So I’m a Spider, So What Vol 2 — Part 6 of 8

Part 6 of 8

Now then, I wonder if those Evil Eye skills I’ve heard so much about have been added to the list?

Whoa. I really can get them now.

These skills definitely weren’t on the list before.

There are a bunch of different kinds, too. How am I supposed to choose just one? This is gonna be tough.

Hey, information brain.

What is it, body brain?

Wouldn’t it be better to get more than one?

Huh? What do you mean?

I mean, you know I have eight eyes, right?

What about it?

Well, doesn’t that mean we can use Evil Eye in up to eight eyes at once?

?! What are you, some kinda genius?!

Heh-heh-heh. Yep, I’m a genius all right.

Oh man. So I am a genius! That means I can get away with just about anything!

That’s right. Wouldn’t it be amazing to use eight different Evil Eyes at the same time?

Yooo. This is crazy. It’s like a whole new world of possibilities.

Although, one eye is using Telescopic Sight, so that only leaves seven.

We should probably make sure we still have normal vision, too, so wouldn’t it be six?

I guess so. So we’ll pick one for now, then get five more as we get more skill points?

Sounds good. Then, body brain, which Evil Eye should we get first?

I’d say we should go for one of the attributes we don’t have, so either Curse or Petrification. The Heretic kinds seem more like they’re meant for use on people than for fighting monsters.

That’s a good point. I think I’d go with Curse, then. Petrification seems to take a while, judging by our experiences with that stupid lizard in the Upper Stratum.

It’s that much more powerful for the time it takes, though. But you’re probably right. Curse would be safer.

Good ol’ me. I really know what I’m talking about.

I’ll take the Cursed Evil Eye, then.

<Curse: Weakens all stat values and causes damage to HP, MP, and SP>

Cursed Evil Eye level 1, get! Sweet.

Obviously, I have to find a monster to test it out on tout suite!

Maybe the info from Mr. Detection can help me here.

Hmm. Hmm, hmm, hmm. Looks like there’s something over there.

It’s still too far away to get detailed intel, but whatever it is, it seems to be on land.

Perfect. I’ve found my lab rat.

Oh, it’s an evolved frog.

Boy, that brings back memories. This guy looks like the upgraded form of those frogs I used to eat.

Doesn’t seem like it’s that much stronger than they were, but I think it probably evolved to adapt to the Middle Stratum. It even has Heat Nullification.

Between that and the fact that it has Night Vision despite the constant glow from the magma, I have to assume it came from the Upper Stratum.

It’s pitch-dark in the Upper and Lower Stratum, after all.

Maybe it got lost and couldn’t find its way back, so it evolved out of necessity.

I hope there aren’t any Lower Stratum monsters that wandered in here like that.

If one of those things evolved to adapt to the Middle Stratum environment… Yeaaaah, no.

Also, now that I can see the frog’s skills, it looks like those “spit attacks” were actually Poison Synthesis, the same as mine.

Apparently, it uses the Expel skill to shoot the poison through the air. Ooh… I’d like to get my hands on that myself.

Then I could fire globs of poison that would put the frog’s wimpy attacks to shame.

I wonder if I can get proficiency for it by shooting threads out of my butt or something?

Hey, information brain. Since you seemed busy with some stupid thoughts, I went ahead and synthesized paralysis poison and immobilized the frog.

Ooh, good one, body brain.

Now we can try out the Cursed Evil Eye.

All right, Evil Eye activate!

Yep. It seems to be working just fine.

So how’s this thing work? Oh… Ooh!

The frog’s HP, MP, and SP are slowly decreasing.

Since it’s still only level 1, it makes sense that it’d be slow, I suppose.

Both its yellow and red SP are going down, but the yellow bar recovers faster than the damage can reduce it, so no effect there.

Maybe once the skill levels up, the damage will outmatch the recovery?

Then I can keep my opponents in a constant state of hyperventilation? Ooh, creepy.

But I guess it’d run out of HP and die before then.

HP and SP are usually around the same amount, after all.

Oh, its stats are going down, too.

There’s a little box next to the numerical values that says “decreasing.”

It displays the normal max value of each stat in parentheses next to their current numbers, too.

Oh-ho-ho. So this is what it looks like when you hit something with a stat-lowering attack.

Sure makes it easy to tell the curse is working.

Good old Appraisal always has my back.

Anyway, it looks like Evil Eye isn’t a passive skill, which I guess would’ve been too much to hope for. My MP is decreasing.

But it’s not particularly fast. About 1 point every ten seconds.

And the frog seems to take 1 damage every five seconds or so, so I suppose it’s fairly efficient?

With my current MP, I could keep it active for about fifty minutes, so that seems cost-effective to me.

Plus, once it advances, I’m sure it’ll deal damage more quickly.

Oh, looks like the paralysis is wearing off.

…No, wait, body brain’s already on it with another round of Poison Synthesis. Great job, me. Always quick on the draw.

Hmm. Its HP and stuff are still going down nicely, but the rate has slowed.

The stats were all decreasing at the same pace as its HP and so on until they hit the halfway point, but now they won’t go much lower.

Is there a limit on how much stats can be reduced, then?

Well, guess that makes sense, now that I think about it.

If it kept going, you could end up with 0 defense or something.

Talk about paper-thin. Actually, that’d be so weak that paper would seem strong in comparison.

Still, just bringing its stats down by half is a pretty big deal in itself.

It’s not that big of a difference on small-fry like this frog, but if I could cut the stats of strong monsters like that eel in half…

Monsters sometimes depend on stats even more than skills in battle, so weakening their stats means a significant drop in their combat abilities.

If the eel’s stats were cut in half, for instance, it wouldn’t be much stronger than a catfish.

This could be a real trump card against powerful monsters.

I’ll have to make raising its level my top priority.

Hmm? Huh? The frog died?!

What the hell? I thought it still had some HP left…

The rest of its HP drained in a flash. But why?

Ahh, it ran out of red SP before it ran out of HP.

So that’s why. Guess when you run out of red SP, your HP starts decreasing really quickly.

WHAAAT?!

Yikes. I’ve had some pretty close calls after evolving and stuff, then.

Good thing I had food at the time.

Thanks to Overeating, my red SP hardly ever goes down, but I’ll have to be extra-careful from now on.

At any rate, Cursed Evil Eye seems pretty useful.

Maybe when I have MP to spare, I’ll activate it to earn more proficiency.

Yeah. I’ll make sure I keep at least half of my MP in case of emergencies, then use the rest to work on Evil Eye.

That should be easy, since I can keep it active while I’m walking.

Okay, but this Evil Eye is totally magic, isn’t it?

I mean, it drains MP, and it’s clearly some kind of supernatural phenomenon that ignores the laws of physics.

Although, that seems true of a lot of other skills, too…

So what’s the difference between magic and those other skills?

I don’t know. Appearance, maybe?

Guess Evil Eye is pretty subtle in that you can’t see its effects unless you use the all-knowing Appraisal.

When you think of magic, you think of something a little louder and flashier, right?

Yep. It’s important to have some flair. I really wanna learn magic.

Sure, Cursed Evil Eye is technically a long-range attack, but it isn’t the immediate impact I’d originally expected.

What I really want is a straightforward, easy-to-understand, ready-aim-fire-boom, long-range attack.

Cursed Evil Eye is useful in its own way, but can you imagine how strong it’d be combined with magic missiles or something?

Damn, wouldn’t that be nice.

Hmm. My quest to learn magic continues, I suppose.

I am a body brain.

As yet, I have no name.

Listen, I gotta vent about the information brain for a moment, okay?

What an idiot.

Take a little while ago, for instance. She wanted to learn some shooting skill or other, so she was all, “Shoot thread out of my butt!” So I tried, but it shot out with more force than I expected, and— Splat! Went right into the magma.

It caught fire immediately, of course.

If I hadn’t severed the thread in time, we’d have gone up in flames by now.

So basically, she’s always making these stupid suggestions, and I’m the one who has to deal with the consequences.

I don’t think a single one of her ideas has worked out yet.

Although, I guess I’m also the one who goes along with them every time…

Still, I wish she’d come up with some better ideas.

Couldn’t you think these things through a little?

Why is the one who’s supposedly the brains of this operation so damn clueless?

Are you stupid or what?

Yeah, I think she must be.

That’s why I, the body brain, have to keep things together.

My actions mean life or death for both of us, after all.

Body brain, body brain!

What is it, information brain?

Do you think we can combine Evil Eye with Telescopic Sight?

?! What are you, some kinda genius?!

Heh-heh-heh. Yep, I’m a genius all right.

Oh man. So I am a genius! That means I can get away with just about anything!

That’s right. Would using Evil Eye from a long distance be wicked or what?

Yooo. This is crazy. It’s like a whole new world of possibilities.

Okay, then let’s find some prey!

Whoo-hoo!

I am an information brain.

As yet, I have no name.

So using Telescopic Sight and Evil Eye together didn’t work. Hrmph.

I guess it really was too good to be true, huh?

At least keeping Telescopic Sight active all the time has raised it to level 5.

The distance and amount of magnification it can do has risen quite a lot compared with level 1.

If I could just apply Evil Eye to this, I could attack from a pretty fair distance, but seems like that isn’t actually an option.

Oh well. Evil Eye is still pretty useful.

Since I’ve been using it whenever I have the MP to spare, it’s level 3 now.

It seems to level up pretty slowly.

But I haven’t been using my MP much in the Middle Stratum anyway, so that’s fine.

At some point, I noticed using Evil Eye doesn’t affect my vision.

I couldn’t combine it with Telescopic Sight, but it seems to be perfectly compatible with Vision Enhancement and such.

If I can see just fine while using it, there’s no reason to make sure I keep one eye free for it.

Now I’m one step closer to my dream of having eight different evil eyes at once.

Also, it seems like you can’t use any of the attribute-adding skills on Evil Eye.

I tried it with Poison Attack, but it didn’t work. So be it.

Just like combining it with Telescopic Sight, that probably would’ve been too overpowered anyway.

If I could combine my deadly poison with Evil Eye, I’d be like some anime character who can kill with a glance.

Just being able to weaken things and inflict damage simply by looking at an enemy seems broken enough as it is, so it’d be greedy to ask for even more.

I thought maybe I wouldn’t be able to activate these skills in all eight eyes at the same time, but it looks like that actually works.

However, it doesn’t change the effect.

Since I’m using it in eight eyes simultaneously, I’d hoped it would multiply the effects eightfold, but no such luck.

However, the several-eyes-at-once thing turned out to be pretty useful for Telescopic Sight.

Depending on how I use it, I can monitor several locations concurrently and zoom in as needed.

Anyway, on a different note, can we talk about the body brain for a second?

What an idiot.

Take a little while ago, for instance. I wanted to try to get the Expel skill, so I suggested we try shooting thread out of my butt. So she was all, “Great idea! Let’s try it right now!” and proceeded to fire it on the spot. Toward the magma.

She said it was “more force than I expected” or whatever, but what kind of idiot does that in the direction of magma in the first place?

Of course, the thread went straight into the inferno with a splat and ignited.

The flames were coming at me like a fuse! It was awful.

Luckily, the body brain cut the thread in the nick of time, but we were this close to my butt getting set on fire.

Essentially, she jumps at my suggestions like an idiot and takes them too far.

Or should I say takes them in the completely wrong direction?

I mean, what good is it making genius proposals if my body brain is too incompetent to enact them?

Couldn’t you think these things through a little?

Has operating the body all this time turned you into a meathead?

Are you stupid or what?

Yeah, I think she must be.

That’s why I, the information brain, have to keep things together.

My instructions mean life or death for both of us, after all.

Information brain, information brain!

What is it, body brain?

I was playing with Telescopic Sight and found a monster.

For real? It’s not in range of my Detection yet.

Heh-heh. Maybe you’re becoming obsolete, information brain?

Shut up, body brain. You couldn’t provide more information than me if you had a hundred eyes.

Bwa-ha-ha, enjoy that while it lasts! You’d better watch your back, pal!

Pfft, I’m not holding my breath on that threat. Go ahead and try to catch up with me!

Heh-heh-heh.

Ba-ha-ha.

So what should we do?

We’ll hunt it, of course.

Aye, aye, sir. Come on, guys! Battle stations!

Whoo-hoo!

Another day of roaming the Middle Stratum.

Hmm. I’ve been here quite a while now, but there’s still no end in sight.

Guess this really is the biggest labyrinth in the world.

If a human tried traversing it, they’d probably have to be prepared to devote their entire life to the endeavor, wouldn’t they?

But it’s a piece of cake for me, of course!

Yep, I’m the best!

Evolving made my stats a lot better, and my skills are coming along nicely, too.

Is there any enemy in the Middle Stratum capable of challenging me anymore?

And if not, doesn’t that mean I’ll totally dominate once I get back to the Upper Stratum?

Heh-heh-heh. I’ve spent a lot of time struggling just to survive, but things are really going my way now!

Once you’re not constantly one blow away from death, this gamelike world is actually kinda fun.

Oh? Ooh? Ooooh?!

Finally. I finally maxed out Appraisal!

Oh man, I’m so pumped!

Appraisal, the first skill I ever picked up, the skill that’s been with me through thick and thin, has reached its final form at long last!

I still remember how incredibly useless it was at first.

Then, each time it leveled up, there were subtle improvements.

What joy I felt as it gradually became more useful!

Especially when it shed its veneer of mere adequacy and became truly fantastic.

My dear Appraisal. No matter how much I complained about you, you kept working hard and growing.

And now, you’ve developed into a skill that anyone would be proud to call their own.

You finally made it! Waaah!

At last. At long last. I’m so emotional!

Thanks for everything, Appraisal! You and I are just getting started!

…Still, no evolution or derivative skills, huh?

No, no, it’s fine.

Just the fact that Appraisal hit its level cap is amazing enough.

I guess I was just kinda expecting some kind of wisdom-granting evolution or something.

No dice, huh? Since it’s you, Appraisal, I don’t mind either way, but…nothing at all?

I’m shocked.

…There’s seriously nothing?

<Fzzzt…fzzt, fzzt, fzzt……>

…What’s that sound? It’s like radio static…

<Fzzt, request, fzzt…upper administration authority limit, fzzt…>

Huh? What’s going on?

<Fzzt……nistrator Sari…fzzzt…rejected, fzzt…>

Okay, this is bad.

I don’t know what’s bad or why, but this is definitely bad.

<Fzzt…ping!>

Compared with the other sounds, the ping! is so clear that I flinch.

What? What? Whaaaaaaat?

Okay, hold on a second. Something’s wrong. Something is very wrong here.

What’s going on? How did this happen? What do I do?

I’ve gotta calm down. Body brain, let’s take a deep breath.

Huff… Whew.

Okay. Let’s go through this step-by-step.

First, I started hearing that weird noise.

What was that? I have no idea.

Normally, I’d just say there’s no point in racking my brains over things I can’t understand, but this is a little too much to just let it slide.

I mean, this is clearly an abnormal situation here.

Yeah. Abnormal.

Here I’ve been going along all this time acquiring skills and stuff under the assumption that that’s just how this world works.

If this were still Japan, of course, their very existence would be abnormal.

Was it really all right to just blithely accept that skills exist here because “that’s just how it is in this world”?

Up until recently, I thought it was fine. But now I’m not so sure.

I definitely heard the Divine Voice (temp.) say this:

It’s like someone was watching me and made a new skill in direct response to my complaints.

If that’s true, the culprit must be this Administrator D.

And the term “upper” means that this D isn’t the only administrator.

So what exactly do these “administrators” manage?

That’s obvious. Skills.

It’s the only explanation I can think of.

The point is, the skills in this world are granted by a group who call themselves administrators.

But how? And why?

Naturally, I have no idea.

But I do know this much.

There’s something wrong with this world.

A shiver runs down my spine.

I’m overwhelmed with fear, a different sort from what I felt when I ran afoul of the dragon.

Are those administrators laughing at me right now, watching me panic like this?

Terrifying.

The skills I’ve relied on all this time seem like a disturbing mystery to me now.

Am I wrong?

If my skills were given to me by these administrators, then I’ve been dancing in the palms of their hands.

Because the whole time I’ve depended on these skills to survive.

“Gamelike”? “Kinda fun”? I’m a fool.

How could I say that so lightly, when clearly the whole system was deliberately constructed this way by so-called administrators?

If these administrators really do manage the skill system, does that mean they’re watching the goings-on of this world as if it really is just a game to them?

And if so, doesn’t that make me just another character?

That makes them sound almost like gods.

What am I supposed to do now, knowing all this?

What do I do now?

RULING CLASS

Today we have extracurricular activities.

My activity, the exploration class, convenes on a small mountain close to the academy.

Though, “close” is relative, since it takes half a day just to walk there and just as long to get back.

Only students who have passed an exam administered by the academy can participate.

Among us first-years, a total of twelve people received permission to take the exploration class.

We leave the school early in the morning and arrive at the foot of the mountain just before noon.

There we have a final briefing session in the cabin at the base and eat lunch.

After lunch, we get divided into groups and start the ascent.

We’ll spend the whole day exploring the mountain, camp there overnight, and head back down the following morning.

In terms of danger levels, only the weakest, lowest-class monsters live in the area.

Before the exploration, the high school sent some personnel to investigate, confirming that no strong monsters had turned up.

Even weak monsters sometimes evolve and become strong, so apparently, they check before each lesson.

There are several objectives for these outings:

To learn basic survival skills.

To experience an environment inhabited by actual monsters.

To collect medicinal herbs and gain more knowledge about mountains.

The overall goal is to accumulate all these experiences.

Ideally, we’re supposed to do that by remaining safe throughout the trip.

There’s even a penalty if anyone tries to confront monsters directly.

If you are attacked, you can gain points based on how you deal with it, but going out of your way to attack monsters is strictly forbidden.

The class is divided into parties, each consisting of four students and one teacher.

The makeup of these parties is decided by lots, and unless there’s a major balance issue, there’s no switching places.

Unfortunately, Sue, Katia, and Yuri ended up on separate teams from me.

Even more unfortunately, I’m on the same team as Hugo.

Our party consists of myself, Hugo, Ms. Oka (aka Filimøs), and Parton, a knight’s son. The teacher in charge is Professor Oriza, our magic instructor.

Parton and I are more than just acquaintances, but we don’t quite have a proper friendship.

Parton’s father was a former baron, but he worked his way up to the peerage rank of count through his military accomplishments.

He also trained his son quite rigorously, so Parton specializes in physical-based skills.

His strength is also on the higher end in our grade.

Apparently, that’s still not enough to satisfy him, so he devotes himself very seriously to daily training.

He tends to act very deferential toward me, so while we talk sometimes, I don’t think we’re particularly close.

Professor Oriza is a middle-aged magic teacher.

He seems fairly unmotivated compared with the other teachers. That he’s only here because it’s his job is pretty transparent.

Clearly, he’s not a fan of dealing with trouble, so when Hugo and I were assigned to his party, he made no effort to disguise his irritation.

Seems like the fact that Hugo despises me is common knowledge.

However, since Professor Oriza is a teacher and all, his combat abilities are definitely high enough to deal with any issues.

Though he specializes in magic, he also has the skills for close-range combat, and his attributes are certainly high compared with any student’s.

If anything unexpected happens, the teacher has to protect the students, so it wouldn’t make sense for a weak teacher to accompany us on this field trip.

What does surprise me is Filimøs, formerly Ms. Oka, actually participating.

She often vanishes without warning.

It seems to me she’s working behind the scenes, but she won’t tell us what she’s doing.

If it requires her to skip class without permission, she must be pretty busy.

So I wasn’t expecting her to show up for a class that lasts almost two full days.

That said, considering my situation with Hugo, I’m pretty glad to have her around.

This way, if Hugo tries to pick a fight with me, Ms. Oka is sure to intervene.

“All right, that’s it for now. After you’ve all finished lunch, please break up into your groups and set out.”

The teacher in charge of the excursion concludes the briefing.

Once we’ve eaten, we’ll be heading out with our parties.

“Well, my dear brother, we must part for a short while. It’ll be terribly lonely.”

“Sue, it’s only for one day.”

“Even one day is too much to bear. When I consider what could happen to you while I’m not around, I doubt I’ll be able to sleep at night.”

“It’ll be fine, okay? They’ve already confirmed the mountain’s safe. Nothing’s going to happen.”

I pat Sue on the head reassuringly.

“Shun, be careful of Hugo, all right? He seems to have gone completely crazy in this world.”

“…Got it.”

Katia’s quiet warning before we part ways keeps echoing in my mind.

Crazy, huh…?

He certainly does seem more fixated on gaining power than ever.

By gathering so many promising young men as his followers, he’s basically building a base for a future army.

I’m sorry, but he’s like a kid playing king of the mountain.

He was always a bit self-centered and childish, but since he reincarnated, it’s only gotten worse.

Well, I’ll just have to be careful to avoid pissing him off with some minor misstep.

Apart from my own private worries, our exploration has been going smoothly.

We arrive in the designated camping area without running into any monsters.

“Sir Schlain, is this the camping point?”

“I think so. Looks like we got here earlier than planned.”

“Oh, young boys have sooo much energy. A little lady like me had suuuch a hard time keeping up, you knooow!”

“Yeah, right. Your stats’re pretty high, aren’t they, Oka? You should have no problem with this crap.”

“If you ask meee, a gentleman would pretend not to know that and treat a lady with kindness anywaaay!”

“I ain’t wastin’ my time fawnin’ over chicks, thanks.”

“Aah, I suppose some girls go for the bad-boy type anywaaay.”

While Hugo argues with Ms. Oka, Parton and I start setting up camp.

Professor Oriza simply watches us in silence.

“Sir Schlain, could I ask you to hold that, please?”

“Yeah, sure. Like this?”

“Precisely. Then if we just do this and this…”

“Gotcha. Hey, it’s done. Thanks, Parton.”

“Not at all. In fact, I apologize for troubling you to help. I ought to have done it on my own, but…”

“Parton. Social status doesn’t matter at the academy. So you don’t need to worry about it so much, all right?”

“That’s certainly part of it, but, Sir Schlain, I respect you on a personal level as well. I do these things of my own free will. If anything, there’s no need for you to be so apologetic about it.”

I’m taken aback by Parton’s frank gaze.

Why do he and other people—like my sister, Sue—feel compelled to fawn over me so much?

I don’t understand it.

After we finish establishing our camp, we’re still ahead of schedule, so we have a bit of time to kill.

We decide to check out our surroundings a bit.

Each of us will act independently, exploring in a small area without straying too far.

I’m somewhat opposed to the idea, but we agree to stay within hearing range of each other’s voices.

That way, if anything happens, the other members will be close enough to come running.

And that’s how I wind up alone on the mountain.

If you collect medicinal herbs and other edibles on your own, you can get extra points.

So I activate Appraisal, and now I’m looking for herbs.

Suddenly, I hear the sound of swords clashing.

It’s coming from nearby, where Parton should be exploring.

The sound is muffled, as if one of the swords is either specially forged or the wielder is using the Silence skill.

But with Auditory Enhancement, my ears pick it out clearly.

I make to dash toward Parton only to find someone blocking my path.

It’s Hugo.

“Yo.”

“What are you doing, Hugo…no, Natsume?”

Hugo greets me pleasantly enough, but it does little to ease my nerves.

“Oh, you know, I was just thinkin’ that now would be as good a time as any to get rid of you.”

Hugo’s voice is calm, but I can barely believe my ears.

I can’t help but gulp.

“You’re joking, right?”

“Do I look like I’m joking? You’re an eyesore, and I’m sick of it.”

At that moment, the light smirk vanishes from Hugo’s face.

“See, this world exists just for me… I’m gonna be the strongest guy alive and take over this whole place. So it don’t make sense for someone to be on the same level as me, or maybe even stronger, now does it?”

“What the hell are you saying? This world doesn’t belong to anyone. Come back to your senses already.”

“My senses, huh? But you can do anything in this world if you have the right skills. It’s like a dream! Obviously, it exists only for me. But a world like that doesn’t need losers like you in it. So die.”

Hugo draws his sword. I have no choice but to do the same.

I don’t believe this. Is he insane?

I knew he hated me, so I thought something might happen during this trip, but I never would have guessed he’d try to kill me, especially for such a ridiculous reason.

He’s serious, isn’t he?

I mean, I know this isn’t a joke, but…

It still doesn’t seem real.

And yet, I can hear my heart pounding like a drum in my ears clearly, and my hands tremble as I clutch my sword.

I try to swallow the confusion and panic and check Hugo’s status.

<Human LV 31 Name: Hugo Baint Renxandt

Status: HP: 628/628 (green) MP: 566/566 (blue)

SP: 609/609 (yellow) : 502/611 (red)

Average Offensive Ability: 608 Average Defensive Ability: 599

Average Magical Ability: 546 Average Resistance Ability: 522

Average Speed Ability: 583

Skills:

[HP Auto-Recovery LV 4] [MP Recovery Speed LV 4] [MP Lessened Consumption LV 4] [SP Recovery Speed LV 8]

[SP Lessened Consumption LV 8] [Destruction Enhancement LV 7] [Cutting Enhancement LV 7] [Impact Enhancement LV 4]

[Flame Enhancement LV 4] [Magic Power Perception LV 8] [Magic Power Operation LV 5] [Magic Warfare LV 5]

[Magic Power Conferment LV 4] [Magic Power Attack LV 2] [Mental Warfare LV 7] [Energy Conferment LV 7]

[Energy Attack LV 7] [Flame Attack LV 3] [Paralysis Attack LV 2] [Swordsmanship LV 6]

[Throw LV 5] [Spatial Maneuvering LV 6] [Hit LV 8] [Evasion LV 8]

[Stealth LV 3] [Silence LV 1] [Emperor] [Concentration LV 9]

[Prediction LV 3] [Arithmetic Processing LV 3] [Fire Magic LV 5] [Destruction Resistance LV 2]

[Impact Resistance LV 2] [Cutting Resistance LV 3] [Fire Resistance LV 3] [Poison Resistance LV 2]

[Paralysis Resistance LV 1] [Pain Resistance LV 1] [Vision Enhancement 10] [Telescopic Sight LV 1]

[Auditory Enhancement LV 10] [Auditory Expansion LV 1] [Olfactory Enhancement LV 8] [Taste Enhancement LV 7]

[Tactile Enhancement LV 8] [Longevity LV 5] [Magic Hoard LV 4] [Instant Body LV 5]

[Endurance LV 5] [Herculean Strength LV 5] [Sturdy LV 5] [Monk LV 4]

[Talisman LV 3] [Acceleration LV 5] [n% I = W]

Skill Points: 350

Titles:

[Monster Slayer]

He’s strong. Unlike mine, his stats lean a little heavily toward the physical side.

And unlike me, he’s been actively acquiring skills with his skill points.

The most concerning is the Emperor skill.

<Emperor: Increases the effects of skills. Additionally, can inflict the heresy attribute effect “Fear” on an opponent through intimidation.>

I can resist the Fear effect.

But increasing the effect of all his other skills is a big problem.

Hugo swings his sword at me.

I meet his blade with my own.

Oof, so heavy!

“Hey, guess what? I know you haven’t used your skill points at all. You haven’t even leveled up. Points exist to be used, you know! Just like this!”

Hugo’s sword starts gushing flames.

I just barely manage to avoid it.

“Make it quick and die, will ya? If this gets too out of hand, the other groups might notice.”

“You really think you can get away with doing something like this?”

“Sure, why not? I’m the future ruler of this world. Obviously, I can do whatever I want! Besides, I’ve got it all planned out. My lackeys should’ve made short work of the others by now. Once I finish you off, we’ll just release the monsters we brought along. Strong ones that wouldn’t normally show up around here. Then we’ll just say they suddenly appeared and devoured a bunch of poor students and teachers, get it? And that I defeated them and survived.”

“You don’t think anyone will suspect you with a half-baked plan like that?”

“Who will? What’re they gonna say? This ain’t Japan, you know. I’m the future sword-king! Who would dare speak against me just ’cause something’s a little fishy? You think they wanna start an international incident? Yeah, right. That’s how things work here. There’s no goody-goody justice system to stop me!”

His words shock me. He doesn’t think like a Japanese person at all anymore.

And he’s accepted that like it’s totally natural.

“See ya. Don’t worry. I’ll remember you in some tiny fraction of my memories.”

His sword gathers huge flames as it swings downward.

However, it doesn’t reach me.

Hugo’s body is suddenly blown backward.

“Natsume. You’ve gone way too far.”

A cold, intimidating tone with no trace of the usual drawl.

An overwhelming presence unsuited to such a tiny elf.

Ms. Oka.

“Your plan’s failed, Natsume. All of your subordinates have been arrested. And I took the liberty of disposing of the monsters you brought.”

“Wh-what?!”

“It seems you were so preoccupied with Shun that you wrote me off far too lightly. I’m sorry, but I can’t let your little rampage go unchecked anymore.”

Our teacher walks over to the fallen Hugo.

He tries launching a surprise attack at her, but—

“Guh?!”

—something invisible knocks him back down to the ground.

It must be the same force that blew him away a minute ago.

I’m guessing it’s some kind of wind magic.

Ms. Oka’s hand grasps the top of Hugo’s head. Then, I sense the flow of magic power.

She seems to have cast some kind of spell on him.

“Activate ruler’s authority. Activating ruler-exclusive skill at the ruler’s request. Consent to activation?”

“Consent granted.”

A flat voice emerges from Hugo’s mouth. It doesn’t sound like him.

Is she hypnotizing him using forbidden Heretic Magic?!

My surprise doesn’t end there. In fact, that’s only the beginning.

Before my eyes, Appraisal shows Hugo’s stats rapidly decreasing.

On top of that, his skills are disappearing.

In a matter of seconds, all of Hugo’s skills are gone except for the mysterious one with the garbled letters.

“What?! What did you do to me?!”

Hugo bellows as soon as he returns to his senses.

“I lowered your stats and revoked your skills.”

“Huh?! That’s impossible!”

“Shun, what does Appraisal say?”

“…Just as you said, ma’am. All his stats have dropped to thirty. Plus, his skills are gone.”

“Wh…? How…?”

“This world does not belong to you. I would strongly advise you to reflect on your actions and start trying to live a normal life. Nothing good will come of you acquiring skills and getting stronger anyway…”

Hugo is absolutely dumbfounded. I’m confused, too.

After that, the exploration class is suspended.

Parton, Professor Oriza, and the others are all safe.

It seems to have been a close call, but thanks to Ms. Oka’s intervention, no one was seriously injured.

All of Hugo’s minions who’d attempted to attack people were captured.

However, none of them would admit to their connection with Hugo, and he cut ties with them as well.

Apparently, a more detailed inquisition will be initiated at the academy, but judging by how it’s gone so far, I doubt much will happen.

Hugo is confident he can talk his way out of it, so he may already have some sort of contingency plan.

Everyone, including me, is completely focused on Hugo right now.

So no one notices the monster, released surreptitiously, quietly following us back.

WISDOM

…Not long ago, I would’ve thought these were crazy good.

Well, to be honest, I still think that, but it doesn’t feel like something to celebrate.

Ugh. Uugh. Uuugh. Aaargh!!

Enough already! I don’t wanna think about it! What’s the point of getting hung up on it anyway?

Even if these administrators or whatever do exist, what am I supposed to do about it?

I’m just a spider.

What can one spider do against a bunch of godlike freaks?

Nothing, of course.

So why shouldn’t I just keep living my life as I please?

Stalkers? Peeping toms? Do your worst.

I don’t care if you’re an administrator or a god or what. Go ahead and watch. I’ll show you a life you won’t soon forget!

I’ll shine like a comet until I burn into nothing!

Feast your eyes on my glorious life!

Information braiiin!

What is it, body brain?

We’re on fire!

I know—I’m totally fired up right now!

No! I mean we’re physically on fire!

Huh?

The thread, the thread!

Wh-whaaa…?!

You were spacing out, so we forgot to cut it off, and now we’re on fire!

What’s wrong with you?! Don’t just report to me about it—put it out!

Hot! Hot! Synthesize some poison! Hurry!

All right, Weak Poison comin’ up!

Geh?! Now I feel numb!

Oh nooo! I forgot Weak Poison still had paralysis attached!

Seriously, what’s WRONG with you?!

So hot! So numb!

I-I-I-I’ve become so numb!! I can’t f… Aaaah! Our HP!

No more jokes! We’re gonna die!

Oh, our HP reached 0.

Wha—?!

Activate Perseverance! As long as we have MP to sacrifice, we’ll be revived with 1 HP!

Ooh!

But if we don’t put the fire out, it’s gonna run out again! Are we still paralyzed?!

Almost… There, it wore off!

Okay, this time I’m synthesizing Weak Poison sans Paralysis! And we’ll set it to the max amount, while we’re at it!

Whoa?! That’s a huge glob of poison!

Ouch. It crushed us. Our HP’s down again.

Ugh. But at least it put the fire out.

Oh, you’re right. Well, now we know Perseverance works, so I guess it worked out all right?

How is any of this remotely all right?

Look, just don’t worry about it.

I mean, what kind of first KO is this?

Don’t worry about it.

Right…

Our MP’s down to about half now.

If we didn’t have Wisdom, that would’ve meant death.

Good thing we got Wisdom, then.

But it was because of Wisdom that this happened in the first place…

Don’t worry about it.

Skills really are handy, aren’t they?

They sure are.

I don’t know why someone would make skills and distribute them, but I guess since they’re there, we might as well use ’em, right?

Guess so. Yeah. Let’s go with that.

So Wisdom functions sort of like a somewhat powered-up combination of Appraisal and Detection.

I might as well just start calling it Professor Wisdom at this point.

For one thing, it’s added details to status Appraisal results for powered-up items.

If I double-Appraise these details, I can access even more information about them. It’s wonderful.

Attack and defense, for instance, give detailed numerical values for each part of the body.

Thanks to that, I learned that my scythes are the strongest attack area on my body, and my defense is pretty much even throughout.

The defense power of the main trunk of my body is a little low, but since I specialize in evasion anyway, I just have to make sure I don’t mess up and get hit there.

My speed is also broken down into reflex speed, instantaneous speed, persistent speed, and so on.

They’re mostly around consistent, but instantaneous speed is a little higher than the others.

And then there’s magic. Where do I even begin?

There are a lot of different entries—magic attack power, rune speed, rune stability, rune strength, and so on—but every one of them aside from attack power is maxed out.

99,999, apparently. That’s not average at all!!

I suppose this must be thanks to the Height of Occultism skill.

It did say something about maximizing rune stats, so this must be what it meant.

So. This must mean that I can use magic now, right?

Fwa-ha-ha. Finally! Finally, I’ll get to use magic!

Oh man. I’m so hyped for this.

But first, I’d better finish going over the results of Professor Wisdom’s assessment.

No need to get ahead of myself.

Last but definitely not least, resistance contained the most important revelation of all.

It shows all of my attribute resistance stats. Now I know what my weaknesses are.

My biggest weakness, of course, is fire.

Even with the Fire Resistance skill, it’s still the lowest number.

Oh, by the way, turns out that having a resistance skill raises your resistance stat for the corresponding attribute.

Aside from fire, I’m also pretty weak to water, ice, and light.

Ice, especially, is almost as low as fire.

I doubt I’m gonna run into any ice attacks while I’m in the Middle Stratum, but it’s still good info to tuck away in the back of my mind.

My highest resistance, on the other hand, is heresy. I do have Heresy Nullification, after all.

My heresy resistance stat is 99,999.

The next highest is my poison resistance.

And surprisingly, the one after that is dark.

So now I know my strengths and weaknesses as far as resistance goes, but you know, I think this may actually apply to my attack capabilities, too.

For instance, if I use fire magic when it’s my weakest attribute, the effect probably wouldn’t be very strong.

On the other hand, the high ones like heresy and dark would probably be really powerful.

I mean, this is still just speculation, but I’m pretty sure I’m onto something.

Moving on, I can see more details about my skills now, too.

Specifically, I can see the proficiency values of all my skills.

It shows how much proficiency I need to get to the next level, too, which will help me level up skills even more efficiently from now on.

I can even see the proficiency amounts for skills I haven’t acquired yet.

Guess what: Now I can look at the skill list even if I don’t have any skill points.

That really caught me by surprise. And all the skills are unlocked, too.

I could definitely waste a whole day just looking at this list.

For one thing, there are some skills that require such a stupidly high amount of points that there’s no way I’m ever gonna get them.

In exchange, of course, they’re incredibly powerful, but I don’t think it’s gonna happen.

Hmm. I wonder if I should stop jokingly calling it the Divine Voice (temp.).

Nah, might as well stick with that.

Oh, right… Where was I?

Yeah, so it turns out there really is an Immortality skill, you know? So I asked the Divine Voice (temp.) how much it costs as a joke, and the answer was…1,000,000 points.

Unreal. I’m never getting that.

But unattainable skills aside, there were some good ones that actually seem achievable if I try hard enough, so I think I’ll save up and get them.

I’ll be using points for Evil Eye skills for a while, but once I’m finished with that and have some to spare, I think I’ll expand my repertoire.

As for the new and improved Detection, turns out that now I can Appraise information I sense with Detection.

However, because the information provided by Mr. Detection is already pretty detailed, there’s usually no need to Appraise it further.

So while it doesn’t seem particularly useful at the moment, there’s certainly no harm having it, and it might still come in handy someday.

Finally, and most important of all, an auto-mapping function was added!

OMG.

And I can even view maps of everywhere I’ve been since I was born, even before I had Professor Wisdom!

This is amazing. Seriously.

The parts of the Great Elroe Labyrinth where I’ve just been wandering around randomly all this time are now totally clear to me on this map!

This labyrinth is way too big…

There’s a partial map of the Upper Stratum where I started, the Lower Stratum where I fell, and the Middle Stratum where I’m currently traveling.

When I tried putting them all together to get an idea of the scale, that alone was easily the size of Hokkaido. And that’s just a fraction of this place?

Anyway, based on my estimation of the distance from the Middle to the Upper Stratum, I think I still have a long way to go.

It’s only an estimate—and maybe I’ll get lucky and find a shaft leading upward or something—but I think I’m better off assuming this is gonna be a long trip.

Oh, and that mysterious garbled skill is still impossible to Appraise.

Man, though, I thought I was gonna die back there. In fact, speaking in terms of HP, I’m pretty sure I actually did.

Without Perseverance, I would’ve died for real. Imagine actually suffering such a stupid death. So much for a glorious life.

Mr. Administrator, if you saw all that, could you please delete it from your log? Thanks a lot.

Anyway, I did unintentionally confirm the effects of Perseverance, at least.

Rather than being resurrected if my HP runs out, it’s more like once my HP hits 0, my MP starts getting used up instead.

Judging by how much my MP went down when I was on fire earlier, I think that basically my MP temporarily serves as my HP.

So whatever damage that would have affected my HP gets subtracted from my MP instead.

It’s sorta like my HP and MP are stuck together.

So if I get hit with a really big overkill attack, my MP could all get drained at once, too.

But thanks to Celestial Power, my MP is crazy high now, so I guess I’ve actually become pretty tough.

However, since I also have to use MP for its original purpose, it’s probably better to only think of that as emergency insurance.

So. Thanks to Celestial Power, my magic stats are all crazy high now. It’d be a waste not to use it, right?

That’s where Height of Occultism comes in! Oh yes.

This skill is like the ultimate version of Magic Power Operation, the skill I’ve wanted for so long—the last piece of the puzzle that is using magic!

Wonderful!

On top of that, it’s a package deal that includes all kinds of convenient MP-related skills!

What a bargain!

If you act now, thanks to our friend Professor Wisdom, you can even get it absolutely free!

H-how can that be?!

Don’t worry, we’ve already put it in your cart and purchased it for you!

Congratulations to me!

So yeah, Height of Occultism. This skill is seriously crazy.

It’s like I got maxed-out versions of [Magic Power Operation], [MP Recovery Speed], and [MP Reduced Consumption] all at once.

My MP, which was down to half after I effectively died a little while ago, is already fully recovered.

It recovers at a rate of two or three points per second, so it only took about ten minutes.

Can you believe that? It’s like an all-you-can-use MP buffet.

And since I have MP Lessened Consumption, it should go down way more slowly when it’s not being used for Perseverance.

As long as I don’t mess anything up majorly, I can pretty much use it as often as I want.

Like, I can keep Evil Eye activated all the time, and it recovers so fast, it’s like it doesn’t use any MP at all.

That being the case, I might as well leave it on nonstop.

So, now that the stage is set, I definitely want to use magic for real.

But I still don’t know how.

At least, I didn’t until now! Yes, I’ve finally learned how to use magic!

Once again, this discovery was made possible by Professor Wisdom, which came with a new search feature.

It’s no Spoogle, mind you, but if you look up a word related to the skill system, it’ll display an explanation.

Yes, I finally have a user manual, kinda. Better late than never, right?

And so I research how to use magic.

According to the search, there are several steps you have to complete in order to use magic.

First, you have to recognize magic power. This corresponds to the so-called Magic Power Perception skill.

If you can’t sense the existence of magic power, you can’t use it as fuel to activate any magic spells. So it’s a major building block in the whole process.

Thanks to Professor Wisdom, I’ve got Magic Power Perception on lock.

Part 6 of 8

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