Chapter 24: Preparation’s Reward

Crimson sat in a one of the secret passages of Falst, his creaky and non-cooperative body having made it difficult to walk there, and giving him plenty of time to regret his overreaction.

Logically, he knew that there was nothing wrong, but the combination of the disappointment he felt and the shock of Raften’s revelations had overwhelmed him. Though, the thing that had really sent him over the edge was his resistant body. He’d spent fifteen years crippled and useless, his body frequently didn’t do what he needed it to back then, and the pain he felt plus the difficulty he had in moving brought back all those memories and touched on a fear of his - that he’d be trapped in his own body once more.

That fear had been what drove his strong desire to learn healing magic, it gave him both insurance and confidence, allowing him to move without hesitation to do what needed to be done.

He hated how pathetic he was.

With a sigh, he banished the thought from his head and focused on the screen that had appeared in front of him:

—————

-[Class] calculation complete.

-Generate [Classes]?

—————

Before he hit the button, he sat back in thought. He wouldn’t be taking a [Class] today, most of the people of this world would, but that was a mistake. It was one thing to reach the minimum requirements for a [Class], and another thing all together to increase the [Grade].

He’d spent the year learning, studying, experimenting, and preparing for this day, he wouldn’t mess it up in a moment of reckless idiocy.

His [Blessing] would generate as many [Classes] as he’d met the minimum requirements for, no matter how many there were, but it would recommend five specific [Classes] to him, ones that he showed more promise in than any other. Crimson wanted to see if he knew the system well enough to guess those five, which would assist in his research.

The first three were obvious to him: [Swordsman], [Mage], and [Scholar]. Those three without question would be among the five. He was confidant enough to bet half the money he’d saved up on it.

The last two would be tricky. Considering the time he’d spent, there would be either a [Scout] or a [Messenger] [Class] because of all the delivery requests he took, though it could be a little different. He strongly suspected that he’d have met the requirements for a rare [Class] there.

The last slot he was the least certain about, and there were two [Classes] he thought possible, the first being a [Craftsman Class]. He suspected that one over any specific production [Class] because he’d split his time so much that he couldn’t imagine the [Blessing] recommending [Blacksmith] or [Tailor]. It would generalize and give him [Craftsman] for a recommendation, but that was assuming that it didn’t instead recommend an [Instructor Class]. He had spent a fair amount of time throughout the year teaching others, so it was possible.

There were, of course, other possibilities, but he thought those five the most likely of all his possible options. Scratching his chin - which had lacked stubble since the moment he’d entered this world - he hit accept on the [Blessing].

—————

-Confirmed.

-Generating [Classes]…

-Completed.

-Displaying recommended [Classes]:

-[Swordsman], [Magus], [Scholar], [Pathfinder], and [Mentor]

-Other [Classes]:

-[Craftsman], [Ronin], [Samurai], [Knight], [Runner], [Assassin], [Shinobi], [Rune Mage], [Investigator], [Mage], [Galvamancer], [Hydromancer], [Pyromancer], [Aeromancer], [Geomancer], [Electomancer], [Magmancer], [Cryomancer], [Pure Hearted], [Priest], [Druid], [Spiritualist], [Hermit], [Blacksmith], [Tailor], [Alchemist], [Herbalist]…

-Select a [Class]?

—————

Crimson nodded thoughtfully to himself, in total, there were about 45 [Classes] on the list, counting the recommended [Classes]. He couldn’t tell how he’d done enough to meet the minimum requirements on some of them, like [Hermit], since that one didn’t fit his behavior very well - he spent a LOT of time with people.

Looking at the five recommended [Classes], he wanted to smack himself in the head. [Magus] made a lot more sense than [Mage], but he’d completely overlooked it in his mental considerations. [Mage] used elemental affinities, but [Magus] utilized all affinities, both elemental and dynamic, which fit Crimson far more.

Like he’d guessed, he had a rare version of a [Scout Class]: [Pathfinder], but he couldn’t tell what the exact difference was. It could possibly just be more powerful, but he wasn’t in the position to find out since he didn’t plan on taking it as a [Class].

Looking over the list once more, his attention turned to two specific [Classes] among the teeming list of [Classes], the first: one that he couldn’t ever remember doing anything even tangentially related to: [Spiritualist].

He had never done anything related to it, not in the slightest, and couldn’t fathom why it was on the list. He stared at it for a long moment, then made a mental note to look into it further in the future.

He then turned his attention to the next [Class] that had caught his eye: [Rune Mage]. Looking at it, he could hear the thrum of his heart in his ears, the blood in his veins accelerate, and his breathing speed up as a huge grin crawled onto his face.

He had never, not once in all his research, come across a [Class] called [Rune Mage], nor any kind of magic that used [Runes]. It was a concept he was familiar with due to his time in his old world, but it seemingly hadn’t existed in this one, so he’d moved on assuming it didn’t exist, but with this [Class], he had a hint, no not even a hint, a clue. The only thing he’d done that was related to [Runes] was in that old book he had, the one that took an insane amount of study for him to even get a glimpse of understanding, even with his supernatural linguistic ability.

The thrill of discovery thrummed through his veins and his eagerness swelled, he’d have to figure out how to use those [Runes] to cast magic!

His heartbeat didn’t quell in the slightest as he turned his attention to something else, something extremely important, and he stretched. No, he didn’t stretch physically, he stretched magically, using the mana he carefully hadn’t interacted with in several days to reach out. It resisted him, like muscles that hadn’t been used in a long time and moved as slow as molasses, but as he continued to push it sped up.

Little by little, his mana accelerated through his body, going from molasses to honey, bit by bit it improved, before he abruptly hit a wall. He couldn’t make it go any faster, and the answer why was given to him in a moment.

—————

-Level Up!

-[Mana Sense] 1>Max

-Rewarded: 10 PER for Max [Skill]

-[Mana Influence] 1>Max

-Rewarded: 5 INT, 5 WIS for Max [Skill]

-[System Instincts: [Skill Peak] 1>2]

-Requisite Data met:

-[Mana Sense]:

-

-[Mana Influence]:

-

—————

Crimson grinned again. He’d need to [Advance] the [Skills] before his mana would get faster again.

There were two ways to raise [Skill Levels]: Quality and Quantity. Either by performing the related action over and over again - which had diminishing returns - or performing the action with great ability. Crimson’s natural abilities were overwhelmingly higher than the [Skills] he’d been given, so it was no surprise that they’d level up fast. From what Raften told him, being an [Administrator] for the [Blessing] was similar to being a programmer for a game back on his old world, but had several differences.

Essentially, the System the [Blessing] was running on was incomplete, which allowed for more freedom and branching paths as new forms of power appeared, but if someone like, say, Crimson came along and blazed a completely new trail, then they had a difficult time dealing with it they didn’t have the code in place to give to him. People in this world usually started on a blazed path, then, if they put in real effort, slowly started to forge their own, utilizing code that already existed. As they worked and strengthened themselves the Gods collected data from the people’s actions and used that data to create new [Skills] to give to the people as they got stronger.

It was a slow and contemplative process, the Gods got time to put the ‘code’ together in programs to give to people and had plenty of time to tweak it as necessary. That meant that all they had to do in a lot of cases was take preexisting lines of code, tweak them a little, then grant them to the person who earned the relevant [Skill] or [Class].

In Crimson’s case, he was pretty much an extremely advanced program or video game that the system could barely run, so in the analogy the Gods had lowered a lot of his ‘settings’ to buy themselves time to write the code they needed to support him at his true capabilities. The easiest way to do that was what they did: gifting him [Skills] so far beneath him that they actually limited him. He’d be able to build the [Skills] up himself and they’d be able to collect the data he generated from it to craft him more appropriate [Skills].

His [Skills] would level up extremely quickly until they reached his actual ability, then he’d be able to start growing them normally like other people did.

Another way Raften had explained it to him was that the ‘data’ he generated was similar to building blocks. The Gods would take the blocks he gave them and combine them into a pleasing or useful shape, then hand them back to him as [Skills]. In this analogy, the reason why they were having a hard time with him is that they had to figure out how to build a completely new structure. For other people they already knew how to build it, but with Crimson they had to figure it out from scratch.

Why was that the case when [Skills] like [Mana Sense] and [Mana Influence] seemed too basic? That was the thing, they weren’t, they were extremely rare [Skills].

Crimson knew from personal experience that most people couldn’t even detect the mana in their own bodies, and if they could it was only to the extent of being able to tell that there was ‘something’ there. They couldn’t identify the exact location - most of the people he’d asked thought that mana originated in the stomach - nor could they tell the amount. [Mana Sense], to them, would have a more concrete, but still vague feeling.

As far as [Mana Influence], most people didn’t deal directly with their mana. They treated it more like troops they commanded from a control tower instead of actively using it like Crimson did. They told it to do something and it happened or it didn’t. For Crimson, he had to lead his mana through every single step, every single tiny little moment.

There were of course upsides and downsides to each. To use an analogy from his old world, Crimson was like the scientist that could mathematically calculate how to throw a baseball, but couldn’t throw it well, while everyone else were like baseball players that could throw the ball well, but they had no idea how to calculate it mathematically.

Crimson hit on both of the [Skills]; he didn’t need to them from what they were yet, he just needed them to do their current job better.

—————

-Accepted.

-Calculating…

-Please wait.

-…

-…

-[Skill: Intermediate Mana Sense] generated!

-[Skill: Intermediate Mana Influence] generated!

—————

Crimson reached out with his mana and used magic to form the wall behind him into a comfier seat, then settled in to grind his two mana related [Skills] up.

—————

-Level Up!

-[Intermediate Mana Sense] 1>Max

-Rewarded: 10 PER for Max [Skill]

-[Intermediate Mana Influence] 1>Max

-Rewarded: 5 INT, 5 WIS for Max [Skill]

-[System Instincts: [Skill Peak] 2>3]

-Requisite Data met:

-[Intermediate Mana Sense]:

-

-[Intermediate Mana Influence]:

-

-Accepted.

-Calculating…

-Please wait.

-…

-…

-…

-…

-[Skill: Advanced Mana Sense] generated!

-[Skill: Advanced Mana Influence] generated!

-Level Up!

-[Advanced Mana Sense] 1>Max

-Rewarded: 5 PER for Max [Skill]

-[Advanced Mana Influence] 1>Max

-Rewarded: 3 INT, 3 WIS for Max [Skill]

-Requisite Data met:

-[Advanced Mana Sense]:

-

-[Advanced Mana Influence]:

-

-Accepted.

-Calculating…

-Please wait.

-…

-…

-…

-…

-[Skill: Sophisticated Mana Sense] generated!

-[Skill: Sophisticated Mana Influence] generated!

—————

It took him five hours to reach that point. He was quite happy with his progress, and he could only describe his stats as monstrous. He had three reasons for just stopping there. The first was the splitting headache he had as a result of his [PER] doubling, which could have been a lot worse if he hadn’t raised his [INT] and [WIS] along with it.

The second reason was that he could tell that this was the last time he wanted to [Advance] these two [Skills], the next time he Maxed them he’d want to evolve them. How could he tell that? [System Instincts: [Skill Peak]]. That [Skill] gave him four pieces of information, it was extremely simple: he knew when a [Skill] was ready to [Advance], when it was ready to [Evolve], when it was ready to be [Fused], and when it was no longer progressing along a certain path with a [Skill], or to phrase that fourth on differently, he could tell when it would be useless to [Advance] the [Skill].

In this case, he could tell that he wouldn’t get much of an improvement from [Sophisticated Mana Sense] and [Sophisticated Mana Influence]. If he [Advanced] them again, it would be a negligible difference - unlike the previous [Advancements].

The third reason he’d stopped was an admin message from Raften. It said:

—————

-Administrator Announcement: Yo, I’ve decided to hold back some of the data from the [Skills] you maxed, so your stat rewards are a little lower than they should be, but I’ll be using that data elsewhere. It would also be dangerous for your stats to grow too high too fast, you can probably feel it right now, so don’t worry Crimson-chan, I’ll look out for you!

—————

Raften calling him ‘chan’ again aside - he found it extremely annoying - he nodded thoughtfully at his message, then accepted the result. He knew enough about the System that Raften’s decision to use some of the data Crimson generated elsewhere was a good call. Better for that data to be used in a new magic related [Skill] than just some stat points. Between a [Skill] and pure stats, Crimson knew which one he valued more.

The headache Crimson had, also indicated that Raften had a point about his stats growing too high in a short amount of time. He’d need to adjust to his current stats before raising them again…but that only applied to his mana related [Skills]. He still had two other [Skills] he could raise, ones that he could work on even with his body not working properly.

He stood up stiffly, stretched - physically this time - then hobbled his way back to the inn, stopping to buy food on the way there. He noticed that he got a lot more hungry than he used to before the [Blessing]. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that his mana wasn’t as present as it used to be? That was the only real major difference when doing a ‘before/after’ comparison.

He’d need to do research on that.

Back at the inn, he grabbed his book, the one he thought was related to the appearance of [Rune Mage] in his [Class] options, then set about trying to learn more.

———

It was five days later that Crimson’s body had finally recovered enough for him to resume normal activities. At the end of those five days, his [Blessing] looked like this:

—————

-Name: Crimson

-Race: Half (High Human, ???) -Age: 16

-Affiliation: [Adventurer’s Guild: Brass]

-Active Title: [Linguist] [Blessings of Trans’Du’Niir] [Rean]

-Titles: Lucky, Linguist, Mentor

-Health (HP): 100/100 Regen/s: 1.9

-Magic (MP): 370/370 Regen/s: 3.8

-Fatigue (FP): 0

-Condition:

-Class: [Empty]

-Sub-Class: [Locked]

-Sub-Class: [Locked]

-Status:

Strength (STR): 17 Agility (AGI): 17

Constitution (CON): 14 Vitality (VIT): 19

Intelligence (INT): 37 Wisdom (WIS): 38

Charisma (CHA): 7 Willpower (WIL): 22

Perception (PER): 44 Luck (LUC): 90

-Affinities

-Elemental

Fire: 5 Water: 5

Earth: 5 Wind: 5

Lightning: 5 Metal: 7

Magma: 5 Ice: 5

-Dynamic

Holy: 5 Profane: 5

Purity: 6 Corruption: 5

Life: 5 Death: 5

Mana: 9 (10) Void: 2

-Skills

-Bloodline: [Eyes of Change: [Eyes of Will] 3/10] 1/10, [???] 0/0

-Class: None

-Sets: [System Instincts: [Skill Peak] 4/10 [Locked], [Locked], [Locked]] 2/10

-General: [Sword Mastery] 3/100, [Sophisticated Mana Influence] 8/10, [Sophisticated Mana Sense] 9/10, [Intermediate Linguist] 3/10, [Secret Sense] 2/10, [Advanced Calligraphy] 6/10

—————

The rewards he’d gotten from progressing [Linguist] and [Basic Calligraphy] gave him some stats in [AGI], [VIT], [INT], and [WIS]. They hadn’t been as extreme as the stats he’d gotten on the first day, but they made a difference.

There had been another difference to appear in his [Blessing]. His [Bloodline] no longer just said [Eyes of Change], but now read like thus: [Eyes of Change: [Eyes of Will] 3/10] 1/10. It had happened when he’d intimidated a low level pickpocket with his eyes while buying food. The really fascinating thing was that he hadn’t gotten an alert for the change, he had just noticed the change when he checked the alert he got for a [Skill] leveling up. He honestly wan’t sure what it meant. Was his [Bloodline] a [Skill Set]?

After some thought, he decided to recruit Verity as a…volunteer test subject. To figure out what was going on.

It was also funny to see that him just living his day to day life had been enough to raise [Sword Mastery] a few levels. It meant that he was utilizing his training even in non training, non combative situations, something he took as a great sign.

Crimson quietly walked into the Guild, he was there a little later than he usually was, so it was already open, but it was still early enough in the morning that he was the only patron in the Guild. Emma was sitting at the front desk, but she was resting her head on her hand, her eyes were closed, and with his increased PER he could hear that she was breathing slowly and deeply.

He grinned then quietly walked past without waking her. He couldn’t blame her for being tired, she worked most days and was required to be at the Guild inhumanly early. Well, he wasn’t one to talk, he was up earlier than this on a regular basis. Even during his break he’d gotten up early, and today he’d just taken a longer run than usual to luxuriate in the physical activity that he’d been restrained from for a little over a week, which was why he arrived a little late.

He went to the yard out back, then walked into the washroom. He stripped off his shirt and instead of grabbing the water with a bucket, used magic to form it into a tendril that wrapped around his chest like a snake, cleaning him before he dumped it on the ground across the room from him. In other words, he shot it at the far wall for fun.

Because of his spell, he didn’t have any water left on him despite it having just cleaned him, so he just put his shirt on and strolled back out.

One upside to the mana [Skills] he had was that they made him more precise in utilization. He’d always been adept at constructing the [Skills], but he hadn’t been so good at using them dexterously, which usually hadn’t been a problem, but that was only the case since the spells he used on a daily basis were used in a burst or he just needed to maintain them without any further adjustments.

He couldn’t count [Magic Light] as a sustained type spell because of its exceeding simplicity, but in the case of manipulating water or the other elements after he’d created them - like he’d just done - he had found it difficult in the past. It took a lot of minute adjustments to the spell’s weave and had been hard to maintain, but with the combination of his [Sophisticated Mana Influence] and his higher stats, he now found the task easy.

The mana [Skills] were still lacking compared to what he was used to - especially in speed - but they made up for it in helping him with things he wasn’t so good at, like had just been mentioned.

Crimson slowly began to stretch, practicing [Amzair] to push his body to the limits and was delighted to find that he could go a little further than he used to. That hard, impassible wall he’d felt for the last few months wasn’t there. It was still difficult, but he could sense that he was actually making progress!

He couldn’t help himself, he pushed himself, hard, and got his reward.

—————

-Stats Up!

-+1 STR for Exertion

-+1 AGI for Exertion

-+1 CON for Exertion

-+1 VIT for Exertion

—————

He grinned, sweaty and trembling, not even able to stand as his muscles ached and screamed at him in a pleasant way. Unfortunately, he would only be able to train to get stats up to a certain point. Normal humans could only train for 10 stats in each area except LUC, which was fixed.

Elves could train for a higher amount [AGI, VIT, WIS, PER] points than humans, but as a trade off the couldn’t get as many stats out of [STR, CON, WIL, CHA] which he found interesting. Each race could gain a certain amount of stats from training, but no more than that specific value for their race. It wasn’t dependent on Level or anything but training; however once they trained for that amount they couldn’t increase their stats any more through training.

For example, if Crimson was a pureblooded human he would only be able to get 9 more stat points each in [STR, AGI, CON, and VIT] since he just earned one point in each, but since he was an odd Half, he had no idea how much he could train for. He might hit his limit with the next stat point, or he might have 12 more left in him. There was no way for him to know since that Gods cursed fool, Raften, refused to tell him.

His hands still trembling Crimson applied healing magic to his muscles. This kind of soreness his magic could heal, unlike the soreness he had from receiving his [Blessing]. He’d tried…several times to heal that soreness.

After almost fifteen minutes, he could finally move normally. He did one more light stretch, just to limber up his muscles, then pulled his beloved bokken from his [Inventory]. Since he had his [Blessing], he could finally read the description for it:

—————

-Lv. 1 Wooden Bokken

-A stick of wood, carved into the shape of a katana, but lacking a tsuba. It was made with a practiced hand for practice. It has been both well used and well maintained by its owner.

-+1 Attack

-Durability: 4/5

—————

He took quite a bit of pride in the description stating that he’d taken care of it, and he was relieved that he was actually able to read the description. [Rean], he’d found through testing, only applied to [Titles] and [Skills]. It might apply to [Classes] as well, but since he didn’t have a [Class] he couldn’t test that one yet. He didn’t think so though.

With a deep breath, he slowly took a stance with the bokken. That alone was enough for his [Sword Mastery] to jump a few Levels. He knew it would be easy to raise its level up to his actual ability, but it felt suspiciously fast despite that.

He started going through the motions, starting first with [Dancing Autumn Leaf] before going through the motions of each and every one of the fighting styles he knew. He swapped weapons to a longsword then did the same. He continued the process, slowly moving through forms, swapping weapons, then moving to the next one. When he finished the full roster of swords that he could use with proficiency, he once more picked up his bokken and moved through the motions again, this time even faster.

He looped once more and when he picked up his bokken yet again, he pushed himself in a different way, putting ferocity in for that loop, then precision, then tranquility, he looped through the different swords time and time again, putting different feeling behind the motions.

‘Philosophy’ determined how and why a sword was swung, ‘feeling’ determined the intended result. With anger, someone might die; with kindness, they might learn an important lesson, and so on. It went on and on for hours. His PER made him vaguely aware of people passing by. He could tell that some of them were stopping to stare and others seemed to call out to him, but he intentionally didn’t let himself hear them. He would allow nothing to break his concentration, he sunk even deeper, and forgot their existence. They didn’t matter, nothing did but the swords that passed through his hands.

He meditated on his swords, he contemplated them. In them, he sought understanding, and they seemed to speak to him, he understood, more than ever before, how to improve. His strikes, his footsteps, and even his breathing became more intentional. There was a meaning and cause behind each tiny motion, and he could tell what a difference it was having. It made him aware that he’d only scratched the surface of what swords could do.

When he was forcibly broken from his meditation, he found himself flat on his back with the butt of Mars’ spear on his chest. The man was scratching the thick scruff on his chin looking at Crimson with an amused look.

Doing a quick perusal of himself and his surroundings, Crimson was surprised to find that he had several broken bones, and what added more to his surprise were the other adventurers standing around him, staring at him with slack jaws. Verity was in that crowd.

With a dry mouth, thirsting for water, he asked Mars, “What, precisely, happened while I was practicing? Why did you knock me down?”

With a grunt, the Bear-Kin responded, “I called out to you, but you ignored me for almost half an hour. My patience ran out, and this was the result.”

Mars let him up and Crimson started to heal his own wounds. The broken bones would probably have put anyone else unconscious from the pain, but not Crimson, and the explanation laid right here:

—————

-[Blessings of Trans’Du’Niir]:

[Fortune] [Tolerence]

[Mana Sensitivity] [Language]

[Influence]

—————

Unfortunately, [Blessings of Trans’Du’Niir] was classified as a [Title], so Crimson couldn’t read the description, but he knew that [Tolerance] was what allowed him to have such high pain resistance. It did nothing to reduce the actual pain he felt, but rather it helped him have a clearer head and control his body better when suffering great pain. In other words, it helped him tolerate pain better.

[Mana Sensitivity] was probably responsible for his ability to feel his own mana, he could probably lay a lot of the praise for his magical accomplishments at its feet, likewise with [Language], it was why he knew so many languages, but he didn’t know what [Fortune] or [Influence] did.

All he knew was what Raften told him, that the [Blessings of Trans’Du’Niir] would take something he’s already good at, and amplify it. Crimson already had a good pain tolerance back on his own worlds, but it was strengthened. That being the case, he would still have found great success with magic without the [Blessings], and probably would have done well learning any languages he set his mind to, but with the [Blessings] it became something supernatural.

He hauled himself, and checked his [Blessing] while mentally double checking that it would be invisible to everyone else.

—————

Level Up!

[Sword Mastery] 3>45

-Unique data has been stored.

-Rewarded: 5 STR, 3 AGI, 1 CON, 1 VIT for Mastery Benchmarks

-+1 WIL for Exertion

—————

He knew that [Sword Mastery] would level up fast, but not THAT fast! He wanted to jump up and whoop at the sight, but remembered that he was surrounded by watching eyes and restrained himself, and ignored Mars when the bear-kin called him on his excitement.

Crimson abruptly remembered that Mars had mentioned calling out to him, so turned to him and asked, “What did you need, Mars?”

“What [Class] did you end up taking, kid?”

Crimson shook his head, “I haven’t taken a [Class] yet, but I hope to soon.”

Mars’ eyebrows shot up in surprise, “I have a hard time believing you don’t have access to even a single [Class].”

“No, I had some options,” better to undersell the amount of [Classes] he had to choose from. “But I want to become stronger before taking a [Class], I think the Gods will give me a [Class] with a High-Grade if I do that.”

Again, he was underselling his knowledge and understanding, but better to do that than have people question him about things he couldn’t talk about.

With another grunt and a sigh, Mars nodded at him and left. Crimson, with his enhanced [PER] heard him mutter something under his breath about a ‘monster,’ maybe he had to go raid a dungeon later? There was no way he was calling Crimson a monster, he was still weak.

Verity walked up to him from the dispersing crowd and caught his arm with sparkling eyes.

“I didn’t realize that you were that good with a sword!” She said excitedly.

Crimson scratched his head, “I’m only a little better than I was the last time I practiced, it isn’t a big deal.”

“NO!” Verity shook her head emphatically, “I’ve already known for a long time that you’re a really, really good swordsman. Even before today, I can’t think of a swordsman I’ve seen that’s as skilled as you, but the difference between the last time and today is like the difference between Lv.1 and 100!”

Crimson was surprised at the force behind her words, she was pushing with all her might to FORCE him to understand how amazing she thought it was, but he honestly didn’t agree. Today only made it clear to him how much further he had to go, complementing or being content with just this level of skill would be an insult.

“It’s not a big deal Verity, I have a long way to go, so don’t get so worked up about that little thing.” He said.

She punch him in the arm, it would definitely bruise, then said, “NO, you don’t get it! There was something about it that was hypnotizing, watching you with the sword now, it felt almost like I could get better at fighting myself. I couldn’t tear my eyes away, and neither could anyone else! Mars got so excited after watching you for half an hour that he challenged you while you were in that trance, you actually hit him a few times! He had to release some of his [Stat Limiters] to beat you down!”

Crimson looked at her with a troubled expression, then decided to just ignore what Verity had to say. He couldn’t ever allow himself to think that he’d done enough, that he’d gotten strong enough, or it would make him stagnate. He couldn’t stagnate when he’d just started! Also…her words were a little embarrassing, and he felt that she was overselling his skill.

With a shrug and a sigh, he went and washed himself off, then he and Verity went to the library. Once there, she told him, “Hey Crimson, guess what?

He glanced at her and used his eyes to ask, ‘what?’

With a big, proud grin, she said, “While you were gone, I got the [Skill: Mana Influence]!”

He smiled back at her warmly, “That’s great, congratulations! What level is it at?”

She made fists in front of her chest in a sign of how pumped up she was, then said, “After a week of work, I got it to Lv.2!”

Crimson’s smile became forced and he felt extremely awkward, he felt it better not tell her that he’d reached Lv.2 of that [Skill] in less than ten seconds. It might damage her pride.

Unfortunately, she noticed his change in expression, “What is that look?!”

“Nothing, keep working at it, that’s a really rare [Skill], and it’s hard to Level up.”

She nodded a couple times with a smug expression, “Yeah, yeah, I think I might’ve set a record for Leveling up this [Skill], everyone else that I’ve heard about with [Mana Influence] took a few weeks to get to Lv.2! There aren’t even that many people with this [Skill] anyway, so I’m probably the best of the best!”

Verity wasn’t slow, by normal standards she would be considered insanely fast, a genius, it was just that Crimson was so far out of normal standards when it came to mana that it made her efforts seem pathetic and her words ring of empty pride. Unfortunately, that truth did nothing to make Crimson feel any less awkward about devaluing her efforts.

Changing the subject, he started to ask her about he progress while he was gone.

————

Mars walked with heavy feet into the office of the Guild Master, his brother, and sat down on the chair placed to the side of the desk, it had been sized specifically for him, and he was more grateful than he’d ever been for its presence. Looking up, he saw Lars staring at him with a raised eyebrow, then he said, “We need to talk about the Monster.”