Ronan moved towards the burning wreckage of the tower. He was watching and waiting for any sign of the Governor. He felt a little bad about all the notifications that had appeared when the tower blew up, but given that he hadn't gained a single level he knew for a fact that the Governor hadn't died in the blast.

He watched for about ten seconds and didn't see any signs of movement. Confused, he walked right up to the wreckage and started to search through it, looking for anywhere the Agrathen leader of the planet might be hiding.

However, he was unable to find anything even after searching for an entire minute. Motherfucker! Don't tell me he wasn't even in the tower? Ronan realised he'd made a mistake.

While that was the tower that the governor used, he hadn't arrived at the same moment in time as he had done in the previous iteration, and he hadn't checked if the governor would actually be inside when he blew it up. Clearly the Agrathen hadn't been, as he would have either killed it with the rainbow bombs or found it during his search.

At that moment he heard the whining of another ship. The frown that had creased his face turned into a smile as he realised the foolish governor had decided to deliver itself to Ronan, and he wouldn't need to go on another wild goose chase.

He immediately put the hammer back into his inventory and conjured a spear, turning around to face the ship that was flying high in the air, above the height that the tower had been before he levelled it. He barely wasted a moment before launching the spear.

Clearly the governor—if it was the governor piloting the ship—hadn't expected Ronan to retaliate so quickly, or with so much power. Ronan was getting used to the sonic booms, and didn't falter for a moment when the rubble around him was blasted in every direction. He simply raised his arms to shield his face while the debris smashed into his body, doing barely any damage.

When he lowered his arms he didn't see the kill notification he'd been hoping for, but he did see the burning metal box on the ground. The governor's ship had gone down in a single strike, but the Agrathen hadn't died yet. Ronan rushed towards it, bringing his hammer out once more.

He saw an arm poking out of the wreckage, blackened and burnt, with peeling skin. When the governor's head appeared, it was as though a game of whack-a-grathen had taken place, with Ronan's hammer smashing down on it instantly. The sound of crunching bone and splattered brains reached his ears along with the chime of victory, and he barely had a moment to feel the level-up healing the small grazes across his body before he was whisked away.

Back inside the waiting room by the fireplace, sitting inside the comfortable chair, Ronan let out a sigh. He was curious to see what the rewards would be for completing the first step on nightmare difficulty.

Congratulations, you have cleared the 1st Step on your Path of the Gladiator!

You have unlocked access to the gladiator market!

+3 Steel Credits

+258 Iron Credits

+189 Bronze Credits

+935 Copper Credits

+Eternal Stormkissed Javelin of the Saurthei Lv.125 (Mythical)

+Myriad Skills Tome (Legendary)

+Skill Upgrade Shard (Epic) x10

+Gladiator Shard Lv.135 (All) x25

The 2nd Step will begin in 2 weeks!

1w 6d 23:59:59…

Steel!? Ronan froze in shock when he got to the first reward of the first step. He had jumped straight from iron credits to steel credits in a single leap. That meant a lot more than just an increased multiplier—it meant he could buy almost everything in the gladiator market without breaking a sweat.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Add to that the fact he'd earned himself a legendary skill and ten epic upgrade shards, he was about to get another massive powerup. He almost rushed into using the tome right away, but then he paused before making a huge mistake. It was possible his heritage would reject it, but he at least had to try.

You are attempting to set a time anchor, and initiate a new path. Would you like to start an anchor path, or a branch path?

Once again Ronan wanted to try and start a branch path. He realised it meant he would have to use the next iteration to earn the merits from cultivation that he needed to get a third sub-class, but it would be more than worth it.

Estimating chrono cost based on implications of branch path…

With 10 epic skill upgrade shards as well as a legendary skills tome, Ronan would be able to take basically all of his skills up to legendary rarity. Depending on how expensive the branch was.

Estimation complete!

Chrono cost of this branch path has been determined on a cascading iteration basis, accounting for the descendant's soul weight:

1+ Iterations: Medium-High chrono cost

3+ Iterations: Chrono cost not payable

That's fucking steep. Ronan would only be able to do two iterations on this branch path, meaning that he would basically only get the rewards twice. It's still better than once, but I wonder about the cost… Will I just lose whatever I gain?

In the past, the Temporal Obelisk had clawed back a portion of his gains each time he went through a branch path. It was annoying, but he understood it. This time he would only have two iterations worth of rewards, meaning that losing a substantial amount of them would potentially render the branch path worthless. Still, he figured it was worth a try. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Confirmation received, preparing to generate branch path…

Freezing local spacetime…

Replicating universal probability matrix…

Anchoring descendant's soul…

Branch path created!

May the endless rivers of time guide your path, chosen son of chronos!

Once the branch path was established, Ronan needed to figure out what order he was going to do this in. He figured it was probably best to use the skills tomes first. It would be tragic to upgrade a skill to legendary only to then get a duplicate copy of it immediately afterwards.

At the very least, if he received a legendary version of a skill he already had at a lower rank, he would be getting the upgrade without spending any of the shards. He was curious to see the effects of the legendary tome—it was his first time using one.

[Myriad Skills Tome (Legendary)] has been consumed!

You have received the skill [Porcupine Shield (Legendary)]!

Porcupine Shield (Legendary): For 0.2 seconds, all damage that is dealt to you will be negated and absorbed, then reflected to those who caused the damage. The reflected damage is the mean of all damage dealt to you, multiplied by 5% of either your intelligence (magical damage) or strength (non-magical damage). (Cost: 50% Max Mana + 50% Max Stamina)

Ronan couldn't believe what he was reading. He just started laughing because he didn't know how else to react. For such an incredibly overpowered skill, porcupine shield had a ridiculous name.

He'd actually almost burst out laughing when he read the name, thinking he'd been scammed by the system and given some piece of crap skill as his first legendary from a tome. However, it turned out to be a simple and evocative name. Perfect descriptive language, in a way.

He was more than satisfied with the skill. He didn't have that many defensive skills until that point, with magic money being the notable exception, and he was glad to have a skill that wouldn't consume his credits—even if the current cost was negligible. He could see it being really useful in the alien prison or against any large hordes of enemies.

Up next were the skill upgrade shards. He had ten epic rarity shards, which meant he could bring one of his epic skills to legendary. However, when he looked over his status he realised that he would probably get more benefits out of bringing stupendous stats to epic and then legendary if he could afford it, rather than upgrading any of his current epic skills. First though, he needed to check the cost.

He dismantled two of the epic shards so that he had enough to afford a basic upgrade, which would tell him if stupendous stats cost a mere 6 shards, as all of the pre-alloy stat-boosting skills had.

Skills available for evolution:

Light Manipulation [Cost: 6 Skill Upgrade Shards (Rare)]

Cure Affliction [Cost: 5 Skill Upgrade Shards (Rare)]

There were even less skills than the last time he had rare upgrade shards, due to the fact that mighty strength had been consumed for the creation of stupendous stats. It was disappointing, but somewhat expected. Ronan dismantled another one of his epic upgrade shards, bringing the total number of rare shards to nine. Hopefully this is enough… Then again, I'm prepared to pay whatever the cost is.

Skills available for evolution:

Light Manipulation [Cost: 6 Skill Upgrade Shards (Rare)]

Arcane Piercing Strike [Cost: 9 Skill Upgrade Shards (Rare)]

Cure Affliction [Cost: 5 Skill Upgrade Shards (Rare)]

Pressure Cutter [Cost: 8 Skill Upgrade Shards (Rare)]

Another disappointment. Ronan sighed and looked at the seven remaining epic shards in his inventory. Even if he was able to get stupendous stats to epic rarity, there was no way he was getting it to legendary—at least not in this iteration.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.