Opening his inventory, Alex found the rare scroll and withdrew it; a prompt appearing as he willed it to activate on the unconscious man.
***
Would you like to use Scroll of Copy Skill (Rare) on Benjamin al Kufah? Scroll will be consumed upon use.
(Y/N)
***
He’d been a bit worried the scroll’s initialization would be more dramatic, a sudden illumination or the like that stopped him from using the item discretely, fortunately that wasn’t the case. As he hesitated to approve, Alex considered if this was the best way to use the quest reward. The plan was to treat the scroll as a test since, if all went well, he’d be receiving a higher rarity version of it shortly, but he had his doubts whether that was the right course of action. Even if it wasn’t comparable to some legendary ability, a free rare skill was nothing to write off. Now that he knew the item activation was completely inconspicuous, all he needed to do was use it on someone strong, assuring himself the chance to choose from at least one powerful ability.
It took a couple more seconds of back and forth, but in the end, Alex decided to continue with the original plan. All the secrets of the process wouldn’t be revealed until he actually accepted a skill, and based on Ben’s testimony, he didn’t consider his future skill to be a throwaway. Lord’s Confidence might not be especially useful to Alex in its current state, though what he’d gleamed about its potential evolutions had him interested. That begged the question of whether he was the best to speculate on evolutions after his failed gambit with Fear Resistance, but he felt the risk was worth it. His methods of persuasion had seemed convincing enough, and unless Alex started abducting people more powerful than himself off the street, this was the most foreknowledge of his options he’d be getting. Hoping it wouldn’t end up being a mistake, he approved.
This time something dramatic did happen, the scroll immediately crumbling to dust in his hands as the particles flew off in a nonexistent wind. A moment later another prompt appeared, this one showing a list of eleven skills ordered by their rarities. During his crude interrogation of the traitorous noble, Alex had been trying to channel the confidence of someone with a truth-seeking skill. Reading over the list in front of him, it seemed his act had only been partially successful. Ben had spoken truthfully about the majority of his abilities, but the man either knew more about the limits of lie-detecting skills than Alex or had simply hoped his falsities wouldn’t be called out.
Most inaccuracies were along the lines of a misnamed skill or the shifting of rarities, though as he reached the end of the list, Alex found Ben had managed to keep one ability from him entirely. He’d initially thought the noble to have only one rare skill, a class related ability that could be seen as a significantly weaker version of Sixth Sense. The final skill on the list dismissed that notion, but as he read the name left of the rarity, Alex found himself sympathizing with the man’s desire to keep it secret. He felt safe in assuming that any skill titled Hedonist would be little help to him in his current predicament. Knowing he would need to look the skill up if he ever got the chance, Alex mentally selected and confirmed his ability of choice.
***
Would you like to copy the skill, Lord’s Confidence (Uncommon), from Benjamin al Kufah? Level and grade will be reset.
(Y/N)
***
Following up with another approval, Alex paused as error messages flashed through his vision once more. Panic began setting in as he read over another error message, but the situation seemed to fix itself before he even knew what to be worried about, his newest skill’s information appearing unbidden.
***
Error
Error
Initiating Proto-
Error Resolved
Skill Lord’s Confidence has been acquired.
Skill
Name: Lord’s Confidence
Rarity: Uncommon
Grade: F
Level: 1
Mode: Passive
Description: Being born into money is easy, making sure your fortune doesn’t collapse once mommy and daddy die, not so much. Why spend time learning all that boring math and politics, when you can have a second you that already knows how to do all the work. Gain an additional parallel consciousness, equip with all the barony running know how pre-installed. While you waste your life in the pursuit of the fleeting, put that second mind to work making treaties, collecting taxes, and keeping your audit appearing honest. Why multitask when you can multiprocess? Skill ability correlates to Wisdom and Intelligence.
***
The description was a bit different from expected, but it held up with Ben’s explanation of the ability.
“Hello,” he probed, the silence that followed disappointing Alex. Deciding to put off further experimentation for the moment, Alex refocused on his surroundings. He was nervous that he’d made the wrong choice in picking the random skill but for better or worse it was permanent. There would be ample time to explore what it could do in the future.
Rising from his crouching position, he did a brief stretch and moved over to the haphazardly tossed pile of jewelry. It only took a moment to find that all of them were inaccessible, bound to their current user. Alex had never bound any items of his own, so he’d forgotten about the possibility, but while annoying, it made sense. He considered taking the items anyway, since it was likely possible to break the bind without killing the man, but ultimately decided against it.
Doing so was likely to turn this into a bigger situation than it was, and though no one had ever said as much, Alex didn’t rule out that they might be able to track the items. The loss of potential riches hurt him, but Alex had enough recent experience with the consequences of his greed, to know better than to press his luck. That didn’t mean he’d be returning the crossbow or its remaining explosive arrows, however. Considering the damage Ben had done to his own party, some might see the confiscation as a lifesaving tactic.
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Lightly placing his jewelry back on the man’s lap, Alex moved over to the lifeless body of the wizard. Even with his considerably high strength, he needed both hands to remove the massive sword that pinned the man’s corpse to the tree, its base getting covered in blood and viscera as Jerry’s organs leaked onto the dirt. The smell hit him soon after, and for once Alex didn’t want to take everything he could, but forced himself to touch the corpse regardless, the body disappearing into his inventory.
A quick look at his gains showed only a single spatial ring among the man’s possessions, and Alex pushed off further examination with a wanting to look over at the spoiled noble. From there, he moved over the partially spilled potion before heading towards the woman’s motionless form. Finding she was still breathing, though even more shallowly than before, he pulled the mat from under her, and poured the remains of the liquid on the worst looking of her wounds. Alex didn’t know how healing worked while wearing armor, but he wasn’t about to waste time trying to remove it. He’d done what he reasonably could, whether she survived or not was out of his hands.
Heading back past the unconscious noble, he stored the body of the shadow tiger as he made his way to the cave, doing a quick sweep of the area as he walked. It was essentially barren, with little of note besides the occasional bones and prohibitive smell of feces. The interior was pitch black, but Sixth Sense and a high perception combined to offer a level of dark vision that made his first-time spelunking easy. It was about fifteen meters in that his skill spotted the first of the bodies, with quite a few spread about the cave’s rear. Not wanting to stay any longer than necessary nor touch the copious amounts of filth, Alex opened one of the inventory portals. Doing a sweep of the place spent a significant amount of mana, but Alex didn’t regret it as he exited the cave and finally got a breath of fresh air.
Punching the man in his temple once more for good measure, Alex removed the binds, stored them in his inventory, and activated Echo Relocation. Calling on Stealth a moment later, he repositioned to a tree a few meters away and took a seat. He’d expected at least one of them to be faking unconsciousness, but it took another fifteen minutes for the first person to arise, and to his surprise it was the woman. She moaned and groaned her way to a seated position, before pulling a potion from her storage and taking a sip. Staying seated, she fell into a meditative state as the potion took effect, though when she finally opened her eyes, they were filled with tears.
Realizing she’d likely gotten partial credit for the kill, Alex watched with anticipation as the sadness quickly morphed into anger, the armored woman walking over to grab her sword whilst screaming for Ben to wake up. Potential outcomes of a fight between the pair flooded his mind, but rather than trading blows, the pair began trading words. He spent another few minutes listening to the screaming match in hopes the situation would escalate, but as they began to calm some and the topic of conversation shifted to him, Alex knew it was time to leave.
The trip back was similarly uneventful to the one there, as he once again avoided taking fights. Alex needed to gain as much experience as he could, but after going through all that trouble, he didn’t want to risk a fight without equipping some armor. Between his abilities and the amount of time he’d spent fighting pretty much naked, he should be fine taking on most creatures in this portion of the woods, but he wasn’t going to risk it. Alex would have felt pretty dumb dying to an errant strike that would have been deflected off one of the chest-pieces currently sitting in his inventory.
Breathing heavy as he arrived back at the hideout a couple of hours later, he immediately headed over to the pool of water near its center. Opening a portal, he cringed as the odor of the cave filled the clearing. Hoping he could just soak the grime away, Alex turned on the water’s heating function and added some soap before pulling Jerry’s possessions from his inventory.
Looking over the robe first, he found it like much else he’d collected recently, was stained with blood. He could still sense a magical presence coming from the item, but it seemed fainter, the function likely damaged by the hole piercing its center. Tossing it in with the rest of the gear for the moment, Alex pulled out the spatial ring next.
Jerry hadn’t carried much in terms of wealth, which held with Ben’s earlier explanation of the man’s circumstances. The only items of note he held were another few days’ worth of food, six potions, and a small pile of mana crystals. While not the troves of loot he could have likely retrieved from the two nobles, Alex knew they were essential under his current circumstances.
Figuring this was likely the last time his hands would be clean for the foreseeable future, Alex decided to have a late lunch. Meal complete, he headed back over to the pool, the smell searing his nostrils as he pulled out the remaining spatial items. Like everything else he’d found in the cave, they were filthy, but since he didn’t plan to wear them, Alex saw no reason to wait for them to be clean.
Most only contained more potions, some rations, and other basic supplies, though a few held some intriguing items such as books. Seeing he couldn’t put it off any longer, Alex grabbed a hairbrush from his inventory, fished for one of the pieces of gear he’d found interesting, and began scrubbing. His lack of prior information on any of the items made Advanced Analyze all but useless, leaving Alex to figure out what the items did the old-fashioned way, trial and error.
His inspection mainly consisted of scanning the items with Sixth Sense as he scrubbed and though tedious, it proved effective. When it came to armor, Alex ended up choosing a mismatched set of sturdy leathers. None of them fit him well as the vest, pants, and boots, seemed to have all belonged to different people, but with so many items partially destroyed it was the best he could do. He’d strapped a dented chest protector over the vest, partially for the protection factor, and partially to keep the loose shirt in place. The dent itself was another issue, though he decided to think of it as a testament to the item’s strength rather than a show of prior inadequacy. Finally, tied loose as to allow ease of movement, Alex donned a cloak that he was certain held unidentified magical properties.
He’d tried everything from infusing a little mana into the item, to spewing random magic sounding words from earth, nothing made the item react. Since the item hadn’t harmed him, and completed his rogue look, Alex decided to keep it on, though he knew the sooner he figured out its ability, the better.
Having his armor situated for the moment, he took the sopping items off so they could finish drying. Opening his inventory once more, Alex began pulling out some of the recovered weapons. Many were blades, which Alex could use or learn to use thanks to his weapons mastery skill, though he was most excited about the ones he could sense a faint aura emanating from. Like with his cloak, he didn’t know what any of them did, but since most were in decent shape, Alex hoped they would work as backups for his current weapons at the very least.
Waiting for the water to finish cleaning after he’d taken a bath himself, Alex began storing the gear he didn’t need for the moment, including a plate armor chest piece that radiated a magical aura. Alex had nearly abandoned his entire look the second he’d spotted it, but seeing as he was unable to figure out its function even after trying it on, he couldn’t reason the limit it would put on his mobility and stealth, especially since he didn’t plan to get hit very much. Reequipping the now dry gear, he picked up an additional pair of bracers and strapped them on. The stench was prohibitive, and the cleaning had taken hours, but as he tugged on the laces of his new boots and a notification appeared, Alex knew it had all been worth it.
***
Tutorial Quest - Main - Subquest 2: A Forester’s Constitution
By rising further than any believed possible, you have proven that not every new seedling will die when trampled. For some, it only strengthens their roots, creating a sturdier foundation that allows them to claw ever higher as they transform into a flourishing plant. But even so, you are still far from being that thriving tree, rather you are something closer to a stubborn weed trying to disrupt the grove, and it’s come time to trim the brush. Further advance your skills and raise your level. Decide whether this fight will be one of alliances or a solo affair. Will you continue to grow or into the resilient tree you’ve shown potential to become, or be doomed to succumb to the fate of the countless fallen leaves?
Rewards: Variable
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