Chapter 423: Fount of Ichor

PS: Priam Character Sheet 
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After stepping over the outer wall of the tribal camp, Log-a-rhythm only needed to take three steps before rooting himself. A perk of having long legs.

Through the dimensional barrier separating the Aelbe manor from the rest of Elysium, Priam saw the clansmen blanch. A fifty-meter-tall vegetal titan—no matter its Tier—had that effect.

The clang of metal soles on wood announced Kazuki’s arrival behind him.

“I’m disappointed I missed Log-a-rhythm’s first steps.”

“A joke? You look sharp, Kazu. And terrifying.”

Priam wasn’t kidding. The moment he looked at his friend, he could feel it—a spearhead pressed against his throat, held by a steady hand that didn’t waver.

The hoplite champion drew a deep breath and reined in his spiritual pressure.

“My apologies. It’s hard to sheath a blade that has tasted blood. A few Tier 3 Aelbes tried to break through while you were gone. Two stayed with me.”

A flicker crossed Priam’s eyes. The fact that Kazuki could already defeat Tier 3 opponents was both great and terrifying.

“Half-step into Spear Mastery III is that strong?”

“The path of the spear becomes exponentially harder the further one walks it… but its fruits are worth the pain.” 

As Kazuki extended his hand, his spear appeared. The weapon looked ordinary, and yet Priam could see through it.

“An image? Did you unlock a Mythic skill?!”

The hoplite shook his head. “Spear Mastery III is linked to the Myths, but I won’t know how until my next High Tribulation. I have also made progress with Micro. As for Domain… that will take a long time.”

“Good to know you’re not a peerless genius with every path. The Seven aren’t that cruel.”

It wasn’t just banter. Deep down, Priam reassessed his friend’s danger level on the Champion scale. Kazuki had started from the bottom, but if his only bottleneck for a perfect Tier-up was Domain, then it was only a matter of time before he caught up.

“What about Tier 1?”

“As we expected. I lost a nobility rank, and can no longer unlock common skills, not even with Potential. Same for Bronze Titles. The System also expects me to take a more active role against the Necromoon, with a small Sun point tax to pay each month. Aside from that…” The hoplite’s gaze grew distant. “I can sense another facet of aether. A deeper level, maybe?” He clicked his tongue, searching for the right words. “It’s like a new color has revealed itself to me. It shows me new perspectives. New Concepts. Before, I had to fumble in the dark or wait for an epiphany to hear the Name of the Wind. Now I just have to listen.” His eyes locked onto Priam’s. “A Tier 1 soul is meant to explore Concepts. At Tier 0, I was blind.”

Priam nodded, somewhat displeased. One of his greatest advantages at Tier 0 had been his ability to cultivate Concept affinity through death or by absorbing fragments of Tribulations. For him, becoming a Sage was merely a matter of time and pain, and unlocking Concepts after that was trivial. My edge will be less overpowered at Tier 1…

“Don’t frown like that. Not every Tier 1 sees as clearly as I do,” Kazuki reassured with a grin. “I performed exceptionally well during my ascension, which improved the quality of my soul’s baptism. That would have been expected, given my Mastery talent.”

The comment made Priam pause. “What do you mean?”

“I’ll explain later. What about you? How are your preparations?”

Priam smiled, then gave his quick rundown.

Lvl Up: [High Aether Manipulation] lvl 53
META (Affinity) +3
META (Focus) +3
META (Endurance) +3
Lvl Up: [Runic Language] lvl 39
META (Affinity) +3
Lvl Up: [Thick Blood] lvl 31,..., 40
VIT +30

Ideal upgrade available for [Thick Blood - Rare].

Prerequisites met:

• [Fledged Phoenix - Legendary]

•  ̶ ̶H̶̶̶y̶̶̶d̶̶̶r̶̶̶a̶̶̶’̶̶̶s̶̶̶ ̶̶̶t̶o̶x̶i̶c̶ ̶B̶̶̶l̶̶̶o̶̶̶o̶̶̶d̶̶̶

• Survived multiple cerebral hemorrhages.

• [Bloodless - Gold]

•  ̶B̶l̶o̶o̶d̶ ̶c̶l̶a̶s̶s̶i̶f̶i̶e̶d̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶b̶i̶o̶h̶a̶z̶a̶r̶d̶ ̶l̶e̶v̶e̶l̶ ̶4̶

• Lost 1000 times more blood than your body contains

• Regenerated 10 m³ (10,000 liters) of blood in a single day

As always, Priam had picked the more exotic prerequisites, leaving [Life is Hard; I’m Harder] and [Homo Elysian Obsession] aside. The other eliminations stemmed from one goal: becoming unkillable.

Ideal Upgrade unlocked:
[Fount of pseudo-Ichor - Epic] - Your body is a spring of vitality. Ideal upgrade potential. Potential Cost: 320

You have selected the skill [Fount of pseudo-Ichor - Epic].
POT -320

[Fount of pseudo-Ichor] - Ichor; the blood of gods and phoenixes.
Within your veins flows a miraculous liquid, infused with great vitality—and even greater destruction. Your bones’ marrow and your flames work tirelessly to produce the blood that animates you. You are overflowing with life force, and your enemies despair of ever killing you.
This skill increases the density of every form of energy stored within your blood. It converts a portion of your flames’ thermal energy into chemical and nutritional energy during blood generation. Micro now allows you to accelerate coagulation and control its viscosity.
Death by a thousand cuts, a form of torture once used in China, Vietnam, and Korea, can no longer kill you.
Note: Upgrading this skill requires evolved Vitality.
VIT +9

New Title!

[Perfectionist - Gold] - Twenty-five ideal skills.
Some reach for the moon aboard a rocket. You are building the foundation of a tower that will touch the stars.
Congratulations! Most of the universe is now willing to go to any length to extract all knowledge from your head.
Provides one ideal prerequisite for any upgrade under legendary. (3 uses left).
Skill progression speed +1%

Priam would start to suspect the information had been compromised the day [Ciphered Record] gained multiple new levels.

At the end of the summary, Louis let out a whistle, and even the hoplites looked impressed.

“Are you planning to use the free prerequisite on [High Aether Manipulation]?” Kazuki asked.

“Nope. I’m just missing one last piece before… well, you’ll see,” Priam answered with a wink.

“Mmh?”

Hyshana cleared her throat just as Priam opened his mouth to elaborate.

“I doubt this is the time for that,” the swordmaster cut in. “The Aelbes are departing.”

Beyond the dimensional barrier, a line of emigrants was forming. Most carried only large backpacks, which seemed little, even for a nomadic people. Only the merchants and a handful of artisans hauled carts behind them.

“They couldn’t wait any longer,” Kazuki explained softly, his eyes tender as they lingered on his wife. “According to the Gaesert shaman, this barrier isolates them from the Wandering Islands. In an hour, Elysium’s laws will pull them back.”

“So they’re packing up before they get booted,” summarized Louis. “Do we let them go?”

“Yes.” Priam cracked his knuckles, then stretched. “Fetch one of the Demiurge’s apprentices, please. Less chance the Aelbes try something stupid with the elves watching.”

“As you command, my lord,” the old man saluted with a mock bow before heading off.

“Kazu, Hyshana, can you make sure no Tier 3s leave? As for me, I’ll get the battlefield ready.”

*

Sun points: 7 612 084 (+ 6 632 381)

Slaughtering undead for twenty hours had almost not been enough. Even with hundreds of elite hoplites, a giant treant blessed by a Holy Guardian, and the flames of Pyro, killing hundreds of thousands of corrupted souls took time. After all, the living weren’t as tireless as the dead.

Yet, Oasis had prevailed.

Sun Shop - Territory

Protective Barrier IX (2 500 000 points) - A protective barrier capable of covering 250 000 square meters and stopping attacks from a weak Tier 0 Elysian Prince. ACQUIRED
Protective Barrier X (5 000 000 points) - A protective barrier capable of covering 500 000 square meters and stopping attacks from a strong Tier 0 Elysian Prince. ACQUIRED
Protective Barrier T1 - IX (10 000 000 points) - A protective barrier capable of covering 1 000 000 square meters and stopping attacks from a weak Tier 1 Elysian Prince. Tier 1 Lord required.

“The shop doesn’t sell barriers strong enough to stop a Monarch,” noted Priam. The only way to halt such a powerhouse seemed to be relying on the Tier gap. “Alright, let’s build our defense.”

The System directed a fraction of its alien consciousness toward Log-a-rhythm, verifying Oasis’s permissions. Sensing It, Priam tensed. Despite his confidence, he wasn’t entirely certain the System would accept that Oasis’s authority could move with the Tal Quercus. When that otherworldly attention withdrew without issue, the young Lord allowed himself a grin. He had won his bet: as long as no one contested it, a moving Land wasn’t a problem.

Sun Points paid and authorization granted, a transparent dome materialized around Log-a-rhythm. Almost paper-thin, the Protective Barrier shimmered with thousands of runes across its surface. Then, in a fraction of a second, the System rewrote the whole runic ritual. Without Priam even sensing the brushstroke, a million runes were etched into the canvas of reality. What had looked like a string of code lines now resembled a web adorned with sigils.

Priam smiled, appreciating the mathematical precision of the new structure. Though he still sometimes struggled to craft long rune sequences, he gazed with genuine awe and fascination at the sheer complexity of the design. Normally, a runic formation resembled a sentence—sigils placed one after another like words to shape reality. Reservoir, Barrier, Uni-direction; that combination would channel aetheric energy from the first rune to the others to create a one-way shield. However, the dome before him went further—using specialized sigils to absorb every type of energy, recharge its reservoirs with ambient aether, distribute impacts across a vast surface, and more.

The Protective Barrier X was so intricately intertwined that simple sequences could no longer express it. As he studied the shield, Priam quickly noticed that the System had arranged certain sigils at the intersections of several rune formations. The same rune thus served multiple sentences, some written horizontally, others vertically.

The result was a marvel of efficiency and optimization. Without a computer, a human could have spent a thousand years trying to assemble such a puzzle and still failed.

If a rune is a point in zero dimensions, then a chain of runes is a one-dimensional ritual. I thought I was writing in two dimensions by skipping lines, but this… This is what a true two-dimensional ritual looks like. Fuck, even with my mental stats, it’ll take me ages to emulate this level of design.

“The aesthetic echoes the beauty of nature,” murmured Osiris. “It suits Log-a-rhythm perfectly.”

The comment snapped Priam out of his mathematical trance. Taking a step back, he whistled softly as he noticed the green reflections across the dome. From within, the sphere looked like the inside of a leaf curled in on itself. Could it be that the System customizes every Barrier to match its Land?

If that thought proved true, the advantage was clear: tailored Protective Barriers would have no universal weakness. If a thief found a flaw in a neighboring Lord’s shield, it wouldn’t exist here. The downside was that such custom work demanded a lot of computational resources. Trivial shit for a near-omnipotent System.

Sun points: 112 084 (- 7 500 000)

Once again broke, Priam checked the dome’s volume. With a radius of two hundred meters, the forcefield fully encompassed the Aelbe barrier—so long as Log-a-rhythm stayed rooted at its edge.

“Okay,” he muttered. “Time to get the rest of the show ready.”

Leaning back against the trunk of his soulbound tree, Priam commanded the platform beneath them to sink, hiding itself among the foliage. No reason to offer the Aelbes a clean line of sight.

Closing his eyes, the Homo Elysian focused on the link between himself and Log-a-rhythm, trying to make their consciousnesses resonate. Despite its growth and the influence of countless Tribulations, the tree’s ego could barely articulate a single word—and probably never would speak more. By choosing Yggdrasil over Royal Elf, Priam had committed to the path of the Tal Quercus. The way of a plant.

As Dishnu yielded control, the distance between Priam’s soul and Log-a-rhythm’s shrank. A mental bridge formed, one more instinctive than what his skill could provide. Soon, alien sensations began to flow through that bond.

One truth hit Priam immediately: the alien way in which Log-a-rhythm perceived the world.

The feel of soil grains polishing its roots as it searched for energy buried in sediment and dust. The coolness of water trickling down through two hundred thousand leaves. The pulse of sap rising and falling beneath bark harder than steel. Signals from every nearby plant whose roots brushed its own. The whisper of wind, carrying distant information. The heat, the light and the taint of a dark moon.

As their link became more intimate, Priam shuddered as hundreds of branches crept in unison. The Tal Quercus grew slowly, but its limbs were legion. He grimaced as a colony of ants began turning him into the base of their nest. Smiled when a bird used him as a toilet, leaving behind useful bits of fertilizer. Sighed as his mere presence—his appetite and his shade—snuffed out saplings growing too close to his trunk.

At last, the connection stabilized. The urgency of man was tempered by the serenity of tree. His twin streams of rapid thought fragmented into countless slower, steadier, more unyielding ones. Two perceptions of aether fused into one, granting them a clearer sight of the world.

Then, [Priam’s System] displayed the blueprints of the hundreds of formations he had been refining all day—ten thousand runes forming traps, barriers, wards, and other distractions.
With a thought, Priam mobilized hundreds of roots and began carving runic rituals underground. It would go faster than with his hands.

*

Status: 

PHYSICAL:
Strength 1 259
Constitution 2 313
Agility 1 659
Vitality 2 233 (+86)
Perception 988 

MENTAL:
Vivacity (D) 666
Dexterity 988
Memory 1 229
Willpower 1 310
Charisma 1 117 

META:
Meta-affinity (O) 1 474 (+8)
Meta-focus 906 (+4)
Meta-endurance 1 697 (+5)
Meta-perception 929
Meta-chance 1 621
Meta-authority 1044 

Potential: 42 444 (+292)
Tier 0

[Tribulation]: Five Tribulations pending.

Next thresholds: 12 attributes > 1 200 / 3 attributes > 1 800 / 1 attribute > 2 400

*

Pheonix - fount of ichor