sick bodies. I even designed them as male or female, tall or short at the whims of the ghosts that would inhabit them. Color, patterns, features all at the whim of the wearer.
As I appeased the ghosts, they gave vital information. So of them were thugs, forr criminals that were doublecrossed by their peers. Other victims of bandits. With their help, I started to build a map of the cri in Windere. I cross-referenced the information from these scattered souls with what my Spectral Court told .
The ghosts of the nobles that died to the geas were still in the castle's basent. They had their chance to serve in life, now they shall serve in death. Once I'd stabilized the country and their help was no longer needed, I'd release them.
One week after I started the project, I had fourteen bodies ready to be inhabited and ushered the souls to co into their new hos. To inhabit their new {Living Thread} bodies. Each of the ghosts was hand-picked by . The wicked and the criminals would not get a second chance at having a physical form again. To those the only solace I could offer was purification.
With the help of the loyal Royal Guard, we worked in the following months to round up and capture the criminals. Bands of highwayn, a thieves' guild, so [Assassins]. While there were [Highwayn] and [Thief] Classes, most often those in these jobs didn't pick the Class. One would need to willingly beco one in their early days. It's the street urchin that knew no better than steal to live that beca a [Thief]. Soone could get a related ranked up version of those during their evolutions.
The rumors traveled faster than we did. By the end of the two-month campaign to round up these criminals, the ones at the outlying villages were on the road. I did chase and hunt so of them, but so long they didn't co back to Windere, I didn't care.
That should be my motto. If it didn't affect Windere, I didn't care.
The prisoners were carried to the castle stockade we built to hold them. There, I used the geas to interrogate them but killed none. The ones that committed no murder or act of wanton cruelty I set free with the geas to get out of Windere forever and commit no cri on their way out. Should they step inside my country's territory, commit a cri, or do not leave in thirty days, they would die.
The others had a special service to perform on the Kingdom's behalf. These n and won were beyond redemption. I had the stockade built because there was no prison. In this dieval society, the prison was for important and valuable prisoners. Those petty criminals and murderers would either be executed or sold into slavery - which I had abolished. Keeping strong people incarcerated eating and drinking at the country's expense was a luxury society couldn't afford.
I stood alone in the stockades, with all the condemned prisoners bound, gagged, and sedated. Throughout my lives, I prided myself on not being a cruel person. I wove an opaque force barrier around the prison that would block all curious eyes except those belonging to the Gods.
I looked at one of the perks I obtained recently. My intention was to ease the process of lifting curses, but what ca was almost as good.
Suppress Curse (rare): Once per day, you can ignore one of your curses for 1 hour.
I used it on my {Slow Learner} curse. Instead of being completely suppressed, it was only reduced by one step. But that ant I was still getting ten tis as many Exp. I raised a sharpened enchanted sword, the one the Duke presented to and executed my prisoners. Painlessly.
Assassination Successful. Contract Fulfilled
For killing level 49 [Second-Story Man], you gained 8,392,935,600 Exp (base 24,010 x 349,560 multipliers).
For killing level 59 [Thief Guild Master], you gained 12,168,183,600 Exp (base 34,810 x 349,560 multipliers).
...
For killing level 35 thug, you gained 4,282,110,000 Exp (base 12,250 x 349,560 multipliers).
For killing level 29 thug, you gained 2,939,799,600 Exp (base 8,410 x 349,560 multipliers).
I imdiately purified their souls and stored their bodies. I looked at my available Exp and tallied the grueso results of my work. Along with the Exp of all the kills since my last level up, I had around three hundred and seventy billion Exp, most from executing the criminals.
That was a lot of levels. Especially at my current level. The cheat of accelerated growth. The dragon I fought was level what? One hundred and sothing? A thief under sixty gave as much Exp now.
I cleaned the stockades myself. I felt as if it was my responsibility. Funny, killing all these bandits did increase overall happiness by a notch. Which proved to that a country where nobody lives on, everyone is happy. The N-zero statent for the induction proof that a country can be happy.
The next day, I prepared myself and applied my Exp. This ti I had enough to rank up my professions. I picked the one with the biggest rarity.
You beca a Wondrous Enchanter (ultra-rare). You gain 5 Skill Points per level, 2 MP, and 1 SP per level.
You beca an Alchemical Jeweller (ultra-rare). You gain 5 Skill Points, 1 MP, and 2 SP per level.
You reached Manastorm Savant level 11
You gained 3 perks.
You reached Deep Eleon (rank 2) level 10
You gained 3 Human perks.
You reached Wondrous Enchanter level 9
You reached Alchemical Jeweller level 9
You gained 264 Skill Points.
98 / 100 Attribute points withheld.
I sighed at the ssage. I was so freaking close to raising my caps again.
The reason I waited a day to apply my Experience and level up was to suppress another curse. I removed a rank from {Unskilled III}, allowing to put Skill Points to reach journeyman ranks without resorting to fusions. Since each Journeyman rank required 3 Skill Points, I could raise 3 Skills to the limit of 49 and another by thirteen points.
I raised these three to Journeyman 49,
Soul Template Restoration (ultra-rare): You can spend SP to restore a body back to its soul template, regrowing lost parts.Heal Internal Damage (ultra-rare): During surgery, you can spend MP to nd wounds to internal organs if you can reach the damaged part.Tissue Regeneration (ultra-rare): You can spend SP to force tissue to regrow at a fast rate.
And this to Journeyman 37
Elven Spellsong (rare): You can use your unique elven vocal cords (or another Skill to create polyphonic vocalization) to manipulate the flow of raw magic in your conduits to create special magical effects. Reduce the chance of failure and damage suffered by Rank x Magic x 0,05% (maximum 100%);
I had confidence in my combat abilities. My capacity of keeping people I cared about alive? Not so much. My surgeries would take a fifth of the ti they took back when I healed Josie, Karina, and Cedric.
I pulled my basic Status report.
Rosewise Honorcoin - Level 101
Eleon 20 / Ghostsight Eleon 20 / Deep Eleon 10
Mystic Sorceress 20 / Manaborne Sorceress 20 / Manastorm Sorceress 11
Strength 28 - Dexterity 35 - Endurance 29
Mind 31 - Willpower 31 - Charisma 31
Magic 120
Ego 120 - Luck 120 - Soul 120
HP 3.772.800
MP 11.329.200
SP 7.678.800
Hooray. I broke the ten million MP barrier. I decided to leave one of the three "Human" perks unused in a sort of rainy day fund. But my Class perks had so good options to pick from.
You gained the perk: Manastorm Wellspring (ultra-rare): Your wellspring can turn into a source chaotic magic that burns selected enemies as they regenerate MP. You deal arcane damage equal to the MP regenerated.
You gained the perk: Fierce Manstorm (ultra-rare): Your Manastorm Wellspring deals arcane damage to both the HP and MP pools of the targets equal to 5 * the MP regenerated.
You gained the perk: True Manstorm (ultra-rare): Your Manastorm Wellspring deals arcane HP and MP damage equal to your Magic Attribute * the MP regenerated.
I didn't want to be on the receiving end of that. Arcane damage, huh?
You purchased the perk: Arcane magic resistance (very rare): Reduce all arcane damage received by 50%.
- Your attempt at obtaining Exp Share (ultra rare) Failed. You got another related perk of a lower rarity.
You purchased the perk: Equal Exp split (rare): Select several willing friendly targets no bigger than half your Charisma Attribute. Exp from all kills any of you score are split evenly between you and all targets so long they are engaged in the fight. Each target uses their own set of multipliers.
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