Chương 115: Penicillium - Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Four I sat with my back against one of the squat trees, knees up to support a tin bowl full of grub. The nice thing about the system's screens was that they didn't need hands to interact with. Not that I hadn't mastered the art of eating with one hand while holding a book or phone in the other in a past life, but still, it was a nice little bonus.

Name: N/A Alias: Ginger Race: Human {Common} Age: 7 Years Mana: 49/53 Primary Class: [Feronie's Crusader {Epic}] Afflictions - Black Lung {Common} - Child of Poverty {Common} Blessings - Blessing of Feronie {Unique} So, the first bit of my stats hadn't changed... much. I noticed the appearance of a new line that hadn't been there before. Alias. So, the name Ginger had stuck, but not as my actual name. That was interesting.

How would that interact with people who had skills that let them see people's names the way I could see the name of plants? Would they see Ginger as a name, or would they see it split apart? Or would it depend on their skill level and abilities? Probably the latter. I supposed I could continue to use Ginger as a name... but it wasn't my name. I just didn't have one of those, and I kind of found that fitting. It wasn't like I spent any time thinking of myself in the third person anyway, so it didn't really matter.

My afflictions hadn't changed, nor had my blessings. Too bad, but not surprising.

Feronie's Crusader Class Skills - Level Two Hundred Thirty-Eight - Aura of Growth {Rare} - Level Seventy-Four > [Shaped Aura] > [Careful Casting] > [Unrestricted Growth] - Blight {Epic} - Level Sixty-One > [Persistent Death] > [Rigour Mortis] - Ritual of Sporemageddon {Legendary} - Level One - Druid Sight {Uncommon} - Level Forty-Nine > [Druid's Sense] > [Druid's Ear] - Mushroom Magic {Rare} - Level Fifty-Three > [Super Shroom Zoom] > [Mushroom Remaker] I grinned. [Blight] had grown a ton while I was down here.

So had [Aura of Growth] and [Mushroom Magic]. [Druid Sight] had grown a tiny bit, but not by an impressive amount. That wasn't too surprising, I just have to start using that skill more often. I felt a notification, one which was only now pressing for my attention, and of course I accepted it. [You have unlocked a Sub-Skill!] [Congratulations! Your [Blight {Epic}] Skill has unlocked the [Infection] Subskill!] [Infection] Once [Blight] has dug its roots into a victim, the lingering mana will spread through their bodies and can move from host to host as long as they are in physical contact with each other. Blight will now use the affected's own mana to sustain itself. Oh yeah, that was nice. It meant more lingering damage, and sure, it wasn't going to be faster to kill, necessarily, but it might make the skill more efficient.

One small use of [Blight], if it could spread, might be enough to kill someone with the infection alone. Having it be able to spread was just beautiful. I figured the transmission would be through contact only, or maybe near-contact if it travelled off of a person's mana. So, not something that would kill a roomful of people, but something that would make anyone touching the first person hit dangerous. Also, this might be a slight danger to myself.

I was pretty sure I could use [Aura of Growth] as a sort of counter to [Blight] if I applied it correctly. The aura skill seemed to have a slight ability to be... I guess selective was the best way to describe it? It was possible to use the aura to counter [Blight]. It wasn't something I did often because... why would I? But now it might come in handy as a way to purge myself of any lingering effects of [Blight] that might have been transmitted back to me. My class skills, of course, weren't the only to improve.

I'd gained a few levels with my general skills as well. General Skills - Level Two Hundred Sixteen - Running {Common} - Level Fifty-Four > [Surefooted] > [Sprint] - Knitting {Common} - Level Sixty-Four > [Patterner] > [Clicky Clacker] > [Resizer] - Basic Poison Resistance {Common} - Level Thirty-Two > [Mana Bleed] - Social Manipulation {Uncommon} - Level Twenty-Six > [Too Cute to Kill] - Poison Handling Expertise {Rare} - Level Forty Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road.

Report any occurrences. > [Iron Lunged] [Poison Handling Expertise] had hit another milestone! That was fantastic! [You have unlocked a Sub-Skill!] [Congratulations! Your [Poison Handling Expertise {Rare}] Skill has unlocked the [Toxicant Sense] Subskill!] [Toxicant Sense] You now have a subtle sense of what is or isn't toxic, poisonous, or otherwise capable of causing you ill. That seemed perfect! I tossed open my satchel and reached for a [Dead Man's Cough] but paused before I'd even touched it. There!

There was a sense of... something. It wasn't a physical sense, like a sense of temperature or anything like that, but there was something that told me that what I was about to touch was dangerous. I think it felt closest to temperature, in a way, but not quite. I could tell that the bag wasn't any warmer than it should have been, but... yeah, it was strange. Was the skill synesthetic, and it just tapped into my temperature sense first? Would the same subskill work off of sound, or balance, or taste for others?

"You look happy," Tyro said. I smiled.

"I am. You wouldn't believe how many of my skills improved."

"I would," he said.

"Getting challenged is one of the best ways to improve. I got a new subskill too."

'Well done," Phillipe said with a nod.

"Maybe once this is all done we'll celebrate with a beer, hmm?" Tyro's grin only grew at that.

"Sure," he agreed easily. Phillipe was quick to mask his pride, but it was there all the same. I felt a bit of a pit in my stomach for a moment before I pushed past it.

"Hey, Phillipe, do you have more than one class?" His eyebrows rose at the question.

"I do. Though it's usually considered somewhat impertinent to ask someone about their class and skills. Though, that's a taboo that's passing. Sharing things only helps, I find."

"Thank you," I said, genuinely.

"I... don't have many people to share stuff with me. Uh, anyway. How do you get a second class?"

"You need your total skills at or above five hundred," he said.

"And you must keep them that way. Once you have a second class unlocked, you can no longer change your first unless you can do so without dropping below five hundred total levels." So it was doable, but only if you got your new class high enough in levels that you could afford the loss. I didn't think I'd be changing my main class anytime soon. It suited what I wanted to do too well, and I was starting to learn that classes and skills as rare as those I'd gotten weren't the norm. As it was, I still had...

forty-six more levels to go to get my second class. That wasn't too bad, but at the moment most of my skills were slowing down their growth. It was taking more effort, more time, and bigger challenges to reach the next milestones. It didn't help that I had [Ritual of Sporemageddon] stuck at level one. If that skill were something a little more useful, then I could easily imagine myself being at the cusp of getting my second class. Not that I expected a second class to fix everything.

"Can you get a third?" I asked. Phillipe chuckled.

"You can. You need your total levels to be at a thousand five hundred for that." That didn't make sense. Each class had five skills, and you had five general skills. So two classes and five general skills amounted to fifteen total skills. Did you have to have every skill across every class maxed out to unlock a third? That was painful.

"You get more general skills," he added after reading my expression.

"Five more with your second class."

"Oh," I said. That made it all a lot easier. It had only taken me seven years to get to four hundred or so, so someone should be able to hit a thousand five hundred within fifteen years, in theory. I looked at Phillipe, and he shook his head.

"No, I don't have a third class," he said.

"Not yet, in any case. I think, if all goes well, I'll have it by the time I reach my masters in the Delver's guild."

"You'll be impossibly useful then," Tyro said.

"At least, if you have three delving-related classes. Maybe take a pathfinder class, or a trap-disarming one?"

"I think I'll use my third class for myself," Phillipe said.

"Not everything in life needs to be about work. Work gives you meaning, but it also... well, there are other places to find joy, I think." He stretched his back out.

"Speaking of things that are tiring, I'll take the first watch, Tyro, you're on second. Now, get some shut eye; you'll need it."