Duplicity

A Speciality Core created by Zachary Atwood.

"... I have to admit, using the spy core for such a thing is pretty novel. I’m not sure what you encountered to allow your Duplicity core to work like that ... You take the race of those you wish to spy on. But usually, you shouldn’t get a true copy as you have, but rather a watered-down version that only gives a fraction of the bonus power. For some reason your variant seems a lot stronger. Even I can't understand the fractals covering the core." **Chapter 283**

"The two sides are almost completely separated, which isn't the case with the normal Duplicity Core ... there is simply too little interconnectivity in your Node (Core?) ..."  **Chapter 290**

"What a disappointment. You cannot imagine the resources that went into fusing your bloodline with a perfected Duplicity Core. You could have used it to become the incarnation of the Machine God, yet you sullied it with the mark of the unliving." **Chapter 665**

## Upgrading the Speciality Core

“I would guess that you need to feed it a higher grade of life and death. A great treasure representing each half of the whole. That and a lot of energy.”   **Chapter 290**

He breathed out in relief when he read that Specialty Cores could only be upgraded to a higher rank after one had upgraded one's Class. But at the same time it said that the strength of the cores was limited, so they would quickly become too weak to provide any assistance unless you kept them at the same rank as your class. - **Chapter 387**

Zac sees the crystallized eye of a Pathfinder Oracle sell at auction where one of its capabilities is described as "can be used to upgrade most basic Specialty Cores". Zac later obtains the Eye as loot from the spatial ring on Rasuliel Tsarun's corpse. - **Chapters 393 & 398**

### **F grade Duplicity Core**

**Appearance**
It was nestled right below his navel and had somehow integrated itself with his pathways **Chapter 165**

"... there was a clean line of demarcation, which each of the halves of the Core seemingly consisting of one of the colours. This only was the surface though, as Zac’s mental sight had no means to penetrate the surface of the Speciality Core.

Covering the core were dense patterns of inscriptions ..." **Chapter 203**

**Effect of Creation**
"It started to look like the purpose of his core was to give him a second chance at life, though as an undead." **Chapter 205**

“Life through death ...” **Chapter 211**

### **E grade Duplicity Core**

**Appearance**
"Its size and colouring were pretty much the same, but the density of fractals covering its surface was on a whole new level. The inscriptions were so fine that the couldn't discern them all with his spiritual vision.

There was also an indefinable upgrade in the quality of the Duplicity Core. It almost felt like it had been a cheap plastic ball before, but it was now upgraded to solid metal. The quality and composition were essentially improved. However, Zac quickly started to feel some confusion as he tried to understand the changes the upgrade had brought.

The reason was simple; there were none. The line in his status screen had been updated to say **[E] Duplicity**, but that was about it. It didn't provide any more attributes, and there was nothing else that seemed to have changed."  - **Chapters 447**

**Effects of changes**

"... the transformation only took a second now as long as he used Yrial’s Transformation skill.

Not only that, but he had also learned that he could now transform twice before he needed to wait for an hour again. In other words, he could now almost completely freely use his two classes in one battle as long as he had a second to spare during a fight." - **Chapter 451**

However, after the evolution it took almost 3 seconds to transform, which was a lot worse compared to before he evolved. Was it because the Pathways had become more complicated, and swapping them out took more time and energy? **- Chapter 491.**

**Commentary**

* Having gone through the options, he eventually sat down to rest, waiting for the cooldown of his Specialty Core to end. During that time, he kept absorbing Cosmic Energy from E-grade Nexus Crystals. It didn’t really help him with his cultivation, but some of it was swallowed by the core to be converted to Miasma. **Book 6, 597**
* It wasn't quite how it worked, but Zac knew it wasn't so simple as his Duplicity Core holding a bunch of Miasma and a spare set of pathways. It wasn't like his pathways emerged from the core itself when he swapped races. It was more like his human side sunk to the depths while his Draugr side rose to the surface. The bodies were one, yet separate. **Chapter 962**