Wild Era, Ch 7: Chaos Remnants

When Kelin surfaced in the main tunnel, another trio of braggans was roaming nearby.

The mine had always been tempting to them and it was only more so now that the mana density had increased. Without the guards that routinely culled them, they were flooding through the area.

He dropped the backpack on the ground as he headed toward them.

By the time they came into sight, the braggans had already heard his footsteps and were hissing as their heads swung in his direction. 

These three were Levels 31, 32, and 35, about the same as the first set, and as soon as they saw him, they raced forward.

Or they tried to, only to find that Gaius was already there. The elemental had silently trapped the feet of two of them, and now the stone was rising up their bodies again to seal their mouths.

It left only one to charge toward Kelin.

This time, an Elemental Ward infused with yellow Earth energy sprang into existence in front of the monster. It was a shimmering shield about six feet high and wide, and it blocked about half of the tunnel.

The braggan’s head slammed into the shield with a thud and a series of crackling sounds came from its neck. It staggered back as it recovered its footing, but the impact wasn’t enough to delay it for long. 

Monsters were durable.

Before it could recover, a bolt of fiery golden energy seared through the air and struck its eye. 

The energy was a higher quality than the previous Earth elemental bolt that Kelin had used and it seared through the braggan’s head, leaving a smoking hole behind.

The braggan’s resistance didn’t help it much against soulfire, but even with part of its head missing, it was still clinging to life.

Monsters were like that. You had to make sure they were dead.

Its soul also suffered some damage in the impact, but less than a soul arrow spell would have done.

“A little better,” Kelin said with a shrug. He focused on the mana form for another bolt and felt it condense more as he launched it.

The second golden bolt seared through the other part of the braggan’s head and that was enough to kill it. 

The monster slumped to the ground, no longer moving.

It was cheaper to use regular spells on these things than Wildfire and his regular abilities needed practice if they were going to improve. Those two bolts had taken about three mana each, which would be recovered soon enough.

He ignored the dead braggan as he walked toward the two trapped ones, and then he flicked a Soul Arrow at each of them. Two ethereal arrows shot forward trailing rainbow flames and struck the braggans in the head.

As the arrows pierced their souls, he triggered Soul Ignition, making the spells explode into flames. 

The braggans shuddered as smoke rose from their eyes and ears, and then they fell limp inside the stone holding them.

Kelin rolled his shoulders, but the burden of using soul energy was less now that his body had adapted to it with his class specialization, so it only left him feeling slightly tired rather than the splitting headache that had nearly made him black out before.

There were several critical features in the refinements he'd made to his soul.

Beyond increasing its strength and improving its ability to naturally regenerate, one of the most important was that it would now constantly gather excess soul energy into a pool for his use.

It was a lot like his mana pool, and the maximum values showed on his status sheet. They were the same as his Intelligence and Aura.

Maximum Mana Pool: 204.

Maximum Soul Pool: 150.

Soul energy was harder to quantify than mana, since it was based on the average of his attributes, but Aura was the most important. As long as his attributes weren’t too unbalanced, it wouldn’t be lower than his current 150 in that attribute.

Aura also helped his soul to recover faster, like Wisdom did for mana, and at roughly the same rate, which put his soul recovery at about 33% per hour.

His soul spells used mana to deliver the punch and then a little bit of soul energy for the damage, so he didn’t need to have as high of an Aura attribute as he did Intelligence.

His class specialization hadn't changed his distribution of attributes, which was still the same as when he'd been an Elemental Mage, but his next class would probably have a more balanced spread across Intelligence and Aura.

That would be at the First Evolution, Level 100.

Gaius released the dead braggans and, after a quick request from Kelin, quickly extracted their cores and passed them over. 

There was no point to skinning the things without a better way to carry the materials, so Kelin retrieved his backpack and stuck the cores inside. 

The Soul Arrow spells were a bit more expensive than Soulfire, but not that much. Each of them took 5 mana and 1 point of soul energy, while Soul Ignition took another 3 points of soul energy. 

Soulfire Bolt had cost him 6 mana to kill a braggan, while the combined soul attack was 5 mana and 4 soul energy.

A normal mage at his level would never have been able to kill higher level monsters so efficiently, but his familiarity with mana was enhancing the spells beyond their usual tier. 

It would take a little while for his body to adapt to be able to do it naturally, but soon the spells would start to rank up.

Having a Legendary Class also helped his magical strength. The natural laws in Soulfire were much better than a basic Elemental Bolt.

He checked the experience notifications and the result chimed in his awareness.

Congratulations, Lord of Wildfire.

You have gained 3 Levels. 

You are now Level 19.

You gain 9 Intelligence, 3 Wisdom, and have 15 free attribute points to assign.

He put the 15 free points to Intelligence, bringing it up to 228.

For now, Intelligence was best, since a higher mana pool meant more to draw on in an emergency. It also meant that he would naturally recover more per hour. 

Wisdom only increased the percentage of mana regenerated and putting six more points in there would add 1% more per hour, but it wasn’t as good right now. It would be important when his mana pool was larger.

He left the corpses behind as he walked deeper into the mine.

There were several more packs between him and the exit, which was about half a mile up the tunnel, but the lower sections of the mine had even more, since the mana density was higher down there. 

They would make for decent experience, not to mention the value of their cores, and he wasn’t going to let the opportunity go to waste. 

The stronger he could get in short order, the better it would be.

He planned to show back up in town as the mine collapse survivor who had killed everything that tried to challenge him. It would be advertising for anyone who wanted to work with him and fair warning to his potential enemies. 

The next pack of braggans had four in it.

Gaius sealed two of them in place as Kelin came around the curve, but that left two to charge down the tunnel toward him.

One slammed into an Elemental Ward that sprang up in front of it, while the second continued on toward Kelin.

A soul arrow seared through the air and sank into its head, but the beast continued to run forward as Kelin dodged out of the way and ignited the spell.

The monster’s body didn’t realize it was dead and its legs took a minute to stop moving. A second later, it slammed into the wall behind him and fell over.

Kelin walked forward and another soul arrow took out the one that had been blocked by the shield.

Then four soulfire bolts seared through the air, one after another, blasting through the heads of the ones that were trapped in the stone bonds.

The fight had taken 32 mana and 8 soul energy. The elemental ward had been 10 by itself. The earlier fight had cost 26 mana and 8 soul energy.

The total expenditure was 58 mana and 16 soul energy.

He was already down about a quarter of his mana, but his soul energy was looking a little better.

He let Gaius extract the cores as he looked at the notifications from the fight.

Congratulations, Lord of Wildfire.

You have gained 2 Levels. 

You are now Level 21.

You gain 6 Intelligence, 2 Wisdom, and have 10 free attribute points to assign.

He was almost up to Gaius’s level, and then they would start to split the experience, which would slow things down even more.

Gaius was saving him a lot of mana in each fight, however, so it was a net gain.

The free points went into Intelligence again, bringing it up to 244.

This time, the experience wasn’t the only notification.

You have reached Level 20. 

You may upgrade one Class Ability and one Subclass Ability by a single tier, to a maximum of Advanced.

Make your choices now.

When he passed Level 20, he’d hit a tier milestone. 

He glanced at his status sheet and then he chose two abilities.

A small whirlwind of fiery golden energy appeared around him and swiftly sank into his body, leaving changes in its wake, 

Congratulations, Lord of Wildfire.

Your Signature Class Ability: Soulfire Sigil has reached the Advanced tier.

[The strength of your Soulfire Sigil has improved, gaining 5% more effectiveness and 50% more to its duration.]

Your Subclass Ability: Artisan’s Sight has reached the Advanced tier.

[This ability’s enhancement to your perception has improved by 10%, for a total of 20%.]

As the energy settled in, he could feel the difference in the abilities’ core pathways and in his eyes. It also felt like his body had adjusted a little more to soulfire.

He’d chosen those two because they were the core abilities for his classes, the most important part of their structure. By increasing them, it would help his other abilities improve over time. 

They were also two of the hardest abilities to improve naturally.

As soon as the process finished, the Path spoke in his mind again.

You may choose a new Class Ability from the following list:

Soulfire Body Refinement. 

Touch of Soulfire.

Soulfire Recovery.

Soulfire Infusion.

A brief description of each ability filled his mind, explaining what they were.  

These were the other core abilities for his class, but he could only choose one of them every 20 levels. 

The first one was an ability that would help him strengthen his body with Soulfire. It would benefit his meridians and the mana lattice he’d woven, accelerating the fusion and helping to harden his body against blows.

It was primarily a defensive trait, but the affinity aspect would benefit his spells too.

Touch of Soulfire was a limited healing ability that was based on his Wisdom and Aura attributes and it required touching the target. At higher tiers, it would be able to purge poisons, diseases, curses, and other afflictions, especially those that targeted the soul.

Soulfire Recovery was an hastened recovery ability that would help to regenerate health, mana, and soul energy over time. It could be cast on either himself or someone else.

Lastly, Soulfire Infusion was a method to use soulfire to reinforce a spell, ward, or weapon, directly increasing its strength. It wasn’t intended so much for his own spells, but rather to bolster those of others if he was working in a group or if he wanted to temporarily boost an enchantment. 

He would eventually learn all of these abilities by Level 80, but the order in which he took them was important, since the earlier he got one, the more chances he would have to upgrade it.

Some people might have taken the healing or recovery ability, or the infusion one if he’d had artifacts to boost, but he knew better.

You have learned the Ability: Soulfire Body Refinement (Basic).

By aligning your physique to Soulfire, you gain a 25% improvement to your durability and recovery. You also gain a 25% resistance to mortal wounds.

The Path’s voice echoed in his mind as a wave of golden flame swept through him again. This one was even larger than before. The whirlwind targeted all the parts of his body, bathing him in soulfire. 

The process lasted for several minutes and with each moment, he felt his meridians, bones, muscles, organs, and everything else adapting swiftly, absorbing the Path’s blessing. 

When it was done, he let out a soft breath and flames flickered in front of him, making it clear that the air inside his lungs had been superheated.

Body refining was a core aspect of strength and it affected every area of power, including passive recovery. 

The sooner you started it, the better.

He hadn’t expected it to be offered at the basic Evolution. Usually, it was part of the First or Second Evolution for the classes that got it.

He hadn’t had anything like it in his first life.

Healing and recovery were good, but if he advanced this ability, attacks would eventually bounce off his skin and he would naturally recover more quickly from injuries. 

What was more, it worked with the mana lattice he’d woven throughout his body, accelerating that process too. The technique was based on this type of ability.

The 25% durability improvement was similar to gaining 25% more Constitution, but the other effects built on top of that, including with the accelerated healing. 

With this, his remaining injuries would be gone in short order and it would be harder to kill him in the future.

The most critical part of the ability, however, was the resistance to mortal wounds. If that reached 100%, even if someone stuck a dagger through his brain, he’d be able to recover from it.

Choosing a defensive class was paying off.

The ability would be at the top of his list for future improvements, even above Soulfire Sigil.

With the upgrades taken care of, he collected the cores from the braggans and then continued heading down the mine tunnel.

Braggans weren’t the only monsters that had appeared here, and before long he encountered a different type.

Two beasts that were stockier and stronger than the braggans were digging at the wall of the tunnel, trying to get to some mana crystals that had been left behind.

The first was Level 36 and the second was Level 41.

He analyzed the stronger one.

Stoneclaw Crawler. Monster.

Level 41. 

Earth Affinity.

Abilities: Physical Melee Attacks, Rend, Stone Spike, Shift Earth, Burrow.

Weaknesses: Ice, Shatter.

Average Attribute Rating: 170.

Highest Attribute: Constitution.

It was an Earth-aligned monster that looked like an armored mole with sharp claws, but it was six feet tall and almost as wide. There were hardened plates of stone across its body, even on its face, which almost hid the blazing yellow eyes. 

There were traces of a fight on the tunnel nearby and the unmistakable tracks of braggans, so these two had probably scared off a pack.

Braggans had a decent ability to spit fire, but it didn’t mean much to the crawlers. These things would rip one of the lizards open from head to tail in a flash. Their claws were like sabers.

Kelin didn’t bother with complicated tactics on them, nor on beating through their defenses. 

He was trying to level up and that meant conserving his mana.

Gaius swiftly bound them in place and two soul arrows flew toward them. The spells pierced through the hardened stone without delay and struck the crawlers’ souls.

A moment later, ethereal smoke wafted away from their heads as the two dead crawlers fell to the ground.

Congratulations, Lord of Wildfire.

You have gained a level.

You are now Level 22.

That brought Kelin’s level even with Gaius. 

He placed the free points into Intelligence, bringing it up to 252, and dismissed the notification.

Gaius created two spikes of hardened stone that tore into the crawlers and retrieved the cores, which he passed to Kelin, and the two continued down the tunnel.

It was tempting to rip through enemies with Wildfire, just because he was so familiar with it, but the spell was overkill for these monsters. 

It was also more expensive at 50 soul energy, since it took more to initiate.

He could do it a few times, but that was all.

The nice thing about Wildfire was that it could spread from one enemy to another at a highly reduced cost, which was another reason it had the name, so if he encountered an army of things, it would be useful.

Until then, soul arrows worked just fine and they let him reserve his soul energy for more dangerous situations.

As he walked on, the mana density in the tunnel was increasing more than he’d expected and it left him surprised. 

It should have started to dissipate by now, flowing out through the earth and air into the surrounding region, but it wasn’t. Or if it was, then there was an even stronger source for it down below.

Had the miners broken into a mana vein?

The thought drifted through his mind, since it was one of the few things that could explain the current conditions, as well as the number of monsters that had already accumulated.

If that was the case, then the likelihood of the miners recovering this mine was growing slimmer by the hour.

A mana vein was much more attractive than simply mana crystals. It was an effectively inexhaustible well of energy from the earth and the source that formed mana crystals when it interacted with bits of water and stone in an area.

If he’d been a normal adventurer and saw this, he’d probably have run for the hills already. Every moment he spent down here was likely to increase the number of monsters blocking his path to the surface.

He wasn’t as concerned by that, since he could have Gaius carry him through the walls to escape, and while he had this many opportunities for hunting, he wasn’t going to waste it.

But it did raise a different issue.

If the mana density continued at this rate, it was possible the mine would turn into a Chaos Remnant.

He hoped that it did, since the value of a remnant was leagues beyond a simple mine. 

It would be a great place to hunt in the future.

It would also be a kick in the mining company’s teeth, since the laws of the civilized galaxy prevented anyone from claiming remnants for their private use. 

The Path enforced it as law, so whatever claim the company had on this area would be dissolved as soon as that happened.

After how they’d treated their workers, he could get behind that.

The origin of Chaos Remnants was interesting.

About two thousand years ago, when ruins from the Chaos War were scattered everywhere and cluttering up the galaxy, the Path of Stars had started collecting them. 

There had been everything from leftover outposts, artifacts, and even entire bits of continents and worlds that came through the Chaos Gates. It grabbed them all, especially the useful ones with magic that could be researched. 

Then it organized them, filling them with monsters and placing them across the worlds as training opportunities.

Most people called them dungeons.

Clearing them was one of the greatest improvement options that the Path offered. It was a way for the allied races to grow stronger in an organized way and to never lack for enemies to fight.

There were significant rewards for fully completing one, from experience to magical items, spell forms to study, powerful artifacts that sometimes had strange effects, coins and other forms of wealth, mana crystals, potions, and more. 

The beasts inside the remnants were often natural monsters of this galaxy, but sometimes the Path captured enemies who tried to come through the Chaos Gates and trapped them inside, leaving them as training targets.

Those were the hardest dungeons to face and the ones with the greatest rewards.

With or without that, it usually stuck a particularly powerful monster inside the remnants as the final fight, a last challenge for those daring enough to attempt it.

The entire system was a way for everyone across the galaxy to contribute to the war and to advance themselves without leaving their home worlds.

Kelin was full of praises for it.

Creating the remnants was one of the times that the Path had been distracted, and maybe it was doing something similar now, which was why it was ignoring him.

He’d seen the first ones built and even now the lure of a new one in front of him was almost too tempting to resist. They were a fantastic way to grow.

There were a lot of artifacts and rare materials in the galaxy and the Path had access to them all, so it placed some in dungeons and made them available as rewards.

All you had to do was get them.

Chaos Remnants and the riches inside provided one of the greatest motivations for progress in the galaxy. They raised the average level of humanity and the other races just by existing.

The most important Chaos Remnant of all was called the Fallen Abyss, but it was half the galaxy away, deep in the Chaos Wild on the sovereign’s home world. 

The sovereign had built it long before the Path started its agenda, and later it became the archetype for all of them. It was said to contain the army of an entire galaxy and that there were enemies past Level 600 there, possibly even Level 700.

Kelin had been there a few times, but never to the deepest levels.

Once the Path had cleaned up the worst of the battlefield ruins and noticed how effective they were for training and supporting the war effort, it started creating new ones of its own, matching them to the local environments.

It had also secured some of the dangerous regions on various worlds, particularly places filled with powerful elemental energy and monsters, locking them up inside. 

A natural concentration of dense energy like this was a potential site.

The mining company probably wouldn’t let it get that far, but if they couldn’t get control of the mana density here, he suspected it would be less than a month. 

Once he got settled in Highmist, he would take a look and see what other remnants were around. His old self hadn’t known much about remnants or their history, but he had heard there were some nearby. 

It was supposed to be one of the major draws of the town.

Right now, however, the thought of remnants and growing stronger cheered him up and he whistled a jaunty tune as he continued down the tunnel.

He had the rest of this mine to clear.