Chương 114: B2 Chapter 21 - Great Spirits

"Quisel?" I walked up to the man, while ignoring another warning that this particular NPC used vulgar language.

"Weren't you supposed to become the king of the underworld or something?"

"Fuck—" He coughed repeatedly.

"—you." He sipped booze, only to cough again and spit out most of what was in his mouth. He wheezed out words like a cigarette addict with his lungs full of smoke.

"You brought any booze?" Holy mother of alcohol, I thought. I summoned a health potion.

"Yeah, drink this." He uncorked it without looking and took a large swig. His lips touched the red liquid, the contents disappeared. Health and mana potions just required slight contact with the mouth to make drinking them more pleasant. The potion immediately took effect, healing Quisel's weary throat. He blinked, suddenly less drunk, and said, "Hey, what the fuck?"

"Feeling better?" I asked.

"Better?" he blurted out." Better?! Do you know how hard I've worked tonight? Fifteen hours of battling with this shitty ale, and now that I'm finally drunk, you hit me with that healing shit!"

"Uh, my apologies."

"And that's after I gave you a favor!" He waved with his arms like a crazy person.

"You goddamned saints; don't tell me you're telling me to go to the temple! I will not! I do not have a problem with alcohol; the bottles go down very easily, thank you very much!"

"No, no, I'd never send you to rehab," I said.

"We're here, uh, to make an offer."

"And that would be?" His glare remained on me, until I said, "How about… We'll buy you three barrels of pure liquor, and all you need to do is examine and bond a few spirits for us. How's that?" Slowly, his scowl turned to a grin.

"Three barrels, eh? Now we're talking. As long as it's not some orc shit from Clamad, we've got a deal."

"The choice will be yours," I said and grinned at Veyra from the successful trade. She rolled her eyes but smiled. I accepted the trade. Quisel, the drunk, ascended to a godlike being. His toes hung down from his feet as he floated in the air, eyes golden and clothes now shiny with a divine glow. The drunken mumbling was replaced by a perfectly mature voice.

"Offer your spirits, adventurer." I started from worst to best, offering him the tiny spirits. The little specks of light floated around Quisel like pet butterflies. A few seconds later, a list of their abilities appeared. I skimmed through. We had eight of them in total, and unsurprisingly, most of the tiny spirits weren't very good. They all had a sixty second active ability with a five minute cooldown, and they offered a minor buff to various stats.

A few were useless, since they buffed fire magic and healing spells, but one landed a lucky affinity for me. Minor Spirit Of Souldrain Rarity: Tiny Spirit Abilities: Minor Souldrain: The Spirit of Souldrain sulks in the void, slowly losing the remains of what once fueled life. Life-draining effects are increased by 10%. Duration: 60 seconds. Cooldown: 300 seconds.

"The sickle has a life-draining effect, right?" I asked. We double-checked, and [Haunt] was indeed improved. For a tiny spirit, a ten percent increase to that wasn't bad at all. Still, the tiny spirits didn't make much of a difference even with all of them equipped. A lot of them weren't even worth equipping.

"Is it possible to remove spirits after they're bonded?" I asked.

"Always," Quisel said.

"After a bond has been formed, spirits can be detached and reattached at will. A bondsmith is only required to transfer spirits to different souls." I turned to Veyra.

"Then, we should just equip the useless spirits as well. There's a chance we drop one on death. The more junk we have, the less likely we'll be to drop a good one."

"Yep," she said.

"Hopefully they're not all trash, though." The small spirits came next. We had a total of six, four from Veyra and two from me. We offered them to Quisel. The animation went through, and he gave us a list. My eyes immediately drew to two out of the bunch. Lesser Spirit Of The Rogue Wanderer Rarity: Small Spirit Abilities: Lesser Rogue Wanderer: The spirit of the rogue wanderer abandoned his sect for an endless search of purpose. Increase the effectiveness of monster avoidance by 25%. Duration: 60 seconds.

Cooldown: 300 seconds.

"Oh shit, look at that," I said, while Veyra was already rolling her eyes. Most players would have probably considered that one garbage. It just reverted all the nerfs the stat had received and a little bit more. However, if I maxed out on monster avoidance, I was fairly sure I could cheese the monster AI in some ways with this. The other one was more powerful for PvP. Lesser Spirit Of Strength Rarity: Small Spirit Abilities: Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent.

Report any sightings. Lesser Strength: The Spirit Of Strength fought wars not for nations, but for the thrill of combat, fighting warriors from both sides of the war. Increase Attack Power by 250. Duration: 60 seconds. Cooldown: 300 seconds.

"Well, you're getting lucky," Veyra said, mostly smirking at the monster avoidance spirit.

"That might as well be a mythic item for your build." I laughed at the joke, but kept studying the four other small spirits. They were, kindly put, trash. Lesser Spirit Of Nature was good for a healer, and Lesser Spirit Of Waterfall offered slight mana regeneration. That was decent for Veyra, but other than that, she hardly got anything out of the smaller spirits. Ideally, both of us would get good spirits to avoid falling behind.

"All of those barely matter," I said.

"We have two large spirits and two great spirits. These better be good." I handed over the first spirit, ripping the bandaid off, and nervously watched Quisel's divine animation as he showcased its stats. Spirit Of Wraithwood Rarity: Large Spirit Abilities Wraithwood: Summoning skills call for ancient wraiths that once inhibited the abyssal forests. All summon skills spawn a ghost-variant, increasing their damage by 35% and turning damage to spectral damage. Ghost summons are immune to crowd controlling effects.

Duration: 60 seconds. Cooldown: 300 seconds. At the end of duration, revert summons to their original state. I stared at it blankly.

"Well, that's a piece of crap."

"Definitely not," Veyra said.

"I know players that would kill for that. Summons that immune crowd control? That's insane."

"Not for us. Maybe we can sell it, I guess. Next one." I handed the last large spirit to Quisel. Spirit Of Peace Rarity: Large Spirit Abilities: Peace: The Spirits Of Peace weep upon harm. Lock all offensive spells and damage-enhancing spells, making them unusable. Healing and defensive spells are 75% more effective. Duration: 60 seconds. Cooldown: 300 seconds.

"Well," Veyra said, "shit."

"Wow," I said.

"That's really good again, is it not? And it's trash."

"These spirits," Quisel said in his annoyingly divine voice, "hold the power of the creators." I breathed in. There was no reason to complain. We already got a mythic evolution stone from this boss fight. The spirits were just a bonus. I sure would have liked something usable, though.

"Please, show us something we can use, Quisel," I said and handed my greater spirit. Quisel's body glowed much brighter, until his aura turned dark, like a beautiful starry night. His eyes turned into glowing purple globes, and the stats of the spirit became visible. Greater Spirit Of Moonlight Rarity: Great Spirit Abilities: Greater Moonlight: The Spirits of Moonlight dreams of the surface, where they once witnessed the beauty of a full moon.

Casting Dark Magic stores a duplicate of the spell cast inside the caster's staff or casting orb. At three stacks, activate Moonlight, re-casting lesser versions of all spells stored. Duration: 60 seconds. Cooldown: 300 seconds.

"Oh wow," I said, turning to Veyra.

"That's good with your boots, no?" She studied the effects details intently. Her hands remained on her lap. She rubbed her thigh only with the fingers of her right hand, almost like she forgot she wasn't paralyzed when she focused. How cute, I thought.

"That could be strong for sure," she said, still studying the effects.

"Not with my current build, though."

"You'll need to respec to dark magic. That's strong enough to consider it, I'd say."

"I wouldn't do a full respec. One or two dark magic spells at most. Now that we've leveled up, I should have the skill points for one. I'll try crafting a build tonight."

"Can't wait to see what you come up with," I said. I then took a deep breath.

"One more. Surely this is good as well, right?"

"How about another monster avoidance buff?" Veyra asked.

"Infinite cup noodles, maybe?"

"Oh fuck yeah," I said.

"Quisel, please show me something good." I felt like a kid putting a coin in an arcade machine, or maybe like a gambler sliding in the chips for a table max bet on a blackjack table, as I handed the final great spirit to Quisel. This time, his divine aura switched to grey. Greater Spirit Of Impenetrable Bulwark Rarity: Great Spirit Abilities: Impenetrable Bulwark: The spirits of defence call for power from the ground itself. Upon activation, share the spiritual bond with another player.

Damage taken by a member of the bond will be directed to the member with the most health. Defensive abilities are 50% more effective when protecting the member of the bond. Duration: 60 seconds. Cooldown: 300 seconds. I stayed quiet, wondering whether that was useful in any way. I was far from jumping from joy.

"A tank spirit?" I asked.

"Interesting," Veyra said.

"I mean, that's useful. I don't think blocking is considered a defensive ability though."

"Yeah, that's useless for me," I said, biting my lip.

"I suppose I'll take it if that's okay with you," Veyra said.

"Most monsters can pierce Elemental Barriers here. I'd ideally not want to place any more skills points to barriers. The spirit could help a decent bit."

"Yeah, it's useless for me," I said.

"It's yours." Quisel bonded both great spirits to Veyra, and that was that. All of the spirits from Shaltar were now bonded. Were they any good? I wasn't sure. Veyra was smiling, though.

"I see potential, especially with the moonlight spirit. I think I have ideas for a small respec."

"You'll be completely overpowered now," I said.

"Looks like you'll have to carry me for a bit."

"Hey, your build is still good even without upgrades," she said in a soft tone.

"These favor me a lot more this time, though. I'll be pretty much maxed out if I upgrade my staff."

"I'll catch up," I said.

"Don't start thinking you'll run from me. We haven't looted the castle yet." She laughed. Quisel's glowing aura lit her grin. Her eyebrows rose, remembering something.

"Oh, do you remember the global notification after we got the spirits? It was something like, ' players with the most spirits can command castles?' Does that mean we can take Shaltar's place?"

"That would be awesome if it's true," I said.

"We'll need to visit the throne room next." Veyra checked the time, and the grin fell slightly.

"I'll have to leave it for tomorrow, though. I, uh, have a lot of things to do before you get here."

"Alright," I said, stretching.

"Good session. I could use a break as well."

"Sorry that I can't stay to push our advantage," Veyra said.

"Annath would have pressured me to stay for sure. My schedule really doesn't fit frontrunning right now…"

"Honestly, if the decision is frontrunning an event or visiting you, I'll choose the latter," I said.

"And we're so far ahead, we could play for half the hours and still frontrun."

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," she said with an amused smile.

"Thanks for the loot, and—" A groan came from the side. The divine glow disappeared, and Quisel, the drunkard, collapsed on the ground.

"Fuck," he mumbled, coughing. We turned back to him. He'd kind of just floated in the air for a while Veyra and I chatted. He frowned up at me.

"The deal. Three barrels of pure spirit!" Veyra shrugged at me.

"Anyway, good night, Aiden. See you tomorrow."

"See you." She logged off, and I was faced with Quisel. I sighed.

"Don't tell me you shitheads will back down now!"

"No, no," I said.

"The choice is yours, as promised. I'll buy three barrels right now. The best stuff there is." He frowned at me, as if wondering whether I was about to scam him.

"I hope you know you're currently the strongest person in this castle. You could easily take command and make a difference for the lives of drunkards like me. Free alcohol for all, I'd say." I chuckled.

"Sure, man. I'll use Shaltar's vault for a free round of alcohol for everyone in the city. Just tell me what to buy first so I can log off."

What followed was a rather slow quest of following our alcoholic bondsmith through tunnels, to a brewery on the poorer side of town, where apparently the strongest spirits were being made. I bought Quisel his alcohol for a single gold piece before logging off for the day.