Tony, Vasna, and Maximus broke from their “cuddle puddle” after what Tony thought was about an hour. His face felt heavy and his throat was raw, however, the tremendous angst that had built in his chest and across his shoulders had been relieved. His body moved easier, his armor felt lighter, and not dragging his feet got just a little easier.

A chime, like silverware hitting the side of a giant crystal cup, sounded urgently in Tony’s head, alerting him to a litany of ignored notifications.

Your Unseen Ally Background has been revealed!

Your Social Link with Vasna has increased to Level 1!

Your Social Link with Vasna has increased to Level 2!

Your Social Link with Vasna has increased to Level 3!

Your Social Link with Vasna has increased to Level 4!

Tony rolled his eyes, not at the news, but at the redundancy of the notifications. He turned to look at Vasna as they walked down the hallway and paused, feeling like he was really seeing her for the first time. Maybe it was knowing who she was outside of the “game” or maybe it was from being a blubbering mess in her lap just moments before, but he had to stop and look.

Her piercing blue eyes had lost a measure of their initial harshness, replaced instead with a fearsome sense of guardianship. The smooth section of her hair which had been pinned tightly against her scalp was tousled, hanging loosely along the left side of her head before coming to the relaxed tail of dreadlocks. The woman he had met on the Spawning Table would have been more than happy to acquaint him with the business end of her tree-made-mace; this woman he felt safe with.

Her eyebrow arched at his continued gaping. “Uh, sorry,” Tony started, “is there a way to consolidate notifications?”

She smirked at him. “Tired of getting the same notification with a different number at the end?” Tony nodded. “You can go into settings and switch notifications to ‘summary.’ You can mess with it from there.” she explained.

Tony took a minute and did just that; he set his level-up notifications to announce only the highest level of any trait achieved at level up and then set notifications to only play on request unless ten or more ranks in a trait had been gained. That done, he requested a summative notification for the last three hours.

Your Unseen Ally Background has been revealed!

You have gained Skill Bonuses: Resolve +2 (Current Level: 7)

You have gained the Skill: Empathy (Current Level: 3 [-2 from Clueless Flirt: Females Trait])

You are Rested (Spirit)

You are Tired (Physical)

You are Dehydrated

You are Hungry

Maximus has Unspent: Specialization, Attribute, Skill, Talent Points

Your Dreadblade is Unnamed

Your Dreadblade has Unspent Upgrade Points

You have unlocked an Achievement: Romance or Something More?

Spend more than an hour in the embrace of another

The Dungeon has increased in Difficulty – You’d Better Hurry!

Tony’s eyes shot wide and he could tell that Vasna had been reviewing at least some of the same information from the curses she was muttering and he would be kidding himself if he wasn’t upset about forgetting to upgrade his Dreadblade.

I wonder if I can upgrade that since I’m not spending MY XP?

The breath caught in Tony's chest. His Social Link with Jorogu had only gone up to five after they had sex in the bathhouse and he'd "accepted" her marriage proposal. The Social Link with Vasna hitting four and the Achievement that came with it, what did that mean? His link with Jorogu hadn't decreased and there was no other Social notification to review.

Tony took some deep breaths and thought about his Dreadblade Screen. There was a time and place to sort out potential relationship issues, and this was neither. His weapon upgrade menu sprang open in his vision.

Please Name your Dreadblade: |

Tony held back the initial urge to name the Dreadblade “Kindness” and mulled over some options before finding one that fit.

You have named your Dreadblade “Legion”

Confirm Name? Yes No

Tony focused on confirming and a new box sprang forward.

Our number is as your will, innumerable and insurmountable. We answer the call: Vae Victis. You have learned the invocation for your Dreadblade!

Tony focused on the new notification and was rewarded with additional information.

Summon Dreadblade (Invocation) – Using Summon Dreadblade with the proper invocation summons the weapon with all enhancements activated and at full charge.

Tony winced as the words “Vae Victis” were burned into his memory. When he regained his focus he was looking at the upgrade screen.

Legion: Level 5 Dreadblade Form: Bastard Sword Heritage: Italian (Roman) Tier: Uncommon Bonuses: Derived Phylactery: Advanced Summon: Dynamic Speed: 4 Accuracy: 11 Defense: 10 Capacity: 22 Damage: 17 Discharge: 26 Range: 18 Enhancements: None Enchantments: None

You have one Rare Enchantment Available (Soul of Tolik the Knave)

You have two Uncommon Enchantments Available

You have four Common Enchantments Available

You have five Enhancements Available

Tony’s head spun with the information but was relieved to know that enhancing his equipment was possible in a dungeon. Looking through the Enchantments, he realized that they were very similar to conventional weapon enhancements from games like Dungeons and Dragons, with the intensity dialed up to eleven. Enhancements were still powerful, but more mundane, typically modifying the physical features of the dark iron blade to enhance the weapon’s base stats. Tony decided to start there.

Enhancements (Available)

Broadened Fuller

Honed Edge

Blade Balancing

Agile Handle

Aggressive Pommel

Broadened Guard

Reinforced Construction

Mutable Form

Efficient Construction

Enhanced Physics

Feeling the need to move quickly, he made the selections of Reinforced Construction, Efficient Construction, Enhanced Physics, Honed Edge, and Blade Balancing. The fact that “Reinforced Construction” existed caused Tony to think that there was the potential for his blade to be broken or sundered and while he could simply resummon it, the Dreadblade could be re-summoned in its broken state.

With that in mind, reinforcing the construction could add to the weight of the blade, and while he was sure that his considerable strength could handle the additional weight, tuning the blade to be more agile in combat without changing its makeup significantly would be a tremendous benefit. Honed edge was a given, assuming it did what he thought, adding to the damage potential of the weapon and keeping it from being stuck in anyone unfortunate enough to be intimately introduced to the bladed part.

Tony moved onto the enchantments and thought at the system, Give me a recommended list.

Available Enchantments (Recommended)

Rare

Intelligent

Vorpal

Dancing

Doubling

Uncommon

Dueling

Elemental Burst

Raging

Spell Stealing

Spectral Anchoring

Common

Returning

Elemental

Bane

Defending

Axiomatic

Anarchic

Immaculate

Anchoring

Benevolent

Kinetic Momentum

Tony rolled his eyes. This being a consolidated list meant that there had to be many options that he could spend hours sifting through. He pressed down the desire to do so with his urgency. Anchoring and Elemental showing up in different variations in Common and Uncommon piqued his interest.

Elemental was straightforward enough, it would add a basic element of his choosing to his blade from Fire, Water, Earth, Air, and Wood and if he layered two compatible elements, they would make a third hybrid element. Fire and Water would make Steam, while Fire and Air would make Lightning; as appealing as making his weapon have combination elements was, taking two enchantments to do so was less so. Elemental burst caught him by surprise. It acted almost exactly as the Elemental enchantment, but scoring a decisive or overkill blow would cause an elemental detonation that the weapon would protect him from. The gears in Tony’s head ground to a stop when he realized that he could blend his Common and Uncommon enchantments to create hybrid elements.

Anchoring in Common would add tremendous weight to the weapon as soon as it left Tony’s hands. In theory, he could impale an enemy to a wall and walk away, requiring truly gargantuan strength to remove the weapon holding them in place. Spectral Anchoring, on the other hand, would allow Tony to spend a set amount of Lore to leave a phantom blade instead that could not be removed until Tony released the Lore or the pinned enemy died. While he considered something like this to be a little morbid, having access to an effect like this could help greatly in fights against giant monsters or opponents that were exceptionally nimble.

After moments of painstaking internal deliberation, Tony made his decisions.

Legion: Level 5 Dreadblade (Enhanced, Enchanted)

Form: Bastard Sword Heritage: Italian (Roman) Tier: Uncommon

Bonuses: Derived Phylactery: Advanced Summon: Dynamic

Speed: 16 Accuracy: 19 Defense: 20 Capacity: 28

Damage: 27 (48.6 2H) Discharge: 32 Range: 24

Enhancements:

Honed Edge: 6 to speed Bonus to retrieve the weapon from mass

Reinforced Construction: 2 to all weapon stats

Efficient Construction: 4 to all weapon stats

Blade Balancing: Increased weapon handling +2 to Accuracy and Defense

Enhanced Physics: Causes knockback 1.8x DMG when two handed +4 Damage

Enchantments:

Rare (1 of 4)

Intelligent: Forms a telepathic and spiritual bond with the wielder

Uncommon (2 of 6)

Elemental Burst (Fire): Wreathes the weapon in Fire, adding elemental damage to attacks. Decisive Blows and Overkill triggers an elemental explosion

Spectral Anchoring: Spend 20 Lore to leave a phantom blade in a living target, pinning them to the spot

Common (4 of 8)

Bane (Divine): Gains bonus accuracy and damage vs (Divine) creatures and Constructs

Defending: Gains a permanent +2 Defense Bonus

Elemental (Earth): Gain bonus Elemental Damage and +30% Lightning Resist

Kinetic Momentum: Continuous hits against a single Target gain +2% Damage per successive hit, to a maximum of 120%

Focusing his intent on his Pet screen, he received an error from the system. Being inside the dungeon would not prevent him from upgrading and enhancing his weapon, but it would prevent him from upgrading his familiar until the next level-up. Exasperated, Tony dismissed his screens and jogged to catch up with Vasna, Maximus on his heel.