SSS Awakening: I Can Create Skills By Will-Chapter 30: The Weight of Authority
The monster drew deeper, feeding directly from the seal. Its presence surged unnaturally, bones thickening, aura flaring violently as if stitched together by something that should not exist.
As the awakeners felt it instantly.
Several gagged, dropping to one knee.
"What is that smell..."
"I can’t breathe."
"My head..."
Arthur felt it too. Even with Sovereign’s Domain mitigating the worst of it, the pressure clawed at him, cold and wrong.
The boss lifted its halberd and slammed it into the ground.
A dark circle spread across the battlefield.
Arthur’s eyes widened. "No, don’t you dare."
But it was too late.
The ground rattled as skeletal hands burst upward.
Once more, the fallen rose.
Clack. Crack. Rattle.
Dozens of skeleton monsters dragged themselves back into existence, their bones stained black with fresh corruption.
Arthur clicked his tongue sharply.
"Damn it."
He had arrived just after the casting finished. A second earlier and he might have stopped it. Now the battlefield reset itself, mocking their progress.
Groans and curses rang out among the awakeners.
"Again?!"
"You’ve got to be kidding me!"
"We just cleared them!"
The tainted mana made it worse. Movements slowed. Heads pounded and confidence wavered.
For a moment, doubt crept back in.
Arthur tightened his grip.
"Not happening," he muttered.
He turned back to the boss, eyes colder now, his earlier playfulness gone.
The monster lunged at him again, empowered by the seal, swinging with reckless force. Arthur met it head on, Sovereign’s Domain flaring as he blocked, redirected, and countered in rapid succession.
The awakeners watched him fight with renewed seriousness.
"He’s not smiling anymore."
"That means it’s bad."
"Still... he hasn’t backed down."
Arthur didn’t look back. He didn’t need to.
He could feel them behind him, struggling yet standing, refusing to fall again.
"Hold on," he said under his breath. "Just a little longer."
The battle wasn’t over.
It had simply entered its final, ugliest phase.
Arthur was not serious for nothing.
He pulled away from the main clash, boots skidding through broken stone as he widened the distance. To anyone watching, it looked reckless, like he was abandoning the line. But Arthur’s eyes were already moving, tracking the flow of the battlefield, the weak points forming and collapsing in real time.
The awakeners were struggling.
They were holding, barely, backs pressed together as monsters kept pouring in. Panic crept into their movements. One mistake and the whole formation would shatter.
Arthur clicked his tongue.
"Tch. You guys really don’t know how to give up."
He turned and moved.
Not toward the boss. But toward the monsters.
His blade cut through the first creature before it realized it had been targeted. A clean slash. No flourish. The second lunged and Arthur stepped inside its reach, shoulder rolling past rotten claws as his elbow crushed its skull with a dull crack.
Boom!.
The awakeners felt it before they saw it. Pressure easing and space opening.
Arthur flowed through the swarm, never stopping, never committing too deep. Every strike was placed where it mattered most. Necks. Joints. Cores. He didn’t chase kills. He erased threats.
One by one, the monsters surrounding the awakeners dropped.
"W what the hell..."
A young spear user stared as a creature collapsed inches from his face.
"Don’t freeze," Arthur said without looking back. "If you’re breathing, you can still fight."
That snapped them out of it.
They moved again, weapons rising with renewed focus. Some shouted thanks out loud, voices hoarse and shaky. Others could only watch him, gratitude burning quietly behind exhausted eyes.
Arthur didn’t respond.
He was already gone.
The boss roared behind him, sensing the shift, rage boiling as its prey slipped from its grasp again. Heavy footsteps thundered as it gave chase, tearing through rubble and corpses alike.
Arthur let it.
He didn’t concentrate on the boss. Not yet.
His intent brushed outward, thin threads spreading through the chaos. Every kill fed it. Every near miss sharpened it. He felt the familiar pressure building behind his eyes, the system quietly tallying the cost of survival.
Good.
More.
He twisted aside as a massive claw came down where his head had been, stone exploding upward. Arthur rolled, rose, and severed the leg of a monster that had wandered too close, not even slowing.
Inside his vision, the interface flickered.
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
❂ SOVEREIGN INTENT SYSTEM ❂
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
⟦ Intent Accumulation Interface ⟧
━━━ CURRENT RESERVES ━━━
✦ Total Intent Points Available: 63 IP ✦
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
Arthur smiled.
"Yeah," he murmured. "That’ll do."
The boss howled again, closer now, its bulk blotting out the broken light. Arthur used Intent Step, vanishing from its charge at the last second. The monster plowed forward, smashing into the ground with a shockwave that sent debris flying.
Arthur reappeared atop a broken pillar, calm as ever.
"It’s time," he said quietly.
He opened the system.
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
❂ SOVEREIGN INTENT SYSTEM ❂
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
⟦ Skill Upgrade Available ⟧
✦ Target Skill: Sovereign’s Domain
✦ Type: Passive — Authority Manifestation
━━━ CURRENT STATUS ━━━
• Current Rank: E
• Next Rank: D
━━━ UPGRADE REQUIREMENT ━━━
✦ Intent Point Cost: 50 IP ✦
⟬ System Query ⟭
→ Proceed with rank advancement?
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
Arthur didn’t hesitate.
"Proceed."
The world seemed to inhale.
Intent flooded inward, compressing, refining. Not explosive, but heavy. Dense. Like gravity tightening around him.
He stepped away again as the boss lashed out blindly, using Intent Step to slip through overlapping attacks, his movements smoother than before, more assured. Even as he moved, his awareness flicked back to the interface.
The upgrade completed.
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
❂ SOVEREIGN INTENT SYSTEM ❂
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
━━━ SKILL UPGRADED SUCCESSFULLY ━━━
✦ Name: Sovereign’s Domain
✦ Type: Passive — Authority Manifestation 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚
✦ Rank: D
✦ Status: ACTIVE
⟬ Authority Expansion Confirmed ⟭
The battlefield no longer merely responds.
It stabilizes around sovereign presence.
━━━ EFFECTS ━━━
• Will Suppression
A sustained authority field radiates from the user.
Hostile entities experience delayed reactions and fractured aggression patterns.
Corrupted and undead targets suffer instinct desynchronization, reducing coordinated attacks and reaction speed.
• Authority Stabilization
The user’s intent remains anchored under pressure.
Movement-based and execution-driven skills resist interruption once initiated.
Pain response, panic spikes, and mental backlash are dampened.
Abyssal destabilization effects are actively suppressed at low to moderate intensity.
• Ally Resonance
Allied units within range gain heightened mental steadiness.
Subtle synchronization occurs during combat, smoothing timing and reducing execution errors.
No coercion or dominance is applied.
✦══════════════════════════════════════✦
Arthur exhaled slowly.
The aura around him deepened.
It did not explode outward. It settled. Like a crown being placed, unseen yet undeniable.
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