“Something like that,” April agreed finally. “Techniques that give a normal person a one percent chance of gaining a precognition skill will be a near certainty for you. Hail Mary attempts for higher tiered abilities usually fail, but in your case, I guess, you’ll have good odds to get it. I can’t stress how amazing this opportunity is, and you should beg, steal or pay for any available historical records from established native tribes to make the most of it.”

Tom froze as the reality of what she was telling him finally sunk in. He kind of knew all this, but when he had come into Existentia, he hadn’t possessed an affinity in the low nineties. Leaning on his affinities for skill acquisition hadn’t been an option, so it was not something he had researched.

Unable to help itself, his mind raced. He leapt from idea to idea as he considered all the different abilities that he would want to attempt gaining. Three, maybe four-period danger sensing that would let him know about threats to his life - seconds, minutes, hours, days, possibly weeks in advance. Hell, with that level of affinity, maybe, instead of a being a feeling, his danger sense would allow him to have glimpses of the future. What else could he do?

“You need to research methods to gain precognition skills,” April stressed. “Your own ideas are good, but getting proven methods is better. Invest time in this. It’s the most important thing you can do. You’ll want Danger Sense, Future Glimpse, Precognition Enhanced Dodge, Advanced Identification, Party Threat Predictions and Treasure Sense as a minimum. I’d also consider some specific oracle-aligned skills like Encounter Prediction, Innate Preparedness and Omen Path Guidance.” She finished breathlessly.

He shifted on the cushioned bench and thought about this. Most of those skills wouldn’t change his core build, and he understood their value. Even buying these skills in the experience shop was worthwhile. The affinity, while boosting his chances of acquiring them in the first place, would also increase their effectiveness. Most people got a scattering of these abilities, despite lacking a measurable affinity. Tom didn’t know the exact mathematics, but he imagined that, for most people, Danger Sense granted half a second warning of a mortal threat. That was enough time to trigger a lifesaving movement, ability, or defensive treasure.

In his hands, the same ability would be completely different. What was in scope for him would change. He was sure he’d get a prod about minor things, like if he was about to stub his toe. Then, if there was a real threat that might kill him, instead of half a second he’d get a handful. Theoretically, that extra time would let him escape without burning skills with long cool-downs.

“I’ll do that,” he agreed quietly. He had no desire to be an Oracle, but being a better spear-warrior, assassin mage, or treasure hunter were advantages he was happy to sign up for.

“As you get older,” she frowned. “The orphanage should be able to provide opportunities that could help you acquire the dodge and danger sense skills. At least, they did so in the past. I can’t comment on its current operations, but I don’t see why that should have changed.”

“I’ll look into it.” He promised.

“Now,” she snapped her fingers. “Let’s talk skill acquisition.”

“I’m very interested in that topic,” Tom assured her. “Possibly more so now than a few minutes ago. Can you help with the precognition ones?”

She smiled:

“No, I can’t help you with getting a precognition skill using the guidance method. That’s something you’re going to have to address yourself. The GODs shop only has tier zero and one items. All the precognition skills are tier two or above.”

“And what if I source a skill stone?”

“You can’t afford that.”

Tom suspected she was right, but it was worth asking. If any of his past companions were alive, he was sure they would be happy to source high-tier skills for him.

“And if I can?”

“If you provide a stone. I can transform it into guidance, but you have to understand that my methods aren’t perfect. You might never get the skill if you go through me. But if you use the stone directly, acquisition is guaranteed.”

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Tom shrugged:

“But with an affinity of ninety-five, how likely would failing to get it be? Should I give it to you?”

He watched her. This was not a question about precognition abilities; it was a roundabout way of finding out about titles.

She bit her lip:

“Yes; provided we have at least a year of time remaining, pushing that through me might be for the best.”

Tom did not smile. That was a confirmation that gaining abilities, particularly high levelled ones, was linked to valuable titles:

“How about helping me gain these skills via simulated combat?”

She frowned thoughtfully:

“Anything I can create will be deadly. You will die in them, and for benefits, at best it’ll be equivalent to your standing blindfolded and having three kids throwing pebbles at you. I don’t recommend doing it here. Now, stop distracting me. Let’s talk about how you’ll earn the credits to repay me for the ritual.”

She snapped her fingers, and the table was filled with various knickknacks. “You’re going to be crafting one of these, and probably repeating it hundreds of times, too.”

Tom scanned them, looking first at a series of small crystals.

Precognition-Attuned Crystal – Tier 1.

Contains a small amount of precognition-attuned energy. Useful in crafting.

There were crystals there for all four of his higher affinities. Healing must have been deemed to be too low for him to add sufficient value. These were clearly the simplest of items, so he focused on the jewellery, bracelets, rings, and amulets.

Bug Zapper – Tier 1

Defensive artefact rated to fry twenty tier-three insects.

And then there was the example with precognition built in.

Intelligent Bug Zapper – Tier 1

Defensive artefact rated to destroy twenty tier-three insects. Will ignore any insects that are not going to do material damage to you. i.e. nonvenomous ones. Venomous bugs that you already have immunity to are also excluded from the active effects. This feature greatly increases lifespan and makes this defence superior to most when in an area where only a small proportion of the insect population carries debilitating or lethal venoms or infectious vectors.

Tom remembered his first day in Existentia, when they had besieged by thousands of wasps. These wouldn’t have helped then, but if you were exploring and the bugs were a secondary threat, they would be a pleasant quality of life bonus.

Across from him, April clicked her fingers.

“Don’t get lost in the details until I’ve explained how this process works. You are capable of getting over the fifty percent value added hump for all these items. There are two types of effort. The first is the refining of base materials. Basically, shaping rock or wood into more useful forms and potentially increasing its quality as you do so.”

“Is that like Earth Manipulation?” Tom interrupted.

“Yes, but it’s a skill, so doesn’t require mana. The skill can also improve quality. You’d need a separate spell for that, one which is too mana-intensive for you to consider.”

Tom whistled:

“That sounds valuable.”

She waved that reaction aside:

“It’s weak. Too weak for combat. You’d have to advance it all the way to tier five before it could even compete with the tier zero spell version. Of course, if you manage to progress it that far, it’ll effectively become a pseudo-domain, because everything is free. Anyway, stop distracting me. Your ability to concentrate puts me on a timer.”

“My what now?”

She laughed:

“You’ll become bored soon and want to go and hit something and I need to finish this before then.” She stuck out her tongue. “As I was saying, you can shape base material into more useful versions, and the second method is to infuse specific energy into an object via a skill.”

“Not a spell?”

“Doing it via mana would get results faster, but mastering the skills will be a lot more valuable long term. Specifically, I recommend you make this.” She held up an elaborately shaped bracelet.

Artefact: Trapped Danger Sense – Tier One.

This bracelet has a single charge of the tier 2 ability Danger Sense. It provides a single warning to help you avoid an otherwise mortal or crippling blow.

Bracelet will break after use.

“This, according to my calculation, has the highest-expected value add per hour of your time, but there’s a downside to going down this path.”

“And what’s that?”

“Cost. I charge five thousand credits for each base skill that I give you, and to make this you would need wood shaping, ritual crafting, and precognition infusion.”

He whistled at that price. “That’s fifteen thousand. How long will that take to pay back?”

“My estimate is six hundred hours of work. If you split your time in here between this and spear mastery, then in a year you’ll be positioned to start doing new things.”

“I presume I could do a stone version. Why would I do wood? My earth affinity is higher.”

“Because wood holds the charge better, so there are greater profits. More importantly, I think wood shaping will be superior long term. You’re going to be able to create and enhance your spears. I know you can make them out of stone, but for most things wood is going to be best, especially given your ability to infuse elemental damage into them.”

“You mean my newly-acquired ability.” She didn’t respond. But she also didn’t need to. It was an obvious conclusion to draw: if he had ten years of experience making bracelets, infusing his magic into future weapons would be easy. “Still, it’s fifteen thousand.”

“Tom,” she interrupted him. “I strongly recommend you do this.”

He sighed. “Well, let’s get started.”