The Path of Ascension Chapter 381

Chapter 381

Matt had to rein himself in after their spar with Ra’thala, and he could tell that everyone else felt the same way.

The fight had been so… different, they all wanted to go another round or five.

Ra’thala’s spells felt unique, and each cast carried with it a surprise as their patterns of energy differed from what they were used to, not to mention just how strong some of the spells were.

His big attack that warped both time and space was something Matt really wanted to see pop up in a rift, but knowing his luck, it would be a Tier 50 skill which they would never encounter. At least not for thousands of years, but he really wanted to play with it now. Few attack skills interacted with space, let alone time, in the way that Ra’thala’s had shown itself to do so.

He also wanted to see what would happen when they shoved an upgrade orb into the skill.

It would also answer a question he had been thinking over as he watched the fights.

What Tier did a purely self-made skill count as?

Was there a possibility for them to abuse self-made skills that were unique to use both a Tier 14 upgrade orb and a Tier 26 upgrade orb on a skill that was clearly beyond those Tiers in terms of complexity and power?

If he could, that was awesome, and it lent itself to further exploitation. And if he couldn’t, then why not?

People did create skills in this Realm, even if rarely, but Matt had no idea how upgrade orbs interacted with them and he wanted to explore the possibilities.

Even a failure could teach them a ton, and Matt’s pockets already hurt as he anticipated the tests his guild would want to run on this idea.

What if they learned something unique about upgrade orbs from this?

Or skills themselves.

Having seen the skills in action, Matt was already formatting a directive for his guild to start creating their own skills that would be useful in the Empire.

If they could simplify Ra’thala’s method a little, as it sounded pretty complicated, they could change the landscape of low Tiers and their relationship with magic.

That was if Ra’thala’s ‘ease’ of creating skills wasn’t a function of his cultivation method.

For all of his strengths, Ra’thala’s cultivation method left a lot to be desired, at least from a pure combat perspective. Its complicated nature and less total essence meant he had to spin up his cultivation cores to fight at a peak level, which took both concentration and effort that could be better spent elsewhere.

That, if nothing else, killed Matt’s desire to look into the method too much. Oh, he’d happily fund both Ra’thala’s efforts and anyone else in his guild who wanted to test methods like it, but his personal interest evaporated upon learning it had such a major weakness.

It also explained why they all had to shift into something closer to a mid-Tier 25 perception speed when talking to Ra’thala. His baseline was a step lower until he spun up his cultivation cores.

Matt did intend to talk to Luna about the method of spinning one’s cores, as it was similar to the method she had taught them about pushing through cultivation suppressors. But he wondered, or rather hoped, that if there was a shared origin there might be a more advanced version that could not just reduce suppression effects, but boost cultivation in a similar way to what Ra’thala used. It was unlikely that there was a known method, otherwise they would have already been taught it either on the Path or in the army, but it was something to look into.

That, and he was sure that if anyone could help in Ra’thala’s desire to reach the pinnacle elite stage, it would be Luna. If he survived her tutelage at least.

From what he understood, she had retreated back into her house for a ‘nap’ once the war ended, and hadn’t been heard from since. He normally wouldn’t trust such simple information outright, but considering that it came from a ‘fearful’ Mara, Matt believed it.

Still, none of that mattered right now. Ra’thala was still new to the Realm and needed to settle down.

To that end, after they ate dinner, they escorted Ra’thala to the room he had been given in the palace.

Eyes turned to Allie, who correctly thought everyone was about to ask her for teleports and vanished. Teleporter having escaped, Matt turned to everyone else and offered access to their suite, which was closest to the Palace, for a place to relax until Ra’thala was ready to go out again.

Allie reappeared the moment they decided to hang out and demanded they watch one of the newer Ascender movies.

Aster immediately pouted as her favorite actor and friend Cynthia Sinclair hadn’t played her in this latest movie, and she insisted the new actor hadn’t captured her subtleties in the same way Cynthia could.

Matt couldn’t tell the difference and he knew Aster better than anyone else, but his comment had only earned him a glare, then lecture, when he mentioned it.

Thankfully there was an easy way to distract Aster and he offered they watch Cynthia’s new movie instead of the new Ascender movie.

Cynthia felt now that the majority of Ascender movies that would be made had been made fifty years after the war, she was able to start taking other roles.

Having played an Ascender more than any other single actor, she had long become a household name and had her pick of movies, which was why most were surprised when she personally funded a lower budget script and elevated what would have been a small single-planet movie into an Empire-wide production.

Matt did understand why she took the role however, as it was the complete opposite of everything she had been doing while acting as Aster. According to the synopsis they had been given, instead of an incredibly powerful cultivator, Cynthia was portraying a weak low Tier who seemed to be always at the whim of fate until she started taking measures into her own hands.

Except her efforts must have proved for naught because the ending of the story was spoiled by the first line of the synopsis. “She died while achieving nothing”.

It was genuinely interesting and Matt had been forced to dedicate actual effort to not have the movie spoiled thanks to the amount of buzz it had generated while they were on their reconnaissance mission.

Aster jumped on the offer, which led the seven of them to a private theater where they watched the movie.

Matt shouldn’t have been surprised, but it was genuinely good. The story was complex enough to keep the viewer interested but simple enough to make watching easy. It also trope dodged his expectation of not actually killing the titular character and true to the movie’s message, the main character struggled and achieved nothing despite all of her efforts.

It was nihilistic to the extreme but so incredibly well done that Matt understood the hype around the movie after they watched it.

Matt was tempted to go back to their suite to get a little work done, preparing his briefs to his guild about all he had learned while it was fresh, but Aster, Allie, Liz, and surprisingly enough Zack demanded they go and congratulate Cynthia in person for her stellar role as not-Aster.

Just months after the movie’s release, Cynthia was still in her press tour and on Rusty’s capital, which would have normally meant they could only send a message but Allie happily teleported them there without a single complaint.

Scanning the planet, Matt pushed a dozen return probes away but paused upon feeling a trio of familiar spiritual perceptions brush against his own.

Rusty, Tur’stal, and Frederic were all gathered within Rusty’s palace? And in a meeting of some sort of — Sensing the people around them Matt understood they were dealing with the Orders.

He had almost forgotten about the Orders with how many roadblocks they encountered when promoting the venture, but from the gathering of Knights and nobles, it seemed like they were finally about to start the program.

Receiving a message to join them if he had time, Matt sighed knowing he would need to mingle and play nice with not only the gathered nobles but also the Orders.

That many people just seemed like a headache waiting to happen but Matt knew what he was getting into when he signed on.

Before he could reply, Allie teleported them once more but this time to Cynthia’s location.

That they appeared in the middle of a live talk show was probably a bonus for Allie and Aster who enjoyed the fame, but Matt felt his social batteries take a hit immediately as every eye and camera shifted to them.

Smiling, he waved at the camera before retreating slightly even as Allie and Aster squee’d all the way up to Cynthia who was still processing their sudden arrival.

The host was smooth and with an easy grin, he turned to the camera and said, “And we were just talking about what Ascender Wraith thought about the movie. I think we have our answer.”

Cynthia wiggled in excitement as she smiled at the exuberant Aster but Matt’s bond was shoved out of the way as Allie and Liz wanted to congratulate her, which caused everyone in the audience to laugh at their antics.

The host, one Brian O’Conner, wasn’t someone Matt knew well but his [AI] pulled up enough information to let Matt smoothly answer in a way that best fit the situation. “The movie was quite the treat. I doubt anyone needs us to say that, but it’s worth saying, and definitely worth seeing.”

That earned another cheer from the audience which helped cover the excited chatter coming from the astonished fans. Thankfully one of the producers had the good grace to mute Cythina’s sound, which prevented the live audience from hearing everything they were saying.

Not that anything they said was sensitive or even negative, but it was private, even if they had barged into the middle of her public interview to give their congratulations.

Sure, this would top the headlines, but Matt still felt bad about it derailing her interview.

A lot of people’s plans had just gotten thrown into a trash can but what was done was done.

Brian, however, just rolled with it and to his credit didn’t fawn over them as Ascenders and instead asked them about the movie, diving into what they liked and didn’t.

The interview ran long, but no one rushed them out and instead they happily chatted for almost half an hour before the conversation naturally ended and all of them took the Allie Express out of the studio.

They didn’t go far, just to a restaurant, but Matt took the opportunity to slip away and visit the still ongoing meeting with the Royals and the Orders.

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He’d much rather stay behind but Aster was having fun with her friend, and as supporters of the initiative one of them needed to poke their head in or risk coming across as rude.

Fifty years ago, Matt would have shrugged such concerns off but recently he had been getting hit with issues that stemmed from his unwillingness to mingle properly and he had been trying to be better about such things.

The moment he entered Rusty’s palace, he was redirected to a side room where he found all three of the Royals waiting for him.

Squinting, Matt flexed his Meld and was disappointed that none of them so much as flinched. He had hoped the oddity of his Meld would be able to jump Tiers considering it felt like the clones were made with what felt like either Concepts or Intents.

Rusty rolled his eyes at the test. “Yeah, we are clones. Can’t exactly leave the party.”

Matt contemplated before asking for and getting a better set of protection in the room before he spoke.

“We got a new ascender.”

All three Royals clearly twitched as they increased their perception before lowering it to Tier 26 levels once more, giving him a very confused look.

Which was exactly why Matt had worded it that way.

“Ascender as in ascended from a lower Realm,” he explained, eliciting a spark of recognition from his listeners. As Matt explained the adventure they’d been through, including how they’d last-minute needed to swipe the man from the Federation, Rusty belly laughed, not his clone but his real body, who waved away the person he was talking to to replace his Domain clone in the room.

His fast move earned him dirty looks from the other two Royals, which Rusty ignored.

“Ok, this is too good to pass up. Continue on with the story. I wanna hear this in person.”

Matt did so and expected Rusty to make another quip but Tur’stal was the first to speak. “Now this is interesting. Making skills. I really want to get my hands on that create matter spell. Using ambient essence to condense into a temporary form at-Tier would mean less mana to reinforce the material than the normal create branch of spells make. Just how versatile is the skill creation process?”

Matt shrugged because he had no idea. “You’d have to ask Ra’thala himself, but he implied that it was a personal skill. Which I understand means he’s unlikely to share how it works. Better odds on it being a skill drop that starts to show up.”