Finally, the glitch creature speaks again interrupting our pretend bickering, "Guys, guys, you're both pretty, but you don't have to fight over me like that, there's enough of me for both of you!"

"Ugh, shut up, freak!", I sigh, "So how does it look?"

"Not good. We got way less exp to work with than expected. The System is stingier than I thought. At least I could pull some threads to prevent them from getting used immediately."

Oh great, keep dispensing the good news, haven't got enough of those in a while... fuck. But at least it doesn't seem like the glitch bastard hasn't caught up to our ruse.

I quickly sneak a peak at my status window, and to my surprise, the exp value is actually changed: 857966. Damn, how is close to a million exp not enough? My next level in Silver Wizard would cost me 23735 exp, so that's a massive amount.

In what world, are several dozens of levels' worth of exp nothing!? And that massive amount is just for one skill!? Do you really want to tell me a single Hybrid skill can fortify a soul more than dozens of levels? Unbelievable...

In shock, I accidentally let out a whisper, "What the fuck...", but it seems I wasn't heard. At least no one reacts to it.

Elly wipes away some fake tears while pretending to sniff, "You, you shouldn't be surprised. This world has already been a huge drain on the System's exp reserves. Remember the artificial story bubble around the world? Nothing gets out, that includes souls of the dead. If no souls return to the source, no exp is returned to the System. All the exp is effectively lost when a soul dies around here."

"So this world is being throttled for non-compliance with their arbitrary demands, huh?", I chuckle, "We really should look for a better Isekai Service Provider. The devas' sucks. Maybe we should switch to the one Ren has. I haven't heard any major complaints from her, rather, she even got a massive signup bonus. You know, just throwing that out there."

Elly facepalms, "That's no laughing matter, asshole."

"Yeah, yeah, I know. Love you too, bitch."

The glitch's threads beg for attention, "Damn you two, can't you behave for a moment... Well, I think with what we have, we can only work on one of the two non-functional Hybrid skills. So that'll have to suffice. But I honestly doubt it will be enough. In the end, your fate will come down to a metaphorical coin flip. Either you can endure the torrent of glitches for several days or... that's it. No more Jared."

"I think I have another idea", I take out the Class Core Therese gave me, "Can't I use this to add another class? Shouldn't that absorb some more glitches?"

Elly contacts me, and she sounds annoyed, (How the hell did you get yet another Class Core in this resource-starved world!?)

Resource-starved? So there are other worlds where class items are much more plentiful? Just my luck...

(I... bullied Therese for it. But that's a longer story that has to wait.)

(No, I think I already get the picture.)

It has to think for a moment, "I'm not even sure if that cuts even. To be honest, even adding the titles might have been a mistake, we got too little exp out of it. You know, the main danger is the total soul strain you're under, both from the sea of glitches flooding in as well as the number of skills and classes you already possess. And in the end, titles are just misplaced skills so they increase the soul strain you're under. The additional Hybrid class and skills would be able to soak up some of the glitches and consume them over time, but a regular class can't do that."

"I see, so since we got less exp out of the titles than expected it might take too long until the difference is compensated. I guess adding a class and using its exp would have a similarly tight margin."

It disagrees, "No, that one is worse. A class is usually a collection of three skills plus the whole framework. In terms of additional pressure that set is probably closer to five or seven titles. With how stingy the System is currently, it is simply not worth it. It is vastly more likely that you'd only make the situation worse for you."

"But can't we use the exp from the item directly? I thought it held the majority of the exp needed to add a new class and its skills. Couldn't you extract that?"

"That might be possible in theory but it is beyond what I know... maybe if Lady Orpyne was here but I've no clue how to contact her..."

Elly scolds us, "It is already insane enough how much you're trashing the creator's work without repercussion, be happy you got even as far as you have. You're really asking for too much here."

"Fine, so that's a no-go then. So we go with the lottery. Fine, do your best."

"Uh, how about you do it?", the glitch continues to mumble something, "I don't really know how to go about it, but maybe you..."

"What was that second part?"

"Nothing?"

"Didn't sound like nothing to me."

Elly chimes in, "I have to agree. You muttered something, and it sounded worrying. Out with it."

The glitch gets defensive, "I said I want you to do that since you should learn that soon anyway."

I don't think that is what it said exactly...

"I thought our time was short? And now you want to play teacher? Somehow that doesn't add up."

"Ah, no no no. We... we do have enough time for this, trust me."

"No, I do not. It is my life on the line here!"

It laughs nervously, "Even more reason for you to do your best then. So... which skill do you want to try your hand on? This one or that one?"

"Don't just go and change the topic..."

But it ignores me and pulls up the two skill descriptions.

D̴͉̍ȇ̸̱v̷̺̓ï̴̮l̸̦͝ị̴̆s̴͍̃h̶̬͠ ̴͓͒C̶͈͐ẖ̸̆ȃ̵͖r̶̦̃m̵̳̈

386 SP

NO EFFECT A̴b̵s̸o̷r̴b̷ ̵Y̶o̵u̶t̸h̸

Concentration

NO EFFECT

"No idea, I can't read either of their names. Does it matter?"

The glitch answers, "Probably not."

If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

Elly angrily exclaims, "Ah, screw you, I can't watch you defile the System any further, I'm out of here."

I'm still keeping up the charade, "Yeah, yeah, don't get hit by the door on the way out."

She contacts me telepathically, (You know why. Good luck, don't screw this up.)

(Yeah, I'll try. See you around - in one way or another.)

"Whatever, let's use the first one. Now what?"

"...dunno. Just uh, do something?"

"Are you kidding me?"

"No, of course not. I, uh, just don't know what your menu looks like. But it is a menu, how hard can it be? You'll surely figure it out."

"...you're fucking useless, you know that?"

"No, don't worry. I'm pretty sure you can do this! I'm optimistic your chance to survive will climb up to a whole percent once you're done!"

"Wow, a whole percent? What will I do with my excessive luck? That's basically guaranteed - to fail."

If it's that low why even bother...

No, people do win the lottery, I just have to improve my chances as much as possible.

But why should that even be in my menu? This is undoubtedly not something the System is designed for, so why should it even be there...

I take a while to click through all of my menu options but I don't find a suitable option. Not that I expected one, messing with existing skills is not something you're supposed to be able to do. But then, I have [Essence Drain] and whatever rules-bending that does.

I mean, how does that even work? I'm pretty sure that Eva told me removing skills and stuff requires a whole factory reset of the soul, you shouldn't be able to just "drain" them as fuel for something like that.

...no, this approach is pointless.

"No clue, just tell me how you do it. We don't have all the time in the world."

The threads twiddle around like thumbs, "I've... never done anything like that, so no idea how to help you..."

"Why did you then suggest that this was possible? Also, I've seen some of my skills get changed, that had to have been you. Who else could have done that?"

"Probably you? At least, I'm pretty sure I've done nothing of the sort. As I said, I'm not really interested in the specifics of your skill thingies."

This is so frustrating, "Ugh, stop spouting nonsense!"

How could that have been me? I was caught up in that glitch zone, the skills and classes were already a mess when I came to.

Do you want to tell me that I did something in that state and that's why everything changed?

Well, if I'm finally honest with myself I was and still am very frustrated with my continuous powerlessness which peaked with the should've-been game over against the wolf boss who reminded me of Marcia...

And then there was [Profane Vows], I saw how it changed its effect. Back then I thought the glitch creature was the cause, and why wouldn't it be? But now... maybe the glitches that make up the skill really did react to my disappointment over its effect. Is that really all that's there to it? If that is so then it isn't even any different from how magic or other skills work. Supposedly, spells require an entire library of calculations to be performed, but thanks to skills, I only have to "will" it and possess the necessary MP.

Well, as long as I don't have another lead, it can't hurt to try.

I bring all of my attention to the broken [D̴͉̍ȇ̸̱v̷̺̓ï̴̮l̸̦͝ị̴̆s̴͍̃h̶̬͠ ̴͓͒C̶͈͐ẖ̸̆ȃ̵͖r̶̦̃m̵̳̈] skill, then let my mind be filled by the desire to "repair" it. A moment later, it feels like I'm touching a clay-like mass with a pair of imaginary arms. Interesting.

When I look around, nothing has changed, it seems that sensation is only in my mind.

Before proceeding with the repair, I follow my curiosity. I want to know if the same would happen with a different skill.

Back then, I changed [Profane Vows], could I change it further? Doesn't seem like it, that one feels appropriately like ceramic, basically immutable. The same holds true for [Essence Drain] and the skills that were changed in the accident. Something in the back of my mind tells me that there's nothing I can do about those, once they are "hardened" like that, they are done. The only way to change them after that is to turn them into fuel for a Hybrid skill, like I've done with [Cure Boost].

In contrast to those skills, normal skills like [Stealth] and [Undead] feel more like plastic, like a cheap water bottle. Still solid, but I feel with enough force - or by adding enough glitchy substances - I could reshape them. No, it feels like a direct application of force would crush them or make them unusable. It needs to be the latter.

What about a Hybrid skill? [P̷u̵r̴e̷ ̵M̷a̷g̴i̴c̴] feels artificial, like an alien metal; hard as steel but also kind of alive, and it also feels thirsty like a sponge - it feels like it tries to "drink" the mental arms. Creepy stuff, I should be very careful when interacting with those skills.

Weird, I would've thought that [Essence Drain] would be in the immutable category itself since it creates them, but I guess not. So I could try to use it as material for my next Hybrid class - or would that create some kind of recursion error? ...I better never try that out.

I return my attention to the skill chosen for repair and try to inspect it with my mental arms. There's nothing to see, just to feel. It's like a mass of barely stable, ordered chaos, for whatever that's worth. Sadly, nothing I can make sense of. Kind of like a tax form or bistromathics.

I slowly try to change something about the form, but it barely budges. There's not much material to work with. As I continue to work on the shape, I notice how something else flows into the mixture. A gel-like substance. Glitches of course. But they are probably what I was missing.

With a bit of hesitation, I mix the two together and can finally start altering the skill's shape. I can see how the skill description updates in real-time.

D̴͉̍ȇ̸̱v̷̺̓ï̴̮l̸̦͝ị̴̆s̴͍̃h̶̬͠ ̴͓͒C̶͈͐ẖ̸̆ȃ̵͖r̶̦̃m̵̳̈

386 SP

Inflict charm on a target you socially interact with at a rate of 13.

Does not require a gaydar.

Good, it is not a complete dead end, we're getting somewhere.

But what is this deja vu? Why do I have the feeling that I've done something like this before? I don't think it is from one of the memory crystals, but a bit more recent.

I continue the alteration process and the skill changes completely after another tiny alteration to the shape.

D̴͉̍ȇ̸̱v̷̺̓ï̴̮l̸̦͝ị̴̆s̴͍̃h̶̬͠ ̴͓͒C̶͈͐ẖ̸̆ȃ̵͖r̶̦̃m̵̳̈

386 SP, reaction

Inflict charm on a person who observes you and feels attracted to your current form.

Magnetism also counts.

I keep trying for a while to achieve a completely different effect. After all, I already have a skill to inflict charm, and so far, I've gotten no use out of that either. But no matter what I do, I can't change its type. It always turns into a form of charm skill or an effectless error message. Seems like the foundation is immutable, huh.

This whole process is quite taxing, so I let go for a moment, and the chaotic mass collapses like a sand castle while the glitchy gel retreats to where it came from.

So just glitches are not enough to achieve a stable form. Yeah, should've guessed that something like this happens. That is what exp is used for in this unholy ceremony - solidifying and thereby finalizing a skill.

But didn't the glitch creature imply it could show me how to create a super-powerful skill from nothing? It didn't sound like it needed exp for that specific stunt, only for my soul to endure the resulting skill. Something doesn't add up here - or it was just bluffing and we fell for it, that's also possible.

Or maybe the exp requirement is only so insane because we want to create a Hybrid skill, and mere glitched skills are cheaper but quite stressful.

Well, no point in pondering that, I'm running out of time to reach a success chance of a whole one percent! Gacha players, eat your heart out!

I don't feel like working on the previous skill any longer since I'm not interested in a charm-related skill, especially not of the kind I've seen so far. So, I bring my attention to the other effectless skill.

I wonder what you will become, little buddy. I haven't seen too many concentration skills so far, so this can only be good.

A̴b̵s̸o̷r̴b̷ ̵Y̶o̵u̶t̸h̸

Concentration

Caster ages rapidly.

This effect bypasses all forms of lifespan modifications and immortality.

Ah, it starts so well...

A̴b̵s̸o̷r̴b̷ ̵Y̶o̵u̶t̸h̸

Concentration

Grab attacks inflict rapid aging.

For each year of life span the target loses this way, recover 0.4193527 HP, MP and SP.

So I guess the theme of this shattered skill is life decay - not what I need right now. Or ever.

What do I hesitate? I have to create a skill here if I want to have a chance to survive, and if none of the options appeal, so what? I don't have to use it once it is done. But there's this nagging feeling I'm on the completely wrong track here. What am I missing, what should I be doing instead?

I know what I have to achieve, and something tells me that the Hybrid skill is my key to it, but I'm not getting any closer.

While trying to figure that out, I continue to alter the shape, but then my experiment gets interrupted by a system message of all things. I let go of the mess mentally in front of me, and the skill returns to its effectless initial state.