Karl was still looking at the two missions when Arthur casually wiped the remaining blood from his hand.
"Tch, this old illness is acting up again."
He spoke as though coughing blood was nothing more than an inconvenience, then pushed himself upright with the help of his walking stick.
"Forget about this for now, you three awakened today so this old man should at least give you something worth celebrating."
Karl’s attention immediately shifted away from the mission as his eyes lit up and a familiar place surfaced inside his memories.
The family vault.
When he awakened Sword God in his previous life, Arthur had personally taken him there and allowed him to choose several pieces of equipment.
Even compared with many rewards Karl encountered later, some of the things stored inside the Reed family vault had been extremely valuable.
Then Karl remembered how Seraphina had gradually taken several pieces from him afterward.
Some had been gifts he willingly gave her, while others were items she claimed suited her better and promised to return later, whenever Arthur complained Karl had been the one defending her.
I really was hopeless.
Karl released a quiet sigh before following his grandfather into the residence, Leon and Mira were already waiting inside the main hall.
Mira sat comfortably upon one of the couches while absent-mindedly spinning a silver bracelet around her finger.
Leon, meanwhile, had somehow discovered a large packet of chips and was already halfway through destroying it.
Arthur stared at him. "Where did you find that?"
Leon stopped chewing for a moment and pointed vaguely toward the kitchen.
Arthur shook his head before looking toward both of them.
"You two awakened S-rank talents today and both of your families have been close to mine for many years, consider this an awakening gift from an old man."
Leon’s eyes immediately lit up. "There really is a gift?"
He threw the packet aside and stood before Arthur had even finished speaking. "Granduncle, you truly are the best elder in Ardent City, my father should learn from you instead of being so unbelievably stingy."
Arthur laughed. "That is how a businessman’s train unruly heirs, if he gave you everything you asked for you would probably bankrupt him within a year."
Karl chuckled while Mira nodded seriously. "He would manage it in a month."
Leon looked offended. "Why does nobody here have faith in me?"
"Because we know you," Karl replied.
Even Arthur laughed at that before turning toward one of the inner corridors. "Come, you can complain about your miserable upbringing while walking."
The four moved deeper into the Reed estate, leaving the main residential areas behind before entering a section Karl had not visited in years.
Several guards stationed along the corridors immediately bowed when Arthur approached, while heavy security formations became increasingly visible across the surrounding walls.
Eventually, they reached a separate building standing behind the main residence.
There were no windows upon its lower floors, while several overlapping formations covered the stone around the entrance.
At the centre stood an enormous metallic door made from an unknown material.
Arthur approached it and removed a dark pendant from around his neck and pressed it into a small indentation beside the entrance.
A thin stream of light passed across the pendant before another formation activated above it.
[Identity Token Verified.]
A second device extended from beside the door and Arthur leaned slightly forward as a narrow beam scanned across his eyes.
[Iris Verification Complete.]
[Access Granted: Arthur Reed.]
Several locking mechanisms shifted behind the walls.
The enormous door slowly separated through the centre before sliding apart, revealing a brightly illuminated chamber extending far beyond what its outer size suggested.
Rows upon rows of reinforced shelves stretched throughout the enormous vault.
Weapons, armour, crystals, sealed containers, skill books and countless objects Karl could not immediately identify filled the surrounding sections.
Some rested openly upon display stands, while more valuable items were sealed behind transparent barriers covered in protective formations.
Leon slowly looked toward Arthur. "Granduncle..."
Arthur glanced at him. "What?"
"Have you considered adopting another grandson?"
Mira immediately slapped the back of his head, Karl laughed as he stepped through the entrance but his eyes had already begun moving across the familiar vault.
Leon was the first to disappear between the rows of equipment, moving from one weapon rack to another while examining almost everything large enough to catch his attention.
Mira was far more selective, remaining near the lighter equipment and occasionally checking daggers, armour pieces and accessories that suited her newly awakened Shadow Assassin class.
Arthur had given both of them enough freedom to choose something useful, so it did not take long before Leon found himself standing before a heavy black shield covered with silver patterns.
Mira, meanwhile, eventually stopped beside a pair of narrow dark daggers whose identification formation displayed Diamond grade.
They immediately drawing Leon over to complain about how expensive her taste was and how her future husband is going to handle her.
Karl only laughed at their argument before continuing deeper into the vault, equipment throughout the Human Alliance was generally measured through two different systems.
The first was Tier, which represented the level range an item was designed for, beginning from Mortal for awakeners below Level 100 before advancing through Ascendant, Dominion, Calamity, Sovereign, Saint, Overlord, Celestial, Eternal, Origin and finally Transcendent beyond Level 1000.
The second was Grade, which represented the actual quality of an item within its Tier. Unranked equipment sat at the bottom, followed by Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, Epic, Legendary, Mythic and Divine.
That meant a Mortal-Tier Epic weapon could still be vastly more valuable than an ordinary Mortal-Tier Silver weapon, even though both were technically designed for the same general level range.
Karl passed several weapons while thinking about what would suit him now.
In his previous life, choosing equipment had been simple because almost everything revolved around Sword God.
Now he possessed the Necromancer class, but abandoning ten years of close-combat experience and standing behind an army with a staff did not suit him either.
Something that can support Necromancy without making the rest of my experience useless would be ideal.
He continued walking until a strange sensation suddenly passed through him and Karl slowed slightly
It was not mana or killing intent, yet something somewhere inside the vault seemed to have reacted to him.
The feeling was faint at first, almost easy to dismiss, but when he took another few steps toward the deeper shelves, the synchronization became noticeably stronger.
What is that?
Karl changed direction and followed the sensation through several older sections of the vault.
Most of the equipment here was sealed inside preservation formations or stored away because the Reed family had either failed to identify it properly or simply possessed nobody capable of using it.
Eventually, he reached one of the farthest corners and stopped, a long black staff floated inside a circular sealing formation.
There was nothing especially grand about its appearance, its surface was completely dark except for several faint grey markings running along the shaft, yet the moment Karl stepped closer, those markings slowly lit up.
The synchronization inside him immediately became stronger and Karl frowned, he remembered the Reed family vault reasonably well from his previous life.
Arthur had personally shown him many of the family’s valuable treasures after his Sword God awakening and Karl had visited the vault several more times afterward.
He did not remember this staff, more importantly he definitely did not remember anything inside the vault reacting to him like this.
The moment Karl focused upon the weapon; a translucent system panel appeared before his eyes.
[Death Stick]
[Status: Sealed]
[Grade: Epic]
[Current Tier: Mortal]
Karl’s expression changed slightly.
Mortal equipment was designed for awakeners below Level 100, which made the staff perfectly usable at Karl’s current stage.
However, its Epic grade was what immediately made it stand out from nearly everything else he had seen in this section of the vault.
Yet there was still no explanation about why this particular staff was reacting to Karl. He stepped closer to the sealing formation, and the weapon trembled again as the faint grey markings across its surface slowly brightened.
Another line appeared beneath the existing information.
[Growth-Type Equipment detected.]
Karl’s expression immediately changed, growth-type weapons were fundamentally different from ordinary equipment.
A normal Mortal-Tier weapon would eventually become obsolete once its wielder advanced beyond Level 100, regardless of how high its Grade was.
Growth-type equipment did not possess that limitation, as long as the required conditions were fulfilled, it could advance alongside its owner.
Rising from Mortal to Ascendant and continuing toward even higher tiers without needing to be replaced.
That alone made such equipment extraordinarily valuable, Karl had encountered only a handful of true growth-type weapons throughout his previous life and nearly all of them had belonged to major organizations.
An Epic-grade growth weapon appearing inside the Reed family vault should have been something impossible for him to forget.
There is no way I never heard about this.
The weapon trembled again, grey light flowed across its surface as the system completed its inspection and displayed the remaining information.
[Death Stick]
[Status: Sealed]
[Grade: Epic]
[Current Tier: Mortal]
[Type: Growth Equipment]
[Compatibility detected.]
[Synchronization increasing.]
Karl stared through the formation while the strange connection between him and the staff continued strengthening.