The Jester of Apocalypse

Chapter 106: Lethal Weaponry

The lava bubbled and sizzled. Lava slimes were morphing and shifting within the gooey pool of molten stone, absorbing the energy and growing by the second.

Neave observed this and felt a strange sense of panic. As far as he had read once, the cores of planets had magma all the way to the planet's center. In his world, the magma started significantly deeper than it did on this world, as the underground was countless times more expansive.

There was something that made Neave wonder. If lava slimes had made their way into the magma of their planet… Wouldn’t there be some genuinely terrifying creatures closer to the core? Perhaps the conditions there were far too extreme, even for monsters? Or maybe there wasn’t much spirit?

That wasn’t an enjoyable thought. The idea of stupidly powerful monsters existing in the planet's core, eating it from the inside the way a worm devoured an apple, was highly unappealing. It was actually fucking terrifying.

Neave shrugged. If that were the case, he would eventually go down there, kill them, and take the cores. They ought to have some crazy powers. Or maybe they didn’t.

Either way, it was time to stop procrastinating.

Breeding monsters was quite an exciting experience at first, as one never truly knew what they would produce. However, after doing it for a while, especially to create a variety of low-rank slimes, it got pretty dull indeed. It was like watching grass grow.

No, actually, Neave sometimes procrastinated by watching the fungus grass grow, too, which meant that watching grass grow was more exciting.

Luckily, he had a moment of respite recently, as he was tasked with making a few weapons for the others. He approached his improvised workshop and examined his work.

First, it was Hunter’s weapon. He had been entirely focused on flexibility and general agility, but that didn’t change his primary fighting style: smashing shit to pieces. Thus, Neave created a special weapon for him.

It was a gigantic sword created from the heavy metal Neave was cultivating. It was a much lighter variety, though, one Neave specialized to be as tough and rigid as possible. Even he couldn’t damage this weapon easily.

As far as its power was concerned, it was actually quite unusual. While holding the weapon, one could move while partially avoiding external force. It was hard to explain how it worked.

That was code for ‘not even Neave really understood it.’ Put as simply as possible, while it was being held, knocking the wielder back or getting them off balance was super tricky. Not only that, but it also permitted stuff like running on walls and ceilings. It even allowed ridiculously far jumps, as the wielder could partially ignore gravity while using it.

It was a terrifying weapon suitable for a mighty, immovable juggernaut. Neave nodded in satisfaction and moved on to the next weapon.

Gabrias’ requested, surprisingly, a bow. It wasn’t something Neave expected to hear from the giant man, but his reasoning was solid. The reason why he wanted a bow was straightforward. Gabrias was extremely tall, but even for his height, his arms were long.

This meant that he could pull a massive longbow with relative ease. At first, what concerned Neave was Gabrias’ lack of coordination, but that didn’t seem to translate to his precision. At all. He was extremely precise with his throws and had no problem using a temporary bow Neave had created.

So, Neave made Gabrias a bow. The material he used mattered quite a bit, actually. Usually, wood wasn’t a strange or infrequent choice. However, the way that wood was created employed complicated, time-consuming plant growth strategies that Neave really couldn’t be bothered with.

In the end, he took a branch off the mighty shrub, an action it surprisingly didn’t protest at all, and used countless qi techniques to permit the material a bit of flexibility. The string was made from the tendon of one of the abominids Neave had created, and it was extremely tough after a minor touch-up.

As for the power it contained, it was relatively simple. With some help from Dukean, Neave had created ice slimes and even an ice golem. Borrowing from one of their cores, the result luckily turned out to be ice arrows. The bow didn’t need arrows, the moment the string was pulled, an arrow of ice would manifest itself, and it could be fired.

Typically, this would be a rather underwhelming power for a bow. Sure, unlimited arrows seemed great, but using custom-made ones, especially coupled with an ability to enhance them in one way or another, was preferable.

However, Neave’s spirit creation and core rounding strategies made a considerable impact. He pulled the bow a bit, and an arrow manifested. Once fired, it struck the wall, and instantly, frost covered the wall's surface in a several-meter radius.

That would be quite the weapon to use against… Well, anything, really. Even with a power disparity, if he could hit someone, he could disable them or kill them by freezing them on the spot.

The creation of this bow reminded Neave of a crucial aspect of weapons that held cores. An element he really lamented himself for forgetting about.

Monsters tended to look more humanoid the more powerful they were. At least if their cores were round enough. This was one of those things that baffled scholars, and it was presumed that something about the bipedal humanoid form was intrinsically connected to higher powers, as could be seen with spirit beasts attaining humanoid forms upon achieving a higher rank.

There was another strange thing about monster cores. When used in a weapon or any object really, the shape dictated the potential power the object would have. It was almost as if the core knew what the object it was placed in was designed or not designed to do.

This was why those orbs he had created tended to have generic element-connected powers rather than something more specific, and it was the reason why something like this bow had powers appropriate for a bow and not a sword.

The thing Neave lamented, however, was that he had completely forgotten that the same thing applied to any piece of equipment. He knew this, actually, and he was planning on utilizing it later, but some part of him failed to connect the dots on one essential issue.

Normally, cultivators used weapons. Why not add a necklace, ring, armor, or whatever else to the mix?

“Because the cores aren’t fucking rounded!”

When one used a weapon with a quasi-spirit, their qi flowed through that weapon as well. If one had a weapon and another piece of equipment, their qi would flow through both objects.

If the cores used to create those weapons were relatively round, there would be little problem with using two or three pieces of equipment. Eventually, however, the stacking interference would strain the individual's spirit too much, disrupting the equipment's function or even harming or killing the user.

Neave wanted to pull his damn hair out for forgetting this. Why? Because absolutely nothing stopped him from wearing twenty rings, a necklace, full armor, bracelets, and whatever else he could come up with.

At least, he believed it didn’t, at first. Perhaps there was some other limit he would have to face, but it would definitely be much less restrained when using rounded cores.

So he decided to check where these limits lay.

In the end, there was a catch. Sort of. As long as the pieces of equipment were different in nature, there would be no problem, but several rings were out of the question. They mutually interfered with their function, again, likely something to do with equipment knowing what role it was meant to play.

He still grinned, however. This very much so meant he had free reign over as many different pieces of equipment as he could come up with.

For now, he made a ring for everyone using the cores of those pudgy abominids he was farming. The effect turned out to be precisely what he expected it to be.

A ridiculously generalized boost to right about everything. With an emphasis on regeneration, of course.

He didn’t have time to puzzle out stuff like armor, but… Necklaces and wristbands served right about the same function. So he made those for everyone as well, using the cores from the same monsters, and voila, yet again, another generalized boost to everything with a focus on regeneration.

Absolutely fantastic.

While he didn’t really care enough to go out of his way for the others yet… He needed another few things for himself.

The first thing he made was a metallic crown. He used one of the hyper-heavy slime cores and made it out of the hefty metal.

The power it granted Neave surprised even him. It was basic telekinesis. Quite powerful, though, and Neave wouldn’t complain about it. Even if it turned out to be trash in combat, it was infinitely valuable in every other way Neave could imagine.

He was already wasting too much time, so he quickly brainstormed what else he could create that wouldn’t be a pain in the ass.

… Glasses?

Actually, yeah, that was perfect. He took some of the brush glass and made some glasses. A core from another glass golem was used, and the power attained…

Neave could see through objects now. That was super useful, actually. He walked over to the corner of his workshop and observed himself in the mirror.

The glasses were adorable. He took them off instantly. Unacceptable. He was a leader, a lord, a future god! There was no room for looking cute.

So he rejected the glasses. Maybe he would hand them to Dukean. He could go look cute all he wanted.

Neave would look like a real man. He grabbed a branch of one of the inferior shrubs, the obsidian ones. Once he shaped these into not-cute-but-absolutely-badass sunglasses, he observed the power. A core from one of the pudgy monsters was used in hopes of granting an effect similar to the ring, necklace, and wristband.

What he got instead was…

“... What?”

Regeneration sight? What the fuck is that!?

Apparently, when he looked at someone, if he used the glasses, he could speed that individual’s regeneration up. That was almost entirely useless, and he was confident he would never use it. He still preferred the sunglasses, though. Even though he could barely see shit through them, given they weren’t all that transparent.

No obstacle to his perception power, though. He would manage.

Where was he again?

…

Oh yeah, the weapons.

Harel requested something that confirmed Neave’s recent suspicion.

She is fucking insane.

A spiked ball on a chain. A spiked. Ball. On a chain. Everyone expected her to take a sword or something, and Marven even criticized her for fooling around. Still, she stood her ground, claiming she wanted to ‘broaden her horizons’ and ‘explore something new while she had the opportunity to do it without consequences.’

Nope. That was just an excuse.

Insane, yep. Absolutely, Neave nodded to himself and observed the effects of the weapon.

It had a similar effect to Neave’s sledgehammer, but instead of force multiplication, it was damage multiplication. Whenever it struck, the impact left horrific harm in its wake, to the point Neave had no plans to test it inside his workshop.

Then he moved on to Dukean’s weapon.

A sword on a chain, what the hell is up with these people and chains!?

At least he could understand Dukean. He had a spirit power that allowed him to manipulate metal, so a weapon on a chain was something he could use to its full capability.

A sword on a chain was still something Neave had never heard of, but you learn something new every day.

The weapon’s power was quite simple. The chain could extend and retract, up to quite far. It was also made of heavy metal, and it was quite sharp, tough, rigid, and all that good stuff.

Now finally, Marven’s weapon. The most boring piece of the bunch.

Glass Shard 2.0.

Same thing as the first one, effectively, just a little sleeker and slightly more powerful. There was another difference. It was stupidly light, lighter than air. Not an exaggeration. If Neave released the weapon, it floated up.

For this weapon, Neave had invested the alchemy techniques into making it as light and hard as possible. It didn’t need weight due to the nature of its power, and with how hard it was, putting a single crack on the edge would be quite the challenge.

That was everything. Neave packed the weapons and rushed over to the others.

He swaggered into the room as if he owned the place. Well, he did literally own the place, but he truly acted the part this time.

Everyone immediately turned to look at him.

Hunter had been running around, already having lost quite a bit of weight, and his polished, much sleeker musculature reflected the shiny orbs hanging on the ceiling.

Gabrias had been standing on one hand, balancing on the glass roller, and lifting weights with his feet.

Harel had just put down the stupidly heavy barbell she had been deadlifting, and the thunk reverberated through the room. Her body was no longer a shriveled mass of sticks, and her muscles were more prominent than Dukean's.

Dukean put down the cumbersome training sword Neave had made for him.

And Marven finished eating the meat stockpile, still receiving the most significant benefits from doing so out of anyone else in the room.

Harel pointed at Neave and then laughed so hard she fell on the ground, “What the fuck are you wearing!?”

To be fully honest, that hurt Neave’s feelings a little.

He dropped the bag of weapons of mass destruction on the ground and grinned at them, “How about we go for a round in the spirit realm?”

The others couldn’t help but smile at that.

Things would be different this time, for sure.