Chapter 172: Dodgy mana crystal.
"First of all, I\'m keeping this, I worked hard for it after all."
As he said this, Ark took out a glowing, fist-sized crystal from his spatial bag. This amber crystal was the angel\'s mana crystal, which was all that was left of the angel, except for the limb.
The young lady was a little surprised, but not by the fact that he had killed the angel, but more so by the fact that he showed her the crystal, and said he was going to keep it, he could\'ve just done so without saying anything.
In Ark\'s eyes, it was only a matter of honesty. In this world, it was common that the party leader would distribute the loot after they had raided a dungeon, and he didn\'t lose anything by telling her. No one here could do anything about it even if they wanted to, since they all knew their places. Ark didn\'t want to hide it and feel guilty about it, so he decided to just tell her.
It would be wrong of him to just hide it and demand more compensation from her.
The young lady gave him a glance, before she looked behind him and at his family.
"Can I borrow your spatial bag for a second?"
Though it was a weird request, Ark quickly understood why she had asked it. He lightly tossed it over to her, and she caught it promptly, before she retrieved her own. After putting them next to each other, she concentrated, and a stream of light emerged from her spatial bag and entered into Arks. After the process was done, she tossed it back to him again.
"Thank you for helping us out, without you guys we would\'ve probably died several times over! I\'m sorry that it turned out like this!"
Ark just caught the spatial bag and put it back on his waistband without checking what she had put into it, as he already knew what it was. "Don\'t worry about it, we earned something from it after all, but we\'ll take our leave now."
The young lady only nodded in response, before she turned to talk to the twins. Ark didn\'t waste any time and immediately left with Atar, Thufrat and Ephine following closely behind. Their reunion might\'ve been sweet, but Ark didn\'t have the time to stay and watch it, he didn\'t want to risk anything after all.
After a while had passed, they arrived back outside their temporary home once more, and they all relaxed. Thufrat had been tense for quite a while now, and he just instantly laid down onto the ground in front of the cave when he arrived. Everyone else turned into their wolf forms before they all laid down in the grass as well.
The soft yet slightly tingly grass was a nice welcome after a long and hard battle, and both Ephine and Atar fell asleep almost as soon as they laid down.
Thufrat and Ark both just stared into the sky, the peaceful afternoon breeze finally managed to calm them down after a while, and they both fell asleep.
…
Sitting on the branch of a tree close to the cave, Ark was contemplating. He was currently in his human form, and in his hand was the angel\'s mana crystal. The pulsating gentle light within seemed incomparably gentle, which felt surreal to Ark considering how the angel\'s true form was all but gentle.
At first he had wanted to give it to Ephine to enhance her strength, but as he thought about it, he was a little scared.
The angel\'s mana crystal might actually be a mirror image of the angel itself, seemingly gentle and pure at first, but actually wicked and dark. To let Ephine absorb and assimilate this mana crystal would be a risk, and he wasn\'t sure if he was willing to take it. He himself had assimilated a mana crystal, but that mana crystal had been from another species of wolf, just like himself.
Had the mana crystal just been dark and resembled the angel in its true form then he wouldn\'t even need to think about it twice. The amber mana crystal in his hand felt like a wolf in sheep\'s clothing, appearing prettier than it actually was.
Since he wasn\'t an expert on assimilating mana crystals, and since he had never dealt with one of this calibre, he decided that it was probably better to just ask for help. Since that was the case, he\'d think a little bit more about it later, for now, he had something more important to do. After the fight they had experienced the day before, he had naturally levelled up!
Ark was a person who liked to enjoy the moment, and he didn\'t want to think about levels or such the day before, but now that he had calmed down and refreshed himself, he was eager to strengthen himself even more! As more days passed, the visions he had seen haunted him more and more. After this fight with the fallen angel, his thirst for strength was even stronger than ever before.
He desperately wanted to grow strong enough to protect what he cared for.
As he watched his status page, a small smile formed on his face.
Name: Ark
Title: Overlord
Condition: Normal
Species: Overlord Elemental Wolf
Level: 60 (104)
Mp: 600/600
Strength: 30 (45)
Agility: 45 (45)
Dexterity: 35 (45)
Endurance: 30 (45)
Vitality: 30 (45)
Intelligence: 200
Wisdom: 135
Status points [140]
Seeing the amount of levels he had gone up, Ark was happy, and he knew that a big increase in strength was going to come from all of these points. With that said, he wasn\'t entirely sure how he wanted to distribute them yet. He still didn\'t quite know how the system worked, as he never knew when he was going to get a new skill.
He thought that he would definitely get a skill when a stat passed the 100 milestone but that wasn\'t the case.
With that said, it didn\'t take Ark too long to figure out what he wanted to do. Since he had plenty of points, he decided to invest 75 points into his intelligence, and 65 points into his wisdom. Mana regeneration was definitely important, but even more so was that skill he might get when the stat reached 200 points, and it was worth the gamble in his opinion.
After investing all of his points into intelligence, he had seen a massive increase in strength, and investing into his physical stats was simply not worth it anymore since he could just boost them with skills and such, it was still good to have just in case, but it was definitely not a priority by any means.
As he poured his points into wisdom and intelligence, he could hear that same old familiar voice once more.