Rudrean’s path had already leveled up when he killed over fifty parrots at the start.

Aelira’s path had also leveled up.

Their Path Talent effects were boosted! Rudean and his loved once now acquired 150% stat boost when within the range of Rudrean.

Aelira’s path talent now provided 60% damage reduction instead of 50% before sharing the damage between bonded.

Lyra’s path leveled up with the defeat of the boss, while Ryzen and Rivera were also only short of twenty-something exp from leveling up.

"It looks like the other parrots scattered. Not daring to attack anymore." Rudrean looked around.

"Yeah, us killing their boss like that must have terrified them." Aelira laughed.

Lyra blinked, sharing good news. "My path’s talent upgraded, and it came with a nice new power."

"I can now generate a material of my design with specific characteristics that I want. This just made it very easy for me to craft damage transfer items."

"Awesome." Ryzen grinned. "Guess we won’t have to worry about damaging the Magic Suits with dual defenses."

After all, if their Magic Suit that was granted via the Institute’s ring was destroyed, they would be forcefully teleported out of the Secret Realm, ending their journey.

So it was a must that they stacked more defense, as it was the best way to survive longer and collect more resources.

...

The group gathered upon a tree branch in the open, no longer hiding. What they did had scared away the monsters from the surroundings.

"We also got B-rank runes from the birds we killed, so we’ll slot them first," Ryzen said as he sat down on a branch.

Rivera and Ryzen began slotting the runes while Rudrean and Aelira discussed which rune they should choose to superimpose the B-rank Super Rune they had just obtained onto.

Lyra was crafting a magic item, with exotic ethereal tools floating around her that were generated from her talent.

She was also checking the status of the drone orbs she had sent.

"Our next target with a concentrated magic reading is twenty-three kilometers away from here. Another thing. A team is heading toward the same spot. Maybe they have some kind of tracker to find resources as well. They are twelve kilometers away from the spot." Lyra informed them. "One of them discovered my drone orb and destroyed it, so I am sending another to follow them."

"What time until they reach the location of the resource?" Rudrean asked.

"They were moving at a leisurel pace, but they must have sped up after discovering my drone orb," Lyra answered. "We should go now, or they’ll take it."

"Let’s go. We are also done." Ryzen stood up.

"We are also done." Aelira cracked her knuckles. "Let’s go beat some people."

"..."

"..."

[Isalyn: Be careful. If you kill someone here, make sure nobody finds that out, or you’ll become a revenge target of their relatives.]

’Nah, we won’t kill just for some competition.’ Rudrean shook his head, but his eyes glinted. ’That is, if they also do the same. So if they want to kill us, we’ll respond in kind.’

[Isalyn: Perfect.]

As the group began moving inside the dragonfly aircraft, they shared each other’s Arcane Path runes to coordinate better.

Rudrean was triggering his third rune to boost his power. He had also superimposed the B-rank Super Rune into his third rune slot.

[Slot 3: Voidante’s Fury (B-Super)]

—> Every 5% of mana consumed generates 1 Nihil Fury Blade, up to 100 can be stored. These blades can be infused into any attacks and grant them 300 omni-defense ignore, up to 3000 when 10 Nihil Fury Blades are infused.

—> Targets struck by attacks infused with Nihil Fury Blades take 10% more damage from all sources.

He was consuming mana to generate Nihil Fury Blades, wanting to stock it to 100.

It was going very fast because, to recover his mana quickly, he had his fourth rune’s power.

[Slot 4: Devouring Void (B)]

—> +200% mana recovery, and it increases by 200% per 20% reduction in your mana pool.

—> When your mana pool becomes empty, it is instantly restored to full at the cost of 10% of your vitality.

Essentially, this Arcane Path build made him inexhaustible in terms of mana.

In simple terms:

Losing 10% vitality would refill 100% mana. And recovering the lost 10% vitality required only 10% of mana.

So, in terms of energy, Rudrean had no chance of running out. The only way to tire him would be through constant mental pressure and overuse of his mind.

He might not lose his mana reserves, but his mind and body could still get exhausted, especially his mind.

Still, this made him extremely overpowered because others had to rely on mana recovery potions, while he could recover to full at any time, not to mention his boosted mana regeneration now recovering 3.2% of his max mana per second.

He could literally afford to unleash large-scale annihilation constantly.

Moreover, losing vitality was actually beneficial because of his first rune’s passive effect. The lower his vitality, the higher his physical parameters.

—> Passive: The lower the vitality, the higher your physical parameters, up to a 100% boost at 30% vitality.

He could reduce his own vitality with his fourth rune’s power to use his first rune’s passive without affecting his Magic Suit, allowing him to gain more power.

Rudrean explained how his Arcane Path worked in this build to the others.

"Holy crap. Your build is crazy." Ryzen was dumbfounded.

"Yeah, insane." Rivera wryly smiled. "You can also summon spirit monsters for aid. It’s perfect."

"What about you, Aelira?" Lyra asked curiously.

"Ho, ho. My build is no less powerful than my darling’s." Aelira chuckled. "Here, check it out."

"First is Voidandi’s Halo, which you already know. I can boost a spell or arcane martial art’s potency by 100% at the cost of 10% mana. I can also restore 10% to 50% mana every minute using this rune’s second active effect. Rudy’s entire fourth rune is about mana recovery, so his is superior in that regard."

"My second rune, called Zilen Vina, is about reducing omni-defense and speed. I did that with the boss, as you already know."

"The third rune, called Night Reign, has only one power. It creates a domain of darkness where the senses of enemies are disrupted, with a chance to seal their senses completely. I used a B-rank Super Rune on this, which increased the size to a 100-meter radius from the previous 50 meters, while also adding an effect that boosts the perception of allies within the domain."

"Oh, that’s neat." Rivera was surprised. "It will be good against other teams."

"Yep. And my fourth rune is kind of the best and most fun." Aelira grinned. "Can’t wait to use it on our rivals."

"We’ll be there soon. The rival team is already there and fighting monsters that are protecting the treasure."