I raised my club bashing a mushroom Puppet eviscerating it's skull. My Golem suit was Awesome! Stomping my foot I sent out a ripple of earth that massively destabilized the horde of mushroom puppets.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Anastasia weaving furiously. I moved back to the line of silken line puppets, they moved making space for me in the formation. Forming a shield out of the golems left arm I summoned another [Knight's Bastion] as it sprang up as a solid wall.
'Anastasia I'm applying my stats' I alerted her telepathically.
'Okay Boss' Anastasia said brushing me off. When I opened up my stats to allocate my stats I saw that my soul stats where no longer blocked off from advancing. Clicking on Mana, I saw a prompt appear.
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[Alert!]
Soul Stats are incredibly powerful moreso than Mind or Body stats. To raise Willpower you need to invest 10 stat points, Mana requires 100, and Luck requires 1,000 stats. As you are now Rank two you can theoretically increase all of them if you save up stat points.
-[Willpower]
Can't increase your actual will but rather increases its connection onto reality. Allowing you to force change upon the world. Your will's ability to effect items and living creatures besides yourself is severally limited.
-[Mana]
Increases the quality of your mana, in creatures without inborn mana pools once it reaches 2 it creates an artificial mana pool. For creatures with inborn mana pools every stat increases Mana size by x 10.
-[Luck]
The greater the Luck the more pull you have on fate, beings with unnaturally high luck change the fabric of reality around unconsciously.
...
Hmm, each of these were really powerful, or more accurately Mana was stupidly powerful and the other were vauge as hell. Willpower promised the ability to force change upon the world, though supposedly it is severally hampered to everything besides yourself, is that what the placebo was? The other, Luck had always been a nebulous concept, what was it, was it even real? Well it was and apparently it was about over writing fate.
Unfortunately the only one I could invest in was willpower and with its unclear effects made me right it off. Mana would only be cost effective later on as I couldn't afford to not invest stats for a while ten levels for it. I decided to round out my Physical stats, investing 1.8 stats I Invested the other 9 stats splitting it evenly into each, with .2 being split between Intelligence and Wisdom.
Snapping back I took a quick snapshot of the battle. The mushroom's moving corpses kept pouring in, Anastasia had flagged in her ability to make Silk puppets. The Skirmishers had been destroyed, the spiders took their place.
Reaching up to the ceiling of the cave I mentally grasped the stalactites ripping them down and letting gravity pull them down. From my position olat the head of the Shield wall I began practicing making my own puppets.
Forming, vaugely humanoid shapes made of rock, without a skill though trying to orchestrate more then one was beyond me, my mind couldn't process and respond fast enough to tempo of the frenzied battle. Dismissing them, I had began to create waves of rocks that rose up from the ground swallowing up massive amount of the mushroom puppets and my stock of Mana.
In response a group of ten puppets clad in robes and wielding staffs appeared. Slamming their staffs in unison their magic disturbed my ability to control the earth. Then with another slam of their staffs they tried to contest my control of it.
Will a push of will I lashed back them with tendrils of invisible mana. They gave up doing more besides destabilize my control. With a rasing of one of their staffs they began to chant.
"ASHASH UIN FAL GERMÜÜND, ASHASH UIN FAL GERMÜÜND, ASHASH UIN FAL GERMÜÜND!!" they chanted again and again, around us mushrooms, plants, and other flora began to strike against us.
"BEHOLD, [PROCLAMATION OF DOMAIN]" one of the mushroom puppet yelled. The ambient Mana became hostile slamming into my bulwark.
"Oh Yeah well here's my proclamation! FUCK YOU" I yelled at the top of my lungs. As I did so I forced tendrils of earth battling the hostile ambient Mana. Taking inspiration from the mushroom tendril. I raised seven tendrils of rock fashioned like that of a kraken. It took all my focus to maintain each and every tendril and my bulwark.
In response they summoned more mushroom tendrils to combat them.
Anastasia descended from the cave roof and began to battle the mages directly, as two broke away to defend the group. The ambient Mana became noticably less hostile with them distracted. Allowing me to more effectively combat the mushroom tendrils.
My rock had the advantage of weight and power, where as the mushrooms had speed and reaction speed. I managed to take down one, and began to have two focus on one tendril. The mental effort began to give a fat headache pushing through I continued to battle on.
After the second one fell and I could focus three on one there tendrils rapidly became destroyed as Anastasia kept on kiting the two mages as the rest struggled to combat me.
"YOU, YOU UPSTART WELP, I WILL CRUSH YOU UNDER FOOT!" a voice boomed outwards as if the cave itself was speaking.
With a final push of effort I managed to wipe out the mages with the rock tendrils. Turning their attention back the horde of puppets I managed to destroy quite a few of them. That was until I felt a foreign source of mana barrel through the rock under me. In the next second I felt myself be lifted up from the ground as a mushroom covered form burst outwards from the ground where I had been standing.
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[Mole Wanderer(4th Host of the Ophiocord Mushroom)] Lvl: 17
Rank Two Animated Undead
...
I was slammed into the ground as Gravity grabbed a hold of me. I manipulated my golem getting up just in time to be barreled in the chest by the golem. I skipped like a stone on a lake across the surface. The Flora around me started to grow rapidly barring me from moving. Molding the basalt rock that made up my golem I made them retract back into the torso of my golem to escape the tendrils of magically enhanced Flora.
About fifty feet apart the animated mole stared at me, it's eyes filled with setting hatred, and it fur was patchy and matted with shelves of mushrooms splitting from its body. It possessed complete control of the earth around it that saturated the rock preventing me from manipulating it. Reforming the shield on my left I decided to go full Knight mode. I shaped the basalt rock into the form of a late medieval knight, with layers of heavy plate. Honestly this was more about intimidation more than anything. Readying my self, I managed to see the blur of movement as the mole dived into the rock like a seal in water.
Rasing my Shield in time, reinforced by [Force Field] and [Knight's Bulwark]. The Mole was stopped dead in its tracks as it resurfaced. Angling my shield so it's body slid upwards I maneuvered my shield. Then with a Herculean effort I pushed upwards levitating my golem and with the mole up into the air and away from its preferred terrain. The effort of levitating and the cost of the two skills cost half my mana pool even after getting a refund from reabsorbing some of the mana from [Knight's Bulwark] and [Force Field]
As it floated in the air in suspense before me and it was pulled back down to the ground I summoned a [Force Field] under foot. Stopping me from falling the mole fell once again on my shield putting pressure on the basalt rock. Pushing it once again into the air as I reabsorbed the [Force Field] after I used it as a Spring board.
Flailing about in the air it tried to do something, however it was helpless as I reached upwards grasping its slightly decayed pelt I pulled it towards me in my right hand I slammed my club into it. The force of the hit caused it to ascend and me to descend.
Beneath me once again I summoned a [Force Field] and used it as a Spring board before reabsorbing it. Smashing it once again propelling it from the ceiling. Using the roof I blasted myself downwards, grabbing it by the tail I swung it back to upwards as it struggled trying to get to the ground.
"ERRGGG, YOU INSUFFERABLE APEKIN!" The mushroom yelled, once again it felt as if the whole cave was the one who was speaking. Blinking for a moment, did that thing just call me a slur for humans? Or was that what humans were called by other species? However I thought who cared and blasted off from the ground and back into the air. Meeting the mole on its way down I grabbed it by the scruff of its neck I twirled like a ballerina before tossing the mole along the length of the cave.
Springboarding off a [Force Field] I zoomed after the mole. Catching up to it I bashed its head again before chucking it again. I once again propelled myself back to the creature. I freed my hands by storing the club into the forearm of my golem. I reached out with my right hand grabbing just right as it tried to grasp the cave wall. Grabbing it by the throat I ripped out it's jugular. Before sucker punching the mole with my left hand my rocky fist digging into the stomach of the the creature. Chasing after I checked in with Anastasia.
'Hey, Anastasia what's happening down there?' I asked.
'Not much we began sealing off this portion of the cave network to prevent reinforcements' She said with a quick glance as I rushed through the air In pursuit. They were indeed building a giant wall of webbing as a steady horde of puppets flowed in through the empty areas.
Slamming, into the mole this time I ripped off its tail. Before I slammed my fist into its head as we pulled I flipped us around so that I was pointing towards the ground under the mole I summoned a [Force Field]. It slammed with force into it with me on top of it slamming it repeatedly into the [Force Field] the creature roared even with its throat ripped out.
Wincing, I reached down and grabbed the creature my golems hands digging through the creatures ripped throat, grasping its spine I squeezed and with a tearing motion it died.
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[Level Up]
You have leveled up after killing a level 15 [Mole Wanderer(4th Host of the Ophiocord Mushroom)]
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