Path to Transcendence

Chapter 127: Soul Evolution

Julius did a double take. He had just evolved his skills into [Armaments of the Arcane] and he certainly wasn’t expecting anything else. Therefore, he was taken by surprise when he got another one so soon.

He took a deep breath to calm and center himself, before taking a look at the notification.

Notice: Soul threshold has been met.

Soul Evolution commencing…

You are qualified to select one of the following rewards…

Free Upgrade of Any Rare Skill to EpicLesser Soul-Nourishing EnhancementConcept Enlightenment AssistanceOne Additional Skill Slot
Notice: You have five minutes to decide on your reward. If no reward is selected after time has elapsed, one will be randomly decided for you.

Julius stared at the notification for longer than he should have. He was just that surprised. Nothing to this point had indicated that something like this was possible. So far the Words of the World hadn’t offered any rewards to him. It had only been notifications of his actions in the form of skills.

Actually, when he thought about it. He had gotten notifications when he entered rifts. Perhaps that was a clue that the Words of the World weren’t exclusively for skills.

The problem with this was that he only had five minutes. Less than five minutes since he had wasted some of it standing there like an idiot, but still time was running short.

He didn’t know exactly what this meant, but at least it seemed like the options were more or less straightforward. The first option was a free upgrade of any rare skill to epic.

If Julius was understanding it correctly, that meant that any rare skill would immediately jump to epic, it didn’t say anything about whether or not they were level 20 or level 1. That was alluring because he had a few rare+ skills that were much more difficult to level up.

Say for example he chose [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal], undeniably one of his most vital skills, it would supposedly become epic and even more effective. However, a part of him was curious about whether he did this and what that meant for the Concept requirement for epic skills.

Did that mean Severing Will would be used to evolve the healing skill? Because in that case, he didn’t think he would want to do that. He had been hoping to learn a Life Concept or a Fire Concept, preferably both. The skill had phoenix in its name and he wanted to try to see if there was some sort of Concept related to it before trying to use a Sharpness Concept.

The only skill he would be tempted to use it on would be [Barrier of Severance]. His current and only Concept would fit very well with the skill. However, what did that mean for the dozen-plus levels he would be missing out on?

Would that cause him to lose any progress he could make from those skill levels or would he receive whatever he would from those dozen-plus levels after he evolved it? That was kind of an important question he would like answers to. Because if it was the first option, he would not even consider the free skill upgrade.

He didn’t worry about putting in the hard work and grinding out the skill levels. Since he already had the Severing Will Concept the hardest part was done anyway. He most likely was only offered this reward because he already had a Concept.

He put the first option on the back burner and thought about the second option.

This option was a bit more mysterious than the other three. A lesser soul-nourishing enhancement wasn’t something that Julius was aware of. Going off the name alone, he would expect that it nourished the soul.

However, he didn’t know exactly what that entailed. Would it strengthen his overall soul? Would it heal it from damage? Or would something else happen?

The two main things that pushed him away from this option were the fact it was described as lesser. Julius didn’t like the sound of lesser. While it might not really mean that it was of subpar quality he didn’t like the implications.

However, did that also mean that there were minor, major, and maybe even peak soul-nourishing enhancements? Perhaps in the future, if he were to get this same notification it would be for a better soul-nourishing enhancement.

An increase to his soul was a captivating thought, but he recalled what the notification had said. It had said that he had met the soul threshold, just like a skill increase would describe it. He was pretty confident that this meant Julius’s soul had gotten to a standard or rather a threshold which led him to receiving these options.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

It was very likely that when he had gained his new epic skill, the acquisition had been enough to bump Julius’s soul to that next rank. After all, there was a reason why elites were supposed to gain as many high-level and high-ranked skills before they tier up. Acquiring and improving skills was a good way to improve one’s soul.

He was well aware that he had a stronger soul than a normal person. It was a reason why he had more mana and a stronger aura than others at his Tier. He had always assumed that it was because he was technically two souls in one body.

When he had reincarnated or transferred to Julius’s body, he believed that their souls had meshed into the person he was today. Therefore, having a stronger soul was not out of the realm of possibilities.

As such, did Julius really need an additional boost to his soul? Would it be nice? Yes, of course it would. However, he wasn’t thinking it was the best option out of the four choices he was presented with.

Not to mention again that it was called “lesser”.

Julius left this option and moved on to the next. One that really interested him.

Concept Enlightenment Assistance. He knew from experience how difficult and esoteric learning a concept could be. Hence, having something to help him learn another Concept was a very attractive reward.

It maybe even possible to learn a Concept that went well with [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal]. That would be pretty great, especially if there was a Phoenix Concept or some sort of related concept that would pair wonderfully with the healing skill.

He just wasn’t sure how certain it was. For all he knew, it was just a little nudge and could only help him so much. Much like the lesser soul nourishment.

Also he was curious about how much control he had over the process. Would it only help him if he was close to a specific Concept or maybe it would come down to pure chance and he ended up receiving a Water Concept instead.

He didn’t even want to think about the possibility that whatever Concept he got from this reward being less powerful than a Concept that he learned on his own. After all, a Concept is a deeply personal thing to a person. That might lead to whatever Concept Julius would learn from the reward to be tainted by whatever the Words of the World used to assist him.

He didn’t have enough information and it was frustrating. For all of his research and time in the library, he didn’t seem to be prepared for this moment. He just wished that there wasn’t a time limit. Which by the way was ticking down fast and he was running out of time.

He reviewed the final and in his opinion the most alluring option as well as potentially the strongest one. On paper it seemed like it was as impressive as the other ones, but he knew better.

He learned how valuable a skill slot was and how important each one was. Therefore, having an additional one could be a game changer.

The potential power of having an additional epic skill or even higher ranked skill was enormous. It would give him an advantage over someone with only ten skill slots. He could also have more skill slots to combine skills with each other. Something he learned how impactful it could be when he combined [Arcane Construct], [Pure Compression], and [Composite Mana].

Another major benefit that he was thinking about was something that was in line with his prior thoughts on the free upgrade and soul-nourishment options. If he were to have an additional skill to evolve through the ranks, he would be able to strengthen his soul in a natural way.

Notice: You have one minute to decide on your choice before one is randomly chosen for you.

Why does it only give me five minutes? I could have ten times that and it would still not be enough, Julius inwardly complained.

For the next thirty seconds, he went back and forth about which option he was going with.

Notice: You have thirty seconds to decide on your choice before one is randomly chosen for you.

Shut up, Julius scolded the notification. I’m trying to think here and you only gave me five minutes.

He was able to narrow it down to two options. Concept assistance and the additional skill slot. The free upgrade, as nice as it would be, wasn’t something Julius was in need of. He had full confidence in leveling his skills through his own efforts and then ranking them up to epic afterward.

He also didn’t want to take the chance that he would lose out on the improvements and power boosts that came with the leftover skill levels.

As for the lesser soul nourishing enhancement, he wasn’t very intrigued by it in the first place. He felt like out of all the options this one was the one he didn’t feel he needed. There were other ways to strengthen his soul and two of the other options indirectly helped with that.

Perhaps, if he had some sort of soul injury, like the one that Professor Youma had, he would be more interested. However, it wasn’t meant to be and so he eliminated it from the running.

Notice: You have ten seconds remaining to decide on your choice before one is randomly chosen for you.

Julius looked up in the air and sighed loudly. He hoped he wasn’t making a mistake and if he was, then he would just have to live with it. He took another deep breath and with more confidence than he really felt, mentally selected his choice.

He had confidence that he could learn another Concept without outside help. He didn’t care how long it took, he would accomplish it one way or another.

You have selected the Additional Skill Slot as your reward. Are you sure you want to choose this option?

He confirmed his choice with an anxious heart.

Congratulations. You have been rewarded an Additional Skill Slot.

Current Skill Slots: 10 -> 11