Master Of None

To the entire party's surprise, the rune carvers that had come on the ships to maintain the runes, had already begun to use materials around the island to create a rune teleportation formation. The rough spatial runes were surprisingly ideal to be carved on some of the stone that came from the ruins. This wasn't by accident though. The stones that the ruins were made of had been treated by unknown methods. Carved from a mountain that had always been closer to the chaotic mana and elemental planes than any other spot known to them in the world. Therefore, when runes were carved on to them, they reacted nearly instantly. This was also paired with the world having denser mana in general since it was returning to the proper flow it should have. The massive changes that might have occurred at sea were why the ships were not seen as a viable way of travel right now. The entire experience with an island slowly being formed below the ocean waves proved this. If the world had changed, then a location like that one would be much more dangerous. The odds were, that asn island might really have formed there b y now. Ending up with another obstacle that the ships would need to face on their way through the already treacherous waters. Beyond that, the rune formation was easily created with little communication through communication crystals. They were another time that appeared to be working even better than before. The messages were more clear than before along with the durability of them seemingly increased. That wasn't all though. Everything that had been forged or created with unique materials had slight changes. The more high class, the more they seemed to improve. Walker could see that the heroic styled armors that they had were much more efficient with mana flow now. Some of the runes had even twisted slightly to take on more natural forms. This would be something that the wandering blacksmith must have been losing his mind over. Not that the party would bother him with such things right away. They all understood that he would be caught up in a wave of desire to learn new things yet again. For him though, this was like the world being new again. He had been in pursuit of such things for a long time already. These changes were just small parts of the overall changes that the party were observing. They wanted to keep looking through everything. The changes in herbs alone had caught Remey and stopped her from doing anything else. Not that she didn't have anything else to do. Ignus was still arguing with her while she examined herbs. Not that she wasn't arguing back. It was just how they got along. A few mages had created a meditation circle. They were passing around elemental manas trying to understand the changes that they had already noticed. This method had been used before by mages, especially those with more nature forward ethics. As that was the case, they had managed to use some of their fire elemental crystals as a center for their mediation. The manas within them had become denser. The crystals showing a clearer color that proved which mana they held. It had been much more faint before these world changes. With all of the good things though, came the bad. Some of the Genesis forces had already brought up how they had to return to their kingdoms or to guard Genesis. This wasn't because they feared what the citizens would do now that they had more strength or more unique system usages in the essence of classes. No, this was due to the fact that the entire world had become stronger in a sense. That meant that the uncontrolled monsters would become stronger as well. There was also a very high chance that the animals that had been developing mana as an aspect of becoming monsters would be taking massive leaps in that way. In turn, that meant both existing monster species and new monster species would appear much more powerful than before. It could also cause the regrowth of certain species of monsters that are extinct. Let alone those that had been struggling to reappear in greater numbers. The pests that were in areas that they should not be would also be a greater area. For the demi-humans, that meant that the farms would be under siege much worse than what they had dealt with before. Their guards would need better strategies using their newfound strengths better. Some armies and guard forces had already begun showing off their ideas for retraining as a whole. They knew that they would be altering their personal battle styles. Therefore, they might even have to rebuild squads entirely. It was a fair evaluation. Since certain metals were also changing, a few kingdoms had even begun to ponder new currencies. Whether or not silver should be purely as a material for blacksmithing, or if other metals would be better off being used to fight undead species rather than just silver. That was when Walker recalled the immortal king. The fact that he had said he would try to use the changes in the word. The elemental manas to break free so that he could pursue the elemental planes and more power. While the immortal king was still trapped in his tower for the time being, Walker did not know what would happen. He would not get there any time soon. He was also level one now. How could he even think of combating a monster that was much stronger than what he had been at his prime. Not that he believed that the immortal king could have resisted his usage of true mana at all. That had been a power that even he couldn't use right now. It was also unsettling since the immortal king had already had Walker give him some natural mana as a payment for the information that he gave them. If that was the case, then the immortal king might be using that to break free of the tower itself. Existence forbid, if the immortal king somehow attempted to use space magic to move the tower instead. With the denser manas there was a lot of variety in what the immortal king could do. But his curse could also grow stronger. That thought left Walker wondering. The immortal king had tried to become immortal. Instead, he had made himself an undead. A grand lich that was still alive but just made of bones. If he had actually been immortal, he wouldn't have trapped his body in the tower and become forced to use skeletons or other undead as eyes and ears. The unsettling feeling kept lingering though. Even as he used his basic healing skill and took potions out of the high spatial storage, Walker could not shake the feeling that things were not done. That the immortal king had gotten what he wanted now that the demon lord was destroyed. Yes, it was fine that the demon lord was gone. The word had returned to the natural flow. Everyone that had been victims of the demon lord could rest now. But was that enough? Now, there was a chance for a greater, more intelligent, villain to grow. Whether he allowed for the world to keep peace or not was up for debate. "You can rest if you need it?" Alice made sure that Walker knew this but also was asking if he needed to rest. She worried that he had not been able to gain enough strength after being injured. After paying the price to use a mastery skill when he shouldn't have been able to use one in the first place with hsi unique class. "I will be fine. I know I'm still a little roughed up, but I was just worrying about a few things. So much just changed, will I even recognize Genesis when we get back home?" to be fair, he did have a few worries that he would not recognize a single thing. The pair even laughed about it for a moment before refocusing on healing and helping. Meanwhile…

"This mana I bought with information. It's useless to me." The immortal king sat with skeletons all around him. Some crumbled to dust while others appeared to radiate with mana before breaking in certain aspects. None of them maintained the proper mental connection needed. Worse yet, the moment the word had repaired itself, the natural mana had changed. He had to start everything over. He did sense something more though. A new connection to the undead that had fallen to pieces had he had left alone. He could sense their bones. He could sense more ancient undead that he had been unable to control due to their age. The materials they had were that of his fellow race. How could he control them when they had studied the same as him? But now, how could he not with his growth in strength?

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