The event lightened the mood of the meeting, though some were highly concerned about the actual safety of having the beasts around. After all, Cara had threatened to eat someone, and even Thor was large enough to accidentally crush someone to death.
Sure, he had Elites loving on him and rubbing his scales, but a casual collision with him would be like walking in front of a car.
Overlord Niall returned after a few minutes of socialization, smelling faintly of human blood, and motioned for Karl to join him.
Karl followed him to the edge of the green space and into one of the signature marble buildings that were all over the Capital, and realized that this one was actually familiar. It was identical to the Inquisition holding building in design, but not in interior decoration. It might serve the same purpose, but the upper level looked more like the lobby of an upscale hotel.
“Monarch, if you don’t mind a short chat.” Niall began, with a gesture to a door labelled [Conference Room C].
Karl followed him in and felt a spell activate as the door closed. Then Niall barred it with a steel beam, which made Karl laugh. The door was made of solid oak, but he could kick it clear across the lobby, so the bar wasn’t for either of them, just to keep nosy people out.
“First off, welcome back. It’s good to see you again, and quite the shock to see how you have advanced. But more pressing is not the known fact that you are a savant, but the fact that your entire group are now Royals. You have no idea how much of a stir it caused among the leadership when the Archbishop returned and casually informed everyone that your group were all now Royals. Of course, he’s so busy with other duties that he was most likely never informed that they were all Ascended a year ago. But for those of us with more time to be familiar with such things, it has raised plenty of questions. If there is some sort of technique to speed progression to that level, it is of national security level critical importance that we know. Your misadventures have raised more Royal Rank Elites this year than the rest of the nation, and nobody understands why.”
Karl took a moment to fully appreciate what the Inquisition’s top Assassin was saying. Overlord Niall had a point. There were so few Royals that they would normally all know each other. He was the outlier, as he didn’t really know anyone, and he was never around others. But now he had blown past that milestone and advanced to Monarch Rank, while the rest of his group was also progressing insanely quickly.
There was nothing in his skills that would explain that, and other than Dana, the others had been growing at a perfectly normal rate before they met with him. Could it be that he had some hidden skill to help his group grow? He could for his beasts, but that was linked to their space. It didn’t really apply to the rest of the group members.
“I think that it is more closely related to luck and the favour of the gods than any level of skill that I possess. The number of exceptional opportunities that we have been encountering is higher than most other Elites could claim in years of training. We have been in two separate opening events for Commander Rank dungeons and what might be a Demigod level trial in the last season alone.”
Niall shook his head. “The trials alone don’t explain it, unless the last one actually forced the advancement. But as I understand the reports, you were already exhibiting well beyond Royal Rank firepower before your Rank had officially advanced, according to the system.”
Karl thought about it for a few minutes in silence, then decided to share a small tidbit about his powers with the Inquisitor.
“I have a skill called [Skill Master] and I believe that it takes effect on my entire group, and not just the beasts I am bonded with. It lets them learn new skills more easily and improve the ones that they have. I suspect that the improvement in their skills might actually be driving their progress.
Most people advance as their skills improve, right? Well, with Skill Master, the skills can be advanced to a Rank over the user. It’s never happened to another group member that I know of, but it does work for the beasts. I have had skills at Monarch Rank for a while now, and that is a large part of my excess combat ability.” Niall took a chair off the stack by the wall and sat down at the large boardroom table.
“What you’re telling me is that there is a possibility that you will have an Overlord Ranked skill while you are still a Monarch?” He asked.
“Not a possibility, an almost certainty. How far through my progression will I manage it is the real question. It might be one of the beasts, and it may or may not be shared with me, but it will happen.” Karl agreed, taking a seat across from the Overlord. freewebnoveℓ.com
Niall took a small object from his storage bag, or perhaps his inventory. Karl couldn’t tell how active the man’s system was.
“Squeeze that for me. I want to test your raw physical strength.” He instructed.
Karl shrugged and picked up the resistance scale. It had a D shaped hand grip on one side and a scale needle on the other, so Karl just squeezed it and watched the needle smoothly spin in circles, three times around before the lever bottomed out.
Niall chuckled. “Well, that defeats the purpose. But it is an answer in its own way. Your strength isn’t on the human scale anymore, even for warrior classes.
Do you think that there is a way you could help a few of our promising recruits advance as well?
What I was thinking was to send them as apprentices to your group.”
“Did they do something to upset you? Sending children to accompany a group like mine is basically a death sentence. Heck, even our protection couldn’t hold up when Overlord Leafa and the Emperor got into an argument over her vacation plans.” Karl replied.
Niall stared at him.
“Come again? I know all those words, but I’m not sure that I understood what you were saying.”
“I’m sure the reports will make it back to you soon. The Overlord decided that she was overworked and decided to go on an unapproved vacation. It led to an exchange of blows with the Emperor of Newbon. Neither was seriously injured, but there was a lot of property damage.” Karl explained.
“That did not make it back to our reports, but I believe that I know the incident you mean. It simply wasn’t explained the same way, and was passed off as an anomaly related natural disaster.
It is actually less concerning to know that it was just a dispute between powerhouses. At least that way, it’s unlikely to happen again.”
Karl wasn’t sure he would go that far. Eventually Leafa would break free again, but trying to explain the whole situation would just lead to a never-ending set of questions he didn’t know the answers to, and probably someone wanting to study his weapons.
He was quite fond of his weapons.