Syl

Chapter 99: Triumphant Return

Once Dewi had replenished his mana, he set to work on melting the ice. The rest of us, in the meantime, rummaged through the treants' remains, hoping to find any salvageable pieces of wood. Dewi, our resident expert, enlightened us about the unique properties of treant wood. He revealed that the wood underwent a permanent transfiguration during the transformation into a treant, making it an invaluable material for crafting staves and bows. I managed to gather enough broken bits to consume. With great care, I initiated the consumption process within myself, feeling the power of the treant profile unlock.

'Lots of overlap with this profile and the [Plant Horror],' I grumbled mentally, 'I hope that boar has something nice.'

The best trait was [Ironbark], which made its bark as hard as reinforced iron, which clearly was why we were harvesting them. Strangely enough, despite being as hard as iron, it kept its vulnerability to fire.

I took a moment to comprehend the new form of magic I had just learned. It seemed that this magic was based on the fundamentals of pure mana rather than an element. This first spell would let me manipulate objects by surrounding them with my raw mana; however, the efficiency was greatly improved if the object contained my mana. It sounded like I finally had a good use for [Mana Infusion] other than pretending to be an elemental.

When Dewi noticed me sifting through the treant remains using my new spell, he beamed, "I told you it was something good, and if you get it to two or three, it gives you a defensive spell."

"You don't know? Surely you'd have it already." I asked curiously.

Dewi chuckled nervously as he scratched his cheek, "I don't actually have the skill... It says my mana isn't pure enough."

"I would have thought you'd have enough... I mean, with all the spells you fling around." I questioned again.

"True, but you've failed to notice that I only fling around fire spells with reckless abandon." He chuckled, but I could sense it was self-deprecating. "Fire is all I've got. Even when I took Air affinity for my ascension, it was extremely impure, and I have to only assume I'll have the same luck with my level twenty ascension."

"I'm sorry..." I said nervously; I hadn't seen anything besides his fiery confidence, which was extremely jarring. "If you get enough levels in [Mana Well] or fuse it into [Soul Mastery], would that not help?"

Dewi smiled, much more reminiscent of his usual self. "That's the plan; leveling them up is just an absolute pain. I've been using trait points to speed up the process, but it's still taking forever. It's also why I want to join the Mage's Guild and see their available resources."

My [Mana Slime] trait clearly did much more for me than I realized. I knew it was the main source of my ludicrous capacity. Still, if it was also raising the purity of my mana and thus all my other affinities, then perhaps that explained why I'd gain a new affinity just from absorbing another slime core. If all red slimes could use [Fire Magic], it would surely have said so in their evolution profile or the adventurer's book I read.

'Is this why Gramps had me start as a blue slime rather than a green slime?' I wondered. 'I know he picked a slime because he wanted traits to get more attention, but I'd always considered [Acid Slime] a vastly superior trait. Heck, look at [Poison Slime] and being able to build a sample list; no other trait even comes close to the complexity of that one.'

Eventually, we finished scavenging through the remains, and Dewi defrosted our boar. I was honestly surprised by how resilient the ice was and could only presume it had something to do with the ice being created from [Cryo Slime].

"Do we carve it into chunks to take apart at the guild, or can you do it here?" Roderick questioned me.

"I can harvest it here; it would certainly be easier than lugging the whole thing back," I responded. "Just..."

"Your secret technique. Hopefully, you'll show us how you do it someday." Whitney said with a gentle smile.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

I felt a surprising amount of guilt, especially after that conversation with Dewi, but I just couldn't risk it, "Sorry..."

"It's alright, Syl. We should be thankful we're getting to split such a good harvest," Roderick said reassuringly.

The boar was too large for a tent to be set up to give me privacy, so instead, the others left me in the clearing and formed a perimeter to guard me from any wandering beasts. While I trusted them not to try to sneak a peek, I still took extra precautions and decided to handle this matter through Alpha. I had Alpha disguise as a green slime again with the [Bonded Companion] emblem, then got to work with [Dissection].

From the boar, what [Dissection] pointed out was the tusks, hide, and a golden sap, which, upon sampling a little, I discovered had some potent healing quality. I took out a waterskin and, after dumping the contents, poured the golden liquid into it.

As for the profile, it had a lot of what I was expecting; [Raging Regeneration] combined with [Defy Death]. Obviously, due to how it spawned, its profile revealed some skills, much to my delight; [Nature Magic] and [Wrath]. The former was self-explanatory; unfortunately, I lacked the affinity as expected. At the same time, [Wrath] was an upgraded version of [Rage], which massively boosted stats at the cost of all mental faculties and was boosted further by how close it was to death.

Two traits were prime for copying, though; [Barkskin] and [Plant Control]. Due to what I could describe as system bullshit, [Barkskin] was like [Earthen Carapace] from the Bear Matriarch, and while I could mimic it, it was maybe half as effective without the prerequisite Nature affinity. This led to a strange situation where [Barkskin] was technically a higher-tier trait than [Ironbark], but now [Ironbark] was functionally more effective. [Plant Control] was similar to [Nature Commune] except it worked on magical plants as well, and unlike the latter, it was not a request; the trait would force the plant to obey. I had mixed feelings about using such a trait, but I'd likely cross that line if my life was at risk.

Eventually, the group returned, and I showed off the goods; everyone was quite happy, especially Evan when he saw the golden sap, which I explained had some healing properties. This led to Roderick explaining how loot distribution commonly worked in a group, where if someone wanted a piece of loot, it would be taken out of their portion of the earnings. Nobody else wanted anything from the boar, so we started our journey back once everything was deposited.

The journey back was rather pleasant, and it was rapidly apparent that the forest had returned to its normal atmosphere. I spent most of my time trying out [Arcane Hand] while also trying to repurpose my [Combust] spell into an ice spell. I felt that freezing damage over time had great potential and would be another damage source for [Decay].

Unfortunately, we were too far out to return without camping for another night. Dewi convinced me to swap to the new emblem so we could all brag about it on our return. During our evening watch, Dewi also requested that I keep casting [Flammable] on him. When I asked for a good reason, he explained that by lowering his resistance, he would earn more experience towards his next level of [Fire Resistance], as without it, he was too close to immunity that he was earning nothing. I agreed and made a mental note to do the same to improve my [Magic Resistance (Lesser)].

When we exited the forest the next day, we confirmed with any groups we saw that the job was complete. Roderick was the liaison, while Dewi proudly showed off his new emblem. There were hints of jealousy from some of the groups, but any ill-will was quickly squashed when the source of the threat was explained. In reality, what was originally advertised as a mid-level silver threat had clearly been an upper-silver or lower-gold.

'Sorry Lisa, I bet that's more paperwork for you.'

Eventually, Evan pleaded for me to keep Dewi occupied, as his bragging had rapidly become obnoxious and was liable to cause a feud. Luckily, my choice of distraction was beneficial to me, as I had him help me add [Heat] to [Fireball] and [Combust], the latter of which was exceptionally tricky due to its dual nature, and it kept him fully distracted until we finally reached Kaerlin.

I tried to give the quest hand in a skip, as it was Roderick's duty as the party leader and quest-taker, but I was dragged along to show off our group's success. The final straw for me giving in was realizing that this might be Roderick's last big quest as a full party. He'd probably do the odd quest or two that required his rank, especially if that forest spawned something nasty again, but everyone else was moving on while he was settling down.

We entered the guild hall like returning champions, and I instinctively felt myself reaching out to [Vanish] and trying to slink into the shadows before Whitney grabbed my arm. My fellow rogue didn't seem to share my love of working from the shadows, and she also relished in the attention. I could only be grateful that Dewi's antics and Rodericks's general loudness kept the eyes mostly off of me. Evan and I exchanged helpless glances; at least I wasn't alone in my suffering.

I graciously let Roderick handle all the explanations; my only contribution to this social encounter was withdrawing the harvested monster materials. During the cheers and shouts, Luke approached me and pulled me aside.

"First, well done, Miss Syl." He said politely.

"Thanks, Luke. I don't know how they do that." I replied, gesturing to the showboating between the trio. I spotted Evan sitting quietly in a corner, nursing a drink.

"A lot of adventurers are in it for the glory." Luke said with an apologetic smile, "But anyway, what I called you for is I have some good news for you."

"Oh? Did you manage to find another slime core for me?" I asked, hopeful.

Luke winced at the question, "Sorry, no... But I've met your other request; there's a bounty out to kill a pair of griffins spotted raiding the western roads."

I couldn't help but immediately smile, "Sign me up, Luke."