Editing/Standardisation: kubor04
Formatting/Extras: APM
Original Translation: Blastron
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Well then, I’ve got a bunch of skill points, so I’d really like to pick up a new skill. I can’t really do so carelessly, though. I picked up [Appraisal] on a whim and basically immediately regretted it.
While I’ve got my safety secured, let’s spend some time thinking about this. I throw together a temporary home, ignoring the bones of the frog that I’ve finished eating. Man, I’m getting pretty good at putting basic homes like these together.
All right. Time to focus.
What skills shouldn’t I take? [Heresy Magic] has taught me that I should, well, just straight-up avoid anything that has to do with magic. I have no idea how to actually use it! Really, I should steer clear of any skills that I can’t figure out how to use from the name alone.
I should also really avoid buying any skills that I might earn myself. From what I’ve seen so far, each skill has some sort of skill proficiency associated with it. When I’ve accumulated enough proficiency in the skill, the level of the skill goes up. Even if I don’t have a single level in the skill, it looks like proficiency still accumulates, and when I finally get enough proficiency, I get the skill. Granted, the only skills I’ve acquired this way were resistances, so maybe that sort of thing is unique to resistance skills. Still, if there’s a chance that I might be able to learn it by myself, I shouldn’t be spending any skill points on it.
When I look at it that way, maybe spending skill points on [Appraisal] wasn’t actually a terrible idea. How could I have possibly worked to acquire [Appraisal] if I were starting from scratch? It’s also ridiculously fortunate that I figured out how to use [Appraisal] immediately, unlike magic. Man, I’ve been complaining about how worthless and unusable this skill is, but this might be one of the rare few skills that are actually usable out of the box.
Okay, so, if I pick a skill, it not only has to be a skill that I can figure out how to use, but also needs to be one that I wouldn’t pick up on my own. That’s actually a pretty harsh restriction, you know! Seriously, all I have to go on is a skill’s name, with no clue about what it actually does, which is, quite frankly, terrifying. On top of that, I have to keep checking with the, uh, “Voice of Heaven” to see if there’s even a skill that matches the name I’m looking for.
From what I’ve seen so far, if I want to spend skill points to acquire a skill, I need to tell the “Voice of Heaven” that I’d like to purchase it. If I ask her about a skill that exists, she responds; if it doesn’t exist, though, she remains silent. So, in order to find out what skills exist, I’ve been constantly spamming the “Voice of Heaven” with requests.
Since I’ve been sending enquiries whenever I’ve got any downtime, I’ve started to put together a list of skills that I might want to pick up. Of those skills, there’s five that meet my criteria: [Poison Claw], [Thread Control], [HP Auto-Recovery], [SP Lessened Consumption], and [Detection].
[Poison Claw] and [Thread Control] are skills that will, hopefully, make me stronger. [Poison Claw] is, well, [Poison Fang], but in claw form, and [Thread Control] is a support skill to help me use my threads more effectively. There’s a couple of problems, though: if I pick up [Poison Claw], it’s probably going to be way weaker than [Poison Fang] at the beginning, and I’m not one hundred percent certain that I’ll be able to figure out how to use [Thread Manipulation].
[HP Auto-Recovery] and [SP Lessened Consumption] are totally background support skills. If they work just like their names imply, they’re going to be extremely handy to have around.
Last but not least is the riskiest choice: [Detection]. In this dungeon, I have a serious need for a way to detect surprise attacks. I think [Detection] is the right skill for the job, but I’m not really sure what its effect will be… or, again, how to even use it. If I pick this skill, it’s a serious gamble.
I’ve found plenty of other skills, but this is the lineup that I’m really interested in. My life is on the line here, so I can’t really afford to be too sentimental here. There’s definitely other skills that I wanted, but didn’t have enough skill points to obtain. Like, you know, [Immortality]. I’m probably off by an entire order of magnitude, on that one.
Hmmmm. I’m torn. I mean, with these skills, I’m not really working to come up with any new strategies, I’m just figuring out how to strengthen my existing ones. Well, this is really what I’m reduced to if I’m trying to avoid picking up any more awful skills. For now, I guess I should pull [HP Auto-Recovery] from the list. If my HP hits zero, I’m probably going to die, right? If I’m an assassin, I should be avoiding any sort of situation where my HP could go down to begin with.
Four more to pick from, hmm… what should I doooo? I mean, there’s [SP Lessened Consumption], which doesn’t really have any downsides I can think of. It’s my safest choice. Picking up [Poison Claw] would probably let me broaden my combat tactics, but getting its level up to a usable point is going to be super slow! If I can figure out how to use [Thread Control], it’ll be a serious boost to my combat ability… but, of course, if I can’t figure it out, then it’s yet another useless skill I’m hobbled with. [Detection], as I mentioned earlier, is a gamble.
Mmmmmmm.
Umf. Alright, I’ve decided.
<Number of skill points currently in possession: 200. Number of skill points required to acquire skill [Thread Control – LV1]: 100. Acquire skill?>
Yes.
<[Thread Control – LV1] acquired. Remaining skill points: 100>
<Number of skill points currently in possession: 100. Number of skill points required to acquire skill [Detection – LV1]: 100. Acquire skill?>
Yes!
<[Detection – LV1] acquired. Remaining skill points: 0>
I’ve picked up [Thread Control] and [Detection]. I know I was just saying things about putting my life on the line, but I’ve seriously just picked up the two biggest gambles from my list. Ahahaaaa… I’m really not cut out for gambling. Well, it’s not like there’s any going back now. I’ve picked up these two skills, and if I can’t use them, I’ll cry.
…I don’t know if spiders can cry, though.
APM - Translation 