Strength: D (300)
Stamina: D (300)
Mana: D (300)
Resistance: D (300)
Agility: D (300)
Skill: S+
That was Falandia’s status when translated to Japanese. It did not have any personal information, had Mana in place of Mind, and had another attribute known as Skill, which was also the only attribute without numbers. This was the norm in Falandia, and it was the absence of that last attribute that made his situation complicated.
The attribute, Skill, is a combination of one’s technique, knowledge, experience, handiness, and various other related abilities. The higher this attribute is, the more a person is able to make use of his other attributes. Falandia’s training focuses mostly on raising this one attribute, and the number within the parentheses represents the percentage.
For argument’s sake, let’s say a physical strength of D has a maximum value of 100, while an A has a maximum value of 1,000. A person with S+ in Skill will be able to use up to 300% of his strength, while a person with a D in Skill will only be able to use at most 10%. So even if the former only has a D in strength, while the other has an A, the former will still be about 3 times stronger than the latter. On top of that, because low skill normally results in lots of wasted power, the resulting strength is actually even less than 10%, usually ending up somewhere less than half. When he had the opportunity to check the students’ statuses, he found that even the higher leveled ones only had an E+.
The team led by the Senba siblings, for example, has seen their fair share of fights despite being beginners; hence, all of their members had an E for skill, making 1 – 3 percent of their stats their limit.
This is the reason why in Falandia skill is considered the most important attribute, and the reason why this information could send the world to chaos.
Until now the rank of one’s attributes have been the basis of all appraisal, but that’s only because they didn’t know of the existence of skill.
Perhaps, if word of the new attribute were to get out, those with low attributes may be saved, but it will certainly bring great chaos to society and countless humans.
That was Garesto’s common sense, after all, a fact they have believed in for all these years; and to Earth, a knowledge they learned these past 8 years. If word of the new attribute were to get out, that would be the same as telling them that everything they’ve believed was a lie.
But what he really feared was the vengeance of those who were once denied and the fall of the current powers, for with that came the worsening of the public order and – at the same time – a delay in the establishment of new laws, leading to even more violence.
Of course, there was always a chance that such things wouldn’t come to pass, but in the case such things did come to pass, the resulting chain of events would be unstoppable.
Perhaps Falandia might have a way of stopping such a crisis, but he did not. At least, not yet.
That was one of the reasons why he tries so hard to keeps his strength under wraps. It is also the reason why he is currently depressed despite the promotion of his skill.
“Ahh… But why all of the sudden?”
The black figure hung his head and sighed.
His skill was still at Rank S before coming here, but that was already within the realm of legends over at Falandia, so he thought for sure it would stop there.
The attribute, skill, promotes after learning various new techniques and gaining new experiences. Garesto’s way of fighting, which was by relying on the strength of their weapons and their skills (preprocessed abilities) would usually be unable to promote it. Moreover, it was also not an attribute that could be promoted within a short time, though things were somewhat different given his high rank in skill.
“Could it be… Because I went to the academy?”
And then, it finally hit him.
“Because I studied another world’s fighting method, their weapons, and how they use their skills, could it be that that ended up fulfilling the condition of learning new techniques and gaining new experience? …No way, right?”
The higher one’s skill is, the easier it is for him to make new experiences and techniques his own. Those with low skill might only gain a new card after learning something, but for people with high skill such as him, the little knowledge he gained was enough for him to devise new fighting methods.
“What the hell!?
I go all the way out here to hide and yet I end up raising my rank instead!?
Are you serious?
That’s it. I give. I give. I don’t care anymore. I won’t do anything until graduation!
I’m going to peacefully pass these three years and no one will even know I exist!!”
Shinichi stood up and declared that boldly, but try as he might to sound convincing, a voice within still told him it was impossible.
Of course, he knew that, but he still had to say it out loud, or else he’d lose his mind. After all, ever since coming back here, nothing’s gone right for him, and he’s been getting hit with one shocking turn of event after another. Even his attendance to Garesto’s academy in Kutoria was supposed to allow him a moment of reprieve, but alas, even that wasn’t turning out as he’d hoped.
“I wonder why my choices keep having the opposite result.”
Shinichi deeply sighed and held his head.
Things probably wouldn’t have turned out like this if it were someone else. Suddenly, Shinichi really felt like nagging at someone.
“I’m not doing this just because, but…”
With his emotions at its peak, he glared at the intruder to calm himself.
It was another monkey-looking raybeast, only it had arrived a little later than the others.
“Hey! The boss monkey over there! You’re gonna help me relieve all this stress!!”
The black figure nonchalantly picked a fight with a giant monkey over 2 meters tall. He even forgot he was currently in Masquerade mode as he jumped up and slammed his fist on the giant monkey’s face. It would be boring if everything ended in one hit, so he made sure to hold back.
“Huh?”
Unfortunately, the giant monkey had not seen his battle with the other raybeasts. Because of that it didn’t recognize him and did not bother to defend itself, which as a result, ended with the giant monkey flying through the air, past the fences, and down the building like some kind of joke.
In the next moment, the sound of metal being squashed resounded and all that hot blood left the black figure. For when he looked down he saw the remnants of one those janitor robots that he’d seen back in the cafeteria.
Fortunately, no one else was around, so the black figure was able to heave a sigh of relief.
“Whew, thank goodness no one was down there.”
He was thankful this city had a rule of not strolling about in the night.
“They won’t be blamed for this, will they?”
They may have been dealing with another horde, but a janitor robot being broken will probably still be counted against them. After all, this area was still under their jurisdiction. It wasn’t his intention to push his mistakes onto someone else, especially not to those siblings.
While wondering what to do, he crushed the rest of the raybeasts with gravity. Unlike other kinds of magic, gravity magic was particularly good at not leaving any traces.
Fire would leave burn marks, water would leave moisture, wind tends to leave some residual mana, but with gravity, he could make it so that no one would even suspect a battle had taken place so long as he destroyed even the glowing organs.
People would probably be able to infer that a raybeast was here because it fell, but if he were to make use of that well, he might be able to make it so that any traces of destruction are solely the raybeast’s fault.
“Maybe I can make it appear so that a stupid raybeast slipped and fell.”
There are security cameras in town, so there’s no point even if he cleans up. Besides, the robots are being monitored, so they’d know either way. Tampering with the data wouldn’t do any good either, since they’ll immediately notice a unit missing.
As he was wondering what to do with the broken robot and the fallen raybeast, a great amount of liquid started pouring out of the robot.
“Sigh, just what am I— Wait, what is that smell? Is that… Gaso… line?”
It’s been a while since he last smelled it, but the moment he smelled that particular smell, goosebumps broke all over him.
Various questions popped in his mind, but he ignored them and casted his special magic.
Sparks erupted from the remnants of the robot.
“Cover it, Gravity (Ga Gorga)!”
Immediately after the robot was covered in gravity walls, the gasoline caught fire, and in the next moment, a flower of fire exploded. All the shock and resulting winds was completely suppressed by the gravity walls, and then as the gravity walls compressed itself, everything inside was crushed.
Cold sweat broke out on the black figure as he sensed the might of the explosion through his control over the spell.
If that explosion were to have exploded in the middle of the road, the surrounding buildings would have surely been destroyed.
“…Why was gasoline in there? And I didn’t sense any photons too.
All the machines here should be operating using photons, so why?”
After seeing that not a single trace was left, the black figure started racking his head again.
There’s no reason to use something that uses gasoline in this city.
One of the appeals of this city is that everything uses photons, so it’s eco-friendly.
He didn’t have any knowledge of mechanical engineering, so he didn’t know if there were any other uses to fossil fuel, but regardless, the amount of gasoline that poured out was excessive.
In the first place, why would janitor robots be moving during this time of the night?
There may not be a lot of people during this time, but this was also the time raybeasts prowled about.
Something felt odd. It felt like he was overlooking something.
—Alright, we’ve wiped them all out!
—It may be our first time, but I’d say we did a pretty good job.
—Yes, thank you!
The victory cries of the students was picked up by his wind magic.
But when he turned to them and saw them, he clicked his tongue.
“Idiot, pay attention!”
And in the next moment, he yelled angrily, kicked himself off the ground, and ran toward them from the building.
“Fly, Wind (Funt)!”
Blowing himself with wind magic, he flew through the air.
He desperately prayed in his heart to make it as he rushed toward them.
Because,
a cleaning robot
was currently headed
toward a defenseless little girl—