Chapter 5 — Ability Selection

{Available abilities (choose two):

Burning Blood (WIL)

Rage Strike (STR)

Pain Resistance (WIL)

Slow Bleeding (CON)

Gauge Your Enemy (PER)}

Toren looked over the ability list with some relief. The healing Ability that gave [Burningblood Berserker] its name was available at level 1. He selected it without hesitation.

Pain seared his body as every vein and artery filled with liquid fire, a torture made worse by his innability to move. In his mana perception, he could sense his mana changing and gathering in his blood, flowing in a blazing circuit with each pump of his heart. Gradually, the pain was replaced with an invigorating warmth, and the Ability’s description appeared in the mirror.

{Burning Blood (Rank 1, Proficiency: Low)

The strength of your emotions has caused your blood to become saturated with fire-aspect mana.

Active:

Ignite your blood. Light the fires within to increase strength, stamina recovery, resistances, and wound recovery.

Passive:

Slightly increased recovery from wounds and exertion. Increased fire affinity. Strong emotions stir your blood, granting a boost to strength, minor resistance to magic, and resistance to cold.}

Toren felt a spark of hope light in his chest at seeing the description. How limited the ability would be at Rank 1 had been an open question. If his luck had stayed bad or the gods really intended to punish him, the healing aspect might have been unlocked at a later rank. However, as expected of viridium-rarity Ability from a viridium-rarity Profession, not only did it come with both physical enhancement and healing, but limited magic resistance, and all of that at the first rank.

Unfortunately, the worry about the Profession’s reliance on strong emotions did prove founded. Though… taking [Burning Blood] may have resolved that problem. Just as he had dared hope when choosing the Profession, something about the change had broken him free of the purposelessness that had weighed on everything the last several days. It would take time to sort through his emotions, but if anger was enough, he was certain he could muster as much anger at the unfairness of the world to make the choice more than worth it.

His gains weren’t over yet. He still had one more choice to make before facing the reality of his new future and, with renewed vigor, returned his attention to the list of Abilities.

First, even though it was sure to be essential as an offensive fighter, he could exclude [Pain Resistance]. Now that he had a healing ability, getting the equivalent Skill instead shouldn’t be particularly risky or difficult. The [Pain Resistance] skill would undoubtedly become a Profession Skill considering it was already directly offered as an Ability, which was all the more reason to avoid selecting it here.

[Rage Strike], an attack that burned mana to empower a single blow, was the obvious choice of the remaining three knowing he chose the Profession for its offense and healing. The simplicity of the ability would make it easy to use, and the strength boost from [Burning Blood] could make it ridiculously impressive.

Yet, even so, such a simple bronze-rarity Ability for his primary attack seemed a poor replacement for [Lethal Shot], and there was a fair chance that it might not increase the power of his attacks much over the boost to his existing weapon skills when using [Burning Blood]. The Profession had better. Should he risk waiting? Or take the Ability and try to evolve it?

Rather… just like with [Pain Resistance], wasn’t there a good chance that he could use what he remembered of [Empowered Thrust] to get an equivalent skill without costing himself an Ability selection? Now that he was thinking about it, [Gauge Your Enemy] might also be the same as well.

Admittedly, after all the work he had put in to learn [Mana Sensing] and improve his knowledge of tracking to the point where he was offered [Mana Tracking], losing [Mana Tracking] and not getting a replacement Ability would hurt, but… eventually he should be able to do something similar with his [Mana Sensing] skill alone. Stronger enemies have higher mana density and leave stronger trails.

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If that was the case, that left him with [Slow Bleeding] as the remaining choice. Being able to survive his wounds long enough for them to heal sounded like a no-brainer. And if his [Burning Blood] Ability actually burned his blood to fuel the boosts, then keeping his blood inside his body would be even more important… unless, did [Burning Blood] also restore his blood?

He tried to get a sense of the answer from the newly acquired Ability, and the impression seemed to be both, which was confusing until he focused on the passive and active uses separately. His blood production was passively increased, but blood was expended to heal.

So, bleeding might become less important as he ranked-up [Burning Blood]? Maybe?

Hmm… If he was looking toward the future, with unlocking the [Mana Manipulation] skill and raising it to the first threshold, he could see [Slow Bleeding] evolving to something like [Blood Control]. Toren mentally chuckled to himself. Going such a route… did he want to unlock [Blood Mage] as a Profession evolution option or a second Profession? He couldn’t see that as being better than [Guardian of the Torch].

Even if he didn’t go the [Blood Mage] direction, the capability to keep himself from suffering blood loss would surely be valuable. Though, if he waited until his level 5 or level 10 Ability choices, it was possible a better version would be made available.

Toren shook off his overly-optimistic thoughts. No, his initial thought was the correct one. He didn’t know how quickly [Burning Blood]’s healing would work at rank 1. Surviving long enough to heal was the only consideration he should be thinking about. The untamed lands would surely be full of vicious animals and monsters. That meant claws and teeth, which meant bleeding.

Not thinking on it further, he chose his second Ability.

{Slow Bleeding (Rank 1, Proficiency: Low)

Your control over your blood allows you to limit its flow and improve clotting.

Active:

Consciously slow the flow of blood from wounds. Magically accelerated clotting.

Passive:

Bleeding wounds are significantly less likely to be fatal. Clotting speed increased.}

Seeing the descriptions for both the active and passive effects, Toren was again sure he had made the right choice.

His choices made, he was done with the mirror unless he wanted to remove an active skill or add a previously unlocked skill—and with a Sponsored Profession, he no longer needed the mirror to change his skills.

Mentally taking a deep breath, Toren willed his awareness away from the mirror and withdrew his hand from the water-like surface. He suddenly felt so much less than before touching the mirror.

A pang of shame welled up when the old woman who had snarked at him to hurry up lowered her gaze upon realizing what his choice had been about, what he had done. To go from level 15 to level 1, even with the rarity upgrade, would be noticeable to anyone even without a mana-sensing skill.

Sacrificing one’s levels and Profession was a sign of a failed path. It was done by people who lost their employment, could no longer find work, and had lost hope. Without friends or family to provide work, a level 1 would have an even harder time finding employment. Even for menial tasks and unskilled labor, there would be plenty of people with levels and Abilities that could do the job better in a fraction of the time.

As he walked away from the Celestial Mirror and started toward the temple’s exit, the people behind the woman also avoided his gaze.

Toren had known he would get this kind of reaction, but it still hurt. Being level 1 at his age was worse than embarrassing—in the eyes of others, it marked him as lazy or incapable. Having an orphan background would only make it worse. At least, with his existing Attributes and the XP penalty for a viridium Profession, he most likely gave off an aura of someone at twice his level in an iron Profession, so it hopefully wouldn’t take him too long to regain the aura of an acceptable level.

Still, after having experienced sacrificing his Profession to the mirror, Toren couldn’t help feeling that the accepted thinking was wrong. If a person had enough support, using temporary Professions for the specific Profession Skill bonuses and to strengthen Attributes, couldn’t that provide a significant advantage when later choosing one’s intended Profession?

Maybe that was what nobles and wealthy families did for their children?

Unfortunately, Toren didn’t have any such support. He was taking a huge risk starting over and would now have to survive long enough to be employable again. Thankfully, his General Skills and training would allow for him to hunt and provide for himself even if he was discriminated against.

Reaching tier 2 and sacrificing a second Profession instead would have been a lot safer, but that would’ve taken years, and he didn’t have that kind of time.

As he exited the temple and stepped out from under the shadow cast by the temple’s facade, he raised his gaze to the Celestial Heavens and let the Great Pheonix's approach warm his face.

Though different from what he had initially hoped for, the gods had granted him what he needed. It was time to collect his remaining belongings from the inn, meet with the recruiter, and seek his future in a new land.