Chapter 458: Spatial Schemes

With access to more information than I knew what to do with, and armed with [Dimensional Praxis], I was ready to rebind my rift to me and avoid paying that cost. That was my original goal, but I truly felt it would be an experience I'd never forget. There was even a chance that, if I did it myself, I could somehow bind more rifts to me than the skill normally allowed. If that wasn't possible, maybe I could feed unclaimed rifts to mine and let it expand.

Maybe I was deluding myself a bit, but I really felt like it was about more than the single trait point now. If anything, saving that point was more like the cherry on top! With my newfound enthusiasm, I started assigning work to my [Sub-Cores] as we sifted through the information, finding blueprints and structures that begged to be reverse-engineered to suit our needs.

At the same time, I had Nu repeatedly open its single aperture, hoping to level up the skill, because my gut told me I'd probably need at least two to link up. When Nu opened an aperture in the rift, it led to an empty void, and even the thought of passing through it filled us with dread. However, when I tried to open the aperture on my side, it simply created a floating crack in space that didn't seem to lead anywhere. I had the idea of us both tearing open holes, then using [Dimensional Praxis] to stitch them together.

Actually, to help this progress, I should send Nu some extra helpers.

I deposited two [Sub-Cores] and sent them over, since Nu could extract them through [Core Storage]. If not even mighty labyrinths could stop us from abusing [Core Storage], what was a bit of dimensional chaos going to do? Anyway, with two additional helpers, I had them work together to cast another [Coordicore], since we'd need a lot of spatial coordinates from the other side.

Having two [Coordicores] summoned meant that I'd finally pushed my insane passive Mana regeneration into a negative, but only while both were actively working. Considering my maximum Mana capacity was beyond all reason, I reckoned it shouldn't be a problem even if both were running simultaneously. If I did hit my bottom, I could always regain some of it while on break.

It seemed that without a bound rift, it was much harder to raise the level of [Personal Rift] through repeatedly opening its single aperture, so I had the Nu team also cast other spells such as [Expansion] on the rift directly. Even though this space wasn't registered to me, it was clearly still allocated for me, as otherwise the space would have completely collapsed. Heck, even if it was reserved for someone else, I would stake my claim on it before them, since I had clearly gotten here first.

Thanks to this, Nu eventually earned [Personal Rift LV 2], and at the same time we were ready for the next step. Opening up to apertures that led nowhere, we needed to stitch them together by linking the coordinates, and thankfully I had a helper who happened to be experienced in this.

"You want me to help apply coordinates like I do with my web portals?" Vee asked curiously.

"Exactly! I'm going to send more [Sub-Cores] over to Nu to help on there, and I figured you and I could use [Ritual Casting] together with my [Coordicore]. If either side finishes first, we can copy the other."

"Um… Sure, okay… Although I feel like this is way beyond my pay grade."

"Come on, you're an expert when it comes to portals; I know you can help."

"Okay, okay. But if this blows up and creates a black hole or something worse, I'm never helping you again!" Vee threatened.

I chuckled and nodded, sending over the additional helpers to the Nu team. After Vee mentally prepared herself, we linked up with [Ritual Casting] and slowly began our work. It was far more complicated than the portals Vee had originally pulled off, but with us stacking so many bonuses, I felt like we could pull it off. I even had both Nu and me actively use [Spatial Erosion], since I felt it was a good way to grease the wheels of what we were trying to pull off.

Our [Coordicores] kept spitting out coordinates, and we had to readjust quickly as the unbound rift seemed to be in flux, even though it felt like it was in one place for Nu. But with each failure, we got faster, and it felt like only a matter of time before we linked the coordinates before they deviated again.

"Ugh, this is so frustrating!" Vee shouted in annoyance. "Can we not freeze the rift somehow?"

I was about to say no when I had a sudden moment of clarity—[Lock]. I wanted to slap myself for forgetting the spell; it seemed like exactly the tool we needed, though casting it on an entire dimensional rift was definitely beyond its default abilities. But with team Nu on the job and the combined might of [Dimensional Praxis] and [Mana Dominion], we soon had a modified version of the spell ready and cast to hold the rift in place.

However, it was quickly apparent that the [Lock] wouldn't last, so time was of the essence, and we frantically kept syncing the coordinates. With what felt like seconds to spare, both sides were completed, and the two cracks in space resonated. With what sounded like a cosmic boom, a tunnel punched through space, shattering whatever dimensional boundaries separated the two locations, and Vee yelped in horror as the two apertures merged.

<Proficiency gained. [Dimensional Praxis LV 4] improved to [Dimensional Praxis LV 5].>

The sudden notification was a bit of a surprise, but more importantly, I felt a familiar presence returning to my side. I thought I needed to do more, but the sheer effort of creating this link was enough, and the unclaimed space became mine again.

I sighed with relief, not realizing how much I had missed this feeling. What was interesting was that as the two apertures linked, they fused into one, since it was originally supposed to be a single door to the rift. With a newly freed slot, I tore open a fresh aperture and saw it open to my rift.

"We did it, I have my rift back!" I excitedly told Vee.

"You know… You went through all this time and effort, and you could have used probably a fraction of it to simply gain a level and earn a trait point."

I clutched at my chest as if I had been dealt a fatal blow. Vee's words were laced with the cruelest, deadliest venom, and none of my plethora of defenses or resistances could stand against it. Truly, letting her evolve and unleash her wrath on the world was a mistake that would doom everyone to suffer the same fate.

Vee frowned. "Why do I suddenly have the urge to slap you? Are you thinking rude things about me?"

I coughed awkwardly and looked away. "Nothing of the sort. Feel free to slap me if it makes you feel better, although I can't say I'll really feel it…"

Vee sighed and shook her head. "I'd probably hurt my hand slapping you. Just… Forget it. I hope the experience was worth it at least."

I nodded. "Definitely. I achieved [Dimensional Praxis] earlier and even leveled it up with what we just did. I should be able to upgrade my [Coordicore] soon, and now I also know that there's a whole world of other dimensional possibilities waiting for me to discover."

"Well, good luck with that. Don't forget you're supposed to get your promotion."

I nodded and let Vee go, since she didn't seem as interested in what we'd just done as I was. If she ever unlocked Riftmancer herself, that might change, but no matter how much Mother or I tried, she just wasn't that interested. She certainly had her moments, but they were few and far between.

"Oh well, more for me, I guess."

I collected my [Sub-Cores] and sent back the ones I had borrowed from my personas for this task, since I needed as much extra processing power as possible. I also had Nu cancel the second [Coordicore] so I could finally start regenerating my Mana supply again.

Feeling extremely proud, I opened my notifications to see what else I had accomplished from this amazing task, only to find not a single extra thing.

"Wait… What? Nothing!?"

I couldn't believe it; at the very least, I thought I'd gained a Legend Point, or maybe a fancy new Emblem, or even a level in Spellseeker.

"I did all of that, and it didn't level up my profession? What gives? I thought it was all about discovering magic and new spells; did [Dimensional Praxis] not count? What about my fake affinity spell? Is that really worth nothing?"

It genuinely sounded unreasonable, and I wondered if my secondary class was somehow broken. I activated [Spell Codex] to be sure, but it worked normally, and I saw no further notifications or changes. I was genuinely puzzled; was creating a spell not enough to level up this class?

With enchanting, I got levels from pretty much everything, but here I got nothing... But then again, I wasn't using my profession's skill during the process, so is that why I got nothing?

Spellseeker had only given me [Spell Codex], which was not like [Rune Engraving] or its former versions. Another way to level up my profession was to raise its skills, but [Spell Codex] had no levels. This felt like a conundrum: I needed tools to progress, but I needed to progress to get the tools in the first place.

Ugh… Maybe I should try submitting my fake affinity spell to the codex? If that doesn't work, then I'm clueless.

<Are you sure you wish to submit this spell construct? It greatly exceeds the user's current level, and as a result, many points will be lost in the exchange.>

I immediately canceled the submission and sighed with relief. Losing points would have been an emotional catastrophe I might have never recovered from, so I was genuinely grateful for the warning. I returned to the submission and, this time, submitted [Flammable].

<Submission successful.>

<Class Experience threshold reached. Spellseeker is now LV 2.>

"So that's how it works! I level up from my contributions to the codex!"

This was an amazing discovery, and I still had another nine elemental debuffs to submit, not to mention those from my other spells. I quickly started submitting them, but it soon became apparent I was overly optimistic about how much I'd be rewarded.

At first I had instantly gained another level upon submitting [Conductive], but then it looked like I was being penalized on two fronts. Additional levels were harder to come by, like with all classes, but by repeatedly submitting different flavors of resistance debuffs, the codex was clearly not happy, and soon it felt like they were barely moving the needle.

Still, after submitting everything from [Fissure] to [Dissolve], I had managed to reach level five in Spellseeker. I felt a little shortchanged, considering I had submitted twelve spells to it, but even I had to admit they were essentially the same spell, just rearranged for each element. There was one exception, and that was [Displaced], which gave me the same warning about wasting points, so I didn't submit it.

I only had twelve because I didn't make a debuff for [Death Magic] or [Healing Magic] yet... Actually, would the last one even work? Hmm… Maybe for undead? Or would it just be some kind of weird buff that makes healing more effective?

I wasn't sure, but after a day of trying to tear open a hole in space, I was too tired to create a spell for now. I had other spells I could submit, but I held off to see what else the [Spell Codex] could do. I eventually found myself at the requests page, which originally had barely anything when I first glanced at it, but now that my Spellseeker level had increased, it had much more to look at.

Interesting… So everything is tied to my profession level, rather than my skill level. I still haven't gained any new skills, which makes me wonder what I'll use my profession points for.

I wanted to guess that I could feed my profession points to the [Spell Codex], but that feature must be locked behind additional levels or privileges. With that in mind, I decided to take my first request and selected a random one at the lowest difficulty.

<I'm jealous of my coworkers [Infernal Crown], can you please help me create one for the ice element!>

I wanted to laugh; the request was stupidly easy since Sylvain had already made a [Glacial Crown], picking up the slack after Sylvester abandoned it for golems. But it was also hilarious because I hadn't expected the request system to be like this, with a personal message from the original requestor.

The message also had some rudimentary spell designs of what the requestor had pieced together, which must have been done through secret observations. I looked through them but found nothing useful, and wondered why this request was labeled easy, since I doubted an ordinary Cryomancer could gather enough information from these scraps to succeed.

It must take my knowledge into account somehow… So since I already have [Glacial Crown], it was labeled easy. Oh well, let's submit it.

<Request completed.>

<Class Experience threshold reached. Spellseeker is now LV 6.>

I was surprised such a simple task gave me a level, but when I saw I was locked out from picking another request for the rest of the day, I understood why. For now, it looked like I'd be able to gain at least one level every day until I reached whatever threshold made easy tasks no longer sufficient.

As I pieced together the best way to approach this, I felt a sudden pit in my stomach. I had spent way too long working on [Dimensional Praxis], and during that time I could have been knocking off easy requests each day!

Damn it… And the worst part is, I can't even blame anyone, since it was my fault for jumping straight into the dimension stuff. Ugh… I better not let Vee find out.