Having put on his warm clothes, the gnome Lanner came out to look at the surface with me. I used Fireballs to melt the snow and ice blocking the dungeon’s entrance.

“Light Orb.”

Everything, including the sky, was pitch black. It was bitterly cold. I could sense my body becoming numb.

I looked at Lanner.

“Fire Blade.” A wave of heat washed over us.

“Cold. So cold,” he muttered. “Also dark. Just snow and ice.”

I gestured with my fiery blade as Lanner approached. “This is the White Waste past the End of the World. Not the most scenic of places on the surface. There should be mountains in that direction and the beastkin settlement.”

Ozy had stayed at the bottom of the entrance passage. It was too cold for him.

I focused and my Light Orb went flying off into the distance and saw the same bleak scenery.

“Perhaps when it is no longer the dark season, we can come up, and the view will be better. It’s a shame it’s so dark. If there were no clouds, I bet we could see a lot of stars.”

“Let’s go back down,” Lanner said.

“You go. I want to wait out here for a while. We are taking a rest day at the entrance passage, anyway. It took far too long to get here, and you will take the lead in combat tomorrow.”

It had taken a long time to get out of the 11^th layer.

Three months had passed since I had last checked my status and met the gnomes. The time had come to re-examine. I would do that after I went back down.

Lanner left, scurrying down the stairs, and I let my Flame Blade go out. Even with my Darkness Vision, everything was still incredibly dark. There was only a hint of light on the horizon, and I could vaguely make out the bottom of the clouds above me.

Standing there in the brutal cold, I endured.

It was a catchy line, and I was stealing it from the beastkin and the gnomes. I could see how it would be a popular phrase if they ever had to deal with a climate like this.

I could feel my Mana trying to fight off the cold as it penetrated my body through my armor and layer of clothing. After standing out here for five minutes by myself, there was a layer of ice covering my face.

With effort, I moved and slowly returned to the dungeon.

“You okay?”

“I endured,” I replied to his confused look.

I would let myself recover a bit and then go out again. It was a great way to level up Cold Resistance quickly. I would prefer to get some work on the skill while I could. Resistance skills were never easy to level. If I were by myself, I might have spent half a month here at the entrance, getting used to the cold and leveling up Cold Resistance into Cold Immunity.

However, I knew Lanner would become bored and frustrated by it. We would stay for a day, and I’d go up a couple of times to experience the surface’s brutality. The entrance was chilly, though there was no breeze.

“A day of this is horrible.”

“But you got Cold Resistance?”

“Yes. I did,” he replied, a bit sullenly.

“It’s a useful skill, with most of these chambers having a cold environment.”

The cold would slow down his reaction times. Having Cold Resistance so he could quickly change wands was important. I didn’t expect him to get other resistance skills, but Cold Resistance in this section of the dungeon was important.

“I would focus on preparing for the day after tomorrow. You are going to need to be ready to fight the monsters on your own. I will only intervene if you are about to die, and I might be too late.”

“What…but you aren’t going to help?”

“No. You need experience clearing the dungeon on your own. Normally I would have sent you on a solo descent, but it is better we don’t get separated.”

Before going back outside, I checked my status.

Level: 20

Experience: BLOCKED

Healing: 520/520

Stamina: 630/630

Mana: 860/860

Class: Tier 1, Adult Human (Blue)

Effect: Increased Skill Acquisition (+10%), Increased Learning Speed (+10%), Increased Stat Gain (+10%), Increased Physical Gain (+10%), Increased Mental Gain (+10%)

Vitality: 52 ()

Endurance: 63 (+1)

Strength: 42+20 ()

Agility: 50+20 (+1)

Perception: 40 (+1)

Mind: 168 (+3)

Magic: 66+20 (+2)

Focus: 61+20 (+1)

Free Points: 200

Tier 1 (13) (35+): Dwarven Etiquette (100), Eldarin Etiquette (100), Elven Etiquette (100), Dancing Skills (100), Pulse Strike (97), Wrestling Skills (95), Drawing Skills (94+3), Dagger Skills (90), Pugilist Skills (84), Bow Skills (79), Whip Skills (57), Stillness (47+4), Driving (39)

Tier 2 (70) (15+): Mana Sense (100), Danger Sense (100), System Sense (100), Soul Sense (100), Speed Reading (100+1), Mana Vision (93+2), Darkness Vision (81+1), Focused Monster Processing Skills (81+1), Critical Thinking (80+1), Focused Deflection (75+2), Shadow Vision (74+2), Focused Dodge (60), Time Sense (58+1), Demonic Lore (57+5), Monster Analysis (56+6), Spatial Sense (52+3), Trap Detection (50+2), Depth Sense (44+4), Focused Combat Tactics (44+4), Focused Shield Skills (43+1), Poison Sense (42), Sweet Teeth (42+2), Focused Throw (40), Focused Cooking Skills (39+3), Focused Rage (37+3), Dwarven Lore (36+1), Eldarin Lore (36+5), High Vostner Lore (36+8), Elven Lore (34+1), Focused Spear Skills (33), Low Vostner Lore (30+3), Focused Axe Skills (20), Soul Vision (6+3), Focused Armor (3+3), Focused Speech (1+1)

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Tier 3 (120) (5+): Empowered Will (100), Mana Manipulation (100), Fear Resistance (85), Empowered Gestures (84+2), Eldarin Runes (80+1), Light Orb (80

+2), Empowered Meditation (68+2), Silent Casting (67+2), Skill Control (67+2), Hidden Status (67+3), Lightning Resistance (61), Cold Resistance (61+7), Clean (60+2), Fireball (55+4), Flame Blade (53+4), Ward (53+4), Empowered Breathing (46+3), Empowered Writing (44+2), Sleep (42+1), Empowered Running (42+3), System Control (40+2), Lightning Beam (40+4), Physical Resistance (35+1), Status Analysis (35+1), Arcane Resistance (32), Cure (28), Dwarven Runes (26+1), Elven Runes (26+1), Calculus (24), Advanced Geometry (24), Empowered Sword Skills (24+4), Soul Strike (24+4), Demonic Runes (20), Empowered Stealth (20+2), Social Resistance (20+3), High Vostner Runes (20), Low Vostner Runes (18), Sonic Resistance (10), Alchemy (10), Empowered Toughness (6), Soul Shield (4+3)

Tier 4 (36): Experience Siphon(C), Gnomish Silence(C), Soul Link (74+2), Poison Immunity (35), Multi-Casting (27+2), Vibration Blade (21+2), Soul Immunity (19+4), Pain Immunity (13), Healing Immunity (6), Fire Immunity (5), Ritualism (4)

Equipment

Gloves: Gloves of Magic (T3) (+20 Magic)

Boots: Boots of Agility (T3) (+20 Agility)

Head: Helmet of Clarity (T3) (+20 Focus)

Body: Heavy Armor of Stability (T3) (+20 Strength)

Ring 1: Ring of Alarm (T3) (Gem turns red if other Mana interferes)

Ring 2: Ring of Force Deflection (T3) (Reduces impact force by a quarter)

Amulet/Bracelet: Experience Blocker (T4) (Prevents all experience gain for primary level)

Weapon 1: Reforged Beginner’s Blade (T3) (Sharpness-T4, Durability-T3, Self-Repair-T2)

Equipment 1: Runic Writing Set (T3) (Write Runes T3 and Below)

Equipment 2: Monster Processing Set (T3) (Processes Level 150 and Below)

Equipment 3: Ring of Remote Awareness (T3) (Allows for remote viewing from companion ring)

Equipment 4: Wand of Explosion (T3) (Rechargeable, single-use wand with T4 Explosion spell skill)

Winged Serpent

Level: 51/462

Experience: 18,782/23,479

Healing: 1,320/1,320

Stamina: 620/620

Mana:

1,560/1,560

Class: Tier 2, Winged Serpent (Yellow)

Effect: Alchemy Skill Growth (+25%), Alchemic Skill Power (+200%)

Vitality: 132 (+2)

Endurance: 62 (+2)

Strength: 79 (+2)

Agility: 111 (+2)

Perception: 65 (+2)

Mind: 123 (+2)

Magic: 156 (+6)

Focus: 72 (+2)

Free Points: 0

I had gained only 397 skill levels. If anyone heard me say that they would probably scream in rage and exasperation. No fight to the death with a demon. Just a visit to some nice but secretive beings I wasn’t allowed to talk about. No saying the ‘G’ word.

I had merged my armor skills into Focused Armor. It was a much more general armor skill, but it had a solid base, with three different armor types feeding into it. While I could have taken my armor skills up to tier 2 and tier 3 to get a unique armor skill, it wasn’t worth it.

This was the tradeoff people made over the years with their skills. Since I was wearing one armor type, it wasn’t worthwhile to level armor skills individually. Switching all the time would hurt my fighting skills and wasn’t worth it. Those fractions of a second in combat were absolutely critical. Messing around with my armor at this point in my career as an adventurer was far too risky.

My weapon skills made me shake my head in disappointment. Those had become neglected by me. Upon my return, I’d need to do concentrated weapons training.

I gained a lot of skill levels in lore. The gnomes had been happy to give old copies of history books they had at no cost. The gnomes were really nice and excellent hosts while I had been there. I had been slowly working through them. The Gnomish sweets were very limited, but I had improved Sweet Teeth.

Fighting was easier since I had more experience fighting and we climbed to the top layer in the dungeon, reducing the risk. That meant my skill-level gain had dropped even further these past three months.

I was still on the edge of Meldor’s Threshold of 70%. It was my Mind stat divided by the weight of my skills by tier, which was 168 divided by 239. That came out to be 70.3%. One skill away from death.

My high Mind stat also trapped me, which was frustrating. Adding free stat points was tempting so I could get more skills to work on, but that would make increasing that stat on its own much more difficult.

Ozy’s growth was slowing down as well as he required a tremendous amount of experience. Well, his leveling and stat growth. His skill levels continued to grow at a steady pace. Monsters could, through Mana, slowly improve skills but not insight skills. It sometimes took time for them to master a skill at the next level. While we might have similar stats, monsters operated under a different paradigm.

I really didn’t want to think about all the skills I had to master. The Speech increase wasn’t intentional; it happened during my chat with the gnomes.

I needed to focus on the soul skills that I had, but it was slow. Using them in battle was difficult. Therefore, I had to repeat training often, but it wasn’t the best way to level them.

My spatial pouch had books relating to several skills I had to learn. I needed to learn the soul skills to hopefully track Xanatos through his curse skill, Experience Siphon, back to the Eldarin Continent portion of the dungeon.

After that were my mother’s legacy, counter-divination, resistance, weapon, rune, stealth, and my father’s legacy. I had the book of Seraphim Etiquette I still had to dig into. Oh, and the ritual book from the Dark Cabal.

So many skills were frankly ridiculous, but I had brought it on myself. I hadn’t helped things by picking up some junk skills. I regret Pulse Strike, Sweet Teeth, and Driving now. While they were fun skills, they weren’t necessary for improving as an adventurer or keeping me alive.

Closing my status after I had looked through it, I made my way back up the stairs and out of the dungeon entrance. The cold wind cut through my armor, clothing, and into my soul. Even with a cloth covering my mouth, every breath seemed to freeze my lungs.

It wasn’t a stretch to say that even my soul was moving in a more sluggish manner under this kind of cold. But it was excellent practice for Cold Resistance. I wouldn’t stop training. That was something the College of Advancement had beaten into me over seven years of mental pressure.

Never stop training. Always keep training to get more skill levels to stay ahead of everyone else. That was the mindset I currently had. And the cold was refreshing in a primal way. I could feel my healing points decrease from my reserves as the cold damage became too much.

I forced my body to move and descended back into the dungeon. “

Fireball.”

I hit the wall near me, and a wave of hot air blasted back at me, pushing away the cold for a moment, allowing me to recover more fully .

I made my way to the bottom of the staircase in the dungeon, and Lanner was giving me a look like I was crazy. “Why are you pushing yourself so much?”

“To be the best, you have to constantly work to push yourself. I don’t want to be dying in the dungeon, wishing I had trained more, and the cold is refreshing in a way. Also, it isn’t easy to level resistances. Take your pick.”

“This is harder than I imagined,” he finally said, and I frowned.

“And you have me using Clean and also cooking. This is practically a luxury you are getting right now. To become a legend is insanely difficult. Your starting point is very low. You will have to work even harder to catch up. It is easy to say something, like wanting to become the strongest spellblade, but it is a completely different matter of going the distance.”

It would take him time to understand, but eventually he would get it. This was a hard life. People heard the stories and gave acclaim to legends. They were called legends for a reason; they were might made manifest in the world, but getting to that point and having such strength was insanely difficult.

Explaining all this to Lanner put my goal into perspective as well. For as hard as it was for him to become a legend, it was harder for me to become a supreme legend and to stand at a height that few others had reached. As a kid, gaining levels had been fun, quick, and fairly easy.

Now, all the skills and the distance I still had to go weighed down on me. I was just 20 years old. If I invested in Vitality, I could do this for 200 more years. I would not do that. I had a decade or two before I had to worry about getting my next class upgrade and more levels.

In 10 years at around 400 skill levels every three months, that would be 12,000 skill levels. It was tempting to plan things out, but I needed to focus on training, not on stats.

I had warmed up enough. It was time to go back up to the surface for another round of Cold Resistance training.

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