Chaotic Craftsman Worships The Cube

Rearranging his soul back to a more desirable configuration, with the two new levels to blessed soul expansion came the leeway to make two more skills blessed, something he considered among the rest of the distractions around him.

While, in general, everyone who had been close enough to smell him since reaching the ninth level of flavour enhancement had thought he smelled nice, the change that had come with awakening it had been on a different scale. In his immediate vicinity, everyone close enough thought he smelled incredible, and while that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, better that than smelling bad at least, the skill itself was flavour enhancement. Smell and taste were both intrinsically connected, but it couldn’t help but leave him worried about just what he could expect to go through the next time something sunk their teeth into him.

Seriously, in the name of all that’s good, why the fuck was that a second-tier job? I gained it with flavour enhancement; there’s no reason it should have been so powerful! Ugh, god, I want to be sick.

At the very least, he had gained something through the horrors of that. He’d been fully prepared for an awakening, even expectant of one, but four went beyond his wildest dreams. Even with the horror of one of those awakenings being for his least desirable skill, the other three seemed like they were overall positive.

I mean, I never would have guessed that mythril blood was going to awaken too. Kind of a shame I didn’t raise it to a blessed skill to see what bonus skill it would have given me, but whatever. Can’t predict everything. Instead, there’s three new ones to consider.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to guess what ‘gift of flesh’ might do for him but knew he’d need to talk to Verbum about it in the future, before he could be left discovering it in some inopportune time, but the other two seemed generally positive. If bone regeneration meant that Thera would have an easier time regrowing his limbs the next time something cut one off, or that any broken ones would heal quicker, then he wasn’t going to turn his nose up at it, and cellular enhancement to him implied a skill akin to healing enhancement; one that would increase how his body repaired and replaced any injured cells within it.

At the very least, he doubted those last two would be bad, leaving him to try and tell himself that it had all been worth it in the long run, even if he wasn’t sure he could actually make himself believe that.

It doesn’t matter; what’s done is done. Myriad, if you don’t make that connect inclination in a timely manner, I’m destroying everything I’ve built up for your church. I can get all of your new believers to convert to Nare or Helori or someone.

His god continued to laugh.

Sure, yeah, I can, but it’s about the principle of the thing! It’s my skill, and it might come in useful one day, even if I don’t want to grow it, I don’t want to just throw it away either!

Mmh, way to change the topic, he grumbled. But…

Name: Ben Heph

Race: Demonic Human

Titles: Apostle of Myriad, The Forgotten One, Miracle Maker, Skill learner, Enemy of Eneth, Trial Defier, Trial Breaker, Godslayer, Monster, Madman, God killer, Threat, The Mad Apostle, Destined God of Connect, God of Destruction, Creator of Life, Great Awakener, Maniac, Brutal Blacksmith, Defier of Gods, Title Holder, Enemy of Olensia, Great Teacher, Student of Helori, Myriad’s Monster, Outsider Slayer, Demigod Slayer, Transgressor, Destined God of Mental Symbiosis, Destined God of Alien Thought Structure, Destined God of Soul Production, Job Holder, Destined Holder of Actualization, Enemy of Duna, Demon Slayer, World Slayer, Demigod of Growth and Gain, First Human God, First of the Faith, Record Breaker, Psychopath, City Builder, Destined Holder of Multiversal Inclination, Blessing to the World, Abomination, Mockery to all that’s good, Horrible Thing, Freak, Blight, Destined Holder of Abomination Production, Destined Holder of Condemnation, Destined Holder of Realm Access, Destined Holder of Alien Sense, Destined Holder of Defiler of Ambrosia, Defeated Pantheon’s Enemy, King of Proselytization, Completionist of the Library, Destined Holder of Flavour Enhancement

Jobs: Entrée (lv 0)

Previous Jobs: Apprentice craftsman, Craftsman, Priest, Enchanter, Mind user, Magic item maker, Magic weapon maker, High enchanter, Fractured mind user, Tree tamer, High craftsman, Apprentice mage, True mage, Tank, Heretic, Adventurer, Divine heretic, Kin, Master craftsman, Master enchanter, Scholar, Connected enchanter, Infernal craftsman, Marksman, Destruction mage, Material mage, High material mage, Profane enchanter, Master material mage, Impious creator, Mind master, Master adventurer, Otherworldly craftsman, Material creator, Master of all, Ritual enchanter, Holy craftsman, Cursed item maker, Actualizer, Summoned enchanter, Destructive craftsman, Soul mage, Freak mind user, Unholy thinker, Polymath, Alien mind, Soul user, Soul master, Evil soul user, Soul defiling gardener, High actualizer, World killer, Connect master, Abysmal connecter, Master of destiny, Hive brain, Divine enchanter, Inclination master, Slayer, Judge, Holy adversary, Title master, Beneficiary, Divine kin, Multiversal material mage, Expert, Body user, High tank, King of intelligence, Body master, Master tank, Primordial heretic, God defiling gardener, Master actualizer, Outsider, High marksman, Fallen actualizer, King of mana, King of stamina, King of vitality, Intelligence embodiment, Soul creator, Mind breaker, Total self, Degenerate body user, Demonic body user, Divine body user, Foul tank, Resistant tank, High destruction mage, Mortal realm actualizer, Beginner dancer, Assassin, Therapist, Trap user, Eldritch mind user, Trap master, Immoral trap user, King of strength, Cycler, Evil god, Destruction god, Soulcrafter, Divine apostle of Myriad, Craftsman: sewing path, Father of abominations, Dancer, Planar mage, Fan user

Attributes:

Affinities:

Resistances:

Blessed skills:

Passive skills:

Active skills:

Blessings:

Trials:

There. That should do it.

Increasing his mana growth was a priority for him, and if he was going to face a god of souls then having more vitality would be useful as well. Even with less than two months until the next wave, that was still plenty of time for him to grow his attributes further and, with the change, he felt the familiar ache in his soul, even if it was less than he’d expected.

I had been pushing things a bit before those last awakenings, maybe I could handle making one more a blessed skill… mmm, no. Next time I’m going to awaken something, I just won’t rearrange my skills and instead squeeze it on there. Next one is either going to be enchanting inclination or a non-affinitied magic inclination, depending on if I finish first or the gods do. Speaking of, how much longer do you think I’m going to need to wait for that inclination?

Okay, I’m pretty confident that I’m getting my enchanting inclination done first then.

Even if it wasn’t fast, it was taking shape, and it felt like he could see the end of that particular skill’s creation in sight, but with all of his other tasks done, they were finished. Walking Tress and Valaria home, it wasn’t long after that Ben and Thera returned to their own as well, back to all of the work they’d left behind.

With Myriad busy with Anailia and Valaria, Ben didn’t have the chance to bother his god that night, leaving him only in his own personal realm to experiment and the mortal plane below, Thera gently breathing by his side while she slept while he stared at the ceiling.

He wasn’t doing nothing, of course. With his soul stretched out, Ben watched the rest of Stonewall dream, easing some nightmares he saw while he did, as he trained in the ways he could. Souls were constantly created, with soulcraft’s change to a blessed skill meaning that the quadrillionth one he would make was coming far closer than he had expected even just a few weeks prior, while everything he was a contender for got trained too.

High in the sky, to the point that nobody in town would have been able to notice during that dark night, Ben materialized, actualized, and enchanted, making and breaking them thousands of times, still feeling no closer to success. Despite what he’d gained from the meeting with the other third tiers, he was no closer to pushing enchanting to it.

Not enchanting, not crafting, not material manipulation, and not even actualization, Ben sighed to himself, with the last one hurting in particular, even though it wasn’t a priority. Ben had been able to awaken to both evil and destruction authority specifically because he could cheat time, using his thought speed to level those skills in a way that no one else in reality could, but in principle, actualization should have been just as easy to awaken for the same reason. He could do it as fast as he could think, and he was always doing it endlessly, both in his realm as well as within the mortal plane. Even if getting it wasn’t on the same scale of importance that awakening enchanting was, it would have been a boost to both his attributes and his lifespan that he just wasn’t getting to enjoy for reasons he could see.

Maybe there’s just some skills that can’t be driven to the third tier? He wondered. Or maybe the length of time needed to practice with it is just beyond anything reasonable, even when compared against an inclination. This is a power that usually belongs entirely to the realm of gods, and given that I can use it in the mortal realm and they can’t, that means I’m already the best in the universe at doing it. What would it even mean to become a god of an already godly power? What would I be able to do with it at the third tier? Make items in the mortal realm that would just exist without needing to constantly be maintained? Basically gain the power to materialize without using mana, just my mind? If that’s not outright impossible, then it’s not too hard to imagine that it would be the sort of thing that takes a few trillion years of practice first.

Just one of many things he was failing to awaken, it still left him wanting to sigh. He could judge through his authorities that so many of his skills felt close; he just kept failing to push past the tipping point for all of them, and there was nothing he could do. His attempts weren’t working; he needed more options.

Maybe I could just bully all of the world’s gods into giving me their collective blessing, he sighed. Just go out and make enemies of all of them and then deal with it if the world doesn’t end… Well, if I do that and then manage to both get my awakenings and save the world after, I’d be in a pretty good position to tell them all that they should have just done it willingly in the first place and to get over it since it saved the world. And then if we all die instead, it ultimately won’t matter.

… I’ll think about it. Before I go and destroy my relationship with all of the gods in the world, it’s not like there aren’t other ways for me to get another few blessings in the next few weeks. Something I can consider at the very least.