Chapter Two: Claws and Hammer Power-Up Methods
“Back in our time, the claw seven star weapon has fallen into the hands of the enemy, so we don’t know what its power-up method is. Can you explain it to us?” I asked.
“What?” Mamoru said in surprise. “You’re that strong . . . without the claw power-up method?”
“What’s wrong with that?” I said defensively. “The claws won’t play ball.”
“No, it’s just . . . you told me you could use the power-up methods from the world of the sword holy weapon, after the fusing, so I was kind of taking the others for granted,” Mamoru admitted.
“Didn’t I explain that?” I asked. “We can’t use those since coming to this time.” The reasons were still unclear, but we had lost about half our power-up methods since our arrival. Ren and I worked out a rough idea of how through our many discussions. From the power-ups from the four holy weapons, I could only use the shield and bow, and Ren could only use the sword and spear. We’d been working together to cover this gap in battle, using life force along with our attacks and applying buffs. It had worked out so far because the whip power-up method was so powerful. I could also apply the mirror power-up method, which provided me with some boosts. That was why we needed to know the claw and hammer power-up methods as quickly as possible.
We really should have asked Mamoru about this sooner.
“I can’t believe you’re that strong without even using it . . . That’s terrifying,” Mamoru breathed. Filolia gave an evil chuckle as she looked over at me intently. Then she twitched and straightened.
“The claw power-up method provides a mastery level for skills. Using the same skill over and over increases its level and enhances the abilities of that skill,” Filolia explained. “It can reduce the required SP, change the effects of the skill, increase its damage, or reduce the cooldown time.”
I looked at the skills I could use, and now—holding a firm awareness of the claw power-up method—I saw gauges appear on each one. It seemed to make sense. The more you used a skill, the easier it became to use. Even better, the mastery levels I had theoretically earned so far were now reflected. The Air Strike Shield branch and Shooting Star Shield master were high because I used them so often, but all my skills had received a boost in some fashion from this. It would be worth going through them all and seeing what had changed. I always popped off things like Float Shield when something kicked off, so those kinds of skills had earned a lot of experience.
The issue was, among the heroes we had here in this world, I was probably the only one for whom these changes had been reflected. The power-up method Ren needed to learn was the axe, maybe.
“Do you know the hammer power-up method?” I asked.
“Legend says it is the fusing of weapons,” Mamoru replied. We certainly didn’t have “legends” about power-up methods back in our time, but if that provided the details, then so be it. I took a moment to think about weapon fusing. I had an idea what it would mean. “You can take the most characteristic equip effect from one weapon tree and apply it to another weapon,” Mamoru continued. I decided to try it with the Spirit Tortoise Carapace Shield, which had been enhanced a lot already.
Spirit Tortoise Carapace Shield 100/100
<abilities locked> equip bonus: skills: S Float Shield, Reflect Shield
special effects: gravity field, C soul recovery, C magic snatch, C gravity shot, vitality boost, magic defense (large), lightning resistance, nullify SP drain, magic assistance, spell support, growth power
special equip effect: Shooting Star Shield (Spirit Tortoise)
Item enchant level 10, defense 15% up
There were some new circular icons down at the bottom too. Those had to indicate the hammer power-up method. Then I looked at using the Shield of Compassion from the Bless Series, just to make sure its effects were a different category of power-up from weapon fusion. The Bless Series couldn’t be directly enhanced. It worked by being mixed with a normal shield. It didn’t matter how weak the other shield was; it would get a real boost from the Shield of Compassion.
I decided to try adding the Soul Eater Shield to the Spirit Tortoise one. I recalled that the Shield of Compassion also had the equip effect “spell support,” which acted in the same way as Trash’s staff to make casting magic easier. Combined with the support of the copy of the Demon Dragon, I could cast Liberation in half the time it took anyone else.
I was getting off track, anyway. Soul Eater Shield weapon fusion!
Spirit Tortoise Carapace Shield 100/100
<abilities locked> equip bonus: skills: S Float Shield, Reflect Shield
special effects: gravity field, C soul recovery, C magic snatch, C gravity shot, vitality boost, magic defense (large), lightning resistance, nullify SP drain, magic assistance, spell support, growth power
special equip effect: Shooting Star Shield (Spirit Tortoise)
Item enchant level 10, defense 15% up
Soul Eat
I immediately noticed that all enhancements to the Soul Eater Shield had been reset. I tried further fusion with other enhanced shields, but it seemed there was an upper limit for increases, depending on the strength of the weapon. So this system wasn’t going to be a walk in the park either. I took a look at the Reflect Shield . . . to see I hadn’t used it at all. It allowed the counterattack effect from any shield to be temporarily added to a shield that didn’t have one of its own. There just weren’t many chances to use it, with the Spirit Tortoise Carapace and True Demon Dragon Shield already having their own powerful counters. I had been using the Shield of Wrath recently, but that caused quite a drop in my defense. Basically, reflect was becoming a dead skill that I couldn’t use. It couldn’t even be applied at the same time as other skills.
In any case, my counterattacks were weaker than those from Raphtalia and Ren. Maybe they could be used when trying to cause status effects, but pretty much anything of any significance that we fought was ready for it. Taking attacks on Shooting Star Shield didn’t trigger it either.
I wondered if the mirror vassal weapon was still attached to me and providing support for the shield. The mirror did keep popping up on its own. It wasn’t completely clear, but the enhancements I had performed with the mirror still seemed to be working and were reflected in my stats. It was higher than the stats that Ren, Raphtalia, and Fohl had told me about. If Itsuki was here, maybe we could have verified all of this.
Raphtalia had access to the power-up methods from the hunting tool, jewels, katana, mirror, harpoon, and book. She couldn’t use the ofuda power-up method, which was similar to the whip. Luckily, all her training and the whip playing along—for the time being—allowed her access to that, although Raphtalia had complained to me about the enhancement ratio.
I’d need to give the hammer power-up method some thought. It looked like the enhancements could be removed afterward. The Soul Eater Shield was also displaying a remainder. It looked like three was the maximum. I wondered what would happen when they were all used up.
“Mamoru, I’ve got some kind of remaining number displayed?” I asked him.
“That’s right. Once you use all of those up, you can’t make any more changes. Obtaining those materials again will replenish the number,” Mamoru explained. That was pretty much what I’d been expecting. “There are also weapons you can only obtain through fusing. It’s a pretty deep system.” It reminded me of a weapon from that famous Roguelike game that could be obtained by giving a fully enhanced katana to the blacksmith. Maybe using a specific, special fusion method could create the ultimate sword. If I could use this method at the moment, though, it meant Ren probably couldn’t.
“Maybe if you fill in the weight category, you’ll stop getting hungry?” I pondered.
“What are you talking about now?” Mamoru asked. “Some game thing again?”
I ignored the minus effect of equipping any other shield that would make your stomach super small.
“Yeah, something like that,” I said. This provided the potential for something other than using grow up—like the bow power-up method. You could use materials to enhance a weapon to the maximum and evolve it into a new one. Filolia looked pretty pleased with herself, for some reason, and switched her claws to weapons that looked like dragon heads.
“I mixed in some claws that were effective against dragons with my regular claws and obtained new, more powerful claws.” Filolia chuckled maniacally. “Further power only increases the darkness inside me!”
“Sure, whatever,” I said. Being able to combine some shields together and create something totally new did sound promising.
“That’s all you’ve got to say?” Filolia replied, a little disappointed.
“Filolia, you can’t expect to get a reaction from Naofumi. His ultimate ability is to ignore other people trying to make a joke,” Mamoru told her. Raphtalia was the one who responded to attempts at comedy. If Filolia wanted a reaction, she should direct her comments at Raphtalia. With that thought, I glanced over at her.
“Mr. Naofumi, please don’t look at me,” Raphtalia said quickly. This whole thing was such a pain, but at least it had also provided some fresh information. I’d just collect what we could and move on.
The hammer was a vassal weapon with forging elements. At least that was easy to understand. The issue was which combination of shields to use. I tried combining wrath and mercy together, but no dice there. I couldn’t combine the 0 series either. Special shields clearly couldn’t be fused. For the foreseeable future, I’d work with fusing the Spirit Tortoise Carapace Shield and True Demon Dragon Shield. I’d use the Spirit Tortoise Carapace Shield as the base. It still annoyed me that combining materials from the four benevolent animals was likely to create the ultimate shield. The only way to get the dragon ones would be having Gaelion turn into it, and that would also mean having to fight him. I wondered if maybe we could use one of his scales instead. I remembered the Demon Dragon saying he had a seal similar to one of the benevolent animals. It sounded like there was something there to explore.
At least I could use the shields from the Spirit Tortoise and Phoenix materials. It wasn’t worth worrying too much about. I mixed in the True Demon Dragon Shield and got Dragon Scale and a counterattack effect added. I couldn’t activate them all at the same time, so choosing the right thing for the right situation was going to become more important in combat.
There was a lot to be said for the past, at least in this regard. I was honestly thrilled to have these lost power-up methods restored to us so easily.
“What are the remaining vassal weapons?” I asked. We had Holn’s whip, Filolia’s claws, and the hammer taken care of.
“I think . . . probably the carriage?” Mamoru replied.
“Okay. The carriage.” I shook my head. So that was a thing. I’d seen Fitoria with something that definitely fit the bill. I wondered why she hadn’t said anything about it to us. That was harder to understand. “What’s the power-up method?”
“There haven’t been enough holders for us to know that. The holders have tended to be so . . . unique, shall we say. Even the pacifiers have trouble handling them,” Mamoru explained. It had only been a few moments and I was already feeling like taking back my thoughts on how great the past was. Maybe we were dealing with a spirit as stubborn as the person I suspected of holding the vassal weapon in the future. Once we got back to our time, we’d have to get her to talk. “We can’t afford to rely on you guys forever, Naofumi. We need to find someone worthy to carry the hammer.”
“I’m going to use my new powers for the good of those goals! Let’s go say hi to everyone!” Filolia spread her arms at her sides like airplane wings and dashed away. She reminded me of Filo more and more.
“Can we introduce ourselves to you first?” Melty asked.
“Oh! Of course you can!” Filolia proceeded to shake hands with everyone and complete the introductions with my party. That marked the revival of Filolia, the girl who was basically a filolial.
We emerged from the underground facility, and the kids Mamoru looked after all mobbed Filolia.
“Filolia! You’re back!” one cried.
“Filolia returns!” Filolia replied. I hoped she wasn’t going to refer to herself in the third person too much. “Have you all been good kids?”
“You bet!” another said with a sniff.
“No lying! I’m not blind, you know!” Filolia adopted another strange pose as she chided the kids before she rushed over to them.
“What? Filolia sounds mad!” a third kid shouted. All of them turned their backs on her and ran for it. Filolia glared at them, fixing them in place. She still didn’t look especially angry to me. She took a deep breath, putting her hands down on a couple of kids’ heads.
“I understand why you did it, but you need to stop Mamoru if he goes out of control, okay?” she told them. Her expression was gentle but her words were sharp.
“We just wanted to help him,” one of the kids replied.
“Like I said, I understand, but I’m also not happy about everything that he’s done to your bodies. There’s no taking it back now, anyway, so that’s the end of it,” Filolia said. The kids shuffled their feet. “I know who is to blame here, don’t worry. This all might even have been required for the development of Siltran. But it isn’t a good thing. You shouldn’t feel proud about it, okay?”
“Okay,” the kids finally managed. Filolia gave a smile and then petted them all in turn.
“I’m back now, anyway! Let’s use our new powers to take over the world!” Filolia shouted. The kids all gave shouts of agreement. I wondered if this was okay. She seemed to have a moral compass and her act together, but then she also seemed to be an empty-headed imbecile. She contradicted herself. Maybe she was like Sadeena—a bit hard to get a handle on.
As this reunion unfolded, R’yne and S’yne came in from the castle garden.
“I thought I heard a commotion. They finally let you out, huh?” R’yne said.
“Ah, R’yne, so nice to see you,” Filolia replied, suddenly calm again, as though formally greeting a guest. There was some tension in her forehead, suggesting she had difficulty with R’yne.
“That’s a bit stiff, talking to your flesh-and-blood sister!” R’yne replied, grabbing Filolia up in a hug that ended with Filolia’s face buried in R’yne’s chest.
“Stop it!” Filolia roared, only somewhat theatrically. “You big-breasted witch!” I hadn’t noticed R’yne’s chest being that large. She seemed in the same ballpark as Raphtalia and Sadeena, but I wasn’t exactly taking measurements. She was big compared to Filo or Melty. I mean, she wasn’t a washboard.
Taking a moment to consider it, I realized that Raphtalia actually had quite a nice-sized rack. Then I quickly backed away from that kind of thinking. Who cared about breasts, honestly?
As these thoughts ran through my head, Filolia broke free from R’yne’s hold on her and put some distance between them.
“You almost sent me back to the underworld! Evil hero from another world!” Filolia declared. I was seriously going to have to ask Mamoru what he saw in this flake.
“It’s nice to see you the same as ever, but do you have to be so hyper?” R’yne said, shaking her head. Filolia gave a cough.
“Why don’t you just go off back home, R’yne?” she suggested.
“And why do you treat your flesh and blood so coldly?” R’yne asked again. She tried to grab Filolia again, but Filolia used her arms to block her. Then they both had their arms up, looking for an opening to strike the other. I wondered if this was what two bears looked like, circling each other, trying to get the other to back down.
“This is the home of my heart,” Filolia said. “I don’t need any annoyances getting in the way.” I could tell she didn’t get along that well with her sister. I didn’t want to deal with R’yne myself—mainly because she was so rude to me all the time. She must have had her fun with Filolia before she was summoned to this world. I was starting to understand how Shildina and S’yne felt. I wondered if big sisters were always problematic for their siblings. I still wanted to believe it was just these three.
“That’s enough, Filolia. R’yne was super worried about you too, so maybe don’t treat her quite so harshly?” Mamoru said. Filolia didn’t look happy about it, but she did lower her arms.
“Okay. I’m sorry,” Filolia said.
“I’m just glad you understand,” R’yne said. “It looks like you were talking to the kids.”
“Yeah, just giving them a bit of a lecture. I’m not completely happy with everything that’s been going on while I was away,” she said.
“Everyone here was involved. You’re not going to get us to regret these results either,” R’yne stated.
“That’s settled now, anyway. Who’s this here?” Filolia asked.
“Her name is S’yne. She’s from our world but came here with Naofumi. It sounds like our world has been destroyed in the future,” R’yne explained. S’yne was watching their exchange with a frown, but after her introduction, she showed off the sewing kit, then extended her hand.
“I’m the Maniacal Brave, the Claw Hero, also known as Brave Claws Filolia. Nice to meet you,” Filolia said. S’yne didn’t really seem to know what to say to that. She looked over at me. I signaled with my eyes for her to just play along.
“I’m S’yne. The Sewing Kit Hero from the future—but I recently haven’t been getting any respect as a hero,” S’yne said. The one who assumes the name of god that we fought against hadn’t included her among the heroes at all. The reason lay with her vassal weapon, which was losing its strength due to her world having been destroyed. At least the translation function that caused her speech to skip seemed to have been resolved.
“The techniques R’yne can use have all been lost in S’yne’s time. R’yne has been training her,” I explained. Filolia moved her face closer to S’yne and spoke quietly.
“Huh? Are you okay, spending so much time with her? Doesn’t she wear you down with all that chatter?” she asked. I almost did a double take—of all people, asking that question. S’yne just looked puzzled and tilted her head, unsure of what was going on.
“S’yne is very chatty too, I’ll have you know. She talks a lot with me,” R’yne said. That was true. Once S’yne got started, she could ramble on a bit. Both of them having come from the same world probably gave them plenty to talk about.
“Is that true? I want to chat with you too! I’m super interested in the future . . . and I’d love to hear some prophecies from the heroes coming from there!” Filolia said. I was a little concerned about the second part there, but she could do whatever she liked so long as it didn’t interfere with me.
“L’yne, you have some knowledge of magic, correct?” R’yne said. “Could you help with the teaching? I’m having trouble imparting how to deploy her optical wings.”
“Stop calling me by that fake name! Who’d have thought Dark Brave herself would have to suffer under such a burdensome sister?! But very well. It can’t hurt for her to learn these things,” Filolia said. It sounded like she could teach the magic from her world. That could mean a power-up for S’yne. “Shall we get into this right away?”
“No, hold on. I think we need to go to Naofumi’s village and say hello to Natalia first,” R’yne said.
“It’s past lunch . . . We’ll take Keel and the others back too, get some food, and make the introductions,” I suggested. We headed to the town below the castle, met up with Keel and the other villagers working there, and then all returned together to the village.
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