Immutable Bulwark

*Epigraph Unknown.*

## Summary

Immutable Bulwark is a peak-quality skill that Zac gained as one of his level 35 skill quest for his Undying Bulwark class. It is primary a defensive skill that creates a large fractal shield that protects the user from attacks, with the protection scaling on Endurance. This bulwark moves independently of the wielder's actual shield and constantly consumes miasma to block attacks. The bulwark comes with spikes so it has some offensive usage and synergies with Deathwish to trigger retaliatory attacks when it is hit. The Bulwark functioned differently depending on which Daos it is imbued with.

The skill was fused with Undying Legion to create Profane Exponents using one of his two upgrade skill quest rewards from his Fetters of Desolation Class.

## Skill Quest

* Immutable Bulwark (Class): Survive the strike of three evolved beings. Reward: Immutable Bulwark (2/3) **Book 3, Page 186**
* With the help of Fields of Despair and a shield, he would have no problem blocking a strike from something like the E-grade rat, let alone surviving it, which was proven by two-thirds of the quest already being completed. **Book 3, Page 186**
* The attack from the queen was the third and final strike he needed to endure to complete his quest for **[Immutable Bulwark]**. **Book 3, Page 208**

## Early Proficiency

* A huge fractal shield that was over two meters tall and four meters wide appeared in front of him as he ran. It had the turquoise color of Miasma, and fractals formed some sort of pattern in the center of it. But the thing that truly drew Zac’s attention was the huge sinister spikes covering the shield. The skill wasn’t purely defensive. **Book 3, Page 208**
* Any ant that tried to bite their way through the fractal shield was immediately attacked by spectral copies of themselves, proving that an attack on his bulwark was counted as an attack on himself. The only downside was that both the power and energy consumption seemed worse compared to when he used his own body as the punching bag. **Book 3, Page 209**
* He had no choice but to brave it, so he pushed a huge amount of Miasma into **[Immutable Bulwark]** as he imbued it with the Dao of Hardness. **Book 3, Page 210**
* But his new defensive skill was different. It didn’t look anything like his shield, and his actual shield took no damage when **[Immutable Bulwark]** was attacked. **Book 3, Page 211**
* He was, however, unable to summon the skill if he didn’t have a shield equipped, so they were connected somehow. **Book 3, Page 211**
* Zac guessed that the power was based on his Endurance, like **[Nature’s Barrier]**, since it wasn’t based on his actual weapon [*later text prove Zac wrong on it not being based on his physical shield*]. The Miasma consumption was also based on how much the shield was attacked, just like an array. **Book 3, Page 212**
* But Zac suddenly had an idea, and the wide fractal wall rose into the air as it started to turn until the spikes were pointing at the ground. ... The moment Zac felt a painful swipe on his back, the bulwark fell down like a trap roof in an old movie. **Book 4, Page 120**

## Middle Proficiency

* The good news didn’t end there, and he noticed that **[Immutable Bulwark]** had evolved as well, pushing it to Middle mastery. **Book 4, Page 226**
* The size of the bulwark was pretty much the same as before, but after some testing, he realized he now was able to change its size. He could make it almost ten meters wide and four meters high, making it look like a proper rampart, but he could also shrink it down to the size of his tower shield. He was also able to move it within fifty meters of himself, allowing him to use it to defend others with greater ease. There was no change to the shield itself, though. It didn’t get thicker or gain any new fractals, making Zac guess that its defensive capabilities were still pretty much the same. **Book 4, Page 229**

## Peak Proficiency

* He had already noticed that **[Immutable Bulwark]** and **[Profane Seal]** reached Peak mastery right after the battle, and one skill after another took a step forward over the following hours.. **Book 7, Page 358**

## Fusion

* The trio came from the last of his skill fusions, which resulted in a skill called **[Profane Exponents]**. **Book 8, Page 148**
* The fusion came from **[Immutable Bulwark]** and **[Undying Legion]**, and they were Zac’s solution to completely overhauling his defensive capabilities. **Book 8, Page 148**
* Meanwhile, **[Immutable Bulwark]** was very powerful, but always required him to wield a shield, which didn’t suit Zac’s taste. **Book 8, Page 148**

## **Synergy**

* To his surprise, almost ten specters immediately appeared in front of the shield, and he quickly realized what was going on. There was a synergy between **[Deathwish]** and **[Immutable Bulwark]**. **Book 3, Page 208**
* ... he tried imbuing **[Immutable Bulwark]** with the Dao of Sanctuary ... The shield quickly started transforming, turning into something that looked like a wall that circled his group. The Dao imbuement apparently changed the way the shield worked, where it gave up some of its strength to instead be able to protect from all directions. ... The problem was that the Miasmic consumption drastically increased, though he would be able to keep it up for some time before he started to run out of energy. **Book 4, Page 56**
* Upgrading **[Bulwark Mastery]** did not improve his attributes or allowed him to unleash some new power, but it did help a lot in utilizing his shield and the fractal equivalent in **[Immutable Bulwark]**. **Book 4, Page 105**

## Commentary

* The good was that the defensive properties of **[Immutable Bulwark]** were extremely high. **Book 3, Page 211**
* Beams kept slamming into **[Immutable Bulwark]**, and Zac frowned at the expenditure. He was losing at least a percent of his Miasma every second from the concentrated fire, meaning that he would be all out of energy within two minutes if this kept up. **Book 4, Page 187**
* It had slightly changed shape to look like the armor he wore when using **[Vanguard of Undeath]**, and he used it as a wall breaker when he slammed into the row of hulking insectoid brutes that held the front line. **Book 5, Page 114**
* However, its structural integrity was breached, and the weakness would transfer over to **[Immutable Bulwark]** as well, meaning his defenses were compromised by at least half until the shield had restored itself. **Book 5, Page 186**
* The small flame [*from Iz Tayn*] shot straight through **[Immutable Bulwark]** and hit him in an instant. **Book 5, Page 190**
* **[Immutable Bulwark]** cracked in an instant under the pressure of the D-grade warrior’s punch, and Zac was thrown through two walls before he slammed into what could either be a massive pipe or some sort of tunnel. **Book 5, Page 311**
* However, he noticed with some surprise that the flames were like sticky napalm, and they stayed on the fractal bulwark and slowly whittled it down. **Book 5, Page 423**
* He might not be able to activate **[Death’s Embrace]** as things stood, but he could still use the shield-shaped coffin to summon **[Immutable Bulwark]**. **Book 6, Page 124**
* The Miasmic shield from **[Immutable Bulwark]** was mostly opaque, but it still allowed him to somewhat see the fiery hellscape above. **Book 6, Page 125**
* The strength of the shield [*meaning Immutable Bulwark*] was based on the quality of his shield and his Endurance, but the increase in its durability had clearly not been linear lately. **Book 6, Page 436**
* The defensive capabilities of the skills were considerably worse when based on a normal shield, but it wasn’t like Zac dared to take a direct hit in any case. **Book 6, Page 472**
* Even his skills from his undead Epic class had fallen behind by this point, and skills like **[Immutable Bulwark]** had long stopped scaling with his Endurance. **Book 7, Page 444**