Markets and Multiverses (A Serial Transmigration LitRPG)

We continued to travel through the Market, searching for shops that could give us fourth-tier soul fragments. Unlike the previous times we entered the Market, we ignored lower end shops. In previous visits to the Market, harvesting Achievement from lower-end shops had been incredibly attractive for us. We had been low on Achievement, and even a few thousand Achievement could make a big difference in our Achievement totals, and thus given us a bump in power for the next world.

This time, things were different. Despite all of my purchases so far, I wasn't even feeling a real drain on my reserves. A few thousand Achievement wasn't worth the essence we would spend on the fight. We only had two months before our bodies started to dissolve, and we needed to make every second count.

We spent the next four days searching, while also keeping an eye on the worm in the sky. The worm constantly twitched and shivered, as if it were caught in some kind of nightmare. At least, that was what its body looked like physically. However, every ripple of its body made me feel uneasy. Even though the worm hadn't done anything yet, I got a feeling that if we let it finish 'evolving,' it would be a huge problem for us by the next time we returned to the Market. Some of the other reincarnation that we had yet to make contact with might kill the worm before we dealt with it. However, I didn't want to entrust our safety to unknown people - especially since there was a very good chance that they were in the midst of their own reincarnations. I didn't know how long the worm's period of vulnerability would last, and I also didn't know how strong it was - but I knew that I didn't want that thing looming over the city next time we returned to the Market.

The other thing I confirmed was the impact of my newest non-keyword Ability. I had already realized that I no longer needed much time or concentration to skip through the first few steps of rebuilding my attunement. According to the text of the ability, it made it easier to reach {Basic}, {Intermediate}, and {Advanced} grade. As we moved through the Market, I realized the results were even better than I had imagined. Despite having already formed my attunement several times, each time I stepped into a new grade, it felt like I was gaining new insights about that grade of the ability. It wasn't quite as concrete as a direct upgrade to my strength - but I was understanding my attunement in ways that I had never understood it before. I could feel the various aspects of my attunement and my identity rippling as I progressed. I could feel the connection to the ocean of souls that I had forcibly forged through the attunement, as well as my connection to water and my connection the eldritch chaos of space. Three different aspects of 'water', all combined into one attunement.

It was very different from the original concept of my attunement that I had focused on, but it felt far more complete than my previous versions of my attunement. I could probably create far more powerful and varied spells with my attunement now, if I spent enough time researching and improving my new attunement. I also suspected that I could upgrade my previous spells with some research. I didn't have time now, but I certainly intended to take advantage of these changes next reincarnation.

The other thing I noticed was the sheer speed of reforming my attunement. During the first day of travel, I hit basic-grade attunement. This was without any time spent sitting down and working on my attunement - I just snuck in a bit of work here and there as we moved through the streets.

During the third day, still without any real dedicated time to improving my attunement, I hit intermediate grade.

The reward pushed me from 237,328.94 Achievement to 237,628.94. Not a huge boost, but it was something. All of this was still without a single hour spent sitting down in real, concentrated effort to improve. I was pretty sure that I could sleepwalk my way into {Advanced} grade too - and it would take me a week, or possibly less. If I sat down and actively worked on my attunement, I could cut that time down to a few days.

I was very happy with my new ability. It was perfect for making both future lives and future Market combat easy and painless, since I would be able to build my attunement faster and more easily than ever before. While my spells would still suffer a massive hit in strength every time we returned to the Market, my new Ability made that strength loss less painful than usual. In the future, I could realistically see myself contributing greatly to our fight for more lives next time. This ability didn't totally make up for my weakness upon returning to the Market, but it certainly helped.

Even better, my stats were also boosted every time I got another upgrade to my attunement. The ten extra points in attunement per grade had given me twenty total points, boosting my alteration stat to grade 9. Every single grade was around a 50% boost in regeneration rate and maximum essence pool size, so getting an extra grade was a massive advantage.

About halfway through the fourth day in the Market, we finally found our next objective. It had taken us less time than I had expected, but a big part of that was because we actively avoided fights. If we ran into a few skeletons, Sallia took them out, but we ignored smaller shops.

This time, the shop looked much fancier than even the shops that sold third-tier soul fragments. Rather than a single building, the store in question looked closer to a miniature mall. It was three stories high, and even from outside of the shop, we could tell that there were numerous smaller storefronts inside of the building, each dedicated to selling something different. Through the broken window of one shop on the upper floor, we could see one shop dedicated to soul fragments. Three more shops were dedicated to different kinds of generic, non-keyword abilities. Several more shops were dedicated to selling various kinds of items, all suited to different builds.

"This should be our next target," said Felix, as he glanced at the mall.

"I think this should have what we need, yeah," said Anise. "It looks much fancier than the other stores."

I scanned the store with soul-sight, and then followed up with my spatial sight. I grimaced. "There are a few notable monsters in the store," I said. "There's one near the upper level of the mall with around grade 12 or 13 Fortitude. There's also some kind of swarm of insects that has taken over the second and first floor. Each insect is weak, but there are a lot of them, and I bet they're some kind of hive mind. There's also two monsters I've never encountered on the first and second floor. They look to have around grade 10 Fortitude. The two mid-strength enemies look kind of like bundles of wire, twisted together to vaguely resemble a human shape. The insects look like wasps. The monster on the upper level of the market looks like a giant bear. I don't know what the abilities of the creatures inside are, but I'm willing to bet that they can work as a team and might threaten us if we're careless."

Sallia glanced at her blade, and then looked back at the store. "Are there any other major threats inside?"

"Not as far as I can see. It looks like this shop doesn't have any skeletons or weaker enemies inside of it - just the hive, two wire-men, and the bear."

Felix thought about it for a few seconds, before he nodded. "All right. Miria, do you want to start off the fight with a clone? If you can, try to bait out a few spells from the monsters inside. If we can figure out what they do, we'll have a much easier fight."

"Got it," I said, before I split off a clone. It charged into the first floor of the store… and instantly exploded.

I blinked in shock as the booming echoes of a land mine turned my clone into a puddle of water.

The monsters in the store immediately turned towards the entrance, and wasps began to swarm out of the building.