I stop and look at her for a moment, and she actually seems to be serious. Tess probably wants to cement Group 4’s strength in the minds of everyone here, whether they’re from Easy or Beyond.

I take a moment to ensure that the barrier around us is still functioning before I note, “I would be showing my hand before the duels. Tacita, Savant, and Gareth would see all of my skills and other abilities.”

“Yes,” Maya agrees. “Tess already considered that. She knew you would object so she told me to ask: Why do you care if they see? You’re on a higher floor than any of them so just fuck them up anyway.”

Those two sentences from Tess, despite coming from Maya, make me think for a while, and though Maya continues to speak, I filter it out.

Yes, Tacita might counter me. Yes, Savant’s full abilities are still a mystery, but why should that stop me? I used to be more cocky and confident.

It’s as if I’ve placed them all on the same level as me. Even if it’s true, I shouldn't be thinking like that; I should be an arrogant piece of shit. My subclass is Pride, isn’t it?

“Okay,” I respond, “I’ll do it.”

Tess must have realized it as well, even during the 1st event when I was conserving my mana for the final confrontation. So now that silly blonde is pushing me where she thinks I want to be.

She really is good at reading people, isn’t she?

I activate my [Mana Crown], and when it appears over my head, I redirect all the mana I’ve been collecting in the orb into the crown. Storing it there is much more stable and puts less strain on my body.

Even then, the empty space inside the crown barely fills. What a scary mana battery this skill makes.

I make my Thermokinetic Mana Heart compress the mana it generates as much as it can and redirect the stream of generated mana into the crown. My body’s store of mana is full, and my reservoir is full too, so all newly generated mana will flow into the crown. In five hours, a nice amount should be generated.

Vortex Core is also full, compressed Primordial Energies swirling inside of it.

That is amusing enough. The Armorer said as much on the 5th Floor. My body is extremely mana-conductive. All thanks to my Mana Circuit, my passives, and my constructs. It's almost as if I'm turning myself into a mana battery, the rest of my body serving as a conduit to direct and shape that mana, right down to my second trait.

Let's just try not to end up like Armorer's former Lord, imprisoned and used as a mana supply.

“I'm gonna go prepare then. See you later.” I wave to Maya and carefully set Biscuit down.

The best doggo decides to do his own thing and wobbles on his way as he follows Maya away.

Tacita is observing me with her lively eyes, still leaning against the tree, brown hair falling over her forehead. Her eyes flicker towards my crown a few times and I watch the thoughts flash behind her gaze. As if she’s already picturing our confrontation in her mind. I can tell, I’ve done the same so many times already.

“Do you think you can take me down?” I ask her.

She pauses for a moment, though it’s only a short one. Tacita smiles brightly, her eyes squinting into a dangerous gaze.

“I see.” There is no need for more words.

Even as I walk away, I start already preparing ideas on how to best use my mana here.

I like the idea of using ethercrystals they mine here. With a few good inscriptions, I could probably turn the entire mine into a bomb. But the quest is to defend the place’ not blow it up, unfortunately.

Or I could turn myself into a bomb, in a bid inspired by Lissandra’s actions at the end of the second floor. The system would surely keep me alive.

The problem with that is that I don’t want a permanent construct like that, and I don’t know if the system will remove it. Any alterations I make to my body during the event will probably stay even after I leave.

We’ve already learned that it’s probably impossible to level a skill during an event, though they tend to level up at the end of the event as if the experience were being collected and applied in the common area.

There is also the fact that after I left the 1st event, my body was fully restored and my mana was returned to the state it was in before the event, but would that happen to the constructs made during the event? Especially now when I don’t have a [Restriction] active?

Well, let’s not risk it and go with a single-use method; it will be a bit more difficult without mana conductive paint, but it should still be manageable.

“Mind if I join you?” Lily asks, as she nimbly rushes to my side, leaving the others to their discussion.

Grumpy (Hell, 4th)

“As long as you don’t distract me too much, sure.”

“Are you saying I'm distracting?” she shoves me playfully, a smile on her face.

I have a feeling of déjà vu. I'm sure she said that same sentence a long time ago, but this time it feels different. It feels more like a joke rather than her being pushy.

“Yes yes, by the way, do you want my left arm? You could use it for [Sacrifice] later. After you restore it, we can find out how much it costs and how long it takes to regenerate your mana before the attack starts to find out if it’s worth it,” I offer.

With her being restricted, my arm could give her an impressive boost. And who knows, maybe this will count towards my points.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“Sure!” the petite healer answers without hesitation.

I might have offered it, but please, at least pretend to be a bit shocked and hesitant.

“Are inscriptions difficult?” Lily asks as we sit at the edge of the outermost wall with our feet hanging over the edge.

A massive clearing is stretched out beneath us, descending from our position. Despite the chilly air, the view of the surrounding mountains and valleys is breathtaking. It just has that sort of rough untouched natural beauty.

All of it is so big, so unreal. Alien even. “Most of the time I just go by feeling while remembering the things that didn't work before,” I answer her.

“But isn’t that boring?”

“Is your plastic surgery skill boring?”

“It’s not plastic surgery!” she pouts. “I did it to improve my fine control. But I think I know what you’re getting at.”

“Simple as that. Do you like any of this, Lily?” I ask curiously.

Even while engaging in conversation, I make sure to keep filling my crown with mana and continue to inscribe a thin layer of my skin with pathways. I do it in this way so I can just use [Resonance] to scratch a thin layer of my skin, and make it all disappear. Or even if I just focus my healing passive there.

“This event or overall?” Lily asks.

“Overall.”

“I love it, Nat.” Lily smiles while looking at the giant mountains that fill our surroundings, swinging her dangling feet, “It doesn't matter how much it hurts or how sad it gets at times, I wouldn’t change any of it.”

Curious, I observe her and devote a bit more attention to our conversation, “What do you like so much about it?”

She opens her mouth to say something but quickly closes it.

She looks at me for a second and smiles as if she’s changed her mind about something, “I like that I’m not alone more than anything. I like that I’m not weak anymore and I like being useful. I’m changing, Nat, I’m not how I used to be and it’s scary at times.”

Quietly waiting, I let her think and I listen.

“I’m not talking about the stats, or the skills, and traits. What I mean is that I’m not the same person I was on Earth and I think the old Lily would be scared of me. But at the same time, she would also be happy for me. I think I’ve improved a lot thanks to the others.”

“Most of it was probably thanks to Biscuit.”

That makes her laugh out loud. “Yes, Biscuit did more work than anyone else. Seriously though, most of it is Tess, she’s like my friend, leader, and mom all combined into one.”

“She does a lot. You guys should help her and show her how grateful you are, at least once in a while. No matter how she acts, it’s difficult for her too.”

“Yeah, I think Maya noticed it first. Though Sophie realized it a bit later. They’ve become really good friends. I’m the one who’s slow when it comes to stuff like this.” Leaning back, she sighs. “I think I’ll have enough mana to restore your arm again and replenish it before the attack starts.”

I nod and, lowering my defenses, coat my hand in resonating mana and cut off my arm at the shoulder, putting it on the wall next to the other.

Lily touches me right after, her healing mana closing the wound and slowly regrowing my arm. She can do it faster, but she’s either taking things slow to conserve as much mana as she can or for the opportunity to touch me longer. Either could be true.

I bet it’s the second option.

To break the silence, I challenge her, “Guess what my subclass is.”

“Pride.”

“Close enough, you can try…”

“Pride.”

Dang it.

“Nat, it’s quite obvious and I think most of the group knows. But I think it suits you. I know pride is generally viewed in a negative light, but yours is comforting. It’s like you have this unshakable confidence in yourself. I often find myself being jealous of you. How easily you seem to deal with situations and events that bother me for days.”

She’s restored my arm up to the elbow by the time she continues, “For example, that thing with Tent Creep, I know I would be cringing for days, but you already seem to be over…”

She stops as I pinch her nose and shake her head, and a playful laugh escapes from her lips.

“For the future Ruler of Lust, you really are quite the comedian, Miss Lily.”

“One day I will have to beat the crap out of Aaron for coming up with that. But you can try to guess my subclass too. Do you think you can do it?”

“Wrath,” I respond, much to her surprise.

Seeing her expression, I must have hit the nail on the head.

“How?”

“I guessed what you would pick back then. We spoke and you told me you wanted to learn to control your skills. I did have two more guesses but that one seemed like the most likely option and you just confirmed it.”

After a minute of silence, she asks quietly, “Was it the right decision?”

“It was a decision you made on your own, that’s all that matters. You just have to do your best to follow through.” I stand up and stretch. “We humans have to try hard to avoid being left behind by our future animal overlords. Biscuit and Noodle are here and ready to take over the moment we show the slightest bit of weakness so do your best.”

“What?” she blinks, confused.

Oh, I don’t think I’ve shared that part of my theory with the others. Well, I’ll have to do that at some point in the future, slowly to avoid scaring them off.

“I’ll explain later. I want to go and place a few traps, but I’ll be back before the attack starts.”

“I’ll pass that on to Tess… and our future animal overlords,” she says carefully.

Sometimes people don't appreciate me as much as they should.

Waving at her, I jump over the edge and fly away from the walls.

The traps will be simple. A number of anchors inscribed into mana stones to make them last longer and keep more of them active than I could with my skill alone.

Obviously, I won't be using my materials and mana stones. I bet the natives have some nice stuff stashed away somewhere. Sharing is caring, isn’t it?

I can also string up some extremely dense, hair-thin threads of mana across the terrain; that would be nice too. Running into one could cut an enemy apart before they ever realized what was happening, and the amount of mana is minuscule. I’ll need to find out how long they can last and how strong I can make them.

There are a few more surprises after that too. Maybe I can prepare an avalanche or something that Min-Jae can help along with his gravity magic.

There’s the question of whether or not I should be using these traps in the first place. I might just wait it out and join the fight near the end when everything seems lost. That could look cool; I bet Biscuit would be proud of me, and it would give me the opportunity to do something flashy.

Anyway, whoever does attack will receive a warm welcome.