Chapter 87

Back with Stone, who still sat in the middle of the battlefield, looking over his journal and tablets. Jarka waited for orders, it was in her nature to be obedient and Stone with Lucifer had saved her life. Dafur was still unconscious, Baelgin, the second Stone-Breaker was gone…

He ignored the loud battle with great self-repression, next to Lucifer, who tried, though unsuccessful, to gain his attention.

<Race: Greater Mana Crystal

At least, your evolution didn't hurt me the same as your friend who is suffering from Stockholm syndrome... Still, deciphering this insanity was a pain in my proverbial ass! So be Me-damn happy I did this for you, you tool!

Apparently, you are the natural evolution of the Mana Crystal race. You are bigger, more cohesive and your natural attunement to mana strengthens by a great amount.

Also… Hehe… You can now be considered as a mid-tier mana crystal. And you are surrounded by greedy Dwarfs and Goblins… *menacing cackle*

Perks:

50% faster learning of mana-based expertises

2x faster mana regeneration and larger mana pool

Due to Refined Mana coursing through your body during evolution, mana refinement became 2x faster and your pool had expanded 2x times larger.

You can naturally feel the ambient mana to great extent.

You can use the Monster perception sphere as your natural sense.

Talent: Refraction

Ailments:

You can be sent to Berserk through outward exposure to refined mana, including your own expertises fueled by refined mana.

Due to being cursed during your evolution from Mother Fire Elemental, you cannot be attuned to any Natural Element (fire, air, water, earth) and their combination. Permanently.

The rest is not possible to decipher by me. ME! The Greatest system in existence!

Sub-Race: Magical Calcite Android

You are weird, but, at least, I can now put you in a category… Still, it does not make sense! What and how have you done it?!

You have built yourself as an Android, aka a sapient, artificial, anorganic being.

Strength and dexterity unlocked! (base 30 strength, 30 dexterity)

Lifeforce: Hardness x 150 + strength

Strength: +5 per level due to growth (Monster perk)

As a rock-based idiot, dexterity is heavily impeded: Dexterity x 0.5>

He also noticed that he could evolve his expertises.

<Hi! You again, huh?> The cheery, loud, voice returned, annoying Stone. <Hurry up! My break starts soon… Hey! HEY! ERONOS! DON'T! Ehm… Sorry, about that.>

"You are too loud," Stone plainly stated.

<Don't care.> Universum snubbed him.

"Evolve everything." Stone ordered, mentally shrugging. It was not worth arguing with the Universum after all. It would just get louder.

<You are learning. Good>

His journal began to flash in new messages;

<Mana Carving and Mana Point resonates, but are missing: Manakinesis L100, Unit's Level 75 to evolve to Mana @!Hidden!@.>

<Requirements fulfilled! Technique: Ambient Mana Refinement evolved to @#!Q*# AAAAAAAAAAaaaaa!>

"Evolve my skills!" Stone repeated and waited but the Universum did not respond. "Uni? Hey! Do it!"

<Holy fucking crap, that hurt! This… This… > the Universum voice cracked. <ARCHI! CONJURI! LOOK!>

<What?> The deep voice of Architect, prime god of Structures and Laws and prime god of Magic, Conjurarum's soft voice sounded in Stone's head in unison.

<Look! What the fuck is that?!> The Universum system yelled in distress, still in pain as he was unable to decipher the strange language from Stone's core.

<Oh… Nothing you have to care about. Architect?> Conjurarum cheerily replied.

<Yes. It's time.>Architect did something incomprehensible and all of the existence unnoticeably stopped for a fraction of a second.

Stone's tablets flickered and disappeared. He tried again and again to open them, but there was no reply.

"Stone!" Lucifer yelled once more, but Stone completely ignored him, panicking over his missing tablets.

The Devilish Sorcerer exasperatedly sighed, slowly sitting up. He slapped Stone with his stump of arm, in which he took quite a good measure of pleasure. This was something he wanted to do a long time ago.

"What?" Stone finally registered Lucifer.

"Look around!"

Stone examined the battlefield, at least as far as he could with his perception sphere and shrugged, "what? Plenty of meatbags and experience packs," he stated. "Ah! Thanks, Luci!" He realized that he could level up some more.

"What? Why are you thanking me?" Lucifer was confused. It took a moment to realize what the idiot was planning.

"Stone! No!" Lucifer really did not want to deal with this.

Stone prepared himself and tried to cast a spell, but nothing happened. "Luci! I cannot cast spells!"

Lucifer heaved in relief. Right now, they were not in a position to fight.

Meanwhile, Harkon was still fighting the Ogre. Both of them had to limit themselves, so there was no risk of collapsing the mountain on their armies. Still, it was a savage battle, powerful blows made scars on the ground and even damaged the enchanted keeps. Bolts, spears, spells and skills were flying from both sides above Stone, trying to destroy the ramparts. Some of the attacks were sent at Stone and his group, from both sides, but Harkon always deflected them with a silvery bolt.

Lucifer could not tell who was winning, the Ogre or the powerful Dwarf, he only knew that if they did not move from their entrenched position, they would die.

"Stone, we need to go."

"But I want to level up!"

"Ahhh! No… Look, you are in no position to fight. This is a battlefield with powerful beings!"

"But…"

"This again?"

"Fiiiiine… Where to?"

"Away from here and then we need to find Lich Hen'Tai, otherwise I will die." Lucifer put all hope into the Lich. Fortunately for him, Stone was Stone. The peb… actually, Golem…

"Android."

"Huh?"

"Android, not a golem."

"... how do you know what I am thinking?"

"I always could."

"..."

"You just did not care, didn't you?"

"No. You are my friend, teacher… Hmm… There was a word for it… Parent! You are my parent."

"... oh god, no…" Bloody tears streamed from Lucifer's eyeholes.

"Luci. How can I walk?"

Lucifer sent him pictures through their unique link of different people walking, running, sprinting… Everything he could remember.

Stone walked around soon. Even jumped a few times, but that felt too weird for him. Still, even he had to acknowledge that a 'proper' body was good.

<Sorry about that. The update took longer for you… strange… What happened? Oh! There are quite a few changes…> The Universum cackled.

Stone got a bad feeling. Very, very bad feeling.

He conjured the tablets. Every explanation, status screen, lists...

Name: Stone

Title: Guardian of Talc Anthill

Race: Augmented Calcite Android

Tier: 2

Level: 50

Exp: 60.48%

Hardness: 3

Lifeforce: 480 / 480

Mana: 1340 / 1340 MReg: 100 / sec

Refined mana: 335 / 278 MRef: 0.63 / sec

Strength: 30

Dexterity: 15

Intelligence: 67

Talents: Ageless, Lucifer {wielder}, Refractor

Resistances: Heat T1L5, Electrical T1L3, Poison T2L10, Acid T2L10, Curse T1L1

Expertise: Mana Point T2L10, Ambient Mana Generation T3L1, Mana Carving T2L10, Healing Bath for minerals T1L7, Ants' Souls T1L15, Mana Shield T1L33, Mana Missile T1L27, Mana Expulsion T1L15, Meditation T1L50, Weak Manakinesis T1L5, Tracking T1L1

And except the status screen, with adjacent lists, everything else was gone!

A menacingly hissing acidic ball hit Stone squarely into his chest, interrupting his child-like weeping. Lucifer watched it, horrified and fearing the worst. He still needed the pebble; their connection through souls was still there and he still needed to drain the refined mana.

<Mana Shield levelled up to T1L33>