Finally, with all of that done, I focused on my people. It seemed everyone was here to stare at me now. I smiled and waved, marveling at the smoothness of my movement. Body. I felt as if I’d been dipped in WD40.

There were many people desperate to talk to me, a level 41 Joel opening his mouth to speak, but Mal, back to his original height, beat everyone to it..

“What the fuck is an Alo-im? And how in all the shitting anus’s in hell did you still manage to rock up with a higher level than me, you absolute cock!”

“Nice to see you too mate,” I replied. “Congratulations on the power increase.”

He nodded smugly. “I told you following Devotion was a good idea. I was able to clear the place almost single-handedly.” I noticed some of those around him giving him unpleasant looks. I just offered him a thumbs up and turned to Joel. “You alright mate?”

“Not happy about dropping the castle. But it had to be done I suppose. Just can’t believe we spent so long getting you a nice damn bedroom and now it’s gone the day you get back.”

“Shit happens man. We’re safe now. We can get to rebuild once everyone has recovered. There’s lot’s doing.”

“How safe is this place now? What about underground?” Joel asked.

“As far as I know, impenetrable. We can hide here forever if we want and it’s a literal sphere, so anything underground within the sphere is ours, and it’s pretty massive so we can go pretty deep.”

“If it encompasses the Dwarven Garrison where all the builders lived, then there should be a lot of good stuff there for us. Food, tools, weapons.

“Yep. We’ll use it all while we hunker down and build back up.

“Except you need to help protect the rest of Malatia,” Mal said, scowling.

“Thanks for reminding me,” I replied sarcastically. “Did you put any of that massive point boost into Intelligence?” Already guessing at the answer. His expression turned sheepish as he looked around at those looking at him expectantly.

“50 points.”

“50 fucking points out of 2000?” Joel exclaimed to sniggers from a few people.

Mal’s scowl deepend. “I was trying to save the damn town,” he snapped.

“But if you put 50 points into Intelligence, didn't you realize you should put more in?” Joel asked.

“He put them in last, as an afterthought,” I answered for him. Guessing what had happened. “Then realized afterwards that he should have started there as he would have spent his points very differently. But, he’s strong, fast, and nearly indestructible and he smashed a lot of deep dwarves to save Far Reach in a difficult position, so we’re not going to judge him.” I looked over to Mal and smiled gently. Plenty of opportunities to invest there later, mate.”

“Thanks, but also not bloody likely. I must have killed two thousand dwarves and you know how many points I got?”

“Two thousand?” I replied remembering Natom telling me about the minimum 1xp for low-level kills.

“Yep. It’ll take me years to get to a higher level. I seriously fucked up.”

“There’s a lot of people out there to fight still, man, and I think we’ll see more people as strong as you when the gods decide to all have their own Chosen or Blessed wandering Falritas. The future got a whole lot more dangerous today. Outside of this bubble anyway. Now, enough of this shit for tonight. Everyone needs to get rested and settled. Tomorrow we plan and look to the future.”

“Fair enough,” he said with a little less anger. “But you still haven’t explained what an Alo-im is.”

“Well that would be whatever I am,” I grinned, bringing a spicy ball up. There was no longer a choice of light or dark; it was now a finely interwoven harmonious dance of powers. I marveled at it myself, for a moment before diffusing it and bringing up the sword of the Alo-im. I could feel the power radiating from the double-edged sword that had one edge Light and one Dark Edge with the opposing powers blending into each other along the spine. It extended further than I’d expected, reaching around six foot long. I summoned my Cleaver of Clive into my other hand, and I coated that in ethereal energy. Those watching gasped. I dismissed the sword and put the cleaver into my barely used Ethereal storage.

“Well despite the changes and the rag rags around your waist, you actually look dangerous as hell.”

“That he does,” Sania said, placing her hand on my shoulder. “But that’s enough for tonight.

“Sania’s right everyone,” I shouted. “I’m sorry we had to go through all of that, and for all of our losses along the way, but you all held strong, and those we lost, fought so that their families and friends can now live in complete safety and that’s what we’ve achieved!” The crowd began cheering again at my words.

“No one will ever enter Far Reach with malicious intent against us again!” I roared. And the roar was echoed back with joy and relief.

“Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure about that yer bastard,” A familiar voice said into my mind.

“What the fuck!” I yelped internally. “Grimstrom?”

“Aye, lad.”

The End of Creations Book 2 Immortal Shell.

Book three will begin in the middle of August. I hope you all enjoyed this installment.