"I figure the administrator likely can't give me any advice on a Lineage upgrade, but I'm asking you. The information I got at the orc longhouse was fine, but much of that seemed to be focused on orc Lineages, and less on elven ones, or from other kin." Axl felt he was getting a bit too close to tipping his hand, what he really wanted to ask about.
"Indeed, the administrator is not allowed to provide you such information, I apologize, my lord. As for myself, I have only scant information on elven Lineages, despite Irialith being dominated by the elven and kobold people, before its fall into a mere sanctuary. All I know is that you will be offered an upgrade based on the trials your body has overcome, influenced by any heritage in your ancestors and unique resources consumed or obtained. If you are of unusually high providence, you may even choose between two options to decide a path for future development, perhaps even three."
Axl was somewhat disappointed, this being very much like the information he got at the longhouse. "Is there a way to change your options? Or dictate them in a very different direction?"
"Nothing is impossible under the heavens, but I have not heard of any such means. Perhaps at the higher grades? But knowledge of even one grade above the F is simply rumor and idle fantasy, and even how to progress within the grade is murky and unclear, with our civilization so fallen. I apologize, my lord.
"However, I should stress that upgrading one's Lineage into the F-Grade while still in the G-Grade is quite unusual, and I thought only possible for beasts, who rely more heavily on Lineage for their progression than the sentient kin. Even then, only the most powerful beasts manage the feat you have accomplished."
Axl nodded, that tidbit indeed being new. "Thank you, Tem."
Seamlessly noticing the conversation was over, the polite bird bowed and flew back to the tree line.
Axl sat with his back against the northern wall, looking up at the ceiling. The previously inscrutable mosaic now clearly showed the gardener, surrounded by plants and flowers, a gentle smile on his face. Axl's eyes widened as he realized something in the dense Mana dancing across the stone. He's an artisan, not a warrior. And I still nearly got my ass handed back to me when we fought.
Taking a deep breath, Axl turned to the main reward from clearing the rift, the one given by the Deep System itself. His previous one when clearing the poisoned rift gave him Bilesong and Limerence, but an upgraded Lineage was an altogether different sort of benefit. It would be a change to the very nature of his body, including its future potential and direction.
>>Geas of the Weak triggered: Maximal F-Grade trial result obtained while in the G-Grade.
>>Reward: Lineage ascendance to F-Grade.
>>Accept? Yes/No
Without further nervous procrastination, Axl accepted the reward.
>>Lineage upgrade options from Common G-Grade Lineage to F-Grade:
>> 1) Stormstrike Elf of the twilight Zazen (Epic)
>> Upturn the very fabric of the Firmament, be it at a foreign land or from a Terran seat. Mold the Dao to your will.
>> Title: Enemy of the Dao, child of the Zen (Twilight Zazen)
>> Cerulean Lightning Descent (Epic Skill)
>> +20% all Attributes, +20 all Attributes
>> WARNING: Choice will trigger a Minor Tribulation in addition to any accumulated Tribulation.
>> 2) Flame of Frenzy (Rare)
>> Heed the call of purest Fire, spread its voice with your flame.
>> Mandatory Quest: Burn it all to ash
>> Soulsearing Combustion (Epic skill)
>> +10% all Attributes, +10 all Attributes
>> 3) Alchemical Vessel in the High Elf (Rare)
>> Forsaking your Lineage, you claim a transitional form reaching into the greater heights of craft and being.
>> Choice of additional Alchemical Organ compartment
>> Meridian implantation (Rare bodyplan improvement)
>> +20 All attributes
>> 4) Bilious High Elf (Uncommon)
>> Poison the self, poison the enemy, poison life itself.
>> Detect weakness (Uncommon skill)
>> Venomous Barbs implantation (Rare bodyplan improvement)
>> +10 to all Attributes
>> 5) High Elf of the Oceanic Fathoms (Uncommon)
>> Your water is deep, dive into the heft of the world itself.
>> Choice of Uncommon water-based skill
>> Choice of Uncommon gill-based bodyplan improvement
>> +5 to all Attributes
Axl expected to have two or three choices, from what Tem said, but having five was quite a shock. But that was nothing compared to seeing that first option, not only from its eye-watering number of Attributes gained, but that it even mentioned Terra. But before he let himself get too drawn to that, he first calmly considered the other options.
The fourth and fifth options seemed somewhat weak, and he didn't want to specialize in poison or water, so he felt reasonably confident ruling those out. The second option reflected what Moxlin warned him about regarding Fire, namely that using it too much might derail your Path. Still, even now he didn't regret leaning into it to deal with Brillhit.
The rewards for the fire-based choice seemed pretty good, with solid Attribute gains and even an Epic skill, but he didn't like the sound of a "Mandatory Quest", not to mention what it was called. If he only got one option, would it be this one? With how little he actually used Fire, he wasn't surprised most cultivators feared being pigeon-holed into the element so easily. After a moment of thought, Axl felt this choice could be an option, but he'd rather avoid it if possible.
The third choice felt very solid, improving his Gastric Cauldron and giving whatever Meridians were, he assumed something that would help even more with Alchemy. Unfortunately, the Lineage didn't give him a percentage increase in Attributes, those being the gains that paid off the most, and it didn't even give him a Rare skill. Actually, as he thought about it, it seemed decidedly lackluster compared to even the Fire-based choice, so why did he gravitate towards it so much?
With embarrassment, Axl realized his impression was made when he read the description, before he even got to the concrete gains the option offered. It was a temporary form, one that could be changed later—maybe even back into a human. The topic he was dancing around when talking to Tem, the hope he'd be able to get back to something like his original body again.
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Finally, he again looked at the first choice, clearly one informed by his repeated usage of Lightning. Fire might have been a one-off, even if a dramatic one, but Axl certainly couldn't argue with the Deep System's call about his leaning into the forbidden element. And it certainly seemed powerful, reflecting that it was the first time he saw anything of the Epic rarity.
In terms of tangible rewards, it provided a ludicrous percentage increase in Attributes—double his highest single percentage increase with Last Human of Luna, in addition to the flat increase. But even better was the sounds of that Epic skill. A skill somehow even better than [Mana Shroud] or [Attuned Drill Strike], and it even sounded like it would be a ranged attack. This would complete his build, turn his most glaring weakness into a strength. To counterbalance all that, however, there was that title.
Back in Ost, when he first started training as a miner, there was a fellow clone that also got into the class, and he was very outspoken and angry, taking every chance he could to complain about how the food rations were doled out, the quality of the water, even the air itself. It was as if he could find a problem in anything and everything, and eventually it all started to converge onto complaining about the overseer and his family. It culminated in a loud speech at the communal cantina about the low caloric value of that particular meal, where he tried to get everybody to throw their trays on the ground and not place them back at the triage slot.
He was gone the next day, dragged off by Security, and never returned. They did it quite visibly too, as the clone was haggling at one of the larger bartering corridors, next to a dyed ribbon stand where many of the maintenance staff tended to congregate in their time off. Somehow, the Deep System was trying to get him to turn into that guy, the clone whose name he couldn’t even remember, to rise up in some pointless rebellion against a force much stronger than himself.
It wasn't just the mention of the tribulation, that alone Axl would've considered, it was the delusional claim of taking over the entire Firmament, of influencing the Dao itself. It felt like a farce—the Shrouded Crescent Valley alone seemed to be larger than the surface of all of damned Luna, and here was a Lineage upgrade talking about taking over reality itself? It was too unbelievable to be true, beyond suspicious.
And what was the Twilight Zazen? That title had come from that subsystem—would he risk aligning himself with a force he knew literally nothing about? And becoming the enemy of the Dao, what would that entail, exactly? He remembered the giant cow's warning about anything lightning-based, and was again grateful at how much implicit information she managed to sneak to him in their short conversation. But his hesitation was deeper than that—so much of this Lineage involved concepts he was completely ignorant of. What the slit even was the Zen, and why is it so at odds with the Dao?
No, he imagined that if he took the first option, his life would be like when he first joined this world, running to survive against overwhelming forces nipping at his heels, a constant, relentless barrage of threats and escalating challenges. Maybe he'd be able to survive that, but would he be able to setup Terrania's Foundational Nexus? Or do whatever Terrania needed next? It was a life of reflexive grasping, a struggle ultimately not within his ability to guide.
Back when Axl had the choice with Quelling, he leaned into the Priant Sow's ability to get him to speak the unfiltered truth, no matter what, grateful to this day for his Gastric Cauldron over the other, more terrifying options. Now he tried to think to himself what he truly wanted and needed—the dubious power of lightning or the more mundane gains of an alchemical body?
Not as certain of his decision as he hoped, Axl reached out with a finger and selected the third choice, Alchemical Vessel in the High Elf.
He first felt his Attributes surge, each gaining 20 points, compounded further by his percentage gains. Already after his clearing the trial he felt he needed to catch up with using his Attributes, and now the effect was even more dramatic, already feeling his body and mind not as fully in his control and ability to use. His eyes widened at that realization—if he chose the first option, his gains would be even bigger, and thus he'd be even less able to deal with them. Would this hamper his ability to survive the tribulation? Had he even underestimated the risk of that first option?
Feeling he had dodged a bullet, he turned to his body, feeling something growing within, like a branching seed from his [Gastric Cauldron] and the pit of his stomach. It was an uneasy feeling, but nothing too painful, and the branching system grew into increasingly minute ramifications that became invisible as they entered his organs and the tips of his extremities.
Looking into his alchemical organ, he saw that the whole thing was now embedded in a large density with multiple ramifications coming out of them, like the heart of his circulatory system, with a similarly large bulge where his Cultivator's Core will eventually be. Even as he stared, Axl had a hard time telling where the refinement corona of [Gastric Cauldron] ended and the meridian density began, as well as where the meridians at their very smallest tips joined the pure physicality of his body.
Before he had a chance to experiment with his upgraded alchemy, he got another choice.
>>Compartment options for [Gastric Cauldron]:
>> 1) Transmutation Forge
>> Specialized organ addendum for manipulation of metals.
>> Upgrade [Gastric Cauldron] from root to trunk to branch of G-Grade.
>> 2) Toxin Distillery
>> Specialized organ addendum for manipulation of venoms and poisons.
>> Upgrade [Gastric Cauldron] from root to trunk of G-Grade.
>> 3) Orbital storage hex
>> a Six-fold set of orbital storage flasks, able to store any cauldron creation.
>> Upgrade [Gastric Cauldron] from root to trunk of G-Grade.
In contrast to the previous decision, this one was easy. He was aiming for a metal-based core of some sort, so the ability to manipulate metals felt like the obvious choice, in addition to its being the option that would upgrade [Gastric Cauldron] the most, by two steps of the grade, not just one.
The Forge formed around the flask nucleus, first forming a sliver attached to its side, then growing into a lumped, bean-shaped attachment. The organ now looked like a sphere with a hand holding it gently. The asymmetry made the organ seem more alive, sitting at a nexus of his meridians, not as much looking like a lonely planet in a formless emptiness and more like a true part of himself, a seamless connection between body and the spiritual organ at its center, the beating heart of his cultivation.
There was another surprise waiting for him at the end of all this, a side-effect of his Attribute gains from the Lineage upgrade—his Attributes had just jumped to 180 for each, and apparently, that triggered another Achievement.
>>Achievement Obtained:
>>Total di-millennial grounding (Consumable):
>>Obtain 2000 Attribute points across all Attributes while still in the G-Grade without using a Lineage inheritance.
>>Reward: Revisit of Dao Vision
>>Accept? Yes/No
Getting the Achievement as well felt additionally odd, clearly it was the next in the chain of the Total centennial grounding Achievement, which he got when getting 100 Attribute points in every Attribute. He expected the next one coming up at 200 points or something like that, but this one was specifically calculated differently, apparently adding all Attributes. Was there some reason this was the case? What would the next one be if it changed with every step? Did the Deep System tweak the conditions to give him this reward early, to get him to reconsider making lightning a more central part of his build? The idea of that felt ominous.
Ultimately, Axl only rolled his eyes at the Deep System. I said no to too much of your lightning bullshit, buddy, give it up. Still, a second pass at the Dao Vision was appealing, since he felt there was another way he could make use of it, one that had nothing to do with what the Deep System wanted of him.