I dismissed the EXP gain window and the faction relation change window, acknowledged the extra window that appeared after those were closed, and immediately absorbed the skill book.
[The martial style 'Iaido' has been added to your 'Martial Arts' style list.]
Neato, I don't actually own a sword so that skill is kinda useless to me, but whatever it might come in handy in the future. Now to see what random skill I've gained.
[Deceive (Active) Lv1 EXP: 0.0%]
Lying about what you can or cannot do, or do and do not have, or do and do not know, could be useful in the future. Deceiving someone can also be used for misdirection. Just don't dig a hole so big you can't crawl out of, ok?
When deceiving someone, adds a 30% increase to success chance.
"This'll come in handy, I'm positive on that," I muttered to myself. Hell, judging by how well bluffing worked on Adam I could do the same to others and it would have an even bigger chance of working. As long as I can make it look like I can back it up of course, I doubt anyone would believe me if I said I could send an army at them.
I whistled to myself and walked to the large warehouse doors, fingering the large tear in my once fabulous suit. I'm going to have to send someone to get this thing repaired, luckily I have some spares in my inventory. But I'll change later, looking like I can survive a wound like this with no effort might be good for my men's morale.
Once the doors came into full view I saw my henchmen quickly moving boxes with snowflakes on them into the large van's storage. Good, I can already see the Lien roll in and at this rate if things go according to plan I can have the Lien needed in a week, two tops. I doubt I'd find another warehouse full like this that would also be easy to break into, but maybe I could try robbing Dust while it's on its way into the city.
I'll have to look into that later, I don't really have time to waste planning and executing large projects like that. I'll need bullheads and other large transportation vehicles if I want to do that, for now I'll simply rob stores until I'm ready. I'm thinkin' of that place on fifth in the commercial district, not as high quality as you'll find in the upper district but the stores are typically bigger and have a lot more Dust, they cater to the large amounts of low to middle class people. Sometimes quantity has its own quality.
A henchman looked over at me and jumped, "Woah, boss. You alright? That's one hell of a cut."
I sat on a crate and watched the other mooks run back and forth, "I'm fine, just hurry up with the Dust. With that big door open, we're not being discreet here."
He nodded and with a quick apology he hurried back to work after I waved him off with a hand. I took off my hat and examined it, turns out Adam did manage to lop off part of the feather that was stuck in the red band. I sighed and yanked the feather out and tossed it to the side, it was useless for appearances now and in my opinion made the hat look better. With that done I decided to open my options menu, I have some information I need to look over.
Graphics
Audio
Gameplay
Help
I tapped on the help option and quickly pressed the 'new information' subsection. I frowned to myself as I read through it, in a way it's useful for the long run but right now it's just a pain. What is it, you ask? Well most of my skills have prestige levels, which is the idea that once you get a skill or whatever to a certain level, usually max, you can prestige it and it will get even stronger at some sort of cost. For example, in Skyrim once you max out a skill like, say, one-handed, to level one hundred you can turn it 'Legendary'. The skill would reset to level one and you get to keep the perk points you earned and get even more.
If I think back to Adam, his aura was at the bronze prestige, one above the base which is where my aura is currently at. The bronze prestige is shown by the skill having a bronze border around it and a bronze star above the skill icon. I don't know what it adds, the help section didn't offer anything about what it gives you, but it did say that to prestige a skill it must reach level ninety-nine. And the prestige levels range from base to bronze, to silver, and up to gold.
Which means to actually max a skill, I have to max the levels four times. Aura already levels at a slow enough rate, and I wince in agony at the amount of grinding I'll have to go through to get the skill to the true max. As of now 'Aura' is level forty five and I should start to use a ton of aura using skills to my daily workout so I can level it up quicker, it'll help me more in the future than doing just stat grinding. I haven't been getting any stats to my workout lately, it probably means I should increase my weights a lot. They've been feeling light.
And once again I find myself pissed at the loss of the instant dungeons, if I just waited a bit I could have created the time dilation dungeons and power level skills much faster. As it stands I have to do this the slow way.
Still, prestige must have its own benefits. Maxing a skill that often better turn me into an unstoppable force or something, cause that's just a pain in the ass. But anyway, I should go back to look into the Beacon students again. See if each year there adds a prestige or something, it probably doesn't but information is key to success. And survival.
I'm going to be good at that, even if it kills me.
The next day I found myself walking outside the city limits of Vale, I needed to find some Grimm so I can create and practice a bind skill. It didn't take me long to come into contact with some Beowolves, I wasn't hiding my presence.
"Let's see," I tapped a finger to my chin as I examined the Grimm before me and slowly charged my can with a Far Strike. All four of the Beowolves growled as they circled around. "I only need one of you."
I swept my cane in a large arc, catching three of the Beowolves before they could move out of the way. Quickly forming aura rope in my left hand I sent it towards the only Beowolf left, predictably the rope encircled and trapped the Beowolf in its grasp. The Grimm made a surprised yelp as it fell face first on the ground, losing two HP.
It growled in irritation and struggled in its binding.
"Come on, break free already," I muttered with another rope already formed in my hand. As if hearing my plea the Grimm flexed its arms one last time and the aura rope broke apart. I grinned, "There we go!"
I threw my hand forward and let the aura rope bind the Beowolf again, this time a prompt popped into view.
[Through the continuous use of a special action, the skill "Bind" has been created!]
[Bind (Active) Lv1 EXP: 0.0%]
This skill allows the user to tie up an enemy with a pure aura construct resembling rope. The aura construct has physical durability that can be broken with enough force and has a set time limit before it disappears on its own.
Duration: 10 minutes
Cost: 5 MP
I grinned to myself and watched the Grimm squirm on the ground, trying to break free of the skill. It wasn't having much luck, as the rope was part of a proper skill now it was much stronger. I should go look for other Grimm now, I have enough aura to spam this attack and I have nothing else to do today.
I lifted Melodic Cudgel up and pointed its end at the Beowolf's head. With a large explosion the Grimm's head was promptly blown to pieces. I debated at first if I should bother taking the fang or not, I don't exactly craft anything with it. Shrugging, I stuck it into my inventory anyway, I had the room to spare and it might be useful later.
Honestly, I'm starting to think I'm developing a hoarding problem.
I summoned Rumble and he formed above the ground next to me. "What is it you require, Roman?" the earth elemental asked.
"Can you find any Grimm for me?"
The elemental didn't say anything and looked around, Rumble pointed in a seemingly random direction. "There, there are large amounts of dark spawn in that direction."
"Thanks, Rumble," I said. The elemental just nodded its head at me and slowly crumbled into dust. That was fine, I didn't need him to take care of some weak Grimm.
I dashed through the forest, taking care to not ruffle and dirty my new jacket too much. Not two minutes of running and jumping later, I finally caught sight of the first Beowolf. I kicked off a tree trunk and launched myself into the air into a clearing while holding my hand out and shouting in my head, "Bind!"
The first rope shot out of my hand and tied itself around the first Beowolf, it yelped in surprise as it suddenly felt itself fall to the ground and immobilized. I repeated the skill at the rest of the pack, fourteen in total.
['Bind' has risen by 1 level!]
Awesome, that added an extra five minutes to the skill's duration. Just as I tapped out of the notification screen I heard a louder roar from the edge of the small clearing I and the rest of the Beowolf pack was in. I looked over to the treeline and a large Alpha Beowolf charged through the trees. I jumped back in surprise as its claws dug itself into the ground where I was previously standing.
I growled and held my hand out, "Bind!"
The rope shot out of my hand and wrapped itself around the Alpha. It seemed surprised at the move but a quick flex of its muscles had the rope around it shatter.
"Damn, seems I need to level it some more," I said to myself. "No matter, that thing can't hit me and I doubt I'd ever die to it. It'll be great skill practice."
And the Alpha was good practice, it never seemed to tire and broke out of its ropey prison much quicker than its lesser counterparts. And all I had to do for the lesser Grimm was reapply the bind skill to them. Great experience and once the Alpha started to take longer and longer to break out of the skill's hold, got it to level fifteen, I decided to stop grinding and simply kill the Grimm.
I wiped my forehead despite the fact that there wasn't any sweat to begin with. I probably spent a few hours out here in the forest, I should get back to my base and plan another heist before delivering the Dust from the warehouse last night to Walter's. We cleaned that place well, seems Adam didn't inform the police about our little skirmish and our night went by unmolested. Once we finished we threw the tied up White Fang members at the foot of a random police station and dove off into the night.
My scroll rang and vibrated in my pocket, I dug it out and answered, "Hello?"
"Hey boss, that crazy police chick from the jewelry store has been snoopin' around the industrial district all day. She hasn't come near the base yet, but she might start. Just thought I'd warn ya before ya head back from whatever you're doin'," one of my henchmen that were slightly higher on the totem pole said.
Crazy police chick? I squinted my eyes as I tried to remember a crazy police chick, then a face with blonde hair and ridiculous aura levels stuck itself into my mind.
"Right, thanks for the tip," I replied.
"No problem, boss."
I closed my scroll and stuffed it back into my pocket. It seems that Jeanette Arc is going to be a regular pain, sad thing is that I doubt we, the criminals, are going to be able to buy her off. If she was like Juane then I'm sure she has some sort of hero complex. The industrial district isn't exactly patrolled regularly by the police, sure they put in a token amount so that the people of Vale have some semblance of security but the criminal underworld is too rooted there to make a difference. Not unless they want a full blown and open war between the police and the criminals that is.
Plus there was the bribing, bribing helps a lot. Bribing makes heads turn away and ruins the eyesight of people. And of course not everything in the industrial district is a part of the criminal underworld, in fact only a very small and select part of it is. But that small part is very influential, strong, and impossible to get rid of.
As strong as a good part of the police force is, with unlocked aura being the bare minimum requirement and almost all the police applicants have some combat training from a combat school, the criminals are stronger by virtue of having more people to field and more diversity. The police aren't hunters, so their combat capabilities are much weaker and are only really above civilians and the usual henchman. On the other side there are criminals that were ex-hunters or just have hunter level skill in battle, like me... eventually. The run-of-the-mill criminals are kept in check by the police, the stronger criminals were kept in check by the hunters themselves, and the Grimm would attack Vale in the event that any criminals try and take over the city. Which is why no one smart in the underworld even considers it, negative emotions and all that, you know.
The Grimm are dangerous and the first thing you do in the underworld is to keep yourself alive at any cost.
No matter how good or strong you were, an endless wave of monsters is still an endless wave of monsters. I'm the only person could keep up with that kind of battle, and even that could only last until I ran out of Dust crystals.
So, there is a nice equilibrium between the police, the criminals, the hunters, and the Grimm being kept in balance here. A silly girl trying to play hero is just the thing that could upset that balance and ruin everything. Right now I need as little distractions as possible.
So I lit a cigar and sprinted through the forest and back into the city, I had no intention of bothering with the police woman. If I can just keep myself out of her sights then she would not be much of a bother to my plans. Hell, she might even be useful to me, there are a few other kingpins in the city that will eventually get in my way. If I sic her on them and get them captured, that would only mean more profit for me in the long run.
Three days went by and I filled each night with a robbery on a randomly selected store throughout Vale. I sold the Dust I got from the White Fang warehouse, that netted me about a million and eighty thousand Lien. With that I technically had the Lien to buy the ship right now, but a smart person plans for the future and any disturbances. I'm going to hold off buying the ship for now and just stock Dust and other things from robberies until it was time to sell. Dust stores only give so much at a time, they aren't warehouses and I'd rather not make a ton of small sales if I can help it.
The mission from last night was a resounding success, nothing worthwhile happened and we left without a trace. It was a little boring to be honest. Don't get me wrong, boring means things go faster and more efficient but at the same time there just wasn't a huge thrill to go along with it. I was almost hoping for something to happen tonight, but I crushed that hope before I jinxed myself. Boring is good for now, I'll save thrills for me and Neo.
The drive down Vale was silent in the passenger van we were in, the larger van was left back at the base since the store we were heading to wasn't big enough to warrant it. I felt a little uneasy about this robbery, mostly because the guild mission my ability gave me had the difficulty as purple. That meant that it was a story driven mission and not a simple easy, medium, or hard difficulty one. The rewards were much better than the typical mission, but if video games taught me anything then it is that story driven mission tend to have a lot of things to them.
If they were done right, that is.
[Guild Mission! (Story)]
You have targeted some random Dust shop in Vale, steal from it.
Rewards: 50,000EXP, 25,000 Lien, tier 2 title unlocked.
Failure: Decreased respect within criminal underworld, imprisonment.
There wasn't a set goal to steal from this store, hell, I could probably get away with stealing a fucking pencil or something. But that won't net me the most money, so better to do this the right way. The van made a turn around a corner and I could see the Dust shop we were going to rob just down the street. Right smack in the middle of the block too. A tad bit more obvious and noticeable when we steal from it than I would have liked, I personally like stores with alleyways myself, but this was a mission generated by by ability so who am I to argue?
The van squeaked to a stop in front of the store and we all stepped out, I looked over to our driver and said, "Keep the van running and keep a look out."
He silently nodded at me and I and the other henchmen walked right up to the store front. One of my other henchmen jogged up to us with large handled containers. They opened them up and took out some Dust storage tubes and passed them around to a few other henchmen, I invested in a lot of those things and the best part was that I could reuse them as much as I want to. Walter's warehouse has a machine where you can just stick them into it and the machine takes the Dust out of it, leaving you with the tubes to be used again.
I cracked my neck, "Alright boys, let's make this quick."
That said I simply kicked the door in and strolled through the knocked down doorway, my goons rushing past me. The ones with the storage tubes went right for the store's own Dust tube storage, carrying some more of the storage tubes with them. Two with large suitcases went for the store counter where some of the higher quality Dust crystals were on display. The rest fanned out with bags and grabbed whatever they could find, I myself went up to the cash register and yanked a crowbar out. There might only be a few hundred Lien at most in there, but hey, every bit counts.
We were simply minding our own business, robbing this store blind. Then, everything changed when a body crashed through the windows.
(A/N) Fair warning, I don't really want to create an all-powerful god amongst men, but I also can't stop it from eventually happening. Don't get me wrong, our dear protag will most certainly be insanely strong. But that won't be for a while as his main source of EXP now is the guild missions, and as he gets higher leveled it takes longer and longer for the missions to give him levels. And only the harder missions give anywhere over 10,000 EXP.
So, while it is theoretically possible for him to become a god, we won't see it for a good long while. As that kind of power, in comparison to experienced hunters, would be around the mid two hundreds and higher. Not yet counting the power boost say, a maiden, would get.
Plus, a god-tiered character would be boring as hell to write. Every battle would be a rofl-stomp.
Also, our MC is not creating a new kingdom for himself, as a character that just isn't what he wants to do or even consider. After all, there is so much you need to do to keep a kingdom running and survive, it's more than 'create this building there with X magical power and people will flock'. He is a thief and a criminal, not a ruler. It's a fun concept, but not one I, or our MC, would want to explore.
Name: Roman Torchwick
Class: The Gamer
Level: 37 (Next Level: 51,720/70,300)
Title: Up and Coming Kingpin
Bounty: 28,000 Lien
HP: 2,494
MP: 4,178 [3,214 + 160.7(5%) + 803.5(25%)]
STR: 49 [Base 35 + 10.5(30%) + 3.5(10%)]
VIT: 64.4 [Base 46 + 13.8(30%) + 4.6(10%)]
DEX: 164 [Base 80 + 12(15%) + 24(30%) + 8(10%) + 40(50%)]
INT: 141.4 [Base 101 + 30.3(30%) + 10.1(10%)]
WIS: 56 [Base 40 + 12(30%) + 4(10%)]
LUK: 11
Elemental Affinity: Earth (10)
Attribute Points: 5
Lien: 3,603,690
Status Effects: Inactive Aura(Toggled Off)