The Fool's Freedom

Level up!

You have reached level 89 in [Warlock]!

+ 3 Attribute Points

+ 1 Mind, Will, and Magic

Level up!

You have reached level 90 in [Warlock]!

+ 3 Attribute Points

+ 1 Mind, Will, and Magic

…

Level up!

You have reached level 99 in [Warlock]!

+ 3 Attribute Points

+ 1 Mind, Will, and Magic

Level up!

You have reached level 100 in [Warlock]!

+ 3 Attribute Points

+ 1 Mind, Will, and Magic

Please advance to the next tier to level up!

Please advance to the next tier to level up!

Please advance to the next tier to level up!

You have acquired a new dormant bloodline: Void Dragon.

Attention! Your bloodline has begun transforming due to the influence of your race.

Bloodline transformation progress: 0%

Bloodline awakening progress: -

Congratulations! You’ve reached level 100!

To advance to the next tier –

Recalculating…

To advance to the next tier and receive access to class selection please fulfill the following requirements.

1. Awaken a part of your transformed bloodline.

2. Advance a skill to the Ancient tier.

3. Gain at least two insights. – Current 1/2

4. Kill a tier two beast or the equivalent class holder. Alternatively, kill five class holders at level 100.

Alan’s head was ringing, along with his body as the system messages came one after the other. He wasn’t exactly sure what was happening, nor why he had done what he had done. It had simply felt right in the moment. He hoped his intuition hadn’t misled him.

His participation in the strange ritual all felt like a single second that had stretched into an eternity. He wasn’t sure if the world had frozen or if his mind was simply refusing to acknowledge the passage of time.

The power that washed over Alan and permeated his being was more foreign than anything he had felt so far. It came with an aura of ancientness, something that was born on the very apex of existence and had remained there for all of time. Unshaken and unbroken.

A dragon’s roar woke him up from the stupor he had fallen into. It came from inside of him, rather than the outside. He was not sure what was happening. Most of the turbulent energy passing through him returned to the dragon itself, but remnants stayed with him. Small enough to handle, and strong enough to alter his very being.

His enchanted skeleton, his muscles, his tendons and organs, and most of all his blood were all… changing. It was a small change, insignificant in the grand scheme of his organism. However, he knew it was just another beginning. Another path to power. A supplementary one.

To think he had just become a shadowless and fundamentally altered himself with his choices. To think he was going to undergo another major change so soon… it was insane, but here he was, reaping the benefits of his luck, and his foolishness. It remained to be seen what they led to.

As far as he saw it, the System just went along with it all.

Time flowed again and the current of energy suddenly cut off. Alan struggled to move, his whole body on fire. He looked at the others around. The dragon remained still, and its presence felt much weaker than it had before. Or was it weaker for Alan and just the same as it had been? There was something else that shocked him too. Alan could swear he felt turbulent emotions that didn’t belong neither to him, nor to the shadows that were one with him.

Could it be?

Arrogance like a blazing sun.

Anger that could end the world.

Loneliness as heavy as a mountain.

And finally… pain. So much pain and emptiness that it almost made Alan’s eyes tear up.

He knew anger and loneliness, and he knew pain well. He had been called arrogant quite a few times, although that had never been a result of his ego or belief in himself. It was simply a defense against the world. Armor to be worn on the outside, over his weak and frail body.

He shuddered. It was like seeing someone close to him suffer. And that… made him angry too.

He turned with a snarl that was not his own and the shadows around him silently flowed along.

The [Red Cleric] was a husk of crystalized flesh that slowly tipped over and shattered into fine dust – the same as the crystals that had been part of the ritual. He hadn’t noticed how her fate had come and felt a pang of guilt for not saving her. However, her sacrifice had brought him benefits, or at least it seemed so. Just a step further and he would know what Tier Two was.

The shadows were oddly silent around him, but their presence was still there and it was welcome. He was growing used to never being alone. Xil hadn’t spoken either and he briefly wondered if the demon had been dragged into the ritual. It didn’t seem the case – the prison cube was still safely tucked in his clothes.

Suddenly… he felt another connection. His [Curse: Stolen Life] had been transformed into a link that allowed him a glimpse of another too. Then, there was a wail. A tortured, torn wail that carried a sense of loss unlike any. Riasko!

Alan found what remained of the lisarni with his eyes. He could feel the pain and the loss. The desperation. He felt no empathy, however. Whatever emotions had wormed their way into him as he gazed at the poor cleric, or felt the suffering of the sleeping dragon were washed away. It was akin to seeing Bonez suffer, only not as intense. He had little reason to hate the lisarni, even if the former had been an asshole. But he had even less of a reason to care about his fate.

The lisarni was a remnant of his former self. His body was thin and disfigured and his scaly skin was falling as if it had rotted off. Riasko raised a single hand toward Alan, but nothing happened. There was no mana left in him, nor was there a sign of any skill coming.

However, out of nowhere Riasko’s body shuddered and the air cracked. Whatever barrier was obscuring them from view shattered like thin glass and the fractal shivered in its entirety while the formation lit up the sky as the clouds seemed to dissipate from the energy above.

“No!” Someone screamed.

Alan blinked. Riasko was gone as if he had never been there.

Alan looked toward the sky where Kalyntha had battled the tier two and his blood froze. There he was – the man controlling the dolls. His eyes were staring wide straight at Alan. There was no sign of Kalyntha or Zirida for that matter.

Something fell from the sky above and Alan quickly recognized the form of Wilbis, beaten and battered.

The second tier two was chasing him, square barrier wings at her back.

What the fuck is going on? Kalyntha and Ziri can’t lose… No.

“What did you do!?” The tier two screamed. His hand stretched out and Alan felt time slow down. Something wrapped around him - something invisible yet strong enough to cut him to pieces. His flesh screamed and time slowed down. He saw five puppets appear and fall toward him, their fists raised. Alan lifted his foot to flee but stopped himself. Run? Him? A scion of a race, an inheritor of the forgotten legacy, and now the owner of a dragon’s bloodline… RUN?!

“BORROW MY POWER… ONLY ONCE... ONLY ONCE! KILL! KILL! KILL THEM ALL!”

A familiar presence washed over and the invisible strings cutting him stopped stuck in his skin. His anger turned into a raging inferno and his will washed the surroundings like a wave, as if it was too strong to be contained, creating a circle of an utterly monochrome world around him.

You’re under the effect of [Bestowment].

You cannot resist.

You have been granted a temporary trait: [Dragon’s Might] (???)

You have been granted a temporary trait: [Dragon’s Endurance] (???)

You have been granted a temporary trait: [Dragon’s Focus] (???)

You have been granted a temporary trait: [Dragon’s Senses] (???)

You have been granted a temporary skill: [Void Dragon Leap] (???)

You have been granted a temporary skill: [Grasp of the Void Dragon] (???)

You have been granted a temporary skill: [Dragon’s Breath] (???)

Alan once again felt… different. It was happening so often lately, but this time beat all the others. It took only a moment and yet power, unbridled and untamed became his to control.

There was wrongness in it too. Something disagreed with the power flowing into him and he spat black blood, and weakness washed away the strength. He watched his hands and felt his body lose weight at a rapid pace, becoming a dried-out husk before a pump of his heart sent new blood through him. It made his muscles swell, and his skin regained its white-grey color.

His muscles felt strong like never before, and whatever minor injuries remained in his body healed in an instant. Misalignments, old pains, achy joints, and even his strangely behaving skeleton. All of it righted itself with impossible speed, producing cracks. He moved his forearm just a smidge and the strings wrapping around him broke as if they were grass.

The puppets landed near him and their fists instantly came like a hail from a distance. They were… slow. He didn’t feel the need to dodge. The arrogant anger inside of him, the will that had given him all, didn’t allow him to dodge something so weak. The first landed on him and Alan barely felt it.

Is this… strength? It feels so good.

He moved. A single step allowed him to reach in front of one of the puppets. His foot broke the ground he stepped on, making it crack and scream from the force. He had torn through the invisible fists rushing toward him as if they were thin dry branches and he was a herald of destruction.

His mind was blank as his hands reached, covered in shadows he didn’t remember summoning and looking like a mix between a human hand and a dragon’s claw.

The puppet’s head was soft, like warm butter. There was no System message coming as he crushed it into fine dust. Was this what having impossibly high Strength felt like?

It took him mere seconds to end the other dolls, then he looked up toward the horrified expression of the tier two.

[Void Dragon Leap] activated and Alan found himself in the sky. It had taken a moment and no effort at all. His hand grabbed at tier two who screamed and surrounded himself in a cocoon of strings. Alan’s claw didn’t penetrate it instantly, but it only took a bit of effort to tear off a piece and grin at the one hiding inside.

Then, he fell. The shadows moved with a mind of their own and the bottomless magic pool he now had churned. [Shadow Creation] allowed him to do whatever he wanted, but so far he hadn’t pushed things too far. It was hard. At least, it used to be.

Now it felt like flexing a single finger.

Two midnight black dragon wings formed behind him he shot up again. The tier two was… running for his life. Running from me? A tier two? Hahahaha!

The one that had been chasing Wilbis appeared standing on a barrier of light next to the puppeteer and the two seemed to flee together… toward the outpost.

Alan stretched his hand in their direction. [Grasp of the Void Dragon] made the air churn and the formation scream as cracks appeared on the dome of light above the clouds. Two draconic hands made of shadows appeared next to the fleeing duo and barred their path, trying to catch them. They narrowly missed the puppeteer who seemed to pull himself sharply to the side, no doubt utilizing his string.

The barrier mage created layers around herself, but they shattered under the might of the strange skill. Alan knew this was nowhere close to its limit. It was simply too strong for him to utilize properly.

Another leap brought him instantly next to the puppeteer and Alan inhaled. The [Dragon’s Breath] made out of darkness washed over the man, turning strings and the dolls that had appeared to protect their master into nothing, not even dust. A moment later the man shared their fate.

You have slain: Skinwalker [Puppeteer] (2-113)

That was… too easy. I wonder if I can fight the [Blackguard] like this.

The barrier mage screamed as Alan’s other hand wrapped around her throat. He held her there and surveyed the battlefield. The gazes of outpost guards and intruders alike were locked on him. He noticed Kalyntha, who seemed fine if a bit roughed up, and Zirida. The [Red Cleric] was wide-eyed and exhausted, but she too was alive. Many outpost members were coming now, having almost reached the place of battle, but they were late. They had missed most of it.

Alan couldn’t find a trace of Feyrith and Byrr, but he saw Wilbis, unconscious on the ground.

He felt his power waning and frowned. It was time to end this. The attacks of the barrier mage were nothing to him and he hadn’t even noticed them. She struggled, manipulating her mana and casting strange skills. It was all in vain as it took a single flick of the wrist for her life to end too.

You have slain: Skinwalker [Barrier Master] (2-106)

Alan turned toward the rest of the invaders, wondering if he should kill them as well. His gaze lingered on the sleeping dragon for a moment. [Grasp of the Void Dragon] washed the battlefield as tens of dark hands appeared and crushed the heads of each invader as if they were nothing. Alan ignored the messages and the feeling of taking so many lives. It didn’t matter to the current him. His resolve was unshakable.

He decided to land before the powers bestowed upon him disappeared and he lost control.

However, a strange tearing sound drew his attention and made him stop.

It had come from the direction of the outpost and he turned his gaze. There was a gaping crack in the world, above the peaks of the towers. Something passed through in a flash, but he couldn’t quite catch it.

The formation holding it all together shone with bright radiance one last time before it started slowly shattering. And without its support, the fractal started slowly falling apart.