[Go for it; you still won’t get my glorious double XP if you do that.]
Cynrik’s face went blank as he heard this, and his body went limp in defeat, but he quickly recovered and sat up straight once again. His eyes fell on the two Sanford siblings. At this moment, both of them were aimlessly looking off into the distance with unfocused eyes, a clear sign that they were utterly engrossed in their Status windows.
“Remember you two, once you increase your Class, dump all remaining XP into your Main Level; after that, I want you both to evenly distribute any stat points into your neglected “Non-distribution” stats. Try to keep everything close to each other numerically.”
Gabby and Benny heard Cynrik’s instructions, which broke their strange state, and nodded obediently. Seeing this, both Cynrik and Brance smiled; however, Cynrik’s face quickly dropped as he turned to face his brother.
[While they are at it, we need to talk about our plan, Tobs pull us both into my SOC.]
There was no audible response from Tobs, but a second later, both brothers closed their eyes instinctively as they felt a sudden gravitational pull from within, dragging them into Cynrik’s Sea of Consciousness.
When they opened their eyes, the two were greeted by a hellacious landscape filled with fire and brimstone; instead of a calm, blue sky, the sky in Cynrik’s SOC was pure darkness as shadows flicked around aimlessly.
Cynrik looked around and eventually spotted Brance, not far away, examining a massive, 3-meter long Greatsword, stabbed into the ground.
“I know you have a lot of questions, but right now, I need you to stay quiet. Although there is a slight time dilation in the SOC, there just isn’t enough time for me to answer them.”
Brance straightened his back and crossed his arms as Cynrik spoke, nodding that he understood. The tone his brother was using was a dead giveaway, just how serious things were.
“Let me preface this conversation with, nothing I say can be spoken outside the SOC. That includes the mind link; here, we are completely isolated from the outside world, including the Deities’ prying eyes.”
Cynrik, too, crossed his arms while throwing a passing glance at the remains of Ragnar’s weapon.
“We were duped. From the time we first stepped foot in the Hall of Gods, we were unknowingly thrown into a bullshit dick-measuring contest between every god in creation. The instant we accepted their “blessings,” we became puppets of Odin and Yahweh. I had told you something felt off about me before, and I now know it to be entirely accurate. These blessings slowly corrode our psyche and soul, changing our emotions and mindsets to those of the Deity we received them from.”
Cynrik kicked the ground and spat lightly before continuing.
“When I left the party, I was under the mental corrosion and control of one such example. This being, who I later found out was actually a soul fragment of the Great Viking King, Ragnar Lodbrok, triggered a quest, where the penalty of losing was the destruction of my soul and his taking over my body.”
“By either sheer luck or my own stupidly overpowered and broken abilities and ideas, I was able to come out victorious…but there’s more to it than that. Ragnar proceeded to leak small bits of info to me under a severe amount of restrictions and painted a picture of just how fucked we are right now. One phrase stood out, Legacy Strife.”
The instant Cynrik uttered those words, his SOC shook violently as an earthquake occurred, causing tiny fissures to tear open on the surface and cracks to appear in the sky. The changes startled Brance to no end. While Cynrik just looked around without concern. He had already experienced this once before, so he figured it would happen again.
“Tobs, please heal the damage for me.”
With Cynrik’s command, Tobs appeared beside him and waved her hands, causing all the damage to fuse back together instantly.
“Anyway, moving forward, I’ll just call it the LS from now on. With the restrictions placed on Ragnar, he was unable to give me in-depth information about what exactly it was, but he vaguely danced around the topic.”
Walking over to Tobs and giving her head pats like he would Gabby, Cynrik started filling Brance in on everything that had gone on during and after his battle.
Meanwhile, outside the SOC, Gabby and Benny sat quietly and devoted themselves to building up their stats. To say they had undergone Earthshaking changes would be an understatement.
Advancing through to Level 20 of the Prestige system, they had capped all their stats at 100. However, this wasn’t all; their Evolution to Tier-1 increased their Distribution stats by 20%.
This boost was more significant for Gabby since three of her stats were raised to 120, leaving Benny only two. Soon, the two siblings did as they were told and dumped over 2,000,000 XP from their pool into their Classes, adding 20 additional Stat and Skill points to their panels.
One thing that had Gabby on the edge of bursting out in loud hideous cackles was that her Class, Archer, had given her a Pseudo 4th Stat increase on her Distribution since it added to DEX and AGI. This meant that now, every time she leveled up, she would gain points in DEX, INT, MIND, and now AGI.
Scrolling through her profile, she stopped and remembered what Cynrik had just said, and the little girl began adding the rest of her XP into her Main Level, bringing her up to level 14 and only about a thousand XP from 15. Beside her, Benny, too, was raised up four levels. Just like that, Cynrik went from being tied for number one with Brance to being the lowest level in the party; Brance was in first at level 16, Gabby and Benny at 14, and Cynrik all the way at the bottom at a measly level 11.
The thought of being at a higher level than Cynrik caused Gabby to giggle; she had already figured out that by being alongside Brance and fighting without Cynrik leeching XP, she and Benny had soared past him.
Gabby shook her head and swiftly started allocating her 62 Stat points; when she was finished, she gave a short nod before pulling out a piece of paper and jotting everything down. Then, when Cynrik and Brance finished their meditation session, she would hand it over to them to get more candy and praise.
: Status :
: Gabriella Sanford (Gabby):
: Title – Perfect Foundation :
: Human Female:
: Age-10:
: Tier-1 :
: Primary Class – Archer : (+2 To DEX, AGI Distribution)
: Level: 14 : 129,426/130,526 :
: Essence Pool(XP): 0 :
: Archer: 20 – XP : CAP
: Distribution: 1.5 DEX, 1.5 INT, 1.5 MIND (NEW) 2 AGI : (+3.5 DEX)
: Mana Codex Tier: 1 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Mana Cycles: 1100 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Mana Circuit Tier: 1 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Gravity Resistance: 2g (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Body Tempering: Tier 1 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: STATS :
: HP 1600/1600 :
: Mana 965/965 :
: Stamina 800/800 :
: Stat Points- 5:
: Skill Points- 88 :
: Strength- 150 :
: Dexterity- 162 :
: Agility- 140 :
: Intelligence- 140 :
: Vitality- 140 :
: Mind- 150 :
: Killing Intent- 133 – 3.25 G :
: Affinity- :
:(SBG) Psychic-Tier 1 (Proficiency= 100%): :Expand:
Taking a note from Cynrik’s playbook, Gabby had kept five Stat points in reserve for use at a time when she would need a sudden boost. Then, looking over the sheet of paper with her data written on it and ensuring everything was correct, she looked over at Benny, who was just finishing up his own sheet, and swapped papers.
: Status :
: Benjamin Sanford (Benny):
: Title – Perfect Foundation :
: Human Male:
: Age-11:
: Tier-1 :
: Primary Class – Warrior : (+2 To STR, VIT Distribution)
: Level: 14 : 129,426/130,526 :
: Essence Pool(XP): 0 :
: Warrior: 20 – XP : CAP
: Distribution: 1.5 Str, 1.5 VIT : (+3.5 To STR,VIT)
: Mana Codex Tier: 1 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Mana Cycles: 1100 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Mana Circuit Tier: 1 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Gravity Resistance: 2g (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: Body Tempering: Tier 1 (Proficiency= 100.0%) :
: STATS :
: HP 1920/1920 :
: Mana 900/900 :
: Stamina 960/960 :
: Stat Points- 3 :
: Skill Points- 88 :
: Strength- 173 :
: Dexterity- 130 :
: Agility- 130 :
: Intelligence- 145 :
: Vitality- 156 :
: Mind- 110 :
: Killing Intent- 133 – 3.25 G :
: Affinity- :
:(BG) Water-Tier 1 (Proficiency= 100%): :Expand:
Gabby’s eyes grew to the size of dinner plates as she read over Benny’s profile. Although he only had two stats in his Distribution, he benefited from killing Kobolds wildly thanks to the massive rewards. The two Stats they had received the most of happened to be STR and VIT, the very same two Stats that Benny relied the most on.
Gabby’s overreaction caused an embarrassed smile to spread across his face, and he had to look away not to show the blush creeping upon his cheeks.
While the Sanford siblings were fraternizing, Cynrik and Brance opened their eyes and saw the blushing Benny nervously squirming in place and the stunned Gabby.
[Tsk, fucking Siscon, ima have to beat some sense into Benny later, I don’t want him turning into a full-on SIMP later in life.] Cynrik shook his head and clicked his tongue but was able to catch the hidden stress and nervousness on Brance’s face, so he decided to make a small joke.
Brance hadn’t taken the news about the Legacy Strife well at all. In fact, he could tell his younger brother was both furious and heartbroken. But unfortunately, there was nothing Cynrik could say. He could only give his brother the space needed and give Brance time to adjust.
Now that he was brought up to speed, Brance had even more reason to be worried about Cynrik’s mental state. After being told that the creatures they were fighting were, in fact, real, sentient beings, Brance was devastated that his older brother had to take on the burden of killing innocents alone. This news caused him to slowly shift his mentality away from the Lawful Good alignment and more to a Lawful Neutral, unknowingly.
CLAP
“OI YOU TwO, GIMMIE YOUR PAPERS, IT’S ALMOST TIME TO GO FIGHT!” Cynrik clapped loud enough to cause a scream from Gabby and even made Benny jump in fright.
-This series is exclusively published on WebNovel if you are reading it anywhere else…You Wrong Fam. PS Check out the Discord, https://discord.gg/dcxKNJEMwg
