The other thing I enjoyed upon waking up (yes, I woke up with the sun, cursing my lack of eyelids) was putting points into what I've already called "Trash Traits". Placeholders on the evolution of actual statistics, meant to be thrown away and recycled for half their cost.
It turns out that fighting someone with two or more levels of Valor above you (and surviving) gives a lot of points. Probably oodles, if your divisor is much less than mine.
Gods, to have fifteen maximum in Sanity and Serenity! The boost of points brought both over half, which may also have contributed to my mood. <1>
For those who are curious, the ones that rounded out the missing corners were [Diligent] and [Vicious].
And, if one didn't count the missing Lore, Psi, and Chi statistics (which for some reason weren't keeping me from the methods I could use to buy traits for them) I was finally… well, not complete, but I wasn't totally missing anything.
So I forgot how rapidly Omnivore method scaled up. Again, like most things in the Systems of Athal, the greatest power leap is between level 1 and level 2.
As you might have guessed, the Cobalt Beetle is an actual monster of the insect world. Okay, in swarms it is a monster of the living world. It's big, it's strong, it has more armor than it should.
And honestly, I already feel sorry for it. No spoilers, but maybe five days, motivated, was too long.
As always, thank you so much for your continued readership and support. I would gladly trade a head of cauliflower for it any day of the week. Maybe just those that end in "y".