Replicus appeared aboard his ship.

A deep sigh sounded from behind his helmet.

The experience from moments ago had been rather interesting, not to mention rewarding.

It was immensely pleasing to see the glowing notification before his eyes, which told of how much he had subtracted from the vast pool of required cumulative mana experience for Tier 4.

Replicus had earned 35,000 EXP from this single kill!

Thud.

The body of said kill fell with a muffled thump from his hand, slumping lifelessly on the deck. Everyone looked at it; Grim with a grin, Allora with bright mana-livid eyes, and Pherdanta with the expected stoic calm.

Araeyn had no immediate reaction, and Baddan, who was standing in the middle of the deck, controlling the ship, took a simple glance at the corpse before going back to staring at the oceans beyond.

“Easy work,” Grim said enthusiastically.

“Don’t say that!” Allora rebuked. “This was only thanks to the boss’ carefully planning.”

Grim scoffed.

“If planning was all it took to take down an Incandescent Stager, they would be a lot rarer than they are now,” he said.

Replicus shook his head.

“We’re far from done. Don’t let your guard down,” he said, and looked past the glow around the deck.

As the ocean was turning steady again, the fleet of ships had returned to sailing forward, though in a more haphazard formation that before.

The skies were starting clear, bringing back to mind the idea that the day was yet to fail for the night to come.

Pherdanta paid keen attention to the other ships’ behaviour.

“Looks like no one is that rattled by the storm, huh? Typical,” Replicus said, as though Reading Pherdanta’s thoughts. “Or maybe they are aiming for a surprise attack once we relax?”

Pherdanta turned to him.

“I’m more worried about the Bishop, master. You may have just excited her with the light show,” she said.

“Probably,” Replicus chuckled. “That ‘lightshow’ was to attract anyone other than her and Eaniss though. I’m sure a few are going to fall for it, thinking it was meant to be something other than a supplementary attack to a very specific situation.”

In short, while [Titan World Storm] was a very powerful skill, Replicus had decided to use it now rather than to save it for later because, first and foremost, he didn’t know if it would work as well with what the conditions would turn out to be like the further they went past the Central Boundary.

There was also the fact that its effectiveness on some of the more renown Incandescent Stagers would basically be non-existent for a plethora of reasons.

Lastly, was the fact that [Titan World Storm] was a very good tool when it came to raw showmanship, and making a spectacle that caused the eruption of an all out battle would be very exciting, not to mention unnecessarily epic.

That said, what Replicus had shown of the [Titan World Storm], was nowhere near its full prowess. It barely counted as half of the skill’s strength.

Replicus had to ‘cheat’ just to activate it, and this ‘cheat’, was through [Sorcery of Essence]’s subskills [Sage Save ], and [Sage Strain].

~~~

[Sorcery of Essence (Special) | Lv.8]

All standard forms of energy and essence are brought to submission by the user’s will, as their concentration, pattern and properties are exploited fully to achieve various incredibly complex commands that mirror what the user desires.

–

-Passive-

• All external forms of energy and essence automatically become richer and more potent when the user draws them, giving a 10% efficiency to what the user utilises them for.

• All internal forms of energy and essence are enriched by 120%.

–

-Active-

[Sage Save]:-

Once activated, this sub-skill builds a potential 0.0001% boost to additional mana quantity every moment the user spends without using their internal mana reserves. The total boost is added to internal mana reserves the moment Sage Save is deactivated. Effect lasts for five days with a cooldown of 24 hours.

–

[Sage Strain]:-

Once activated, this sub-skill builds a potential 0.001% boost charge to mana concentration every moment the user spends without using their skills. The total boost is applied to internal mana reserves the moment Sage Strain is deactivated. Effect lasts for five days with a cooldown of 24 hours.

–

Mana Requirements: 300,000 (I) Mana; 100,000 (I) Mana every day.

Duration: —

Cooldown: —

~~~

The results of the two active sub-skills grew more phenomenal with time for both Replicus’ mana cores.

He had been following the conditions of the skills for as long as he possibly could everyday.

The benefit of [Sage Save] on his mana, increased his total pool of mana for five days, and [Sage Strain] increased the total concentration – meaning the qualitative difference between core colours.

As the moments Replicus spent without using his own mana accumulated in worth to the equivalent of 25 days – for his main mana core – and those without using his skills totalled to roughly 15 days, the amount of strength he had just added to himself was atrocious – for both mana cores.

~~~

[ MANA (II) Partial : 742,023 ]

—

[ MANA^ (I) Partial : 2,204,755 ]

~~~

As [Sage Save] added a 0.0001% increment, Replicus’ first mana core had its total mana quantity inflated by 211%, and his second – which had not been used in accumulated time worth 29 days – had been inflated by 245%.

[Sage Strain] which added a 0.001% increment had adopted a 1,269% increase in concentration for both cores in the 15 days worth of time Replicus didn’t use his skills. As a result, Replicus’ mana cores jumped in quality – the first one adopting a similar quality to the purple hue, and his second, blue quality.

Unfortunately, the caveat for [Sage Strain] was that when using skills, Super skills, for instance, activation would be possible, but the full capacity of the skill couldn’t be reached as the mana quality received through the sub-skill was more of an imitation than the real deal.

That didn’t stop Replicus’ physical stats from jumping very high in potency though.

Right now, the Penetrator could feel the ridiculous surge in his strength which would last for five days.

It didn’t waft out like how a natural purple core would, but that wasn’t important.

All was fair.

He had a feeling that he was only able to handle this amount of power because he was all bones though. All strong bones. Other experts probably couldn’t handle such a thing at once, which led him believe that [Sorcery of Essence] wasn’t an attainment common even among Mages.

“Boss. I think we’ve attracted a few…” Grim said while looking left and right.

Two ships were coming their way from opposite directions. One of these seemed to have the intent to crash into theirs.

Replicus’ sockets flared.

While he was able to invade other ships, he still didn’t have the ability to look past the barrier that veiled the decks of others’ ship.

‘Annoying.’

Not knowing who he was up against was a hassle.

He had marked Eaniss’ ship and the Bishop’s, but the rest were hard to differentiate. The last target had been picked at random after discounting the two he had designated as no-gos.

In any case, Replicus had planned for most scenarios.

“Allora. You’re up,” he said to the tall, female Unlimited.

“Right!” Allora said and prepared to finally take up her role as the enemies sandwiched them!