Badge in Azure

When Saleen saw his equipment disappear, he was at first startled, before coming to realize that the bangle was meant for expanding slots for storage! It was a rare attribute and Saleen had only seen something like that in books, never seeing it in the flesh.

12 star charts corresponded to 12 equipment storage slots.

The use of equipment in the storage slot was entirely free from any environmental influence, even when one was to use it in the territory of others. It was one of the reasons that mage were stronger than warriors. The magic equipment of many warriors would have lost their powers when used in some territories, while the equipment slots that mages used were equivalent to a equipment territory it themsevles.

The equipment of mages were related to the human body. The human body was a mysterious world in itself. The number of equipment allowed to be equipped on the mages’ fingers with rings, magic arrays allowed on their belts, and spells affixed to their robes were all related to the human body. The difficulty of adding to the number of such slots were unimaginably huge.

A bangle was usually allowed to only have one equipment slot, and Gaine expanded it to 12 instead.

The feeling of hardness and cold on the armament’s original form was entirely done away with its new incarnation as the Starline Armament. The robe was soft, warm and comfortable to wear. The armament consisted of the Starline Ring, Starline Bangle, Starline Robe, Starline Belt, and the Starline Mask.

Saleen felt a prickling pain on his hand when he was done putting on the armament—it was from the Star Gathering Needle entwined on the Starline Ring, prickling a hole on his finger. Countless amount of information gushed in through the wound, and Saleen felt as if the armament was being absorbed by his own body. The equipment ceased to feel like a piece of equipment, and became something like a second skin growing right on top of his natural skin.

The six elemental badges on his belt were completely restored. The Blue Ice Maiden leader woke from her slumber, and all six leaders went to stand behind Saleen.

What felt peculiar to Saleen however, was the feeling of having grown another soul inside his body. The peculiar sensation made him feel rather uncomfortable and rather alarmed.

Gaine smiled and said, “That would be your Figure of Fate. Can you feel it now? You can summon it any time you like.”

A chant seemed to emerge somewhere in his mind, and it was one that he did not need to actually chant, as he became capable of mastering the frequencies of its mental vibrations in an instant. A figure that looked exactly like Saleen himself emerged from his body as he commanded it.

The figure was different from the water puppet. Saleen was able to tell that the figure had little in the way of thought, and it required commands from him to move about. What made him feeling uneasy however, was that the figure’s level was far higher than his, and thus had a very strong presence. Despite being its powers being suppressed to be at the pinnacle of level nine, it nonetheless made Saleen feel as if a dragon was hiding inside his own body.

“Saleen, there is no need for you to summon the Figure of Fate our for battle. You were not familiar with the skills of astrologers and I didn’t have time to equip it with anything. But, that thing would be able to take a fatal hit in your stead. The constellation power within it however, is something you need to replenish yourself. When its constellation power reserves are depleted, the Figure of Fate is as good as dead weight.”

“How strong of a punch can it take?” Saleen recalled the golden grand swordmaster who dealt a serious blow on Jola, the one who was equipped with the Substitute Puppet skill. The attributes of that Figure of Fate of his seemed to be similar to that Substitute Puppet.

“I don’t have a good way of describing it. If the grandmaster were to land a blow on it at full force, the figure would have needed repairs. But, you will nonetheless emerge unscathed. Anything below level 14 would have depleted its powers at best. If something can’t hurt the figure, then it can’t hurt you. You get what I’m saying?”

Saleen nodded as a gesture to say that he understood. The reason why his instant death spell failed to kill Jalin was because of that peach blossom mask of hers. His Figure of Fate was capable of working in similar ways.

“Alright, let me have a look at your equipment.” Gaine looked at Saleen with practically sparkling eyes, before setting a dummy about a dozen meters away. That dummy was covered in starlight—something meant for measuring the damage output of Saleen’s equipment.

Saleen put his Figure of Fate away and extended his left arm. The equipment which he spent five months to craft appeared on his arm, as one of the star charts spun a little on his Starline Bangle.

The pitch-black equipment was covered in silver magic patterns and resembled a miniaturized level 15 thunder dragon. The thunder dragon coiled around Saleen’s arm, with its claws clinging hard on his arm as it opened its mouth. The eye shone with pale light, and Saleen seemed to have seen some weird image appearing on his Starline Mask.

It was an indication that the eye of the thunder dragon on his equipment had locked on to its target. The constellation power outside of the dummy circled around it, forming a perfect defense.

“I shall call this…the Thunder Dragon Blaster.” Saleen sighed. That thing was, after all, not something that he crafted using his own alchemical abilities; it owed most of its powers to the thunder dragon’s own magic patterns on its bones.

Levels usually determined power output. Regardless of how powerful Saleen’s mental powers were, he was still a level nine sorcerer. The Thunder Dragon Blaster was something painstakingly crafted over five months using level 15 materials, but it worked just like Hogina’s gun. Its attacks paled in comparison to that of an actual thunder dragon.

The thunder dragon spewed an icicle from its mouth. The size of the projectile was similar to that coming out of an ice gun. However, the speed of flight achieved by the icicle was not something Saleen had anticipated. It hit the target at almost the very split second it was fired. Saleen believed that at such speeds, even when his enemy were to be able to sense the incoming danger prior, they would have been able to do nothing to avert it.

Furthermore, the targeting capabilities of the Thunder Dragon Blaster exceeded that achievable by the Hogina’s gun that he crafted before, by a significant margin. However, the mental power cost remained small.

Blue electrical sparks jumped on the surface of the icicle as it hit the starlight on the surface of the dummy. The attack disintegrated the starlight defense instantly. The icicle did not enter the dummy; it froze the dummy instead.

“Some weapon you have there!” Gaine was thoroughly amazed. It was a magic attack at the pinnacle of level nine. What was more significant however, was that it entirely ignored energy defense of any kind.

The ice attribute of the icicle achieved the effect of absolute zero, and it was something that was unleashed from within the dummy. The dummy may have looked like it was being frozen solid, but what happened instead was that it was being reduced to dust by the super-cold temperatures. A breeze was all that was needed to turn the dummy to icy debris on the floor.

The Thunder Dragon Blaster crafted by Saleen was a ferocious weapon like no other. Anything hit by it had absolutely no chance of surviving.

“Alright, now let me see what will you be able to kill with that toy of yours!” Gaine said as he unleashed five more dummies and had them set faraway. Saleen shot another icicle as soon as he lifted his arm.

The starlight on the surface of those level ten dummy was disintegrated immediately as well, with the dummy frozen yet again.

Saleen’s Thunder Dragon Blaster hardly expended mental powers. The notable expenditure was on the dragon crystal embedded on the equipment. Saleen did not even move his arm with his second shot, firing yet another icicle away from the Thunder Dragon Blaster’s barrel. The third icicle turned on its own before hitting a level 11 dummy.

The level 11 dummy remained incapable of stopping the electrical powers on the icicle. Saleen fired his fourth icicle. The starlight danced on the level 12 dummy’s surface, and the icicle seemed to hit an obstacle. Electrical flashes were seen on the surface, before the projectile slipped right through the starlight and hit the dummy’s chest area.

Gaine nodded. If the level 12 dummy was put under his control, it would have been able to avoid the lethal attack. But, even level 12 starlight proved incapable of stopping the icicle, allowing it to pass. Just how was Saleen able to harness so much from the thunder dragon’s magic patterns?

The fifth icicle was fired, and it was too one that changed its course automatically, heading straight for the level 13 dummy.

The icicle struck the starlight on the level 13 dummy’s surface. Starlight danced and the electrical pulses on the icicle jumped violently. The icicle split into 36 splinters, before exploding with a loud boom.

The level 13 dummy’s starlight failed to withstand the explosion and shut off. The dummy itself however, remained unscathed.

The sixth icicle was fired onto the surface of the level 14 dummy. The starlight glowed with dazzling brightness and the icicle was broken right there and then. Thunderous boom was heard before the splinters hit the surface.

The starlight immediately dimmed considerably, yet it did not die, disappearing together with the broken icicle instead. Starlight was seen bursting from within the dummy again, wrapping it inside.

Saleen took a look at the level 15 dummy and saw that his equipment was no longer able to keep shooting another lightning icicle.

Six icicles were the limit, and the speed of restoration seemed to be considerably slowed. If he was able to shoot all six of his icicles on one dummy, he would have still been able to break the level 14 dummy.

The problem, however, was that his enemies were not dummies, and they would have came armed with powerful equipment.

Theisio’s Origin Stone of Darkness was definitely something his gun was unable to break through. Saleen recalled that not even nine Six-Winged Flying Snakes were able to break the stone’s defense, and felt rather dejected about the fact.

However, the Thunder Dragon Blaster had one advantage that other equipment lacked—zero possibility of recoil when casting attacks.

“Very good, Saleen. When I was at your current level, there was no chance that I would have been able to craft something this powerful. That thing was able to break anything below level 13. The range seemed pretty long, and I believed it would have served you well,” Gaine commented.

“Too bad this thing still can’t kill the pope.” Saleen put away the Thunder Dragon Blaster. There was an image that only Saleen was able to see at the left eye side of the Starline Mask. The part that was responsible for storing energy inside his equipment was seen restoring gradually. The speed was slower than he had expected. The six magic nuclei embedded inside the Thunder Dragon Blaster were hardly expended. The inability to perform continuous attacks was due to the part responsible of converting energy and make the lightning icicle; that part needed to be recharged slowly.

Saleen estimated that he would have needed about an hour for restoration, firing one lightning icicle.

When the damage potential of the Thunder Dragon Blaster was taken into consideration, the rate at which it was restored was actually frighteningly fast. However, battles between powerful ones have victors determined within minutes.

Regardless, his labor proved incredibly fruitful. Gaine crafted large amounts of figures for him, and every single warrior on the Ancient could be revived. The figure also had one advantage—it was capable of being stored inside space equipment. He would have been able to mobilize his army of figures anytime, anywhere. Saleen calculated quickly and found his mental powers were expanded by more than 12 folds, almost reaching the limit of that ring.

His own original mental capacity had allowed him to control 60 ancient warriors when he first came to the Imperial City of the Abyss. That number multiplied by 12, meant that he was able to now control 720 figures.

That thought had Saleen felt that he became ready to do battle again.