(III) Enough

167 (III)Enough

Encounter Complete (3/5)

Adjusting Legendary Skill…

Applying Partial Skill Evolution: Magical Resistance 100 (Master)

Vitaemancy 93 > 95

Outside Context Problem 87 > 88

Killing a surprised and confused Jealousy was far easier than facing down a hidden one. When the Animancy field vanished, Shiv slammed his pillar against the Jealousy’s body and tore it wide open. An application of Chronomancy followed by an inertial discharge later, the Greater Demon was carried away from the limits of Blackedge as bloody mist and falling chunks of tissue.

As soon as he finished killing the creature, he felt a dense field of multi-hued mana combust into existence just under his skin.

Magical Resistance was a strange skill. It didn’t seem to evolve in most cases—aside from becoming dischargeable, perhaps from a type of skill fusion, considering the Tarrasque and Hawgrave. It felt more like a layer of bone rather than a limb. It was a weight fused inside Shiv, but a supportive weight. One that made him feel stronger. More durable than ever before. But even if it hadn’t evolved into a more sophisticated skill, it was fusing with his Physicality, and so it was going to change eventually.

Before he had a chance to ponder that question further, another flash of Animancy flared in the corner of his eye. It originated at the apex of the Perch again, and Shiv was on it in a second. Instead of using Outside Context Problem, he approached the Animancy mana in a rush of kinetic energy and extended a mess of Vitae toward it. He wasn’t sure how his Vitaemancy and Animancy would interact, but by this point, Shiv would have flung himself into a pool of Necromancy if it meant setting his entire prison ablaze.

To his surprise, he found his Vitaemancy utterly unaffected by the Animancy. Moreover, it felt like a shallow pool to him. Waters he could navigate. He took a chance and let his Vitaemancy dig deeper through the faint blue mana, and he felt several Animated Skill Infusions pass through him at once. His breath hitched as he realized he was rooting around the inside of several Animancers.

The ones that were trying to stop him from evolving.

Shiv’s rage exploded. He infused that anger into his Vitaemancy Skill and shredded his foes apart from within. They died one after another, none knowing how they went or why. By the end, the blue mana winked out, and Shiv found himself blissfully alone again. Alone in his Delve with another notification as a reward.

Initiating Encounter (4/5)

“Let’s see you assholes reach into me now—” A portion of Blackedge disappeared. A colossal entity shaped like a massive palm and dotted with countless eyes tore down Minhall Avenue, leading from the edge of the city to Starhawk’s Perch itself. “Motherfucker, not you again,” Shiv snarled.

But of course it was the damned Recollector. It hadn’t even shown up in its initial form—the shape it took possessing Confriga. Instead, it came forth like a natural disaster, and before Shiv could respond, its past selves scattered in different directions, ripping the town asunder.

Buildings were obliterated. People were vaporized. Shiv let out a cry of frustration as he spent half the force condensed by Maelstrom to accelerate himself.

This proved to be a mistake, as the uncontrolled blast that exploded out from him obliterated the middle of the town and turned Starhawk’s Perch into a spray of smoke and rubble. To make matters worse and final, one of the Recollectors plunged downward and shattered the very foundations of the town.

Blackedge cracked in three parts and began to fall from the sky. Shiv’s stomach went with the collapsing town.

Encounter Failed

Resetting Delve

Adjusting Legendary Skill…

Shiv found himself falling again and let out a growl of frustration. “Felling eldritch bullshit.”

Of all the enemies he'd faced, the Recollector stood among the worst. Sullain was far more powerful, but Shiv didn’t fight the Vicar alone. He had thousands of orcs helping him, and the Legendary Mage was an emotional and psychological ruin that practically helped Shiv win out of sheer foolishness.

Even now, Shiv didn’t know if he could give himself great odds against the Recollector in a direct fight. It had taken him, Adam, Uva, and a desperate plan with an Animancy bomb for them to win. But Shiv did have far more speed, durability, and strength than before. That, and the Recollector was connected to its past selves by a singular source of vitality as well.

“I changed my mind,” Shiv said as the first challenge triggered once more. “I think my odds are pretty good after all.”

He tore through the golem, the orc, and the Jealousy in quick succession right after. Then, before the Recollector arrived, he positioned himself in its path and spent time building up his speed, his strength, but most of all, his durability.

When the Outsider spawned, it noticed him immediately. A high and discordant cry lashed Shiv’s sanity as the Recollector slammed against him. The Deathless gritted his teeth as he felt the staggering might of the eldritch nightmare. His pillar groaned—it even bent a little. But it didn’t break. And soon it stopped curving as Shiv gathered even more Toughness within himself.

the Recollector screamed in confusion. Its screeches grew higher when Shiv spent most of his condensed might and launched his pillar forward into the Recollector’s face. A kinetic tsunami drove Shiv deep into the Recollector’s flesh. As it was a kilometer wide, he found himself embedded deep in its eldritch tissue. It tried to scream, but was interrupted by Shiv detonating himself inside it.

A pocket of absence expanded within the Recollector. Every last self it had lurched back in agony, and Shiv drew upon more force with his Maelstrom. Waves crashed into Shiv and peeled the inner flesh of the eldritch behemoth from its frame. With the Pillar of Orichalcum stuck inside its body, the Recollector’s couldn’t move either.

“Well,” Shiv said, licking his lips as a feeling of primal triumph took hold. “Somehow, I remembered you to be a lot ”

it screamed. It lashed against him with its power, but rather than its Chronomancy damaging his temporal shell directly, he grunted in discomfort as he felt himself take the blow with his Magical Resistance for the first time. It didn’t feel good; a bit like letting someone swing a hammer against his body. His soul felt bruised, but the Recollector’s Chronomancy didn’t take hold. Not immediately.

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This was how Shiv realized why most people with Magical Resistance flinched so much. It still sucked all kinds of shit to take a magical attack. It was just much more survivable, like finally wearing a layer of plate armor while someone swung a warhammer at your skull.

Before another explosion of golden mana could impact him, Shiv touched the Recollector and ripped the vitality out of its body, and it escaped the eldritch entity like clouds of hissing steam. One after another, its past selves flickered out of existence. It tried doing that mind-rending scream a few more times, but Shiv slammed his Maelstrom down on its head. Bits of its body were pulped as it was driven against Shiv’s pillar.

“No one does,” Shiv replied, wondering why the Delve rendered the Recollector’s personality so well while screwing up with most of the slaves and normal people. Probably a skill and memory thing. “But you didn’t care about the little people. And I don’t much care about you. I just wish I could have ripped you apart this easily when we first faced each other. More people could have lived.”

And that was the main reason why this Delve Quest took the shape that it did. Everywhere Shiv went, people died. It wasn’t always his fault. But he was never fully enough. And someone else always paid for that.

Shiv thought as the Recollector faded from existence and flowed into Shiv like a fading stream.

Encounter Complete (4/5)

Adjusting Legendary Skill…

Shiv felt his Magical Resistance rattle inside him. He let out a grunt of pain as it slowly began pushing its way out from his insides. “What the hells are you doing now, skill?”

He didn’t get the answer to that question, as a notification appeared.

Final Encounter Initiated

Shiv cast himself back in time as he felt his insides continue to change. He looked around, searching for his foe, but a shadow drew his attention skyward.

And there, up in the air, was someone he didn’t expect to see at all.

Hovering just above the central spire of Starhawk’s Perch, Shiv saw a perfect copy of himself glaring down at him. The mutilated remains of his clone’s Voidmantid armor hung from his body just like Shiv’s, barely protecting his modesty. The Deathless scoffed. “Really, System? We’re doing this shit—”

The clone spread his arms wide, and a wave of raw force exploded out from him. The top of the perch was ripped apart. The rest of the structure was crushed down to its foundations.

“Alright, let’s do this,” Shiv spat. He froze time and launched himself skyward—

Only to be tackled by a Vitae golem that started draining his vitality. Shiv cried out as a sudden weakness took hold of him. He grappled with the golem and tried to fling it off him. As he pulled, a kinetic tide slammed into the back of the golem—and was countered by a kinetic tide of its own.

The center of the town was flattered.

Encounter Failed

Resetting Delve

Adjusting Legendary Skill…

Shiv found himself falling again. He narrowed his eyes. “System. You’re kind of a cheap, cheating shit, you know that?”

It didn’t give him a reply.

Shiv ripped through the four challenges again and blasted up into the air to intercept his clone. This time, he had his own golem prepared beforehand and used it to intercept his clone’s. As the constructs battled, Shiv eyed his other self with a slight sneer. “So. How does it feel to be a clone?”

“How does it feel to have the smaller cock?” his clone asked in turn.

Shiv blinked. “It’s the same—” The clone vanished in a burst of Chronomancy. “—size. Godsdammit.” Then, he saw a blanket of pitch-black miasma spread across the town. This fucking asshole had all his skills. “Double godsdamm—”

Shiv felt his Chronomancy shudder, and he manifested his temporal shell. Time stopped, but he was still too slow to react. A jetstream of flames was left in his clone’s wake as he impacted Blackedge and unleashed all the force built up within his Maelstrom and his sheath.

A good third of the town was reduced to nothing but a crater. The clone launched himself back a second and repeated the act two more times. Shiv almost intercepted him by the end, but was stunned as the clone struck him with his Biomancy.

With a final resounding crack, the town shattered into pieces, and the Delve shuddered.

Encounter Failed

Resetting Delve

Adjusting Legendary Skill…

Shiv was falling. For a few seconds, he just let himself fall. And then, he decided to voice his frustration. “MOTHERFUC—”

Five tries followed. He tore through everyone up till his clone over and over again. Every time Shiv floated across from his evil twin, he made adjustments. He tried being aggressive—but that was useless on its own as he had no good counter to Creeping Void. It seemed that merely possessing the skill didn't let you see through that of someone else, and the moment he lost track of his clone was when he lost.

He adjusted by focusing on tracking his clone’s lifeforce. That helped—but then the clone began jumping to different points across his past and he got to the town first again.

Shiv tried running an offense. He laid down his own Creeping Void and attempted to kill his cloned self in a split second. He adjusted to Shiv by shifting across time and destroying random parts of the town.

Defeat after defeat followed. Not once did the clone directly engage Shiv. No. He did things Shiv might while running an offense. He chucked decoy corpses. He moved in one direction, shifted across time, and then moved in another. And then there was the problem of his Maelstrom.

Shiv didn’t have a counter for that. Not enough of a counter to protect all the people in the town, or even the town itself. For too long, he had been focused on directness and brutality. But that came at a cost. What he needed to deal with someone like him was overwhelming control. Or ridiculous precision.

Shiv thought.

He had good odds against Adam if he got close, but that was just the thing—Adam wouldn’t let him get close. Adam would hit him with a flood of Divination-guided Necromancy arrows from well over the horizon, and that would be that unless Shiv spent the whole time fleeing.

For once, Shiv wished he had gotten less destructive skills. That would’ve made this easier to manage.

Ten more attempts followed. Each one ended in abject failure. He just couldn’t keep himself pinned long enough. Turn eleven followed, and he didn’t even see himself. The clone just smashed into Blackedge from below and blew the town apart while one of his golems lured Shiv off.

And that thought triggered another change. Shiv let out a ragged cry as he fell from the sky. His Magical Resistance was ripped free of his insides, and it began to turn . It sank into Shiv’s muscles, his bones, his skin, and even into the kinetic energy around him. At the same time, his force waves collapsed into him—and stayed there. Instead of drawing force inside him, Shiv felt a building pressure thunder deep inside.

Initializing Unconfirmed Legendary Skill Evolution: Leviathan of the Shapeless Tides