Dante’s Immortality – Chapter 64

He processed the words for almost a full minute. “Why would you sign the mana contract then?”

Victoria rolled her eyes. “It’s not as though you can’t win, it’s that you currently wouldn’t be able to. I was told that you only took a basic world essence manipulation class at the academy, which wouldn’t be a problem on its own, but Jace has likely already specialized at least two Classifications three times. I’m not sure what Classifications he has, or even how many, but they definitely won’t be normal.”

It was challenging to comprehend her words, mainly because as soon as he heard specialized three times, his brain shut down. “Three times, how is that even possible?” Even specializing twice didn’t seem feasible with the drastic increase of world essence required after the first specialization.

“The wastelands are far less populated than the noble’s territory. In other words, far more resources go to far fewer people. Specialization isn’t uncommon, even for standard mercenaries, and twice specialized is the norm for most leaders. It’s the reason why Daxez was so pretentious, even though my position is technically higher. And also the reason the nobles were unable to recapture the wastelands after the last campaign. The Devotion guild branch that he is a part of is one of the strongest in the outer regions, and if they journeyed so far for Jace, he is likely being groomed to be the next guild master.”

It seemed like the world as he knew it was just turned upside down. “If you and Master Daxez were to fight, who would win?”

Victoria snorted. “I would crush him like a bug.”

“Then why didn’t you?” His tone was incredulous, everything could have been avoided if Victoria had just rolled over Master Daxez.

“I will, but due to certain preexisting circumstances, it would be… problematic if I stirred up too much trouble and brought too much attention to myself.” She smiled at him, but it seemed somewhat sinister. “All you have to do is kill Jace, then make Daxez mad enough to attack you, and I’ll kill him with no questions asked.”

Great. He was bait.

“How can I beat Jace then?” Their fight didn’t have a set time, so he didn’t even know how much time he had to prepare. It was possible that it would take place in only a few days.

Victoria seemed to think it over. “The number of attributes the two of you currently have are likely similar, although yours would be more diverse, and you likely wouldn’t lose out when it comes to skills, if only because you can teleport. Where you truly lose out is world essence control, I would guess that Jace has already completed the third level of the spectral attunement. But I wouldn’t worry, we have over a year before this particular dungeon boss reforms.”

“Would the spectral attunement even make that much of a difference?” Victoria had said that it was just a footwork technique, so he had thought it would mainly just keep his footsteps quiet when sneaking.

Victoria stood and walked over to her bag, then pulled out a bracelet. “The spectral attunement was created by the ancient master assassins of the inner regions, it shouldn’t be underestimated. Watch closely.”

She clamped on the bracelet. “This bracelet has an enchantment that works similarly to wraith collars, but this one in particular won’t interfere with mana, skills, or world essence manipulation. In other words, it’s a training band that will limit my attributes to what they would be without my Classifications.”

If there was a time to try and attack or flee from Victoria, it was now. He didn’t really consider it though.

“This is the result of learning the second level of the spectral attunement.” Victoria stood in place while blue world essence seemed to surround her legs, becoming incredibly thick in only a brief second. Then she jumped sideways to the sound of rocks being crushed, moving at a speed that didn’t seem conceivable. It was even faster than him, without any Agility attributes.

“As you can see, the second level will bolster one’s speed dramatically, and also carries a decent amount of power.” Victoria pointed to the ground where she was standing only moments ago, it was completely shattered. Even the ground she was currently standing on had cracks in it.

Victoria saw his serious expression, then nodded. “It’s a bit unrefined at the second level, but effective in combat nonetheless.” After saying those words, she jumped side to side in rapid succession, he was able to keep up with her movements visibly, but doubted that he would be able to match them.

Victoria came to a stop. “Agility and Dexterity will also aid in speed and control while utilizing this technique.”

That meant that the speed he could reach with just the second level of the spectral attunement would be far greater than he would be able to otherwise.

“The third level doesn’t drastically increase speed like the second, but will enhance a combatant’s offensive ability to a terrifying level.” Victoria pulled out two daggers. “The control required for the third level will give the necessary skill for world essence channeling, and is also the reason why two daggers are so viable.”

She held the daggers out and filled them with world essence. Victoria had far more control than anyone he had ever seen, the daggers only had a thin blue layer of world essence covering them, like a razor's edge. If he hadn’t been watching carefully, he likely wouldn’t have even noticed it.

“After impaling someone with the two daggers, you can channel the world essence between them and inflict massive damage that won’t be stopped by world essence diffusion.” The daggers she held out had no visible change, but tendrils of blue world essence began to quickly shoot between them. It almost looked like lightning jumping between the two blades.

Victoria stopped, and Dante cleared his throat. “What is world essence diffusion?”

She looked at him for a brief moment, as if wondering he was serious, then sighed. “At its base level, world essence diffusion is when a combatant’s Constitution and Intelligence, or in other words mana, interferes with the world essence cutting into their body. It’s why a world essence manipulated blade can cut down a tree in one swing, but won’t necessarily kill a combatant with a bit of Constitution or a massive amount of Intelligence.”

After thinking it over, Victoria’s words made sense. Cutting through enemies was one of his largest issues in a fight, but he had associated the issue with his lack of ability in world essence manipulation. It wasn’t the least bit upsetting though, because it meant that he would be far more resistant to world essence manipulated attacks. Still, it wasn’t something he would be testing willingly.

If world essence channeling countered that, it was exceedingly useful. It made the second and third level of the spectral attunement as useful as two unique skills, and there were still two levels left.

“There is also something of a counter to your teleportation skill that Jace will know, but he may not use it if he doesn’t know of your skills beforehand.” She said it nonchalantly, but he froze. Blink was his best skill by far, and without it, his offensive and defensive potential would be destroyed.

Victoria saw his bleak look and rolled her eyes. “Relax, it’s not that bad. It’s a counter to every skill, try teleporting to me.”

Doing as she said, he spread his awareness toward Victoria and was surprised to find that his awareness couldn’t come within around a foot of her body. He could still Blink to her, just outside of its reach, but wouldn’t be able to cross that threshold.

“This is called a mana aura, created by dispensing mana in the vicinity around you to block skills from being cast. Without using it, a skilled magic combatant could just cast a skill directly on your body to instantly kill you, or someone like you could just stab everyone in the eye for an instant kill.”

He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Even if it was great news when he was going to be attacked, it was slightly limiting in his offense. Thankfully, given the way he fought, it wasn’t such a big deal and would likely help him more than it hurt him.

“This mana aura is useful, but the drain is quite high. Basically, you just wastefully throw your mana out of your body. My current upkeep for this aura, which has a radius of around one foot, is 10 mana per second. Many skilled combatants will keep it activated, but only dispense it at the rate of their mana regeneration.”

That was good news, if only for his Blink skill. Not many people would be able to keep up with a 10 mana per second drain.

Victoria took off the bracelet, then pocketed her daggers. “So, what’s in the bag?”

He had been so preoccupied with Victoria’s demonstration that he had actually completely forgotten the fox that was continuing to scratch him through the bag. “They said it was an umbra fox. Honestly, I don’t know if it’s worth anything, but I brought it with me anyways.”

Victoria’s eyebrows rose. “You found an umbra fox?” She held her hand for the bag, and he gave it to her.

Victoria reached in for the fox and pulled it out, and he was surprised by how docile it had become. It didn’t put up any struggle whatsoever. “It’s young too. How interesting. I was going to find you a flying creature that utilizes stealth for scouting, but this could do.”

He perked up at the mere thought of taming a creature, any creature.

She glanced up at him. “Umbra foxes are rare creatures that have a natural stealth skill, but this one is a bit young, so it won’t have the ability for a few months. Because of that, and its speed, it could be considered an ideal utility creature for anyone in my guild, but it’s generally looked down upon because it offers no offensive or defensive support. Its intelligence is also well above average, but should still be something you can handle as it grows. Whether or not you want to keep it is your choice.”

An offensive creature would be nice, but not really necessary, and Victoria had said that she was going to get him a bird for scouting anyways. “How large will it become?”

The fox was small, but Victoria said that it was young. If it stayed its current size, around the size of a rabbit, it would be easy to hide in almost any situation.

Victoria examined the fox from a few different angles. “It’s already fully grown.”

Dante nodded. “I’ll keep it then.”

Victoria sighed in what seemed to be relief. “Then we can leave this damn mountain range early and get some actual combat training in.”