Mountain of the Immortals

Most days, I had one of the servants come and knock on the door of our bedroom to wake me up. Not today. I opened by my eyes at the darkest hour of the night and carefully got out of bed, trying not to wake up Aphrodite who was still sleeping in her spot beside me.

I washed my face and turned back to the bed to see my darling Aphrodite sleep. It was tempting to climb back into bed, but I was ready to go out and fight, become stronger, and get my revenge.

Cronus had no idea what kind of pain would be coming his way. We had lived under his heel for thousands of years and he'd had hundreds of chances to change his ways. Yet he insisted on pushing everyone away and ruling with an iron fist. It was a wonder he'd managed to stay on the throne of the Greek world for so long.

"Get up, lazy-ass," I said, pulling away the satin sheets covering the body of the goddess. "It's training time."

At first she didn't respond to my call but soon she was up and preparing for our hike to Ares' place and then the spot where we had been XPing for the past couple of months. Aphrodite started casting buffs on all of us just as the sun was beginning to rise and after Ares cast his own set of buffs, I was pulling the first group of monsters.

Fighting as a group of four instead of three meant that we could kill more monsters and faster. It also meant that the XP was split four ways instead of three, but the Dark Energy always favored larger parties and cooperation. For each additional person in the party, an XP bonus was added. The bonus XP started at 60% for two people and reached all the way to 120% for a full party of nine people. With four of us, we were looking at a 70% increase and so even though the XP was split between more people, the fact that we were able to kill monsters quicker and get more XP out of them made it worth it.

Ares wasn't a pushover. His fighting style with the two swords was relentless, alternating between rapid strikes and the occasional weakening spell for whenever a monster would stray away and try to chase Aphrodite while she was healing me. It barely took us half an hour before we reached peak performance.

I knew exactly how many monsters we could handle at once, the path I needed to take to give them time to respawn, and how I should bring the herd of monsters toward Ares so that we would take them out as fast as possible. By the third hour of fighting, I could say with absolute certainty what the maximum amount of XP earned per hour would be.

Each hour of this intense XP farming, including the rest time that Aphrodite might need in order to regenerate MP for healing and rebuffing us, brought us 0.09% XP toward level fifty-eight. With less than five percent left each, it meant that we would need fifty-six hours to gain the level.

Aphrodite had already commanded the crafters to start working on our flying vessel project but since we didn't know how long it would take for them to have it ready, the most sensible thing we could do was to use the full sixteen hours each day to XP. The goddesses didn't appreciate it but since they had already agreed to it, we simply continued until the sun was setting.

Having earned almost one and a half percent toward our new level was both extremely rewarding and extremely draining on our bodies. By the time we reached the city again, all we wanted to do was have a warm bath and go to bed. But there were still a few tasks that needed to be done, at least for me.

First of all, I was informed by the head pygmy crafter that the most rudimentary form of a silent means of flying transportation would take a full week to create. That was with all of the pygmies and new crafters working on it day and night. I thanked the man for his dedication and expedience in creating what we needed and ran the numbers through my head. The air-vessel would be ready in six days and we needed to run a full-on XP party for an additional forty hours to gain our levels. And so I decided that eight hours per day would be the best option.

We would all have gained our level in five days and still have one day left to rest and prepare for our mission. Ares didn't say anything about the change in the number of hours we would need to train daily, even if I knew he was happy to hear it, but the goddesses were beyond ecstatic that they wouldn't need to go through today's ordeal again. As was I, of course, though I would never show it.

Having set the gears in motion, I started checking the notifications I had received during the day as I took yet another walk outside.

* * *

The construction project "Academics and Research Institution" has been successfully upgraded to level 5.

* * *

Eager to see what kind of upgrades we might have unlocked, I pulled up the building's information and absorbed its information at once.

* * *

Name: Academics and Research Institution

Level: 5

Researchers: 24/24

Available Research: Improved Resource Gathering - Lumber Level 4

Improved Resource Gathering - Metals Level 4

Improved Resource Gathering - Stone Level 4

Improved Resource Gathering - Farming Level 1

Magic Core Extraction Level 1

Magic Core Attachment Level 1

Level-Up Requirement: Settlement Level 6

Level-Up Cost: 6,400x Lumber Units (64,000 MP)

3,200x Stone Units (32,000 MP)

Construction Time: 3,840 minutes (2,304,000 MP)

Description: Knowledge is the ultimate currency in the world of Apocosmos. This institution is focused on discovering long lost truths, deciphering the meaning of past events in order to provide insights into the future, and pushing the limits of understanding. Through time and perseverance, the institution can provide permanent boosts to all facets of life in the Apocosmos.

* * *

There were so many things that gave me joy in this single upgrade. First of all, the researcher slots had doubled. What's more, since the new citizens had moved into our town, all the slots were now filled. We would be able to increase our research efforts much faster with this many people working on each subject.

I was expecting to see the initial research topics ready to start working their way to level four but was pleasantly surprised to see the three new ones.

* * *

Name: Improved Resource Gathering - Farming

Level: 1

Type: Passive

RP Needed: 6

Precondition: None

Description: Apply the natural laws of the Apocosmos in combination with magic practices to make gathering food resources through farming easier, faster, and more efficient. Increases food resources gathered by 2%.

* * *

It looked like this research topic followed the same logic as the ones increasing the output of the mining camp and the lumberyard. I immediately selected it and put six researchers on it so that it would be ready by tomorrow. I wanted to see if the research cost dropped the same way it did for the rest of the resource gathering research topics. I also thought it would be a good idea to bring this one up to the same level as the rest of them. That way, I would be better able to monitor if we were producing too much or too few of a specific resource and do something to increase its production or work out a deal for exporting it instead.

* * *

Name: Magic Core Extraction

Level: 1

Type: Active

RP Needed: 90

Precondition: None

Description: The process of removing the magic ability applied to a mundane item can be as fragile as attaching it. Through research and experimentation, it becomes possible to extract the magic core from items. The extraction is not guaranteed to succeed, but it is possible to extract a stable core and store it for later use or upgrading.

* * *

Now this was a research topic that made this whole building absolutely worth it. While increasing the yield of the resource gathering buildings was great, it wasn't exactly game-changing. The same results could be achieved with just a bit more time. This topic on the other hand opened the doors to some unique possibilities. Coupled with the fact that we now had a magic item generating altar, we would be able to extract any magic ability we would think might be useful for us. All I needed to learn was the percentage chance of success for such procedures.

Before assigning a number of researchers on the topic, I pulled up the information about the last of the newly unlocked topics.

* * *

Name: Magic Core Attachment

Level: 1

Type: Active

RP Needed: 90

Precondition: None

Description: Stable magic cores are a rare commodity and can be extremely useful when paired with the right item. Through research and experimentation, it becomes possible to attach magic cores to turn mundane items into magic ones. The success of the attachment process is not guaranteed, but it is possible to attach a stable core.

* * *

As I suspected, the two topics were almost the same--one of them allowing for removal of the magic core from items, and the other for attachment of a magic core to other items. Since I had eighteen researchers left and each of the topics required ninety RP, I put nine on each of them. This way, we'd be able to use these abilities in a matter of ten days. By that time, we would have gotten more magical items from the altar and I would make sure that Aphrodite kept an eye out for items with interesting abilities that might come into our city with any traveling merchants.

Having kickstarted the research and with all of the mortals working there now fully occupied, I headed to the altar to get our new magic item for the day. Beforehand, I made a stop to see if there was any ambrosia left on the hexagonal prismatic ambrosia cell tower.

To my satisfaction, there was nothing there. That meant that Aphrodite had already started collecting it. Since she was the one who came in and out of the home the most during the day, I had asked her to make sure she collected the daily ambrosia and she was happy to do it.

With that task off my mind, I headed straight to the altar to find a pair of gloves made of very thin metal chain links. I picked up the gloves and inspected them, trying to identify their magical attribute.

* * *

Item: Gloves of the Reckless Crafter

Type: Magic Item - Gloves

Durability: 50/50

Grade: E Grade

Weight: 14st.

Description: A pair of gloves that provides total protection to the wearer from all smashing and cutting injuries while crafting or working with materials. The protection that these gloves provide works only against tools that do not otherwise register as weapons.

* * *

This was quite a useful item for our pygmies but I couldn't help but wonder... If there was a magic ability that made people impervious to injuries from tools that weren't weapons, was there also one that would cover injuries from weapons? It was kind of hard to imagine how this ability would differentiate between me hitting my hand with hammer or butcher's cleaver while wearing the glove, and pressing a dagger that registered as a weapon into it.

Still, it was another magic item that we'd gotten for free and I wasn't going to complain about it. As long as they kept coming, I would be happy to receive them. Though I couldn't help but wonder what kind of changes we would see once the altar had been leveled up.

I pulled up the next notification I'd received and my smile spread even larger, despite my exhaustion.

* * *

You have gained a Divinity Level. Congratulations, your Divinity Level has increased to 12.

You have unlocked 1 divine skill.

* * *

I had been waiting for this for quite some time. Not because I wanted another divine skill necessarily, but because I needed fifty thousand followers to build the divine realm construction project that allowed for pilgrimages and passive praying.

* * *

Divinity Level: 12 (Minimum 2)

Followers: 50,107 / 55,000

Divinity Points: 11/12

* * *

The rate at which the number of my followers was growing was accelerating rapidly, and even though I was expecting things to calm down at some point after all the attention I got from the declaration that I was the supreme monster slayer, I was also enjoying all of the benefits that came with it. People were attracted to power and if there was something that people would put their faith in, it was someone who would be able to keep them safe from monsters.

I pulled up the construction tab for the divine realm projects and chose the temple. The outline of a gigantic temple appeared on a plan of the town. It was made of marble with tall, thick pillars holding up an intricately carved facade. What was most interesting to me was the fact that there was a large representation of me sitting inside at the top of the temple, with my arms wide open, as if to welcome the pilgrims after their long travels.

I had never been this welcoming to mortals in my life so far, but I supposed that the Dark Energy knew better than me, since this building was a manifestation of what my followers needed in order to start praying for me passively. And I wasn't about to start messing with that.

There was a stone paved road leading up to the temple, with statues of more gods on each side. There was a representation of Aphrodite with one hand extended, a butterfly sitting on the side of her finger. She was wearing a lavish and revealing dress. Opposite her was a statue of the goddess of the hunt, wearing a set of thin deer antlers while holding up her bow to target something in the sky, as if hunting a large bird of prey. A few feet away from her, slightly further away from the temple itself, was a statue of Ares. He was sitting on a pedestal, holding two swords. He appeared to be shouting, with one sword extended forward as though ordering people to charge into battle.

This solidified my suspicions that the temple would work for all of us, though I still wasn't a hundred percent sure.

I selected the south side of the city, and put it as far away as possible from the portal. I had three reasons for this. First, the amount of XP rewarded for pilgrimages was analogous to the distance traveled, so it made sense to make them walk as far as possible through the city--especially since this was a completely safe ground for them. It wasn't a huge distance by any means, but the small amount of additional XP might eventually pile up and make for a larger bonus.

The second reason was theatrics. Putting the temple at the edge of the city meant that pilgrims and followers would reach the end of their journey and find a temple that sat above the rest of the world. The cliff below the temple was steep and the view of the clouds below us and the lands beneath them would make it an even greater and more spiritual experience for them. These people would return to their homes and tell others of this life-changing experience of theirs, prompting even more people to start their own pilgrimages. This would hopefully create a snowball of passively earned XP over the years.

Finally, I knew that the roads leading to the temple would quickly be populated by merchants and sellers of all kinds of religious symbols. Maximizing the distance between the portal and the temple would allow for more people to set up shop, which in turn would bring larger amounts of gold into our city, since our people would be the only ones allowed to sell there.

I approved the construction of the temple and the outline became permanent on that side of our town. It would take sixty hours to build, but I didn't feel very comfortable with the single DP I would be left with after its construction consumed ten of them. Building it instantly would cost me two million MP but at least I would start getting back my DP faster, so I mentally focused on the instant-build option.

There was no way I would ever tire of watching large stones, iron, and long logs of wood being processed mid-air and placed in perfect harmony with each other in a matter of a few seconds. It was like the performance of a group of master bards. Beautiful and complex.