While the pain was nigh unmatched, Lone's Physical Pain Resistance allowed him to think beyond it and imbue his Basic Regeneration with his SP.

In an instant, he burned through almost a third of his nearly 100,000 SP to regrow his limbs and fend off the barriers assaulting him from within.

With that done, he sprung up to his feet, still constantly feeding Basic Regeneration stamina points. He activated his Bone Armour and Survivor's Speed at the same time.

The next moment, as a group of whizzing barriers sized and positioned perfectly to enter his eyeslits and render him blind appeared inches from his face, he put his full force into a punch aimed at Soph's armoured head.

He let himself get blinded since he knew Soph wouldn't allow the barriers to continue onwards to his brain. Lo and behold, she did indeed dismiss them the very moment they had finished destroying Lone's eyes.

He felt something crack from the impact when his vision returned. "How many layers is that...?" he wondered aloud.

His punch had connected with a seemingly thin wall that was actually made up of hundreds of barriers, dozens of which he had broken right through before being stopped.

"Enough to stop your fist," Soph answered before she doubled the number of barriers inside of him, almost forcing him to his knees.

Lone activated Tail Spear and sent all nine of his furry limbs towards his short lover. Soph clearly had no intentions of even trying to cut off or stop the now incredibly hard and deadly tails.

Instead, she flickered out of existence and appeared again a few hundred metres down the road. Lone then witnessed as she raised her arms and started to yell as if to tell herself 'I can do this'.

"Wow..." was all Lone could say when he saw the veritable maelstrom of jade death that Soph had created above her head.

Hundreds- no, perhaps thousands upon thousands of barriers all joined together spinning fast enough to turn granite blocks into piles of rubble. Even just the noise they were giving off was painful to hear.

Lone nodded his head, knowing that this was an important moment for Soph and her magical development. She was completely lost in her own world as she focused on summoning up this attack that he felt could likely turn even an X-ranker into little more than ribbons.

He knew what this was. He'd read about it. 'Skill Enlightenment' they called it. Similar to how one could only reach a new rank of power with the correct enlightenment, in rare moments of extreme emotion or contemplation, a skill could be born or developed in a strange new way via enlightenment.

It could easily fail and cause tremendous backlash to the person going through it, however, unlike normal enlightenment which was risk-free.

Without hesitation, he manipulated his bones to create a colossal shield as thick and as tall as Bone Armour would allow him to.

Lone then kicked the paved flooring hard enough to plant his feet deeply into it, rooting him in place. 'I'm gonna need every scrap of SP to come out of this unscathed.'

His ears twitched. Soph's yell had come to an end and the droning sound of impending doom was fast approaching.

"I swear to god, if this kills me, when you use Minor Time Control to undo it, I'm gonna slap you so hard for being such a hypocrite regarding my life-risking activities. I'm also never gonna let it go," Lone mumbled.

A few moments prior, Breena and Hamish had heard Soph screaming and came to investigate. Once Hamish saw what was going on, he decided it was a good opportunity to learn something, both for himself and for Breena.

Thus, the two of them were watching from a safe distance down the road.

"W-Will Master Lone be okay?" Breena asked.

'I wonder if she'll ever call 'em master an' mistress tae their faces?' Hamish remained silent for a moment while he stared at the massive collection of massive spinning barriers that were suspended over the annoying gremlin's head.

"Ah'd die fae sure if 'at 'it me," he finally answered. "Lone though? 'At foxy cunt's tougher 'an nails. Ah'm convinced nothin' short o' ah god can make 'im kick the bucket, an' even then, nae withoot ah fight."

"... I-I see." Breena wore an anxious expression. "B-But why is Mistress Soph making an attack l-like that? She's always telling Master Lone off for being so reckless..."

"Yer Western Stone Dwarfish is near-perfect now, lass. Ye soond more fluent 'an me," Hamish commented when Lone created the most fuck-off massive shield the dwarf had ever seen in his over 100 years of life.

"T-Thanks," Breena said while a blush formed on her face. "M-Master Lone is a good tutor."

"Aye, 'e is. An' she's basically nae conscious right now. Ah've seen 'er state afore. The fancy folk who care fae technical terms call it Skill Enlightenment," Hamish explained. "If she succeeds in fully formin' at attack, she'll get ah new skill ootta it. It has tae form an' perform its intended purpose, 'owever. Knowin' Lone, 'at cunt's aware ah this which is why 'e's nae tryin' tae stop 'er."

"W-What could happen?" Breena asked curiously.

"Or the host'll nae get ah skill. Simple as 'at. Well, they'll also never be able tae enter 'at state again fae 'at particular skill an' they may be crippled fae a wee while. It's rare. Ah've never seen anyone but Ewan dae it afore. Interruptin' the process is grounds tae get even ah silver-plate adventurer's plate revoked," he elaborated in a saddened tone.

Breena seemed to mull over that for a second before Hamish heard her whisper, "Two skills in one day while I haven't earned a new one since Lone sacrificed himself to save me from Darkness..."

Hamish caught himself sighing. "Pay attention. She's throwin' 'at scary feckin' thing."

"Ah, uh, y-yes, of course, Mister Hamish. I-I'll try to learn whatever I can, lacking as I might be..." Breena replied.

Lone slowly peeled his eyes open only to find that he was lying on the ground with his vision covered in system notifications.

He dismissed them for the moment and got up, or, he tried to at least. Tilting his head down he noticed he was missing almost his entire body save for his head and the left side of his torso.

'She destroyed my bones in seconds. I'm only alive because I managed to rapidly create and recreate a head-sized shield to protect my skull,' Lone surmised.

He willed his SP to power his Basic Regeneration but didn't notice any increase in healing speed. "I'm already out of SP? Fuck. No wonder I feel like shit."

"Ah think 'at's on account ah ya bein' little mere 'an ah takin' 'ead right now, pal," a familiar voice said.

"You know, you might be on to something there, Hamish. It's surprisingly painful to be reduced to this," Lone joked before spitting out a bunch of blood.

"Will ye be okay?" the dwarf asked, an uncommon hint of concern in his tone.

Lone would have nodded were doing so not a struggle right now. "I'm alive and no longer under attack. I'll be right as rain in half an hour? Maybe an hour? Never been this banged up before. I'm more concerned about Soph. Is she okay?"

Hamish gestured with his head, to which Lone followed with his eyes. Breena was waddling over with the armoured Soph on her back.

"Lassie passed oot. Ah dinnae ken why but seems the Skill Enlightenment drained 'er way more 'an it should've," Hamish explained.

Lone searched around with his mind for his Blood Clone and found it down the road, having apparently been blown clean from his body when he was almost killed.

He controlled it to enter his bloodstream in an attempt to speed up his healing. It had no such effects, but who knew? Maybe wanting it to do that would result in a new skill effect.

"Soph has a peculiar ability. Kinda like how Growth Accelerator lets me determine ideal weapons and armours, she can overload skills and things that require mana with more MP. I think it's linked to her Mana Sensing but I'm not sure," Lone said.

Hamish went silent before he slowly and very carefully said, "So ye'r tellin' me ye just survived ah magical attack 'at 'ad ah little over 3,000,000 MP pumped intae it? And that's also why she's oot cold?"

"By the skin of my teeth. Without the bone-strengthening I got from Guildmaster's Hilda hits, then I'd have been dead, Soph would have had to have turned back time, yadda yadda. But yeah, I did. Pretty scary, right?" Lone said, a grin on his pained expression.

At this point, a third of what was missing from his chest had been regenerated, including his heart. It was a bit freaky knowing he could function without such a critical organ. Basic Regeneration truly was an unbelievably powerful skill.

"... Once ah'm finished teachin' this one," Hamish said, pointing to the struggling Breena, "we're done, through an' through. Ah'm ah simple dwarf o' lackin' strength. Wae powers like yers, ah thought bein' pals in the long run would be 'elpful. Large shoulder tae lean on if ever needed, aye? Well, wae both of ye bein' so strong... trouble'll follow. It's only ah matter o' time afore ye piss off someone strong enough an' nasty enough tae use oor connection against ye. It'll be best if we never contact each other again, fer ma safety an' fer yers."

Lone's expression hardened. "... That was always the plan regardless. You teach Breena, then you retire. I work off my sentence, then fuck off back topside. Why restate what we both already knew?"

Hamish glanced down at Lone and slowly nodded. "Aye, ye'r right, Fox, ye'r right."

A few hours had passed since that serious conversation between Lone and Hamish.

Hamish had carried Lone back to their temporary camp while Breena had done the same for Soph even if it had completely exhausted her.

'Isn't the point of earning more power to get strong enough to not worry about other people's power? Maybe Hamish is right. A person is probably much safer staying at I-rank than ever climbing the ladder to Divinity,' Lone thought as he stroked Soph's hair.

She was still unconscious but she seemed to be in fine health, so the assumption was that she was simply conked out from draining her MP tank.

'Still, even if statistically you're less likely to meet harm as a simple nobody, at least when you're a powerful someone, you can resist. If my path endangers those around me, they need to accept that or cut me out of their life like Hamish plans to do. I won't stop until Soph has her Immortality unsealed. Then we'll both be nigh unkillable and free to scour this massive continent to our heart's content for the rest of time,' Lone concluded before he chuckled. 'And hey, if we ever got bored of wandering after that point, what's stopping us from world hopping? I'm sure I'll eventually reverse engineer hero summoning.'

With that having been gone over, Lone felt much better. With renewed vigour, he pulled up his notification log to see how much Soph's enlightenment-driven barrier attack had benefited him.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 6. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 7. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 8.

'From the initial internal barriers and her cutting off my limbs?' Lone wondered. 'How'd she cut off my arms and legs anyway? There's no way those particular barriers had the power to get through my bones.'

It took a second but an answer came to him. 'Sneaky little devil... She used Mana Sensing to perfectly cut through my ligaments to separate my bones and effectively slice my arms, legs, and tails off... Definitely need a skill that makes my skin and my muscles harder.'

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 9. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Level 10. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 1. Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance All offensive barriers produced by the skill Unique Magic: Barrier Magic used on the host shall be 15% [+10%] weaker and 15% [+10%] easier to break. Cost: N/A Mastery: Intermediate Level 1

'And that's from the second assault when she was teleporting and the sneaky eyeball thing. I wonder if that boost to 15% was critical in my survival. I don't think it was, but who knows? 10% is a lot,' Lone thought with a shrug.

Now came the motherlode. The treasure trove of skill upgrades that came from Soph's final attack left Lone damn-near frothing at the gills. Well, it would have were he to own gills.

First came Colossal Shield Mastery, a new mastery; Buckler Mastery, Shield Mastery, Bone Armour, then Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance, Basic Regeneration, and finally, Physical Pain Resistance.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Colossal Shield Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 2. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Colossal Shield Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 3. The host has developed the passive skill: Buckler Mastery. Buckler Mastery

A child-skill of the skill [Shield Mastery] commonly used by swashbucklers and duelists alike.

When holding a buckler the host is 5% more likely to parry a blow when attempting to do so.

When wearing a wrist-strapped buckler, any ranged attacks aimed at the host have a 1% chance of hitting the buckler regardless of where they were aimed.

Cost: N/A Mastery: Beginner Level 1

'Ah, that explains why half of my chest survived and not just my head,' Lone thought. 'Wonder how many levels it got.'

He got his response immediately. 24 levels was the answer.

Buckler Mastery

A child-skill of the skill [Shield Mastery] commonly used by swashbucklers and duelists alike.

When holding a buckler the host is 30% [+15%] more likely to parry a blow when attempting to do so.

When wearing a wrist-strapped buckler, any ranged attacks aimed at the host have a 3% [+1%] chance of hitting the buckler regardless of where they were aimed.

[New!] Grants the talent [Forced Parry], Say the words [Forced Parry] when wielding a shield and the host shall successfully parry any incoming attack regardless of its power (if the power of the attack vastly outstrips the durability of the shield and the host's own body, the shield will shatter and the arm holding it shall break).

Cost: [New!] 10,000 SP to invoke (48-hour cooldown). Mastery: Advanced Level 1 Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Buckler Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Advanced Level 2. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Buckler Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Advanced Level 3. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Buckler Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Advanced Level 4. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Buckler Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Advanced Level 5.

'Insanely expensive SP cost on that talent. Longest cooldown I've seen so far too, but fuck me if that effect isn't uber-powerful. It says 'wielding'. I need to test if wrist-strapped- or, well, wrist-connected counts as wielding. The break chance means nothing to me due to my shields being made of my bones and the arm breaking is even more negligible. I could block an attack from a Divine with this, right?' Lone theorised as he moved on.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Shield Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 9. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Shield Mastery] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 10. Congratulations! The host's unique subskill [Bone Armour] has levelled up! It is now Master Level 1. Unique Subskill: Bone Armour

A subskill unique to the host, Lone Immortus.

Allows the host to use the unique skill [Basic Regeneration] to push the host's bones outside of their own body and use them as a weightless shield.

The strength of the bones will increase with mastery. The strength of the bones will also increase the more that they're broken and damaged.

The host can create a full suit of armour. [New!] Now Includes the host's tails and anything the host is in contact with that they deem worth protecting.

The host can create a shield at whatever size they wish outwards from any point of their body.

Cost: None to invoke [No longer has a cooldown to reinvoke]. Drains MP [New!] or SP to recreate rapidly or to heal at varying levels depending on the speed of the recreation or the severity of the damage being healed. [The dedicated cost the shield had to be created based on its size has been removed]. Mastery: Master Level 1 Congratulations! The host's unique subskill [Bone Armour] has levelled up! It is now Master Level 2.

'Huh. Can I now make skyscraper-sized shields? Can I protect entire cities with the effect upgrade? These changes need testing, for sure,' Lone concluded, a big grin on his lips.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 2. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 3. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 4. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 5. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate Level 6.

The levels went on and on. Clearly, surviving that enormous attack of Soph's was an incredibly effective method to boost this resistance through the roof.

It blasted right through to advanced rank, increasing the boost from 15% to 30% and kept going. Finally, the last notification regarding this skill's level-ups arrived.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 1. Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance

All offensive barriers produced by the skill Unique Magic: Barrier Magic used on the host shall be 60% [+30%] weaker and 60% [+30%] easier to break.

[New!] All magical barriers used to attack, trap, or impede the host shall be 5% less effective.

Cost: N/A Mastery: Expert Level 1

"All barriers?" Lone mumbled.

His mind whirred. He'd already experienced how literal the system was with its bonuses from his testing with the active effects weapon masteries tended to gain at intermediate rank.

With this extra effect saying 'all barriers', that likely meant all barriers. Now, the question was, how far did 'all' extend?

For example, would Lone's own Illusionary Dome count as a barrier? If so, he would have three skills that could counter it in unison were he to encounter another one in the future; Illusion Magic Resistance, Enhanced Vision, and now Unique Magic: Barrier Magic Resistance.

'I only ever expected for this skill to be useful for two things. Helping Soph master her unique skill, and if she ever needed to hit me and an enemy at the same time. This is a very welcome surprise. Now, are there any more amazing treats waiting for me in my logs?' Lone asked himself eagerly.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Basic Regeneration] has levelled up! It is now Master Level 2. Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Basic Regeneration] has levelled up! It is now Master Level 3. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 2. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 3. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 4. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 5. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 6. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 7. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 8. Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Physical Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Expert Level 9.

"Lotta levels which are always nice now that I know levels do improve skills ever so slightly, but nothing mind-blowing," Lone sighed in content rather than disappointment.

Just then, Soph began to stir. She pushed herself up to sit on her knees as she looked around blearily. "Wha...? Where...?"

Lone grinned at her. "You, little missy, are in need of three things. First, congratulations. Second, thanks. Third, a good telling-off for coming closer to killing me than even the Blue Orc Chieftain managed to. Let's thank our lucky stars that I have Basic Regen at such a high mastery, huh? Bone Armour too."

Soph looked confused before her eyes widened. "So many notifications... Wait. What did you say I did?"