The Ruined Death Knight

[Mortal Reminder]: Cost 700 000 XP (+ 50 000 per level)

Danzel stared at the cost in silence.

The cost alone was one of the reasons why he hesitated to upgrade his skill. It just required too much XP to bring a skill up to the maximum level.

9 levels of a single skill cost him, 3 690 000 XP!

And that was only possible thanks to his 45% discount.

If he really had to pay the full price, more than a third of his savings would have been burned away.

At times like this Danzel question the existence of his status window.

It was so designed that it would encourage him to kill or simply make it extremely slow to level on the later stage. If he had to actually rely on gaining XP from training, it might even take him decades to bring himself to his current level.

But even if he question what his status window actually was, he couldn't do much about it even if he wanted.

Also, the benefits it was clear.

[Mortal Reminder level has increased from Lv. 1 to Lv.2]

[Mortal Reminder level has increased from Lv. 2 to Lv.3]

...

[Mortal Reminder level has increased from Lv. 9 to Lv.10]

[The skill [Mortal Reminder reached the Tempering Process!]

[Choise 3 of the given options and enchant 1 of the picked options.]

[Dead Mana Affinity]: the skill will be more attuned to the death attribute and change accordingly.

[Soul Affinity]: the skill will be more attuned to soul essence and souls. The change will happen accordingly.

[Power Increase]: increase the damage inflicted and lethality rate in both body and soul in cost for a cost.

[Ranged activation]: the skill will be able to be activated without a mark from the medium range for a cost.

[Curse]: the skill will leave a curse upon the target.

[Cooldown Reduction]: the skill will be able to be used more frequently.

[Number Activation Increase]: the skill will be capable to be used more than one time.

[Heal]: the skill will heal the user according to the change.

'Modification changed into Tempering, huh?' Danzel thought to himself.

Though choosing 3 options stayed the same, the enchanting part got him interested.

1 out of the 3 options he chooses will be twice as worth as a single option. Making picking all the more difficult.

But the sudden appearance of the new text was a pleasant surprise.

Although most of the time they were self-explanatory, it was better than nothing.

And looking at the many options, Danzel grinned by having [Power Increase] figured out. He theorized that this option was at the cost of something and with the new text, his suspicions were found to be true.

But such information also weighted his mind.

Of the many options, one, in particular, caught his attention, the one being [Ranged Activation]. An option that would most likely change [Mortal Reminder]just like [Grasp of the Undying], but that wasn't with a cost.

A cost that he wasn't aware of.

But even then he decided to pick that option as it did the exact thing that he wanted. And as for the second option, they were many great ones.

The [Curse] sounded quite appealing with his abilities and [Cooldown reduction] with [Number Activation Increase] also sounded quite interesting.

Each of them had an advantage on their own, but they were also the 2 affinities that he could choose, further mutating his skill into a certain direction and potentially adding something.

The only two options that sounded bad were the [Heal] and [Power Increase].

While for the former he had many other alternatives, the latter in turn will bring another negative unknown negative effect upon the skill. He already had [Ranged activation] bringing some kind of cost already.

Bringing him to do a process of elimination, the ones who weren't eliminated were the [Curse] option and the two affinities for simple reasons.

The other options wouldn't strengthen the skill, but just make it more frequently to use and [Power Increase] was just a troublemaker on its own. As for the [Heal] option, he already had [Necromatic Restoraction] and [Undying Guard].

After weighing his options, Danzel finally decided on the option.

Them being...

[Dead Mana Affinity]

[Soul Affinity]

[Ranged Activation]

The reason the [Curse] option was left out was that he already had a complete curse. Although a new curse is quite tempting, he didn't necessarily have to force a skill that wasn't specialized in curses to hold one curse.

And as he will pick [Dead Mana Affinity], the chance of [Mortal Reminder] to receive a curse wasn't complete zero. He found choosing the affinity much more natural and for the most part, picking the affinities never went wrong.

If it didn't receive a curse at the end of the tempering, that just meant that the skill wasn't meant to be a curse in the first place.

And for the "tempering point", at least that's how he called it was put into the [Soul Affinity], as that affinity was basically the entire soul of this skill.

After confirming his options, a large amount of information rushed through his mind.

[The Tempering Process for the skill Mortal Reminder has been finished!]

[Mortal Reminder Lv.10 becomes Soul Ender Lv.1]

[Soul Ender]: A manifestation of soul essence shall remind all mortal souls where their destined mortality would bring them to. Manifest a part of your soul essence that can only be seen by you and the target to directly pierce one other soul essence with a high chance of damaging one's soul and bringing forth the end of their soul. If marked, this skill is 150% stronger, and if not it's 50% weaker. The one who uses this skill will also be known as the [Bringer of the End].

"This is..."

Digesting the information he receive and reading through the description, Danzel fell silent.

Using the knowledge he gained, Danzel used a portion of that knowledge to manifest a part of his soul essence in front of him.

Taking only a few seconds of testing, Danzel finally managed to do it.

From someone else perspective, nothing would seem to have changed.

But in Danzel's POV, he saw an exact clone of his in an ethereal dark green form without the helmet. And that clone stared back at him.

Or rather...he stared at himself?

It was as if he could see through his clone's ethereal eyes and his own.

'So that's how it feels to manipulate soul essence itself?' Danzel thought as he risen up and reached out to touch his clone.

But before he could, the ethereal clone slowly dissipated into nothingness.

He watched every single detail of it happening and he released that the soul essence didn't disappear, but instead it moved back into his body.

Of where he didn't know for sure. But if he had to guess, it would be his very own soul.

He realized long ago that soul essence was something essential for every being. So important that in fact could affect one's soul.

To him, it didn't make sense for such a seemingly large amount of soul essence to simply disappear. Adding to that, when the soul essence "entered" his body, he was reminded of the touch of the dead souls engulfed by the black waters of the realm of the dead.

It wasn't the same but it was somewhat familiar...

"Interesting..." Danzel mumbled to himself.

'That clone of mine also wielded a sword just like me, maybe if I figure out how to manifest just the sword, I might find a way to weaponize it.'

He next went to see what was the [Bringer of the End] and all about.

[Bringer of the End]: One of the many who can orchestrate the final end of a being. Depending on [?], those close to the end might see visions of one of the many. Once that vision manifest, one's end has been destined. Increase all Death attuned abilities by 5%.

'One of the many, huh? Does that refer to the ones who are capable to destroy souls?' Danzel thought slightly annoyed by the [?].

As for the vision, he found them quite weird, but the 5% bonus was quite nice to see.

'The important question though was...how do I gain this skill? Or is it a talent?'

Ideas flooded his mind, of how to use this exact knowledge and gaining [Bringer of the End]. And while he had many things he wanted to try. He decided to test those ideas for later.

"For the time being, I should write them down..." Danzel said as he brought a piece of paper and his worn-out magic pen.

He had some difficulties writing with a moving carriage and all, but after finishing another to-do list and putting it back in his storage ring.

He stared at his status window to see what skill to upgrade next, listed by their importance.

1:[Swift Movements]

2:[High Jump]

3:[Armor of Vengeances]

4:[Shield Charge]

5:[Death Guarding Swordsmanship]

6:[Bleed Verocity]

7:[Siphoning Soul Blade]

And the list continues to go on.

For the sake of not finding himself in the same situation as today, Danzel was willing to spend every drop of XP.