Saintess Summons Skeletons

Chapter 77: Diminishing returns

What blue crystal was left connecting the mansion and the city ground snapped like a twig. Sofia flew out, holding Pareth and Alith. The whole thing tilted, due to the unclean break, the other side of the mansions walls hit the ground as it slid down the hole, producing a thunderous sound. The two Phageids inside tried to escape through the same window, colliding with each other

[You have been affected by : instant death. But your skills negated the status]

Alith screamed to slow them down. It worked well enough, they froze for a second, as the mansion kept tumbling down into the black abyss below. They couldnt even try to latch to the bottom of the city once they recovered, because the mansion was rotating the other way, making their exit face the void instead.

It was good that these things werent so proficient at moving around. The message informing them of their kill would soon come, but they had a more pressing matter to attend. It was due to the noise of this whole affair, the Phageid larvae from the nearby mansions were leaving their nest.

Sofia saw them pop out from the windows of the mansions directly on the left and on the right. Maybe those further than that were coming out too, she had no time to check. There was no way they could fight two of those. Even less so in an open environment, where a single stretched out tentacle could hit them from far away.

With no other choice, she grabbed Alith and followed the falling mansion, flying down the hole. If the thing that keeps mana around the city is a sphere Then there should still be some down there!

And that was correct. Flying above an infinite abyss, knowing that at any time you could run into a zone without ambient mana and fall was quite scary. But not as scary as the Phageid Larvae searching for them above. Sofia could still detect where the mana ended if she focused hard enough, but maintaining that while flying and holding onto Alith and Pareth was a bit much. So she decided to wait not too far from the hole.

They could hear the things move around above, and the strange gravelly sound that their tentacles made as they slithered around. That they were completely silent otherwise was quite unnerving. Even the zombies used to make some sound. Some grunts. But these dont. What are they really? It looks like theyre from another world So how did the Alphageid come about in the trial? And how did I never hear about any of this before? You would think something that big would be impossible to forget

Well most of my education came from the Churchs books. I cant keep going into everything blindly like I did until now. But I need to get stronger fast Ah Ill think about it if we even manage to get out of here.

That the things hadnt known to follow them down the hole meant that whatever they relied on for sensing things other than sound wasnt sight. Sofia already had a big suspicion of that but this confirmed it. Because the monsters had gotten a clear line of sight to the trio when they left their mansions.

They had been waiting in silence for a while but the things were still moving around on the surface. Screw this, were going up, Im getting tired of flying in place. The first option was to go back up the same hole and fly away, hoping that they dont get hit or chased. Pretty bad. They could also try to go around the city from the outside, then fly up the wall, but Sofia was quite scared of flying out of the zone that had mana, even briefly. So they could only search around for their first hole and go up through there.

The underside of the city was completely flat, you would think that it would make finding a large hole easy but it didnt. Because the lighting was uniform and flying lower put them at risk of falling out of the mana sphere. So they could only fly around in circles, as close to the bottom of the city as possible, hoping to find the hole. At least they knew the approximate direction.

They finally found the hole and sat down in the mansion that lacked its guard.

So, refraining from using [Angels Bolt] was a good idea, Sofia started.

Alith vigorously nodded, Really, just imagine if you used it and it didnt kill the thing in one try. Wed have at least three of those chasing us.

You saw how fast they reached us too? Theyre awkward in their movements but actually very fast once they decide to step down from the spheres.

Yeah, were lucky that the first one never wanted to let it go Hey Sof, actually, isnt this the perfect opportunity to go and break one of those big spheres? Since theyre unguarded.

... Lets check out the level ups first and well do that if theyre still out.

Oh Im done with that already. You know what, deal with your things, Ill go outside and check out how many left their places. Im pretty sure I can go unnoticed, Alith said before jumping out through an empty window. At least she doesnt make a lot of noise. But neither do they. I hope she stays safe.

Alright then.

You have defeated [Phageid Larvae - lv. 201]

[Way of the Fool] grants slight bonus experience

You gained a level! * 6

You have defeated [Phageid Larvae - lv. 245]

[Way of the Fool] grants slight bonus experience

You gained a level! * 3

[New Active Skills are available!]

There were a few things to note. First of all, the bonus experience from [Way of the Fool] had gone from normal to slight. But also the Phageid that was way higher level gave a lot less. So either the experience requirements from level 109 to 112 were incredibly increased compared to going from 100 to 109, or the second kill gave way less experience for some reason.

Sofia thought the 44 levels of difference between the monsters probably made up for the increased xp requirement. Yet they gained a lot less progress from the second kill, so it had to be that it actually gave less experience.

This is the slime farm all over again then. We can only get so much out of killing monsters without taking much risk Should have seen it coming.

Overall it was still a good harvest. But ideally they would need to find a way to make these things give xp again. After all, the key out of this place could be in their next skill.

Unlikely but not impossible. They didnt have many other things that could work so they needed to keep up that hope.

What keywords did I get then? Is it time for another triple fusion?

As she tried to access her available skills, a few new messages appeared.

New available skills have been altered by your specialization! (won 100% probability check)

Hidden property : [Specialization alteration probability] : When acquiring a new class skill, it has a chance of being altered to better fit your specialization. This chance starts off at 0%, and goes up depending on your use and understanding of the specialized skill. The first activation is guaranteed to result in an altered skill. Your accumulated chance percentage will be reset to 0% after getting an altered skill, and may be viewed from your status.

Available Active Skills :

• [Dispel ]: Dispels
• [ mist] : in a thick mist.
• [ soul] : to the necromancers lifeforce.
• [Solar ] : [ERROR]
• [ spine] : [ERROR]

Alright Im not even allowed to get broken descriptions anymore I guess. Can that be fixed, Mr Scribe?

She waited a bit but nothing happened. That meant that she wouldnt get anything.

Too bad. Usually complaining about broken stuff works

So Ive only got a single word to go off of for each. Solar and Spine. I see how that could have come from the specialization. One related to the sun and one to skeletons. Could have been two cool skills but its weird words instead.

Cant see them help us escape from here. Just gotta make the best out of it I guess.

Dispel Solar something? No, it sounds too specific. I really really dont want to waste the dispel keyword

Solar Dispel something already feels like it would be better, maybe that would be good a dispelling curses or stuff like that? Would Solar Dispel Night make it daytime anytime? Dont have Night as a keyword though And a spell like that would have to cost millions of millions of mana, wouldnt it? Thats also something I should be careful with. I can still only barely handle casting [Angels Bolt] as it is

So something not too specific in its function that I can never use. Like [Lead the Dead] used to be. And preferably something that sounds reasonable for my level so I can actually cast it.

Ill be better off keeping Dispel for later, while Solar is a word representing something strong so I could use a power upgrade right now.

Solar something something. Sofia tapped her nails on the Midenicite slab floor of the mansion as she was lost in thoughts.

I need to be careful with the order of words. I have mist, soul, and spine. I can only start with Solar Solar soul mist and Solar mist soul both dont inspire me much.

Solar spine mist? No.

Solar mist spine? That could work actually. I dont know what a spine of solar mist would be. Maybe something like [Heal undead] where the spine represents a ray coming from the sky and solar mist just means it burns things?

So like a spell that burns things with a ray of sunlight? If it ends up being that its pretty cool. But it would suck if I also cant use it indoors or at night.

Hmm, what are the choices I didnt think through again?

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