Wild Era, Ch 39: Coralfire Court (Double)

As Kelin crossed the desert, the coral towers of the city rose swiftly from the sands. 

The sun was stretching late into the day, and the towers were lit by both the sunset and the flames of the sea in the distance. The light reflected from them in a thousand colors of the sea.

He didn’t know where the Coral Sea was, or if this Coralfire Tribe was even the original inhabitants, but whatever civilization had once lived there, its world had been beautiful.

It didn’t take him long to approach the city, but about three quarters of the way there, a sensation of heat on his arm pulled his attention to the Bracelet of Unseen Presence.

The bracelet was pulsing with a fiery heat. Sometimes it was low, but at others, it was almost enough to burn his skin. 

It was blocking an attempt to scry him.

He had expected one sooner. 

With how hot the bracelet was, the attempt had to be pushing the Level 150 effect on the artifact. It suggested a Seer that was Level 200 might be trying, and he wasn’t sure the city even had any of those. 

There weren’t that many high-level Seers around outside of the guild and the city’s official staff.

Either Yaris was out of prison and had hired a stronger Seer, which was unlikely given how much that would cost, or his father had gotten involved...perhaps even the backer behind him.

Kelin wasn’t sure how accurate the block would be, but the bracelet’s description said it would reduce the effectiveness of high-level scrying, even if it couldn’t block it completely, so hopefully it was giving them a headache.

Being in a dungeon would help with that. 

They were independent realms and it was notoriously hard to pinpoint someone’s location inside of one, at least if the Seer was outside and the target was inside.

Seers could use an item or strand of hair from a person to find them more easily, but as far as he was aware, he hadn’t left anything like that behind.

Blood he’d left in the guild’s examination hall would have been destroyed immediately, since the alliance was well aware of the possibility of using it like that, and he had a habit of incinerating his traces in general.

He considered the possibilities for a moment, but there wasn’t anything he could do about it for now. Hopefully, the bracelet and the dungeon would be enough to block the attempt.

If not, he would deal with it.

He pushed the concern aside as he continued toward the final city, and before long he reached the outskirts. 

The towers here were similar to the large one by the eel, with most of them between 150 to 200 feet tall. They towered above the desert, each of them a naturally gnarled stone plinth covered in a dozen varieties of waving fronds and grasses that should have been at the bottom of an ocean.

The sea was only a half mile away and the heat from the waves radiated through the capital city, turning the streets between the towers as hot as a sauna. It brought with it a blue haze of coralfire that flowed between the towers, making the city look like it was under the ocean waves. 

His salamander ring continued to absorb all of the heat, leaving him perfectly comfortable, so he appreciated the beauty of it for a few moments, but his feet didn’t slow as he walked between the towers. 

He could sense a heavy concentration of mana not far away, and he headed toward it.

There had been no monsters between the last fight and here, so there should only be the boss and its attendants left. He was confident that he’d cleared everything else. 

It was a pleasant side effect of ticking off a dungeon. 

Whenever one threw a horde at you, it sent everything it could, and there weren’t usually any stragglers left behind.

He’d kept an eye out on the way for the lair of that Elite Arcanist, searching for anything it might have left behind, but he hadn’t found anything. The angle of its approach suggested it had come from the city, so it had probably been a guard on the outer edge.

Only a few Elites had treasure or a secret location like the coralfire pond that they were guarding, but his scan of the area was thorough as he walked by, and Gaius checked for any strange elemental signatures and mana concentrations that touched the earth.

There was nothing that he could find, however, so he dismissed the thought.

When he reached the center of the city, the towers turned into a ring that surrounded a central area. It was open to the sky, and smaller pillars stretched upward inside of it. They were scattered haphazardly like natural sea formations, each of them different from the others. 

The height of the area slowly rose toward the center, creating a natural hill with several terraces for courtiers and officials to stand.

At the top, there was a pair of coral thrones, which were framed from behind by a series of ornate pillars in a half circle. Mother of pearl, gold, and rare sea gemstones decorated the thrones and the pillars were carved with intricate motifs of sea creatures and merfolk fighting.

The setting seemed more elaborate than the records he’d seen and a dozen monsters of various types were arranged around the thrones, surrounding the central figures.

Kelin’s attention immediately turned to them as he analyzed everything.

Coralfire Tidal Queen. Level 85. Elite.

Royal Sea Serpent. Bonded Companion. Level 85. Elite.

There was no king on the throne beside the queen, just the serpent that was coiled around her chair. 

The queen was a tall and elegant-looking example of her species, with scales that were royal purple and an aura of coralfire that made the air around her resonate with the same shade. She was wearing a dress made of iridescent shells and held a jeweled trident in one hand.

The sea serpent around her throne was at least thirty feet long with a sleek, narrow body. It had blue and green scales that stretched along its form, two fringes in place of ears and several fins along its spine and sides. Two long whiskery tendrils framed its mouth, giving it a look like a catfish or a wise sage.

Its mouth was closed for the moment, but its jaws were wide, suggesting an impressive biting force, and its body spoke of speed and agility.

Both the queen and the serpent were staring in Kelin’s direction, as were all of the monsters waiting around them. He scanned them next.

Coralfire Royal Guards. Level 82.

Coralfire Noble Mages. Level 82.

Coralfire High Shamans. Level 80.

There were four of each type.

The Coralfire Royal Guards were stronger versions of the Guardians and Net Casters. They wore iridescent shell armor and held silver tridents in one hand and a silver net in the other.

The mages and high shamans were spellcasters. Most of them held staves or wands in their hands, and the various glowing straps and talismans across their bodies spoke of enchantments waiting to be released.

It was a strong array of forces, especially with the queen and sea serpent pair.

It was rare to get a double Elite as a dungeon boss.

She was a powerful mage, while the serpent was a physical type with extremely high vitality and durability.

It was eerily similar to Kelin’s bond with Gaius, but more one-sided than what he had. 

He could see some details of their bond in his soul sight, including how it linked their souls and life force together, and the connection was in favor of the queen. 

She was powerful, but the sea serpent had far more vitality than she did, and the bond put it at her disposal.

If his assessment was right, the sea serpent’s presence would heal her whenever she was injured, and its soul would anchor hers, making it so she couldn’t die as long as the serpent lived.

Its life was at her command. 

It was a form of slavery.

With a one-sided bond like that, the serpent would never be able to leave her side, and even its thoughts and emotions would be influenced by her will.

He despised that type of bond.

In his past life, some of the creatures that came through the Chaos Gates had tried to enslave residents of the galaxy with soul magic like that.

The race that was most known for it was called the Iristai. He scorched the earth whenever he found them, leaving none alive.

Their entire culture created a chain of soul magic that channeled strength and life force to the highest of them, while all the lower ranks could only die at their command.

The more of them there were, the more dangerous it was.

Their culture tried to sell it as some form of noble sacrifice to their betters, but reality was against them. They were destroying themselves.

Their bonds confined the lower ranks to obedience and death at the whim of those above them, making it impossible for them to fully live. 

A sliver of their soul was ripped away and given to their superiors, which destroyed their potential. Their skills and abilities leveled more slowly afterward, and their future options were limited.

Allowing them to exist was the same as letting rot set it.

He’d never been able to damage the Chaos Gates that sent them, since they were created by immortals from the other galaxies, but it was one of his dreams. Perhaps he could manage it if he reached the Seventh Evolution this time.

Without his presence over the last three hundred years, he wondered what had happened in the stars. Hopefully, someone picked up what he’d left behind.

Then he shook his head, dismissing the old thoughts as he focused on the present.

He’d have to kill the sea serpent first.

As for the attendants, he could kill them with soul arrows or Wildfire them all, but it wouldn’t do much to advance his skills, so he settled on a different plan. 

The queen and serpent were only 7 levels above him, while the others were 2-4 levels, and there were still a lot of abilities he needed to push to Elite.

Thanks to the amount of Intelligence he had and the tier of his abilities, he was near the peak of power for a mage at his level, if not beyond it. 

The level difference between him and these attendants wasn’t much, but they were Level 80, so by default their abilities should be at the Elite tier. That was an advantage dungeon monsters had.

It was also what he was going to use them for.

He ignited a new Soulfire Sigil and tucked it into his shirt, and meditated for a little while until his mana was restored. Then he pulled out a stack of the older shielding talismans and activated them, surrounding himself in a barrier six layers deep.

He spoke with Gaius for a moment and then walked forward, crossing the barrier into the queen’s domain. As he did, he deactivated his spell bracer and only infused a moderate amount of mana into the shield around him.

As soon as he entered her area, she let out a shout and leapt to her feet, pointing her trident at him. A bolt of purple-hued coralfire shot across the two hundred feet that separated them and slammed into Kelin’s mana shield.

The bolt bored a hole straight through the shield and struck the layer of talismans across his body, burning through half of them as runes shattered and turned to sparks of mana in the air.

He assessed the strength of the blast as he drew a ward circle on the ground around him and set the Soulfire Sigil in the air.

Then he pulled out a few more of his older shield talismans and activated them.

As he did, the sea serpent uncurled from the queen’s throne and floated into the air. Waves of fire flowed around it, making it look like it was in the ocean.

It bared its fangs, but there was a cunning look in its narrow eyes as it studied him, waiting to see what he would do.

At that moment, the twelve attendants attacked. 

The four royal guards raced toward the queen, taking up positions in front of her, while the high shamans began to cast a joint spell that made massive fire currents begin to cycle through the area.

Flames gathered between the coral pillars like a river, twisting and raging as it flowed around the area and filled the entire space with enough heat to melt lines into the stone. 

Without his defenses and the salamander ring, it would have drained Kelin’s vitality quickly, while bolstering the monsters’.

The mages had been waiting for the shamans, and now they summoned flaming tridents, whips, and spheres of flame and hurled them at Kelin. 

The spells grew larger from the fire coursing through the area. They doubled in size and intensity as they flew, and slammed into his ward with thunderous explosions that sent waves of blue fire cascading all around.

At the same time, the armor of royal guards shone as it reflected the flames around them, which changed shape at their command. The flames intensified and turned into a fire barrier around the queen’s throne. 

Then the guards created tridents out of coralfire and hurled them in Kelin’s direction, adding more attacks flying his way. They slammed into his ward, sending bright cracks through the surface, and then exploded, adding more volatility to the flames surrounding him.

His ward was much more efficient than his mana shield, and he kept his spell bracer deactivated as he assessed the value of the strikes. Then he turned his attention to the four shamans, which were the most troublesome. 

Their ability to augment other spells was going to waste his mana, and they could probably heal the queen or try to curse him if he gave them the opportunity.

There were four soul arrows around his staff, so he intensified each of them, tripling their mana cost, and then sent one at each of the shamans.

Blindingly bright rainbow arrows shot toward them like bars of prismatic light and disappeared into their souls. 

The shamans staggered as their spells were interrupted, and before they could even recover, ethereal smoke began to rise from them.

The mages saw what was happening and redoubled their attacks, sending another wave of spells at Kelin, but he let them crash against his ward as he created two new soul arrows and Soulfire Bolts, adding them back to his staff.

His ward was dropping at about 3 mana per strike, so even with eight or more attacks every second, the mana cost was manageable for a moment. He let them continue to attack it as he focused on the queen and sea serpent. 

Then he ignited his mana and soul pools as he began to Blaze.

20% of his maximum mana and soul energy disappeared in an instant as mana compressed within his meridians, and a current of molten force roared through his body.

He shaped a Soulfire Bolt from the denser mana and intensified it. Then he targeted the sea serpent.

The serpent hissed as it saw his attention lock onto it. The fins on the sides of its head flared wide as it bared its fangs, which flashed in the light. It started to bunch up as it prepared to charge at him, but a command from the queen made it freeze as she kept it from leaving her side.

It glared at Kelin as its tail swished, curling around the queen’s shoulders protectively.

Kelin paid no attention to their interaction as the bolt of crackling soulfire shot across the distance between them. 

It bored a hole straight through the royal guards’ defensive barrier, as well as a vibrant purple one the queen summoned at the last second.

Then it seared straight through the sea serpent’s head, right between its eyes. The top half of its head disappeared, leaving only a scorched expanse behind. 

The serpent’s body didn’t even have time to harden in shock. It simply went limp and collapsed out of the air, falling with a massive thud onto the coral dais at the queen’s feet.

Its body was so heavy that the impact sounded like one of the coral pillars had just exploded.

The queen stared down at the dead sea serpent, her eyes wide, and then she staggered, grabbing at her head as she let out a piercing shriek of pain.

Kelin swiftly dismissed Blaze. Then he intensified one of the soul arrows around his staff and sent it at her in a scintillating ray of light. With her weakened defenses, it disappeared into her soul in an instant.

Then he ignored her as he grabbed a mana potion from his belt and swiftly drank it. With that spell and all the attacks hitting his ward, his mana had almost bottomed out, leaving him at 46 of 640.

The potion gave him 103 back, but he grabbed one of the basic potions and drank it too, which added another 50.

That was good enough for now.

Howls of rage sounded across the area, but there were only eight of them as the shamans began to fall to the ground. Their eyes were blank and covered in rainbow flames as they joined the sea serpent in death.

The ocean of flame that was swirling through the area trembled as it died with the shamans. Its currents slowed down and the heat began to fade. 

Wisps of coralfire dissipated into the air, swiftly fading into the environment. It would take a few moments, but the thread was cut.

At that moment, a wave of stone rose up from the earth, wrapping around the royal guards and the mages. It swiftly climbed their bodies, locking them in place as it buried them in stone to their waists.

At Kelin’s orders, Gaius’ left their arms free, allowing them to continue summoning ranged attacks, and so more coralfire tridents and spells rained down on him.

The queen was still in shock from the death of the sea serpent, so he recreated the soul arrow he’d spent on her, and then he ignored all of the attacks as he sat down within his ward and did his best to meditate. 

This fight was effectively over, but for the sake of training his abilities, he had to drag it out a bit longer. He could kill them all with the mana he had left, but it would waste the opportunity.

It was very difficult to maintain meditation while under attack, but that meant it was excellent training for the ability.

Each impact on his ward was like a gong in his mind, some of them soft and whispering, some loud and strident. He centered himself as he cycled his mana, trying to keep the flow smooth and uninterrupted in the midst of it all.

With the shaman’s augmentation spell gone, the attacks falling on him were weaker, reducing the cost. 

For now, the mages were maintaining a constant spell assault at about one cast per second, but the royal guards were split between trying to restore the barrier around the queen and attacking him.

The cost of his ward dropped to 6 mana per second, but even with meditation he was regaining much less, about 2.5% of that.

He would only be able to hold this position for 30 seconds, but while he could, he was going to take advantage of it.

The queen was dealt with, although she didn’t know it yet, but he kept his senses alert as he closed his eyes and focused on meditating.

The queen got control of herself and her hands relaxed from around her head. She looked up at him with bloodshot purple eyes and snarled, her sharp teeth flashing. 

“A Lord...” she snarled, speaking for the first time as she looked at him. She was speaking telepathically and her voice echoed in Kelin’s mind, but it didn’t make him open his eyes.

“At least you are that much, unlike those who came before. You do not sully this place as much as those dregs of society. But you are still a mere human and you dare to challenge Us, to slay my pet?!”

Then she raised her trident.

A seismic shift of mana made the area tremble as the coral pillars around her throne began to glow. Runes appeared across them, resonating in tune with the ones on her trident.

Then a wave of pressure crashed down on the area like an ocean tide. It avoided the trapped monsters, but it slammed down on Kelin’s shield like a mountain collapsing.

Stress fractures crackled through the surface as the ward took the brunt of the force, but its spherical shape helped it here, dispersing a lot of the impact. 

Above his head, his Soulfire Sigil blazed as the energy from it reinforced the barrier.

The queen didn’t stop there. 

The tidal pressure flowed around the area as she raised her trident again. This time half a dozen columns of coralfire sprang up from the ground. They twisted like fiery tornadoes and tore apart the air around them as they headed for Kelin.

He cracked an eye open and studied them. Then he closed it again. 

The queen was drawing on ambient mana and the enchantments of her throne room to enhance her attack, and a moment later, the six tornadoes reached his ward, where they merged into one larger coralfire tornado. 

Blades of flame lashed against the barrier as the winds tried to slice through and howling pressure tore at its edges. 

Wisps of soulfire and golden flame lashed out from his ward in response, but swiftly dissipated in the face of the attack. Cracks spiderwebbed through the shield and his mana dropped precipitously. 

He continued to focus on meditating, but he grabbed another intermediate mana potion from his belt and held it in his hand. His mana was dropping swiftly back toward 100, but he was carefully calculating the expense. 

Lesser attacks from the attendants continued to rain down as well, but they were torn apart by the tornado, which didn’t pay any attention to other spells.

A thought to Gaius had the elemental raise the stone around the mages, sealing them up to their necks, and they froze in place, unable to cast any more spells for now. 

A moment later, the same thing happened with the four royal guards.

As Kelin’s mana dropped to 70, he sighed and stood up. 

He drank the potion in his hand, and then he studied the tornado as he tracked its mana flows. 

His ward was taking a beating, which was good, but it was too intense, so he had to cut it down a bit. 

The queen had summoned it, but it was a defensive enchantment anchored in the coral pillars around the area, which were drawing from the mana veins below the desert.

A thought to Gaius made the elemental flow through the stone, heading for one of the pillars. The pillars had strong wards against mana intrusion and interference, so Gaius couldn’t affect them directly, but there were other methods to deal with them.

The elemental swiftly began to remove the sand and stone near the closest pillar, and three seconds later there was a massive hole next to it that continued to expand.

It was twenty feet deep and thirty feet across, revealing the entire base of the pillar and the earth nearby. 

It wasn’t a completely artificial pillar, so there was a strong network of coral connecting it to the land, like it had grown down into the desert, as well as to the other pillars nearby, but once it was exposed, Gaius began to undermine the rest of its support.

Stone spikes rose from the ground at the elemental’s command and slammed into the connecting web that held it up. Each of them was two feet wide, and it was like the jaws of the earth closed on the coral.

The pillar’s supports exploded into fragments that rained down into the hole, leaving it held up by almost nothing.

At Level 78, the elemental was swiftly gaining proficiency with the amount of Earth mana he could control and his strategies had developed. Facing him as an enemy would be unfortunate for anything that was still touching the land.

Gaius didn’t let up on his assault as he shattered the pillar’s remaining connections and it started to shift under its own weight. 

A massive cracking sound echoed through the area as the pillar wobbled. The movement broke the last few connections and its peak tilted over as the base began to slide. 

Then it tumbled into the hole that was still expanding, sending an eruption of displaced mana around the throne room as the enchantments that were anchored to it broke. 

A moment later, the pillar next to it joined it, and then the one past that. 

Within ten seconds, half of the throne room fell away, sliding down into the earth. 

Even the queen’s throne tilted, making her scramble to keep her feet. If the attendants hadn’t already been bound in stone, some of them would have fallen in as well.

The tornado around Kelin died away as the mana support from the pillars faded, and he dismissed his ward as he walked forward to the queen.

She recovered her balance and raised her trident again. This time, a wave of sonic force roared out of it. 

The spell formed three waves in the air, one for each point on the trident, and crashed against his mana barrier.

The impact hurled Kelin backward a dozen feet.

He only kept his footing because he managed to slant his shield at the last moment to push his feet back toward the ground, where the enchantment on his boots helped to stabilize him.

The sonic blast was an unending stream raging against his mana shield, which was warping as it began to disintegrate under the force. 

Even without her throne room for support, the queen was a powerful mage. 

The disintegration was weaker than the tornado, but it was against his mana shield, which was less efficient than his ward, so his mana continued to drop.

He was down to 150 mana now, and his mana shield was losing about 5 a second. 

If that spell hit his body, it wouldn’t take long for it to tear him apart.

He fought against the disintegration as he worked to rebuild the shield, forcing the mana to weave together more tightly, and he intensified it at uneven intervals, sending waves of more powerful mana through it that helped it to stabilize.

When the queen saw that he was resisting the spell, she let out a shriek of anger and continued the barrage from the trident as she raised her left hand.

A spiral of coralfire appeared in the air above her, and then bolts of the element began to rain down on him, like purple lances falling from the sky. 

They crashed into his mana shield, sending cracks splintering through it as it wavered on the edge of failing. He had to struggle to maintain it, but the added force was too much for the ability’s current form. 

Unless he did something else, it would fail in seconds, so he intensified the shield, which forcibly hardened its structure, and started walking forward.

It didn’t take him long to cross the distance to the queen, and as he walked, he checked on the soul arrow that was still burning in her soul. 

It was intensified, so it had ignited quickly, but her innate resistance was keeping the flames low. 

The Persistent Spell effect on the arrow was fighting against that to keep the flames hot and her spell casting was distracting her, which drew away her energy and made the flames soar higher, but if she were left to her own devices, she might be able to survive it.

When he got close to her, he raised his hand and a pulse of Soul Paralysis exploded outward.

He empowered the spell and it hammered into the queen’s consciousness and soul, making her freeze in place.

The wave of sonic force from her trident shattered, and her Rain of Coralfire spell dissipated into fragments in the air. The shock also made the flames in her soul leap upward as her resistance wavered.

He stunned her again before she could recover, and then he flicked two soul arrows into her soul.

Their flames joined with the one that was already there, and they swiftly built into an inferno of rainbow light.

As she tried to recover her wits, he stunned her again, sending the flames soaring.

Within moments, rainbow smoke began to rise from her skin and then her eyes turned the same shade.

Seconds later, she collapsed to the ground as her soul burned away.

The instant she died, a wave of purple-tinted coralfire erupted from her trident and washed over the area. It gathered around the eight attendants that were still alive.

When he saw that, Kelin headed toward the group of four royal guards that were trapped in stone. Beyond them, the four mages were as well. 

Since they were still alive, the battle hadn’t ended yet and there were no notifications from the Path, so he sat down near them and began to meditate.

When his mana recovered about 45 minutes later, he had Gaius release all eight of them.

When the stone pulled away, the monsters’ scales and eyes had changed to a purple-red aura that sent their strength surging. 

The queen’s death had made their natural affinity go berserk.

It was something like the soul bond with the sea serpent, except an area effect that was much shallower.

When the guards saw him, they instantly leapt to attack, stabbing with the tridents in their hands without regard to their own defense. Coralfire and stamina infused the weapons as they tore into his mana shield, ripping lines through the soulfire. 

The mages also resumed their barrage of spells, but they were more unbridled now and barely able to hold onto their mana structures. The spells were turning to raw coralfire at the edges.

He decided this would work well enough for training, so he reinforced his shield and took all of the damage on it until his mana dropped to 10%. Then he had Gaius lock them down again. 

That cycle repeated for the next four hours until he felt the difference in his mana shield as it changed. It morphed under the pressure into a denser and more flexible structure, and the mana cost to resist the attacks dropped to half what it had been.

He shifted to his ward circle and did the same thing again.

Dungeon monsters didn’t tire easily and these eight had plenty of time to regenerate their mana and stamina while Gaius kept them trapped.

When they came too close, he stunned them with Soul Paralysis, making sure to take advantage of the persistent effect to draw it out.

Occasionally, he let an attack through so it would trigger his reactive sigils, which released Soulfire Bolts that hurled the guards backwards. 

The cycle continued for hours as he let the enraged monsters attack, and eventually he felt the changes that he was waiting for.

Then he shifted to Blaze.

He started with an intensified Soulfire Bolt that seared through one of the mages, and then he followed it up with a regular Soulfire Bolt at 108 mana.

Then he had Gaius trap them as he meditated. 

When his mana was back, he did it again.

This time, he used an intensified and empowered Soul Arrow that cost 270 mana and 216 soul energy, followed by a regular one at a third of that.

Intensifying a spell tripled its mana cost, but Empower Soul Magic was necessary to boost the soul energy cost. That ability was still at Expert, which normally allowed double the cost, but he forced it to triple it instead.

Since it was the weaker ability, he used empowered Soul Arrows after that, and two rounds later, everything was dead.

Above, the sun had long set, but the light of a silvery pink moon and the blue flames of the ocean kept the world filled with a serene light.

It was a stark contrast to the devastation below.

Gaius had torn apart the throne room and shattered half of the coral pillars, while the spells from the mages and the queen had melted and disintegrated most of the rest.

Battle scars from the royal guards’ attacks left furrows two feet deep in every direction, crisscrossing the area around Kelin in a spiderweb of lines.

Notifications from the Path began to ring in Kelin’s mind when the last one died. 

He looked at the ones from the battle first.

He preferred quick fights, but drawing out a real battle was a traditional way to train abilities, especially when your enemies were at a higher tier, as these had been at Level 80 and higher. 

The results were worth the trouble.

Your Class Ability: Soulfire Mana Shield has improved by a tier and reached Elite.

Your Class Ability: Elemental Ward has improved by a tier and reached Elite.

Your Skill: Empower Soul Magic has improved by a tier and reached Elite.

Your Innate Ability: Meditation has improved by a tier and reached Elite.

He nodded as he reviewed the improvements for each one.

His mana shield and ward improvements were similar, with the mana density, durability, and efficiency up to 75%. That was a good jump over Expert, which had been at 50%.

Meditation jumped from a 30% speed savings to 40%, and Empower Soul Magic at Elite allowed him to more easily triple the cost of his soul energy spells.

Then there were the other abilities that were below Elite but had still improved.

Your Spell: Soul Paralysis has improved by a tier and reached Expert.

Your Class Ability: Reactive Sigil has improved by a tier and reached Advanced.

Your Soulfire Ability: Blaze has improved by a tier and reached Advanced.

Soul Paralysis’s stun effect would last for longer now and overcome more resistance. For Reactive Sigil, the mana he could store in each sigil doubled from 5 to 10, making them much more dangerous.

But most importantly, Blaze had finally improved, and the results were decent, which made him feel satisfied.

At the Advanced tier, the density of your spells is increased by 8 times, while the cost is increased by 17 times. 

It still cost 20% of his mana and soul energy to initiate, but the result was much stronger. The increase in density was critical, while the efficiency had jumped from 38% to 47%.

That was the last of the tier notifications, so he turned his attention to the other ones. First was the experience from the battle.

Congratulations, Lord of Wildfire!

You have gained a Level.

You are now Level 79.

The queen and her attendants had been decent experience, but he waved it away as he moved on to the next set.

You have cleared the Coralfire Chaos Remnant!

Requirement Met: Clear 90% or more of the monsters inside.

Additional Bonus Met: Clear 100% of the monsters inside and kill the final boss.

You are granted bonus experience for completing these objectives, as well as for the successful completion of the remnant.

You have gained 3 Levels.

Your Soul-Bonded Elemental has also gained 3 Levels.

Congratulations, Lord of Wildfire.

You are now Level 82.

He glanced at the attribute gains from those levels and the one before, which added up to 4 Wisdom, 12 Intelligence, and 20 free points left over.

His Wisdom rose to 194 and his Intelligence went to 652. 

Both of them were alright for now, and his soul energy wasn’t dropping too much unless he empowered a lot of Soul Arrows, so he put all 20 of the points into Constitution, taking it from 144 to 164.

With the 55% resiliency improvement from his physique, that put it at the equivalent of 254, well into the First Evolution standard for a mage.

The next notification was for reaching Level 80.

At Level 80, you are granted the final Class Ability for your Class at the Basic Evolution:

Soulfire Reinforcement.

[This Ability allows you to reinforce physical and spiritual objects as well as spell structures with soulfire, enhancing their strength, durability, and any enchantments they hold. It can also be used to transform an object into a temporary weapon, granting it enhanced damage and effectiveness against your enemies. 

At the Basic tier, you are able to channel 5 mana and soul energy into the object per second. At higher tiers, this Ability will gain additional effects. If you are already able to infuse objects with Soulfire, this Ability will stabilize the process and enhance your current ability by the stated amount.]

It hadn’t been his first choice of abilities, but as utility went, it was a very decent one, and it had practical battle applications as well.

It was often necessary to reinforce an ally’s ward or to infuse a weapon with mana to strengthen its attack.

For him, it would allow him to use his staff as a weapon infused with soulfire, or even a random stick he found. He could also reinforce his clothing with it, improving their defense and making them as hard as armor.

He would have to test it out, but he was curious if it would help to keep his efficiency enchantments from degrading. 

He would have to spend the mana to stabilize them, but if it helped, it would be useful.

The next notification was something he’d been waiting for.

You have earned an Ability Reward for a perfect clear and for completing the remnant at a High mana density and High danger rating.

You may choose one Ability to upgrade by a single tier, to a maximum of Elite.

Make your choice now.

He’d been hoping that the reward would make it to the Elite tier, and it had.

He considered the options, and then he made his choice.

A great spiral of golden soulfire appeared from the air as it began to rotate around him, slowly sinking into his body, and he felt the ability improve.

Congratulations, Lord of Wildfire.

Your Signature Ability: Soulfire Sigil has improved by a tier and reached Elite.

This sigil exerts a protective influence on the area within its radius. At the Elite tier, it provides 35% increased healing and recovery (health, stamina, mana, and soul) to the caster and allies, as well as 30% improvement to the duration and protection of Fire and Soul spells. The effect is reduced on those above the caster’s level.

Mana Cost: 100 mana.

Duration: 3 hours.

When imbued into an object, it gains an additional 10% effectiveness or more, depending on the quality of the medium, and the duration will increase.

Kelin smiled at that. 

The mana cost had risen from 50 to 100, but it was a 10% improvement over Expert, and the duration had doubled.

With the refined quartz disk, it would be 45% increased healing and recovery, and 40% to defense, and it would last up to six hours, which was almost enough for an entire night. 

The increase was considerable, given how it took no extra energy once it was active.

He could have tried to improve his physique or a subclass ability, but he used the sigil more, basically in every battle, and his physique still needed a bit of time to settle in before he felt comfortable upgrading it.

He’d have to stress himself repeatedly to make sure the progress there was smooth.

Now that the sigil was up to Elite, it had finally reached what he thought of as basic proficiency, with all of the information from the Path that was designed to support it, and he could start to analyze its more complex facets, comparing them to the law that he'd known in the past.

He would probably work with it himself to take the ability to Epic, since that was the beginning of a more unique path.

If he did it right, it would help to illuminate the differences between the higher laws of Soulfire and Wildfire.

The next notification appeared.

You have earned a treasure reward for killing the Final Bosses of this Remnant: Coralfire Tidal Queen and Royal Sea Serpent. 

As the difficulty of the encounter was harder than usual with a dual Elite, and you completed it solo rather than with a group, the reward has been upgraded to the Rare grade and it will be customized to you.

A glowing sphere of light appeared in front of Kelin, and then it resolved into a scroll in front of him, which he reached out to take.

He looked at it with curiosity, wondering if the Path was going to give him more runes, and as soon as he touched it, knowledge flooded his mind.

Foundational Soulfire Enchantments (Rare, Elite).

Soulbound to Kelin of Highmist, Lord of Wildfire.

This scroll holds a description of five foundational enchantments that rely on the Law of Soulfire. They can be used for crafting equipment, enhancing artifacts, and as temporary and permanent wards, as well as independent spell structures.

A comprehensive study of these patterns will help you to incorporate the soulfire runes you’ve learned into more complex patterns.

These five patterns are organized into core functions: healing, defense, offense, augmentation, and obscuration.

He was pleased with it.

He knew quite a few enchantment patterns, but none that were specifically for soulfire, so this would help him quite a bit. 

Foundational enchantments were the most critical type, since everything else relied on them. They were core structures that other enchantments expanded on, and if they were flawed, all the enchantments that used them would be less efficient and stable. 

If they were perfect, the enchantments would benefit from enhanced efficiency, speed, and performance.

These were well within his understanding and he was impressed by their elegant structures, which were like the golden curves of a natural law. They resonated with meaning as he studied them.

His crafting skill for adding these would need some work, but once he got it up a bit, he should be able to add some better enchantments to his gear, particularly his Staff of Soulfire. 

He had space for three of them on there, and these would be the best complement for its innate affinity.

The information on the scroll was copied into his memory, but he stored the scroll away as well, so that he could study it later. The Path had given him both a mental and physical version of the enchantments, and sometimes it was useful to look at the physical one.

Then there were the final notifications.

You have earned treasure rewards for completing this remnant.

You are awarded 24 gold and 7 silver coins in the local currency.

You are awarded an additional 20 gold coins as a bonus for the dungeon’s High difficulty and mana density.

Your guild badge has recorded your accomplishments, which will be acknowledged by the Stars Alliance when you return to a guild hall.

170 Guild Credits have been added to your badge.

150 bonus credits have been added to your badge for completing the local Alliance Quest: Scout the Dungeons.

Like always, the coins appeared directly in his personal storage space, and his badge let out a chime.

It was a bit more gold than the last dungeon, since this one was a higher level, and the amount of guild credit was double the usual, probably due to the double boss.

The quest reward had also gone up a bit.

He let out a breath as he sorted through everything and then he got to work gathering the cores and the treasure that was left behind.

The twelve attendants had a decent amount of gear that was useless to him, but it should sell well at the guild, so he tossed it into his storage along with their cores and scales. 

There were also a few more Coral Sea Gems, ward shells, and some more of the Coral Flame Sapphires, Oceanlight Seaweed, and Blood Coral.

The Royal Sea Serpent was similar to the eel in that it gave him a massive stack of magical scales and organs, all of which were infused with vitality and mana. He stored it all away and then moved on to the queen.

Her trident was shining in the light, as were the bracelets on her arms, her necklace, and her crown.

He studied all of them, but they were highly specialized for the queen’s style. They improved the strength of her sonic wave attack, gave her a mental attunement to the trident, added some mental and emotional links to her subjects, and a few other things.

None of it was very useful, so he added them to the stack to sell.

When that was done, he looked around the area, checking for anything else, but the only thing left was the dungeon portal that had appeared behind the throne.

He took a moment to ignite a new Soulfire Sigil, which he tucked into shirt, and then he looked down at the Bracelet of Unseen Presence on his arm.

He had a feeling that he would run into whoever had triggered it soon.

He let his mana recover and then he grabbed a few shield talismans from his belt and checked his spells.

He gave the strange and beautiful desert a last look, and his gaze rested for a moment on the coral-hued moon and the reflected blue flames of the ocean. 

Thin clouds drifted past the moon, giving it an ancient and inscrutable appearance like a wise sage looking down, but it was partially obscured at the same time.

It made him wonder what civilizations had risen and fallen beneath that light and now lay buried beneath the waves and desert sands.

He shook his head to dismiss the feeling.

He activated the talismans in his hand, surrounding himself in a shield just in case someone was waiting outside, and ignited Blaze, compressing his mana and soul energy.

Then he walked through the dungeon portal.

The silvered blackness of the starlight flowed around him, and he was gone.