The next morning, I woke up at 6 AM mainly because I couldn't sleep the entire night. I was eager to get out of bed.
The reason for this was that Hina-nee slept in the sa room as . And since there was only one bed we ended up sleeping together last night. I protested and offered to book another room since I just received a lot of money, but she had insisted on staying with . As a result, I remained awake the whole night. How was I supposed to sleep with her there?
On the contrary, Hina-nee seed to sleep just fine. Better than fine, in fact. She used as a body pillow, wrapping her body around . That didn't help calm down whatsoever, especially since she was barely wearing anything. Luckily, I taught her about the Crafting system and she just happened to have the materials to craft so undergarnts, so she wasn't completely naked. Almost, though.
Anyway I was sleepy, but I've stayed up entire nights before. No big deal.
After gently prying Hina-nee's arms off of as to not wake her, I slipped out of bed and equipped the Corruptor armor set I received from the Vault of Corruption. I had wanted to get that black armor set in that store I browsed before, but now that I had this Corruptor set, there was no need for that.
"Mm Kazekun?" Hina-nee murmured quietly, slowly waking up.
"Ah I woke you after all," I said apologetically.
"No, don't worry about it mmnh."
Saying this, she stretched a bit before yawning cutely. I headed into the bathroom to wash my face with so cold water. Toothbrushes didn't exist in this world, but mouthwash did for so reason, so I just used that. I then took a shower to fully wash away my drowsiness. Then, as Hina-nee did the sa soon after, I headed out first to buy so proper clothes, pants, plus shoes for her at a nearby store - a simple female black outfit with black ankle boots, nothing much. Tianyin didn't offer all that much variety, being a small city. I would've certainly liked to get her sothing a lot better though.
When I returned, she was done, so we left our room together after she slipped on the clothes I got her gratefully and happily.
"So, Kaze-kun, how's the food of this world?" she asked eagerly as we walked in search of a good restaurant to eat breakfast. Unfortunately, the inn didn't provide food.
"Well, it's not bad? It's pretty similar to our old world's cuisine, but there are so iffy dishes."
She made a confused expression, and I chuckled. "You'll see."
I led her to the sa restaurant I had eaten at before and the sa waitress greeted once again. For so reason, it was always her. She handed us nus and quickly retreated.
"Go on, take a look," I said with a wry smile.
Hina-nee did as told and began flipping through the nu. "Chiken? Sickleboar stew and what the heck is this? Lissard steak?"
I shrugged. "I've only had the curry chiken before - and it really does taste like chicken."
"Hm in that case, I'll go with the lissard steak."
I blinked. "You sure?"
Hina-nee smiled. "Yep! But of course you're eating it with ."
My eyes widened. "Uh, actually, I think I'll pas-"
"Waitress!" Hina-nee beckoned the girl over. "Can we get two servings of lissard steak?"
"No problem!" the waitress said, jotting down everything on her notepad. "Is that all?"
"Er-" I tried interrupting, but Hina-nee left no leeway.
"Yep, that's all."
"Perfect. Your food will be ready in roughly ten minutes."
With that, the waitress walked away, leaving behind a very happy Hina-nee and a very depressed .
"Hina-nee really?"
"Heehee, it's always good to try new things, y'know? Who knows? It may not be that bad!"
*****
"Hack ah, that was horrible," I coughed, face contorting in disgust.
"Well, well at least now we know for sure that lissard steak isn't that good," Hina-nee laughed awkwardly.
I shook my head and opened up my system, taking out several gold coins out of my inventory to use as paynt. I then switched to the 'Skills' tab to see what other skills I should obtain using my 10 AP.
"What are you looking at, Kaze-kun?" Hina-nee asked curiously, switching her seat from across from to beside .
"Skills," I replied. "Wait, Hina-nee, what level are you right now?"
"I'm Level 10, why?"
I blinked. "Just from killing sickleboars?"
She began laughing to hide her embarrassnt. "Ah, well I got a bit carried away, you see and before I knew it, I'd killed a bunch."
"Oh, yeah, that's always been a habit of yours when it cos to fighting," I chuckled. "So? Did you use the SP and AP you got yet, or no?"
She shook her head. "I don't really know what stats to spend it on, you see and I haven't decided what class I want to be yet, regarding skills."
"Well, just answer this then. Would you rather fight on the frontlines or provide support from the backlines?"
"Hm if I had to say, frontline would be best. Sitting back and providing support just isn't my type of thing."
"Huh, okay. Are you a speed-type fighter or strength-type fighter?"
"Both, but more so speed," she replied without any hesitation. "I excel at being fast and striking my opponents where they are weak, but I also have confidence in my ability to just brute force things."
I nodded in understanding. "In that case the Assassin class probably suits you best."
"Assassin, huh"
"Yeah. As for the stats you should level up, I'd say AGI, STR, and DEX are your best bets."
She nodded happily. "Got it! Assassin it is!"
I then turned back to my own screen and began browsing the skills I could get while Hina-nee busied herself with leveling up her stats and whatnot.
I first selected 'Vanishing Clouds', the skill that had saved my ass countless tis already. I saw that it was connected to another skill - a 'better' version of it, as a matter of fact. I clicked on the skill to see what it was.
[Na: Vanishing Steps]
[Category: Assassin]
[Type: Active]
[Description: For a set period of ti, you gain greatly increased agility, speed, and the power of invisibility. You are also granted the ability to move through any and all objects except living beings. For this reason, you will be rendered practically untargetable unless the enemy uses their own body to attack you. Duration: 10 seconds.]
[Cooldown: 24 hours]
My eyes widened as I saw the cooldown. A full day? Wasn't that kind of excessive? I get that this skill was pretty overpowered, but
Still, this was one hell of a skill to have. 10 seconds of invisibility and untargetability was more than enough to take an enemy down. It could also allow you to escape especially sticky situations thanks to the increased agility and speed boost it gives you. Overall, 'Vanishing Steps' was an incredibly versatile and useful skill. I decided to unlock it for 2 AP. Besides, according to A.R.X.A., my INT stat had to do with active skill cooldowns. In other words, I could potentially reduce this cooldown of 24 hours.
It seed that this skill was a slightly higher-tier skill, since it cost 2 AP instead of 1. Still, it was worth it. I kept browsing with 8 AP remaining, this ti setting my sights on so other skill paths. Then, I found sothing I really wanted.
[Na: Way of the Mage]
[Category: Mage]
[Type: Passive]
[Description: Passively increase your MAG and DEX stats by 3 each.]
After so exploring, I noticed that there were eight paths that branched off from this skill, each representing an elent of hidden arts. They were:
Pyromancy - fire-related hidden arts.
Hydromancy - water-related hidden arts.
Aeromancy - air-related hidden arts.
Geomancy - earth-related hidden arts.
Biomancy - life-related hidden arts.
Cryomancy - ice-related hidden arts.
Luxomancy - light/lightning-related hidden arts.
Umbromancy - shadow/death-related hidden arts.
In addition to these, however, I noticed that after you learned all the hidden arts of any elent path, you could access two more paths that were connected to the final arts of the eight basic elents:
Astromancy - space-related hidden arts.
Chronomancy - ti-related hidden arts.
And finally, after mastering either one of those two advanced elents, there was one final hidden art you could learn. I clicked on the hexagon for it and read what it was.
[Na: Chaos Bloom]
[Category: Mage (Chaosmancy)]
[Type: Active]
[Description: ???]
[Cooldown: ???]
Chaosmancy the hidden art elent above all the rest.
I sat, stumped. Which elent path should I start with? Pyromancy - fire - seed highly destructive and useful, but Hydromancy (water) sounded pretty versatile as well.
In the end, I settled with learning one hidden art from each of the eight basic elent paths. I had exactly 7 AP remaining after getting 'Way of the Mage', so I was regrettably one AP short. As a result, I learned a hidden art from every basic elent except Biomancy which were 'life' related hidden-arts. It just didn't seem all that appealing to - I looked at the first art, saw that it was just a healing spell, and didn't look further. This elent path was probably for Supports.
Conclusion - I finally knew how to cast hidden arts now. The mont I obtained my first hidden art, a pop-up hologram appeared in front of , explaining what hidden arts were, how my MAG stat affected them, and so on. It was all information I already knew, so I just dismissed it after skimming through the text. The only thing noteworthy was that skills in the Mage category - in other words, hidden arts, since those were the only 'skills' in this path - had an additional attribute to them: cast ti.
To cast a hidden art, you had to chant its elent, tier, and na out loud, then wait for the cast ti to finish before it would actually fire. This was the fatal weakness of Mages - cast tis were pretty short at first, but as you began using more advanced and powerful arts, the cast tis also beca longer. There were certain artifacts and items that could shorten cast tis, but this was still the glaring weakness of this class, according to the holographic pop-up. During the cast ti, you were vulnerable, after all.
All in all, I acquired seven hidden arts:
[Na: Pyrosphere]
[Category: Mage (Basic Pyromancy)]
[Type: Active]
[Description: Launch a moderately-sized ball of fire at target location that explodes on impact.]
[Cooldown: 10 seconds]
[Cast ti: 2 seconds]
-
[Na: Aquabomb]
[Category: Mage (Basic Hydromancy)
[Type: Active]
[Description: Launch a moderately-sized bomb of high-pressure water at target location. The bomb will explode on its own after a given amount of ti, but the caster can also control the explosion ti.]
[Cooldown: 10 seconds]
[Cast ti: 2 seconds]
-
[Na: Aeroblade]
[Category: Mage (Basic Aeromancy)
[Type: Active]
[Description: Throw a rapidly-spinning disc of highly-pressurized and concentrated wind in target direction. The disc will attempt to slice through anything it cos into contact with, and will disperse on its own after five seconds.]
[Cooldown: 10 seconds]
[Cast ti: 2 seconds]
-
[Na: Geotorrent]
[Category: Mage (Basic Geomancy)
[Type: Active]
[Description: Cause a large stalagmite to erupt out of the earth at target location. Depending on the target location, the material, strength, and sharpness of this attack may vary.]
[Cooldown: 10 seconds]
[Cast ti: 2 seconds]
-
[Na: Cryoskewer]
[Category: Mage (Basic Cryomancy)
[Type: Active]
[Description: Launch a narrow skewer of ice in target direction. The skewer will attempt to pierce through anything it cos into contact with. Even if this attack does not end up being fatal, if the ice manages to lt inside the target's body, it will slow them. Especially useful against Apodous-type Magic Beasts.]
[Cooldown: 10 seconds]
[Cast ti: 2 seconds]
-
[Na: Luxostrike]
[Category: Mage (Basic Luxomancy)
[Type: Active]
[Description: Unleash a fast-traveling crescent-shaped projectile of light energy at target location. Explodes upon contact.]
[Cooldown: 10 seconds]
[Cast ti: 2 seconds]
-
[Na: Umbrostrike]
[Category: Mage (Basic Umbromancy)
[Type: Active]
[Description: Unleash a fast-traveling crescent-shaped projectile of shadow energy at target location. Explodes upon contact.]
[Cooldown: 10 seconds]
[Cast ti: 2 seconds]
Having spent all of my AP, I exited my System.
Reviews
All reviews (0)