Back in their home, there was a large pile of boxes by the entrance. All of them were items for the Harmony Guardians. Everyone was changing pretty much all of their gear, only keeping some items. For instance, Neria still held her staff due to the ability to store liquids to be used later. Flint was the outlier. Instead of buying new equipment, he got some rare materials to upgrade his armor.

Since everyone had to check their purchases, they all just took the packages to their rooms to make sure everything was in place. Hera had her titled blades helping her carry all the boxes since she had more than double the amount of items of the other team members.

The Empress sat down in her bed and opened her status windows before doing anything else. She had leveled up 15 times in the last months. From levels 41 to 56. And her attributes jumped from 112 to 143. Not to mention the various skills that she got to make up for the lack of bonus attribute points. That wasn’t enough, of course. According to the people in the intelligence agency, she would be a few hundred bonus points behind someone at the same level. But thanks to her [Exponential Growth] the difference in attributes wouldn’t be that big.

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Hera Quetzaveth -- Role: Explorer Level: 56

Legacy: Court of Blades [Blades]

Title: Mana Touched, Wardbearer, Ophidianite Progenitor

Total Stats: 858

Strength: 143 Endurance: 143

Agility: 143 Charisma: 143

Intelligence: 143 Luck: 143

Mana: 8 513 321/8 513 321

Empress Core: 20 179 300 /20 179 300

Passive Mana Regeneration: 11 493/s (20 687/s with items)

Active Mana Regeneration: 21 993/s (39 587/s with items)

Empress Core Regeneration: 11/s (21/s with items)

Remaining attribute points: 0

Skills:

Legacy:

Court Ruler, Courtship, Bestow Title, Army of One, Revocation of Nobility,

Royal Quest, Bestow Gift, Royal Seal, Venomous Arsenal, Blade Graveyard, Empress Core

[Handaxe Combat 3, Chakram Combat 3, Glaive Combat 3, Sword Combat 3, Two-handed Sword Combat 2, Dagger Combat 3, Scimitar combat 1, Axe combat 1, War Axe Combat 1, Knife Combat 2, Tonfa Combat 2, Rapier Combat 1, Short Sword Combat 1(+1), Lance Combat (+1), Scythe Combat 1(+1)] -> Bladed Weapon Combat 3 (+3)

Passive:

Exponential Growth (29)

Observe: Red sight 3

Treasure Map

Wire Trap Style 3, Subtle Strike 4, Dorohla style 4

Throwing 1(+1), Cutting 1(+1), Blocking 1 (+1),

Battle Dancer 3(+1), Attack Pathing 2, Synchronized Battle 3

Dodge 4, Run 4, Improved Stamina 5, Flee 2, Jump 2, Climbing 1(+1), Acrobatics 1(+1)

Mana Recovery 5, Mana sensitivity 4 , Shaper of Mana 2 , Mana Vessel, Reinforced Mana 2

Improved Regeneration 3

Ailment Mastery 3, Poison Mastery 2, Allergy Mastery 1, Chain Mastery 1 , Regeneration Mastery 1,

Earth Mastery 1, Lightning Mastery 1 , Sound Mastery 1, Frost Mastery 1 , Lava Mastery 1 , Steel Mastery 1

Elemental Mana Mastery

Earth resistance 2, Wind resistance 2, Water resistance 2, Sturdy Body 4,

Magic Armor Proficiency 3

Nature connection 1

Silver Lining 2

Ancient language 5

Pathfinder 1, Awareness 2, Lockpicking 1(+1)

Dancing 3(+3)

Cooking 1(+1), Cleaning 1(+1), Polishing 1(+1), Sewing 1(+1),

Ophidianite Skills:

Ophidianite Scales 3, Ophidianite Poison 6, Ophidianite Vigor 2(+1), Ophidianite Sight 1, Ophidianite Mana Sense 1, Ophidianite Resistance 1, Ophidianite Regeneration 1, Ophidianite Adaptation 1

Active:

All in 2

Inspect 2

Hide 4, Sneak Attack 3

Weapon Maintenance 4, Weapons Rebalance 3, Weapon break 2

Etching 4

Medical Reference 3, Identify Ailment 1

Green Thumb 2

Chain of Command 5

Poison Coating 3

Toxic Mist

Grasshopper Stab 2(+1), Grasshopper Slash 2(+1), Grasshopper Draw 1

Role Skills:

Local Guide

Private Room, Meeting Room

Explorer’s Assassinate

Explorer’s Map

Hunter’s Catalogue, Explorer’s Hunt

Explorer’s Research

Explorer’s Blueprint

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“Daskka, how about the new skills? Can I get them?” Hera turned to the herald.

“Yeah. Those are the last two skills in your legacy, mum. To get another, you are going to have to figure it out by yourself. I’ll help, but you get what I mean,” Daskka replied.

“Ok, let’s see what they are.”

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Noble houses

Assigning your court members to the various noble houses of your court will allow them to gain benefits depending on the rank of their house. Each house can have more than a single court member. The houses must have a name and a theme given by the Empress. If the Empress does not give a theme, the legacy will create one. The theme will affect the possible skills and bonuses of the house.

Duke - House yet to be named. 0 out of 1 members.

Marquess - House yet to be named. 0 out of 2 members.

Marquess - House yet to be named. 0 out of 2 members.

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House Heirloom

You can assign a skill from a member of one of your houses as an heirloom. When doing so, the house will incorporate the skill, and any member of the noble house can inherit it. However, each house can only assign an heirloom to a single member at a time.

Current Heirlooms:

Duke - House yet to be named. - None

Marquess - House yet to be named. - None

Marquess - House yet to be named. - None

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Hera read the skills a couple of times. Trying to make sure she understood everything. Unfortunately, she still had a lot of questions. Looking towards Daskka, the herald was just staring back, already waiting to be called. The Empress chuckled, “You already knew I wasn’t going to just say ok, right?”

“Of course. The skills barely go over anything. I would be surprised if you didn’t have any questions.”

“Ok. First things first. Are those all the houses I’ll ever get?”

“No, just like your court, you can grow them. Oh, and your titled blades can’t be part of a house. They are already your retainers.”

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

“My retainers?” Hera tilted her head.

“Yeah. It means they are like the people who work directly under the Empress. While Noble houses have their own things to do. Or that is how it’s supposed to be in the actual empires. For us, that analogy kind of breaks since the titled blades are more independent than the rest of the court.”

“Got it. And what about the house rank? Is it already in order?”

“Yep. It goes Duke, Marquess, Count, Earl, and Baron, being the last one. Not in real life, but the last one of your court. Apparently, you can have at most 2 different Duke houses, 4 houses for the Marquess, then 12 for the Counts, 36 Earls, and like… at least 100 for the Barons. But… it was a bit weird. I don’t think those numbers all happened at once. Also, this doesn’t feel like a hard rule. There might be ways to go around it,” Daskka explained.

“Wow, that is a lot. I mean, I doubt I would even get enough court members for all those houses. Even now, if I had one more Marquess house, it would already almost be enough for the entire court. And the number of blades in each house can increase. Right?”

“Yep, and I don’t think there is an actual limit. Also, the growth will be based on the blades’ actions, so if you ask them to do a bunch of small day-to-day things, it shouldn’t take long for all of them to have a house. Oh. Another thing, once they join a house, they can’t go to another one. But you can take them out of the house if you want. They just won’t be able to get back.”

“Got it. And Dukes get the best buffs, right?”

“Exactly. Also, the heirloom can scale with the house it is in and the blade that gets it. It won’t be a perfect thing, but if a skill from a low level weapon keeps being passed on, it can eventually reach the same power level as skills weapons you have now have.”

“Right… this is a lot of information,” Hera stopped to think for a moment, “Hey… do you think that if I have Vulcan awakening a blade I can have an awakened skill as the heirloom?”

Daskka stared at the Empress for a moment before opening a big smile, “I don’t know, but it sounds like a good idea.”

Hera turned to Forge and called Gale over. During the past months, Hera was trying to learn more about this skill and she had more or less decided on the heirlooms. First Ink’s [Whispering Ink]. The ability to disable someone’s skill was too powerful to let go. Especially if she was facing against a person. She could imagine sealing a fighter’s [Fury], or maybe a mage’s [Sync] during a fight. That would toss their entire combat style in disarray. Her next idea was Autumn’s [Armor of Fallen Leaves]. It was a skill Hera never used during a fight and only tested it out properly while training in her private room. The spectral armor would work similarly to her current armor. But instead of wasp wings that would move to cover her, the leaves would take that place. By itself, that was already a great thing, since each cast of the skill would create about 50 large leaves, but they could also stack on top of each other to increase the protection against a single blow. The other skills she considered were damage based, but she didn’t like the idea of keeping those kinds of skills. Generally, the reason a weapon attack skill was strong was not just by the skill itself, but the various passives and bonuses the weapon already had stacked on top of each other. That’s why one item she got had buffing skills and one of them was even more valuable than Autumn’s.

However, when considering all her current blades. Gale had the best awakening skill. The awakened Wind Furry, allowing her entire court to have copies of themselves, was too good to pass up. Luckily, today was the day that Vulcan was reborn due to his skill. But before upgrading the skill, Hera decided to add Gale to the first Marquess house. She knew her naming sense wasn’t the best and simply called it Verdant House. Opting not to pick a theme to see what the Legacy would create.

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The Verdant Marquessate was created.

Gale has been assigned to the Verdant House as its Marquesas

Verdant House theme - Winds of change.

Verdant Marquessate skill created.

Ever-Evolving Tactics

Members of the Verdant Marquessate grow when exposed to varied scenarios, gaining an ever-increasing scaling bonus depending on how many unique creatures they faced.

Extra scaling per creature + 0.01

Additionally, when facing a new type of enemy for the first time. Members of the Verdant Marquessate receive a 10% bonus to their damage for 10 minutes.

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“Ok… this is pretty cool,” Hera smiled.

“It really is,” Gale nodded excitedly. There was something about being the first Marquess of the Verdant House that really made him feel good.

“Right, now Vulcan, can you?” the Empress turned to Forge, who nodded and gently tapped Gale, awakening him again, his physical form shifting and the wind itself forming a solid shape around the blade of the glaive.

“Now… how do I do this?” Hera turned to Daskka.

“That’s…. Oh? Ok, weird. Gale is the one who has to do that. Weird, but he still needs your permission to change the heirloom.”

“That’s kind of fun. Makes the houses more independent,” Hera nodded and turned to Gale, “Can you make the awakened wind fury as the heirloom of the Verdant House?”

Gale focused and after a moment, “Yes. I just did.”

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Heirloom of the Verdant House

This skill can only be used if the user is in an awakened state.

Awakened Wind Fury: The wind can understand your intentions even better than you do. With this skill active, the weapon creates 2 wind clones to follow up your attacks. The wind clone attacks deal between 60% and 130% of the damage dealt by the original. Your luck stat influences the number and damage of the attacks.

Duration: 1 minute

Cooldown: 1 hour

Mana Cost: 4 million mana

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“Ah…. That sucks?” Hera stopped to think. It actually didn’t, It meant that anyone who was part of the Verdant House could have two awakened skills, and it also didn’t say anything about requiring Vulcan to awaken them. If she somehow found a way to awaken her blades without using that skill, maybe she could trigger this version of Wind Fury. It was a shame that the skill became a bit weaker, the cooldown increased a bit, and so did the mana cost, but it was still amazing.

“Ok, now Ink. You are up. And because I want your skill to get the best possible result, you will be the Duke,” Hera called Ink over.

The dagger nodded, “It will be a pleasure, Empress.”

“I think I’m going to use colors for the houses. Just to keep a pattern. If one is Verdant, the other is Wolf, and the third is Tech it’s going to feel weird,” Hera said and stopped to think for a moment, “You will be know as Duke Alabaster, and your theme is Silent Disruption.”

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The Alabaster Dukedom has been created.

Ink has been assigned to the Alabaster House as its Duke.

Alabaster House theme - Silent Disruption.

Alabaster Dukedom skill created.

Subtle Sabotage

Members of the Alabaster Dukedom are experts at hindering their target’s movements. Each strike has a chance to disrupt the target’s mana, making it harder for it to cast any spells for 3 second.

When the target also has one of its skills sealed, the disruption increases to 1 minute.

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Hera also gave permission for Ink to add his [Whispering Ink] skill as the heirloom. The theme ended up fitting perfectly the dagger, which meant the two skills now complemented each other. Hera also knew that if someone’s mana was disrupted as they were mid casting, the spell would likely fizzle out. Or, in a worst-case scenario, it would rebound, causing a backlash to the caster. Calling this combo perfect was an understatement. Unlike what happened with the Verdant house, the heirloom was an exact copy of the skill Ink had with no reduction in any of its effects. It seemed like Dukedoms could maintain the same power as the skill. Or maybe this happened because of the awakened version of Gale’s skill was too strong for the legacy.

For the last Marquessate, she decided to wait. The skill she intended to give it was in one of her new items, but first, she had to say her goodbyes to her current court.