Rise of the Devourer

Book 3: Chapter 51 — Ability Upgrades

Noah sat on the rocky floor, opening up the options of his abilities as he took everything in. He’d shot up in power rapidly, and it’d done wonders for his attributes. Especially after he switched his title back to Progenitor.

Astral Script:

Name: Noah Brown

Race: Draconian Humanoid

Rank: D

Title: [Progenitor]

Paths:

Wyrmblood Guardian (Legendary) - level 129

Runebody Arcanist (Legendary) - level 128

Attributes:

Power: 1631 [2038]

Agility: 1436 [1795]

Constitution: 1744 [2441]

Mystic: 1860 [2604]

Attribute points: 289

Skill Points: 4

Noah took the attributes in. His buffed attributes were above two thousand, especially his constitution and mystic, which had quickly risen to become his two primary attributes. Still, he at least tried to maintain a relatively balanced ratio between all his attributes.

Taking his free attributes, Noah put a hundred and eighty in agility, before putting the rest into power.

Power (Buffed): 2038 → 2175

Agility (Buffed): 1795 → 2020

Satisfied with that, Noah moved on to look at his abilities which had all reached level fifty.

[Wyrmblood (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 50]

[Arcane Step (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 50]

[Abyssal Fusion (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 50]

[Void Annihilation (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 50]

Unlike before, reaching the next rank up level didn’t automatically level up the abilities. From now on, he would have to use a skill point anytime he wanted to upgrade his abilities.

Extremely conveniently, he had exactly four skill points available right now, but more than one ability of his was close enough to level fifty that it would make perfect sense for Noah to wait a little bit and grind his ability levels, before spending his skill points.

He thought over it for a moment, going through his abilities one by one. There were a few abilities of his that had ranked up to advanced as well, and Noah pulled them up.

[Bloodwyrm Swarm (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 28]

[Arcane Specter (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 30]

[Abyssal Inferno (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 33]

Noah selected his bloodwyrm swarm ability, opening it’s description.

[Bloodwyrm Swarm (Legendary, Advanced) - Level 28]

Your mastery over the draconic arts has reached new heights, allowing you to transmute your own blood into a swarm of lethal Bloodwyrms. These sanguine serpents, imbued with your essence, obey your every command, whether you desire them to strike as a frenzied horde, inflicting [Hemorrhage] and [Malaise] upon your foes while leeching their life force to fuel your own, or to coalesce into a singular, monstrous Bloodwyrm of unparalleled might. With this fearsome ability, you become a living conduit of draconic power, your very veins a wellspring of both destruction and vitality. Unleash the fury of your Bloodwyrm Swarm, and bear witness as your enemies are consumed by the sanguine tide of your making.

“Creepy,” Noah said, looking at his own blood. So now he could turn his own blood into the creatures? He made a cut on his hand, letting the blood flow out and he could feel the power lying there. He let the blood wyrms appear, the creatures forming and flying around, waiting in anticipation as they formed one by one. His wyrmblood rapidly refueled his blood, letting him create more and more, and even after he had almost a dozen made, he still felt like he could simply keep going.

“Is… is there even an end?” Noah wondered to himself. There likely had to be, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to spend hours slowly bleeding himself.

A moment later he realized where the limit was. His lifeforce was sustaining the wyrms and thus, his health regeneration had slowed down rapidly. It took a few seconds for his wound to close when he let the healing work on it, a far cry from the instantaneous healing he experienced normally.

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Mildly disappointed that he didn’t have an infinite bloodwyrm supply, he moved on to the little wyrms. Extensions of himself, he could command them similar to how he could command Tony, and Noah simply had them combine into one entity.

The blood wyrms swirled and fused, blobs of blood pulsing as a much larger wyrm made entirely of blood now floated in front of Noah, looking rather terrifying.

“Oh boy, that’s… quite the scary sight,” Noah said, patting the bloodwyrm on its face. His hand sank into the creature, before coming back out coated red from his own blood. Noah shook off the blood, feeling disgusted, before he dismissed the creature.

The giant bloodwyrm flowed back into him, before disappearing. Noah filed away the ability for the time being.

He moved on to Arcane Specter. Opening the ability, Noah lets its description appear.

[Arcane Specter (Legendary, Advanced) - lvl 30]

Your mastery over the arcane, combined with your [Shadow Heart] perk, has unlocked the ability to summon forth a legion of Arcane Specters, each one a perfect reflection of your own form and magical prowess. No longer bound by a fixed specter count, the size of your spectral army is limited only by your mana reserves. These ethereal warriors can meld into shadows, strike at your command, and persist indefinitely, sustained by your arcane energy. With this army at your command, you can execute complex strategies, overwhelm enemies with numbers, or scatter your forces to gather intelligence and strike from afar, making you a one-man army capable of waging war on an unprecedented scale.

Noah whistled to himself. A part of him was tempted to test the ability out, but he decided to leave this one for later.

He moved on to the next ability.

[Abyssal Inferno (Legendary, Advanced) - lvl 30]

Your command over the abyssal flames has reached terrifying new heights. Not only can you unleash the full, devastating power of the inferno in a hellish maelstrom or concentrate it into a focused, incinerating beam, but you can now also shroud yourself in the very flames of the abyss. This passive ability grants you an aura of unearthly fire, constantly flickering around your form, ready to be unleashed at a moment's notice. The abyssal flames that engulf you serve as both a formidable defense and a potent offense, searing any who dare to come too close and empowering your every strike with the fury of the abyss. With this newfound mastery, you have become a living embodiment of the abyssal inferno, a force of destruction that even the mightiest of foes will learn to fear.

Noah read the ability, before trying to reach for it. Like turning a switch on and off, he found himself able to summon dark ghastly abyssal flames all around him, setting himself on fire, quite literally, as the flames burnt through his lifeforce.

He realized, rather horrifyingly, that if he wanted, he could turn off the wyrmblood and the flames would simply consume him alive without ever stopping.

He turned the ability off.

“Well, that was quite fun… but now, time for the main stuff,” Noah said, as he returned to his level fifty abilities.

After a bit of deliberation he decided to at least upgrade one ability right now, and then decide if he would upgrade more or not.

After thinking for a moment, Noah picked Abyssal Fusion. A prompt appeared in front of him.

Do you wish to use a skill point to rank up [Abyssal Fusion]?

Yes/No?

Yes.

Initiating rank up.

This ability is tied to a familiar.

Familiar Tony [Abyssal Symbiote] has begun evolution.

The rank up will complete upon the completion of the evolution.

Evolution Time: 240 hours

Noah watched in horror, as he felt Tony shudder before the symbiote went to sleep, all the little fine tunings done by the creature now gone, and his Abyssal Awarenessnow flooding him with information, without any filter remaining to restrict what he could sense.

A headache assaulted Noah, and he looked up at the sky with a frown. “This isn’t fair!” he shouted.

Then, he selected another ability, and after a moment’s hesitation, used another skill point.

Do you wish to use a skill point to rank up [Arcane Step]?

Yes/No?

Yes.

Initiating rank up.

[Arcane Body] has synergized and upgraded the capacity of [Arcane Step]

Upgrade Time: 180 hours

“I see how it is,” Noah said, looking at his notifications. His body was practically humming now, as if sucking in mana, and the runes on his body were flashing and glowing. Noah tried using Arcane Step but found the ability inactive, as if it had gone dormant. It was still there… but sleep.

He had a feeling he could force it to activate, but he didn’t push the ability unnecessarily.

A part of him knew it’d be best to do something like this one step at a time, especially if upgrades like this took away the ability from him during the period of the upgrade.

Alas, it didn’t take him long to lose all willpower as he caved in and used his other two abilities as well. Afterall, if he used them all at once, then he’d have to wait less time for each.

Initiating rank up.

[Cosmic Wyrmblood (Bloodline)] has upgraded [Wyrmblood]

Upgrade Time: 200 hours

Initiating rank up.

[Void Annihilation] gathers powers from the Abyss.

Upgrade Time: 120 hours

Noah looked at his timers, and then, with quivering excitement building up inside his body, he left the chamber he’d been waiting in, to head out for the feast that awaited him.

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