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989 Words
The trickster was slippery, as his control over his illusions was so refined that even the cameras couldn’t pick him up. If Zack was there in person, he could have shattered the façade, but that was asking to be discovered, so he had to resort to videos only.
Passive recon was safe recon.
While the Tier 10 Pathers didn’t know it, the little ballroom they were congregating in was inside Tur’stal’s palace.
The second-place Pather went by the name Pause. And what an apt name it was.
The girl didn’t even try to hide her Talent just her identity.
As near as they could figure, every three seconds, Pause reverted to a physical form she had previously chosen. That included her clothes and stamina, just not her mana. Though as far as they had seen, the Talent didn’t depend on mana to function. More than once, Adam had cut the woman’s head off from an invisible hiding point, only for her to reform perfectly unharmed.
A monstrously strong Talent. Nonetheless, not even the greatest Talents were invincible. It must have some limitations that they hadn’t puzzled out yet.
For that matter, Adam hadn’t either. His wins were from when he managed to entomb Pause in some entrapment skill or another. She usually had ways to wiggle out of them, clearly knowing her own weakness, but that didn’t stop the tactic from being effective half the time.
So, most fights devolved into seeing if Pause could stumble upon and stab the invisible man before she was trussed up.
While entertaining, the pair never revealed new skills to each other and just applied the same few skills in new ways.
They also never really visited the top ten lounge, which limited their ability to track the top two Pathers.
After covering the other things he had learned during his watch, there was nothing else worth discussing.
Zack stood up and carefully pushed his chair under the table at his spot. Taking a moment, he inched it slightly left so it lined up with his stationery and turned to bid Allie farewell.
Even at Tier 23, he needed the break after a week of being perpetually alert and observing the Tier 10s.
That, and he had to report their latest findings to their handlers.
Sighing, he paced to the teleportation formation and vanished.
Allie watched as Zack winked away, and then leaned over, poked his chair a smidgeon, and slightly tilted his pad of paper.
A finger flick moved his markers into a counterclockwise spiral instead of a clockwise one.
She grinned and let loose her best evil laugh.
Having been partners for well over a century, she knew all the best ways to mess with him.
She practically had it down to a science; maximum annoyance with minimum effort.
Leaning back, she swung her feet up to put them on the desk, but her chair slipped off the pole, and she crashed to the ground. Crawling to the base of the chair, she saw that her chair’s bolts had been carefully cut through so, when she leaned back, she would be sent tumbling.
She giggled as she reached up, grabbing the peanuts from where they still hovered in the same spot.
Having been partners for well over a century, he knew the best ways to mess with her as well.
Still smiling, she pulled a plusher replacement chair out of her spatial ring and settled in for the grind.
Shoving away from her alchemy table, Liz let out a huff and waited for the latest potion to finish its final stage of boiling down.
Looking over, she saw Matt carefully tracing out the runes for his talismans and, once again, she wondered if she could keep up with him.
Even using [Blood Manipulation] to move her body like a marionette, she was still weaker than his persona.
Quill was a force of nature, with enough trump cards to fill a dragon’s hoard.
She… was limited to fire. With a Talent that practically disallowed all non-blood elements. It was absolutely wonderful to embrace her inner flame once again, but the simple fact of the matter was she had to work double-time to just counteract all of her fire skills being in her outer spirit. Even with her internal blood manipulation tricks, she only held so many other cards she could play.
And if you consider each of the talismans as a card, Quill would have a million cards to play. Almost literally.
Liz squashed that train of thought, as it would only lead to jealousy. Besides, she believed she might have a way to massively increase her power shortly.
If only she could perfect the process.
Originally, the restrictions on her Torch identity had sparked the idea. While she was barred from using any outward blood skills, she still had free reign within her own body.
In theory, that gave her an advantage over even her hulking partner, who couldn’t use the repulsive or mana charging effects of his Concept. In practice, even with an internal Concept, she was limited in what abilities she could exhibit.
Against normal opponents, even Tier 12 monsters at Tier 9, that had been more than enough to carry her through. Against the other best Pathers her generation had to offer, she struggled to overwhelm them as she had the more predictable monsters.
She needed an additional edge. That had gotten her thinking about her alchemy.
Battle potions were their own field of alchemy for a reason. A boost to strength in the middle of a battle could be the deciding factor.
The problem with most potions was their immediate side effects, which usually entailed the drinker getting weaker for a time, combined with an increasing resistance to the effects of the potions if used back-to-back.
There were some serious drawbacks to overcome if she wanted alchemy to be more than a last resort or finishing measure.
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