MMORPG : Ancient WORLD

Chapter 525 Skill Upgrades

'I expected there to be changes but not of this level,' Alex thought, feeling stunned as he looked at the changes to his physique stat panel.

Alex had planned to pick the upgraded versions of his old skills, with few exceptions like the air walk and arcane parry because, at the current stage, those utility skills were useless to him, but before doing anything, he decided to check his status window.

Alex found no visible changes except his Ancient bloodline having grown to 6%, a slight increase which brought no visible changes or unlocked any new skills from his physique, or so he thought until he saw the massive changes.

Alex had acquired two physical traits from his physique, namely the Eyes of the Ancient and the Heart of the Ancient.

In addition, he had acquired five skills, each one with a great use case, but it would be a lie to say that besides the darkness manipulation, every other skill was becoming less and less useful in battle, since even when his Rank was increased using the Ruler's pride, they gained little to no boost unlike all his class-specific skills.

Alex knew the skills he had were great, but he had outgrown them, just like the majority of skills he could get from normal armor and weapons. But it seemed that was about to change in a major way.

'I will need to do a lot of testing to realize the potential of this beauty,' Alex thought, looking at the changed description of the very first physical trait he had received from his physique.

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Name: Eyes of the Ancient

Grade: Unique

Effect: Grant the user the ability to see the truth of the cosmos.

Description: The eyes possess the ability to penetrate illusions, peer into other realms, perceive the world in nuanced shades of black and gray with exceptional clarity and focus, and discern the subtle movements of mana and cosmic energies with unmatched precision.

The eyes possess the ability to manipulate the perceptions of others, ranging from simple illusions like fractured sight and echoes of doubt to unseen puppeteer cords, each capable of compelling beings to dance according to the user's wishes.

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While the description vaguely described some of what Alex could do once he learned to use the said abilities, the brief description did not do justice to the things he could do with his eyes.

While the first half was self-explanatory, the illusion-based abilities were quite vague and also very complicated to wield.

The first ability, called Fractured Sight, allowed Alex to manipulate the perspective of others, putting one or many in an illusion and forcing them to perceive the world through a shattered lens, making them see walls bleed, loved ones appear monstrous, and causing their sanity to fray with each passing moment.

The second ability, called Echos of Doubt, allowed him to plant one or many seeds of doubt in the minds of his targets, which grew at a slow pace but, if not dealt with properly, had the potential to ruin a individual and make them go insane.

The Unseen puppeteer Cord was the best, as it allowed Alex to make someone his puppet without them finding out or even someone else noticing, at least not unless someone of a high enough Rank was intensively looking for the abnormality hidden deep within the target.

However, each of these skills came at a cost, either a high mental drain depending on his target and usage, or with heavy restrictions to successfully trigger them.

The second trait was the Heart of the Ancient, but besides receiving an upgrade to its existing attributes, it did not receive any additional changes.

The same was true with the darkness manipulation, which was expected since it was already at the perfect stage.

The skill Tenebrous Shard Enclave, which he used the most in battle to create a dome of darkness to boost his darkness attacks and suppress other individuals, also received a major upgrade, just like all other skills from his physique.

The Dark Enclave Alex could create was no longer restricted to a mere hundred meters and, could be stretched indefinitely, with each extra hundred meters costing him half a million points of mana to create and 100k mana per minute to maintain.

The next skill was the Darkness Embrace, which also received a major upgrade. Now the dense swamp of abyssal darkness could be stretched as far as Alex desired, with each additional hundred meters costing him an extra 100k mana to create and an additional 100k to maintain it for every minute.

The real upgrade was the small pocket dimension linked to the abyssal swamp, brimming with potent darkness that could gradually dissolve anything it took in its embrace.

Alex could also expel all its contents at once or retrieve specific things with enough practice. The best part was that the only extra cost of using the pocket dimension was two million points of mana once he activated the skill.

Alex could also choose not to use the pocket dimension and just use the normal version of the skill to engulf his enemies in a flood of growing darkness that eroded away their flesh and blood in a few minutes.

The following skill, Nihility Purge, similarly obtained a major boost as now it could erase all cosmic aspects, which basically included elemental energies, aura, ki, radioactive energies of the Iron Empire, and so on.

The last skill, Devourer, which had made the path to stat maximization much less challenging, obtained a significant boost. Now Alex could also absorb the secrets of flesh, including skills, knowledge, and even memories.

The advantage was that he could choose which specific aspect to extract, but once something was extracted, it became a part of him and could not be removed, especially the fragmented memories, as the skill did not have such an option available.

'Let's see if Erebus has some good abilities prepared for me, seeing how this will be the last time normal skills will give me any real benefits,' Alex pondered as he closed the status window and shifted his sight to the skill page.