I hadn’t expected that. There wasn’t a good chance that I’d gotten enough experience from the signaleech to level everything up a couple of times, but maybe I could force //ENDLESS to its next level breakpoint. Of course, all that was riding on how much experience //WIPE-AWAY had given me. Ten crystals couldn’t hurt.

//TEN CRYSTALS SELECTED.

//WARNING: THERE IS A 1% TOTAL EXPERIENCE LOSS FOR EACH CRYSTAL.

//CONTINUE?

Uh, no. I did not want to lose ten percent of the slyk’s experience to absolutely nothing. One percent, though? That I could easily live without.

//TWO CRYSTALS SELECTED.

//DESIGNATE DIRECTLY TO ITEMS, OR STORE FOR LATER?

//FINAL WARNING: STORED CRYSTALS LOSE 10% OF THEIR STARTING TOTAL EVERY TEN DAYS.

It wasn’t really a hard choice to decide that I would level up //ENDLESS and the weapon that my floodforest moss had corrupted into. I couldn’t see myself getting rid of them any time soon, so they really were the best investments.

An image of a perfectly square oily black crystal appeared before my eyes, then split straight down the middle. Each chunk broke apart into countless smaller chunks and flowed into the text for the trinket and weapon I’d designated as recipients, and a dozen seconds later I had an indication that I’d gained a little more experience than I’d expected.

//ENDLESS MASTERY LEVEL INCREASED TO 22.

//ENDBOUND-NULLBLADE MASTERY INCREASED TO 9.

I checked the item description for the //ENDBOUND-NULLBLADE a few times to see if anything had changed, since none of its item mastery upgrade levels were visible. There were no discernible changes that I noticed except for the change in item mastery level, which was a little disappointing but also expected. After that I looked over all of my other items I had equipped, only to find that none of them had gained any experience whatsoever. Apparently //WIPE-AWAY didn’t just take from its own weapon, which was something I’d have to remember if I ever had a whole set of gear I wanted to level up at the same time.

At that moment, however, I really didn’t give a shit. Because //ENDLESS’ new upgrade completely changed how I could play around with it.

//ENDLESS(//CORRUPTED,Crafted)

Core Mastery Requirement: 3

Current item mastery: 22

Ribbons in use: 3/4

Use a consumable on a ribbon to paint it in the colours of said consumable. Consume a ribbon to gain the effects of the consumable.

Ribbon recharge rate is based on the strength of the consumable it is dyed with.

Ribbon consumables have (25+Mastery)=47% increased strength.

Mastery 5: Increases ribbon recharge rate by [10+((Available Ribbons)*15)]%. Currently=55%.

Mastery 15: Grants one additional ribbon and the ability to remove consumables from ribbons. Warning: doing so destroys the consumable in an utterly non-recoverable way.

Upgrades at item mastery 1/5/[15]/25/???. Upgrade effects are hidden until achieved.

I could get rid of the low-grade ‘blessing’ I’d gotten while fighting to help Nia and the pill that had almost killed me in the aftermath of said fight. The thought of saving the energy-storing pill did cross my mind at one point, but the memories of what it had done to me made the flick of my finger that expelled the copper marrowbloom pill from //ENDLESS effortless and satisfying.

Three ribbons to do whatever the hell I wanted with. The possibilities weren’t quite endless, since I’d have to find or make the consumables that I wanted to put into the ribbons, but all it took was one high-grade recovery pill and I’d be sitting much prettier than before. Or I could try to do with the signaleech’s oil what I’d done with coral and needlemaw blood not so long ago.

If I was going to try something like that, though, I wanted to make sure someone was watching just in case it tried to kill me. “Hey Jun, can you watch over me and make sure I don’t get violently sick or crippled?”

Jun sat up straighter in her chair, then slowly turned to me with a worried look. “In general, or right now?”

“Both preferably.” I answered seriously. “If this works, maybe I can find a way to make one of them for you.”

“If… it… works.” Jun slowly repeated. “Seb, you haven’t even told me what you’re about to do.”

Right. That part. “Right, sorry. I just upgraded endless, and I’m going to try and make a few potions with what I’ve got in my inventory. Throw some stuff at the wall and see what sticks, you know?”

Jun swiveled her chair to face me and crossed her arms. “That’s one of the worst ideas I’ve ever heard. We can’t afford to waste the materials we have, so at least wait until rootia and Okeria come back. Her healing could mean that she’s really good at making blessings.”

She made a good point. “Yeah, that’s a lot more sensible than what I was about to do.”

“Does that mean you’re not going to do it, or that you’re going to do it anyway and admit it was stupid afterwards?” Jun asked with a smirk.

“I’m not going to put myself in any more danger than I have to.” I said. “I’ve already had enough of that from the signaleech.

“Good.” Jun nodded as if she was convincing herself that I wasn’t about to do it anyway. “Good. I’ll sweet talk rootia when she gets back into helping you out. Not sure if it's even necessary, but it can’t hurt, right?”

“If you think so.”

Jun and I talked for a while longer while the rest of my empty nodes flooded in. I was expecting a little more from the signaleech’s spoils, but I had a whole load of raw materials that needed to be processed. Along with all the potential I could harvest from all the nodes I’d just gotten, there was a good chance that I’d end up with a completely corrupted set of armor.

The question was; would that actually be for the best? None of my corrupted gear directly gave me any stats, and if I corrupted everything I had, my stats would end up pitifully low. If I had more stat nodes to put on my spine of enmity that could definitely shore up that weakness, but if I was lacking one thing at this point, it was unfortunately stat nodes. Even the signaleech had only given me seven, which was two more than the minimum Jun got for absorbing literally anything’s core. Which only further proved how absurdly overpowered her core function was.

Hell, she could start making node ‘stars’ to burn them in whenever she wanted to. I still couldn’t make even a single one with the nodes I had on me. It felt almost like the exact opposite of the struggle I had in my old life, where getting enough empty nodes and levels was the challenge. Now I was throwing away empty nodes by the fistful to upgrade armor that was better than anything I had in the first five years of my old life.

I leaned on my elbow and watched the back of Jun’s head as she swiped through her interface. There wasn’t much I could do without Keratily or Okeria here to help make something of all the spoils I’d collected, so now it was time for my well-deserved nap.

“Wake me up when Keratily comes back.” I said with a yawn, then closed my eyes and pressed my head into a soft throw pillow.

“I will.” Jun said absentmindedly. “Sleep well, partner.”

An unknown amount of time later, I woke to someone jostling my shoulder. I opened my eyes to see that I’d flipped over some time during my nap, and was now staring at the plush back of the couch instead of the back of Jun’s head as I’d expected.

“Rootia and Okera just got back.” Jun said with another shake of my shoulder.

The information took a couple of full seconds to pass through the foggy haze that was my sleepy mind. “Thanks.” I mumbled, rolling over with a grunt and swinging my legs under me. “Did you tell her what I wanted to ask?”

“She did indeed.” Keratily confirmed. “I should be able to help you, but you will need more ingredients than just the slyk oil you harvested. I don’t have much on me at the moment, but I should be able to put something together that will aid you in the rest of this hazard.”

“And I feel like I gotta help too.” Okeria sighed, flopping down onto the couch next to me. He was fully armored when he started, and completely unarmored by the time his ass touched the cushion. “I’ve got some vials and containers that might have stuff ya can use. It’s the least I can do for ya since ya saved my life and left most of the signaleech’s corpse for me.”

I half-formulated a sarcastic response in my head, but if this was Okeria actually trying to open up and be generous, then that was definitely the wrong thing to say. Most likely a very satisfying wrong thing to say, but the wrong thing nonetheless. I held my tongue and nodded in thanks, which Okerai returned, then took one of the canisters of signaleech oil out of my inventory for Keratily to take a look at.

She snagged it from my hands and studied it closely, humming and nodding to herself whenever an electric jolt shot through the oil. “Your armor will keep the oil from doing too much damage to your body, so that shouldn’t be a problem. The question now is what would you like this oil to do for you?”

Keratily set the canister down in the middle of the board game table, purposefully knocking away pieces as she did. Jun made a noise of disbelief, and looked like she was about to complain, but realized that she’d just been given an out and shut her mouth before she dug herself a hole.

“The oil’s properties give it a very narrow berth that I can work with. It is a strange mixture of biological and system-crafted, which when combined with the taint the slyk left on it leaves me very little room to improvise.” Keratily explained. “If you want the strongest blessing I can create with the oil, it will be one of three things: a blessing that drains battery from whatever you damage, a blessing that electrically empowers your body and mind for a short time, or a blessing that puts you into a slyk-like state.”

She tapped a finger on the top of the canister. “However, if you have more of this oil I could attempt to make all three.”