I Reincarnated As A Stick

Chapter 197: Mass Fusion

Ding!

“Due to the difference in existence level of the two bodies, the user has obtained 504,232,000 unused experience points from Argentum.” Not long after talking with Argentum about the unused experience points, a notification soon came to Aurus, to which a monotonous voice read in his mind. Of course, with Theresa on his left shoulder, he ignored the monotonous voice resounding in his mind and commanded the system to show the notification through a screen instead.

Whoosh!

As a slightly corporeal screen appeared in front of his field of vision, Aurus went ahead and manifested a hand out of the massive amount of FP he had before using it to point towards the screen as he focused his sense of vision towards Theresa and asked, “Is this amount sufficient enough to fuse all of the skills?”

“Hmm…” Theresa crossed its arms and placed an index finger and a thumb under its chin, pondering as it looked at the amount that Aurus had received from Argentum, making multiple calculations silently in a matter of an instant. A few seconds later, Theresa nodded its head before looking at Aurus with a smile on its face, saying, “The amount of points that have been given is more than enough to fuse all of the skills, Master!”

“That’s a relief,” Aurus let out an inward sigh of relief as he listened to Theresa’s words. Of course, 500 million experience points was more than enough for an Inanimate to level up from C-grade to X-grade without a problem…for a hundred times. Nevertheless, he thought about how many experience points he had used up while fusing the small number of skills he had back then while comparing it to the great number of skills he had right now…albeit all of them being at the lowest possible grade.

“Since all of these skills are at the C-grade Mortal level, the cost to fuse two skills into one is equivalent to one level of mine,” Aurus muttered as he was thinking out loud before continuing, “I have obtained 1255 skills from this skill room…which equates to around…628 levels. Of course, I ordered Theresa that all of the skills must be fused to their limits, which means that the fusion will happen again and again…until only a few skills remain.”

It was then that Aurus realized that Theresa’s ‘more than enough’…might not be the same as Aurus’s ‘more than enough’. With this in mind, Aurus went ahead and asked Theresa as he radiated an aura of slight unease, “Theresa, how many unused experience points do you reckon will be used while fusing these skills?” 

“Oh! Out of the 504,232,000 experience points that you have supplied me, Master, I presume around at least 380 million of those points shall be used up in fusing these skills!” Theresa replied with a cheerful smile on its face. In response to this, Aurus let out an exasperated sigh, slightly regretting the fact that he learned all of the skills in this room.

“Then again…120 million experience points is still more than enough for me to max out my level once I reach X-grade Inanimate, as well as max out Fenrir and Charisa’s levels before they attempt an Existence Tribulation. Not only that, but it’s also enough for my plans after that,” Aurus muttered to himself to get his hopes up…only for it to be crushed yet again by Theresa’s words.

“Ah, I must also remind Master that I might go over this estimated amount. Due to the number of skills I’m working with, I’m not quite sure as to how many unused experience points I would use up. What I gave was just an educated guess,” Theresa said, to which Aurus responded with, “I…I see.”

Whoosh!

Not long after responding to Theresa’s words, an aura of melancholy radiated from Aurus as he shouted in his mind, ‘My precious unused experience points…! Farewell!’

Just as he was thinking about this, Theresa went ahead and started fusing all of the skills together, gesturing with its hands as it gradually emanated a faint golden glow. It then raised both hands upward, with multiple motes of light of various colors and sizes coming out of Aurus’s body not long after.

Swoosh! Swoosh!

Under the manipulation of Theresa, these motes of light arranged themselves in front of Aurus’s field of vision in an orderly fashion, with the ones that were the biggest and glowed the brightest at the top, and those that were the smallest and glowed the dimmest being at the bottom.

After noticing what Theresa was doing, Aurus decided that there was no use moping around over experience points that were going to help him improve his combat power, focusing his sense of vision on the plethora of little motes of light that were positioned a decent distance away from his field of vision.

He looked at these motes of light and noticed that almost all of them were incredibly small and dim, while only a handful were big and bright, with Aurus hastily concluding that these were the skills he had learned, albeit in a form that was more visual than ever before.

“Master, I think you’d want to see this,” Theresa said to Aurus before clasping its glowing hands together, setting off an array of small explosions in front of Aurus’s field of vision. Fortunately, these explosions were only visual. If these explosions also had an auditory part into it, Aurus was incredibly sure that he would teleport away from the skill room and come back when Theresa tells him the process is done.

But since the explosions were only visual, Aurus became engrossed at the intricacies of the explosions. Amidst the multiple flashing lights, there were multiple conclusions to the collisions of the motes of light, or in other words, the fusion of the skills.

There were times that two motes of light would clash against each other and not find a winner, eventually deciding to co-exist as a part of them existed in the other. There were also times that a mote of light would easily engulf the other mote of light, yet the power of the engulfed mote of light would still be seen as little dots. Of course, there were also motes of light that are on the same line, a resonance forming between the two of them as the two motes of light fuse as one, with the appearance of both motes of light overlapping one another from time to time.

To Aurus, the sight of what the motes of light were doing was akin to a skill. A skill that he could not learn as of yet. Nevertheless, even though he felt that he could not learn this skill, he could at least take some ideas from it and incorporate it into his skills.

Eventually, around ten minutes had passed, with the only remaining motes of light in front of Aurus’ field of vision all being big and bright. Naturally, these motes of light had undergone the same things that the small motes of light had undergone, leaving a few dozen large motes of light that made their way towards Aurus’s body, only to be absorbed by his body a few seconds later.

Whirr…

At the very instant he had absorbed these motes of light, Aurus could feel a sort of strength coursing throughout his body that was both familiar and unfamiliar to him at the same time. Little by little, this strength gradually adapted to Aurus’s body, eventually infusing him with a strength that seemed weak on the outside, yet intrepidly strong in reality.

Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!

After being infused with a newfound strength, a near incessant amount of notification sounds resounded in his mind, making Aurus sigh inwardly that he was going to have to endure through the monotonous voice yet again. Surprisingly, after the notification sounds had stopped, there was no monotonous voice that resounded in his mind whatsoever. As he wondered as to why that was the case, Aurus heard a light chuckle from his shoulder, prompting him to look at Theresa.

“It seems that Master does not like the original voice of the system that much, so I shall read out the notifications and even add a bit onto it for Master instead,” Theresa said after grabbing Aurus’s attention, sticking out its tongue before starting to talk about the notifications Aurus had obtained.

Taking a deep breath of air, Theresa then started to talk, saying, “The active Class skill [Grand Spiritas Deification] has fused with multiple skills of the same category, transforming into the active Class skill [Supreme Deification] of the Epic grade. Due to the low grade of the skills that were fused with this skill, the grade of [Supreme Deification] has lowered to C-grade Mortal level.”

Listening to the first notification attentively, Aurus could not help but radiate an aura of shock as he heard that he had obtained a skill at the Epic grade. Not only that, but for some reason, the skill had reverted to the lowest grade possible, C-grade Mortal level. He pondered over it for some time, eventually understanding why the latter had happened, but he could not wrap his head around the former, interrupting Theresa from continuing as he asked, “Are you certain that [Grand Spiritas Deification]…rather, [Supreme Deification]…is of the Epic grade?”

“I am incredibly certain, Master,�� Theresa replied to Aurus’s question without getting annoyed. It then added, “The system cannot lie in front of Master after it has obtained the [Penultimate Veridical Spirit].”

“[Penultimate Veridical Spirit]…” Aurus muttered the name of the skill Theresa mentioned. Just as he was about to ask its properties, Theresa continued to talk, saying, “If you still don’t believe the system, Master…here is the skill’s new description.”

Whoosh!

Without delay, a slightly corporeal screen appeared in front of Aurus’s field of vision, to which he had no choice but to read since he was incredibly skeptical of what Theresa was saying. But then…after he read through the description of [Supreme Deification], he went silent for a bit before saying, “Continue.”

_________

[Supreme Deification (Epic)] (Level 1/3)

Grade: Mortal (C)

A status boosting skill formed from the fusion of multiple skills that harmonize and resonate with one another, allowing one to boost their stats to unimaginable levels. Due to the low grades of the fused skills, the full potential of this skill cannot be seen, being sealed for the safety of the user. Of course, being a skill with a fixed name, the power it gives even at a low grade cannot be mocked.

> When activated, increases all of the user’s stats by 600%

> When [Supreme Deification] is activated, the user gains access to [Supreme Entity], increasing the user’s stats even further by 400%

> When [Sole Entity] is activated, the user gains access to [Ruler of All], allowing the user to create a domain wherein the user can control anything and everything inside it in exchange for the user’s gained stats. The effectiveness of the user’s control over the domain is reliant on the amount of stats the user has gained from the skill.

________

‘Is this really the [Grand Spiritas Deification] I often used before?’ Aurus could not help but shout out loud in his mind, thinking that this skill he had received was incredibly broken, especially the last part where he could create a domain that allowed him to control everything in exchange for his gained stats. To him, exchanging the stats gained from a skill was quite a good price for an ability like that.

‘Not to mention, a skill with a fixed name…’ Aurus continued to think about the description of the skill, recalling the three tiers of skills based on names. According to his memories, a skill with a changing name every evolution is the weakest type of skill, a skill with a fixed name is the second strongest type of skill, while a skill with a fixed but simple name…is a skill that could easily make others submit to a being.

Since the first notification had set his expectations for the fused skills that came after it to a very high point, Aurus was very eager to find out what level they had reached in terms of their names and rarities. Fortunately, due to the great number of skills that were fused, all of the skills that came after [Supreme Deification] did not disappoint Aurus.

“The active Class skill [Ancient Modular Flux Equipment Fabrication] has fused with multiple skills of the same category, transforming into the active Class skill [Flux Equipment Creation] of the Legendary grade. Due to the low grades of the skills that were fused with this skill, the grade of [Flux Equipment Creation] has lowered to C-grade Mortal level.”

“The active Species skill [Omnipresent Spiritas Waltz] has fused with multiple skills of the same category, transforming into the active Class skill [Omnipresent Movement] of the Rare grade. Due to the low grades of the skills that were fused with this skill, the grade of [Omnipresent Movement] has lowered to C-grade Mortal level.”

“…”

“…”

“The skill [Nine Realms’ Myriad Spellswords] has fused with multiple skills of the same category, transforming into the active Class skill [Spellswords of Ruination] of the Legendary grade. Due to the low grades of the skills that were fused with this skill, the grade of [Spellswords of Ruination] has lowered to C-grade Mortal level.”

Eventually, Theresa was finished going over the notifications that had come after all of the skills Aurus had obtained from the skill room had fused with the skills he already had, with him identifying every one of them before being left at a loss for words every time. At the end of all that, Aurus could not help but let out a satisfied sigh before muttering, “Using all of those unused experience points is incredibly worth it. Although it looks like that I’ve weakened on paper, in actuality, I’ve grown stronger. Far stronger than what I used to be.”

While feeling satisfied with the outcome of the fusions, Aurus went ahead and asked Theresa as a thought flashed in his mind, “Ah, right. Theresa, how many unused experience points have you used in the fusion?”

“Er…” Theresa tried to recall the costs for each fusion before calculating all of them into a single sum in a matter of seconds, eventually replying with a smile on its face as it said, “In total, the fusion has used up 476 million unused experience points, Master!”

“…” After hearing what Theresa said, Aurus was left at a loss for words…this time from intense grief. A few seconds later, he let out a long and disappointed sigh before telling Theresa in a slightly dejected tone, “With our purpose here now fulfilled, let us go and get Comprehension Leaves.”

Not long after, he softly muttered to himself, “Haah…I can max out Fenrir, Charisa, and myself with around 30 million unused experience points. But what about what comes after that…?”

Oblivious to what Aurus was currently feeling, Theresa replied to Aurus’s words in a cheerful tone and said, “Let us depart, Master!”