A robotic construct charged forward, slamming into a small wyvern, the dragon-like beast made Akhenamen feel like he was in a Monster Hunter game with how similar it looked to a certain very well known green dragon from that game.
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The tail slammed toward the construct, sending it flying back a few steps before finally stopping the blow and gripping the tail tight. Sofya, running in circles around the wyvern, avoiding huge flaming balls of fire, was wearing a big backpack with Tesla coils generating electricity between two antennas.
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A water-pipe like exhaust between her hands, shaped like a rifle. Mini-tesla coils on the barrels lit up one after the other as Sofya slide under one of the fire ball, before lining up her shot and pressing the trigger, a loud “CRACK” of lightning slamming into the reptile, sending the Wyvern crashing to the ground with a pained scream.
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The robot construct, which looked a lot like a rebuilt and improved Bob, jumped forward, its electric punches slamming into the wyvern, creating small shockwaves through the sand from the great power contained within those punches!
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Pulling out two grenades, she pressed a single button, causing the small ball of copper to start beeping, the button glowing bright red before she threw it hard, letting it land inside the Wyvern’s opened mouth, causing Akhenamen to surround himself with his aspect, knowing the gory shower that awaited Sofya and him now.
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And much to Sofya’s horror, the inner explosion caused by the powerful grenade made the young wyvern’s head and throat explode in gory bits which rained down around the battlefield.
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The grenade was an Impact Shockwave, a powerful shockwave which tore apart flesh itself from how violent it was. The Wyvern’s death was not a surprise.
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“Eww… ew-ew-ew. That’s disgusting.”
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“I thought you were used to fighting?”
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“I am! But that’s just disgusting.”
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Akhenamen shook his head and easily erased and ended the existence of the flesh covering Sofya, making her clean once more.
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“Thanks!”
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“You’re welcome. How much exp did you gain?”
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“This wyvern was quite young, so not too much… around 500 exp! Not too bad actually!”
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“So what goals would you like to accomplish before getting to Tron?”
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Akhenamen had promised Tyfania he would go to Tron, the Gnome’s Grand Capital and their greatest factory and bastion. A city said to be so big, so massive… that none, not even the secret services of the Northern Alliance knew just how deep the Under City was. Many monsters, beasts, and abandoned automatons lived in the Scrapyard under Tron.
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He had to admit he was very eager to see such a city. One straight out of someone’s Steampunk dream. He could already guess that secrets had to be waiting for him inside that Scrapyard, including another Prothean complex.
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One that he was more than eager to explore, considering his soon-to-exist new class quest, which should happen in that complex, according to his future memories! The quest had not yet dropped, as he was supposed to become level 40 to unlock his new class quest and finishing his world quest would bring him from level 31 to level 41 because of the promised ten levels.
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Talking about that Quest, Akhenamen thought back about Ruby-Khion’s reaction to all that happened, firstly, the poor cat goddess finished refining her sister’s soul only to realise one half of her statue was missing, and Selinad was now being lit by the sun.
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Akhenamen’s attack had cut through the earth and exposed Selinad to the sky (and also cut a part of the continent, but that was just a side note). She was deeply surprised but didn’t get angry at Akhenamen. She had felt one of the Fallen rising, the kind of threat that should have made any gods justified in using their full power to fight on Zenthia.
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The thought that Akhenamen, who was only a Throne at the time, had successfully slain a Dominion was ridiculous, but it was the truth. And with his relation being confirmed with at least three Singularities, the gods quickly decided he would face no repercussions for almost cutting their bastion of faith in two.
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Their relationship to Akhenamen was definitely not a good or even neutral one anymore; he had caused much destruction and death, but he also couldn’t be fully blamed, as they would cause as much damage if they had fought against the Fallen. Akhenamen was just a useful scapegoat to blame.
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As for the interested he didn’t really care what the gods thought of him. He did feel… great sorrow at the lives he had taken with his attack, not all were beasts, and five gods in particular had created an alliance just to deal with him when they would have the occasion. They called themselves The Solution. Those five gods were those who had lost the most followers and even their main temples to Akhenamen’s blast.
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Akhenamen had wanted to visit them to present his excuses, but Ruby-Khion and even his Aspect siblings had told him that it would be a bad idea. Maybe it would work on mortals (and even then it was unlikely to), but the gods wouldn’t forgive him because he said sorry. He did, however, send his deepest apologies and compensation to the victim’s family.
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He even negotiated the resurrection of some of the deceased with some of the gods. Most refused to let go of the souls they had obtained; some did it even without his request or payment, and others accepted in exchange for obtaining some compensation.
In total, around 40% of the dead sentient beings were brought back, a very small number to Akhenamen but a success to Ruby-Khion. Now that Akhenamen was finished dealing with the aftermath of his battle with Damocles, Ruby-Khion and her people would be reaching Oleron under the XVII’s legion’s protection.
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Not just her but many gods would actually penetrate Oleron under Akhenamen’s watchful eyes. Akhenamen was not scared that they would try anything. Outside, Akhenamen would never take such a risk.
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But while he was in Cygislax, he had the stats of being at the 12th rank. Not that a twelfth transcendent rank existed, as once someone reached the Absolute or even Singularity rank, it was likely their traits and equipment were enough to bring them well above the supposed limit of 10 000 stats. However, the System limited its strength and lowered it forcefully to 10 000.
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The only exception was aspects like Akhenamen, whose stats couldn’t be restrained by the System as they were technically of a higher standing on the universal hierarchy ladder.
Because of this, Akhenamen, whose state should be restrained to the one of an Absolute, instead had states in the 12000’. Even if every god descended, they would all be slaughtered effortlessly.
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Technically, his presence alone made sure that Sapphyra’s rebirth would not be interrupted, but other gods, allies of the Twin Goddesses, would be useful as they were guarding the Felinid's soul tree while Ruby-Khion was away.
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It would start in one week when the Felinids would all reach Oleron. The presence of all their remaining people was necessary. In the meantime, Akhenamen was busy seeing to the reconstruction and defensive matrix planning, his own experiments on the mushroom hybrids (with Sofya’s help), training with Orikon and finally helping Sofya get stronger to learn more on how the inhabitants of this world normally gained strength when they weren’t favoured by the System like he was.
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“Mind reminding me what kind of traits you’d like to get before moving to the next rank?”
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“Oh, of course! Well, I got two [Epic] and two [Rare] traits. I’d like to get five traits, and at least three of them being [Epic].”
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“Alright… but I do have a question that’s been bothering me… doesn’t this create a huge difference in power between those who can afford to slowly build their traits and those who can’t?”
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“You’re right, but there are also other paths to rise in power! You can also replace some of your traits using certain blessings, artifacts and potions. It’s called the Trait Reserve, where you can “store” your traits until you have a potion or anything allowing you to swap traits. Then you gotta use a “Reset Potion” to bring back your stats to those of a level 1. And the System, which knows you’re a level… let’s say 80, will bring back your stats to normal, but this time counting the newly chosen traits!”
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Akhenamen nodded; he had to admit it was an interesting solution. As expected, after thousands of years, the inhabitants of Zenthia had found ways to use the “fair” System to their benefit by literally forcing the System to recalculate their stats. Of course, it was likely the System was more than aware of this “bug” and just allowed it.
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“That’s smart. So you killed a Wyvern that was higher level than you, by yourself… got any traits yet?”
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“No eheh- takes more than that to get one!”
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“Wait… just realised, but where does your second Epic trait come from? Last I remember, you had one epic and two rare.”
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“I won an Epic trait by being the first non-Cygilite to step foot in Cygislax’s Main Frame’s room! It’s called [Gnomish Pioneer of Cygislax]!”
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“I see. How do you think I could help you get a Trait?”
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“Well, I go by this simple basic rating scale!”
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She suddenly pulled out a board from her inventory, pointing at different pre-drawn figures. Making Akhenamen slightly shocked, she carried an actual chalkboard (stolen from The Academy’s reserve) in her Inventory.
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“Here’s my rating scale!”
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You accomplished…Then it is…. You participated in a raid against a cave filled with goblins.[Goblin Slayer] [Common]You personally led the charge on the raid against the goblin filled cave or were amongst the vanguard of the raid. [Goblin’s Bane] [Uncommon]You successfully defended a city under siege by a goblinoid army and participated in the battle against the goblin lord personally. [Green Skin Crown Slayer] [Rare]You fought against the Goblin Lord personally and were the one to defeat him in single combat! [Epic]Finished a [Main Quest] during which you had to find and destroy one of the main bastions of the Goblinoid, leading in the reversal of the war and allowed the allied forces to push back and win a major offensive against the green-skin. [Legendary]Finished a [World Quest] where you personally helped in or directly slayed the Goblin Dominion Transcendent that had risen in power, allowing his people to start a war against all of Zenthia. [Mythical]
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“I see. That’s a pretty good chart. But… Why do you have that, and what do you have against goblins?”
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“Well… uh… I have a chart for a lot of things. And I just don’t like goblins.”
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“Aren’t they a sentient race that rivals the gnomes with their ingenuity, though?”
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“I still don’t like them. If you ask me, we should build a wal-”
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Akhenamen sighed. He had to admit he hadn’t expected Sofya to be racist against Goblins, but well… maybe she had a goblin rival at The Academy? He would have to help her overcome that hate during their training. But now that he knew about this chart, he had a good idea on how to help others in gaining traits, as even his people still needed to gain traits in such a way.
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