CH1151

“Ben, buddy?” Jake said, swinging his legs under the table that the two of them, along with Thera, Amy, and Yuzu were all sitting at. “Gotta say, of all of the humans on the planet, I think you might have adapted to life here the best.”

“Hmm? What makes you think that?” Ben asked, pulling out food and drinks for all of them to enjoy, while also carrying both the table and all of the chairs they were sitting on as they flew through the air, going from city to city converting more skills into blessed ones for all those who needed it, a barrier projected around them to keep them unaffected by the wind of their speed.

“Just kind of the general vibe you give,” Jake shrugged, content enough to let the matter drop while he was being fed, getting to enjoy the closest thing to a day off he’d had in weeks, even if he at least was there for work. While Ben and Thera could both fly them from location to location quickly, Jake’s archmagic could lower their travel time even more, on top of another good reason the gods had wanted him and Amy there.

Those two were in essence Yuzu’s pet project, both having been heavily invested in, in an attempt to get them to the third tier, and while that was looking less and less likely as the next wave drew ever closer, both were still exceptionally powerful forces.

Jake with his archmagic and Amy with her archaugmentation, with both Yuzu’s help growing their various skills and attributes and all of the tower blessings the world had to offer by that point. Neither of them was weak; if anything, they were two of the most powerful individuals on the planet, falling only behind the third tiers and perhaps only two or three other contenders at most. Even if the invasion starting so soon meant the chances of them reaching godhood themselves had plummeted, they were still worth investing in, and with Ben’s new, heightened ability to produce souls, it was a chance to let those two grow even stronger.

And even with it being a request from the divine, Ben didn’t bother trying to demand anything for the work. The truth of the matter that he and the gods both knew was that they were his friends and, as such, Ben would have eventually made the time to modify their souls, anyway. The present arrangement had only sped things up.

“Well, don’t worry about my vibe,” Ben told them. “Instead, actually think about the changes you want while you’re eating. Both what blessed skills you’re going to take and what sort of arrangement you want for your affinities and resistances.”

With Jake comfortably having room for three more blessed skills and Amy having room for two, the thought was on both of their minds as they grappled with which of their other skills to choose for the best benefits, even if the other choice was simple.

“Man, you know I’m going all in on affinities like Yuzu. You know how excited I was hearing about that when she came back? It’s all I’ve been thinking about.”

“Yeah, of course that would be what you’d go with,” Ben sighed. “Whatever. Amy, as a frontline fighter, I know I can count on you to choose something more interesting, right?”

“No, just affinities for me too, thanks.”

“Oh my god, why?”

“If I need to awaken my augmentation eventually, having all of my affinities boosted is only going to help. For defense, can’t I just ask you to make me some better armour?”

“I mean, sure, yeah, and I was actually going to make you all something new now while I have you, but-”

“Then raising my resistances is just wasting this chance,” she shrugged. “Having high affinities is going to give me a lot of long-term options that raising my resistances just won’t. Sorry, Ben.”

“Mmh, fine, whatever. Maybe one day, the world will learn to love and accept those of us better at taking hits from magic. In that case, since we’re not that busy, I’ll just whip you all up some decent armour now.”

“Define ‘not busy’,” Amy muttered, looking down on the world below flash by as Ben flew them across various cities, the scene only changing when he went into Jake’s mind to make him teleport them to other locations for them to work, be they other, more distant towns acting as gathering points, or else to the middle of the ocean to work on those living in aquatic settlements.

Ben ignored the comment though, it wasn’t important. Starting with Amy, Ben materialized a range of options in her size, be they soft and comfortable shirts and pants, sturdier leather armours, a suit of metal armour, chainmail, and a cloak, all floating in the air beside them. None had the sheer level of effort put into them that Ben had put towards Thera’s new cloak the day prior, but realistically, they wouldn’t need to. Thera’s cloak had been beyond overkill; once he added the enchantments he had planned, everything he’d just created would still be essentially impenetrable.

“And once more, I really wish you weren’t so good at eyeballing my sizes,” Amy sighed, knowing there was no escaping from that while Ben just shrugged.

“We’ve been over this. I’m a master craftsman. I can eyeball everyone’s sizes without issues.”

With the power of his alien sense making it even more clear, but he didn’t feel any need to bring up the nature of that particular skill. While he was happy to view the experience as nothing more than raw information, there was no changing that by experiencing all of the various senses of the world through his soul, among other things, it made him uncomfortably aware of everyone he passed.

“Anyway,” he went on. “Just one moment and I’ll finish these up for you guys.”

Pulling the last resource he needed out, Jake, Amy, and Yuzu all frowned when Rook appeared; a vacant, unfocused look in the immortal’s eyes while Ben held his mind, using the man’s soul to enchant on everything he’d just created.

Absolute defense tied with his resistances, resistance enhancement, his various other defensive skills, and anything relevant in his rings, finished off with a thin bit of barrier magic for each. As annoying as it was, there was no denying that Amy had been right. When he could make things like that, growing one’s resistances was undeniably less of a priority.

He handed them over when he was done, letting her slip them into her ring before he made similar items for Yuzu and Jake as well, making the two mages unbreakable new staves as well before holding out his hand to Amy.

“Weapon ring, please,” he requested, wanting to modify the spatial ring full of what had once been some of the best weapons he could make to add that indestructible function to them as well, giving him dozens of more items to practice with before turning to Thera.

Enchanting items like that could only be done while they were out, he didn’t want either of the kids seeing how he was using Rook, lest it negatively affect their development when they were both still so young, but without that worry he got to making Thera much the same, not only various types of clothing and armour with absolute defense tied to it, he also pulled out the cloak he’d worked on, giving it those same enchantments as the finishing touches, even if to a far greater extreme.

With his skill, Ben enchanted each individual scale that made up the armour, rather than a sweeping enchantment to cover it all, before giving the same enchantment to its inner lining, letting him hand it over, even if he was still disappointed with the result.

Even with the best defensive enchantment on the planet, I still wasn’t able to push it to mythic, huh? Damn it, this really is impossible.

“Dare I even ask?” Thera said, looking over the new cloak in admiration while Ben smiled.

“Consider this my favouritism. I will stake my professional pride on it that nothing in the world is getting through that cloak. Took me most of yesterday to make, too.”

“Willing to maybe stake some of that pride on what you just gave us, too?” Jake asked. “You know, just so we can come complain if it fails on us?”

“So long as you guys don’t run into anyone with magic nullification, then you’ll be safe even just wearing the light shirts and pants I just made you. And on the off chance you do run into a nullifier, Yuzu should be able to notice first, and she can nullify their nullification. You’ll be fine. Even if that doesn’t work out for some reason, the armours should do a good job keeping you safe, even without the defensive enchantments.”

“Alright, but if I’m killed off, then I’m gonna haunt you.”

“Do it,” Ben laughed. “If you become a ghost, then I can figure out a way to shove your soul into a new body, and then all can be forgiven, right?”

“I’m sorry, if you’re done, can you put him away,” Amy said, looking Rook’s way. “Having him staring at us is… Ben, do you not ever worry about how the rest of Earth would look at some of the things you do?”

“I think about it occasionally,” he shrugged. “And I’m sure some of the things I do would look pretty irredeemable to any upstanding person on Earth, but I do have certain ethical lines I don’t cross. I use the forbidden gods who went and made the war so much harder than it needed to be in their stupidity, I use the demons who are trying to destroy the planet and everyone on it, probably eventually the rest of the universe too, and I use anyone who’s tried to harm me. So long as I don’t go beyond those ethical lines, then I don’t care what anyone on Earth might think. But if this is making you uncomfortable, I can make it less apparent while I work.”

He had other people he wanted to make defensive outfits for after all, and that was a perfect time to do it, but at the very least, he could actualize around Rook to make it less obvious how he was using the man, making it appear he’d disappeared as if he’d been put away, back into his prison.

“I don’t know,” Amy said, looking only marginally more comfortable with the man out of sight. “It’s just… Jake’s right. You really have adapted to this place better than anyone else.”

“Eh, well, home’s what you make of it, right?” Ben told her, trying to drop the matter. He didn’t need to be reminded of how Earth might view his actions; he was well aware. Even ignoring the way he designed tools to slaughter demons, which he doubted many other humans would have complained about given the context, there was no denying that the things he was willing to put the forbidden gods, defeated gods, and Rook through could easily be viewed as excessive at best, but to him, that also felt like the reality of the situation. Even with all everyone was doing, the world was still on the edge of total devastation. If using those who’d tried to damn it or else had nothing but evil in their hearts could make things a bit safer, then he could live with it, and however his old world might judge him for it didn’t matter. They’d never know.

“Anyway, we can’t have lunch without dessert,” Ben went on, pulling out more food from his rings to change the subject, not wanting Rook filling their thoughts during their brief time together. “Come on, all of you, eat your fill. We’ve got a long day ahead of us, and this might be the last real break you three get. Might as well enjoy it before you’re all subjected to letting me play with your souls.”