Congratulations! You have reached Level 52! +8 Stats distributed between Vitality, Perception, Resist, Intelligence, and Control, +35 Free Stats! +1 Stat to a Mental Stat. +1 to a Physical Defense Stat. +1 to a Mental Support Stat. +2 Control. +36 Health, +45 Mana, +40 Stamina, +3.5 to all Regenerations! +1 to Health and Stamina Regeneration!

Due to Guidance of the Wraith Adder, +4 Agility and +2 Bonus Stats!

Due to your Fate Philosopher's Key, +3 Intelligence, Wisdom, and Focus!

With the most recent burst of Stats that Randidly obtained, he pushed himself over 1000 with Intelligence. The first feeling Randidly felt was a feeling of disorientation, but then his powerful Control began to weave itself back across the battlefield. Intelligence, Grim Intuition, and Control that he deftly weaved the trap that he wanted to spring. His capability surged upward, allowing him a completely ridiculous level of multitasking across the front.

Obviously he didn’t weaken his images or Skills, but he simply allowed his roots and vines to be slowly undercut as more and more Nether Beasts surged forward and threw their bodies forward. One strike at a time, those attacks reached the towering roots emanating that brilliant white light. His roots would smash and weep back and forth in furious retribution, but several powerful Nether Beasts would group together and barely repulse Randidly’s moves. Nether Beasts began to slip through the space between the towering roots, reaching the frontlines of Lady Iellaya’s camp once more.

Congratulations! Your Skill Inscrutable Mien of Genesis (M) has grown to Level 252!

Of course, Randidly bled these carefully allowed enemy forces with thorny roots. Small wounds, nothing fatal, but enough to make them easy pickings for the fresh recruits. More ambient Nether was created that the array began to steal and repurpose. The visual variations in the area intensified, making the point of contact between the two forces even more chaotic.

“...ah shit…” Randidly winced. Even though he intended for it to happen, it still hurt when one of his roots was felled. Both Absolute Grasp of Yggdrasil and Inscrutable Mien of Genesis trembled with the failure, forced to endure the backlash as the tall root swayed and then collapsed to the ground. Its light went dark and Nether Beasts surged forward with gleeful roars. Yet Randidly gritted his teeth and did nothing.

His eyes burned emerald as he watched more and more Nether Beasts rush greedily forward.

Once the first root had fallen, the other three had to face attacks from more directions. In three huge crashes, those roots fell too, rapidly withering to nothing and leaving behind a relatively undefended ditch that the trenches had become. Nether Beasts filled it, rushing madly forward as their success gave them confidence.

Randidly released a breath and winced. Fuck… that hurt more than I thought it would. Not anything serious, but-

There was a hand on his shoulder that brought Randidly abruptly back. Salazar flicked his tongue out of his mouth uneasily as he considered Randidly. “Are… a-are you a-a-alright? If y-you aren’t-”

“No, I’m fine,” Randidly shook his head. “I’ll recover quickly. But it’s too late for them.”

A monster with nothing but hunger opened its mouth and tasted the air.

Salazar looked confused, but Randidly didn’t bother to answer. Even now, it was out there, among them. It crawled gleefully across the slain roots of the World Tree, skittering from slaughtered branch to branch. It licked its lips as it moved amongst the Nether Beasts, its energy similar enough to them that the phantom went unnoticed. It was almost welcomed amongst these strange beings of instinct. It had many legs and a mouth wide enough to swallow the sky.

This will teach you to assume you have the market on images of darkness cornered, Randidly thought grimly. Implacable Price of Exodus.

The dark thing with too many legs and a mouth wide enough to swallow the sky paused in its made journey through the surging forces of Nether. Even as Nether Beasts rushed forward around it, the thing looked upward toward Randidly. Then it smiled. Its tongue tasted the air again, shivering in anticipation.

There was a moment of suspended time as the image moved and the whole of the trench dug in front of Lady Iellaya’s camp could feel the change. Randidly noticed the Nether Beasts realize something was wrong and struggle to escape, but the image was already among them. There was only the phantom of jaws that materialized around the Nether Beasts and the darkness of the hunger lurking beyond that.

Those jaws covered the entire ditch.

Crunch.

Congratulations! Your Skill Implacable Price of Exodus has grown to Level 203!

Congratulations! Your Skill Implacable Price of Exodus has grown to Level 204!

Congratulations! Your Skill Implacable Price of Exodus has grown to Level 205!

Even the Nether advance turned sluggish as all of the Nether Beasts that had charged into the trench vanished in a flicker of curved teeth and the sound of all of those Nether bubbles and cores being smashed to a pulp at once. Randidly brought his hand to his chest and winced as he endured something akin to heartburn as that foreign Nether lashed out at him for being consumed so quickly.

Unable to withstand the pressure, Randidly burped lightly and blew out a stream of dense Nether energy. Both Zauna and Salazar looked at him with obvious shock and alarm, but Randidly could only shake his head helplessly.

“Don’t worry about it, this isn’t more than I can handle,” Randidly said with a grin. But he couldn’t help but notice how more Nether energy leaked out of the corners of his mouth like smoke as he smiled. Which greatly increased the alarm in Salazar’s eyes as his two assistants considered Randidly Ghosthound.

Shaking his head, Randidly turned back to the battlefield and allowed the headache he suddenly possessed to slowly ease itself away. That was even more powerful than expected… but the word ‘price’ is important… that strength only comes from giving something up. In this case… defending within that trench with any Yggdrasil Skills now after using that image would greatly weaken it.

...better to keep it as a last resort, moving forward…

Although the Nether Beasts paused for a little while after visibly losing so many, more reinforcements surged forward to fill the now expanded trench. In addition to annihilating the Nether Beasts, Implacable Price of Exodus had also largely gotten rid of the small defensive fortifications that had been spaced throughout the trench, which allowed the Nether Beasts to surge forward without any real resistance besides the shallow slopes at the edges.

Those slopes were enough to give Lady Iellaya’s camp an advantage, but it was now clear that they firmly had the attention of the Nether forces, and with each comet that dropped down to the ground, the quality of troops was slowly rising. It was gradual, but there were no longer any Nether Beasts at the two-star tier of strength. They were gradually rising toward three.

For a relatively shaky group like these recruits, that would be enough to overcome any small advantage. But Randidly planned to give them one more edge. Especially as he saw how most of the Nether comets that were impacting the ground were making landfall in front of their base.

Ruinous Drive, Randidly thought silently and his energy began to radiate out from him like a halo of destruction. Unlike the Skill Flowing Momentum that this Skill had evolved from, Randidly no longer had to be literally leading a charge forward in order to provide the benefits to the surrounding individuals. They didn’t need to be part of his ‘momentum’ any longer. Now, Randidly could simply act as a powerplant that supplied a little extra damage to attacks all across the frontlines.

It was really a small thing, likely even smaller than the advantage given to them by the height advantage from the trench. A minuscule percentage of the damage these desperate soldiers inflicted with their images and weapons. A small edge to a sword slash, a finger’s worth of pressure to a blast of fire, a hint of chill to a whirlwind of ice shards.

But it was across a whole portion of the battlefield.

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 36!

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 37!

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 38!

The area Randidly could affect grew slowly along with the Skill Levels, but it was only really enough to benefit Lady Iellaya’s camp. Which was still bolstered to almost fifty thousand people utilizing the pretty modest bonus that Randidly provided. Which, in the aggregate, became enough for the current forces to deal with the rising strength of the Nether Beasts.

The ground of the ditch soon got soaked in ichor and blood of the Aether and Nether forces until it was a muddy hellscape of broken bodies and fizzling grey putty. Hooves and feet and chitinous legs churned the broken substances strewn across the ground until it was a grey/black paste. Ignoring their losses, the Nether Beasts continued to throw themselves forward.

Slowly but surely, the slight edges were enabling the brave defenders at the edge of the ditch to smash back wave after wave of Nether Beasts, leaving the failed attackers broken and trampled underneath their own.

Yet each wave would rip down one or two of the Aether soldiers. Small losses, but more and more Nether Beasts were surging behind, their black, glassy eyes filled with hatred. They were the river of carnage the flowed out of the beating heart of rage that was the Nether King in the sky.

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 39!

They would not stop until that emotion had run its course. And even from here, Randidly could feel the demand for blood.

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 40!

Congratulations! Your Skill Ruinous Drive (Ru) has grown to Level 41!

Slowly but surely, the extent of the assistance that Randidly could provide was growing. Even now, Randidly’s over one thousand Intelligence pointed out that it wouldn’t be enough. He would not grow quickly enough to keep the soldiers of Lady Iellaya’s camp safe so long as he only acted from afar. Yet even so-

BOOOOOOOM!

Randidly looked sharply upward as the sky above him cracked. A black comet of Nether raced downward, piercing through the barrier that Lord Miln had set up that kept the Nether Beasts from being able to drop anywhere across the battlefield. Before Randidly could react, it had raced down and smashed into the edge of the trench directly in front of Lady Iellaya’s camp, obliterating the bodies of defenders in the surrounding area in a wave of gore.

The soldiers that had been slowly stabilizing were instantly killed. Visual reverberations rippled out over the surrounding area as the dense Nether began to spread.

Lightning fast, Randidly flooded the area with the attacks from Absolute Grasp of Yggdrasil. Now that the opponent had gotten out of the area he had affected with the Implacable Cost of Exodus, Randidly could utilize his World Tree Skills again.

Yet as soon as he unleashed the attacks, Randidly’s Grim Intuition told him that these wouldn’t be effective; this foe hovered just below the Nether Gatekeeper tier of power. It was squat and humanoid, with six muscular arms that seemed to be constantly rolling at the shoulder joints. When it flexed, its muscles rippled and reformed around the small scratches that Randidly’s root attacks had made.

The surrounding Aether forces regrouped and rushed toward this foe, but it whipped its arm to the side and ripped apart the nearby resistance. Randidly watched as a severed torso of an Aether soldier tumbled sideways through the air and roll across the ground. Then the powerful Nether Beast raised its head and roared its defiance.

The sea of Nether Beasts behind it roared enthusiastically at the show of power. Their roar was a promise. They were coming for blood.