“It’s done,” Afilada said as she stood from her seated position. Her knees protested since she had been sitting there motionless for the last several hours. Previously she had managed to upgrade her fighter, rogue, and guardian classes, and now she had upgraded her seeker class as well.
It turned out that upgrading a class wasn’t as simple as gaining one. Activating the opal class stone imparted knowledge, but then the user had to act on that knowledge. There was some information on what the class itself meant, but most of it was on how the pathways in your body needed to change.
The large pathways that she had long been able to interact with didn’t need to change much. The cultivation which thickened them she had been working on since the latter days of the first tier. That was when their tutorial observer had explained to everyone the basics of the process. As her classes had progressed to one hundred percent she had slowly been able to see smaller paths branching off of the main ones. In order to upgrade a class it was these pathways that she had to work on.
These smaller paths for her body's energy developed as her class completion grew. Each class added different pathways. In order to access the power of an opal class she needed to make better use of these new pathways. By using the opal class stone she was shown where she needed to link those paths with her physical body. There was already a tenuous link, but it was up to her to strengthen those nascent connections. The good news was that she didn’t really need to understand the method, she just needed to focus her energy toward the indicated areas and some Network function took care of the rest. The bad news was it took a long time.
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Luckily for her she had the rest of her team to watch over her while she upgraded, just as she had helped watch over them while they did the same. Her time with her mentor had taught her many things. One of those was that she would not be able to claim the throne of this world without help. It wasn’t enough to be the strongest and to lead through fear. Those around her would need to feel like they were a part of her crusade and not just disposable pieces.
This had affected not only how she interacted with her small party, but also with the rest of her army. It was easier now to call them an army since she had earned an Army Array from her mentor. No longer did she simply take the best of what everyone else had and left them with the scraps. Take her remaining class, hunter. She could have easily taken someone else’s opal hunter stone for herself and made them earn another. That’s what the old her would have done. Now she would instead praise them on their achievement and try to earn one herself.
It felt strange, but she supposed in the long run it wouldn’t cost her much and would make her troops more loyal to her. Not only that, but they had discovered that quest rewards were partially tailored to the one who earned them. While anyone could use an opal class stone, assuming they had the required quartz class, the person who earned it as part of their quest would be more in tune with it. She was better off earning her own stone that would better align with her own style.
“Let’s go boys and girls. I got a report of a dungeon that gives out a lot of hunter stones. This will be my last and then we can work on finishing your upgrades, Sabi.” Afilada offered her hands to both Pierto and Sabi and helped them to their feet. The party set off at a brisk trot with more purpose in their step then there used to be. Maybe her mentor really knew what he was talking about after all.
