Gaining the skill Ajax could intrinsically feel a lot of what the ability could do, he knew that he could put a restriction, and he could set a time, he could even influence what the buff provided. That is where the innate information stopped however.

“First thing we need to talk about is how the restriction works.” The prince said. “One thing people mistake about this is that the restriction works as a limit placed on your system as a whole, that’s not correct.”

“How do you mean?” Ajax asked

“Your restriction for [Mana Syphon], when you tried to turn it off for that one lizard you turned it off for all of them.” The prince pointed out. “Putting up that same restriction with the skill won’t magically make you able to exclude just one person because they are touching you.”

“How does it work then?” Ajax was confused since that’s how he had assumed the skill would work.

“The skill works by adding a command in your own mind.” the prince explained. “This means that you would instinctively turn off [Mana Syphon] just to make sure you wouldn’t use it on anything you make contact with. If you have the skill to exclude only one lizard then it would do that, otherwise it would do it for all of them.”

“Does that mean that I could still use the skill on something that was touching me so long as I didn’t know they were touching me.” Ajax asked.

“Yep.” the prince confirmed. “A good example of that is putting a restriction not to attack an elf. If an elf covered head to toe in bulky plate armor fights you, until you find out they are an elf you would gain the benefit of the restriction despite breaking it.”

Ajax was at once both happy and sad, the skill working this way would mean that he had a way of creating loopholes for himself but he couldn’t use the skill to make the system verify things for him.

“Next, the duration of the restriction.” the prince continued. “There are three important points. The first is the soft minimum, one day. Any restriction that is shorter than that can be placed, however the benefit would be nearly zero.”

That made sense to Ajax, switching restrictions from one to another was clearly not in line with the way the skill was intended to work having close to no effect before a minimum time limit would fix that though it would still let him use the restriction part of the skill for shorter periods of time if that was what he needed.

“The second is a week.” the prince continued. “This is similarly the longest duration you should be placing a restriction for, you can do it for longer but the increase in time past that point makes the increase in power minimal.”

That was good to know, Ajax imagined that he would be spending a lot of time playing around with the restrictions as he got a better feel for it. “Is the last one a middle point? The best time to power ratio.”

“No.” the prince shook his head. “The last one is a permanent restriction. This is only a last resort.”

“Why is that a last resort?” Ajax questioned, he knew why it wouldn’t work well for his purposes but depending on the power it could lead people to forming a whole style based upon multiple such restrictions.

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“The most obvious reason is that the skill can only handle one restriction at a time.” the prince explained. “Sure the power gain from a permanent restriction is pretty big but unless you pushed the skill past the first threshold and managed to get the ability to place more restrictions at the same time you will basically lose the skill.”

“Wouldn’t that mean that you could grow this skill specifically so that you could place multiple permanent restrictions later for a big boost in power?” Ajax asked.

“In theory, yes.” the prince acknowledged. “The skill is however very hard to level, not to mention that actively working to level it could limit your other skills. There are two reasons I am mentioning the permanent restriction, one so that you don’t place one by accident when playing with the skill. And the second so that you actually do know it is a big power boost there for you to use in order to survive something. Any questions so far?”

Ajax could think of a few on how the restriction worked in terms of the loopholes he could use regarding not being aware he was breaking the restriction but that could all wait.

“Okay now for the more varied portion.” the prince said. “You can use the skill to place many different types of restrictions but they all fall into two types. Restrictions placed on yourself as a person, and restrictions placed on your skills.”

“Isn’t that the same thing?” Ajax asked, if he placed a restriction not to use mana it would obviously affect his skills as well.

“It could have the same effect but the way it is achieved makes the skill work differently.” The prince explained. “A restriction to wield anything but a sword and one to only use the [Sword] weapon skill will both do the same thing, you can only use a sword. A restriction on yourself however can be channeled into any type of bonus even if it has nothing to do with the restriction in question. A restriction on a skill however can only boost the skill restricted, though the bonus is much better.”

“So if I use a restriction to only use fire mana I could put the bonus of that into increasing my physical power, but if I limit [Mana Augmentation] to only work with fire mana I can only use the boost to strengthen the skill.” Ajax caught on.

“Exactly.” the prince nodded. “For now I suggest you play around with only restrictions on yourself.”

“Why is that?” Ajax thought he was missing something.

“Because of how [Empowering Restriction].” the prince answered. “While a restriction is active the skill will slow down any other skill from leveling, but if placed specifically on a skill it will slow that specific skill down a lot more and it can even affect the threshold options offered. This is not a skill you want to use while training or practicing to increase other skills.”

Ajax wasn’t happy to hear that, how was he supposed to get used to using the skill if he couldn’t practice with it? Then again the skill would be useful when it came to results, he might not use it when he was practicing [Alchemy] but he would definitely use it if he was making something important to make the result better.

In the end Ajax currently decided that the skill would best fit as a reactionary element of his fighting style. If he was facing an ice elemental and he needed the power boost he would restrict his ice magic, or if he broke an arm he would restrict use of that arm. Until the skill gained a few levels it wouldn’t be all that powerful anyway.

With that Ajax and the prince returned to the group as Ajax had a lot of things to consider. He was very happy that he managed to unlock the skill he had been interested in for a few years now, he would just have to find a way to practice the skill without it crippling the rest of his progress.

It was interesting to see all the elves streaming back into the clearing now that the danger had passed. The guard outpost by the arch was already back up and a few more teams had returned from the delve, two of which brought with them a few monsters that needed to be killed but nothing as strong or as numerous as the lizards.

The first thing Ajax did after his talk with the prince was to let Lexi know about his new skill, the reaction he got was not one he had expected.

“Don’t use it on any of your mana aspect skills.” Lexi all but shouted at him once she heard about the skill.

“I wasn’t planning on it, the prince already warned me not to use it on skills as a whole.” Ajax tried to reassure her.

“Using it on skills isn’t ideal but using it on mana aspect skills can get you stuck at a threshold.” Lexi explained. “The first threshold for most mana types is the level fifty, that’s relatively early and almost everyone breaks through it with the efficiency upgrade since it’s the only one you unlock. Using [Empowering Restriction] on aspect skills can make it so that option isn’t there and it will get you stuck at level fifty until you manage to get another option.”

Ajax was feeling quite smug as he knew all of his Rare mana types had already gotten past that threshold so that wouldn’t be an issue but he would make sure to be careful with his Epic ones. He wasn’t worried about his Legendary affinity as Life was so versatile he was expecting to be spoiled for choice when it came time for that Threshold.

“I won’t.” Ajax promised her.

“Good.” Lexi hugged him. “ Congratulations on unlocking the skill, it can be very powerful despite the downsides it brings.”