Saintess Summons Skeletons

Right, so, Solar mist spine is a solid option. Next

Solar soul spine and Solar spine soul are the other possibilities.

Weirdly enough these both feel alright?

I get the impression that Solar soul spine would give a bonus effect to my spine and Solar spine soul a bonus effect to my soul? It’s an active skill though so a bonus I need to maintain with mana…

What if Solar soul spine helped me resist burns? Could go well with [Angel’s bolt]. Ah but just Solar soul might be better for that then? Or not, that sounds like a soul buff again.

Ah, makes me realize I didn’t consider two words skills.

So Solar soul I just said no. Solar spine? Could see it. Solar mist? Sounds weak.

And on the other hand the only new thing is Dispel spine.

That could be an insane skill… If you just make people’s spine disappear? Kinda like the skill from my demon form in the trial that made the target’s heart disappear?

But wouldn’t work on what doesn’t have a spine… Like the phageids. And if the enemy has a healing skill they won’t die from it… So that’s another no.

So. Final verdict.

Either : Solar mist spine; Solar soul spine; or Solar spine.

I feel like not making a three word skill is a waste at this point. I only have so many slots and it feels like that forces the Scribe to work harder, seeing how it came up with [Graveyard of the righteous] from the broken [Consecrated mass grip].

She pondered over it for a while. She wanted to be sure not to be impulsive like she had been before, causing her to miss out on [Mass soul grip]. She didn’t even know how she could have acted like this. A lot of things she questioned her own decision about. It bothered her a lot. So many things she did that she felt were rushed or straight up terrible decisions.

She decided to take the [Solar soul spine] and let the Scribe do its job.

You have acquired the Active skill : ‘ soul’

You have acquired the Active skill : ‘ spine’

You have acquired the Active skill : ‘Solar ’

Meanwhile she reflected on this impulsivity of hers. The list was long.

Forgetting to use [Identify] for the longest while after learning it. Wasting money in the city and on the ship instead of buying useful stuff like more potions or skill scrolls, despite Kuli’s advice. Revealing to a level 300 Vampire that she could summon blood. Jumping towards the Siren Queen to blast her when she could have jumped a bit off on the side and be safer both from the Siren and the explosion of her own attack. Taking the hardest sounding trial choice. Carving out her heart and jumping to her death trusting an amulet and an old ritual circle from a rotten grimoire. Picking skills without considering all her options. Going out of the safehouse to chase after an armor piece without even hunting an animal for Pareth to be hosted in…

Only after she decided to tunnel out of the pyramid did she feel like she recovered her better judgment. Not that it wasn’t her taking decisions before, but she felt like that weird 'on edge' state she had been in the whole time had resulted in her altering her choices. Maybe some of them would have done the same either way. But maybe not.

She wanted to believe that this wasn’t it. But that felt more and more likely now that she felt better, and took the time to analyze her past actions. She had really been the victim of a [Soul Parasite].

She brought up [Blessing of the Deep] again.

[Blessing of the Deep] : The Saintomancer was granted a name.

They may see the inhabitants of the Deep.

Lv.1 : The Saintomancer and their summons are immune to the [Mind control], [Hypnosis], [Confusion], [Insanity], [Domination], [Soul Parasite] and [Instant Death] status effects.

(Next function unlocks at Skill Level 200)

She had passed out, and had a weird hallucination. She thought now that it probably wasn’t a hallucination at all.

I saw an inhabitant of the Deep. That’s what happened? Right? That thing?

It conveyed one message. ‘Freedom’

And then the blessing was changed. It updated to grant me freedom. That’s consistent with all other immunities. Mind control, hypnosis, death. All things that take away your freedom. The purpose of the Deep is freedom? Or its blessing at least?

Yes and no. Freedom is my purpose. All the Deep did was giving me the blessing I wanted.

This all makes so much sense now.

So I had a soul parasite. The idea was frightening. And that removed it. But I didn’t see a system message from it? Well. I’m pretty sure now, this is what happened.

I’ve felt so much better ever since.

Alright. I don’t know many things about the world. But this I know for sure.

The Deep is an ally.

Now she only had one question left about this ordeal.

Why? And when?

How did she even end up with something so otherworldly sounding like a soul parasite in the first place. Souls. Spiritual plane. Alith?

No. I’m dumb for even considering it.

And It started before that. She had first felt this strange sensation at the Church, that she was certain of. The high priest on the first day?

Not this either, I got the blessing afterwards. They would have known and removed it then if now they feel like it’s worth removing.

So sometimes during my stay at the Church, after getting the blessing. I can’t really deduce more now. Maybe after I learn more about these parasites. And I will.

As long as it wasn’t the Magisterium. Whoever did this shit to me is going to pay for it.

Even if it was him actually. I’ll go and fetch his bones for Pareth if I have to. Who was it, uh? The priests? The Oracle? Their God?

Wait for me, Skyreach Church. I will be back.

That was all a plan that could only work if she wasn’t trapped in Zangdar forever. Now she held additional hope. Maybe the Deep would come once again to offer her Freedom? They hadn’t broken her out of the Church so she doubted it. But one could dream.

And right as she finished her train of thought, as if the scribe had been waiting for her to be done, the [Solar [[ soul] spine]] line in her status changed.

[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 1.02m (1 + skill level/50) diameter sphere around the point of impact.

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

Recover Health equal to 0.1% (Skill level/10) of the damage dealt by the explosion.

The spine will disappear if it leaves your hands.

Requires a 3 seconds channeling to deploy. Costs 100 mana per second to maintain.

Yet another mana intensive spell… She activated the skill. Over the next three seconds, her mana spread out and materialized the Spine of the Black Sun.

The weapon was… A spine. Yep. Good old human looking vertebral column…

In actual fact, to call it human looking was a bit of a stretch, but it had the same general shape. The part that was essentially the ass of the spine, which Sofia didn’t know the name of, was in her hand, it was carved out to be like a proper handle.

It was strangely straight for a spine. Anyone with that in their back would have a weird posture… She counted 44 vertebrae, which was actually a lot more than humans had. A thin filament of holy light linked all the hollow vertebrae from the inside. The ‘neck’ part was the point of the spine sword, and was actually tapered into a point, unlike a real spine.

The spine was quite light, and around 150cm long. It was a sword in name and general shape only. Much more bone than sword. No edge, no sharpness. Only a few broken bits of ribs on the sides. Maybe the point could still be used for stabbing, she had managed to prick her finger with it at least.

She swung the thing around in the air. Of course she had absolutely no training in the use of a sword. It was quite underwhelming.

Can I cast [Angel’s bolt] while holding it?

The answer was no. Not with the same hand at least, the other worked just fine.

How about the whip form then? It took a bit of fiddling around before she understood how she needed to shift the way her mana supplied the sword to change its form. As she finally activated the whip form, the straight sword slumped and sagged, tip touching the ground.

The vertebrae weren’t touching each other at all anymore, only linked by the now much brighter holy light current coursing inside. How long is that thing?

Sofia knew what a whip was but she had never actually seen one. Let alone how to use it. After hitting herself a few times with it she finally managed to attack forward. She didn’t expect it to touch the wall five meters away but it did, the filament of light extending and each vertebrae getting further and further away from each other. It rebounded against the mansion wall producing the crisp sound of a bone hitting a hard surface and not much else. The wall and the weapon were both intact.

Didn’t lie about the low physical damage. I think it can still go further.

Getting a good swing with it wasn’t all that easy. Trying again and again, the furthest she managed to hit the wall from was about ten meters. Can an actual whip hit that far?

Waiting for Alith to come back, she continued her testing.