B3 Chapter 315: Sanctuary, pt. 3

“If you want to prove yourself worthy of VOS…”

An enigma, another tantalising hint at the truth behind the Vesryn order. Clearly, whatever it was, it was important to the order — some sort of supreme skill, perhaps? Or could it be some sort of ceremony or ritual. Vesryn, wherever it was from, seemed like it was well founded and had a deep foundation.

Any group that could have devised such a potent art had to be, especially one where their bloody initiates had a Heroic class for the first tier.

Not for the first time, Kaius couldn’t help but wonder how high the peak really was. He’d met Ekum, but such an existence was so far his superior that it was contextless — Kaius couldn’t even fathom charting a course from his current position to that lofty height.

Yet he knew eminently that the common Vaastivarian understanding of the limits of power were wrong — or at least so incomplete that they may as well be the same thing.

By the common definition, anyone who reached the second tier was a seasoned and driven warrior of great power. Those that pushed further, reaching above three hundred to the heights of Gold — like Rieker and Ro? They were movers and shakers, people who demanded respect wherever they went. Beyond that…there were only hushed whispers of the monsters who had made it to the third tier. He’d always thought there would be a rare few who existed, but Ro had shared that they were potentially a lot more common than he believed.

As much as that had been his reality for so long, it was clear that the third tier wasn’t anywhere close to the heights of what was achievable. Even if he discounted the contentious histories that suggested the Eternal Emperor had managed to reach the fifth tier, did he really believe that the culture of complacency that pervaded Vaastivar could match up to an organisation like Vesryn?

How strong would they consider a third tier? A master of the order, an ancient worthy of fealty? Or would they be a simple sergeant?

He shook his head — it was a strange thought. Already he handedly bested creatures that would give a full team of High Silvers pause, and he had yet to even breach the second tier himself.

Yet it felt like there was a yawning chasm between where he was now, and where he might end up in the future. Again and again, he’d been shown that the ceiling of possibility was something that most people created for themselves.

Vos— something enigmatic, and quite possibly otherworldly. He could only hope that he would learn more with his final skill. Father had mentioned it was something of a capstone for a class. Not necessarily more powerful than other abilities, but almost always something that was foundational to the class’s identity.

It certainly sounded like Vos would fit that description, if it was a Skill, that is.

“If you think any harder, your head might explode. What’s got you so curious?”

Kaius looked up to find Porkchop watching him, his head slightly tilted. His brother’s words drew the rest of their team out of their thoughts.

“Just an odd epigraph — I get more curious about Vesryn the more I learn.” Kaius shrugged. “At the very least, two of my skills look fantastic. One is a parry and riposte skill that will let me make use of more of my Stamina, and the other will let me channel my offensive spells through my blade.”

“No glyphs?” Ianmus sounded disappointed — with his voracious hunger for magical knowledge, the mage had grown almost as invested in his glyphs as he had.

“None, though I’m not all that disappointed — I’m sure my last skill will be an interesting one. What about the rest of you? Have you taken a look at your available skills?”

“I have.” Kenva nodded with a smile, shifting so that her shoulder leaned into the living wood wall behind her. “I’m going for an area skill — Maiming Rain. It’ll let me shatter an arrow mid-flight to summon a burst of splinters. I think it’ll be good for swarms, and also anything that is agile enough that I struggle to hit them.”

That was perfect! After so long with little area attack capabilities, he’d been growing worried that none of them would develop a skill along those lines. Though, it would have been nice if Kenva had gotten the skill a little earlier — it would have come in handy for taking out the rootborers, that was for sure.

It helped that Kenva was grinning like a fool — obviously excited with the skill. It was an infectious mood — new skills made it rather hard to feel anything other than joy. Especially when you were some of the rare few who would ever get to experience picking out two skills back to back, let alone doing so for the second time.

It didn’t take long for Kenva to share her second pick — another that would both bolster her strength and round out their capabilities as a team. Ensnaring Seedburst, a Skill that would summon a group of rapidly growing ensnaring vines wherever she shot her arrow. Battlefield control — something that they already had a little bit of, but more ability to hinder their enemies was always welcome.

Both skills had break-points, the area they affected growing larger every fifty levels. All in all, Kaius thought that the skills were a perfect fit for the ranger, and he hoped they would serve her — and the team as a whole — well.

It seemed none of them had held themselves back from checking their available skills, because no more than a few seconds after Kenva had finished explaining her own picks, Ianmus had jumped at the opportunity.

Surprisingly, his pick hadn’t been a sorcery or metamagic, but a standard Skill — albeit one that still made use of mana in a constant slow trickle while it was active. Ilthurial Mage-armour. It did exactly what it sounded like, surrounding Ianmus in an almost invisible layer of compressed armour made from solar affinity mana.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

Kaius felt like a stone had been lifted from his shoulders as Ianmus explained — ever since he’d seen the inside of his friend’s stomach, there’d been a consistent feeling scratching away at the pit of his stomach. Ianmus was…vulnerable. This skill would do something to correct that.

It was unfortunate that it would be a poor defence against physical injury — creating solid barriers out of such an immaterial affinity as solar would be out of Ianmus’s reach for a while yet.

Rotten roots, it was still something — and Ianmus had insisted it would be quite effective against attacks of a magical nature.

Much to Kaius’s surprise, Ianmus’s next selection also wasn’t directly related to magic — hells, it didn’t even use Mana! Theurgic Mentalist would cost stamina over time to speed up his cognition, and hasten his ability to channel and weave mana workings. It even came with a level of intuition towards spell stability and structure when he was casting — something that ultimately made Ianmus select it. He was hopeful that it would help him to progress further with his work on the new sigils he’d been testing for improving his free-casting.