Chapter 855 - A home for the court (Patreon)

“You found a way!” Hera gasped.

“We did, a way for you to make a private room for your court,” Peaches nodded.

“But there are some restrictions. If we do something like that, or the MAZE does it, then you have more freedom. For you to do it, only a few things will be possible.” Fritz added.

Hera nodded, “Yeah. I wasn’t expecting to make a one-to-one copy of things. I just wanted to be able to let them still be around while they are not out.”

“Yeah, that part would work. At least we think so,” Lodi was sitting on the ground, with her arms and legs crossed, “The thing is… Legacies are finicky. Even for someone as amazing as Peaches.”

“What does that mean, exactly?” Nimbus asked.

“It means my winged friend. That even without combined efforts, we will never be able to make a skill directly for the legacy itself. Alas, fret not. For we are neigh omnipotent and were still able to create a skill that would serve as a home for you and your brethren,” Capri opened a big smile.

“Really? The skill you came up with is not even part of the legacy?” Hera gasped.

“Yep,” Nina nodded, “We did try, but it was a moot point. Like Capri said. We can’t interact with a legacy directly. So we can only make something that might seem like a good idea to add to itself.”

“It’s kind of like fishing. And the skill we make is just some bait we are dangling in front of it. Even if we believe the bait is perfect for the fish, it might just decide it doesn’t want it,” as Kelp finished speaking, everyone was starting at him, “What?”

“I just… didn’t expect a fishing analogy from the fish,” Livy tilted her head.

“I don’t know why. In all honesty, it just seems more likely,” Kelp huffed, crossing the arms of his water fueled suit in front of him.

“Why is that?” Hera asked, “I mean. Why can’t you make something directly for a legacy?”

Peaches thought for a second, “That’s a bit complicated, kid. Do you mind tellings us what do you know about how legacies come to be so we know how to explain?”

“Sure. Let’s see… Legacies are what happens when someone…” Hera paused, “Actually. I don’t know if it has to be a person. Can a monster create a legacy?”

“They can. It takes much longer for them to make one, but they can,” Lodi added.

“Lodi! Can you say something like that?” Tara gasped, knowing about all the restrictions they had surrounding sharing information.

“I can. I already told Hera about the monster. And it was pretty obvious that what it could do was related to a legacy. If she didn’t connect the dots, that’s not on me. Besides, the system isn’t nagging me, so it’s fine,” Lodi shrugged.

Lurize snapped his fingers, “Oh! Do you mean that monster that was guarding a doorway in your room?”

“That’s the one. The whole fake system window it could do. Part of its legacy,” Lodi nodded.

“Well, then… fuck. That makes me worried about the higher layers. How many monsters will have legacies up there?” Hera frowned.

“More than you would like, but less than you might think,” Nina quickly replied, but all the guides refused to elaborate.

“Ok. Back to the topic at hand. Legacies are what happens when someone, or something. Raises a skill to the maximum rank, and then goes beyond it. That rank increase, from a skill at master rank to something else is what creates the legacy. And it will be related to the actual skill, but also expand based on the skills that the person used to improve that master skill. So like. If someone is going to make a running legacy. The other skills that helped increase the rank of that running skill will influence the legacy. So maybe, stamina, improved regeneration, sprinting, parkour. All those will be bundled up and become a legacy,” Hera continued.

“That’s about right, kid. But why it does that?” Peaches asked.

“Why?” Hera tilted her head.

“Yeah, why?”

“I… don’t know. It just does. The system rewards people for their hard work. Isn’t that it?”

“Not quite,” Peaches shook his body.

“Ok. Do you remember the curse? How it was something the system couldn’t handle?” Talpa asked.

“Yeah. It was like a loophole. Something that was able to go between the laws the system had in place to fuck with it,” Hera nodded.

“Right. Legacies are kind of like that, but not loopholes. How can I put it…” Talpa frowned.

“It’s something that is part of the system, while it isn’t. Like a not all everything that lives underwater is a fish, but all fish live underwater,” Kelp said with a smile. The guides seemed to agree with what was being said.

Livy rubbed her temple, “I think I say for all of us when I ask. What?”

“What what?” Kelp turned to the Leviathan.

“That. What you just said. How can something made by the system not be part of the system?”

Tara raised her tail, making sure to keep her witch hat covering most of her face, “Can I try to explain?”

“Go for it,” Peaches gave an approving nod. Hearing that, the Ophidianite ancestor pulled a small notepad and started reading.

“So, from what you told me. Legacies are like self contained version of the system that have their own set of rules that are less restrictive than the actual system. However, legacies have a ‘budget’, of sorts. A certain amount of rules they can bend to create more powerful effects. Using that budget also requires the legacy to give a penalty to its holder as a way to balance things,” Tara looked up. It took her just a moment to realize that she was the center of attention, making her pull her hat down and mumble, “Or at least that’s what I understood when we were talking about it.”

“That is actually a pretty good way to put it,” Peaches smiled.

“The information might be correct, but your presentation lacked flair. Still, the magnanimous me approves,” Capri nodded, “Alas. I must add one piece of knowledge that was missing from your speech. The reason a legacy is created is because the owner of a skill that has been fully mastered is able to push that skill to a state that the system itself did not account for.”

“So, a legacy is created when someone breaks the system?” Crimson asked.

“That is one way to put it. And it has to be related to a skill. If you break something else, then we have a curse like issue,” Nina grabbed a few of the chips that were still in the middle of the table but no one was eating them.

“If you don’t mind. I have a side question about this,” Viper moved forward to be more visible to everyone.

“Sure, shoot,” Lodi replied.

“Can any skill become the origin of a legacy? Even the ones that can’t rank up?”

“All skills can rank up. And the master rank of any skill is 10. Well, technically 11. Since the 11th is the actual ‘master rank.’ Oh, but that doesn’t apply for legacy skills. Those have their own rules. And role skills. Those only have the base rank,” Talpa explained.

“Wait. Really? I have skills that know for not having another rank,” Hera frowned.

“Which ones?” Nina asked.

The Empress quickly opened her status windows and checked, “Exponential Growth, Mana Vessel, Treasure Map, Elemental Mana Mastery, and Toxic Mist. None of them are showing their rank.”

“That means that you, specifically, can’t increase the rank of those skills. You are missing something to be able to do that. I can be another skill, or you have to do a certain thing in order to unlock the ability to rank them up. It is rare to find a skill like that. But that means the skills can get significant boosts when they rank up,” Nina explained.

“I see..” Hera stared at her status screen, trying to figure out what were the requirements for those skills.

“Kid, before we lose you. Can we talk about the skill we figured out?” Peaches asked.

“Yeah. Sorry we got really sidetracked. What do you need to tell me?”

Fritz took a step forward, “Ok. So the skill we want to teach you is called ‘Mana Palace.’ Well… actually, it’s a variation on that one.”

“You probably heard a similar term before, Mind Palace. It’s famous in detective stories. You know, that thing about imagining files or books with the topics you know about to then pick them up when you need? That is a skill that exists, but in this case it is for spells,” Kelp added.

“People use that one as a quick way to remember a spell or an enchantment. We tweaked that one to store summoned weapons and creatures. But, to store one ant, you would need about 5 billion mana per second. But that’s only because it is a living creature. If it was just a dead ant, the cost would drop to just a few hundred,” Nina explained.

“You killed something to check that?” Hera asked.

“No, we found a dead ant and tested with it,” Talpa corrected.

“But inside,” Lodi turned to the screen on the wall of the private room, “Do you mind if I use this?” after getting a nod of approval, she changed the view. From a mountain top view to a simple corridor, with a blank room in front of it. There was only a table and a bed inside, “Here. This is what it can look like. Together with the skill, a few guides worked to make a program that lets you visualize how things look inside. Kind of like one of those house building games. This is just a way to help you, since the interior will be based on how you think about things. But having a house plant ready, you can just tell the skill ‘make it like this,’ and it will work. Also, you can have like a garden, a pool or whatever. Just keep in mind that everything has its mana cost.”

“Ok,” Hera nodded. A part of her wanted the court members to be able to change things in their rooms, but having to make any modifications herself wouldn’t be that bad.

“Again, we don’t know for sure how this will interact with your legacy. And things might change if the skill gets added to it,” Kelp continued, “But we also managed to add one thing. This is the reason why the amount of mana needed for each thing inside the palace can get so high. You said that your court shares their senses with you?”

Hera shook her head, “It’s the other way around. They can see through me and through each other. I can’t do that. But I can know what they know during a fight or something.”

“Right. That’s what I meant. So in addition to all this. Inside the Mana Palace, every member of your court will get a tablet or something similar that they can access. Through it, they can watch what you are doing, hear what you are hearing, and send you messages from inside the palace. Otherwise, you won’t be able to communicate with them,” Kelp finished his explanation.

“That’s really cool. Will they be able to use those tablets, or whatever they are to watch movies and things like that?”

Peaches nodded, “They can, kid. That was one thing that I worked out with Tara. Basically, the Mana Palace can use the game they made as a router to connect to the internet. But you need to have your tablet with you and be able to connect to the internet. Another thing. Games are more complicated. Single player ones, or things that don’t use the internet will work fine. If they want to play something that has a lot of players that becomes more of a problem. You need to connect your tablet to a computer and then the computer will be recreated inside. Sending messages to other people is also something they can’t do all the time. A specific app will have to be open in your tablet to allow for that communication. And it has to be open, not just running in the background. The tech part is really complicated, but basically sending a message to someone and searching for something are very different things even if they look like they are similar. Doing anything like that will drain some mana, unless you have the files already downloaded on something that is on you. I know it sounds a bit weird, but that’s the only way we managed to make this work.”

“Wow, that is amazing! Thanks! It must have been a lot of work to make this skill,” Hera opened a big smile.

“Yeah, it was. But it was fun. It’s been a while since we had to figure out something like that,” Nina smiled back.

“Alas, if you accept this, then comes a different problem. How to deliver said skill to your self. Even the magnanimous me is unable to simply give it to you,” Capri shook his head, “However. We can give you a quest for it!”

“A quest?” Hera asked.

“Yep. It’s going to sound kind of big. But it has to match the type of skill and this is a big one. So, if you liked the way we set everything up, we can give you the quest. If not, we can go back to the drawing board to see what else we can come up with,” Lodi said.

“No need. I loved it. What is the quest?” Hera was smiling from ear to ear.

“Like we said, it’s a big one. But one that will be solved one way or another,” Peaches turned to Tara, “You are the ancestor. Care to do the honors?”

“Ok,” Tara nodded and looked towards the Ophidianite. There was a pause, and a notification appeared in front of her.

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Quest Acquired

Struggle of the Strength Spirits
The Strength Spirits are struggling to survive in their home. End their struggle.

Rewards:
Skill: Mana Palace
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