“Most of my enemies would be Gods now, so the difference in Elemental Masteries will become a big problem if I don’t do anything about them.”
Stats could be increased with ranks.
Demigods would do this, but their Elemental Masteries were lacking compared to Gods, who had Stats and Elemental Masteries.
Just because Neo could hit harder than Stage-2 Gods didn’t mean he should ignore his Elemental Masteries.
He wanted to make his foundation as firm as possible.
Or else it would come back to bite him in the future when he fought even stronger enemies.
“Are you worried about your elemental masteries?” Zera’s voice rang from behind.
He turned around and noticed her walking towards him.
“You should rest. Why are you here?”
“It’s boring to do nothing.”
She stood before him.
Her injuries had healed somewhat. Her hand had been reattached firmly, and the hole in her stomach was closing slowly.
“Want my help?” she asked.
“It’s okay,” Neo replied. He needed to create his own World before he could start pushing his elemental masteries higher.
“You know from Savant we need the help of the World to increase our masteries?” she asked. “Tartarus doesn’t do that. That’s why everyone here is only peak Expert unless they came from the outside.”
“That’s why I didn’t see many Gods among the Grand Expedition,” Neo commented.
He looked at Zera with a complicated expression.
For the inhabitants of Tartarus, they couldn’t go beyond Expert as the World didn’t help them.
The people who came from outside were in a similar position. Tartarus cut all communication from outside, and they couldn’t receive their World’s help to go beyond Savant.
This problem was not lethal for Awakeners/Demigods.
They could rank up their Traits.
But Gods needed to increase their Elemental Masteries to rank up.
In other words, Zera had been a Stage-3 God when she arrived in this world.
Had she been somewhere else, she might’ve reached higher stages.
“You don’t have that problem, do you?” Zera asked him.
“….?”
“You gave a connection to Elizabeth. That’s something only a World can do.”
She stepped closer, looking at him with a mischievous smile.
Suddenly, the world around them warped.
‘Shit! This is a Sanctuary!’
Neo became alert.
Each Sanctuary was unique and was a subdimension of its own.
In other words, Zera had just kidnapped him.
“Are you thinking of fighting—”
“No, it’s nothing like that,” she said. “I deployed the Sanctuary to make sure Tartarus couldn’t hear us.”
Neo nodded. The World could hear them since they were near its Core. Nonetheless, he didn’t drop his guard.
“Why did you pull me here?”
“You are a World’s Avatar, right?”
“….?”
“Don’t act oblivious. Worlds can manifest a body and put their consciousness inside it. That’s how most Worlds interact with their inhabitants.”
Neo frowned.
She didn’t know about Heavenbreakers?
Or maybe she knew, but meeting a Heavenbreaker was so rare that she believed Neo was an Avatar as it was more plausible?
“Maybe I am, maybe I’m not. What’s that got to do with you deploying your Sanctuary?”
“You don’t need to act. You being a World’s Avatar explains how you didn’t realize Tartarus wasn’t allowing us to absorb its energy. Because you had your own power source, and you never bothered to absorb Tartarus’ energy.”
“As I asked before, why does that matter?”
Zera stared at Neo silently.
Despite her carefree smile, he could tell countless thoughts were moving inside her head.
She was planning something. The fact that she didn’t react upon seeing Elizabeth—the twin sister of Julie—didn’t bode well either.
He would’ve escaped with Elizabeth long ago. But he hadn’t sensed even a bit of malicious intent from Zera.
“I just wanted to know why people from other worlds came here and wanted to take down Tartarus. It makes sense if your goal is to devour Tartarus and increase your strength.”
What….?
Neo was stunned when he heard Worlds could be devoured to grow stronger.
In hindsight, it made sense. He had not thought about it as it was too outlandish of a theory to even come up with.
The most he could’ve thought of was devouring Sacred Treasures.
“If you are a World, you can increase your Elemental Masteries yourself. I’ll help you with that.”
“….?”
Zera spread her hands as if showing him the World around her.
“A World’s support will help us a lot against Tartarus. You must be quite a weak World if your masteries aren’t Supreme, let alone beyond it, but that can change with a little bit of training.”
Neo remained quiet.
He knew how to increase his masteries.
But the Savant rank and Supreme rank were still confusing for him.
If a Stage-3 God like Zera explained about those ranks, he would have an easier time comprehending it.
“Let’s start right now. We don’t have time to waste,” Zera said.
She raised five fingers.
“The masteries most people know are Apprentice, Adept, Expert, Savant, Supreme. If you go beyond Supreme, you become the God of that element.
“Now, my question: what do you think makes Gods different from Awakeners?” she questioned.
“Their [World]?” he guessed.
“Correct. Each God has a World that is created with their understanding of their Element.
“Simply put, we, the Gods, copy the actual Worlds and try to create our World using our Elements.
“To do that, we need to reach Supreme Mastery first.”
She curled her fingers and kept only one finger up.
“Apprentice mastery and Adept mastery are collectively responsible for [Comprehension].
“Awakeners at those masteries increase their understanding of the elements and learn how they work.”
Then, she raised another finger.
“Expert Mastery is where you apply your own [Interpretation] to the element.
“A Water that drowns, a Fire that lights the way. These are Concepts one can learn.
“By applying your personal interpretation of the element to the knowledge of the element you’ve learned, you create Concepts.
“This is why Expert mastery stage is called [Interpretation].”
Lastly, she raised her third finger.
“Savant Mastery and Supreme Mastery are the stage of [Implementation].
“Those at these masteries learn to manifest their Interpretation and form a World with it.
“The Worlds help you at these stages. Think of it as the World giving you training wheels to help you learn to ride a bicycle,” she said.
Neo noticed something in her words.
“Training wheels? You know what they are?”
Zera stared at him as if wondering why he was asking such an obvious question.
It took her a moment to realize she had forgotten something important to tell Neo.
“I’m from Earth too.”
“You… what?”
Neo had a weird expression on his face.
Maybe he was thinking too much, but why was everyone from Earth a heavenly genius?
No matter when Zera was born, she couldn’t be older than 3000 years.
She reached Stage-3 in those few years. It was fast, considering most awakeners on Earth had no one to guide them which slowed their progress as they had to learn everything by themselves.
“I think you are misunderstanding something, Neo. I’m ol… long-lived,” she said, correcting her words just as she was about to call herself old. “I’m a Witch.
“I’ve been reincarnating since long before the Apocalypse came to Earth, and I had powers since as long as I can remember.
“This is why I reached Stage-3 in my current life so quickly.”