Foxmoor Fiction
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SSD 4.66 - My Weary Soul
🕑 Added 2024-04-19 17:35:51 +0000 UTCI think we will get through the last of the notifications next chapter, but I'm not completely sure. Still have the largest and most significant remaining. That will be posted on Monday or Tuesday.
Would love ideas for different soul skills. I know some that I want to use already, but it would be great to have different ideas.
“You want to know how I got so proficient at death magic? I tried to save people, and they took it wrong. Some were actually grateful, but most people get weird about it. I mean, does it really matter that I used material from a corpse to save your life?”
-Al’kusad Jfogaoi, Master Necromancer
==Caden==
You have upgraded some titles.
Touch of the Grave III
You have brought several people back from the brink of death. You have repeatedly touched the grave and the boundary of souls. Careful of that boundary, it doesn’t always like to be touched.
+600 (700 – 100 already given) Ability Points
+Moderately easier to learn and cheaper to buy life or soul related skills (15% Discount)
Dread Salvation III
You have brought multiple people to the edge of death due to your actions, and then made them truly grateful to you by bringing them back. Whether by deceit or accident, you have touched on both death and life, though… if this was an accident… you might need some help.
+900 (1050 – 150 already given) Ability Points
+Moderately easier to learn and cheaper to buy death and life related skills (15% Discount)
+Skills and titles relating to deceit are moderately more effective (15% boost)
Right… It wasn’t all bad.
I hadn’t only brought death. It was nice to know that my plan had worked and people had lived, when they would have died. That I had been able to give that to them.
I would have thought, looking out at the vast expanse before me, that it would be easier to keep that in mind.
Except, for all the trees that tossed their branches about in the storm, as if they were at a rave and bouncing their heads to the rhythm of the winds, for all of that and the countless animals and monsters that lived within me, they weren’t what mattered. I didn’t hold them sacred, at least not in the same way.
Sure, there was something special about being in nature and the quiet certitude it could bring… but it was special because I was there. Me, and others who could appreciate it.
Nature was meaningless… without meaning.
It seems a trite thing to say, but it was true.
Intelligence made nature into more than just a cycle grinding out the remaining time of the universe.
So… yes, I prized people above nature. Prized the potential of what they could become.
Nature should be saved because we care about other people. Because we want others to have that same experience and connection. Because we want it to remain for the future.
My ability to made and unmake it had cheapened its value, somewhat.
I was sad that I had, of necessity unmade so many natural caverns to suit my own goals. I had left which ones I could, but my very presence had altered them.
You might think it would make it easier to let people die, knowing their soul would go on. And, if it was truly them, simply moving on to a heaven, that might be true… but it wasn’t. This version of them would die.
So… yes. I was glad to save some lives. To prevent the loss of something that could never be regained. To allow this facet of them to shine brightly for a while longer.
I’ll shine my best.
I pulled up the next and continued.
You have earned titles:
Dam is Full, Spillway is Dry I
You have had full mana for more than a week, not even expanding your aura.
.
.
.
Dam is Full, Spillway is Dry II
You have had full mana for more than two weeks, not even expanding your aura.
.
.
.
Dam is Full, Spillway is Dry III (Max)
You have had full mana for more than a month, not even expanding your aura. Are you okay? You know you can do stuff with mana, right? Like, expand the dungeon, build shit, and make creatures. Is is depression? Have you seen that therapist I recommended?
+1050 AP (150 + 300 + 600)
+100% of unused mana regeneration is used to generate aura, at 75% efficiency
+(Max Bonus) Whenever aura is generated this way, an equal volume of aura transforms into dungeon
Your skill has improved:
Dungeon Aura Expansion III has become Dungeon Aura Expansion IV
Not anything that he had been expecting.
The dungeon had expanded while I was gone, there was still a whole ancient city that I needed to deal with, though it wasn’t all in my area of control just yet.
I thought Exsan had done it.
Apparently not.
I shrugged, there wasn’t much for me to do with this. It was one less thing I needed to deal with, really. With the inclusion of the dungeon conversion, this method probably expanded my dungeon faster than if I created aura using my full attention.
It was useful, but not earth shaking. I moved on.
Your skill has improved:
Soul Meditation III has become Soul Meditation X (Max)
Soul Meditation X (Max)
Entering your own soul is as easy as breathing. Further meditation can lead to a greater understanding of your true self and strengthen your soul, but you have already gone further than almost all have ever done. Mana regeneration is massively boosted while you focus inwards. Leads to greater awareness of souls.
You have gained a title:
The Impossible Leap (Max)
Going from level I to II isn’t too hard. From I to III is harder. From I to IV, insanely difficult. What you managed, going from from III to X in a sudden leap forward? Without a skill book… Impossible.
You used an active skill continuously, without breaks, for more than a month, bringing it up to max level. There is dedication, and there this what ever this is. Congratulations?
+7500 AP
+Every pattern (monsters, plants, traps, etc...) in the AP store cheaper than 50 points is automatically given for free.
+Your elemental, and universal, skill cost discounts also apply to future purchases of the appropriate pattern types
+(Max Bonus) That 50 points is only considered after your other discounts apply first, and whenever future discounts would bring something at or below 50 points, it is automatically given for free
Power to the Max I
You raised a skill to its maximum extent. Some people will go their entire lives, and never achieve this. Legends gain dozens. Keep going.
+500 AP
+(Skill Type: Soul) You gain the title: True Soul Domain
True Soul Domain
Some skills are simply more. More powerful, more dominating, more controlled. A domain is the expression of that. As a dungeon, many skills are already a pseudo-domain. With this title, the pseudo falls away.
+0 AP (Awarded Title)
+All your soul skills act as though they were a domain skill of equal level
+When contesting other domain users with a soul skill, that skill is treated as though it is one level higher
+The natural immunity of sapients to active dungeon skills in diminished by 10% per skill level
If I had been standing, I would have staggered. Knowledge rushed through me in waves.
Thousands of animals, monster, plants, fungus, traps, and other designs swept through me.
Most of my shards were consumed to handle the influx, but I still remained.
I let myself bask for just a moment.
Are these from the world in general, other dungeons?
I smiled. I didn’t know, but I could ask.
Some of the plants… were strange. I wasn’t sure what to make of them. The animals and monsters were obviously odd, but I was more used to that.
I shook my head.
Something to deal with later.
It wasn’t a bad thing, after all. I would need to massively expand my evolution and testing areas, but that was always going to be true.
I had scarcely done more than acknowledge them once I returned.
Onward.
Your skills have improved:
Learning III has become Learning IV
Destructive Assimilation III has become Destructive Assimilation IV
Vital Comprehension III (Life) has become Vital Comprehension IV (Life)
Mana Construct Intuition II has become Mana Construct Intuition III
I waited for a moment, but that was it.
Guess some of them are simple.
A wave of additional patterns started flowing in.
Oh, right… the discounts.
Learning was a universally helpful skill, but its biggest application at the moment was a universal discount, which meant more patterns fell below the 50 point threshold.
Same thing with vital comprehension, it already directly made ‘summons’ cheaper. Guessing that was the name for all the living stuff in the patterns. Whereas the construct intuition worked the same way for all the not so fleshy things.
Guess people were still making offerings while I was gone.
It was the only reason for those skills to go up while I was gone.
None of the patterns I was getting were stronger than the strongest I had already created, though a few came close. The strongest ones, appropriately, were those aligned with the life elements, seeing as I had the largest discounts there as a result of the titles that had just been upgraded.
I already wanted to explore the various elemental effects more, but this was just additional incentive.
Like I don’t have enough to do already.
I just smiled and shook my head.
More things to learn isn’t really a problem.
I pulled up the next notification.
You have gained a title:
Soul-itary Confinement I
You have spent more than a single continuous week inside your own soul.
.
.
.
Soul-itary Confinement II
You have spent more than two continuous weeks staying inside your own soul.
.
.
.
Soul-itary Confinement III (Max)
You have spent more than a month inside your own soul in one go. A titanic achievement, and a colossal risk. Things do happen outside, you know… Adventurers delving, looting, monsters killing, etc…
Let’s just see if we can keep you a bit more involved in the world, yeah?
+3500 AP (500 + 1000 + 2000)
+Enhance and synchronize temporal perception when inside soul
+Reduced loss of synchronicity between soul and body while away
+Synchronicity restores more quickly
+30% Discount and learning speed to soul skills
+(Max) Even when soul diving, a single shard is left functional in the body
Soul Weary
The soul is indestructible, but it can be worn down. Pushing it to the edge is not the smartest or healthiest option. Completely on brand for you though! Do we need to start adding a health or stamina bar for everything? If you insist on overdoing it, at least you will find things a little easier in the future.
+250 AP
+10% Discount and learning speed to soul skills
Back from the Brink II
You survived that which should have killed you. You didn’t think you were supposed to stay in your soul, or go that deep, for that long, did you? Exhausting your soul didn’t help, either. Your level of introversion is as impressive as it is concerning. Homebody is fine, soulbody, not so much. Try to get out more.
+200 (300 – 100 already given) Ability Points
+All skills are easier to learn while you are in personal danger. (20% increased experience)
Snarky as ever. And ugh… that pun.
I was absolutely too stubborn for my own good.
Need to be more careful.
I probably would have been more shocked about almost dying, but… I kind of already knew. My arrival had required me to regain control of my body. I had pushed myself because I wanted to win, because I wanted my soul to be mine.
I smiled as I felt the resonance with Exsan.
Very alike in some ways.
I had expected more patterns to be added onto my current queue, but there was nothing.
Either none of them are that cheap, or there just aren’t any.
I had noticed that when I had looked over the system’s list of soul skills before.
Soul skills were rare. There were not very many of them. And they were expensive, too. The skill store was hardly comprehensive, and I doubted that the pattern store was any different, but even so, there were a lot of things inside it.
At least now I had a substantial discount on buying one of the few available soul skills. My initial titles on arrival only gave me substantial benefits in learning a skill, not buying them.
I would figure it out on my own, if needed, just as I already had.
More notifications blinked at me, not so patiently waiting. On to the next…
Comments
bbk
Caden is probably the most efficient soul mage in that world and if not now soon for sure
Liam
Thank your for this Chapter. story for all the stories I have read yours is the first that has Has the main character have multiple chapters of the main character Becoming OP.😀
Foxmoor Fiction
Yes, yes it should.
daavko
Number go up! Thank you for the chapter. One tiny thing I noticed, shouldn't the total AP for Soul-itary Confinement be 3500?
