Without much else to do other than roam around the house for a little while, I simply chose to take a moment to breathe some fresh air at the top of the roof. The outside air was quite refreshing and calming, which was probably why I eventually slept until sunset after what felt like seconds.
Once I wake up from such a nap, I can't help but feel confused and also wake up with a bad case of sunburn since I slept during the day under direct sunlight. I truly did not care; however, since magical healing powers seemed to deal with almost anything, I was sure some sunburn wouldn't be that big a deal.
For the second order of business, I stand up and stretch all over, letting my small body reach its full growth potential. Man, my body didn't seem to change at all despite having been months since I lived in it, or was I just imagining things?
My previous male body developed quickly, but in this one, even though what feels like a year has passed, I still feel the same height! I'm still just as short! When was my body planning to grow up, uh? Whatever, what matters most is not something petty like that. I better get back inside and read a book or something.
"Lady Yoimiya, there you are!" A maid greets me and rushes to try to tell me something right after I leave the rooftop to go read a book at the library.
"What is it?" I ask the maid, who seems flustered and quite distressed. I was getting worried just by her looks, hoping it didn't have anything to do with Julius or any crazy, powerful enemy from the church.
"A woman showed up earlier this afternoon. They seemed to be looking for you, claiming to be your mother?" My jaw drops to the floor as soon as the maid finishes her sentence, and very well-deserved tears come from my eyes, tears of happiness.
My entire body couldn't believe it; there was simply no way my mother was here; how had she found me? It didn't matter to me; I didn't care how as long as I got to see them again. Even if I didn't know them all that well, no doubt a small part of me still cared deeply about this subject, perhaps because the original soul in this body used to be her daughter.
"Where did she go? You let her stay, right?" I ask the maid, who points in a different direction, one away from the mansion, which quickly prompts me to start running outside.
"They left in a dragon! You can't catch up to her running m'lady!" The maid screamed some nonsense that didn't matter one bit; what good was my strenght and stats if I couldn't catch up to the running pace of a dragon?!
Without hesitation, I began running faster than I had ever run before, leaving the territory of Lord Auri in quite a quick amount of time, looking all around for my mother, the one I assumed would be Ariel since she said Okina had died during the initial attack.
If only there were a way to grapple some of the tall tree branches so I could swing myself around; that type of power would be helpful, I said to myself, making the crown react to my query with a cheeky response I wasn't used to yet.
[The described skill is named "Spatial hook"; in order to acquire this skill, you must first acquire another skill named "Spatial magic" and raise its level to level 5 as a minimum]
Okay, smarty pants, but how do I like to acquire those skills in the first place? It's not like the world system is easy to understand, you know.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
[Skill "Spatial magic" needs one thousand skill points, and you currently have three thousand from past level-ups. To acquire a skill, you can just ask the world system or ask me, and I will do it for you.]
Alright! Did anyone say time to use skill points!? Or whatever that means. Go for it, crown! I want that skill, Spatial magic since it sounds like it could be helpful.
[Understood. You have acquired the skill 'Spatial magic level 1'. I will now increase its level to level five using another one thousand points if you approve.] (YES/NO)
The heck, why not? If using all my skill points meant I could get five levels for what felt like no work whatsoever, then why not?
[Spatial magic's level has increased from level 1 to level 5. Do you wish to acquire the skill 'Spatial hook' for two hundred points?] (Yes/No)
I click on yes, and right after that, I suddenly feel my arms twitch a little bit, followed by a weird sensation of pointing my arms toward the sky. I didn't understand much of why I wanted to do such a thing, but as soon as I pointed my right arm up, I was surprised that a dark power hook launched from it and landed mid-air, followed by a crazy pull-up with me along for the ride.
The hook launched me about forty meters into the air, followed by a floating platform that appeared below my feet as soon as I started to fall back. "What the!? THIS ABILITY IS AWESOME!" Excited and now more motivated than ever, I start fucking around with the hook covering massive distances as I pull forward at tremendous speeds, practically flying around until I notice that the skill consumes MP quite fast.
My base MP has become 15,000, yet each hook consumes five hundred MP. So I could at most use it 30 times, which wasn't bad, but it was a lot of MP just to simulate flying, which probably would've been a better idea now that I thought about it ewe.
[Each level reduces the MP consumption; you can raise the skill level eight times and lose all your current skill points or acquire another two levels of spatial magic to unlock flight, but do be aware that flight consumes a high rate of MP per second.]
Each level reduced the stamina consumption by how much exactly? [By half for a maximum of 10 levels]
By half? The hell call me stupid, but with my MP going past level four, it makes no sense. I only wish to raise the skill level to that level, please!
[Skill 'Spatial hook's level has increased from level 1 to level 4]
[You have four hundred skill points remaining]
With my newfound skill and the insane MP consumption achieved, I continue swinging through the skies until I finally get to see a lady running on top of a dragon in the direction of the town I first landed in when the Witch teleported everyone at random; why hadn't I guessed that?!
"MOM!" I scream at the top of my lungs while flying toward her with the help of my hooks, catching the woman's attention as she turns around to see me, and I get to see her as well. I could tell almost instantly it was Ariel as her eyes met mine beneath the fading sunset's light.
The dragon stopped running as soon as Ariel recognized me, followed by her demounting her dragon to start waving her arm at me while happily smiling. It didn't take me long to land in a not-so-controlled way since I had never used the hook before or spatial magic at all, so my landing was not the cleanest, with a massive dust curtain around me once I landed hard on the floor.
"Baby! Are you okay? Mama is here!" I hear Ariel's voice as soon as I land, which relieves some of the immediate pain from landing like an imbecile against the ground. The touch of my mother's arms, however, soon relieved all the pain with a sudden calmness in my heart.
"I'm alright, Mom. Are you alright?" I ask my mother, who takes everything a little too emotionally as she quickly starts getting all too cuddly and overall aggressively possessive of me, not wanting to let me go from her crushing hug.
"I've looked for you all over the place! I was looking for strong upcoming girls until I heard about your feats from this region; I can't believe you have been doing all those things." My mom finally let go of me once I tried to push her away for a second since I couldn't breathe being so near her chest.
"Yeah, well. I've only done what I've had to so far. I'm sorry for not looking for you as much as you did for me, but I've been more concerned with just waking up the next morning; I'm sorry."