337 Spoils of War! (1)
Under the tree, Ogwulf felt a sort of relief gush through him. The effect of RESET cascaded over the two individuals that made up his figure.
[The skill ‘Bringer of All’ has timed out. Separation will now begin…]
Promptly after, a sharp sensation cut through from the middle of his body and broke apart his temporary individuality, a faint glow washing over his body as soon, it tore into two beings with a bright light, their figures becoming two Null Lifeforms.
One was naturally Skullius, the other being the nameless Apostle.
Skullius couldn’t utter any words for a few seconds as he looked at himself, currently dazed at whether what he had just experienced was a dream or otherwise.
The sensation of merging with his Apostle. Becoming a singular individual that had the two’s combined traits…
In that state, it was as if he was in a dream while being high (not height).
Of course, the Penetrator couldn’t use this analogy but it was how he felt, him being unable to explain it fully.
“That…was….” he said while taking short pauses in between.
“AWESOME! Wait! What?! Who cares! Yes! Awesome! Why haven’t I been abusing my Nullmancer Class like this all this time?!” Skullius shouted, completely disregarding the fact that he was no longer imperceptible.
The Apostle beside him laid down with its paws laying flat, a blank look in its face as it looked at the jovially raving Penetrator.
Skullius calmed himself down after this initial joyful reaction, clearly thinking things through.
Even after thinking hard, the amazing beauty of this skill couldn’t be disputed.
The countless possibilities that he could unlock with it were immense!
‘It seems everything I can do and what the Apostle I merge with can do is all possible for the Bringer of All that’s created! Furthermore, the real power of this skill lies in the base skill used, which is powered up and split into many different skills at the very peak depending on what core I have!’ Skullius excitedly thought.
When he had become Ogwulf, Skullius had experienced many incredible things, above the obvious. One such thing was that he better understood the intricacies of his and his Apostle’s skills now.
All of the Penetrator and basic skills were now things he could use more appropriately with a greater understanding which was a boon.
The other thing was…
‘I can’t believe I have the ability to cheat such things so easily. The RESET…’ Skullius thought as his socket flames flared wildly.
The RESET was a flaw of the Limitless Body Null Demon Hound.
However, because Skullius and the Apostle were merged onto Ogwulf the Limitless, the RESET applied to him too but not as a flaw!
The intricacies that followed after this were still pretty unclear, but they made Skullius consider more about this threat that could somehow summon this BoneTender if his Apostle didn’t RESET.
Probably because the conditions that applied to the Hound didn’t apply to him, the RESET effect was morphed into something different for him.
And now, all of his cooldowns had been refreshed!
This was effectively cheating the system!
Skills that he hadn’t thought he would get to use anytime soon, like [Depths of the Core] were now open for him to use and better yet, if he used [Bringer of All] again in the next…. uh… 15 days, he could use the core manipulating skill again!
‘Hehe!’ Skullius thought while rubbing his armoured hands. ‘I won’t need to wait for three hours for [Flesh It Like You Mean It] too. This is too good!’
Indeed it was.
All this considered though, this skill wasn’t as overpowered as it seemed as there was a little nook that demanded Skullius to be beware.
In fact, it was the same benefit he had just discovered.
If he could attain the flaw of his Apostle while merged with it, then perhaps different flaws affected him differently. As he thought, the Hound probably had special conditions that couldn’t apply to him but… what about Red Rage and his flaw?
He could tell that not being able to kill innocents was something he would likely be bound to follow if he merged with the Pelvis-Boar-Man!
This, he had to be mindful of.
Lastly, on the same subject, Skullius had to consider the effect of the flaw on the Apostle itself.
The Penetrator stroked the large Hound’s furry head as it donned the [Pseudo Spirit Walker’s Hide].
“So that’s really how it works, huh? You lose everything you learned?” Skullius said to the Hound that stared at him without making any movement.
From its personality, to the new tricks it would have learned all the way from the last RESET, including skills, the Hound would lose them all as it turned into this seemingly mindless machine, ready to learn everything again after every impactful fight.
“That’s cruel….’ Skullius thought before his socket flames flashed. ‘I’ll figure out a way to remove that flaw. What’s the use of having some mindless bro that only responds to everything I order? It would be great if you could be a little rebellious like that bastard Red Rage had been.”
Red Rage who was hidden in the spatial storage quivered.
[Apostle ‘…’ approves of your words. 10 Favourability]
Skullius felt… delighted by this.
Good.
With that all done, Skullius set his flames to the next big thing he had earned.
His spatial storage ring lit up as in the next moment, it released… the Elimparidis Stone Staff!
The Penetrator wielded the staff in his armoured hand with glee.
How noice it was to have this construct which boosted mana by 10,000 with an Absolute Conversion!
This meant that the boost depended on the core colour of the individual. Unlike the mana band that Skullius had bought from Frock, this staff could give the user 10,000 units of mana that correlated to the refinement of their own mana!
Of course Skullius was yet to appreciate this change as his core was still merely white but he would in time.
“Heh… Gambling your life does make my bones throb in excitement. No wonder Tulnas and Silrat are so obsessed with it!” Skullius said.
This was his thought process, his thoughts going back to when he had asked Tulnas about this subject of gambling.
It sure had returns, if it worked.
The Elimparidis Staff gave a wide range of effects to the user along with some incredible skills, all of which had been identified by Skullius when he had been in his Ogwulf form.
One lay in the white gem atop the staff, reflecting the vague image of a world within and at this moment, the only who knew the truth about this was Skullius. That truth being that this reflected image was actually a mini-world stored within the gem!
He didn’t know the specifics yet as he had to actually explore it first but this was such a crazy concept!
The Penetrator summoned Red Rage from his ring, the Pelvis-Boar-Man looking a bit disgruntled as he glared at his master.
Skullius ignored this and gave a strict instruction.
“When I disappear, collect the staff into your ring. You have your weird Null Life powers so you can tell when I want to come out, right?”
The Pelvis-Boar-Man slowly nodded to which Skullius gave him a pat on the head.
“See you in a few minutes,” Skullius said as he willed himself into the white gem, his figure vanishing as with the flickering of his sockets, he appeared somewhere entirely new!