Chapter 36

thanks for the help, aregatu !!

You have to think that once he can use to or is it wants he can use 2 auras, he can use attack and the prot ward to power level them both at the same time.

RanaSuilep

Hi, while I'm not the author, the schedule is once a week on RRL while he post every finisched chapter here, if I got it right. (Also when Patreon is 5 chapers ahead, then everyone gets a extra chapter)

Oliverthms

hi author , great novel, can you make some kinda of a schedule and announce it ?

whooops forgot the prereq

tibbish

Looking forward to this next chapter and seeing how all these changes come into play. I have been waiting a while to see if/when Rain will grind because in all the other chapters he doesn't seem to take full advantage of the massive Mana regen that he has. Thank you for the chapter SenescentSoul! I enjoyed it!

I'd argue that even summer is not urgent skill, he will likely not be able to rise it and health well to be useful in current endeavor. At least 3 days on summer, at least two on well, if he forgoes all other skills and activities, like in this chapter.

8Psycho

I agree; Rain ought to unlock his fave skill trees to tier 3, AND max his current skills - to unlock hidden skills - before spending skill points other than on [aura IFF]. Actually, he probably ought to unlock ALL skill trees to level 2, first - it's relatively cheap - just on the off chance that there's something there that would complement his current skill set nicely. Also, he ought to already plan for tier 4. Check how much XP it takes, check whether he can "cash in" class levels for the XP so he can spend more than his current level progress, do the math on how many levels' worth of XP it would take to reach tier 4 - and if levels are unrefundable, calculate at which class level he'd be able to afford tier 4.

Elaborate

Aura IFF is the single most important skill he currently has access to. *Nothing else* is worth acquiring until after unlocking all the Tier 2 skills of his 5 chosen trees. Unless those skills are *immediately* valuable, it is not worth spending his remaining three points until unlocking the Tier 3 skills of his 5 chosen trees. Of which he has sufficient experience to unlock two per day. Of the skills that we are currently aware of, and that he meets the prerequisites to select, Summer is the only one worth spending a point on, and that only to unlock Health Well. Shear is something that will very likely be taken eventually, but currently has very little value relative to Refrigerate and Immolate (remember it has double the mana cost of either of those). Something else worth noting - With the scale at which he is able to gain experience, it could be very lucrative for Rain to simply unlock *all* skill trees up to Tier 3, and act as an information broker of sorts. This should initially start by prioritizing the skill trees of his allies, and as favors to influential persons (Lavarro and her daughter Mahria, for example). Then open business trading information for funds as necessary, but preferably for services and information he does not have access to (class benefits & requirements). Compile all of this into a tome, to be sold and disseminated. If managed correctly, it could make him very wealthy &/or influential. It is worth noting that it would be a good idea to figure out *why* discussing personal stats and skills is taboo first. Though largely inconceivable to me, it is hypothetically possible there is a good reason for that, which may affect the above plan.

Muspellsheimr

IFF is a given, but I would say Summer and Health Well with the last skill point in reserve. The big reason is that he already has damage auras that cover nearly all situations. Having a way to self heal and regen from over health is more important than a different way to deal damage.

RanaSuilep

Rain now has 4 free skill points. Neat! My guess is he'll go Aura IFF for sure, along with Shear. After that... maybe it'd be worth checking out all the Tier 2 skills for the rest of his skill trees? It's not like he has anthing else to do with his exp now. I could see him just picking up Summer/Life Well too. I'm really enjoying this story, it even makes me want to write something of my own... Keep it up SenescentSoul!

Bombastus

Prismatic Intent is the skill that will let Rain use multiple auras at the same time, but he won't get to take it anytime soon. One of its pre-reqs is having a level in at least 15 (!) different auras. Rain currently has 7 auras. If he takes IFF next, the earliest he could take PI is at level 24.

Bombastus

i sure love my blue boxes

GrayReader

idk if we're on the same patreon, but it works fine on chrome. Either way Soul provides us epubs and pdfs which you can read on any number of applications. For other patreons though you can get a chrome plugin called EasyReader which will let you turn a post into any format you want.

ShadeByTheSea

Yeah seems to me they're trying to do a weird combo of Twitter/Reddit style comments and I think that is a pretty bad idea. Both of those comment systems aren't even that good on their own. A regular old forum style comment system would be better IMO. Failing that Discord is better than this.

tibbish

I assumed he'd go dual aura after Health. I remember it being fairly high on his list of to get stuff

tibbish

Patrion is and awful for reading and browsing, it loads slow its hard to maneuver around, comment system is trash, no way to sort them, no night version for the site etc etc.

Ole Halvorsen

Do you have a Discord server set up?

Muspellsheimr

Personally, I really enjoy the math. It makes his skill gains seem much more genuine to me. I would agree with you though, the giant list of all the skills at the start of the chapter isn't necessary, although I did find it useful to find what his current skill levels now are with the rank ups he got at the end of the chapter.

Backfire

i do think he'll get the health aura and well, but he has 1 more skill to choose from after that and Aura IFF... mostly I'm wondering what he'll pick for that one, before i figured he'd get a jump on the stamina season aura, but,,, if a force ward is around, I'd go for that instead... maybe he'll find another hidden skill tho~ we'll see

MagicWafflez

Tis a good problem to have lol.

DominusIgnis

On firefox android, random letters always pop up in the process of writing comment.

8Psycho

I know, right? Even to see them all I need to click "load more comments" like 30 times. I suppose it wasn't designed for this level of discussion.

SenescentSoul

Wow, Patreon's comment system truly is awful. Tried to edit an earlier comment, and accidentally deleted it instead, without a way to cancel or undo. Tried to make a reply to it through the still accessible reply button, but when I actually submit the comment, it just disappears...

Muspellsheimr

Please we all know he is getting the Health aura and forgoing any wards for a long while yet.

tibbish

I believe I agree.

SenescentSoul

Amen, brother

Ah bugger, all caught up, curse me and my poor impulse control, i should have come back to this fiction in a years time. Thanks for the chapter.

HenryMorgan

seems like you're not thinking about the future too much. go back and read through the auras he has available, and think about what he might get in the future and put 2 and 2 together. On top of the direct damage reduction auras, he's going to have permanent mana regen/stam regen/hp regen auras, defensive auras, STACKING offensive auras, velocity aura which can be used to fuck with their movement and make them trip over themselves, that force auras which might be able to apply a force to enemies, which might slow them down or something. Then theres the overcharge ability that he hasn't taken yet, but from what it says, it sounds like he'll be able to charge his 2 auras with mana, then release them all at once, like a wave. doing that with 2 auras at once, and the amount of mana he has, and with the force aura going through walls and shit, he'll be able to charge that up with tons of mana, release it, deal hundreds or thousands of damage all at once, while not even being in danger. and all of that is without him even having tier 3 abilities yet. Yeah, his defense is weak, but if nothing can even get near him, it doesn't matter. Yes, ranged attacks will be strong, but thats why he has armor, and he also will have those defensive auras in the future, along with velocity to allow him to dodge. plus more. He can always run if he needs.

ZaA

Something that has been bugging me, that Rain seems to not have considered. Lavarro was stated as going on these various quests specifically to help her daughter advance in level / experience. It seems like with Essence Well, it would be easy to barter for a position in the group, with payment being assistance hunting level 25+ essence monsters, with a fair division of found loot. That it would snub the girl's father should just make it easier to agree to, and would additionally provide Rain with a working connection to an influential party. Edit: If I understand correctly, Essence Well's mana cost is defined by the transfer rate, at ( tr / 0.2 ), so anything that modifies that will adjust the 'base' cost. Because Channel Mastery affects both the amplitude *and* the cost separately and at the same rate, it is modifying the transfer rate by [multiplier], and modifying the cost at [multiplier]^2. So at 50% intensity, it is halving the transfer rate while quartering the cost? If correct, Essence Well at 20% has a 100% efficiency, while lower has a net gain of mana. 200% efficiency at 10% transfer rate should be doable at his current skill level, and can be maintained for >3 hours before he runs out of mana, for total mana given >11,000. Alternating between that & Winter to recharge, he can give >3,000 mana an hour to his party, without ever going below 75% mana himself if timed correctly..

Muspellsheimr

... I said it was not in the cards YET, damn it. When he will open up Tiers 2 & 3 we will see.

8Psycho

With iff his auras fully leveled using 2-3 offencive auras on one person should stop anyone and with him gaining bonuses per aura level to power and range he can already do what 30 to 40 metres? Imagine at 300 aura levels bonus.....

Zed

when is he gonna realize that he need to contribute to his other stats een with an 7/3 distribution the fact that he is weak and dont truly have an attack style magic spell kinda just piss me off. like really you are in an hostile world where you already experienced that most people cant be trusted with deadly monsters and you wont choose an attack spell to defend yourself.........REALLY come on at some point this need to be fix cause the way i see it our main character deserve to die because he treating the world that he is living as a fantasy not thinking he will die

terrance smith

eh~ I'm sure rare is relative. they're rare on the surface, but everyone in the guild has killed at least one, and people farm lairs. getting one might be dangerous, but I'm sure there exist dungeons that have them.

MagicWafflez

we don't know yet that physical ward is not in the cards, he hasn't unlocked tier 3 for defensive wards, but each type of tier 2 didn't have any prerequisites, so he might be able to get it.

MagicWafflez

Haven't some of the other people in story already said they're hard to come by though? Even in high level areas?

tibbish

Physical ward is not in the cards as of yet. Ward is naturally used to protect party, not oneself. Mc is yet to find out what role he will play best in the party during battle.

8Psycho

he doesn't need channel mastery maxed for [Aura IFF], just extend, amplify, and focus. it makes sense since channel mastery was a hidden skill, so it wouldn't be listed as a prerequisite for a non-hidden skill (no point in hiding it then xD)

MagicWafflez

eh, they're rare here because this is a rank zero area. to find monsters he'd have to either go into a dungeon or go to a higher ranked area.

MagicWafflez

if he's going to get any kind of ward, it will be a physical damage one. most other dmg types are done using magic, and his armor will negate a good portion of that. maybe some other time~ there is also the issue that, if he has a ward up, he'll be stuck without a method of attack... at least until he can get Prismatic Intent

MagicWafflez

Yeah his major limitation for getting new skills and leveling at this point is finding more special higher level monsters to kill that'll allow him to level again. Which seem to be fairly rare

tibbish

I'm a little confused. He only gained 5 levels in channel mastery right? and he was level 4 before it, so he can't get IFF yet can he? Needs 1 more level in channel mastery right? Oh, nope not channel mastery at all, but aura focus/amplify/extend

Critical Hit

Hmmm, as his [channel mastery] increases, he'll be able to amass more and more XP. Any meta-skill like [aura IFF] plugged into [essence well]+[channel mastery](-) is just going to accumulate XP near-constantly., because he'll be able to have it ON near-constantly. When he gets [channel mastery] a bit higher, he'll be able to start with [velocity]; the horse will be able to get used to it over time if he starts it on 5% or so (by comboing with high-but-not-level-10 [aura IFF]) and gradually upping it until the cart is practically flying... Speaking of 'flying', I wonder whether maxing [velocity] will unlock [gravity reduction] in tier 3 or 4...

Elaborate

Ah, you're right. I didn't consider the boosts. Got me there.

Points must indeed be spent smartly, that's why I said it will depend on a lot of things. 3*2*2*1.3~15%, 1*3*3*3(extend) = 27. Meaning that per 100 dark damage to the party mc will use 400 mp, that skill will level up like a rocket.

8Psycho

I don't think he'll get a ward just yet. He's already hit his level cap, so he has to spend his points smartly. Dark ward would be difficult to train considering that it only takes mana when damage is mitigated, and a measly 3% dark damage reduction isn't going to make it easy to level. Not to mention, it's not clear if dark hounds even deal physical or dark damage. As it stands, it doesn't seem like a worthwhile investment.

Yeah IFF will change everything for him. I think being able to run 2 auras at once will be the next huge jump for him.

tibbish

hahaha I didn't think of this at all and imagining the look on Rain's face if this pans out is priceless

tibbish

I've got to 2nd this. Down playing the leveling as "blue boxes" and "numbers go up" are really just denigrating the character development IMO. Which is a big part of the reason I like LitRPG books. You get to see the character grow in a clear definable way and its fun to imagine what he'll do next with his new skills and capabilities. It also allows a way for character growth which almost no one seems to do well. To be fair some authors don't handle this well either and they seem to turn the character into a Superman and don't know what to do with him or they go the other way and make the character's life a nightmarish hell to hamfist in some drama. Creating a balance is difficult but I think the author of this story is doing a good job. Only thing I'd ask for at this point is more material to read but who wouldn't? Oh and maybe less cliffhanger endings involving my preciooussss blue boxes plz

tibbish

Not sure if it is meaningful to comment stuff like that or is it counterproductive? Common sense predictions. Offensive, Utility, and Defensive Auras are still only have Tier 1 open, so that is 3k exp to open Tier 2 for them, after that mc will still have enough exp to open one tier 3. So that's that. Another thing is, if dungeon they are going to is consistently dark themed, mc might consider taking Dark Ward and Radiance auras, depending on a role he wants to take in this exploration and what will come out from opening tiers.

8Psycho

Moar !

M van Dongen

I like the blue boxes and active character development. Some of the main reasons I enjoy litrpg over other forms of fiction. Keep up the good work

Chris Bridgeman

If 10-times increase for tiers holds... than tier 3(10000) is long since available to him, and tier 4(100000?) will not be available for a long time. Unless of curse mc can use up more exp that in his lvl, I don't really see why not. Mc will now regen 64k mana per day with no-focus-winter, or 155k with focus-winter, all that exp must be used on something. That said, if mc cannot use more exp that in his lvl, it would form somewhat natural barrier in progression of skills. Not sure if that will be a good thing, since skills already have requirements.

8Psycho

Fuck I need another chapter now so I can see that IFF in action! Why can’t I give you more money for more chapters!! Take my money dammit ;-;

Christian Kenney

Great work ! Next please?

Zed

Agreed, im just along for the ride. Hell, what hes done so far has got him to number 3 in RR so no need change what he wants to do. Its working as it is lol.

DominusIgnis

Honestly there are a lot of opinions in the comments and I really just want to read the story. SenescentSoul, you write it the way you want it, anyone who doesn't like it can pound sand.

L Pedersen

... You might want to finish the chapter

Garrett

Petty correction - I think this can look better: If my math is right, and that is a huge if, I think I can get it -> If my math is right - and that is a huge 'if' - I think I can get it

Elaborate

... has rain tried boiling the ration bar? it seems like it would be a ramen packet kind of scenario...

MagicWafflez

Hah, if they don't have Zero I wonder if they have Absolute Value. Gods below, He'd probably blow their minds with trig/calculus depending on how far he progressed down those paths in college. Janus's eyes would probably melt if Rain shows him the math he did for his exp gains and how he constructed the formulae. I don't mind math crunching, but I would say throwing up the skill windows is wasteful unless he is acquiring a new skill or there's a particular benchmark hit (like maxing it.) One thing that is kind of bugging me is he seems to be somewhat...cognitively dissonant/oblivious?... regarding the standard education of the people. He hasn't crossed the line into being an asshole/arrogant about it, but its kind of weird he hasn't taken into account what he's learned versus the stereotypical/assumed knowledge of a medieval society especially since he's already had one major subject (Zero) be a tripping point for those around him. Which, yeah, small sample size, but not all of them are adolescents and Tallheart isn't even a human. Its a short hop for "hard? psh, this is just high school math" being flippant and it being dickish which isn't a character trait I'm picking up from Rain at all.

Keifru

... xD i see a lot of people saying this ch is boring... but... think about how rain felt... he had to lay there is sensory deprivation all freakn day. that's... like some Guantanamo bay shit right there. ... i love you rain, and I'm all about theory crafting to figure out modifiers and such with math... but... i draw the line at exp. I'm not gonna check for how much exps you get for skills, because it's such a temporary concern... after he's maxed it really doesn't matter anymore, not like the rest. 'using more mana gives more exp', is good enough for me... that said. i don't blame him at all for inventing math problems to solve while he's in sensory deprivation... poor baby yeay! Aura IFF Ho!!!

MagicWafflez

Hmm, how is all this overmana going to affect the horse, btw? Is it going to learn to understand the local language, if this goes on? I wonder if it's routine for animal trainers in this world to get the [winter] aura to make the training stick better in the animals' minds... (Can horses and other animals level, btw, or is that reserved for humans and monsters?)

Elaborate

scrap. Hit the button prematurely. But to continue. The blue boxes are awsome to me. It helps remind me of all the things that he curently has at his disposal and how they are progressing. Because lets be honest, after a few days of not looking at this I forget a good bit of the detail of the abilities being used. Plus I'm assuming its not that bad for the author for putting them because alot of it ia copy and paste and changing a few of thr values. But for me its dope. As for the lengthy math bit.....eh, not sure how I feel about it...i do like it because you get inside the MC's head and are able to get more questions raised like the whole horse bit. And im assuming it wont be like this most chapters at all. Just a person eperimenting with the world and how it works. So to end my monolouging, story is great, i love it, im literaly checking like 5 times a day for the next chapter.

DominusIgnis

I'm happy he was finally able to grind his way to qualify for [aura IFF], and the math-ness of the chapter is probably to be expected. Any hidden skills showing up yet? Huh, I theorized that the [essence well] + [channel mastery](-) + [aura focus] would be the best training method, a while back, Nice to see that Rain agrees. Hm, now he might want to test whether he can unlock tiers, even if it causes him to go down a level., as long as he has not spent the points. If that's true, can someone calculate how many levels he'd need to 'save up' in order to unlock tier 4? I'm thinking it's probably too late already, but you never know... Nice to see Rain getting better at manipulating the GUI, as well. Hmmm, if he keeps going, he might be able to shape the various windows into number-like shapes and draw out calculations without paper...

Elaborate

Just to be clear, this is your novel so what i say dosnt mean shit. Its your story nit mine

DominusIgnis

Just realized that this chapter is basically a character building chapter for the system and Rain's relationship to it. Relatively boring on its own, but it makes future interactions more meaningful.

Garrett

As someone who isn't any good at math, I just want to say that I thoroughly enjoyed this chapter. Most of the number crunching kinda just went over my head, but I liked the sense that Rain is really putting thought into the system and how he can best use it to his advantage. Now that Rain has more or less figured out how skill exp works, he can basically power through the long and boring parts of skill grinding (as seen in this very chapter) which can only benefit Rain going forward.

Garrett

I love the blue boxes, not a huge fan of the math. Its cool that hes working on figuring everything out, but we dont really need to know about the mechanics as in depth as you go for this chapter.

Joseph

I have mixed feelings about this chapter, objective speaking is not a great chapter, too much math without real substance, on the personal note it was a cool chapter, seeing how overmana is changing the protagonist, how he remember stuff that most people should not remember, how he is doing math problems as if he had a calculator. It make the reader more conscious how overmana is becoming a part of Rain. Still using a good chunk of the chapter for math just to say that (if it was your plan), I don't think is was a great idea, still kind of cool, but for sure not the best. (Maybe your plan was just to have a way to tell the reader why he is getting that much exp, idk I'm just trying to come up with a why you wrote that) I don't know what most reader search in those "blue boxes", but for sure what I search is new stuff that I could get hyped, like the chapter you wrote the IFF and all the "new" skills. For most novels those "blue boxes" are a way to tell the reader that the protagonist had got stronger via stronger stats or skills, but I think is a bad way in this novel, so I would suggest to have a "big" spam of "blue boxes" only in situation like "a bunch of new skills" or you think it would make a lot of sense, but I would advise against to use the "blue boxes" just to remind us of all the skills Rain have, just have a little box with just a maxed out skill if that skill had been maxed out. On the end I just want to say, ty for writing this novel, I want to be honest, most of the time you post a chapter I say to my self that I would stock pile at least 5-8 ch so I would read them all the once, because the pace is slow (just to make sure, I like the pace of the novel), but I just can't, after 30 min I just have the urge to read, so I want to say it again, ty for the novel :)

Auron32

At least make efficiency 50% for lvl10 please. 63k Mana? Mc can Regen only 37k per day tho... Also, blue boxes is one thing, but wasting whole chapter on math was kinda boring.

8Psycho

Wow, well efficiency doesn't get better?! What a bummer... Idea for future metaaura for tier 4-5: Aura Concentration. Aura Intensity:Range Conversion. Mc also needs a fast thinking type skill

8Psycho