Seraph looked at the 82nd failed artificy battery, getting the applied battery was easy, but copying was practically impossible.
Though the sunk cost fallicy was lobbying against it, Seraph had to stop with the artificy, it was becoming an extremely innefficient avenue of time investment.
Though he would keep his empyrean sparks, which had gotten a bit of an upgrade over the last month.
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Name; Seraph.
Strength; C-625. Endurance; D-543. Dexterity; C-633. Agility; C-646. Magic; C-612.
Skill(s);
Magic; [Rift strike], [Shattered rift]
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"System, 'Shattered rift'? What is this?" Seraph asked with confusion.
{
Seraph still didn't know what
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[Shattered rift]:
-Chant-
Crack, crack, hear the bones creak, the flesh twist, as space collapses and the world cries out in agony. The cracks show, and the veil lifts; [Shattered rift]
-Strong (long) chant-
The cracks show, the veil lifts. Until dawn, the stars show. Until twilight, the red sun shines. Time twists, as the clock reverses. Reality becomes illusion, as flesh is turned inside out. The lands cry out in agony, but none answer; [Shattered rift].
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Seraph silently sighed in annoyance, both versions of the chant were weird, and he didn't even know there could be more than one chant for something! "System, why does [Shattered rift] have a second chant while [Rift strike] does not?"
[[Rift strike] does have a strong chant, and it is caused by
"What the hell even is
[Redacted]
Looking at the response from the system, he sighed 'Examine; [Rift strike]'
===
[Rift strike];
-Chant-
To break space-time; [Rift strike]
-Strong chant-
Pierce the veil, defy space-time, a strike to subjugate the abyss; [Rift strike]
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Seraph got a bit irritated, but didn't go on a rambling spree to discern the truth. He was in public, he forced himself to take an actual break. No matter how relieving the feeling of progress was, how entertaining it was to watch the numbers go up.
His body still needed to rest, even his mind needed actual rest. The part of him that wanted to re-enter the dungeon and test these new spells was screaming, trying to claw away at his patience and will. While the part of his mind that was at the forefront, which was surpressing it's own wishes to pursue efficiency, was doing it's best to not get twisted enough, that the lock that is it, opens.
But to be totally honest, trying out the new things brought about by
Fun fact; an artificy battery's materials weren't actually that expensive, and if he makes a few every time he returns to the surface, he'd still have a lot of money left.
So his current savings was about half-a-million valis, which would do quite well for some gloves, wrist guards, and leather armor.
Seraph squated as he pulled out a pair of wrist guards from one of the dustier shelves, it was of good material for level ones, Only costing 120000 valis. He took it with the two other items he had chosen.
"That'll be a total of 535000 valis, do you want to pay in installments or in full?"
Seraph sighed, and put about 12 bags filled with valis on the table "In full."
The clerk looked at the money, then at Seraph "You do know you can go to the guild and get guild-notes, right?"
'Wait, I can just carry paper instead of coin? I'll investigate that later.' "No, but I'll make sure to look into it. It is sooooo annoying to carry so many damn bags everywhere."
"Good," The clerk said as he started to sift through all the valis "Yes, this enough, would you like to pay extra to donate to Yuno's orphanage?"
"No." Seraph said while picking up his new stuff, leaving in absolute silence.
It was honestly always so annoying when someone asks you if you want to pay more for some random charity, even if Seraph was a cold and uncaring monster that didn't care for children. Why were they so irratatingly placed, even normal people wouldn't like it if they were peer pressured into putting money into a charity they didn't know anything about. Who knows if Yuno's orphanage tortured orphans as to satisfy certain donors.
Unlikely, but still possible!
Seraph entered an alleyway, and enjoyed a quiet nap. After which he put on his new property over his other-worldly clothes, which were somehow still in perfectly good condition.
Seraph wasn't really sure what to do now, he didn't take many breaks previously, and the things he did as recreation were reckless at best, and illegal at worst. In accordence with how he relaxed before he became an enlightened being.
But the most reasonable thing he could think of was verbal torture, basically; Messing with someone.
But who could he mess without suffering any repercussions?; That girl... Sestia was it? The loli with the weird, physics defying, blue string.
But where was she?; In some abandoned church.
But; Where was that ruined building?
The guild gave the answer after only a bit of questioning, after he explained why he never arrived for any of the councling sessions. His answer being "I had gained a bit of enlightenment, and I was in the middle of manifesting a skill. You wish for me to abandon a chance at a skill just so you can play pretend?" That shut them up.
After he was told where the building was, they tried to tell Seraph to go to the counciling, but he was already gone.
He had a mission, one called mental relief. One by the means of bullying someone in the body of a small child.
"Knock knock." He said in front of the wretched door, which was quickly opened. Seraph frowned slightly, this place didn't have the classic jokes of the council instilled into the populace.
The loli-con pandering manifested as a 'God' looked at the cloaked figure, and instantly jolted back. The image of a cloaked figure about 1.5 times your size will do that.
Seraph silently regretted that his parents didn't do the genetic upgrade while he was still in the womb, if they had done that, then he may have been a 6'1 specimen of a man.
But sadly he was 5'8.
"What is it? Suffering from malnutrition? Is that why you're so small?"
After the wannebe lover of a rabbit returned to her senses, she found "Why are you here?"
"To mess with you," He said as he made himself at home on the coach "Don't you have a job?"
Veins quickly appeared on the penniless god's forehead "That's not the point, what makes you think you can just enter my home?"
"This is a home? I thought this was a dump, with you being here and all." Seraph just couldn't understand, how could a homeless person have a home. Or... Was she not homeless?
This was a great scientific discovery, the loli wasn't homeless! Seraph couldn't help but display his shock, on his hidden face.
The lo- Hestia, that was her name! Hestia fumed with anger, and was about to ready her fist. But choose to back down, as crescent made an apperance, stopping right at her neck "No, no, no, Hestia. Do you not understand? Gods are practically mortals here, except if they have one of the cheats that they can keep."
He retrieved his sword, which he would soon replace, it was slightly banged up.
"I'm still a god!" The loli said, somehow not scared in the slightest.
Seraph sighed "A god that can crush the dungeon without a sweat?"
"...No, I can't do that. But no other god can do that!"
"Do you really think you're all gods?"
"...What do you mean?"
"A god is an almighty being that has ascended, god's can be born from the void, be born from another god, or a mortal can become a god. At least that's the usual spiel."
"'Usual spiel'?"
"Basically, a god would be able to erase the dungeon, easy. A god would never need to be scared of anything except other gods, except if you think about norse mythology with the gigantomachy and greek with the titanomachy.
-Basically, I don't consider you a god, I consider you a spirit that is close to the laws of the world." Seraph said, of course you could replace 'Laws of the world' with the 'Great dao', but the former is more easily understood by the masses.
Hestia pouted and choose not to talk to the cloaked figure, he didn't even consider her a god! As such she closed the door and went back to relaxing.
Meanwhile Seraph was brainstorming, this didn't relieve the stress in the slightest 'Is it because the stress holder didn't do it?' The only idea he could come up with was letting the other guy beat up some random thug.
He left without notifying the godess on holiday, and quickly started to walk through dark alleys, already feeling a slight pull in his chest.
After a short while, he found your average thug, who also spotted him. The thug quickly took out a dagger and said "Your money or your life!"
Seraph thought for a moment if this was really a good desicion, but then shrugged it off, it was the best Idea he had at the moment.
His falna shifted, its form changing, but it's attributes not changing.
Seraph smiled slightly as words spieled out of his mouth "While you were robbing people, I was studying the blade. While you were concerned about a bad rash, I was studying the blade,"
"How the hell do you know about that!?" The thug yelled as he ran in closer to Seraph.
"While you were crying at the death of your first love, I was studying the blade;" A small laugh was released at how embarassing this was "[*Teleports behind you*]"
Seraph vanished, and appeared behind the thug. Where he quickly put his right foot forwards, and gave a good jab against the back of the head.
Which was then quickly followed with a step of the left foot bundled with a left hook, again at the back of the thug's neck.
And then as a finale, he choose to show off a bit.
He shifted his upper body to the right and then pivoted of the right foot, having the left leg in the air with it's knee tilted at a 90 degree angle. The moment he was back to facing the thug, he switched the leg he was standing on with a jump, and mid jump his right leg was put forwards and shift diagonally while contracted, and then snapped open with the feet going against the thug's head.
[The seed is planted]
Seraph laughed lightly but crazily, as the thug showed off his caved in skull while falling to the ground "That feels... So much better!"
He looked around for a moment and remembered 'The status thing!'
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Name; *Null*
Strength; C-625. Endurance; D-543. Dexterity; C-633. Agility; C-646. Magic; C-612.
Skill(s);
Magic; [*Teleports behind you*], [No chance in hell!]
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Martial master,
Increase power, speed, and comprehension of all martial arts.
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"Well, that's a rap." He said as his Falna returned to normal. He sighed slightly, that final attack was far to innefficient. He could've just did a single punch with actual force behind it against the nape, specifically between the 4th and 5th lumbar vertabre and used far less energy.
But he didn't regret it too much, the stress that had built up was lost with that tornado roundhouse kick.
Seraph no longer found any need for relaxation and placated the part of him that wanted to test out his new spell.