CH876

“Delair, hammer down, looks like we’re changing things up for a moment,” Ben said while she’d only just started to register the notification. “Sit down for just a bit.”

Was the level a fluke coincidence or something repeatable? He knew he had to check and grinning brightly she did as he said as he repeated what he’d done before, giving her a higher quality of information on enchanting next, feeling the knowledge become a part of her without any notification to go with it.

Okay, so maybe that didn’t work but then again…

He materialized and tossed her a small pendant, the young dryad catching it out of the air.

“Enchant on that to the best of your ability. Something that would be useful on a pendant but otherwise it’s up to you.”

“Okay.”

She focused on it as she began her work, applying her affinities to it the same way he’d apply his resistances to give the wearer an easier time with plant spells specifically and was rewarded for it once more, her enchanting reaching the third level when she did.

If she’d been beaming after the first then the next had left her almost ready to explode in excitement and seemed to verify that he was now able to transmit information to a level of detail that he could have a reasonable chance of causing a level beyond the few one-off times he’d managed to help people gain some in the past, if not an outright certainty of it, but he wasn’t yet done. He’d just helped her level two skills he was excellent at, could he do the same for one he wasn’t?

Instantly he was materializing a seed, some water, dirt, and a pot to hold it all before carefully handing it over. He could feel Mora’s new eyes on him with interest, able to see what was happening and switching between him and Delair while Thera was able to pick up that something at least was happening but not seeing the finer details of it while Ben next moved to try and reinforce her knowledge of plant magic, not having any of his own experience to draw from but instead pulling it from the memories of other, more powerful dryads he’d been connected to in the past and tried to apply it in such a way that he knew would suit her, hearing as she not only got her fourth level to it but completed her job as well, leaving her unable to even partially contain herself any longer and jumping for joy, Ben’s actions all but unseen as he buried his face in his hands and muttered under his breath.

“Oh god, this is going to create so much more work for me.”

---

“Is it weird I want to cry?” He asked as he laid there on the shop floor, even more testing done. “Like, not to sound insane but with the way I currently think, the majority of my mind is actually pretty emotionless now. It would have to be for me to stay sane, meaning that the part of myself that I express to the world is what gets my feelings since that part typically keeps speeds comparable with baseline reality but now here I am, the whole of myself in despair. Isn’t that just a little strange?”

“Ben, every time you talk about the state of your mind it sounds strange,” Thera said, doing her part to comfort him despite the comment as she sat beside him, rubbing his head. “But there there, it’s going to be okay.”

“It’s never going to be okay again. The gods are going to try to keep me as busy as the soul mages.”

“You are technically a soul mage, you do remember that, right?”

“Yeah, in the way someone with a doctorate in the history of cheese making is a doctor, everyone knows it doesn’t really count! Ugh, I’m literally only one guy!”

After Delair had taken her new job, going for craftsman, further experiments had shown that, so long as he had the experiences of at least a few awakened skill holders of a given ability within his mind, he could almost instantly give a level to a tier one active skill and almost certainly lower their leveling thresholds as a result, at least for the next few that would be coming after.

While Delair’s status was still somewhat short, he’d been able to help her level a couple of her other skills thanks to it and Thera had gained levels for every tier one active skill she had except for her mana examination and her spirit comprehension, with the first already being at its ninth level and only needing to awaken and the second being one she was the first to hold, Ben having no experience there he could give her even across all of the minds he’d invaded which implied one overwhelming, undeniable fact. The gods were going to want him to keep doing it.

He could already see it, all of them up there demanding his work for the mere pennies they’d try to provide and then acting offended that he’d want more, even as they asked him for days or even weeks of his time, with the worst part being that he couldn’t justify keeping it to himself either. This was a power worthy of the third tier, one that would be useful for the world as a whole too, but more than any of that, it was going to be a pain in the ass.

It also meant that his own skills would likely grow even faster as well, which was of a small consolation. He’d even raised his dance level while testing Thera’s own, but there were more implications that couldn’t be ignored either. If he was going to be able to help others raise their skills that way, he’d likely be able to help them gain them too.

It was something he hadn’t tested yet, that would come after the small breakdown he was letting himself enjoy, but he was already thinking about if and how he’d apply it to himself, with the worst part of all being that he didn’t think he saw anywhere he’d want to. If he could more easily gain more passive skills then he would have taken it in a heartbeat but active skills? Sure, in theory, he had linked his mind to awakened fighters of all sorts and mages as well. He could almost certainly now learn any combat skill and at least some of the non-affinitied magics with minimal practice but the issue was that doing so would only split his focus, and in a significant way.

Everything that he was was going towards trying to reach the third tier with connect and refine his ideas for the tools he’d need if he was going to fight a god. Maybe throwing a few punches would now be enough for him to unlock the zeroth level of unarmed combat and maybe with a few hours or even a few minutes of attempts he could now gain a new magic if he really wanted to but what would be the point? If the world wasn’t collapsing around him then he would have gone mad acquiring all he could but more first-tier skills weren’t going to help him kill a god and despite all of the bonuses he held across his jobs, titles, blessings, and skills, he wasn’t going to put enough effort to get any new combat or magic to the second tier when he had better things to focus on.

What am I supposed to do if I were to waste my time getting a bunch of vanity skills? Punch the most powerful god in reality to death? Maybe my sacrilege would be enough to make the blow hurt, maybe even do some damage but I’m not trying to get a combat skill to its third tier in the time I have left so there’s no way it would be enough. Ugh, does the entire universe really hate me? Letting me get the coolest fucking ability I could hope for and no freaking time to enjoy using it on myself? Is that really it?

“Ugh, I’ll need to figure out how I’m going to tell Myriad about this and how I’m ultimately going to arrange things to do this too,” He muttered. “Maybe I could combine it with all of the soul modifications I’m still scheduled to do? Anyone who comes for a modification gets their levels raised since they’re at least seeking power and anyone who doesn’t want their souls modified doesn’t. Oh damn it, that means I’m going to have even more people to awaken then too! If I can get the seventh levels of physical magics to the eighth then that means I’ll be able to awaken them immediately after. Oh my god, this is so much work and it’s completely irrelevant to my goals beyond the fact that it’s going to help anyone I help have a better chance of living and I guess improving the world’s odds a bit too and I want to be sick.”

“Come on now, it’s going to be okay,” Thera comforted while the two kids watched Ben’s breakdown from the side, neither seeing why he was taking something that seemed so good so hard. “Just ask for something outrageous enough that it will keep requests down, I know you’re good at that.”

“Ugh, it doesn’t matter, they won’t give it to me. They’ll fight tooth and nail and try to guilt me from whatever angle they can to talk me down and then some are going to threaten me for being insolent or something stupid and then I’m going to have to put them in their place which is only going to make them more mad even though they’re going to deserve it and then I’m still going to breakdown because even if I know I’m being ripped off, I decided to not abandon this stupid planet and I’ve done so freaking much for this world already I swear if I live I’m going to force every stupid god to give me their blessing whether they want to or not. They’ll see how evil the god of sacrilege can be!”

“The what?”

“Nothing Delair, I’m just whining and being a disgrace of an adult, please ignore me while I’m being a bad influence.”

“Ben, if she ignored you while you’re being a bad influence then she’d never be able to learn anything from you,” Thera told him with a level of gentle sincerity that only hurt all of the more, forcing him to finally get up.

“No, okay, this is fine. And even if it’s not fine, I’ll work it out. I can handle having one more task on my already ridiculous schedule and I still need to actually see if I can help teach others active skills for now but even if I can’t, there really shouldn’t be too much demand on that front from the gods, right?”

“...Unless of course they want me trying to train any civilians in a couple skills to act as a last line of defense for themselves,” He sighed before going on. “No. Okay, you know what? No. A zeroth level anything isn’t going to help anyone for the third wave, I’m not doing it so for now, we’re just going to do a quick test to see if I even can do that in the first place and then move on from there. Delair, we’ve spoken about it before but are there any non-affinitied magics you’d like access to?”

“Can you help me learn material user and destruction like you? Oh, and I know it’s not magic but can I try connect too, please?” She asked, already excited at the prospect and instantly melting away some of Ben’s despair.

“Alright, now I kind of want to cry for nicer reasons. Yeah, I can do that so let’s do our best here.”

He transferred all of the things he’d learned about those three rare skills and the experience of using them, having no other sources to pull from for them but still trying to adjust as he did. Two were bonus skills from awakening and one came from his god, not something he’d gained himself but he knew how it felt to use them and watched as she started to try, not getting immediate results and leaving him just the smallest amount of comfort.

Okay, so it looks like this doesn’t leave skill acquisition as easy as it does leveling. Of course, the difference could be a matter of minutes but still, just gotta watch and see.

With attempts for it all ending with mixed results, both magics working out to about an hour for proper acquisition of the two skills she’d had no experience in, leagues better than the weeks or even months it might normally take to gain a non-affinitied magic but still long enough that further showed it wasn’t worth wasting his time on, even if connect hadn’t gone so smoothly.

So she didn’t get connect for herself in the end which means there might be some limits I’m not immediately seeing. The fact that I don’t know how anyone would acquire that to begin with might be part of the problem but it shows that I can’t just teach any skill I’ve seen, there’s going to be exceptions. Still, I’ll reserve some leisurely skill acquisition for the future if I’m not brutally murdered in the next few months, which as a fun bonus means I’ll mostly just need to buy passive skills from Zandale when the war ends too so hey, that’s a positive, right?

A minor positive compared to how much work he was still expecting it to be but a positive nonetheless as he did his best to manage his feelings for what was left of the remaining day, being forced to put a pause to it not more than a second later.

<Ben, I- What’s going on here?>

Definitely nothing the gods are going to try and financially abuse me over. Why, what’s up?

<Alright, fine, give me a real answer later. Arrangements have been made for the two third tiers you’ll be helping, they’ll be ready for you in an hour.>

Okay, great.

With the shape of his current thoughts, he didn’t know if he could experience true distraction but at the very least it would be one new thing to occupy him, lightening his load just a little bit with something new to look forward to.