Saintess Summons Skeletons

Sofia couldn't help herself as she kept admiring the staff from every angle. Even the crown was whatever, this, in comparison, was an object that had changed by its own will to fit her needs. When she stood up and held it with the lower pointy tip on the ground, the top of the catalyst held by the demon hand reached about the level of her eyes. Sparks of blue electricity flew around when she swung the scepter, and she found out about two new things she could do with it.

First of all, there was a Dragon horn inside of the staff. Bones. So now the staff was one of her two blessed constructs and she found out with great joy that the protection from the blessing was extended to the whole object, not just the bone. Following that logic, she changed her second blessed construct to her own skull, after putting on a rune and trying it on one of her hands first, just in case. The verdict was that her whole skeleton had become much more resilient. Why it applied to the whole staff from the horn and only to her skeleton instead of her whole body, she didn’t know. But previously, when she had tried it on her hand, it didn’t spread like this, so she guessed it was a hidden perk of [Bone dominus] reaching level 2.

The second new thing the scepter could do was to be used for the cast of [Spine of the Black Sun]. Like this, the sword form was more than three meters long, looking more like a lance with its tip swapper for a sword, which Sofia found worked strangely well. This also extended to the whip form. It was much harder to aim like this, but she could control the starting trajectory with [Bone dominus], which negated the issue. In fact, she could lash out with the whip without even having to swing the staff, just guiding the start of its motion and letting momentum do the rest. The sword and whip hits benefitted from the electrical effect too.

The Icing on the cake was the description of the skills updating to reflect the new casting and upkeep times, just in case she wasn’t sure.

[Spine of the Black Sun]: Invokes the weapon ‘Spine of the Black Sun’.

The Spine is a blunt segmented longsword that may also be used as an extendable whip.

Deals low physical damage.

Upon hitting an enemy with the Spine, creates a solar burst, damaging all enemies in a 5.00 (6.82)m (1 + skill level/50) diameter sphere around the point of impact.

The explosion’s power scales with the skill level and the strength of the hit.

Recover Health equal to 20% (Skill level/10) of the damage dealt by the explosion.

The spine will disappear if it leaves your hands.

Requires a 3 (1.5) seconds channeling to deploy. Costs 100 (50) mana per second to maintain.

[Graveyard of the righteous] : Create a 600 (601.8) meters (3*Skill Level) large and wide consecrated graveyard around the Saintomancer (Must be solid ground). The skeletons of the righteous dead are buried in the graveyard, their arms and upper body may surface to grab the Saintomancer’s enemies, incapacitate them and - or drag them underground. The skeletons have the relative strength and resilience of a level 200 (1*Skill Level) Paladin and cannot inflict any direct damage.

Requires a 5,58 (2,79) seconds (10 - class level/50) channeling to deploy. Costs 100 (50) mana per second to maintain.

Also, from her testing, the speed of charging Angel bolts had doubled, but the mana depletion had doubled as well. This meant that it didn’t count as a ‘sustained magic’, which Sofia complained but was not surprised about. The [Erredian Rot], however, was sustained magic. Now only costing 5000 mana points per seconds, it was an enormous discount. It didn’t, however, spread with an extended maximum reach out of the zone touched by holy light. And that’s good. Because I would lose any and all precision I still have with it.

Also, how does it even apply to the spine’s explosion range? And the staff reaches my eyes when upright, so 1.82 meters sounds about right. Guess there’s 14 centimeters between my eyes and the top of my head, could’ve lived without knowing that.

I don’t even want to know how much I weigh. I noticed the wooden floors of the inn creaking a lot when I walked, and I didn’t even have my wings out… Pareth would probably blast straight through and end up crashing into the wine cellar.

Well, flooring issues aside, it’s about time I looked at my new skills, now feels like a great time.

[New Active Skills are available!]

[New Passive Skills are available!]

Yeah, yeah, I know. Let’s do the passive first since I have fewer keywords. I might want to start making two-word skills more often now with all the free slots I have.

Available Passive Skills :

[Runic ] : You are one with the runes of [Venerated ] : Impose respect in the name [ lord] : speed to all controlled undead.

Unless… I mean… [Runic lord] is fine, alright. But [Venerated Runic lord] though…

[Runic lord], from the descriptions, sounds like it would probably give a permanent speed enchantment to me and the undead around. Which, by itself, is good enough to take without looking back.

Venerated and lord in the same skill though, it feels like a waste to not use them together, even if the descriptions don’t match at all. And with the draconic system, adding such imposing keywords might help push the skill in an interesting direction too…

But just [Runic lord] is a much safer choice…

Whatever, do it! Give it to me, [Venerated Runic lord]!

You have acquired the Passive skill : ‘Venerated ’

You have acquired the Passive skill : ‘Runic ’

You have acquired the Passive skill : ‘ lord’

Annnnd Sir Scribe wasn’t ready for this one it seems, well, it’s alright, take your time. I’ll be looking at the actives while you deal with that.

Available Active Skills :

[ command] : soul that none can resist. [Restore ] : Infuse the target with mana to [Ritual skulls of ] : ERROR [ penumbra] : ERROR [Ceremonial ] : Invoke the authority of [ pulse] : in a wide area around the caster.

Hmm. Interesting. I don’t see an instant pick like I did with the passives, but maybe that’s just because there’s so many keywords… I have two slots to fill, but that’s starting to feel like not so much space anymore. Though I suppose that’s all I get until I finish the next trial when it comes to active keywords because the ones from level 240 will probably get skipped like before every trial.

[Restore command] still sounds like a solid choice, though its use will be quite limited in battle. [Restore penumbra] doesn’t feel right. [Restore pulse] sounds like it might be some kind of resurrection skill? Better stay away from these two.

I’ll just keep a list of all decent options or I’ll never manage to choose.

1-[Restore command]

What else can I do with ‘Restore’? Not much I think, it doesn’t really go well with ‘Ritual skulls’ nor with ‘Ceremonial’. I guess maybe [Restore Ceremonial penumbra] might end up being alright? I’m not convinced. Next for the skulls…

‘Ritual skulls of’ kind of overlaps with ‘Ceremonial’, since religious ceremony is usually built around a ritual of some kind, like the Templars’ anointment ceremony. So I guess, just no double starting keyword this time. That does take care of a lot of combinations.

Then, in the basics I have [Ritual skulls of penumbra], which I guess is an option, I have no idea what it could do which I’m not very eager to bet on. Next is [Ritual skulls of command], sounds kind of like something with a mind-control effect similar to [Domination], like put the skull on someone like a helmet and it commands them? I don’t know. Doesn’t sound bad but also not really the kind of skill I want to have. I’ll put it down as a viable option though.

2-[Ritual skulls of command]

And the last option for two word skulls is [Ritual skulls of pulse]. I can’t imagine what that would do at all so it’s out.

Sofia paused for an instant. She opened her status and tried to think about what her skills lacked.

I have no active defense against physical attacks. Sure I can try to parry with my sword, but if an attack gets past Pareth for whatever reason like Victory’s flying sword, then I struggle to avoid it. So some kind of defensive or evasive active skill to pair with [Evasion] would be great. At least now I can counter spells with [Heat Death] so that’s not an issue.

Another thing I lack is a fourth summon, but I don’t think these keywords are gonna be it.

Besides that, I could use more offensive options. So far it’s been angel bolts left and right, but what if I fight someone like Alith who is immune to fire and explosions? Then even the spine’s explosions wouldn’t do much besides apply the staff’s electricity. I also have the rot now though. But it might only serve as a slow mana drain against enemies with high mana reserves like another saint, so in those cases, more attack is also nice. Simply having more attack patterns can make touching enemies easier. Might have not struggled as much to touch the master if I had a few more different options to cycle through.

A way to prevent enemies from getting close like Astelia’s [Repulsion] would also be incredible against all melee fighters. I do have the graveyard but at these levels everyone can jump over the skeletons or fly, so it’s been largely relegated to a movement tool. [ pulse] does sound like it could work toward that kind of repulsion skill, but what else could I pair it with? [Ritual skulls of pulse] might actually do just that? Oh, that would be good.

But would I take it like that or with something else? The options are ‘ command’ and ‘penumbra’. [Ritual skulls of pulse command] or [Ritual skulls of command pulse]? No, these sound like they want to mess with people’s heart beat again, this is not what I want.

[Ritual skulls of pulse penumbra] just sounds silly. But [Ritual skulls of penumbra pulse] does have potential. It could also be some kind of wide area attack, which I’m not against. Two more good options down, then.

3-[Ritual skulls of pulse]

4-[Ritual skulls of penumbra pulse]

This leaves the ‘Ceremonial ‘ options to consider. As a whole I don’t really like that keyword, it doesn't inspire me much. But I shouldn’t dismiss it so easily. Basically it feels like an empty word. Like it would add some kind of twist to whatever comes after but not much? Because it’s so bland it should work with a lot of things.

[Ceremonial command] for some kind of mind control or maybe something like a boost to people I give a ceremonial command to do something? Kind of like the effect of that one classless, [Zealot] that gives stats when fulfilling your God’s orders. Could work but I don’t like it much. [Ceremonial command pulse] would be just the same thing but in a wide area instead of single-target. And ‘pulse command’ is still weird.

[Ceremonial penumbra] could be many things like a stealth, attack, defense or utility skill. It’s kind of a random pick but I don’t think it could turn out bad.

5-[Ceremonial penumbra]

I think ‘ pulse’ works better with the skulls so I wouldn’t use it there in general. Following the previous ones, though, I have [Ceremonial penumbra command] and [Ceremonial command penumbra]. The latter doesn’t feel right, but the former… Maybe it could, like, create an area of magical shadow? Something like that could be strong, blind my enemies while I still see perfectly thanks to VPPV’s passive effects? One more for the list.

I think that’s all, so.

1-[Restore command]

2-[Ritual skulls of command]

3-[Ritual skulls of pulse]

4-[Ritual skulls of penumbra pulse]

5-[Ceremonial penumbra]

6-[Ceremonial penumbra command]

I have two slots. I can take any two of those that don’t overlap. What do I want to do with this?