Zarian blinked after rereading the achievent and realizing he had forgotten how incredible this reward was. He reached into Para’s pocket dinsion and pulled out the scroll that the System had delivered to him last night.
He hadn’t aura-identified the scroll until now.
Before Zarian concentrated, he thought how funny it was that they had two people with plenty of ways to use and abuse life energy. Zarian had his Bloody Lifesteal, and Gilbert had a new trait after upgrading the uncommon Extra Life to sothing epic, Life Wellspring.
Now that I think about it, it might be ti I look at upgrading Bloody Lifesteal sohow. It’s falling behind a little.
That sounded like a no-brainer, but it actually required so major brainstorming. Zarian was thinking of upgrading the uncommon spell himself, which was sothing he’d never done before.
It was a simple enough spell. It only had basic symbols and runic text. There were even so blank spots where he could fill in stuff. Maybe he could pull it off. Maybe.
Putting experintal wizardry plans aside, Zarian held the scroll up.
It was like the other scrolls. They were a foot and a half long, made of leathery parchnt, and had a thick rawhide cord keeping it rolled up and pinched at the middle.
Each one was dark yellowish while the cords were brown.
Under Zarian’s aura perception, each scroll shone with their own mystical power colors and shapes based on their unique runes and arrays. The death blight scroll was dark and harrowing, while the friendship revival scroll was illuminating and welcoming.
The scrolls also had deeply ingrained runes that were special and guarded by the System.
Zarian could feel the Star System actively shielding the special runes. He assud these were runes for the ga chanics that kept scrolls as special items.
Zarian pushed hard just to stress test the Star System, and the System resisted all the way successfully. This was definitely a hard-coded chanic, so Zarian left it alone for now.
He found it novel that he and his friends reached the point where super high-quality items, such as scrolls of imnse power, were now available.
The weapons and armors were nice, but they were more useful to Hannah. The flasks filled with dangerous concoctions could go to Gilbert.
But the scrolls? Those were definitely in Zarian’s wheelhouse.
Zarian grabbed up all the scrolls with his aura and placed them into Para’s pocket dinsion. He moved onto the next achievent.
Zarian snorted and reached into the pocket dinsion again.
He pulled out the dark, leather bound vial with a bulging hand-sized belly and a cork on top. Sothing awful and tragic roiled inside of the vial.
“Damn, System, when you really want to be ruthless, you really can be,” Zarian said, putting the vial back into the pocket dinsion. “Much appreciated. I’ll keep this for a really rainy day.”
“Huh, that sounds cool. I would wonder what that favor could be, but apparently I don’t need to think hard about it. Thanks.”
Zarian already had a lot to think about. So the less thinking he could do, the better.
“I’m really not an overachiever, but I guess I owe my thanks to the gnolls for stealing what could’ve been my first lair,” Zarian said, nodding. “You know what? I’ll even scratch behind so of their ears to show my appreciation.”
So new notifications popped up in front of Zarian. His eyes widened at the ssages.
“Star System, now I know you are acting wild,” Zarian said. “There are a lot of gnolls. A lot, a lot. How many ear scratches and head pats am I supposed to give to accomplish the side quest?”
The Star System didn’t respond.
Para gave a happy impression in the back of Zarian’s mind. Technically, she was a part of him. She could accomplish the quest for him once they reached the central ho of the Blood Prairie Savages.
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I have a bunch of leftover quests don’t I? Zarian checked.
Yeah, I cleared out so of the older side quests, but now I have new ones, Zarian thought.
Either way, the rewards were pouring in heavily. The stats had gone up because of the Legendary Lair Conquest achievent.
Zarian could feel the difference in Strength and Agility especially since those were low compared to everything else.
However, Zarian was physically the second most capable person overall right now because of his Thematic Law/Floridian Mindset. That divine trait buffed Para by a lot, which buffed Zarian’s body by a lot.
Still, building up the base Strength and Agility without having to use Free points was always nice.
Now onto the last achievent, which had given him a slightly ridiculous and troubleso reward.
Zarian sighed. “Oh, Christian God of Gilbert, damn it all. Isn’t my plate full enough?”
Zarian summoned the grimoire. He waited as sothing shifted around under the cloak from behind him. The grimoire crept out from under Para slowly while flat with the bed.
Humanoid fingers and centipede legs extended from the back cover. Yellow-white patches of fur and horns covered the front cover. Beady eyes of different sizes and types blinked, clicked, and lolled about from the spine.
Zarian blinked slowly at the thing.
The grimoire was certainly weird as it moved skittishly across the bed. Then it turned to Zarian and emitted a gurgling screech before scurrying back under Para’s cloak.
Zarian sighed again. “How am I supposed to learn spells when the grimoire is all timid? Am I supposed to force it?”
Para ford a feminine hand, the palm splitting into a mouth. “I can help there, Zarian. I know you are busy, but since this is a basic grimoire, I should be able to read its initial spells quickly and pass the knowledge to you.”
“Uh, sure, thanks.” Zarian hesitated, then asked, “Is everything okay, Para?”
“I have been thinking about existence and choice and the aning of life. I have been thinking of many things I haven’t thought too deeply about outside of morality and what I am in the grand sche of everything,” Para said.
Zarian opened and closed his mouth. He didn’t know what to say, so he nodded.
Para turned her attention to the Grimoire of Weird Morphs. She gently caressed the bristly and horned top cover.
The grimoire made phlegmy purring sounds that sounded like soone’s clogged up drainage pipe. The grimoire seed to like the parasite more than the actual host.
I feel like summoning the other grimoires and letting them toughen this one up. Especially the hell gator grimoire, Zarian thought mischievously.
That’s bullying and hazing and hypocritical of you. Why not build trust first before we add pressure gradually? Para directed through their ntal bond.
Oof, damn, you are not holding back when you act like a mother. Fine, fine, use your gentle parenting and see how far that goes, Zarian returned.
At the very least, Para would take a short ti to learn the first two or three spells once she could get the weird morph grimoire to cooperate. It was a basic grimoire, too, so it had plenty of growing to do before it advanced like the others.
Leaving Para to ta their new grimoire, Zarian moved on to the juicy stuff. Actual levels, advancents, and new gains.
“Oh, yeah, that’s that good, good stuff. I’d snort it if I could,” Zarian said, chuckling. “I’m eight more levels away from the big Level 100 and all the cool stuff that cos with it.”
More importantly, these advancents ca with one skill upgrade and so new features that were unique to grimoires.
High Rune Mindfra 1 was more incredible now.
That includes the spiders and everyone who has a mind spider in their head, Zarian thought, amazed. This ans everyone can have their brains structured and in sync like a bunch of computers on a network.
Hannah would lose it once she heard about this.
The only problem was that the aura cost would get heavy if he tried to boost and maintain too many ntal workloads at once. It would probably work best when used against extre problems.
“Still a very nice upgrade,” Zarian said. “But wait, there’s more.”
There it is, Zarian thought. A new elent to the ga. Apparently, the advanced grimoires can do more than upgrade spells. They can turn skills into spells, which gives more access to the runes and designs of those skills. Better yet, they’ll grow stronger with the grimoires rather than individually, making it all more efficient for as a wizard.
This also played into Zarian’s new theory. He should be able to advance spells on his own without the Star System’s direct help. Ruvaria hadn’t ntioned it, but Zarian was sure she left it as sothing for him to realize on his own.
Bloody Lifesteal was the perfect candidate for a DIY upgrade. After all, Zarian had loads of new inspiration from all the bloody magic stuff he’d experienced recently.
Other than that, he had so choices to make for turning skills into spells. Hence why he had gone skill hunting before returning to the lake.
Before Zarian made any permanent choices, he checked the new gains from waking up this morning. He was already smiling before he read it.
“About damn ti,” Zarian said.
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