On to a new mission

"How about this one?" Hera gave flint another arrow, this one was supposed to turn into lightning when fired.

Flint looked it over a few times, "It's close, but not quite there. Try to shoot it."

Hera took the arrow and placed into the notch in the center of Robin's body.

'Thank you, Empress. Now let's make that pole longer, shall we?' Robin, the bowblade, said.

He was an elegant bow made of something called Azure Oak. Because of that, his entire form had a deep blue hue, and the fibers shifted to a vibrant teal. The bow itself was almost split into two pieces that mirrored each other. Starting from the center, where the arrow was located, the wood curved back for a few centimeters before meeting a series of black metal sheets sculpted to create a pattern of large leaves all the way to the tip. Those metal leaves also had bladed edges that could be used to attack, even if the weapon didn't have any skills to improve those strikes. At the very tip was a golden string attached to the opposite end. However, that color would shift if Robin used a skill called [Arcane Barrage] to fire magically created arrows. In those cases, the golden string would emanate a greenish-brow color as the magic of the rest of the wood passed through it.

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Robin - Bowblade - Arcane

Cerulean House

Attribute Scaling:

Empress Attributes: 852

Intelligence X 20.5, Agility X 18, Luck X 25,

Strength X 3, Intelligence X 3, Charisma X 3

Active Skills:

Seal of Mystic Resonance

The blades on the tips of the bow create spectral arrows allowing the wielder to fire an additional volley. These arrows seek out the weakest points in the enemy's defenses, ignoring 25% of their resistances, but are only 50% as strong as arrows fired by the actual bow.

Duration: 1 minute.

Cooldown: 20 minutes.

Passive Skills:

Arcane Barrage

Robin can fire magic arrows that can be more powerful the more mana is used to fire them.

Ethereal Resistance

Grants resistance to magical attacks and effects, reducing incoming magical damage by 20%.

Arcane Battery

Robin can store mana to use as part of his attacks.

Current Mana stored 3 000 000/3 000 000

Cerulean Marquessate Skill

Commanding Position:

Members of the Cerulean Marquessate are the generals of battles and leaders of armies.

Their mere presence can increase the scaling of their allies by 2% for each member of the Cerulean Marquessate within 30 meters

In addition, when a member of this marquessate gives an order, those who are following said order to gain a bonus 10% to their scaling while following said order. Once the order is completed, the bonus decays over the next 10 seconds.

Only one of said effects can be active at a time.

If a court member received this benefit, it cannot receive it again for 1 hour.

Familiarity 10%

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The bowblade fired the arrow at a tree about 50 meters away. Lightning crackled around the projectile before it hit the back of another arrow. The third one in a line. Robin hit the exact same spot four times in a row. Each arrow being embedded at the back of the previous one. However, a few moments after this last attack, the horizontal totem pole that was being created collapsed, the arrows falling into the ground.

"See? It can deal elemental damage, but not turn into a bolt of lightning. There wasn't enough of that mana in the making," the dwarven crafter explained.

"This is really hard," Hera huffed.

'The creation of arrows might be. But hitting them like I did is child's play,' Robin's voice was filled with a snarky pride.

The Empress rolled her eyes. Ever since she ordered the bowblade, she started learning how to make arrows. She could create a few basic ones out of wood, metal, or plastic. That last one was just for show since it was wildly inefficient to make. Not only it would be weaker than ones made of wood or metal, but it required almost 10 times more mana for a single projectile. However, the Empress realized one thing. She could use regular arrows in a dungeon without a problem. But outside of them, things changed. She would leave every arrow she created behind. Her options would be either find the arrow and retrieve it, or leave it to decompose. Sure, that could work with wood, but what about metal? She didn't want to leave a trail of arrows for people to follow, or hurt themselves by accident. The worst-case scenario was that one of the projectiles was in a good enough condition to be used again and another person used it to kill someone. And that wasn't something she wanted to have in her conscience. Hence why she was trying to make elemental arrows. Bolts that changed into pure forms of elements as they flew and dissipated after hitting their target.

Up until now, she has only managed to make three kinds of arrows. The first was fire, although she cheated. Instead of turning the arrow into flames, she made a small spell circle inside the projectile that would ignite and convert all the wood into elemental energy. The second one was ice, and it followed the exact same concept, but after igniting, she also added an order to flip the temperature and freeze the surrounding air. Lastly, was a mud arrow. That was a bit more complex. By starting with an arrow made out of dirt, she added water and let it change its shape. However, unlike the fire and ice ones, this wasn't exactly a prime example of offensive power. Hitting something with that arrow was like hitting something with a ball of mud, sure it could have some force behind the impact, but it lacked damage.

Flint made sure to explain that this wasn't how elemental arrows were made, but it was a step in the right direction. He also offered to reach out to some contacts and get a blueprint for the Ophidianite since he wasn't an expert in projectiles, but she refused for now. If she understood how to make something, it would be easier to tweak it.

Skyler got up and called the Harmony Guardians, "Let's go. The doorway will open in 10. We should stay by the entrance."

Hera quickly rushed to pick up the arrows she created before walking back. Flint could use one of his skills to break down those items into raw materials so they could use them again later.

"Did it work?" Neria asked.

"Not really, but I'm getting there," Hera smiled. As they approached the doorway, she turned around to the titled blades. All of which were walking along the group, "Sorry everyone. We have the whole set number thing. The sensors might give a bad reading if you are around."

They all nodded and returned to the legacy. Even Twiggy and Robin, the two blades walking along them, were sent back.

"How are they holding up with the changes in your court?" Vash asked.

"They are ok. Nimbus and Lurize are more used to that. Vulcan didn't have enough time to get to know them. Viper and Crimson are doing well, too. I guess it's because they are twins, but they don't open up to the others that much. Livy… Honestly, she makes me worried. I added Ember to the court at the same time I got her, and they were closer than I expected. They even said their goodbyes before I let Ember go. That was the first time this ever happened and I have mixed feelings about it."

"Wait… you court can do things you don't know about?" Roan asked.

Hera frowned and shook her head in a half yes and half no, "Sort of. I can hear everything they say to each other if I want to. But I can also give them their privacy. Which I do. Like, Daskka, Nimbus, DJ, and Chris had a prank war going on and I ended up caught in the crosshairs a couple of times because I didn't know what they were doing."

Roan blinked slowly, "You know, every time I think your legacy can't get any weirder, you one up it."

Hera shrugged, "I'm a former human who became a half snake and now is the matriarch of a pseudo lost civilization that is currently trying to grow by letting others change species. I gave up trying to be normal a while ago."

"When you put it like that…" Roan sighed.

"And how are the new court members feeling? Are they ok?" Neria asked.

Hera paused, "I don't know. Hang on," she put out her hands and called out to the new Duke Alabaster. Due to his position in the hierarchy, all the other court members seemed to lean into him for their troubles, "Shadow, can you come out?"

Appearing directly on top of her hands was the scythe. It had a long curved shaft made out of a metal with such a deep black color that it was impossible to see any of the details around the weapon. The blade was made out of something similar, hiding its shape completely. Looking at this court member was almost like looking at a glitched part of the world. Something that couldn't reflect light, or that was completely immune to the changes of color in its surroundings. The one thing that was different was by the connection between the blade and the shaft, there was a single transparent bead with a grey ferrofluid inside that moved as if it was inside a lava lamp.

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Shadow - Scythe - Stealth Affinity

Duke Alabaster

Attribute Scaling:

Empress Attributes: 852

Agility X 20.5, Endurance X 18, Luck X 18,

Strength X 3, Intelligence X 3, Charisma X 3

Active Skills:

Shadowstep Strike - Seal of Umbral Convergence

Teleport behind your target and deliver a strike from the shadows. This attack ignores 50% of the target's armor. After teleporting, Shadow leaves behind a 2m³ lingering shadow at the point of origin for 5 seconds. Allies standing inside the shadow gain increased critical hit damage.

Cooldown: (10 seconds) 3 minutes

Extra critical damage + 20%

Passive Skills:

Shadow Mastery

Grants a 20% increase in critical hit chance when attacking from stealth or while the target is affected by a debuff.

Cursed Edge:

Enemies struck by Shadow have a chance to be cursed, reducing their damage output by 15% for 10 seconds.

Alabaster Dukedom skill

Subtle Sabotage

Members of the Alabaster Dukedom are experts at hindering their target's movements. Each strike has a chance disrupt the target's mana, making it harder for it to cast any spells for 3 second.

When the target also has one of its skills sealed, the disruption increases to 1 minute.

Alabaster Heirloom

Whispering Ink:

Enemies struck by the Ink are marked with a shimmering glyph. Landing three successive attacks on a marked enemy deals bonus damage and temporarily disables one of their skills.

Bonus damage based on a 15% of the target second strongest attribute.

Skill disable duration: 7 seconds.

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'Is everything ok, Hera?' Shadow asked, realizing he was the only one out. His voice wasn't as deep as his imposing appearance showed, which somehow made his form even more intimidating.

"Yeah. I didn't call you because of a fight. Neria asked me a question, and I didn't know how to answer. How are you all doing? The new court members, I mean."

'Oh? I believe we are all doing well. But we are still getting used to everything. None of us had a mind before, you know. But thank you for letting us stay out of the legacy while you were sleeping. We were able to talk and start to figure some things out,' Shadow replied.

"I'm glad. Just be careful not to spook anyone again. I'm pretty sure not even a soundproof spell would be able to drown out Skyler's scream from last night," Hera chuckled.

"Hey!" Skyler protested as Shadow turned to her and lowered his blade.

'Once more, I'm sorry about the scare. It's already hard to see me under more general conditions. At night in the dark, I'm near invisible,' Shadow replied.

"He's saying sorry again," Hera explained.

"I'm fine with him. I don't want you talking about my scream," Skyler huffed.

"To be fair, even the guards showed up," Roan added.

"Shut up!" Skyler yelled again, gaining some stares from the other groups waiting for the doorway to appear. Luckily, that didn't take long. A few seconds later, the doorway behind them became active.

Hera thanked Shadow again and sent him away, while doing the same with Daskka before crossing to the Underground Babel. There was more movement than they expected on that path. Still, they avoided talking with anyone, since this was part of the rules. The less they knew about other missions, the better. About one hour later, they arrived in front of the doorway they would be crossing.

"Calypso Beach… You know, it's been a long time since I went to the beach for fun," Roan sighed.

"Me too," Neria nodded, getting odd stares from the rest of the group.

"What? The room I live in didn't have a beach. It was just rocks," the triton huffed.

They continued talking, reminiscing about the times where they could stop the smell the flowers while they waited for the room the be unlocked once again.