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Hera and her group ended up doing about a dozen dungeon runs. Even the slowest of them was barely an hour long. The loot wasn't all that impressive. In total, they got around 70 thousand gold and a lot of those odd cloud balls that seem to be almost like balls of yarn that they could find in the Woolly Plains. Blue was the one who took all of those clouds so that she could increase her legacy's power. Another interesting development was that the boss of the dungeon could drop parts of its body. During those runs the group managed to get one piece of the beak and a couple feathers. All of those materials could also be used by Blue, and you should give a different result from the cloud balls that they found.
For Stormcloud, each of those physical manifestations of a storm could turn the legacy's clouds into something more tangible. Something less likely to be affected by any sort of disruption. The pieces of the Elemental Scion, on the other hand, could give different abilities for the legacy. The beak allowed the clouds created by Blue to have more unique shapes. She now could make small modifications to the shape of her clouds so they could be more offensive or defensive. She was still very far from being similar to what the Scion could do, and even if she wanted, there was no way for her to make a palace or a place that they could sleep in. And if the cloud balls were anything to go by, absorbing several of the same item would give diminishing returns. The feather also gave something extra for Blue. Now the clouds that she created were able to hold more weight before collapsing. From what Blue could understand, eventually, if she got enough parts from either this monster or others, she could fly thanks to her legacy without having to worry too much about how heavy something would be. Although, fly might be an overstatement. It would be more like being carried by the cloud instead of actually flying, but it was still a massive improvement from what she currently had. The clouds of blue made now could only be static. Even the escalator that she created had to be stuck in a certain loop, and it couldn't move from that position. If anything went beyond that, the cloud would dissipate before it could even be used as a platform. If Blue got enough items like the Scion's feather, that could all change.
However, aside from that, there wasn't much they could gain inside the dungeon. The monsters were way too weak to give any actual combat experience, much less help them with leveling up. Not to mention that after a while, killing those elementals felt wrong. It was as if they were bullying the creatures, and that left a bad taste in everyone's mouth, even if they still did another four or five runs after reaching that conclusion.
When they went back to the city, Blue stopped by the Guild to see if any other pieces of the Elemental Scion were for sale. Unfortunately, it was a rare item, and they didn't have any available. To make this worse, Stormcloud couldn't tell her if there was any actual use for the pieces just by reading the descriptions. Only when she had the cloud material in her hands could she actually see what was going on.
Stormcloud wasn't the only legacy who got something new during this dungeon. When they got back home, Daskka pulled Hera aside and talked about a few skills that had completed the integration with the legacy.
"What is that exactly?" Hera asked.
"So, your skills can be split into three categories. First, the skills that won't be any different because of the legacy. Things like All In, Exponential Growth, Treasure Map, and your role skills. That doesn't mean that you can't use the skills with the legacy, but there won't be any changes to what they do," Daskka was on the table, using her mist to illustrate what she was trying to say. She made a stick figure and wrote 'Luck Up' on the side, "Think about your Silver Lining. It has no way of connecting with the legacy, but you still can get improved results because of what the skill does."
Hera nodded, "Yeah, that makes sense. Blue had a lot of skills like that. Things that just didn't change."
"Exactly. A few other skills are in this category: Medical Reference, Identify Ailments, Green Thumb, and Ancient Language for obvious reasons," Hera just nodded in response. All the skills that Daskka mentioned were clearly unrelated to the legacy. It wouldn't even make sense if they could be added.
"The next category has the skills that you can share with your court. Those are all your combat styles, all your resistances, and things like Shaper of Mana or Reinforced Mana. Basically, those are skills that you have, and your blades will also have. You don't have to do anything, casting a spell, or use a different silk, is all unnecessary. Your blades will also have it as long as you have that skill. And it's nothing that the legacy will affect. These skills are doing their jobs well enough the way it is."
"Really? I thought that those would be part of the legacy."
Daskka shook her head, and made another drawing. It's the same stick figure, but now it was getting hit by a ball of fire and seems to be fine with that. Beside it was a floating hand axe that was receiving the same attack, and nothing happened, "I understand why you thought that, but no, those are your skills. The court is just making use of them."
"OK, I think I understand. What about the rest?"
"The last category is the skills that the legacy can change. Before anything, I have to warn you. These changes are up to you. You can choose to allow the legacy to affect the skill or not. This is important because you will lose those skills if you pass on the legacy to someone. And I'm not sure if you would be able to get them again. Even if you do a training program or try to recover them. Another point. Integrating a skill with the legacy means that everyone who has the legacy will eventually have the potential to receive that skill. It's not a sure thing, but it is a possibility. Just like you will eventually get some extra skills."
Hera frowned, "That's something I really have to consider. What if I pass on a skill like hide? Does that mean that I will never be able to hide from anything again?"
"No, well, yes, but not really. Losing a skill like that doesn't mean you can't do whatever you want to do. If, for instance, you pass on the hide skill, you can still play hide and seek. Or try to hide under the bed or something. There will be nothing stopping you from doing that. But, you won't have any skills that improve your ability to hide. In fact, there's one skill that could help you understand that," Daskka gestured with her tail, and a notification appeared in front of Hera.
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The [Court of Blades] legacy wants to integrate the following skill:
Etching
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Etching - Legacy Skill
You were able to give specific powers or buffs to your place by engraving set enchantments on the weapons. Each blade can receive a limited number of engravings. If you remove one of the engravings, there is a chance that the number of engravings available to the weapon will decrease.
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Do you wish to integrate the skill [Etching] with the legacy [Court of Blades]?
[Yes] [No]
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Daskka gave Hera a moment to read the notifications before continuing, "So, if you let that skill change, it doesn't mean that you will never be able to engrave something again. You can still carve away if you want, but you won't have any benefits from the system when doing so."
"OK. I understand. But what can I engrave? Like, does it have to be a phrase? A word? A drawing?"
"I don't actually know. I think it has to be like a word or something simple, but you're gonna have to test it out to see. This is one of those skills that we need to figure out. I don't even know if just writing something would work or if you have to use a spell at the same time," Daskka shrugged.
"Got it. Is that the only skill that can be integrated now?"
"No, there are a few others. But confirm if you want to add that skill or not. You can change your mind and say no now, but yes later," Daskka waited for a moment while Hera pressed yes. This wasn't much of a question. It was obvious that she wanted to integrate that skill. After the notification vanished, another appeared.
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The [Court of Blades] legacy wants to integrate the following skill:
Weapon Rebalance
Weapon Break
Chain of Command
Dodge
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[Dodge] and [Weapon Rebalance] had very similar changes. [Dodge] would allow her blades to evade attacks better while also ensuring that the attacks wouldn't be redirected to another member of the court. It was just something that would lessen the strain on Hera's strategic ability, and the skill didn't lose any effects. [Weapon Rebalance] would apply the better weighting of the weapon as Hera added them to her court. Doing that would make her blades move more freely. Again, nothing would be lost to the skill, and she could still use it on her own weapons.
[Chain of Command] had a unique difference. This would lose any chance it had of allowing her to give buffs to her party members. Instead, it will allow her to give direct commands to her blades, and the court members would receive increased strength while following her orders. The good part was that the ability to make her voice carry through the area wasn't affected, meaning that she could still direct her party if she needed to.
Lastly, there was a weapon break skill. Hera didn't consider accepting this skill into the legacy even for a second, but she was curious about the changes.
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Weapon Break - Legacy skill
By ensuring your blade is destroyed with the attack, you can deliver a blow that will deal increased damage. The attribute scaling will be added, and the final result will be used to increase the attack, adding the familiarity bonus after those calculations.
If this skill is used by a titled blade, the effects will be five times as strong.
You can also use this skill to permanently remove one slot from your court. Doing so will multiply the effects of this skill by the remaining number of court members available.
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Hera was a bit surprised. This was much stronger than she expected. The regular [Weapon Break] could make her attacks between 2 to 15 times stronger depending on the weapon's rarity. If she considered even one of her handaxe, which were all uncommon, one attack should be around 13 times stronger than usual. Despite that, she didn't even think twice and pressed no, refusing to integrate this particular skill into her legacy. This wasn't something she was thinking just about herself, but about all the future legacy holders. She didn't want to be the one willing to sacrifice the court members. It didn't matter that they weren't technically alive. Not to mention that eventually, she would get her own title blades, and those seem to be sentient, which made the idea of being able to kill them to deal a lot of damage even more disturbing.
"One question. Are you also under the rules of the court?" Hera turned to Daskka.
"The one about not betraying you and following your orders? Yeah, I am," Daskka put her tail in front of her body as if she was hiding her nonexistent breasts, "What are you trying to make me do?"
"Keep acting like that, and I'm gonna start taking pictures of you and selling them online," Hera teased, "No, what I want to ask you... No, I want to order you this. Never show me the weapon break skill as part of the ones that can be integrated again. In fact, never let me integrate that skill. I don't care what's going to happen. I don't care if that's the only way to save my life. I don't want to be the one putting that skill inside the legacy. I will not let that be what I pass on to the future holder."
Hera could see that Daskka was struggling with that. Probably not so much with pretending that this skill couldn't be integrated, but the idea that Hera was willing to die rather than accept this skill seemed to disturb the snake. Still, after a few moments, she had no other option but to nod in agreement. The empress's orders were absolute, even if it was something potentially self-destructive. As long as she didn't ask one of her court members to hurt Hera themselves, they had to follow the commands. If it wasn't for their poison connection, Daskka would be much more upset with Hera for giving this kind of order. However, she could see how much the explorer was bothered by this. Not because she didn't believe it was the right call, but because she never wanted to force Daskka to do something that she didn't want to do. Her worry was that her desire to protect Hera would be too strong in some situations, and the snake would push her to accept this skill again. And depending on the situation, Hera wasn't sure if she could keep her values as she wanted. If she was about to die, Hera would do her best to maintain what she said, but if one of her friends or even Daskka's life was on the line, she wasn't sure if she could just ignore the skill completely.
They discussed the possibilities of the skills for a couple more minutes before Helena knocked on the door to the dining room where they were having this seemingly one-sided meeting, "Hey, sweetie. Do you have a minute?"