As Adam got hit for the eighth time, he really wished he had opened the 5th Gate. Had he unlocked it, he would have been able to avoid those painful slaps and directly understand how the fish's skill worked with his domain.
Unfortunately for his rattled bones, he hadn't yet opened the 5th Gate, and so he had to endure. But now, after those eight slaps, he had finally understood how the fish's skill worked.
This allowed him to understand why he seemingly couldn't replicate the AOE effect, and he simulated the skill in his mind, with his new correction.
He then looked at the incoming fish with an evil gaze and dodged it's tail whip. Until now, since it had worked everytime, the fish had continued using the same attack and clearly didn't expect Adam to dodge.
But before it could move away, Adam slapped his palm against the fish. In an instant, ice spread from his hand and froze it's entire body, in and out, killing it.
And yet, despite having frozen the fish completely, the water around Adam hadn't been affected in the slightest.
Actually, now that he had grasped the [Icy Stomp], because of their similarity, he also mastered the [Icy Touch], and even enhanced it.
Adam decided that when he got back the system he would change [Icy Stomp] to another name, as it wasn't really an icy stomp anymore. Icy Stomp and Icy Touch had fused to make a better version of the skill. He felt like [Ice Statue] was a good name since that was how his enemies would end up.
This new skill had a single target attack and an area of effect attack. If Adam wanted to hit multiple enemies then as long as a part of his body was in contact with the ground, he would use the ground as a medium to freeze everything in a radius he could change.
As for the single target attack, as long as Adam could touch them with his body too, not his sword though, then he would send a compressed wave of frost energy into their body, that would burst out.
If they were weaker than him, then they would completely turn into ice, in and out, like the fish, and even if they were a little stronger, the effects of the skill would be devastating. The only bad point was that with the system, the amount of damage this skill did would be a set value, so as long as the enemy had enough HP, even if they are weaker they would still be able to survive.
Still, Adam was happy, he had gained powerful skills, and they would be especially powerful in this world, and even useful in the real Epoch. The only drawback now was the use of Aura. Since he had perfectly mastered the skill, he ahd to use Aura every time he used it, and this skill was particularly costly as it had taken more than a tenth of his Aura to be used.
Now that he had killed the monster in the lake, he could have gotten out and continued exploring, but he didn't feel like it. Ultimately, he wanted to wait for the Empire's army, and they would need to come through this area to go to Harold's kingdom.
Moreover, he liked being in water, probably because of his class, and he felt like he could figure out skills faster here.
So Adam ultimately decided to wait here for the army. The first thing he did was to learn how to breath underwater, which wasn't that hard.
To a normal human it might sound impossible, but for Adam it wasn't that hard. This was a skill that already existed and had been grasped by many people who lived near water bodies in Epoch, be it NPC or players.
It was only an E Rank Skill, showing how easy it was. And as the Aqua Sovereign, it was even more easy for Adam. Following the steps he had read about online some time ago, Adam was able to recreate the skill in under ten minutes.
After mastering [Water Breathing], Adam could stay underwater as much as wanted. This was also a very good spot for him to train as his Aura regeneration went through the roof, and even when he used his [Ice Statue], using more than a tenth of his Aura pool, he would recover in slightly more than a minute and a half, and that was only his passive regeneration.
Adam had already guessed that training while being surrounded by water would help his training, but he never guessed it would be this effective.
As such, Adam began an intensive training, and only stopped an entire day later when he saw what he was waiting for in the distance, moving toward him. An army of 100 000 men had really come for him, and they were quite quick!
Adam got out of the lake, and started rushing toward the army. With his speed, although they were quite far, he was able to reach them in half a minute.
The army suddenly stopped when they saw a man in armor appear before them, and an officer came forward and asked Adam "What are you doing here?"
Adam looked at the officer and said with a smirk "I killed two kings, are you here to kill me?" The officer was dumbfounded by Adam's cheekiness. He came to them by himself? Couldn't he see the 100 000 men behind him?
He felt something was amiss, but he still unsheathed his sword, and pointed it at Adam as he shouted "KILL!"
Then, the army behind him responded "KILL!" The entire army formed a formidable killing intent, and their simultaneous shoot was scary.
Unfortunately, they were facing Adam, who didn't fear them in the slightest. Normally, he would have answered in kind, but this time he didn't, because that would use some of his Aura, and he wanted to have every bit of it accessible.
As the army started rushing toward him, he jumped toward them. He had made a simple plan, and he he would test his new skill.
Adam made an estimation that his new skill used around 10 000 of Aura to deal 500% percent damage to everyone within 50 meters. But since he had perfectly mastered the skill, he could change some of it's effects.
He could change the area of effect either by spreading the same amount of Aura on a wider area, which would make the skill have the same cost but the damage dealt would be lesser. Or the other solution was to pump more Aura into the skill.
As for the damage, he couldn't make it bigger, unless he was touching his target and used the single target version, but other than that, even using more Aura wouldn't make the damage he deals bigger.
But Adam felt his damage was already more than enough. From the aura the soldiers released, they were only level 50, like the other soldiers he had met. Actually, their only real strength was their numbers.
Maybe they had a few experts in their midst too, but it wasn't anyone he needed to worry about. In the end, the strongest in the army were probably only somewhat stronger than Lyndon.
Adam arrived next to the army, and he easily dodged their strikes as he entered through their ranks. Although they tried to block him, Adam was easily charging through them. One of the things he had done was to finally perfectly master his skill [Charge] and even enhance it a little.
It was really easy to do as this was only an E Rank skill. The only reason he hadn't done so yet was because he didn't feel the need to. But it was quite useful for his plan.
Although Adam wanted to have all his Aura, he still used [Charge] because his passive Aura recovery was enough to allow him to use the skill freely.
The soldiers tried to block him, but they quickly understood that wasn't possible, as everyone who stood in his path was sent flying, vomiting blood. They also tried to use their weapons against him, but they were all close to each other so attacking was hard.
And Adam even allowed himself to take a few hits as he didn't care. He only stopped when he was in the middle of the entire army, which was the best place to use his skill.
As he reached the center of the army, he finally stopped, and looked at the surrounding soldiers who had drawn some distance with him.
He smirked at them, and provoked, they began walking toward him, their weapons toward him. Then, as they were drawing closer and closer, and they were about to attack him from all side, Adam gathered all the Aura in his body, and stomped the ground.