Almost immediately, they decided that there's only really three options: Spending all 345 SP on Requiem of the Gravedigger, manually leveling Rejuvenate to around 100, and putting everything into health regen stats; using the SP on Greatsword Mastery, with the rest being the same as the previous; or manually leveling Rejuvenate to 56, spending all SP on Rejuvenate, putting 9 of the free stats on Strength, and 21 of them on Mana Regeneration Vitality Multiplier.

After an hour of externally internal debate and a lot of math, they make a short list of all the pros and cons of each path.

Requiem of the Gravedigger Pros Great burst +2 Kinda okish DPS +1 Good mix of Magic and Physical for increased health regen and mana +1 Tons of PP +3 About 96 health per second with Rejuve and RCD active +1 Lowish Omen of Death cooldown +2 Cons Heavily reliant on ghouls for DPS -1 Heavily mana reliant for damage -2 Neither Rejuve nor RCD become free -1 =6 Greatsword Mastery Pros Great DPS +3 Highest Stamina and Health out of the options +2 About 112 health per second with Rejuve and RCD active +1.5 Cons No ranged damage -1 Burst isn't great -1 Neither Rejuve nor RCD become free -1 =3.5 Rejuvenate Pros Free RCD +1 About 133 health per second with Rejuve and RCD active +3 37.5 minutes of Rejuve +2 Cons No damage -3 Rejuvenate would still need an additional 18 (just under 2 levels worth of) free stats put into mana regen to make it free, which is half the point of doing this path -0 Eliminated by Rookie giving 19 more free stats, assuming it stays at 1 per 20 =3

Surprised and sad that the Rejuvenation path isn't the way to go, though both agree that they'd score everything the same way if given the option to redo it. If it weren't for the need for damage against the goblins, Rejuvenate's lack of damage would only be -1 and they wouldn't feel as bad about taking an option that's scored only 1 less for higher satisfaction that comes with having permanent Rapid Cell Division and near-permanent Rejuvenate, with permanent only being 2 levels or 343 PP away.

And even then, they sit on the fence for an additional 10 minutes on whether to take the worse option for the current situation in order to get the option that is both better for the long game and more satisfactory. SP is only so common and training up Rejuvenate could take hours, after all. In the end, the massive amount of power that the 1035 extra PP could potentially give and the fact that they need damage now is what wins Requiem of the Gravedigger its spot as the option they choose.

Before he can have fifth thoughts on the matter, Degritone puts 14 points into Vitality and 16 into Health Regeneration Vitality Multiplier, then puts his SP into Requiem of the Gravedigger. Before he can start regretting not choosing the maximum regeneration option, he maxes out the Rookie path, gaining him 19 free stats. Additionally, he's surprised to find that he also gained +1 to all stats at 150 and +1 to all stats per level 300.

Congratulations! You have completed the Rookie path!

After finally taking your first steps into this new world, you found yourself inadequate.

Now, you blaze down the path of self improvement.

Choose:

10 Strength and Empower lv1

OR

10 Endurance and Channeling lv1

Your choice will affect future Rank Paths.

After looking at the skill descriptions, he chooses 10 Strength and Empower, then looks over his choices for where to put the rest of his 1079 PP.

Introduction Conquerer 0/500

Rising Star 0/1000

Soul Survivor 0/50

Hardy Soul 0/100

Modifier 0/500

"Well, Soul Survivor's a 100% choice, since no matter what we pick, we'll be left with- well, no, we could pick Hardy Soul, a 500, and get most of the way down the other 500, but it'd probably be better to just get Soul Survivor now and say we're doing either the two 500s or Rising Star, then starting down one of the 500s or Rising Star, si- or maybe just keep the extra PP, since Hardy Soul is a reward path and starting it without finishing it is useless." Degriclone says.

"Intro Conq is pure rewards, Modifier is reward plus completion, and RS is pure reward," pause. "RS will either be worth it because tons of rewards, or not worth it because big gaps in rewards," Degritone says, starting a fast clap while looking up. After a few seconds, he stops and looks back to his paths. "Modifier probably has something related to skill experience or something, which could be cool. Who knows what Intro Conq and RS have, though."

"You might as well go ahead and get Soul Survivor, though," Degriclone says.

"Myeah," Degritone says, putting it up to 50 immediately.

Congratulations! You have completed the Soul Survivor path!

The unrefined soul of a creature can be a dangerous place.

Some yearn for that danger.

Most just hope they never encounter it.

You are more resilient in the face of it.

Regenerating Soul Shell lvX

Tilting his head, Degritone turns on Soul Sight and looks at his soul, finding it exactly the same. Looking closely, he finds that the valleys of fog aren't getting smaller whatsoever. He raises his arms and says, "How's that not damage?"

"Huh?"

"The path reward was for external soul damage to heal. Still have the weird lines."

Degriclone looks at Degritone's belly for a while then shrugs. "I'm kinda partial to Rising Star myself. It was for top 100 overall, right? Should be good, even if it is spaced out."

"Adapter was skill experience, and that was only for the top 1k," Degritone says, nodding. "Granted, it was for a different leader board, but still." The two Degritones wobble their heads back and forth for a while. "Modifier probably has something for skill experience or growth, which would always be useful, and maybe a free skill or skill modification."

"Yes, but Rising Star could be," long pause, "tons of free stats, per-level gains, or," pause, "maybe even SP that we could use on Rejuvenate," Degriclone says. "RS almost definitely has good rewards, while Modifier only might have something good. Only 100 people per planet have RS, while probably millions will have Modifier soon enough."

"And scarcity might equal power," Degritone nods and brings Rising Star up to 29 to test the waters before committing and is very surprised to get Delver's Bounty at 10 and Capacity for Talent at 20. Nodding to Degriclone, he maxes out Rising Star, getting Unbreakable at 30, Resolve of the Wanderer at 40, and Accelerated Condensing at 50, all of which are unleveling skills.

Delver's Bounty is upgraded by 2.5% at 60 and every PP total that is 10 higher than a multiple of 50, followed by an upgrade of 1% to Capacity for Talent at 70 and every 20 higher than a multiple of 50, an upgrade of 5% to Unbreakable at 80 and every 30 above a multiple of 50, 0.5% to Resolve of the Wanderer at 90 and every 40 above 50, and 1.5% to Accelerated Condensing at 100 and every multiple of 50. This brings them up to 50%, 20%, 100%, 10%, and 30%, respectively.

Congratulations! You have completed the Rising Star path!

Few are capable of surviving in a new, strange world, but not only that, you were able to show you're capable of thriving.

The world is vast, your path long. Wherever it takes you, you will shine like the morning sun.

"Ten percent more PP?" Degritone asks no one, raising his right eyebrow while slightly lowering his left. "Glad I listened to... me? You?" He flails his hand around in the general direction of Degriclone, who currently looks excited, for a while before shrugging.

"I say Modifier next. SP or skill experience would be really nice to help with training Rejuve," Degriclone says.

"Though, Intro Conq might be per-level rewards. Wait, no, you're probably right," pause. "Modifier could possibly have SP per level, which would be cool. Odd and probably unlikely, but cool." He puts PP into Modifier one at a time until he gets a reward of 3 SP at 50. Nodding, he puts it up to 309, using up all his PP, and gaining a total of 18 SP, 3 every 50 PP, and 4 free stats, one every 75 PP.

Grinning, he looks at all his useful skills' popups as he scrolls down to Rejuvenate, enjoying having played Numbers Go Up for a little bit, but is horrified once he reaches Omen of Famine, as it deals 2612.475 damage, which is only 148.525 less than his maximum health, and isn't reduced by mana armor, due to it being direct damage.

After quickly doing a bit of math on his calculator to confirm his quick mental math that 32*32 is higher than 35*29, he adds 3 to his Endurance and 20 to his Maximum Health Endurance Multiplier, bringing his maximum health up to 6109, still 3 casts of Omen of Famine away from death. "Crisis... averted, question mark?"

"What?" Degriclone asks.

"An instant-damage-based mage would cook us alive. Just a second ago, they would have killed us in two shots, now we survive an additional shot then need to book it to Flash Space to recover before they can cast another one," Degritone responds. "Getting ganked by multiples of them would still mean death, but we're a 1v1 build, anyway. Omen of Famine was dealing about 150 less damage than I had health."

"Well, it does scale excessively well, is super high level, and also our stats are all wonked out. Normal people would almost definitely have more balanced stats than we have, at least in terms of Strength to Endurance ratio."

"True, but we'll still need to be wary of mages until we find out they are purely non-instant damage users. Anything that touches our armor is fine, from AoE to projectiles, just not instant damage like Yorick's E," pause. "Hopefully, we'll get a %max health regen skill soon. Omen of Famine already kinda works as a burst heal, though, since it has its 40% spell vamp off cast damage."

Waving his hand in front of his face, he says, "Anyway, this 18 new SP into Rejuve or RotG? Maybe save it to finish getting Rejuve to 100?"

Degriclone nods, then Degritone casts Omen of Death on himself to update his clone's capabilities. They look at each other and nod before walking out to see how everyone's been doing for the past hour and a bit and to find the council.

There's about half as many people outside as there was before, with his father among the missing. "Dad out securing the perimeter with the best survivors, I'm assuming?" the two Degritones say at the same time while walking up to the council, minus his uncle, before simultaneously, and slightly quietly, saying, "Now in stereo."

"Yeah," his mom says, turning to look at him. "We're even using the walkies," she adds excitedly, shaking the walkie talkie in her hand, which emits a somewhat quiet voice he can't quite hear from the distance he's at.

"Coo-ul," Degritone says, "but I've got something cooler. Well, other than my clone." As he finishes, Degriclone Flashes forward so he's where he'd be if he'd walked forward to normal talking distance with his mom, and Degritone himself activates Rejuvenate.

She gives a long, exaggerated gasp before excitedly saying, "You can teleport!?"

"Yes, but only about 5 feet at a time right now. I," pause, "came out to treach- treach?" he asks with a slight laugh, shaking his head before continuing, raising and lowering his eyebrows as he says the incorrect word, "treach you how to do it. It's kinda complicated in idea, but simple enough that it shouldn't take too long."

He launches into an explanation of Flash Space first, pausing any time the walkie talkie makes noise, and to take questions.

A little over 32 minutes of balancing his use of Rejuvenate to keep himself above 500 mana, answering questions, explaining, and explaining the exact same thing with slightly different words, his aunt is suddenly a small bit in the air and falls to the ground. Not long after, they've managed to modify her Flash Space into Flash.

During this time, the construction team has managed to put up a much-more-hastily-built-than-intended wall behind the house, facing south, toward where the goblin camp is, roughly 100 feet long and 10 feet tall, with small holes for their magic and gun users to see and shoot through.

"We should probably call everyone back, it's late," Degritone says, noticing that night time has fallen while they were doing that. After a short pause, he also adds, "Also, be sure to teach anyone you can about Flash. It's," long pause, "probably the best movement skill in existence."

In the middle of him saying the word, "existence," the walkie talkie activates, with his dad's voice coming through, saying, "Group of five goblins spotted about 100 yards south of the house. Should be crossing the creek in under 30 seconds at their pace. Everyone not at the house, return now."