(65) The Project

In the centre of the Boss room, Kraton uncovered the large, metallic 'pendant'. The rings laid flat and still on the stone table and the gaping hole in the centre longed for something to complete it.

Kraton traced the metallic rings with a touch of intimacy, this device was something he took many months to create, every small detail had been handcrafted without a crude mould. Blood, sweat and tears had been poured into the creation of this item, but if it worked, it would definitely be worth it.

Kraton took out the orange gem with his large fingers, inspecting it again to make sure it was perfect. He slowly moved it towards the large device, the rings shuddered as if it were becoming alive.

The gem would have to be slotted into the hollow wound like a battery as there were two curved caps at the top and bottom to hold it in place.

Kraton fumbled with the gem, unable to slot it in. He tried again, yet was met with the same result. Lysine snickered as Kraton became more and more forceful, frustration building up.

"Let me do it." Lysine spoke up before Kraton could damage the device.

Kraton passed the vibrant gem to her and stood to the side, his fingers throbbed in soreness due to the metal clipping his hairy skin.

"Done!" Lysine had gracefully slotted the gem in without a problem. A warm, orange glow expanded out from the gemstone, it followed the numerous fancy lines and patterns, flowing through them like veins.

As the warm glow passed through the rings, the runes lit up one by one. After a short while, the glow resided, only leaving a faint radiance emanating from the metallic pendant.

The device still laid on the stone table, but it felt like it was no longer a dead piece of metal. It felt alive, the gem; the heart, the contours; the veins; the faint radiance; the breath. It was as if the blessing of life was bestowed upon the once inanimate device.

The two Bosses let loose a soft sigh, unaware that they had been holding their breaths in awe.

Kraton shuffled over and lifted the glowing contraption with ease. It wasn't just his strength playing an effect here, but also a few of the many runes etched on the rings.

He lifted it up and held it in front of him, five or six runes near the base of the outer ring started to glow a little brighter. Kraton slowly retracted his hands, but the device stayed stable in the air. As soon as Kraton's hands had left the device completely, it shuddered slightly. Kraton reached forward in preparation to grab it, but it stabilised right away.

He retreated back to Lysine's side but kept his eyes on the large, hovering pendant. Slowly, but surely, the rings began to rotate. The outer ring spun sideways slowly, whilst the inner ring rotated on a horizontal axis, slightly faster than the outer ring but still not at an astonishing speed.

The two stared entranced at the beautiful, spinning item. The soft, pulsing glow coupled with the rotating rings and flickering runes hypnotised them, leaving them reassured by it.

"Shall we test it?" Kraton asked, his focus still transfixed on the device.

Lysine nodded and took out a small ring, it was half made from a silvery metal and ruby stone. The two materials smoothly blended in with each other, twisting the colours around themselves.

She approached the spinning pendant with the ring on her finger, as she neared it, the runes on the spinning rings, and the ruby lustre on her ring shimmered simultaneously. The ring on her finger felt cool to touch despite the warm glow it gave off.

Lysine positioned herself next to the hovering device and nodded again at Kraton.

He picked up a slightly modified directional bomb from the ground and faced it towards Lysine. He was only three or four metres away from her, a blast from this close range was deadly against players under level 12, but threatening for those of a higher level.

Without a delay, Kraton pulled the pin at the back of the bomb, a large impulse pushed him back a couple of metres but he withstood it. Out from the other end, a pillar of flames rocketed out towards Lysine.

She closed her eyes as to not get blinded by the searing light and she waited for the flames to hit and the heat to rise.

Kraton watched as the flames dispersed around an almost invisible barrier, the blaze spread out under the pressure between the flames behind it and the slightly slivery barrier, highlighting the region encased by the shield.

As the flames died away, Lysine opened her eyes and glanced at the hovering, rotating contraption. The two rings were rotating slightly faster than before, and most of the runes on the inner ring had lit up, the orange glow flowed through the contours towards these runes more than it did towards the unlit ones. And once the flames had disappeared, so did the light that lit the runes.

She reached out towards the fading barrier, but her hands passed through it like it was merely an illusion.

Kraton discarded the destroyed bomb and made his way towards the device. He noticed that the ground a metre or so away from the device was charred, the radius seemed equal at a specific distance away from the device, creating a black arc on the floor.

*Bang*

Kraton bounced backwards when he tried crossing the line. The rebound felt close to double his speed - which wasn't much.

Realising that he forgot, he took out a ring identical to Lysine's, but bigger and slotted it onto his finger. Once the ring was firmly attached to his large finger, the ring, and the runes on the device shimmered again.

"Hold on," Lysine stopped Kraton, "Throw something at the device, throw it without any strength first."

Kraton had paused mid-step when Lysine told him to stop moving, he awkwardly turned around and stepped backwards, finding a random pebble on the floor.

With an underhanded swing, he chucked the small pebble towards the floating device. With a soft *pang*, the pebble rebounded backwards, nearly a mirrored trajectory.

"Do it again! But throw it harder!"

Again, Kraton picked up another pebble, this time he bent his body back, his hand behind his head. His arm tensed up - muscles under his hair bulging. With a strike similar to a whip's lash, his arm flung forward at an astonishing speed.

The pebble exploded out of his hand, a massive *boom* erupted as the air tore apart. The violent throw led the accuracy astray, leading it towards Lysine. By instinct, she flinched and braced herself as she watched the crude projectile approach.

A second *boom* exploded through the air as it collided with the silvery shield, the runes on the spinning outer ring of the device lit up brightly at the same time.

"S***"

Kraton cursed and ducked down immediately. The thrown pebble rocketed back towards him, almost reaching Mach 2. The sound barrier became obliterated by the pebble, a powerful implosion sucked in the air around the barrier.

The pebble narrowly missed Kraton, but the suction of air behind it tore a line of hair from Kraton's head. Before the small projectile could collide with the wall, it disintegrated into nothingness, unable to bear the force it held.

A gush of air stormed through the room sounding like a hurricane. After a moment it finally reverted back to the normal condition, the spinning device remained unscathed by the vicious assault.

"Hahaha!" Lysine's laugh broke the silence, snapping Kraton out from his fear. The bald line on his head looked as bizarre as the sea parting in two.

Kraton quickly covered his head with a random piece of cloth and glared at Lysine. He made his way towards the device without a problem this time and inspected it in case there was any damage.

After checking that it was completely fine, he used Analysis on it.

[1]

Kraton knew the purpose of each of the runes, but it left him wary that others might also find out the runic effects if they had a tier 3/3 Analysis skill. The most useful and intricate runes that he had etched were the Key and Lock and the Extension runes.

The Key rune allowed the owner to pass through the defensive barrier that had the matching Lock rune. This rune was inscribed on Kraton and Lysine's ring, whilst the Lock rune was obviously on the Shield Relic.

The Extension rune was also inscribed onto their rings. This allowed some of the Shield's power to be extended onto the two of them. Although the effect was weaker, it could still be very helpful when defending or even attacking with it.

What Kraton was surprised about was the extra effect of having a Flame-attributed core. Originally, it was implemented as an energy source as cultivating Electric-attributed crystals was too hard in the current environment. The Electric mana would be discharged into the ground and the outcome would be a neutral-attributed or 'regular' Energy crystal instead.

But with this additional effect, facing the majority of human mages would now be easier; flame spells were the simplest destructive spells to learn (unless you wanted to specialise in different flame types).

Kraton was also ecstatic to discover that it was a relic, it was only 1-star, but it was a relic nonetheless. For Equipments, a relic was a stage higher than Diamond-quality, but for Items, there was an Artifact stage between S-rank and Relic rank.

Most relics would always have a way to improve its strength and rank. For the Shield Relic that Kraton created, the rank was based on the core. If the original crystal was also Superior Quality, then the Rank of the Shield Relic might have scraped 2-star.

However, to increase the rank any further, a medium-sized, medium-quality crystal or higher would be needed. But this also meant the Relic would have to be adjusted to contain the larger gemstone.

Kraton wasn't in any hurry for Barren to cultivate medium-sized crystals, right now, the high-quality small crystals were already powerful enough.

The two Bosses tested the limitations of the Shield Relic until it was well past midnight. There was a high chance that the human players would start challenging them again, and so they required at least a bit of rest.

"Let's hope those traps work now..." Kraton mumbled in his deep slumber.

~~~

[1] Misc. = Miscellaneous: of different kinds, to be grouped separately from other groups.