Chereads / Arachnomancer / Chapter 18 - Evolutions

Chapter 18 - Evolutions

-Subordinate

Name:Set

Race: Ink Widower(rare)

level: 5(Evolution Possible)

Required exp: 1200

Health (300/300)

Resource-Ink essence(110/110)

Shared perk- Closed System

Loyalty: Max

Condition: Normal

I bring up Set's screen and confirm the evolution. Set is wrapped in a shiny black ink shell. It starts pulsing out black energy after a few minutes and she starts making weird noises..... I can tell she is enjoying it but.... Is evolution supposed to be an enjoyable thing? There are a couple screens that explain what evolution is now that Set is evolving.

Evolution is basically a restructuring of the body for monsters. It can't increase their rank but it gives other benefits such as changes in attributes or an additional aspect. The attribute change can decrease attributes sometimes though. Say a monster is built to be an assassin. quick, nimble, and stealthy. If the monster goes down a different evolutionary route, for example a tank, it will lose attributes in Agl and will have a harder time in stealth.

However, that is something uncommon. Most monsters evolve in a way that suits their current build increasing the appropriate attributes. There are also those that acquire an additional aspect. This makes a creature a variant. Like the variant harpy and the giant rat. Additional aspects have a huge effect on the monster altering their appearance in a drastic way. Enough of this though onto evolution.

Set is giving off weird feelings through telepathy. She can't speak but, maybe after this evolution I can ask what was so enjoyable about it. A screen pops up giving countless options. It seems this is a benefit I get. I can evolve my subordinates in any way I wish. I immediately scrap all options that lower her current attributes. Most of the left over ones will improve her current skills and primarily the Agl attribute .... Some even will intoduce new skills... However, the ones I'm most interested in are the ones that will give aspects.

Wait. Is.... I immediately choose the evolution with an aspect that has caught my eye. Life. I doubt it will be overpowered at this point but in the future.... Well who truly knows.

The pulsing of the ink shell increases and eventually the colors start to change. An amber colored energy starts to wrap around the black energy turning them into threads. These threads starts waving crazily outward from the shell. After a couple more minutes the shell has amber colored liquid flowing through it as well and it starts to break apart.

Set walks out and I'm immediately suprised.

Her size has not really changed, not even half a meter tall. However, her body which was a stagnant liquid now constantly flows up towards her eyes. Amber colors are mixed in the ink flow as well making it look kind of amazing. Before her eyes were just black orbs but, now they have a flow as well with black and amber colored liquids swirling.

I bring up her status screen to see what has changed

-Subordinate

Name:Set

Race: Ink of Life Widower(rare)

level: 5

Required exp: 1200

Health (310/310)

Resource-Ink/life essence(200/200)

Shared perk- Closed System

Loyalty: Max

Condition: Normal

Her health has not increased that much but, her resource has had a massive boost. I can speak to Xelu so I wonder if I can speak to Set now as well?

"Set can you reply now?"Gin

'Creater?!?! I can finally share everything!'Set

Hmmmm?.... When Xelu sent thoughts through it had a robotic tone but, Set has more of a mature female voice, in contrast to her personality. She goes off into a tangent about something weird which I ignore. I'm aware that she might be a little crazy. Hopefully she will become much better than the arachne queen. I didn't read her diary much past her insanity phase but, I have a good enough idea.....

I wonder what the life aspect will allow her to do? Will she be able to create life? That would just make her another broodmother wouldn't it.... Maybe, it will let her raise the dead by giving them life.... No, her species has changed to an Ink of Life Widower so it has to do with ink, right? I can probably just ask her what she do.

"Set can you tell me what you gained form the evolution?" Gin

'.....Forever.... Hmmm? what was that? Ohh yeah. Ughhh, my attributes haven't changed all that much. I did gain a few perks and skills though. The perks are pretty good but the skills are weird. One can heal by trading the damage with a picture, giving whatever is in the picture the damage. It uses up all of my resource though. The other creates runes that can slowly draw life out of enemies by sticking it on them. The runes can be used then but, it doesn't say how....'Set

Those are pretty impressive. I'm not sure to what degree the heal works but from the sound of it, it should work on just about anything.... I'm not sure how resistances work with the runes.... Is life damage even a thing? Is it true damage? Well it won't work on enemies without life and most enemies can probably just smear it since its made of ink. Thinking on it though, there are a lot more conditions for the runes.... Probably worthless on aquatic creatures....

While in thought about such things Kess comes up to me. It seems she is done with transporting the corpses from the battle. They should have some loot in their base. I have no idea on where the treant base is but the harpies is right above me. I send out Xelu to look for the treant base and, send Kess out to loot the harpies base.

Now the next plan of action is to gradually gain strength and potential, swallow any other local territories, and search for drow settlements. I don't have any clue on where the drow live but, I know they are somewhere close. They shouldn't be too far as the arachne queen mentioned a close settlement that she got sacrifices from.

They are not too important to me though. Just a potential problem. The most immediate situation is to see what I have. I figured out that the territory orb can increase my stats but, what else can it do? How am I supposed to do things like strengthen subordinates? I try messing with it for a while but, I get very little from it.

However, I did learn something about wars. Evertime energy is absorbed the territory will grow. However, territories can't grow past a territory they overlap. Say for example a territory is overlapped with another that is north of it. It can't grow any more north but, It can grow around that territory and in every other direction. Wars can be fought to eliminate one side to give room for the other to grow. They don't usually occur though, unless one territory has a huge advantage over another.

It seems that setting up a territory here caused an overlap that pissed the treants off. The Harpies did not mind the overlap but, the treants showing up and hitting the cliff made them angry.

I'm waiting for Kess and Xelu to return before I do anything else for the moment.... Actually, I think I need to have a talk with Set.....