Next up, he had a recently-revived minion who needed some attention.

Gremlin Two has reached level 15!

Horned Gremlin threshold 3 attained.

Evolution threshold advancement progress: 3/3

Evolve to Armored Gremlin

Evolve to Dustclaw Gremlin

Evolve to Flickering Gremlin

Combined Evolution: Cen Combined Evolution: Centoo

Gremlin Two has 5 stat points available.

Gremlin Two has 4 ability points available.

The evolution options were the same as Skarm’s, indicating that they were species-based rather than something unlocked based on individual actions like human classes. It did make him wonder if that meant minions could gain classes in addition to their species abilities, or if it was a one or the other kind of deal.

Two's eagerness to be evolved deeply contrasted Skarm's hesitance. The gremlin bounced from foot to foot, tail waving.

Levi read over each of the evolution types again carefully, in case he’d forgotten some of the details.

[Armored Gremlin: This evolution focuses on defence and survivability. It gains health at an increased rate and can utilize momentum with a high degree of flexibility. Its main drawback is a decrease in non-physical damage and lower impact from stamina usage.]

[Dustclaw Gremlin: This evolution focuses on offense and annihilation. It amplifies the power of all attacks and increases mana utilization and recovery. Its main drawback is reduced stamina and decreased ability for concealment.]

[Flickering Gremlin: This evolution focuses on stealth and evasion. It can move faster, gains stamina at an increased rate, and amplifies concealment and ambush abilities. Its main drawback is decreased health and reduced damage resistance.]

He also lingered over Combined Evolution options for a long moment. He was intensely curious about what would happen if he tried to combine creatures from different elemental alignments. Until recently he’d have assumed that kind of thing was impossible, but he already had the Convergence Array and the multi-element Dungeon Seed to prove that elements weren’t actually as entirely polarized as it had always seemed.

For a minute Levi considered combining Two with Centoo, smiling faintly at the concept of a many-legged gremlintaur, stealthing through the shadows on the walls and stabbing with knives and legs alike.

But he had no guarantees that the actual combination would be anything like what he imagined. He also didn’t like the idea of potentially breaking the gremlin-wide power increases by changing Two’s species to something non-standard. He'd already made one mistake today from making assumptions. If he ended up losing a full level’s worth of abilities to some unknown restriction, he’d be cursing himself for days. Nor did he want to risk Two’s personality and self.

For now, he’d keep his gremlins on their default paths, even if he definitely wanted to find out what cross-species Combined Evolution did at some point. It could be amazing, or it could be useless. Better to test it with someone less important than Two.

Armored, he gave serious consideration to. Recent events had proven how even a little bit more survivability could be what mattered in a fight, and with the gremlins’ insane regeneration rates stacking health could be a powerful option.

Dustclaw, he discarded immediately. Two’s whole thing was stealth, so nerfing that would be counter-productive, even if the increased mana would pair nicely with his Natureblade.

Or he could go with Flickering, same as Skarm. The increased stealth was ideal for Two’s fighting style, and he really didn’t tend to stay in the thick of things often.

He flicked back up to Armored, tempted to do it just from the nagging desire to collect as much information as possible about everything, but he was building an army here. As much as he wanted to collect data, the primary goal was survivability and leveling potential, not research. Ward could try Armored, perhaps, or Gordon’s gremlin Elmire.

Levi selected Flickering Gremlin.

Two’s pools bottomed out as the evolution process began, orange light glowing from his eyes, mana warping the air around him. While Skarm had seemed surprised by the evolution process, Two leaned into it as though fully prepared, stretching and swaying along with the twisting reshaping of his physical form.

His green patterns darkened, streaks of grey growing across his torso and shoulders. His scrawny form shrank and condensed in the same way Skarm’s had, limbs reshaped with visible muscle. His horn and claws seemed almost to vanish as they went from solid to semi-translucent, then the mana aura slammed back into him as the transformation completed, refilling all his empty pools in an instant.

Total health had dropped as promised, from 210 down to 166, but the jump in stamina from 500 to 740 more than made up for it. Mana remained unchanged, but not for long.

Two also had his usual five stat points to assign. Levi put another two into Psyche since Two did use his Natureblade pretty regularly, bringing mana up to 30 with 9/minute regen. The remaining points went into Spirit, bumping stamina by another 45.

Gremlin extra-stat-points were so overpowered. Even without regen of 2-3 seconds, their pools were already among the highest of all his minions. Sure, the low mana and minimal health were non-optimal, but he had no regrets about grabbing every gremlin he’d found.

Finally, that left abilities to be looked over. Four points, like usual for a third-threshold monster. Levi brought up the options, which were unchanged from last time.

Horned Gremlin Abilities (Gremlin Two)

Sharpened Claws

Increase damage dealt by unarmed attacks.

(Unlock: 1 ability point)

Echo Mimic

Gains the ability to imitate natural sounds or animal noises to confuse pursuers.

(Unlock: 1 ability point)

Gorer

Horn obtains barbed protrusions, inflicting more damaging bleeds.

(Unlock: 1 ability point)

Leap

Ability to jump is doubled, and attacks landed from the air deal significant additional damage.

(Unlock: 1 ability point)

No, none of them seemed particularly essential at the moment. Sharpened Claws were a bit obsoleted by his having Natureblade, Two rarely used his horn, Echo Mimic seemed weirdly situational. Leap might be useful in some circumstances, but would it be important to have now?

Levi was tempted to max out gremlin stat point gains and get started on increasing their experience bonuses - especially now he had Conduit so high - but he had a bunch of new gremlins he could use for that. Spread out the cost.

Sneaky was currently at 2/5, which meant that if he put all four points into it it would evolve to its next form.

He lingered over the choice, both options tempting. Two was both doing well as a sneaky gremlin and lagging behind Skarm significantly due to his own ability points being heavily devoted to the species-wide upgrades. The other gremlins were already high enough level that it might take a while before they could improve abilities, so the delay could mean actual consequences in leveling speed.

Then again, he could also stop by a random level 1 dungeon and grab a few at base level, they shouldn’t take more than a week of fighting to reach the first threshold.

He still had time. There was still a month and a half to go. He had to think long term and not just immediate. The longer he held Two back on personal abilities, the less powerful he’d be in the actual fights that mattered.

He’d done enough as an auxiliary, time for him to be his own gremlin. And his own gremlin was very sneaky.

Decision made, Levi assigned the points. Time to see what this ability evolved into.

He was not disappointed.

Corrosive Concealment (Tier 6, Passive)

Attacks made from stealth deal significantly increased damage.

Any enemies within 3 feet who fail to detect this creature’s presence will be subject to an ongoing damage aura.

Corrosive damage will persist after leaving the aura for a time equal to time spent within it.

“So that’s why some parts of Destruction dungeons were more damaging than others! And here I thought it was to compensate for the fact they only had gremlins, but it was actually because of the gremlins.” Levi shook his head, grinning. “The things you learn by becoming a Tamer.”

He could preview the advancement paths for the ability, and took a moment to do just that. Increased range and increased duration, both incredibly enticing. A stealth specialist that could skirt the edges of the conflict passively dealing damage to any enemy unaware of his presence? Hit and fade, dealing major blows to individual enemies while weakening anyone else in range. Sounded perfect.

“Can’t wait to see you in action.”

He looked around, not quite spotting his gremlin at first, before finally picking him out in the shadow by the wall. He definitely should have been easier to spot, the shadow wasn’t that dark.

Levi chuckled as Two blinked up at him with big falsely innocent eyes. “Or, not see you, as the case may be.” He focused in on his gremlin's details and made one other change before flipping back to the stat overview.

Tu: Level 15

(Flickering Gremlin)

Strength: 22

Health: 166/166

(+26/min)

Psyche: 10

Mana: 30/30

(+9/min)

Spirit: 43

Stamina: 785/785

(+47/min)

Tu looked down at himself, then up at Levi with a puzzled expression. He waved his hand in the air as though to indicate something intangible.

“You noticed?”

Tu nodded slowly, his expression uncharacteristically uncertain.

“I figured it was about time you stopped being a placeholder. You’ll always be Tu, but now it’s officially a name and not a number.”

Tu lunged forward and hugged Levi’s leg, bumping his forehead against his knee.

Levi laughed and knelt down to pat his faithful gremlin’s back. “Yeah, same to you.”