Outfitting Familiars

After traveling at a somewhat slow pace without stopping for the entire day, we made camp late into the night among some sparse and bare trees about a mile outside from Winter Wood. Just a few hundred yards from our location, the temperature dropped so low that thin patches of frost began forming on the trees.

This frost became more and more prominent the closer one got to the actual Winter Wood.

From here, the average players, people, and animals without the proper affinities and resistances or equipment would start experiencing debuffs and even some some Damage Over Time from the extreme weather conditions inside. Luckily for us, not only did the land dragons come equipped with accessories suited for the Winter Wood, thanks to Lady Mara's foresight, but the village blacksmith had also gifted us each a single frosted tree dragon core.

Even in the surrounding settlements and neighboring cities, these mana cores came with a high price due to simple necessity. Their armor effect was inheriting a Thermal Regulation perk that allowed one to survive unharmed in this region. Due to this, the frosted tree dragon itself was a very uncommon creature despite being the main variation of tree dragon.

I personally went through and used the frosted tree dragon cores on the upper armor pieces of each of my companions' new suits, ensuring the optimal functionality of these tertiary benefits. I was honestly surprised the completed and rested armor could take an extra inheritance, let alone a third one. This made me regret not overloading the armor with various inheritance.

Of course, there would always be future sets of armor and even cores that could be used on Hauntings. Sadly, the fire enchantments on all of our weapons would conflict with any ice inheritances we would acquire from these areas. This could easily be compensated for by buying necessary cores but this was once again a future effort.

For tonight, instead of hunting I sent the others out in teams of two under the watchful gazes of Darkwing and Duck. The unkempt land was just unruly enough to hide small bodies and there were just enough trees to be considered for obstacles. It was time to train our passive assassin familiars and raise everybody's Agility through fleeing exercises.

While the first pair of Agnes and Skooma who had vastly contrasting stats were sent out to compensate for one another, everybody else was kept at camp processing 'precious ancient electrum'. Electrum in Bygone Era was most any alloy of natural metals such as the ancient copper-gold or green gold from Greece and anything else man-made with metals more precious than copper. For us, we were using forty-five-percent gold weight, fifteen-percent copper weight, and forty-percent ancient scrap weight.

It took a few tries to get the right recipe for the original one-pound ingot to be named electrum by the system, but once Oleander found a single working recipe we spit out eleven of the same ingots and set to work crafting common styled accessories. While these enchantments depended more on the stone than the item, using a basic metal and a magical metal that was further enchanted would hold much greater benefits for the final product as long as it was done correctly.

Namely, the only other enchantment on the item could only be a Conduction Enchantment and one of a stronger level than the enchantment itself. With my Expert Enchanting skill and its overall level coupled with my crafting buffs, such a requirement was now as easy to meet as all of my previous enchantments. For some of the others, though, it required some grinding.

Now that everybody else in the party was at least level forty-five, I finally took the next step to level fifty simply by creating a pair of limit broken rings. Each ancient electrum ring had an epic purple name of 'Ancient's Lucky Charm' and provided the wearer with thirty Luck. Luck had started as my highest skill and was now my lowest with more than one-eighty without temporary effects.

With temporary effects, it was my third highest stat behind Endurance and Intelligence thanks to my current armor. With these two rings, Luck became my highest stat with an overall one-fifteen just in temporary points. Until, of course, I continued raising my levels and stats.

I made four more ancient electrum rings that came out with likewise purple epic names which read 'Dummy's Guide' and increased Intelligence by thirty points apiece. The temporary points beside my Intelligence stat were originally sixty with my armor, but the addition of one hundred and twenty Intelligence points quickly swamped my Luck stat and heavily bolstered my mana pool. This alone brought my overall mana pool almost to eleven hundred.

Next came a pair of simply bangles set with short chains and enchanted for mana conduction. On each of these chains were placed the numbers one through six made from transmuted synthetic pristine crystals. Each crystal was then given a stat enchantment which created a 'Limitless Rainbow Bangle' that improved every stat by a further twenty-five points apiece.

This might not have been as much as the rings, but the rings did not have to share their mana conduction between numerous enchantments. With only five points of difference for the five extra stones involved, I was more than satisfied with two rainbow stat bangles for myself. That was still fifty points in every stat overall without even counting level fifty-one.

Crafting next a simple headband of annealed ancient electrum braided into a simple six-strand belt, I set the center of the headband around a single simple pristine synthetic crystal before beginning the two stages of enchantments.

[Successfully Crafted: Agile Noble's Circlet]

[+1500XP]

[+1500 Expert Enchanting XP]

[+1500 Expert Transmutation XP]

Finally, I finished off my personal set of accessories with a two charm earring that still came out to a reduced twenty-five stat points per charm.

[Successfully Crafted: Parallel Thought Earpiece]

[+2000 XP]

[+2000 Expert Enchanting XP]

[+2000 Expert Transmutation XP]

[Expert Transmutation Leveled]

[+100 XP]

The 'earpiece' was a pair of sun and moon shaped crystals dangling from a simple ancient electrum stud that my cordycep body simply molded its ear to. Both charms raised Intelligence by twenty-five points, thus proving that it was possible to double the same accessory enchantment with an extra charm to a certain extent. The full extent of how many times with how many reductions, though, I did not care to find out.

With an overall thirteen-hundred mana, I felt like I was more than ready to solo the Hardcore Mode for Silk Spitter's Sepulcher. Even though the others only got their limit broken enchantments to the lower twenties, the compiling of all their personalized accessories and bangle stats made them more than capable of waltzing through the same dungeon we were originally worried about trying. With the same level of equipment as before!

By the time early morning rolled around with the return of the final team between Conansson and Stonewall- our slowest members- everybody was equipped with what could easily be equated with a minimum of level one hundred stats and equipment with no level present below forty-eight. Even among the familiars the lowest levels were now forty-one and forty-two for the owl escorts.

Thinking of Duck's improvements, I curiously open my menu windows to examine the information for Cweeper and Hermes.

[Name: Cweeper

Level: 43

Affinity: Darkness, Life, Void

HP: 260

MP:500

PATK:69

PDEF:98

MATK: 98

MDEF: 105 (+15% Magic Resistance) (+20% Dark/Fire Resistance)

MVSPD: 110%

Strength: 48

Endurance: 72

Agility: 61

Intelligence: 110

Willpower: 105

Luck: 100

Description: Cweeper is Dusk Imp Priestess that was Captured and Tamed by the first Classless Beast Master, Life Hack. As a Priestess variant, Cweeper is not only a creature of the shadows but connected to the nether dimensions as well as capable of some healing. After living under the heel of a Dusk Imp Summoner who used their blood for sacrificial rites, Cweeper has few skills but has the highest Intelligence of their generation.

Inventory: Savage Bound Bokuto, Goblin Hunter's Armor

Skills: Elemental Claw LV7 Dark Ailment LVMAX Shadow Merge LV4 Rift LV3 Soothing Touch LV15 Elemental Manipulation LV6 Fire Manipulation LV2 Wind Manipulation LV2 Water Manipulation LV2 Earth Manipulation LV2 Darkness Manipulation LV5]

[Name: Redcap Hermes

Level: 50

Affinity: Fire, Wind, Darkness

HP: 520

MP:350

PATK:105

PDEF:102

MATK: 66

MDEF: 158 (+12 Magic Resistance) (+15 Elemental Resistance) (+10 Curse Resistance) (+5 Poison/Venom Resistance)

MVSPD: 140%

Strength: 75

Endurance: 108

Agility: 140

Intelligence: 108

Willpower: 103

Luck: 52

Description: Born and raised for the sole purpose of enacting vengeance on behalf of the upper echelons of goblin society, Redcap Hermes was trained by some of the most dangerous goblin warriors on the Imperial Continent only to end up bested by the bane of goblin kind, the reborn Goburin Sureya, Life Hack. In exchange for the chance to grow truly powerful, Hermes now serves Life Hack as his shadow guardian.

Inventory: Huntsman's Raiment, Ceremonial Goblin Scythe

Skills: Swordsmanship LV12 Flying Guillotine LV7 Staunch LV8 Burning Gale LV7 Wind Cutter LV6 Fireball LV7 Shadow Merge LV MAX Electric Aversion LV1 Spin Specialist Maneuverability 360 Edge LV3 Paralyzing Touch LV3 Elemental Manipulation LV3 Fire Manipulation LV3 Electric Manipulation LV1 Darkness Manipulation LV1]

I quickly realized two very important facts. My familiars were heavily lacking in the armor, weapons, and general stats department. For Cweeper, all of this was easily fixed. Hermes, though, presented some issues.

For both of these familiars I promptly transmuted and conduction enchanted two sets of six rings, two pairs of charm bangles, a pair of ornate double-charmed collars, and a pair of double-charmed earrings. Each set of six rings were each made with enchantments for each stat, and the bangles were then made into rainbow stat bangles. This immediately raised all of their stats by eighty points.

Cweeper, though, was given a double Willpower and Intelligence enchantments on her collar and earring. Hermes was given both doubled Endurance enchantments to increase his base defense because his armor was a slowly evolving type. With just this, though, I was able to raise both of their values by a rating of roughly one hundred monster levels.

Next I simply gave Cweeper the first Captain's Silk Standard whose set bonuses were all five percent stronger than the soldier version. With this, all of her stats once again soared even before I transmuted her old Bokuto into an 'Ancient Savage's Galvanized Elder Bokuto' that packed a whopping fifty-five damage. Sadly, I could not do this for either Hermes or Duck. Duck, however, could still be equipped with a set of six wrings and two rainbow bangles to boost all of her stats by one-thirty.

Turning my attention to the issues at hand with Hermes, I set to work solving one of the two problems behind his ancestral artifacts. The armor was too big of a problem to tackle without sleep, so I simply settled for upgrading his weapon. Now that I had real alchemy and enchanting skills, not only could I transmute various materials from my own bones but also with silk spitter chitin, and a few other leftover monster parts from various creatures.

In the end, I sacrificed an entire femur- mine- the sun eagle's beak, three pounds of Normal Mode dungeon boss chitin, and the bones from kobold tails to refine and enhance the Ceremonial Goblin Scythe. By the time I was done with just the materials and transmutation, the weapon increased by twenty damage into the mid-sixties.

After laying down several material and conduction enchantments, the damage rating once again rose by twenty points to an eighth tier weapon with a bonus MATK rating of fifty-six. It was officially the second best weapon in our party with a legendary gold name of 'Unchained Spirit Scythe'. With this, Hermes had attack and health stats comparable to the Easy Mode mini bosses.

Cweeper alone had the overall offensive and defensive capabilities of an elite monster or mini-boss based on physical and magical attack and defense ratings alone. Add in the absurd amount of HP and MP as well as the rest of her bolstered stats and she was nearly equal to Hermes in overall combat power. Hermes, though, would always have more power in the physical department while her magical abilities were pushed beyond natural limits.

Now, everybody else just needed to follow suit by updating the equipment of their familiars. Most of the imp warriors and lesser female imps had been given the original dusk slaying armor secondhand once we all got the newer versions from the armorer. However, the newer versions were no longer appropriate to outfit the familiars with considering the new materials and methods.

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