TRAINING
Katia and I were lazing around.
The two of us had been working out in the courtyard of the castle to try raising our skill levels.
Well, actually, there were three of us if you count Fei.
Anyway, we had finished for the moment and were resting in the garden, looking at the flowers.
“Ahh, that was tough. My magic-related stats are solid, but my physical stats still need some work.” Since Sue wasn’t around for once, Katia was speaking in Japanese today.
“Yeah. But still, we’ve got better reflexes than we had in our old lives, and it’s nice how much easier it is to improve with training.”
“Totally. It always seemed pointless when we had to run marathons at school and stuff, but every step you run here builds your stamina.”
In this world, both skills and stats only improve when you use them.
Since I couldn’t level up yet, the only way I could strengthen my stats was by training the old-fashioned way.
But that old-fashioned training was all you had to do to get stronger.
It was tough, but when you knew it would pay off, it was a lot easier to stay motivated.
“You may be a girl now, but you’re still boyish on the inside. Personally, I have no desire to work out so intensely.”
“You say that, but you’ve been working out, too.”
“Well, I hardly have much of a choice.”
“Whaddaya mean?”
“Well, I suppose it’s not as immediate now that I’m no longer in that egg or freshly hatched, but I’m basically on the verge of death.”
“Huh? Since when? I had no idea.”
“Well, of course not. I never told you.”
“So what gives?”
“You know that I was found in a dungeon called the Great Elroe Labyrinth, right? Well, turns out I was in considerable danger at the time. Apparently, I was in a spider’s nest, and it nearly ate me.”
“Seriously?!”
“Seriously. But the spider ended up being some inferior species, so it couldn’t break through the shell and gave up.”
“Whoa, sounds like a close call.”
“You might’ve wound up dead before you were even born, then.”
“Right. Unlike in Japan, you can be killed at any moment in this world, so you’ve got no choice but to get as strong as you can. Besides, I have to evolve.”
Evolution occurs when a monster satisfies certain conditions, like reaching a particular level. Usually, it comes with a new appearance, better stats, and so on.
“You heard Ms. Anna, didn’t you? If I don’t evolve from this form within ten years or so, I’ll die.”
Fei’s current species was a monster called an Elroe kolift, which had a short life span.
In order to prolong her life, she had to evolve.
To that end, she had to defeat other monsters and raise her level.
And if she wanted to do that, she had to be stronger.
Unlike us, Fei had a very real need to become more powerful.
That was why she voluntarily participated in our training sessions.
“So? How’re you doing?”
“My Instantaneous, Persistent, Strength, and Solidity skills are all up to level eight.”
I was using the Appraisal Stone in my hand to check my status. It was a level 9, belonging to Katia’s family.
This item could be considered a national treasure, yet Katia casually borrowed it from her home. I had to wonder if the duke was all right with it, but since it was convenient, I decided to just be grateful and use it.
“Your skills sure go up quickly, man. Is it just a difference in natural talent or what?”
Katia seemed a bit frustrated.
Even though we were doing all the same things, I was gaining levels faster. In this world, anyone can get stronger with effort, but the speed of progress varies.
They say it’s due to a difference in talent.
“I mean, they’ve called me a prodigy in the duke’s family all my life. How can you be this much faster than me? You cheating bastard!”
“You should give me some of that talent, too.”
I avoided Katia’s and Fei’s envious gazes. It wasn’t like there was anything I could do…
Katia’s and Fei’s skills had strengthened steadily, too, but not as much as mine. For some reason, Fei had Fire Resistance and Petrification Resistance, so I was kind of jealous of that. But I figured she’d get mad if I said that, so I kept it to myself.
“By the way, have you used any skill points?”
“No, I kinda haven’t been able to commit yet, so I’ve still got ’em saved up.”
“Oh, I think I know what you mean. You want to keep them for when it really matters, right?”
Skill points can be used to acquire new skills or add to the proficiency level of the skills you already have.
Usually, people are born without any, but as a reincarnation bonus or something, Katia, Fei, and I’d had plenty of them since birth.
“You’ve got a hundred thousand points? You cheating, bourgeois bastard!”
“Hey, that’s even meaner than before!”
I really hadn’t gotten around to using them yet.
At first, I wanted to acquire magic skills, but Anna told me not to use magic, so I backed off. She probably didn’t realize I had skill points, but to take advantage of that and acquire the skills secretly would feel like a betrayal.
Since then, I just hadn’t felt like using them.
“Does that mean you two have used some of yours, then?”
“Just the hundred points it took to get Telepathy.”
“What about you, Katia?”
“…Only a thousand.”
If I remembered correctly, Katia had 50,000 points.
Given her behavior during the conversation, I had assumed she’d used them all up, but she’d barely touched them.
“What’d you get?”
“…I’m not telling.”
“What? Come on, just tell us.”
“…You promise not to laugh?”
“Yeah, I swear. What is it?”
“Oh, I’m ready to laugh, don’t worry.”
“Hey! Ugh, whatever. I got Appraisal, okay?”
I didn’t laugh, but I probably looked baffled.
Without thinking, I exchanged glances with Fei.
Appraisal is more or less the one skill you shouldn’t acquire.
If anything, I was really curious as to why he did it anyway.
“Why would you do that?”
“I couldn’t help it! Appraisal is a staple of reincarnation stories. It’s tough gathering info in a new world, right? So if this were a novel or something, the protagonist would be super-good at Appraisal. I just wanted to do that, too…”
“But Appraisal is like the number one offender on the list of crappy skills. Why would you spend your points to get it, knowing that?”
“Listen, man, I didn’t know that at the time! I was still just a baby when I got that skill! You remember how hard it was not understanding anything, right? So of course I wanted to try and get more information. And as soon as I started thinking about Appraisal, the Word of God spoke to me! So of course I picked it up on impulse!”
Yeah, it made sense when he put it that way.
I did remember my anxiety when I was a clueless baby.
Not being able to understand what the people around me were saying stressed me out, too.
And since the Word of God spoke in Japanese, it’s only natural that you’d want to cling to that.
“So is Appraisal as bad as they say it is?”
“Yeah. It sucks. It’s totally worthless unless it’s a super-high level, I get a headache every time I use it, and as a bonus, you won’t get proficiency from Appraising the same thing twice unless you wait a long time in between, so it’s ludicrously hard to level up. I do my best to raise my proficiency whenever I have spare time, but I’m still only level four. It’s breakin’ my heart, man.”
Just hearing about it was irritating.
Still holding the Appraisal Stone, I re-Appraised my skill point field.
As soon as I did so, a list of available skills was displayed, along with the required skill points.
I looked through until I found the Appraisal skill.
“Oh, hey, I can get Appraisal for a hundred points.”
“What? For real?”
One hundred points is the lowest number needed to acquire any skill.
Skills that could be acquired for a cheap hundred points were either equally ineffective or particularly compatible with the user.
The fact that Katia had to use 1,000 points to get Appraisal proved that it wasn’t truly an ineffective skill.
Sure, it wasn’t very helpful at a low level, but it could be a major asset if raised high enough. My low price meant I was particularly compatible with the Appraisal skill.
After a moment of hesitation, I acquired Appraisal.
My remaining skill points went down to 99,900.
“I got Appraisal.”
“What? For real?” Katia repeated herself. “Well, don’t come crying to me if you regret it later.”
“Well, I’ll cross that bridge if I come to it. I’ve still got plenty of points, anyway.”
“Nobody likes a man without a plan, you know.”
For the time being, I decided to hang on to the rest of my points for a more important time.
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