Roughly a week of working odd jobs for the money to afford a significantly better microphone along with researching the topic at hand, Melena finally set herself back up to make another video. She took a few very short test videos to inspect her framing and whether or not her microphone was as good as advertised. It wasn't, but it was only noticeably different from her real voice if you'd heard it without an electronic mediary before.

Finally, she clicked record. for what would, hopefully, be the final time for this video. This time, she stood center frame on a blank background, as this wasn't a topic that required a white board. "While my previous video stated that I'd probably cover Skills next, I got a not-insignificant number of questions about the Patron system. There is a fact about the Patron system that would segue nicely into the topic of Skills, so this isn't a horrible order of topics."

She put her hands behind her back and said, "Additionally, I got a good microphone. It's not perfect, but it's as good as I could afford in a single week of work. Now, onto the topic of Patrons. With the updated Patron system, it's still somewhat unknown the exact capabilities of the system, but this video should provide general enough knowledge that, even should we find the specifics have changed, the information inside will not be completely useless.

"First of all, Patron choice. This is primarily based upon what images you have used, what your image of yourself entails, and what Skills you have at the time of being offered the choice. The System can't perfectly predict the future, but it is good enough to curate the choices down to a number which you will find acceptable. Additionally, each choice offered will at least be considered in some form by you.

"This may, on very rare occasions, lead to a single Patron being offered. I have only ever known this to happen for the Patron of Obsession, which I both am glad exists and hate the fact they exist, but that's a massive tangent I will not get into in this video. I may post it in a comment if people ask for it.

"Some people asked if you can change Patrons or not. You can, but only if your Patron dies. Another option is to become a Patron, but people wishing they'd changed Patrons will almost never get to that point. Should you fail one of your Patron's tests, you will not get to choose a new Patron, but will lose your status as a protege.

"Now, onto how Patrons work for real. Patrons are a classification of living creature that the System awards to those who win the Levels 91 and up bracket of the Architect Tournament, then pass the test therein. Even if I were to talk about that test, the System would mute the audio of the video while I'm explaining it. This happens with very few things, but the Patron test is one of them.

"Patrons are afforded a few privileges that normal people are not, at the cost of an obligation. They are granted the ability to move between worlds that either they or their proteges have visited before and are allowed to hear any knowledge about the System, even the few pieces of normally restricted knowledge; we are not immediately granted this knowledge, however. Additionally, we get a permanent world that only we and those we allow to enter can enter. The only exception to this rule is proteges.

"Proteges are the obligation of those that accept being part of the Patron system. Protege is the official term for one who is granted power by a Patron. We must see our proteges when they require it while not involved in the Architect Tournament or an invasion. 'When they require it' has recently changed; with the introduction of your world to the System came some updates. These were not directly tied to your introduction, but you happened to be a part of them when you were originally introduced.

"The way it is now, we grant Patron Paths. As of recording this video, these Paths can have a PP requirement of anywhere between 10 and 50, plus a minimum of 90 and a maximum of 250 for each tier of the protege. The PP requirement is set by the Patron when the Path is granted. Individual people can be given differing PP requirements. As far as we've been able to discern so far, the Patron has little to no control over the actual Path's PP rewards. When a protege completes their Patron Path, they must be seen immediately.

"However, we do have direct control over the Path's completion rewards. Your Patron will issue a test related to their domain, which they choose, then depending on how you performed on that test, they can give you a reward of their choosing, up to a cap. The exact amounts for how much of what we can give varies wildly between the most expensive SP and the least expensive Bonus Regenerations, but it can be generalized to simply being a pool of 'Patron Points' we can spend, with each reward costing varying amounts.

"I won't exhaustively list each cost, but 1 SP costs 500 Patron Points, 1 Bonus Regeneration costs 1, and 1 free Stat costs 35. The only Stats we are unable to grant are percent total Renegerations or Resource pools, and percent Stat scaling on Regenerations or Resource pools. Additionally, we can grant Skills, but what Skills we provide must be the same for everyone at the same tier, unlike the other rewards. Granting a Skill costs 300 Patron Points.

"Patron Points accumulate for each individual protege, with the rate as which they accumulate points increasing as they spend time without spending them. To use an analogy, it's as if each protege has a savings account with 3.45% to 25% compounding interest rate per 35 System days, compounding once every System second. This is equivalent to 86.03 Earth days and 2.458 Earth seconds.

"The tiers of protege are now included in the names of the Paths you complete. When you first choose a Patron, you aren't given an official tier name and only barely accumulate Patron Points, with an initial pool of Patron Points of 20. You also have a maximum number of Patron Points equal to 750 times your protege tier in numeric form. Once you complete a Patron Path, your tier increases to that of the word in the Path's text. If a non-Advisor-tier protege's Patron Points drop to less than 1, their Patron Points set to 20.

"The tiers and interest rates are as follows: Associate at 3.45% interest, Initiate at 10.2%, Neophyte at 10.5%, Apprentice at 11%, Intermediate at 12%, Proselyte at 13.25%, Journeyman at 15%, Patriciate at 17%, Senior at 21%, Master at 25%, and Advisor at 0%. Advisors stop accumulating Patron Points. The theory as to why is that the System implemented this policy to prevent abuse; however, nothing is stopping, or has ever stopped, proteges from not turning their Patron Points into Stats and/or Skills for years on end to accumulate interest between tiers.

"The final bit of information on the Patron system is that it was originally one man's Skill. But I'll go into more detail in the video on Skills."

After wrapping up, she went to edit the video. Watching over it, she only needed to remove the very end and very beginning, where she clicked record and end recording. She wasn't yet sure what to do, if anything, for editing, beyond cutting out the unnecessary beginning and end. She then uploaded it and sent it to Degritone again.

Degritone: Naisu~~ Cutie took center stage this time~~ And a much better mic, too~~ Would it actually be better to speedrun through the protege tiers for the higher interest rate?

Melena: Depends. Assuming you want maximum power, it's better to wait until your Patron Points reach 750 to get the maximum increase in power that the System will allow. Usually, it's not worth staying in the Associate tier for long unless you know you will have a little over 10 System years of time where you do not require the power.

Degritone: Makes sense. 0.035% per day is tiny compared to the next tier up. Anyway, how has the cutie been~~? You doing ok, mentally, after all that's happened?

Melena: Not particularly, but I will survive; and, you need not worry, though I know you will. Now that I have a better microphone and know how the editing software works, I should be able to make new videos much faster. I have, personally, been otherwise alright, though. Nothing major since your return. How have you been?

Degritone: I wish I was there to give comforting cuddles~~ I've been fine. Rescued 2 small villages worth of lolis, but there's just so much work to do that I can't realistically do at my level without causing some loli somewhere to be sad, so I need to find some form of organization to help out. Chasing rumors and killing any loli abusers I happen to see in the act. I do wait until night and make sure no one can see me before murder, though. Haven't gotten many skill levels, but have gotten a single level for my troubles.

Melena: Sounds like you're having fun.

Degritone: Seeing so many loli slaves every day is torture. Not being able to do anything about it is worse. I also need comfort cuddles, but blah. I'll live. Hopefully. Anyway, it saddens me to end conversation with a tiny, but I have other tinies to save. See you next time you upload~~

Melena: Then we shall speak again then.